HULK SMASH!

Modern Aggro Budget Competitive Counters Midrange Mono-Green

speck2993

Creature (28)

• 4x Avatar of the Resolute
• 4x Dryad Militant
• 4x Experiment One
• 2x Greenbelt Rampager
• 1x Greenwheel Liberator
• 2x Leatherback Baloth
• 1x Merfolk Branchwalker
• 2x Narnam Renegade
• 1x Rhonas the Indomitable
• 1x Ripjaw Raptor
• 3x Scavenging Ooze
• 3x Strangleroot Geist

Instant (9)

• 4x Aspect of Hydra
• 3x Beast Within
• 2x Vines of Vastwood

Sorcery (2)

• 2x Nature's Way

Land (21)

• 19x Forest
• 2x Hashep Oasis

---

Sideboard

Instant (8)

• 2x Blossoming Defense
• 2x Dismember
• 1x Feed the Clan
• 3x Nature's Claim

Sorcery (3)

• 2x Creeping Corrosion
• 1x Nature's Way

Artifact (3)

• 3x Relic of Progenitus

Enchantment (1)

• 1x Shapers' Sanctuary

---

Maybeboard

Creature (1)

• 1x Garruk's Companion

Instant (1)

• 1x Natural State

---

This is Magic as Richard Garfield intended.

Intro

Stompy is the epitome of creature magic. We play 1-drop into 2-drop into 3-drop into pump spell and win before our opponent realizes we're a contender. There is no acceleration, there is no combo. There is only the stampede.

Cards

Creatures

Turn 1

• Experiment One is our strongest T1 play. It quickly grows to 3/3 and 4/4, and regeneration is pretty strong. This is always the card we're looking for in our starting 7.
• Dryad Militant is best on T2 triggering an Experiment One, but can serve as a T1 play as well. A 2-damage attacker is not irrelevant, and your opponent is unlikely to deal with Militant early on. Also hoses storm and hurts Snap decks.
• Narnam Renegade is also best on T2, either triggering E1 or following a traded Dryad Militant, but if our opponent is playing an aggressive deck that relies heavily on one creature, Renegade is a viable T1 play.

Turn 2

• Strangleroot Geist is the purest T2 play. It can trigger an E1, letting us swing for 4 and triggering E1 again if it dies. A hasty, sticky body causes lots of problems for our opponents; Geist is likely to hit for 4-7 on its own, and if our opponent fetches or shocks, that can constitute half their life total. If they play around Geist, then we can play a slower 2-drop and establish a board early.
• Avatar of the Resolute is the slower 2-drop mentioned above. It can evolve E1 on T2 (although it won't get any counters if it does), and is relevant late game as well. Consecutive Avatars can represent a lot of damage, and trample and reach are strong in the late game, helping us push through damage and defend against things like Inkmoth Nexus.
• Scavenging Ooze is another slow 2 that makes up for it in the late game. It's also a good way to evolve E1 on T2, because if they kill Ooze then E1 is free to evolve to 3/3, and if they kill E1 then Ooze can eat it. That's symbiosis. Also builds life, which allows us to play defense when we can't race, and produces counters for Avatar of the Resolute.
• Merfolk Branchwalker is currently being tested as a 1-of here. If we play it T2, then it gives us a much stronger T3, letting us either find a good play or smooth out our mana for one already in our hand. We're only running 21 lands, so the probability of getting stuck on 2 is nontrivial. However, this can_not_ help us build our E1 to 3/3, so it's really only good on T2.
• Greenwheel Liberator is another 1-of that I'm testing. If you don't open with E1, then trading your 1-drop and landing a Liberator is your best bet. If that doesn't happen it's pretty mediocre; in the late game we start spamming bigger bodies without much trouble, so it doesn't help us much there.

Turn 3

• Rhonas the Indomitable is often a game-winner. With that activated ability, it practically turns itself on, and a 5/5 indestructible body on turn 3 or 4 is backbreaking. It triggers E1 even if it's not active, which is nice. The reason I'm only running 1 is two-fold: first, it's best as a late topdeck, where +2/+0 and trample breaks stalled boards. Second, this deck can't afford dead cards in its fast starts, so I don't want to have to hold back a Rhonas due to legend rule. Still, I think I'll up the count to 2 once I can justify the price, and even 3 might be correct.
• Leatherback Baloth is a 4/5 body on turn 3 that gives 3 devotion for Aspect of Hydra. Later on, these pump our E1s to 5/5 if need be.
• Greenbelt Rampager is interesting; I think that it deserves a split with Leatherback Baloth, but I'm not sure if it's at 3/1 or 2/2. It has two main upsides: first, it can allow us to build E1 to 3/3 as early as turn 2, which is insane; when that happens, we almost certainly win the game. Second, it's good when we're stuck on mana. I've won games where the second land came past turn 7, because 1 drops can hold down the fort until this arrives, and if our opponent stumbles a bit, we can recover really bad draws. On the other hand, we lose 1/1 in stats and 2 devotion for Aspect of Hydra.

Turn 4

• Ripjaw Raptor. This is predators.dec, and I would be remiss if I didn't play at least one velociraptor. It's taking the spot of a Leatherback Baloth; at the cost of 1 extra mana, we get a repeatable card draw engine to win the midrange matchup. Honestly, this probably doesn't belong in the deck; Leatherback Baloth is often better. Still, it's fun and flavorful and I opened one a few weeks ago, so I play it.

Spells

Pump

• Aspect of Hydra provides burst damage to punish painful manabases and slow starts in the early game, and forces our opponent to block everything in the late game. I've been thinking of dropping to 3 and bringing in the Nature's Way from the sideboard, but T1 Experiment One into T2 Strangleroot Geist into T3 Leatherback Baloth into Aspect of Hydra is too good to pass up. On something with trample, especially Avatar of the Resolute, this is an incredible tool on stalled boards; even if we don't have it in hand, we can force our opponent to maintain lots of blockers in order to prevent 11+ points of burst damage.
• Vines of Vastwood gives a decent pump, but more importantly, it protects our Aspected creatures. It can also be cast on your opponent's creatures if they try anything tricky; this is especially relevant against Infect, which can be a really bad matchup if they land a Blighted Agent.

Removal

• Nature's Way is T2 removal in Mono-. It plays well with our scaling creatures, kills relevant T1 plays like Birds or Glistener Elf, and gives us vigilance and trample in the lategame. Seriously, this is the best roleplayer in the deck.
• Beast Within hits noncreatures and works at instant speed. We actually have some trouble dealing with the resulting token, but it's not something we're incapable of dealing with, and hitting everything at instant speed for three mana is too good to pass up.

Lands

• Hashep Oasis is great. Our manabase is almost totally painless, so we can afford the damage, and the pump is quite relevant, especially in floods. Activating only at sorcery speed is a bit of a nuisance, though.

Sideboard

• Blossoming Defense comes in against heavy removal and some aggro races; cutting, say, Ripjaw Raptor for Blossoming Defense makes us measurably quicker.
• Creeping Corrosion comes in against Affinity (and Eggs). We can't outrace Vault Skirge or Cranial Plating, so we take the control role here; keep lots of Avatars, don't attack unless it's safe, and try to blow them out with Creeping Corrosion. Matchup goes from 20-80 to 35-65.
• Dismember comes in against most creature decks. It helps us beat faster aggro decks like Infect and Eldrazi, and can give us an edge against Midrange. I actually don't bring this in against Affinity; we're pressed for slots, four life is significant, and they can often ignore it with a Ravager in play.
• Feed the Clan comes in against aggro mirrors, especially Death's Shadow and Burn. Generally, we can't outrace a dedicated aggro deck unless they stumble; our deck is designed to go under quick midrange decks and stall the board against slow midrange and control. We're a turn slower than most aggro decks, so if we can bait them into thinking that they've won, Feed the Clan can buy us a turn and the game. I leave this out against Bogles and Affinity. Feed is good when we're racing against damage, but in those matchups, we're racing against their critical mass; they can often pile on 5 or 10 extra damage like nobody's business.
• Nature's Claim comes in whenever I have to deal with a pesky artifact or enchantment. This should come in against Infect to hit Inkmoth; we can't hit it with Nature's Claim, so this has to come in.
• Nature's Way comes in against decks with important T1-2 plays; we're generally looking to derail them on T2 and build a winning board before they recover.
• Relic of Progenitus comes in against GY decks, for obvious reasons. Most can beat it, but we have dead slots in those matchups anyway, so it's worth it. Remember to bring this in against Storm; they often can't go off with it in play, because they depend heavily on Past in Flames.
• Shapers' Sanctuary comes in against slow midrange and control decks; as stated above, we're planning to stall the board against them, and this helps us draw our siegebreakers before they overwhelm us.

So that's the deck! I'll add thoughts on some of the cards I've excluded over time, and might type up some matchup analyses at some point as well. Leave your thoughts in the comments below!

Date added	6 years
Last updated	6 years
Legality	This deck is Modern legal.
Rarity (main - side)	1 - 0 Mythic Rares 11 - 3 Rares 23 - 8 Uncommons 6 - 4 Commons
Cards	60
Avg. CMC	1.74
Tokens	Beast 3/3 G, Energy Reserve