This is a mid-range/control hybrid, primarily focused on playing cards for tempo and card advantage. The 3 cards most important to the deck are
Growth Spiral
,
Frilled Mystic
, and
Hydroid Krasis
. The deck also plays a lot of cards/effects that are flash/instant-speed, which is how the deck can generate negative tempo for the opponent and really create situations for the opponent to misplay.
Mulligans
You are really looking for
Growth Spiral
or
Incubation Druid
in the opener, as the best lines for this deck involve ramping to 4 on T3 and turning on
Frilled Mystic
asap. But you also have early interaction with
Syncopate
and
Seal Away
and those can also help bridge you to 4+ mana when the deck really starts to come alive. If a hand has no meaningful action until T4, I would not keep it unless playing against control and you have counters.
General Lines of Play
The decks plays very well against other mid-range decks and you are usually letting early threats through and looking to counter/answer cards that can snowball.
Vivien Reid
, Teferi,
Thief of Sanity
are all the kind of cards worth countering/removing, while cards in the explore package such as
Jadelight Ranger
are often not worth countering. You can often
Frilled Mystic
a 4 or 5 drop against Golgari-blue and then trade the Mystic with a Jadelight.
Angel of Grace
also threatens to ambush and eat early drops and both
Settle the Wreckage
and
Cleansing Nova
are ways for the deck to catch up on board.
Incubation Druid
is vulnerable to removal but can often swing the board for you too. Becoming a 3/5 at instant speed is VERY powerful but you should be careful when you play this. If you suspect the opponent has instant removal, it's often just better to use it without adapting. But when they tap out or it's just obvious they are not going to remove it right now, not only can it become a great blocker, get out of
Lava Coil
range, it's also just a kicked
Grow from the Ashes
to make
Hydroid Krasis
bigger. The deck tends to focus on these tools to answer the opponent, gain card advantage or keep parity, and then play Krasis to turn the corner.
We are a little soft to very aggressive decks so a lot of cards in the SB can shore that up. That is not to say that we can't beat them G1 if we counter an important threat, draw into a sweeper, stabilize with a Krasis, etc. Post-board against aggro decks we are definitely trying to play a control strategy, run them out of threats and win with late game value. Control decks are a bit more tricky. Pre-board, you have to just find ways to make their cards clunky, have counters against them at the right time, and hope you can over-power them gradually with the CA from Krasis, but post-board you can bring in
Carnage Tyrant
,
Sorcerous Spyglass
, etc and really play the aggressor, break their combos, etc.
No Walkers Here
Don't put walkers in this build. This deck doesn't curve out with creatures like Golgari, and cannot protect them from creatures. Krasis is just strictly better because it essentially draws you the cards you would have gotten from a Vivien or Teferi on the spot and gives you an attacker/blocker too.
This deck plays a lot of high-impact cards, has answers for pretty much anything, and many lines of play to experiment with. The single
Wilderness Reclamation
should come out against aggro, but is great against anything mid-range or slower. It kind of turns the breaks off on the deck but I really feel that 1 copy is the correct number.
