Creature (26)
- 4x Dryad Militant
- 2x Elvish Mystic
- 4x Experiment One
- 4x Garruk's Companion
- 4x Kalonian Tusker
- 4x Leatherback Baloth
- 4x Strangleroot Geist
Land (20)
Sideboard
Creature (4)
Artifact (2)
Instant (8)
Sorcery (1)
I ran this Stompy deck in a 58-player modern SilverBlack (commons and uncommons only) league and came in third. You can watch my full play through of the tournament in the youtube video above!
Stompy is built to be aggressive. It isn't the fastest deck in the format, trading a little bit of tempo in exchange for reliability as compared to some decks like infect. The reliability allows it to survive through most removal heavy matchups though, and still have a good chance of winning in the mid game by trampling over opponents for the last few points of damage. Below I'll outline my build and why I run the cards I do.
One drop creatures
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Elvish Mystic helps us get off the ground quick. I run 2 in place of land to help dump our hands a bit faster turn 2 and 3, and to help with Aspect of the hydra 's devotion. It also is a much better late game top deck than a land, since if you strap a Rancor or buff it with Vines of Vastwood even a 1/1 can become a problem for your opponent. Running the elvish mystic does have some potential drawbacks though. The big one being, your enemy can potentially keep you off mana by killing it. In almost all cases, unless you're really stuck on mana, your opponent wasting a lightning bolt on a mystic is where you want to be anyway, but if your opponent has a sweeper it can be pretty rough to blow out your field and your mana. Over all I found it worth it to run a few.
Dryad Militant is an all-star in normal stompy, though I'm starting to wonder if I should have switched it out for something else in this version of the deck. A 2/1 for one will always be great, but the secondary ability is more relevant when rares are allowed since it offers some soft protection against snap caster and tarmogoyf. I didn't see a lot of flash-back type effects in the tournament so it might have been better to run Young Wolf for resilience to a lot of the single-target removal decks I kept running up against, or some other good green one drop with a more relevant ability.
Experiment One is definitely our strongest one drop. By tun 3 he'll be a 3/3 in almost all cases, and if he manages to get to 3/3 without being bolted, he can always regenerate by removing two counters -- which isn't ideal, but any resiliency is great!
Two drop creatures
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Strangleroot Geist is awesome in any mono-green aggro style deck. He is the best target we have for Rancor usually, since even if your opponent tries to 2-for-1 on him by bolting him, he just comes back instantly with haste and can swing in anyway.
Kalonian Tusker offers up the best body we can hope for at 2 mana. Sadly 3/3 doesn't dodge bolt, which is a big problem for my friend here, but having 3 toughness is still surprisingly relevant against a lot of the little creatures your opponent might have running around.
Garruk's Companion is the card mentioned so far that is not likely to be run in most modern stompy decks, since with rares you have access to Avatar of the Resolute which is strictly better. Still, a 3/2 with trample makes this guy powerful. You'll usually want to save your Rancor for other targets, but Vines of Vastwood and Aspect of the hydra are great on this guy!
Our three drop BEAST!!!
Leatherback Baloth
is the best creature in the deck. He's 4/5 so he dodges bolt. He provides 3 points of devotion toward aspect of the hydra. Generally you strap a Rancor to him with Vines of Vastwood up for protection against Path to Exile and then let the 6/5 trample beatings begin! (10/5 if you manage to hit a vines!)
Pumps and Protection
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Vines of Vastwood It's hard to pick an all-star from this list of three, because they are all super powerful and super important. If I had to give it to one though, I'd give it to vines. This card is the best because it is the most versatile. Its main use is to save your creatures from Bolts or other removal spells, but it doubles as a +4/+4 for two mana, and triples as a way to stop your opponent from doing things to his own creatures!
Aspect of the hydra
Aspect is my runner up. In stalemated games this guy breaks it. Its the spell that extends your reach into the mid-game by giving huge buffs if you manage to establish your board. One game I gave one of my creatures +10/+10 from it and swung in to win the game!
Rancor comes in 3rd, but its close. This deck is reliant on giving creatures trample so you can do damage through your opponents blockers, and this reusable enchantment is the best way to do that! The problem is, if your opponent has mana open, he can sometimes kill your target for the enchantment and 2-for-1 you. That is why this is 3rd on the list of buffs. It's usually best to save it until you have Vines of Vastwood as backup protection, or your opponent is tapped out.
Removal
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Prey Upon is great because we will almost always have the largest creature on the field. That means this spell becomes an almost universal one mana removal, though unfortunately at sorcery speed.
Dismember is a card that I started mainboard, but in the end I moved to my sideboard in favor of Prey Upon . This card is great though, it kills pretty much anything in the format except for some tron monstrosities, and the loss of four life is usually not relevant since you are most often the aggro deck. It comes in from the sideboard against decks like Infect, where your life total is meaningless and only poison counters matter, and probably against decks that delve for anglers, just because against 5/5s it is going to often be better than Prey Upon unless you happen to be holding a pump spell in addition to your dismember!
Land
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Treetop Village is a monster in this deck! Against some decks that were only running sorcery speed removal, this card just plowed through them every chance it got. The trample makes this land a great buff target, and 3/3 is a decent body if you have the mana to keep activating it every turn. Sure, we also run 17 Forests but this bad boy is where its at!
The Sideboard
Dismember is an awesome card in Stompy! But I already discussed it a bit above so I wont go into detail here.Back to Nature never ended up coming in, but I envisioned it as a blow-out card against hexproof decks. I actually experimented with playing a hexproof deck myself, and heard others talk about potentially playing it, but in my testing Stompy was just more consistent. This might have been a poor inclusion, though it was also a one of.Guttural Response This one seemed useful in most match ups against blue. Usually it was a one-mana counter a counter spell or counter a bounce spell. Either way it was often worth boarding in. Kavu Predator was in my sideboard because I had tested against a few life-gain based silverblack decks that seemed quite strong. I didn't run into any in the tournament, so it might not have been worth it, but at the time it seemed like a reasonable inclusion. Needle Storm was put in because I was worried some decks might have flying, which I have virtually no protection against. For such a deck this card might be a blowout, however I didn't run into any fairy / delver of secrets decks. Quite possibly not worth inclusion.Relic of Progenitus seemed like a good bet and did come in one game against a delve deck, however for the most part it was unnecessary. The decks I struggled with I didn't need it against. Possibly not worth inclusion in the sideboard.Unravel the Aether This was my best sideboard against the Isochron Scepter control deck that ended up winning the whole tournament. Its definitely worth it to have some enchantment and artifact hate, and this is one of the better ones. Young Wolf was added to my sideboard after round 2 which was a removal heavy deck. I also saw it coming in against decks with lots of sweepers. I'm not sure it ever actually made it in, and I'm split on whether it was a worth while sideboard inclusion.
Choke wasn't in my sideboard, but it should have been. I simply didn't want to spend the money to buy them, but it definitely would have been a worthwhile sideboard card.
Kitchen Finks is another card that would have been in my sideboard if I had them, maybe instead of young wolf. against an aggro mirror this spell can be a blow out due to the life gain and resilience.
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| Date added | 9 years |
| Last updated | 8 years |
| Legality | This deck is Modern legal. |
| Rarity (main - side) | 27 - 13 Uncommons 16 - 2 Commons |
| Cards | 60 |
| Avg. CMC | 1.50 |
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