Commander Collection: Boulder Dash

Commander / EDH Bracket 3 Elementals Landfall Omnath Ramp Ramp RUG (Temur)

Jurrane

Creature (31)

• 1x Aesi, Tyrant of Gyre Strait
• 1x Ancient Greenwarden
• 1x Avenger of Zendikar
• 1x Azusa, Lost but Seeking
• 1x Bane of Progress
• 1x Birds of Paradise
• 1x Bloom Tender
• 1x Dryad of the Ilysian Grove
• 1x Flamekin Harbinger
• 1x Forgotten Ancient
• 1x Lotus Cobra
• 1x Mina and Denn, Wildborn
• 1x Moraug, Fury of Akoum
• 1x Mossborn Hydra
• 1x Omnath, Locus of Rage
• 1x Oracle of Mul Daya
• 1x Pathbreaker Ibex
• 1x Rampaging Baloths
• 1x Ramunap Excavator
• 1x Risen Reef
• 1x Roil Elemental
• 1x Sakura-Tribe Elder
• 1x Scute Swarm
• 1x Silverback Elder
• 1x Tatyova, Benthic Druid
• 1x Thicket Crasher
• 1x Thrasios, Triton Hero
• 1x Tireless Provisioner
• 1x Titania, Protector of Argoth
• 1x Toski, Bearer of Secrets
• 1x Walking Atlas

Artifact (4)

• 1x Conduit of Worlds
• 1x Crucible of Worlds
• 1x Sol Ring
• 1x Sword of the Animist

Land (36)

• 1x Boseiju, Who Endures P
• 1x Botanical Sanctum
• 1x Bountiful Landscape
• 1x Breeding Pool
• 1x Cinder Glade
• 1x Command Tower
• 1x Copperline Gorge
• 1x Exotic Orchard
• 1x Fabled Passage
• 1x Field of the Dead
• 1x Flooded Strand
• 7x Forest
• 1x Hinterland Harbor
• 2x Island
• 1x Karplusan Forest
• 1x Misty Rainforest
• 2x Mountain
• 1x Otawara, Soaring City
• 1x Rockfall Vale
• 1x Rootbound Crag
• 1x Scalding Tarn
• 1x Spirebluff Canal
• 1x Steam Vents
• 1x Stomping Ground
• 1x Strip Mine
• 1x Sulfur Falls
• 1x Terrain Generator
• 1x Wooded Foothills

Enchantment (6)

• 1x Burgeoning
• 1x Elemental Bond
• 1x Exploration
• 1x Temur Ascendancy
• 1x Trade Routes
• 1x Zendikar's Roil

Commander (1)

Instant (12)

• 1x Arcane Denial
• 1x Beast Within
• 1x Chaos Warp
• 1x Counterspell
• 1x Cyclonic RiftGC
• 1x Essence Scatter
• 1x Fierce Guardianship *f-etch* PGC
• 1x Gruul Charm
• 1x Heroic Intervention
• 1x Mana Drain
• 1x Mystical TutorGC
• 1x Worldly Tutor

Sorcery (10)

• 1x Awaken the Woods
• 1x Cultivate
• 1x Farseek
• 1x Kodama's Reach
• 1x Nature's Lore
• 1x Rampant Growth
• 1x Splendid Reclamation
• 1x Sylvan Awakening
• 1x Three Visits
• 1x Triumph of the Hordes

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{U}{R}{G} Introduction: Landmaster Flash {U}{R}{G}

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Welcome to my primer for "Boulder Dash", an EDH Temur landfall deck with Omnath, Locus of the Roil as the commander.

Landfall is a powerful and synergistic strategy in {U}{R}{G} colours, is fun to play at casual Commander tables and has decent game against most opponents. This primer outlines the decisions I've made in building the deck, outlines some of the key cards, and provides some ideas and tactics about how you can get the best from a Temur landfall build.

As a general introduction, this list is focused around two main themes: Elemental tribal and landfall, which combine to form an aggressive deck that can run away with card advantage quite quickly. It doesn't pack much in the way of removal and instead tries to overwhelm its opponents before they can develop much of a board state. Omnath, Locus of the Roil contributes plenty of power and efficiency but I've tried to ensure the deck still functions well without him. I'll explain more about his role as Commander in the following section.

Commander Choice

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We now have no less than five different flavours of base-green Omnath to choose from. So why Omnath, Locus of the Roil? He's probably one of the more underrated and niche options of the five we have, but he's still an effective Commander in his own right That's because of his two triggered abilities:

1. When Omnath enters the battlefield, he deals damage to any target equal to the number of Elementals you control. Since Omnath himself is an Elemental, this is usually at least 1 damage.

2. When a land enters the battlefield under your control, put a +1/+1 counter on an Elemental you control. If you control eight or more lands, draw a card.

One of the reasons this version of Omnath is slept on is because it's not as explosive as some of the others. He cares about Elemental tribal which isn't currently a particularly strong tribe and his second ability - in my opinion, the stronger of the two - is more about generating incremental value rather than big splashy effects. It's this second ability that this deck is largely built around, as we have many ways of getting lands into play, to use him to draw cards and re-fill our hand. But his damage ability is often still relevant as we run about ten other Elementals in this list.

Omnath's true value therefore is in his ability to draw cards when lands come into play, once we've reached a critical mass of eight. That's very important for us as aggressive decks like this can often run out of gas. Our goal is to keep the engine running while our Elementals and other powerful creatures pound face, to reduce opposing life totals in short order. Sometimes we'll even get to kill an opponent with Commander damage courtesy of our big angry jellybean.

Deck Elements

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The key elements of the deck are as follows:

1. Extra Land Drops: As a landfall deck, the goal is to get as many lands in play as possible, both during the early game to ramp quickly, and later on when its various landfall value creatures are on the board. To do this, the deck has various mana accelerants, including Azusa, Lost but Seeking, Oracle of Mul Daya and Dryad of the Ilysian Grove, along with the usual green ramp package of various Cultivate type effects.

2. Landfall Triggers: Many cards generate incremental value via landfall triggers. Ancient Greenwarden kicks things into overdrive by doubling the number of land triggers. To ensure the deck can continue hitting its land drops, Crucible of Worlds and Ramunap Excavator allow you to recycle lands from the graveyeard. Fetch land effects from Fabled Passage, Bountiful Landscape and the relevant coloured fetch lands double your land drop triggers for even more value. Splendid Reclamation is amazing for a landfall strategy.

3. Combat: This is an aggressive deck that wants to attack, so sitting back while your opponents develop a board state will rarely get you very far. Because it only really has the one linear win condition - overwhelming your opponents with waves of creatures - a few combat tricks have been included to force damage through. These include Triumph of the Hordes, Gruul Charm, Sylvan Awakening and Cyclonic RiftGC. Moraug, Fury of Akoum is an all-star here, potentially allowing multiple combat phases with various combinations of land drops, fetch lands and ramp spells.

4. Elemental Tribal: Although it's not a full tribal deck, the synergies between the various elemental creature types also benefit our game plan. The main benefit is for Omnath, Locus of the Roil triggers, which can pick off targets if there are problematic creatures on the board, or do damage to the dome. Flamekin Harbinger helps find the right Elemental at the right time (this will often be Omnath, Locus of Rage for the explosive power it has with extra land drops, but we have other options).

Each of these four elements is discussed in detail below.

Extra Land Drops

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We run an abundance of ramp effects that service two purposes: (1) to help us accelerate in the early game and win the resources race against other players; and (2) to maximise the number of land drops we get to trigger our various landfall abilities. We can generally group them into two categories, as follows:

One-Shot Spells: These are also sometimes called burst effects but, whichever terminology you use, they're generally restricted to a one-off benefit, unless we're able to recycle them from the graveyard. Most of our instants and sorceries fall into this category ie. Farseek, Nature's Lore, Rampant Growth, Three Visits, Cultivate, Kodama's Reach, Awaken the Woods, Spendid Reclamation; plus dear old Steve's sacrifice ability. Then we have our fetch lands which are great because just playing them and activating them will give us two land drops each time. Finally we have Trade Routes which can return lands to our hand, ready for us to replay them again (or to use the channel ability from Boseiju, Who Endures and Otawara, Soaring City).

Repeatable Effects: Alongside our one-shot spells, we have a cost of reusable effects that are able to be used multiple times. These include permanents that grant us extra land drops such as Burgeoning, Exploration, Aesi, Tyrant of Gyre Strait, Azusa, Lost but Seeking, Dryad of the Ilysian Grove, Mina and Denn, Wildborn, Oracle of Mul Daya, Silverback Elder, Thrasios, Triton Hero, Sword of the Animist and Walking Atlas. We also have several useful cards that allow us to re-play lands from the graveyard: Ancient Greenwarden, Ramunap Excavator, Conduit of Worlds and Crucible of Worlds.

Landfall Triggers

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One of the main ways we gain value in this list is through our various landfall abilities that grant us benefits when lands ETB. Obviously our goal is to play a land every turn but ideally we want to have multiple land drops that really allow us to harness our landfall effects. Here is a list of the main landfall triggers we run, along with their intended purpose:

• Aesi, Tyrant of Gyre Strait: Extra land drops and draws us cards each time we play a land. Absolutely tailor made for this deck.
• Ancient Greenwarden: Doesn't have a landfall ability per se but it doubles all our other landfall triggers, which is incredibly strong.
• Avenger of Zendikar: One of our finisher cards and a classic go-wide gamewinner for many landfall strategies. As soon as it ETBs, we get an army of Plants and a few triggers from its landfall ability usually mean we have a critical mass of attackers able to punch through opposing defences.
• Field of the Dead: We run so many different lands that having 7+ land cards in play with different names is usually trivially easy. Then each subsequent land drop gains us a 2/2 Zombie. Another great tool for go-wide strategies.
• Lotus Cobra: One of our favourite mana accelerants. Each of our land drops effectively nets us two mana when its in play. Particularly useful in the early game when we're trying outrace other players.
• Moraug, Fury of Akoum: Insanely powerful finisher card. Storing up land drops for multiple combat phases in the late game is usually a winning strategy.
• Mossborn Hydra: Anything that has trample and the ability to regularly double its +1/+1 counters is worth a serious look. It became a 128/128 beater and one-shotted an opponent on something like turn 6 of a recent game, thanks to some fetchlands and Sword of the Animist.
• Omnath, Locus of Rage: The other Omnath that we run in this list. Making a 5/5 Elemental each time we play a land is pretty broken in this deck. Another strong finisher card.
• Rampaging Baloths: Similar to Omnath, Locus of Rage and another great way to build up a powerful token army.
• Roil Elemental: Many of our own creatures are pretty hefty in battle but, with this card, we always have the option of stealing our opponents' best dudes when we hit our land drops. Plus it's an Elemental too, which gives us some extra synergies.
• Scute Swarm: Yet another powerful go-wide finisher. This can well and truly take over the board with a critical mass of land ETBs.
• Tatyova, Benthic Druid: One of our best sources of card draw. Staple for a landfall deck.
• Tireless Provisioner: Another great source of ramp. We usually want him to create Treasure tokens with his landfall ability, unless we're in a burn-heavy or otherwise very aggressive pod.

Combat

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The main way we win games is through combat. With the right combination of land drops, powerful creatures and finisher cards late in the game, very few decks can go toe-to-toe with us. Some of our finisher cards are listed in the previous section but we also have access to Pathbreaker Ibex, Cyclonic RiftGC, Gruul Charm, Sylvan Awakening and Triumph of the Hordes, each of which can often be insta-win effects (and the latter four can all be tutored with Mystical TutorGC). I might add Craterhoof Behemoth too at some point.

Elemental Tribal

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There's always the option to go full Elemental tribal with our version of Omnath but this list instead focuses on landfull strategies rather than going down the kindred route. That said, we run a number of Elementals that are chosen primarily for their strong effects while also granting us extra Omnath triggers. These are:

• Avenger of Zendikar: Already mentioned in the landfall triggers section above but worth mentioning as it's an Elemental and a fundamental part of our go-wide strategy.
• Bane of Progress: We have to be careful as we run a number of artifacts and enchantments ourselves but, if timed correctly, it can be a crippling one-sided sweeper for a lot of our opponents' stuff. And we then get a big beater for our troubles. Definitely worth including.
• Flamekin Harbinger: Not a bad little tutor for just {R}. Our usual targets are Avenger of Zendikar or Omnath, Locus of Rage if we're planning a creature assault, or Bane of Progress if there are lots of artifacts or enchantments that we need to clear out.
• Forgotten Ancient: I've played this on turn 2 and watched it get to 20 counters in a matter of turns. Incredibly quick to power up and capable of dealing some pretty serious damage.
• Omnath, Locus of Rage: Already mentioned earlier but easily one of our strongest creatures and a must-answer threat in this deck.
• Risen Reef: An excellent ramp source and a good way of either getting extra land drops or drawing more cards. Either way it's great here.
• Roil Elemental: Stealing other players' stuff is always fun. Triple {U}{U}{U} can be a bit tricky sometimes but we ramp out enough lands that it's usually OK.
• Thicket Crasher: Giving all our Elementals trample is exactly what we want to do as it means they'll punch through for extra damage. Often a good finisher card.
  
• Titania, Protector of Argoth: Already the Commander for another deck in my collection and basically our secret second commander for this list too. We'll be sending plenty of lands to the graveyard so she churns out a steady stream of 5/3 Elementals, in turn fuelling our various tribal synergies. Amazing card.

The Role of Counterspells

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You might be wondering why I'm including counters in such an aggressive deck. Playtesting has shown that they tend to range from useful to essential, as there are plenty of hoser cards that can shut down our game plan instantly. We reserve our counterspells for these types of threats: boardwipes, pillowfort enchantments, problematic hatebears etc. We're currently running Arcane Denial, Counterspell, Fierce GuardianshipGC, Mana Drain and Essence Scatter. Having the requisite untapped mana is rarely an issue as we're ramping so quickly and putting lots of lands into play.

I've written a bit about counterspells in the primers for other decks (especially this one) but it's worth talking about their primary role here. Because we only have five counters in this list, we have to use them quite sparingly. I would consider them an absolute last resort, only to be used under the following circumstances:

• We're about to win the game (ie. swinging in with our creatures for lethal but an opponent has a way of stopping the attack or avoiding the damage).
• We're about to lose the game (someone does something that will instantly take us out, or puts the writing on the wall for future turns).
• An opponent is going to completely run away with card advantage or does something that we're otherwise unable to interact with.

If one of these conditions is likely to be met and you have a Counterspell (or similar) in hand, I'd say use it. Otherwise, with so few in the deck, I'd recommend saving it for another time.

Power Level

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I categorise decks in my collection according to four tiers of power, from 1 (most powerful) to 4 (least powerful):

Tier 1: Higher powered decks with fast mana, free spells, and infinite combos or instant wins that are searchable with tutors.
Tier 2: Well tuned decks which may have infinite combos or instant wins that are searchable with tutors, but not many fast mana sources and/or free spells.
Tier 3: Reasonably well tuned casual decks that are capable of powerful plays. May occasionally have infinite combos or instant wins but don't generally use tutors to find them.
Tier 4: Lower powered or linear decks, weak enough to play against other casual decks.

I would classify this as one of my Tier 3 decks. It plays Magic the "fair" way and tries to win through combat, rather than do anything degenerate or broken. It's definitely too strong to play against precons and has decent game against other non-competitive decks, so I'd be happy to play it in most casual pods. To use the new bracket system created by WotC, I'd say this is a list for Bracket 3, as it features a couple of game-changer cards (Cyclonic RiftGC and Fierce GuardianshipGC).

Budget

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The budget for this list is pretty high ($800-$850) which is surprising as it doesn't run any fast mana cards. However it runs a lot of premium choices that are in the $20-$30+ range: Cyclonic RiftGC. Fierce GuardianshipGC, Mana Drain, Crucible of Worlds, Pathbreaker Ibex, Otawara, Soaring City and many of the relevant coloured fetch lands. But budget Omnath decks are definitely viable although, due to its aggressive play style, the one area I recommend not compromising on cost is its mana base, as you definitely want as many lands that ETB untapped as possible. In a three colour build, this often means investing in fetches and shocks, although the price of many of second-tier dual lands is now pretty low.

Upcoming Changes

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Like many of my lists, this one has gone through several years of development and refining as it's evolved into its final form. But I'd say it's finally at that stage: there aren't many replacements I want to make and I'm happy with where it sits on the power scale. I've had some fun games with it and it's definitely become more interactive over the years. It's one of those decks that can definitely pop off under the right circumstances and there have been times when its caught my opponents (and sometimes me) by surprise.

Thanks for reading this primer and I hope it's helped you if you're thinking of working on a Temur landfall build.

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All My EDH Decks

{W} Giada, Font of Hope {W}
S(i)erra Sidewinder: Mono-White Angel Tribal

{U} Talrand, Sky Summoner {U}
Blue Streak: Mono-Blue Spellslinger

{U} Orvar, the All-Form {U}
Clone Zone: Mono-Blue Shapeshifters Combo

{B} Sidisi, Undead Vizier {B}
Swamp Thing: Mono-Black Goodstuff

{B} Syr Konrad, the Grim {B}
Black Hole: Mono-Black Sacrifice/Aristocrats

{R} Torbran, Thane of Red Fell {R}
Red Force: Mono-Red Group Slug

{R} Rionya, Fire Dancer {R}
Firebird: Mono-Red Storm/Tokens

{G} Titania, Protector of Argoth {G}
Timber Terror: Mono-Green Stax

{W}{U} Grand Arbiter Augustin IVGC {W}{U}
Control Freak: Azorius Control

{W}{U} Elminster {W}{U}
Crystal Wing: Azorius Skies & Scry

{U}{B} Oona, Queen of the Fae {U}{B}
Dreamcatcher: Dimir Faeries Tribal

{U}{B} Narfi, Betrayer King {U}{B}
Ice Breaker: Dimir Snow/Zombies

{B}{R} Rakdos, Lord of Riots {B}{R}
Steamin’ Demon: Rakdos Life Loss

{B}{R} Juri, Master of the Revue {B}{R}
Pandemonium: Rakdos Sacrifice

{R}{G} Hallar, the Firefletcher {R}{G}
Trailblazer: Gruul Kicker

{R}{G} Wort, the Raidmother {R}{G}
Barnstormer: Gruul Conspire

{W}{G} Sigarda, Font of Blessings {W}{G}
Stampida: Selesnya Humans Tribal

{W}{G} Captain Sisay {W}{G}
Legendia: Selesnya Legendary

{W}{G} Sythis, Harvest's Hand {W}{G}
Diamondback: Selesnya Enchantress

{W}{B} Daxos the Returned {W}{B}
Curse of Novgorod: Orzhov Constellation

{W}{B} Kambal, Consul of Allocation {W}{B}
Oblivion: Orzhov Lifegain & Lifedrain

{U}{R} Firkraag, Cunning Instigator {U}{R}
Dragon’s Fury: Izzet Dragons/Goad

{B}{G} Hapatra, Vizier of Poisons {B}{G}
Scorpion Express: Golgari Deathtouch

{B}{G} Nath of the Gilt-Leaf {B}{G}
Outlaw Run: Golgari Elves/Discard

{W}{R} Bruenor Battlehammer {W}{R}
Steel Force: Boros Equipment

{W}{R} General Ferrous Rokiric {W}{R}
Gatekeeper: Boros Multicoloured

{U}{G} Momir Vig, Simic Visionary {U}{G}
Wicked Twister: Simic +1/+1 Counters

{U}{G} Ezuri, Stalker of Spheres {U}{G}
Toxic Garden: Simic Infect

{W}{U}{B} Tivit, Seller of Secrets {W}{U}{B}
Steel Vengeance: Esper Artifacts

{W}{U}{B} Yennett, Cryptic Sovereign {W}{U}{B}
Riddler’s Revenge: Esper Topdeck

{U}{B}{R} Marchesa, the Black Rose {U}{B}{R}
Revenge of the Mummy: Grixis Dethrone/Combo

{B}{R}{G} Vaevictis Asmadi, the Dire {B}{R}{G}
Dragon Wagon: Jund Dragons Tribal

{W}{R}{G} Pantlaza, Sun-Favored {W}{R}{G}
Raptor Attack: Naya Dinosaurs Tribal

{W}{U}{G} Galadriel, Light of Valinor {W}{U}{G}
Vapour Trail: Bant Flicker

{W}{B}{G} Karador, Ghost Chieftain {W}{B}{G}
Hair Raiser: Abzan Reanimator

{W}{U}{R} Kykar, Wind's Fury {W}{U}{R}
Storm Runner: Jeskai Tokens

{W}{U}{R} Hinata, Dawn-Crowned {W}{U}{R}
Phantom’s Revenge: Jeskai Spirits Tribal

{U}{B}{G} Yarok, the Desecrated {U}{B}{G}
Boomerang: Sultai ETB Triggers

{W}{B}{R} Kaalia of the Vast {W}{B}{R}
Abyssus: Mardu Angels & Demons

{U}{R}{G} Omnath, Locus of the Roil {U}{R}{G}
Boulder Dash: Temur Landfall

Date added	5 years
Last updated	2 days
Legality	This deck is Commander / EDH legal.
Rarity (main - side)	12 - 0 Mythic Rares 51 - 0 Rares 14 - 0 Uncommons 11 - 0 Commons
Cards	100
Avg. CMC	3.20
Tokens	Beast 3/3 G, Beast 4/4 G, Copy Clone, Elemental 2/2 G, Elemental 5/3 G, Elemental 5/5 RG, Food, Forest Dryad 1/1 G, Insect 1/1 G, Plant 0/1 G, Treasure, Zombie 2/2 B