It's a shame I didn't get around to posting this deck before it's about to rotate, but this is my newest standard fixation!
The thing is, god 'ole mono green devotion is powerful, but it can't beat Supreme Verdict/Planar Cleansing in most cases. I thought "Well, what dodges removal...? Aetherling!", and thus I built Mono Green devotion with a blue splash.
Sylvan Caryatid/Kiora's Follower-
Our dorks. I have thought about replacing the Caryatids with Elvish Mystics to make our hands less vulnerable to getting Thoughtseized, and to make turn 2 Courser's happen, but the fixing and the 0/3 body are very valuable. We do have a couple of double blue spells, and once we get Aetherling out we need all of the blue we can to keep him alive and getting our opponents dead. Kiora's Follower is a strict upgrade to Voyaging Satyr because A) it's bigger, and B) it can untap a fattie that's tapped to get a surprise block and catch people off guard.
Kiora, Jace, Nissa-
Kiora is an all-star in this deck, being able to explore is fantastic both for the ramp and for getting through our deck faster and providing more bodies to pump out with a Nykthos. Her minus can also lead to crazy double Nykthos turns, and has good synergy with Courser. She's also angle to come at my opponents, since she has proven especially easy to ultimate, especially given creatures to block for her. While I realize that Jace has no green pips in his mana cost, he draws me things that do, and I feel like being able to go through your deck quickly while mana ramping is one of the most powerful things you can do in magic. Nissa is just sweet, turning excess lands into fatties, or being basically a free spell can be crazy. One time I cast a Caryatid, Nissa, and overloaded Cyclonic Rift all in the same turn without the help of Nykthos because of Nissa only costing 1 of you use her other +1 ability. Overall, running 12 Planeswalkers gives us really good resiliency against Supreme Verdict and stresses out Hero's Downfall/Detention Sphere real bad.
Courser, Polukranos, Genesis Hydra, Hornet Queen, Aetherling-
Meat + Potatoes. This is where the deck thrives. Polukranos is both a payoff card and an enabler, Courser helps us survive knucklehead beat down and finds Nykthos on top of the deck, Genesis Hydra and Hornet Queen bring too many friends to the party for a single Hero's Downfall to deal with, and Aetherling JUST. DOESN'T. DIE. I decided not to run Burning Tree's, because, well, I had to cut something from the original lists, and it was only good in combination with other things to cast or a Nykthos to make quick mana with.
The SB is still kinda in development, but I feel like it's getting there.
Something I've considered doing is replacing Caryatids with Voyaging Satyr to have every dork untap Nykthos, but I'm not sure it's worth the downgrade in card quality, plus the Satyr dies to Doom Blade.
Sooooo, this deck has performed really well for me lately, the only issue I've had is high variance hands, but that goes for any ramp deck. I've learned that you sometimes have to take risky ones because it doesn't mulligan well (although it does mulligan better than the regular old Green devotion lists). Let me know what you think!
