G/W Selvala Fast Combo(cEDH)

Commander / EDH* Combo Competitive Elves GW (Selesnya)

walkingballista

Creature (29)

• 1x Arbor Elf
• 1x Avacyn's Pilgrim
• 1x Birchlore Rangers
• 1x Birds of Paradise
• 1x Bloom Tender
• 1x Boreal Druid
• 1x Copperhorn Scout
• 1x Elvish Mystic
• 1x Eternal Witness
• 1x Fyndhorn Elves
• 1x Grand Abolisher
• 1x Heritage Druid
• 1x Joraga Treespeaker
• 1x Karametra's Acolyte
• 1x Llanowar Elves
• 1x Mirror Entity
• 1x Priest of Titania
• 1x Quirion Ranger
• 1x Ranger of Eos
• 1x Reclamation Sage
• 1x Recruiter of the Guard
• 1x Scryb Ranger
• 1x Seeker of Skybreak
• 1x Skullwinder
• 1x Somberwald Stag
• 1x Stoneforge Mystic
• 1x Temur Sabertooth
• 1x Village Bell-Ringer
• 1x Wirewood Symbiote

Sorcery (9)

• 1x Eldritch Evolution
• 1x Finale of Devastation
• 1x Green Sun's Zenith
• 1x Mobilize
• 1x Open the Armory
• 1x Regrowth
• 1x Steelshaper's Gift
• 1x Sylvan Tutor
• 1x Weird Harvest

Land (27)

• 1x Arid Mesa
• 1x Bountiful Promenade
• 1x Brushland
• 1x Cavern of Souls
• 1x City of Brass
• 1x Command Tower
• 1x Flooded Strand
• 6x Forest
• 1x Gaea's Cradle
• 1x Gemstone Caverns
• 1x Horizon Canopy
• 1x Mana Confluence
• 1x Marsh Flats
• 1x Misty Rainforest
• 2x Plains
• 1x Savannah
• 1x Temple Garden
• 1x Verdant Catacombs
• 1x Windswept Heath
• 1x Wirewood Lodge
• 1x Wooded Foothills

Artifact (9)

• 1x Chrome Mox
• 1x Lightning Greaves
• 1x Lotus Petal
• 1x Mana Crypt
• 1x Sensei's Divining Top
• 1x Sol Ring
• 1x Staff of Domination
• 1x Thousand-Year Elixir
• 1x Umbral Mantle

Commander (1)

Instant (17)

• 1x Autumn's Veil
• 1x Beast Within
• 1x Benefactor's Draught
• 1x Chord of Calling
• 1x Congregation at Dawn
• 1x Crop Rotation
• 1x Eladamri's Call
• 1x Emerald Charm
• 1x Enlightened Tutor
• 1x Nature's Claim
• 1x Noxious Revival
• 1x Silence
• 1x Summoner's Pact
• 1x Swords to Plowshares
• 1x To Arms!
• 1x Vitalize
• 1x Worldly Tutor

Enchantment (8)

• 1x Carpet of Flowers
• 1x Concordant Crossroads
• 1x Instill Energy
• 1x Nature's Chosen
• 1x Survival of the Fittest
• 1x Sylvan Library
• 1x Utopia Sprawl
• 1x Wild Growth

---

Maybeboard

Creature (7)

• 1x Aven Mindcensor
• 1x Bane of Progress
• 1x Dosan the Falling Leaf
• 1x Elvish Spirit Guide
• 1x Fauna Shaman
• 1x Great Oak Guardian
• 1x Scryb Ranger

Instant (4)

• 1x Abeyance
• 1x Call to Glory
• 1x Heroic Intervention
• 1x Roar of the Kha

Sorcery (3)

• 1x Altar of Bone
• 1x Natural Order
• 1x Uncage the Menagerie

Enchantment (3)

• 1x City of Solitude
• 1x Grasp of Fate
• 1x Survival of the Fittest

Artifact (1)

• 1x Mox Diamond

---

This deck is still a work in progress!!! Budget versions available in Conclusion!

Introduction

Many people say the G/W Selvala is the inferior of the two Selvala, Hear of the Wilds|Selvalas and that if you want to play G/W just run Captain Sisay . If I have to be honest they're right, G/W Selvala is neither the best of the Selvalas nor is it the best G/W commander you can run. But this doesn't mean G/W Selvala is without it's merits.

Obviously the big downside of G/W Selvala is that she draws your opponents cards too, and with the prevalence of counterspells and other instant speed interaction in cEDH this is a major downside. On the other hand she turns all of your untap effects into cantrips and is capable of winning quickly, turns 3-5, if you have a decent hand. Furthermore, Selvala is relatively cheap to build and is a fun deck to play if you enjoy stormy and complex lines. I believe Selvala shines best at less interactive tables and can be a very fun deck to pilot.

Pros

• Resilient to quite a few stax and hate effects present in cEDH.
• Large quantity of ramp allows the deck to cast and recast Selvala throughout the game, even after she's removed a few times.
• The deck can be tuned to your taste, becoming a more staxy deck if it can't outrace decks in your meta.

Cons

• Selvala draws your opponents cards, this is bad, very bad and is the main reason Selvala will never truly shine. We can compensate for with with Silence type effects but the lack of instant/sorcerry tutors makes this unfeasible
• Fairly commander reliant, without Selvala, the backup plan is to manually assemble combos and to figure out a way to draw your deck.
• Struggles in fast combo pods, you're a turn too slow to race, and you have no real interaction.
• Too many wrath effects can destroy the deck, as we don't run many artifact ramp cards except for the power 4.

Gameplan

Selvala wins by assembling an infinite mana combo and using Selvala to mill opponents out, alternatively you can assemble soft locks by recurring Beast Within and using Somberwald Stag to kill them if allowing your opponents a chance to interact is too dangerous.

Selvala can win in a range of ways but the main 3 are:

1. Assemble Mirror Entity + Wirewood Symbiote
2. Assemble Umbral Mantle or Staff of Domination with something like Priest of Titania or Karametra's Acolyte
3. Grabbing Paradox Engine and non-deterministically comboing off until you draw into tutors/one of the aforementioned comboes

Combos

Mirror Entity + Wirewood Symbiote

This is the easiest combo to assemble and is the primary gameplan. How this combo works is you activate Mirror Entity's ability for . This means all your creatures are elves, thus Wirewood Symbiote can bounce itself to untap Selvala . Now you can recast Wirewood Symbiote for and start the process over again. From this point assuming that you have 3 opponents as is standard, it should be near impossible for the combo to fizzle unless you are extremely unlucky in the first few activations. The best part is that the combo only requires to start assuming you have both Mirror Entity and Wirewood Symbiote out on the field

Umbral Mantle and Staff of Domination Shenanigans

This combo has the advantage that it doesn't actually need Selvala out to combo off, it just needs her to help draw into it. More often than not you will have an equipment tutor and only be able to fetch Umbral Mantle , in this case you actually do need Selvala as an outlet. If possible Staff of Domination should be used, as it provides an outlet that doesn't also need your opponents to draw cards.

In order to make infinite mana with Umbral Mantle , you need a dork like Priest of Titania or Karametra's Acolyte that produces or more. Then, you can simply tap and untap the dork with Umbral Mantle to make infinite mana, after this you just attach the equipment to Selvala and use the untaps to draw your deck.

In order to make infinite mana with Staff of Domination , you need a dork like Priest of Titania or Karametra's Acolyte that produces or more. Then, you can simply tap and untap the dork with Staff of Domination to make infinite mana, the advantage of this route is that after you make infinite mana you can simply use Staff of Domination's last ability to draw your deck and win from there.

Non-deterministic Paradox Engine Shenanigans

There isn't much to this line, as you are just using Paradox Engine to untap Selvala and make mana and chain spells. This usually allows you to assemble one of the earlier combos. What makes Paradox Engine especially enticing in this deck is the fact that unlike other decks, rocks and dorks are not necessarilly needed to combo off, the curve is low enough that for the most part given a couple starting cards in hand all you need is Selvala to combo off.

Matchups and Mulligans

WIP

Single Card Discussion

Notable Inclusions

Birchlore Rangers

Heritage Druid , but it acts as a filter, allowing us to produce when we need it. But why not run Orochi Leafcaller you ask. Unlike Orochi Leafcaller , if we don't have a Concordant Crossroads effect out, cards like Birchlore Rangers and Heritage Druid and turn our elves into sudo-rocks with Paradox Engine

WIP

Notable Exclusions

WIP

Meta-Specific Swaps

WIP

Tips and Tricks

• Umbral Mantle We can attach Umbral Mantle to Selvala to draw our deck. It's important to note that in this case, the Mantle gives the creature it is equipped to the ability to pay a cost in order to make it bigger. The cost is to pay Symbol:3 and Symbol:ut it. This means that untapping the creature is part of the cost, and since Selvala's ability is a mana ability, we can continue tap and untap her without passing priority

WIP

Conclusion and Budget Lists

While Selvala, Explorer Returned may not be the most optimal Selesnya commander or the most optimal Selvala to play, I still really enjoy the deck. Who nows, maybe someday in the future a card will come out that can propel Selvala, Explorer Returned up to decks like Captain Sisay and Selvala, Heart of the Wilds

Special thanks to:

• CharlesIII, for the Mirror Entity + Wirewood Symbiote combo, I likely would have never noticed it on my own in addition to laying a lot of the groundwork for this deck.
• FroggyTroller, for the original decklist that got me interested in Selvala, Explorer Returned
• The /r/CompetitiveEDH Discord community, for giving me lots of constructive criticism.
• AverageDragon, for allowing me to use the code for the [Primer] Momir Vig Hackball primer.

The ~$570 budget list. This list has all the same packages as the original with the exception of Crop Rotation + Gaea's Cradle , which can be replaced with Nykthos, Shrine to Nyx for the most part. All it's missing are expensive lands like Savannah and fetches.

Date added	6 years
Last updated	5 years
Key combos	Mirror Entity + Wirewood Symbiote Crop Rotation + Gaea's Cradle
Legality	This deck is not Commander / EDH legal.
Rarity (main - side)	7 - 0 Mythic Rares 38 - 0 Rares 29 - 0 Uncommons 18 - 0 Commons
Cards	100
Avg. CMC	1.73
Tokens	Beast 3/3 G, Morph 2/2 C
Based on	Selvala Untap CharlesIII EDH