Let the raptors run wild! This deck is designed to take maximum advantage of enrage triggers while ramping to big dinos and a variety of win conditions.
Forerunner of the Empire is a key piece in this deck by both activating Enrage any time a creature ETBs (and wiping any pesky token creatures from our opponents boards) and by tutoring up whichever large dinosaur we want for the matchup. While I will always be happy to tutor up Etali, Primal Storm, if I have Heroic Intervention in hand and enough mana, I will tutor Polyraptor and combo off with infinite 5/5 raptors.
Deathgorge Scavenger is here to grow or stabilize my life total from early damage. Incidentally if he sticks around he will be really helpful exiling away ideal targets for The Scarab God or God-Pharoah's Gift Decks while becoming a bigger and bigger threat.
Ranging Raptors presents opponents with a terrible choice - let early damage through or help ramp this deck into even bigger Dinos. Even if they use non-damage-based removal on it, that means they've wasted their spell on one of the smallest Dinos in the deck - OK by me. Late game this is handy to keep back on defense as it can help mill your deck for lands and draw you to powerful spells more quickly.
At first I was unsure of Needletooth Raptor coming in as a 2/2 at the 4 mana slot. However, it has tons of great interactions in a deck designed to maximize the Enrage mechanic. In the early-mid game (turns 3-4), I'm okay just trading this with an attacking creature, as it will ensure that at least one of their other large creatures dies. When it gets pinged by Forerunner of the Empire, it acts as removal, and I don't even mind if it dies when I play 2 small dinos on a turn (which can happen late game) since it deals 10 damage. It's even a reasonable target for Reckless Rage, which kills 2 of their creatures for only a single ! And imagine your opponent having to contemplate wasting unconditional removal on a 2/2... I think Needletooth Raptor is a good card.
I am also playing a staple from Ixalan, Ripjaw Raptor to help card draw and to mill my deck for land drops or big creatures.
Raging Swordtooth is in this deck to enrage my creatures or pick off a X/1 from the opponents board, which I think is slightly more useful than a 3/3 token with trample and haste from Regisaur Alpha.
Etali, Primal Storm is a somewhat high variance finisher, but if I can play him with Otepec on the board as a 5-drop with haste, I'm happy to make the gamble. The ability to steal a land drop or spell off my opponents library while cheating out dinosaurs is simply too powerful an ability to pass up.
Ghalta, Primal Hunger is an absolute bomb that can be played as early as turn 4 in this deck. This card is a real finisher, and it demands an immediate response or the game is over.
Polyraptor is the aforementioned combo finisher that can can create 8 copies of itself if Forerunner of the Empire is on the board. This likely finishes the game all on its own, but can be even more assured if I can play this the same turn as Heroic Intervention, which creates infinite (or at least an arbitrarily large number, since the Forerunner's ping is a "may" ability) raptors.
Plainswalker:
Samut, the Tested is the lone Planeswalker in the deck. The +1 double strike ability is too good to pass up, and if I can ultimate her, it's simply Good Game.
The only sorcery in the deck is
Commune with Dinosaurs which is the ideal turn 1 play as it can either draw me a great dino or save me from being mana-screwed. Even later in the game, the ability to pay
for an extra land or the dinosaur that finishes an opponent is useful.
Reckless Rage is great red removal that also functions to trigger enrage! For a single
, is a great deal. In the worst case scenario we only have a single Human creature on the battlefield, which would kill either
Otepec Huntmaster or
Drover of the Mighty (which would not be buffed up to a 3/3. However, this deck plays so many dinosaurs that there should almost always be an available target with upside for this deck.
Heroic Intervention is a key piece in the Forerunner of the Empire + Polyraptor
combo, and is also useful for saving our creatures from board wipes in control matchups or matchups against White.
The sideboard probably needs the most work, but at present is designed to stretch out the mana curve of the deck and to provide some extra punch in certain matchups.
Abrade is more red removal that can also target enchantments.
Blossoming Defense is key against decks with lots of removal and can also be subbed in if we want to go hard for the combo.
Carnage Tyrant is very useful to substitute in against control matchups since he can reliably hit the board and stabilize.
Regisaur Alpha is here to sub in for the smaller
Raging Regisaur if the haste ability is more useful in a particular match, or if I just need to be putting more bodies on the board against go-wide strategies.
Silverclad Ferocidons is a card I'm playing with here, mostly for the potential of the enrage ability. While I'm not that excited for the 8/5 body for
because it will trade down for less expensive creatures, in a deck that can repeatedly trigger the enrage ability, this quickly forces opponents to make hard decisions. While this might just rid them of some extra lands, it can absolutely punish decks that are trying to play their big creatures.
Thrashing Brontodon is here to be an ideal early stabilizer against aggro decks. Even without a mana dork this can come in as a huge blocker to absorb any efficient early attacker.
