Table of Contents
Hello everyone! I’m back again with the deck that goes bigger than anything else you’re going to face, Temur Ramp! Initially, I wasn’t the most impressed by Temur Ramp as I believed it had a really hard time beating anything that wasn’t Yorion. Furthermore, Yorion had a pretty poor weekend in the first MPL split, so Temur Ramp should be in a really bad spot, right? Well, between Jessica Estephan going undefeated in Day 1 of her split and Autumn Burchett posting a reasonable 7-5 record, I’d figure I would give it another shot.
To my surprise, the deck played significantly better than I gave it credit for! Since I tried Autumn’s list (plus some changes), I’m undefeated in Mythic with a clean 5-0. Before we dive into my list, let’s take a quick look at Autumn’s.
Temur Ramp by Autumn Burchett – October Zendikar Rising League Weekend (MPL)
[sd_deck deck=”DEWDpoOlp”]
The base of Temur Ramp is functionally the same from when I tried it, but with 2 major differences. One, they play significantly more MDFCs compared to my original list, which I don’t like, and two, their sideboard is significantly better than mine.
Although the versatility of the cards can be really nice, the toughest part for Temur is getting out of the early game, and having a large amount of taplands doesn’t help you in that endeavor. However, their sideboard was such an improvement over what I initially played which definitely paid off in the splits. With some tweaking, I think I combined the best of both worlds into one list.
Temur Ramp by DoggertQBones – October 2020 Season
[sd_deck deck=”cVWEOqvoB”]
I really like this iteration of the deck. There are fewer tap lands so curving out is much more reasonable and the sideboard is just a few tweaks from Autumn’s. Kazandu Mammoth seriously unimpressed me so that was an easy cut, and Glasspool Mimic can be good, but is rarely not a tapped Island, so I shaved one there. Before I go any further, I’ll break down the whole deck.
CARD CHOICES
3 Ugin, the Spirit Dragon: The biggest and baddest planeswalker around, if you can manage to cast it. There’s functionally no situation Ugin can’t get you out of as it’s good against any deck that cares about having non-lands on board. I don’t hate playing 2, but I feel like I always want to hit Ugin off an Ultimatum, so may as well increase those odds.
2 Tangled Florahedron: The replacement for Kazandu Mammoth in the list. If you can cast Kazandu Mammoth early, it was medium at best, but Florehedron does two things way better than Mammoth: it’s a 2 drop and it’s a mana accelerant. I’m surprised that Autumn’s team was happy with having only 8 turn 2 plays (and Stomping on turn 2 isn’t even good unless you’re killing a creature) so adding 2 more has felt really good for the deck.
1 Glasspool Mimic: Most of the time a land, sometimes a 3 mana Terror of the Peaks. This deck could probably do without it, but I kind of like the high roll nature of it.
4 Lotus Cobra: The best 2 drop mana accelerant in a long while. Cobra does so much for so little, and when you get multiple out, you can have an absolute field day of a turn. Just today, I hit 2 Lotus Cobras off a Genesis Ultimatum, and was able to cast a second Ultimatum because of it! The card demands an answer quickly or it can ramp you into your dangerous threats before your opponent can deal with them.
4 Bonecrusher Giant: It’s the best red card, why not play it? Gives you interaction, a 2 mana play, and a solid roadblock.
4 Llanowar Visionary: I’m not the biggest fan of Visionary, but being a mana dork and drawing a card is still relatively solid. It’s good enough for sure.
4 Terror of the Peaks: Part of the Genesis Ultimatum combo kill and just a scary standalone threat. No matter what you’re facing, Terror can win you the game if left unchecked for a turn or 2; you can demolish your opponent’s board if they’re aggressive or kill them insanely quickly if they aren’t.
4 Beanstalk Giant: It’s not the most exciting Ramp spell, but it gives you something to do later in the game and is excellent with Terror of the Peaks and Genesis Ultimatum.
2 Shatterskull Smashing: Bolt Mountain with some upside, no surprise here.
4 Cultivate: The premium ramp spell of Standard, getting an extra land on the battlefield and to hand in one card is so good in a deck that’s as mana hungry as this one.
4 Genesis Ultimatum: The only reason to play the Temur colors. This is likely the “strongest” card in Standard as the pressure you can put on your opponent from casting even one Ultimatum (assuming it doesn’t just kill them outright or completely whiff) is immense. Don’t leave home without them.
24 Lands + 5 MDFC
SIDEBOARD
2 Chainweb Aracnir: Rogues can be a very rough matchup, you need enough escape cards to combat it.
3 Scorching Dragonfire: Really good against Rogues and other aggressive decks. My old list had Lovestruck Beast in this spot and if Rogues becomes less popular (which seems doubtful), then you can go back to them.
4 Mystical Dispute: Counterspells are your worst nightmare, so just play this broken anti-counterspell counterspell!
3 Elder Gargaroth: The viability of Gargaroth is going to wax and wane heavily on the meta trends, but Gruul is trending way up, and this card is one of the best ways to mess them up.
1 Ox of Agonas: I think every red deck should be playing 1 Ox of Agonas in their sideboard. It’s excellent against Rogues and is good at refueling your hand, I don’t know why I don’t see way more of this guy.
2 Shark Typhoon: An uncounterable, instant speed, large threat that replaces itself? Seems pretty good to me.
MATCHUPS AND SIDEBOARD GUIDE
Gruul Aggro
| In | Out |
|---|---|
| +3 Scorching Dragonfire | -1 Glasspool Mimic |
| +3 Elder Gargaroth | -2 Llanowar Visionary |
| -2 Cultivate | |
| -1 Terror of the Peaks |
This matchup can be hard depending on how fast their start is, but if they stumble at all, you can easily take over the game with your huge threats. Try to stall them and work your way to one of your 5 drops, an Ultimatum, or an Ugin if you’re really fortunate. I think you want to split the ramp package, but it’s possible you may want Visionary over Cultivate as it can chump block and draw a card
Dimir Rogues
| In | Out |
|---|---|
| +3 Scorching Dragonfire | -1 Glasspool Mimic |
| +2 Chainweb Aracnir | -4 Lotus Cobra |
| +4 Mystical Dispute | -4 Cultivate |
| +1 Ox of Agonas | -1 Genesis Ultimatum |
| +2 Shark Typhoon | -2 Ugin, the Spirit Dragon |
This matchup is all about trying to run them out of counters so you can stick an important threat. We trim the low impact cards and substitute them with higher impact cards. Cutting Cultivate can be scary if you start missing land drops, but flooding is a death sentence in this matchup. I think you want to cut one Ultimatum as some opponents will bring in Mystical Dispute against you. This matchup is definitely not the best, but most lists only have 4 counterspells, and most of the sideboard is dedicated to beating them.
Rakdos Midrange
| In | Out |
|---|---|
| +1 Elder Gargaroth | -4 Lotus Cobra |
| +1 Ox of Agonas | |
| +2 Shark Typhoon |
They’re going to try and run you out of resources, which will be rather difficult as you have a whole lot of must answer threats. Kroxa is definitely scary, but their deck doesn’t do much against you without it. Lotus Cobra is too low impact here as we don’t need to go fast and it dies to all of their cheap removal.
Golgari Adventures
| In | Out |
|---|---|
| +3 Scorching Dragonfire | -1 Glasspool Mimic |
| +2 Elder Gargaroth | -4 Lotus Cobra |
This matchup will be relatively grindy so we want some more removal for Innkeeper and more threats in Elder Gargaroth. Similar to the other grindy matchups, Lotus Cobra becomes unnecessary as speed isn’t particularly important. This matchup should be quite favored for you as they aren’t particularly fast and your late game trumps theirs.
Yorion Decks
| In | Out |
|---|---|
| +4 Mystical Dispute | -1 Glasspool Mimic |
| +1 Ox of Agonas | -4 Lotus Cobra |
| +2 Shark Typhoon | -2 Cultivate |
This board plan is pretty similar to the others, just run them out of answers with your game winning threats and you should have no problem. Yorion is more or less the entire reason you would play Temur to begin with!
Keep in mind that a lot of Standard’s best decks are attrition-based so Lotus Cobra comes out really often. If speed is what you need, keep it in and board out some of the clunkier cards. That’s all I have for today! If you like my content and want to see more of it, you can check me out on Twitch! Have a great day!
