I knew I shouldn't have whined about my CMC.

I sort of like Lotus Cobra, but I don't think I like it better than whatever I would have to take out in order to include it, and I don't much care for Sakura-Tribe Elder in this deck. Paying 2 and a card slot for a forest that comes into play tapped, even if I could bring it back, doesn't feel like good value to me, unless I'm missing something.

Sakura-Tribe Elder is usually just a Rampant Growth, but that's a solid effect that your deck could use in order to become a little more explosive in the early turns. It has some minor upsides, like being able to block before it grabs the land, and just being a 1/1 with 1 devotion whenever you need that (protection against stuff like Grave Pact, fodder for Survival of the Fittest, an extra body for Regal Force, avoiding the tax by Thalia, Guardian of Thraben, flash with Yeva, Nature's Herald, draws a card if you have Zendikar Resurgent). But in the end, it's still mostly just a Rampant Growth, and there is nothing wrong with that.

Is edh your primary format? Because the value in Lotus Cobra can't really be overstated, there might not be any card that is better at turning ramp into ramp. Lets say you drop him turn 2, you can harrow turn 3 for 5 immediately usable mana, to maybe cast a skyshroud, leaving you at yet another 5 freely usable mana, which you can use for any number of purposes like say omnath at 3 or an Asceticism/Greater Good, to either win or draw the win by turn 4/5. Not an unrealistic scenario, and not even including the incredible power it brings to: fetches, crucible, oracle of mul daya, azusa, etc. The body taps for Cord of Calling, trigger a regal force or shamanic revelation, tap to earthcraft, and obviously sacrificing/discarding, uses are endless.

Honestly at 39 Lands you'd have consistent triggers for a long while without relying on any tricks. In the very worst case scenario you are looking at a turn 3 Omnath who still has 1 mana floating, into 6 mana at turn 4 without any other interactions. If your omnath then connects on the turn 4 with 6 floating your clock is sped right down to 3 swings, if you say have a forest on the 5th turn then you'd be looking at another 7 seven mana on him. The turn 5 Omnath swing can at least hit for 14 and is threatening lethal on that player, or you could now cast any of the thugs you'd normally have cheated in. This is literally a 2 drop snake and 5 lands btw. You've turned a bad mulligan into something playable.

I'd say that's value and less winmore. The voltron omnath deck's I've experienced usually win on turn 3 sometimes 4.

Oh and Bear Umbra on Omnath, Nature's Will, Trailblazer's Boots

Woodland Guidance is good with higher CMC.

Sorry guys, this was starting to make my head hurt so I stepped away for a while.

I realize that I'm the one who brought up the fact that my average mana cost is a bit high for this deck, but in the long run, and thanks the_earl_0f_grey for unintentionally bringing this home for me, this is a casual deck and I don't want to win on turn 3 or 4. It's not fun for anyone at the table and it's not fun for me. EDH is the only format I play, and it's the only format I play for that exact reason. I like 1 hour plus games with lots of janky card interactions, and early, middle and late game strategies that take longer than 5 minutes to develop.

I realize that devotion is slow and may not happen at all, and that Lotus Cobra is pretty awesome early game and not terrible any time, but what would I take out to include it? Should I take out cards that are basically here for devotion, like Khalni Hydra and Primalcrux to include fast cards like Lotus Cobra? What about including Nature's Lore or Three Visits, both of which are better than Sakura-Tribe Elder?

Mana is somthing that this deck does well, card advantage is something this deck doesn't do that well at all, so card slots are important. If I run a lot of 2 drops to ramp me faster, will I run out of gas too soon? Yeah, I know I'm arguing against my earlier expressed complaint (a complaint that I now sorely regret making), but that's the dilemma isn't it?

Anyway, thanks the_earl_0f_grey, you've given me a lot of fuel for thought (and a bit of a headache), and thanks again, Emzed. Your well reasoned commentary is always welcome.

Im sorry that my comments have caused you so much stress. To me it seems as simple as deciding between if you want win-more or to win more. Maybe take a break from magic and sort out what you actually want from it?

And to all your questions yes. Green has some of the best draw power in magic and your commander is uniquely excellent for turning raw mana into cards with Life's Legacy or Momentous Fall.

From the description:

"This is the first EDH deck I ever created, and it's gone through a number of incarnations to get where it is today. It's a casual deck, and I want it to remain so. You'll not find any turn 3 win conditions, stax cards, or infinite combos included here."

So you see the_earl_0f_grey, I actually do know what I want from Magic, and what I want is to not play competitively. I have never played a game of Standard, Modern, Legacy, or even draft. What I want from Magic is fun, and not just fun for me, but fun all around. If I win, cool, if I don't that's cool also as long as everyone is having a good time. I could force the mana curve down low enough to win quick, sure. I could take Vorinclex, Voice of Hunger or Choke or Hall of Gemstone out of my binder and put them in the deck to stop other people from enjoying Magic, but that's not what I want out of the game.

It's why I hardly ever play at a local game shop. There will always be that one guy who's entire worth is dependent on him winning the game at all costs. He'll have all of his infinite combo pieces stuffed into the deck and his tutors to go get them, and all his stax effects to shut the game down and make sure nobody but himself is having any fun.

It's harder to make the kind of deck this is. One that lets other people play and enjoy the game, while trying to get some stuff done yourself. I could net-deck the hell out of this build and make sure it's one of those turn 3 or 4 wins you're talking about, but...no.

Having said all of that, I do appreciate the card suggestions you've made, and may yet incorporate some of them into the deck, but overall I'm pretty happy with the way the deck plays now.

I don't think casual vs competitive is as black and white as you see it. In my opinion, the majority of decks are somewhere between "the 99 most fun looking cards in my commander's colors that i own" and the perfect killing machine. Your deck clearly has a well defined plan, and every card fulfills a specific role that is geared toward eventual victory. Those are basic characteristics of a competitive mindset, even if your deck isn't optimized and has a really high mana curve which slows it down a lot.
What it comes down to is not whether a deck is casual or competitive, what matters is that there is a consensus within your playgroup. Some playgroups are fine with early combo wins, land destruction, Time Stretch and Stasis, others are not, and both those opinions are okay. If everbody is more or less on the same page about these things, your games are the most balanced out, and you can have fun - whatever that means for you.
Personally, i see myself as a fairly competitive player. I played several other formats intensively and competitively before i ever got into EDH. I do enjoy the durdling around and swingy games you get to experience, but i also try to make sure my decks can actually end the game once i am ahead.

I have my own Omnath, Locus of Mana-EDH decklist on here. Haven't played it yet, planning to build it at the end of the month. Have you considered Helix Pinnacle? I have played the deck online a couple of times, and I think it's a funny way to have an alternative path to victory. Also a great mana sink if Omnath gets blown up. And honestly, if your opponents let you fire up that thing, they deserve the loss :)

Okay, the_earl_0f_grey and Emzed, I haven't had a chance to playtest this revised deck yet, but as you can see, I've lowered the CMC by quite a bit. Unfortunately, that meant taking out some very good though high costed cards.

The new, faster cards I added are, Lotus Cobra, although I'm still not completely sold on that one, Crop Rotation, which will allow me to go grab the Rogue's Passage or Maze of Ith if the need arises, Bear Umbra, which probably should be here, Hermit Druid, just so I won't miss a land drop, Nature's Lore, which I do like better than Sakura-Tribe Elder, and the return of Mirri's Guile, a low costed favorite of mine that was previously in the deck.

The CMC for the deck has been lowered significantly, so the odds of me starting the game with a handfull of 7 drops should have been diminished.

If you guys want to critique the changes before I actually play a game with them, I'd be interested in your thoughts. I'm seriously thinking about getting an Azusa, Lost but Seeking, and your thoughts on adding that one would be welcome too.

He_Who_Hungers, I had Helix Pinnacle in the deck for a minute, but I ended up taking it out for a couple of reasons, but mostly because it's not an interactive, feel good way to win.

I can definitely confirm that Azusa, Lost but Seeking is legit good, especially with a Courser of Kruphix or Oracle of Mul Daya on the field. Add in Horn of Greed and draw a ton of cards while you are at it.

Though I don't think you want to be giving everyone the ability to draw cards when they play land, it may be worth considering.

Azusa, Lost but Seeking really needs me to be drawing lots of lands, and I'm not really there with this deck, at least not yet. That's why I haven't ordered one yet.

The more I think about it, the more I think Exploration, or the even better Burgeoning might be a better choice for inclusion.

You don't need to draw a lot of lands if you the nckude vards that let you play lands from your library/graveyard (Courser of Kruphix, Oracle of Mul Daya, Crucible of Worlds, etc.)

Try it or not, it's up to you. But I know from experience that it is a good card. Exploration is also a good card, but Burgeoning also requires you to actually have lands in your hand, which was your argument against Azusa. Unless you build with that in mind, it does less work than Azusa. With Azusa, those lands don't have to come from your hand at all.

Azusa seems rather mediocre here, if you don't draw at least 5 lands in your top 10-12 cards, she does basically nothing. That's not unlikely to happen, and cards like Oracle of Mul Daya and Sylvan Library can help find extra lands early on, but the card still doesn't look good enough to me on average. Decks that draw lots and lots of extra lands via cards like Wheel of Fortune, Necropotence or Crucible of Worlds are much better homes for Azusa.
Lotus Cobra also doesn't reach its full potential here, there are no fetchlands and not that many effects that trigger it repeatedly. It's still a fine card, but maybe a simple Arbor Elf would be just as good for only one mana. (In contrast to the cobra, it also synergizes with Mana Reflection and Extraplanar Lens.)
I don't quite know what to think of your idea to use Hermit Druid to ensure land drops, i've never seen that approach before. Usually that guy has the job of milling the whole deck for some combo or at least fill up the grave for reanimation. Anyway, maybe it will work the way you want it to, let me know how it plays out. Yavimaya Elder could fill a similar role.

demonicgrizzly, you're absolutely correct that Azusa, Lost but Seeking is a great card. My son runs it in his The Gitrog Monster deck to amazing effect, but you pretty much have to have a number of cards included in the deck to take advantage of her, and I really don't. I'm not currently running Courser of Kruphix, in fact I traded away my copy after I got Oracle of Mul Daya . Crucible of Worlds wouldn't be optimized in this deck, since I don't have any mill or sac engines, and although I do run Oracle of Mul Daya, it has it's own built-in extra land drop feature, which is awesome.

So, even though I may nix the idea of a card for this deck only, it doesn't mean that I think the card's no good, just that it's not optimal for this build as it's currently set up .

Emzed, thanks for your feedback, it's always welcome.

Hermit Druid should work out well. It's low cost both to play and to activate, guarantees a land drop every turn, and is card advantage of a sort, even though that card advantage has to be a basic land.

I was a bit reluctant to include Lotus Cobra, but since the_earl_0f_grey was so adamant that this deck would greatly benefit from it, I'm going to give it a run, it may surprise me by how good it is, who knows.

With Hermit Druid in the deck, including a card like Genesis that gives you value from a full graveyard becomes more attractive. It's yet another slow card advantage engine, so not really a completely new dimension for your deck, but it might be quite good at grinding through a long game with lots of removal flying around. You can also discard Genesis to Survival of the Fittest or Greater Good, so there is a little redundancy of enablers.

That might be a good idea, Emzed. In addition to the two ways you mentioned, I could also sac it to High Market or Miren, the Moaning Well. Not the reason any of those cards are in the deck, but yeah...

Something to think about, but I'll have to order a Genesis, I don't currently have one.

I agree that Azusa, Lost but Seeking wouldn't really shine in this deck without bigger changes. She only gives as much as she's given and doesn't generate any advantage on her own. If this deck had some Cultivate, Kodama's Reach, Nissa, Vastwood Seer  ^Flip, Krosan Tusker, Life from the Loam, Yavimaya Elder, type of ramp it would be ideal, but without it she'll just only work well enough with Oracle of Mul Daya and Lotus Cobra.

This deck is better suited to something like Vorinclex, Voice of Hunger

I was merely attesting to the fact that Azusa is a good card, not necessarily saying you had to include it in the deck. As I mentioned it does take some editing and cards to make it work, and I was only questioning your suggestion of burgeoning and stating the primary difference between where the additional lands come from (from hand vs from anywhere, which is why I woould consider azusa over burgeoning in this list)

Azusa makes a better commander in my opinion, since it's easier to build around her as a general rather than making a bunch of changes just to include it.

I do appreciate the suggestions, demonicgrizzly. Your point about the difference between Exploration and Burgeoning is well taken.

Okay, things might be getting wonky now, but I like this this kind of wonkiness.

I just read an article that Nicholas Lever posted on PucaTrade about some recent price drops on certain cards, among them was the serious drop in price of the card Berserk. It happens that I pulled one of these out of a pack of Conspiracy: Take the Crown, and being not a fan of destroying my commander and all his saved up mana at the end of turn for just a one-hit, even if that one-hit could knock out a single opponent, I dutifully stuck Berserk in my rares binder and never looked back.

Sometimes an idea strikes me like one of those light bulbs over the head of a cartoon character that buzzes and blinks but never actually comes on, but when he said that playing this on someone else's attacking commander could be a lot of fun, the light bulb blazed to life.

Yes, I can play this on Omnath, Locus of Mana as a knockout blow, but even more fun than that, would be to knock out a player that you're not even interacting with, they're being attacked by someone else, and at the same time crippling the player you are interacting with. This is such an awesome possibility, that I had to add Berserk to the deck.

Unfortunately, something had to come out, and since I wasn't completely sold on the awesomeness of Lotus Cobra in this deck, it's out for now. I do have 11 other EDH decks though, so it may eventually find a home.

That's a nice twist on playing Berserk. A good way to help eliminate and opponent (and set up some animosity for the next game). Love it.

Nice deck :)

A few suggestions:

Regal Behemoth for another mana doubler and some card draw

Rishkar's Expertise and Hunter's Insight for more card draw on theme with the deck.

Lightning Greaves and Swiftfoot Boots to protect your commander.

City of Solitude If your playgroup uses a lot of counterspells and instant removal.

Hope this helps!

Thanks for the suggestions, MegaMatt13.

The deck is in a state of flux at the moment. A few weeks ago I came to the realization that this deck was slow and many times I would have an opening hand with a lot of high mana cost cards. I expressed that concern here and received some good ideas for lowering the mana curve from the_earl_0f_grey and Emzed. Even though I gave them some push-back on a lot of their suggestions, I actually have incorporated some of their ideas into the deck, replacing some 6 and 7 drops with some 1 and 2 drops, lowering my mana curve by almost a full point, going from somewhere around 4.50 to around 3.50. I haven't had the chance to play this in a multi-player game yet since making the changes, that will come this coming weekend, but I have played three Dual Commander games with it against a pretty highly tuned Atraxa deck, and even though I only won one of those games (one game I was mana-screwed) I've tuned out what I saw as weaknesses and will continue to do so when I play multi-player this weekend with the playgroup.

As I said, much of this transformation has been to take out a lot of those 6 and 7 drops. One of the casualties was Zendikar Resurgent which, for 1 more mana, is a better alternative than the chancy Regal Behemoth.

Rishkar's Expertise is a card I've looked at before, but again, at 6 mana and being forced to draw cards equal to Omnath's power, it could be okay early game when I don't really need cards and can't afford its cost then anyway, and can be virtually unusable later in the game when Omnath is large, but when I could use a few more cards in hand.

Hunter's Insight has never been on my radar, but except for the later game drawback mentioned above, I could see being able to use this card early game and it only costs 3, so it's certainly one to consider.

Earlier on, I did run more pillow-fort options, but opted to replace a lot of that with mana protective measures, like Asceticism, Savage Summoning, Yeva, Nature's Herald, Mirrorpool, Winding Canyons, Yavimaya Hollow and others. Lightning Greaves is always a good card though, so it may make its way back in.

I have City of Solitude, and I think it was in the deck for a minute when Beast Within was the only instant in the deck. Now I have 5 instants that would be affected by the City, so it may not be the best option. I replaced it with Hall of Gemstone, which I think I may slide back into the deck, it's such a good card here, although it draws its share of hate.