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Brewing in Ixalan
Ixalan is out for a while now, and I have been fiddling around with a plethora of decks to figure out the meta and what weaknesses the meta has at this moment. I have created the Extreme Token Generation Deck a few months ago, before the whole Abzan tokens deck became popular, because there was an obvious lack of interaction with token decks in the meta back then. Right now, token decks have become more and more popular and even though I do not share the enthusiasm for the Abzan tokens list as much (since it plays more like control until vraska is out or the value engine of stockpiles and procession is going off), I do like that token decks have had success in the last couple of weeks. I will keep testing my for now completely optimized token deck (link above), which focuses more around trampling an opponent with a giant token army created in a few turns.
But since the meta adapts well to decks that turn out hidden gems, I have started testing with other types of decks as well. And the fruits of that search for other niche decks has ended here.
Decks run a lot of spot removal these days to survive until the late game, and blossoming defense is a perfect card to blank out removal and swing in for the kill. And what better creature to protect is there than electrostatic pummeler, who can end game in one swing!
Deck Explanation
We all know the Gruul Electrostatic Pummeler decks that have been around for a pretty long time. These decks are pretty simple: put down an electrostatic pummeler, buff it up with something like Larger Than Life, double its power and toughness with its own effect for energy and then swing for the win. They usually play other aggressive energy creatures like Lathnu Hellion and Voltaic Brawler.
I argue that this is too much of an all in. The Red Green deck is too vulnerable to any value cards that take care of their deck. Removal and counters from control decks makes them blow out, value decks like temur energy outvalue them, and ultra aggro decks like Ramunap Red outrace them. Being in Red and Green also offers you almost no interesting sideboard techniques.
I argue that we move towards blue and black. Why?
We get to play card advantage cards like rogue refiner, glint-sleeve siphoner and cartouche of knowledge (which will almost never fizzle because of blossoming defense backup and bristling hydras innate hexproof).
We have important sideboard strategies in these colours that help us out in a variety of matchups. Think duress + negate against control like uw or ub and combo like god pharaohs gift. Fatal push versus aggro decks helps us out too. Finally, vraskas contempt is a specific answer against gods and planeswalkers. Out of green we get appetite for the unnatural for pesky artifacts or enchantments, and deathgorge scavenger for graveyard hate aginst scarab god, scroungers, god pharaohs gift etcetera.
We get to play value engines like the scarab god, vraska, or nissa. These function as a backup plan to win the match.
Altogether this is enough for me to play the sultai colours in this deck. Perfect to protect a win condition like electrostatic pummeler.
Common Playstyle
In this deck you want to make reasonably large amounts of energy to swing with growing creatures like longtusk cub, bristling hydra and the most important win condition: electrostatic pummeler.
A common game looks like this:
TURN 1: Land + Attune with Aether
TURN 2: Land + Servant of the conduit
TURN 3: Land + Electrostatic Pummeler (tap servant and 2 lands) backed up by blossoming defense. You can leave servant untapped to pay for the defense when necessary but this will open the way to your opponent to remove your servant first and then your pummeler.
TURN 4: Land + Larger than Life on your pummeler, pay 6 (or more if you need to get through blockers, you can do this by palying attune in this turn, second servant etc.) energy to double its power and toughness twice, and swing for 20 trample damage (and possibly servant for another 2 damage). Usually this is enough to win the game.
BEWARE!! Make sure that you always have a blossoming defense available with mana to cast it when you play your pummeler. It is possible to play it on turn 3 with the method described above, but if you do not have a servant in the field at that time I suggest waiting for turn 4 with casting your pummeler and hold a green open for defense, since pummeler is a removal magnet.
The other cards in this deck are used for energy generation, other creatures that can beat down the foe and become bigger in the process, cards that generate card advantage, and buffs with evasion for your creatures.
Have fun playing aggro in a combo type way!
