Trying out removing one Abundant Growth for a Talara's Battalion . What does everyone think? Love the card draw, but a 4/3 Trample 2-drop that can only get bigger seems like something that could benefit us more.

I think Talara's Battalion is a great fit here. I support this playtest.

This kinda breaks the tribal focus but I wonder how would a Khalni Hydra do?

I would go with Lead the Stampede over Coat of Arms . It's cheaper and draws cards.

Also Imperious Perfect is fantastic in any elf deck.

DenzelPretzel, I LOVE Khalni Hydra in devotion decks. An elf deck should be one of the best decks to fit him in :)

I'm not sure where I will test the Hydra in place of; but I REALLY do need to build a devotion deck with him in it.

vishnarg...I quite like Coat of Arms in this deck as a relatively inexpensive way to pump all of the creatures. In most games, all of the elves on board are +5/+5 or more. Even with only 3 not "summoning sick" elves on board if a Coat of Arms hits you typically will have lethal damag on board. 95% of all Genesis Wave 's cast with this deck will be 5 or more cards; so it is very rare that this doesn't hit. Also, at 5 CMC; it can be hard-cast by turn 3 to pump the elves up for a "Zoo" style aggressive line.

I do love the idea of Lead the Stampede . It would draw multiple cards in this deck. I do have to be careful about how many non-permanent cards I utilize in the deck; and card draw is quite strong in this deck; however I will most certainly test with it to see how it interacts.

Imperious Perfect is a great Elf! I literally got to a point where I could have filled two decks (with Joraga Warcaller , Joraga Treespeaker , Imperious Perfect , Immaculate Magistrate , Elvish Mystic , Elvish Champion ....and many more). Some elves that are astoundingly good just didn't make it in the final cut as I had to find the perfect set to interact with one another in a way that could push the combo and devotion nature(s) of the deck (i.e. draw cards, ramp quickly, etc.). I so badly want to make a straight "Elf Aggro" deck.

It is big to pump up the elves though, so I will give Imperious Perfect a try to see if I can take advantage of its ability. Thank you for the suggestions!

I hate you. I like the deck, but I hate you

Haha!!! What did I do diatryma?

In all seriousness though, thank you!

sorry, there's a guy that plays a deck very similar at my cardshop, and it's always made me hate him, I have like... 2 decks that can do anything to it :P

diatryma, If You Really Want To Blow Up An Elf Deck Just Cast A Few Pyroclasm

not on this deck. the elves are 5/5's. HAHAHA

Haha!

vishnarg is right that board wipes are the best way to deal with elf decks in general. Even straight "elf beatdown" decks purpose is to build up as many elves as possible as quickly as possible and use a few lords or other cards to pump them up. They are all kind of a "sum is better than parts" type deck that rely on an army of elves. Even in a deck like this where there is a ton of draw to quickly rebuild a board; a well placed Supreme Verdict or Damnation will put us back a couple turns and is really the best thing you can do to win against elf decks.

DenzelPretzel...you are so right! I can't count the amount of times an opponent top decked an Anger of the Gods or Tron players getting Pyroclasm only to get pissed that the elves were all 4/4 or more :) That is one of the bigger benefits of the Coat of Arms in the deck; as well as a huge bonus of Elvish Archdruid . I wish I could fit in Elvish Champion too; but there are just too many good elves to use them all and maintain synergy...I guess that's a good problem to have :)

But diatryma, vishnarg is right that when dealing with most elf decks, Anger of the Gods will kill most if not all of the board (and will do so against this deck in situations where we haven't drawn well or been able to play any "pump" cards).

As much as it pains me, I will give you a good and fast card that can be awesome against elf decks for your sideboard....Hibernation .

Hibernation will only bounce them all, but it definitely puts us elf players back a few turns and doesn't allow us to "go off" or ''beef up' in the case of beatdown decks because of summoning sickness...Also, with cards like Joraga Warcaller , Joraga Treespeaker , Presence of Gond , Immaculate Magistrate , Elvish Promenade , and any other card that creates elf tokens and/or +1/+1 counters (of which there are many that are played in several versions of elf decks); they will lose all of their counters and tokens!

This deck is hurt quite a bit less by Hibernation because many of the cards would draw us more cards and the Coat of Arms doesn't place counters, etc.; but it is still worth running against this deck if you have room in the sideboard. Having said this, I get the feeling your opponent plays more of a traditional Elf deck...and a well placed Hibernation into Supreme Verdict a turn or two later....and you most likely will destroy your elf opponent....Don't tell anyone I told you! :)

I feel like this deck is begging for a creature like Craterhoof Behemoth to come off the top of a huge Genesis Wave and just win you the game out of nowhere.

dcarpntr....I agree with you.

I have been playing a mono-green version similar to my original devotion deck Devotion to Green (Modern) (NEW) with Craterhoof Behemoth and Tooth and Nail in the place of Nylea, God of the Hunt and Mistcutter Hydra ....

This has shown me just how powerful Craterhoof Behemoth is. For the time being, I have replaced Talara's Battalion with Craterhoof Behemoth . Obviously I will continue to test and see if this is the best card to remove...but I agree with you that it should probably be in here (for the simple reason that in many games you can simply hard-cast it even if you don't hit it off of a wave!)

Thanks for the great suggestion!

Haha, thanks for all the suggestions for sideboards on them =) I've been thinking about sideboard Damnation s anyway, so we'll see. And the Hibernation s are a bit limited sadly, as I can't use them against anyone but him really haha, but I do like it, thanks =)

haha! No problem diatryma...Damnation will work just fine! And, like you said, it's amazing against many different decks (not just green ones :). My brother and I test against one another; so we often find odd "tech" against one another that may not be mainstream side-board material (but we like to try and put decks through hell :) Good luck in the next match!

Nissa Revane

I'm curious as to why you aren't running Nettle Sentinel ? Seems like it fits perfectly with Heritage Druid and Genesis Wave .

Also, I've been playtesting the deck against an aggro Zoo build I'm tweaking and I've noticed that when I cast Gen. Wave for more than 8 (which is the number I tried to make the minimum so I could play anything in the deck), I usually hit two Garruks, rendering one of them useless. Perhaps 3x of Garruk Wildspeaker would be a more efficient number to play? Or do you not care if you lose one because you need Garruk right away to ramp with Nykthos, Shrine to Nyx and/or Utopia Sprawl ?

Fun deck. +1!

dadadart....there is actually 3 Nissa Revane 's in the sideboard. It is an unreal card against Zoo, Affinty, Jund, and other "Fair" decks ; but because its match-Specific and can slow the "Combo" down a little; we just side them in when needed /beneficial. It's an awesome card and a great suggestion!

dcarpntr... You are right about Garruk Wildspeaker ...I've even gone as far as currently testing a version with no Garruk's at all (to see if the "ramping" is lost enough not to just have four more elves / enchantments in. I can't say it will work (I haven't tested it anywhere near enough and Gaeruk is just outrageous in green devotion decks); but you never can know without trying it :)

I have reduced the Garruk Wildspeaker 's down to 3 in favor (currently) for another Abundant Growth . It may become another Heritage Druid as well; but I gotta test to see if the card draw is better and if any more than two Heritage Druid 's are needed (as I got to two after testing). Great suggestion! Something I should have done a while back; but I'm too loyal to the "green devotion core" as I call it :). Thank you!

dcarpntr...I'd love to see your Zoo deck when you've got it a tweaked as you'd like it. We did a version we call "New Zoo" (because of some of the more recent cards ) that includes Strangleroot Geist , Vexing Devil , and Man-Lands . Sounds like you have a more tested and honed version. Please feel free to link it here . I'd love to test with it ( especially if its better than some of the traditional Zoo decks we see)

I actually had a red/green Zoo deck pieced together at one point when Nacatl was still banned. It ran Vexing Devil, Kird Ape, Flinthoof Boar, Rancor, Lightning Bolt, Dismember, Goblin Guide, Experiment One and a few cards I can't remember off the top of my head. I doubt it's anywhere near as effective as a Naya Zoo deck but if you want to take that base and build something for your playtesting, you're more than welcome to.

You can take a look at the Zoo deck if you'd like. I wouldn't say it's tweaked to where I want it yet. It's getting better, but something is still missing and I can't put my finger on it. And I think the sideboard looks alright at first glance, but making a sideboard is the worst of my deck building skills.

dcarpntr...Love the idea of Boros Charm. Double Strike can end the game and so can the indestructible part (when the realize they didn't wipe the board :) Great idea. KOR is much stronger now that Deathrite is gone; and Ranger of Eos is a brilliant idea for bringing back your 1-drops. It's Zoo with synergy! Who would have thunk it was possible? Great deck.

Midwest....Dismember is a great idea too. There are so many cards that are great for Zoo. Looks like we may have to tweak our list a bit :)

Thanks for the compliment! I have to say that I playtested the Zoo vs Elves match-up about 20 games both before and after you had added Craterhoof to your deck (without sideboarding because I used TappedOut's playtester). Before Craterhoof was in there, Zoo won a slight majority of the matches because Elves didn't have a real finisher after casting Gen. Wave. After Craterhoof was added, Elf Devotion won something like 14 games of the 20. Zoo would get the life total down to single digits and then Elves would massively ramp into Genesis Wave bringing Craterhoof into play and it was GG... over and over again, consistently.

I still really love your list! Keep up the cool brews!