Hermit Druid - Gravekeeper of the Forests

Pauper EDH*

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Creature (38)

• 1x Anurid Barkripper
• 1x Backwoods Survivalists
• 1x Battlefield Scrounger
• 1x Burr Grafter
• 1x Drudge Beetle
• 1x Elder Pine of Jukai
• 1x Feral Deceiver
• 1x Festerhide Boar
• 1x Golgari Brownscale
• 1x Harbinger of Spring
• 1x Hooting Mandrills
• 1x Humbler of Mortals
• 1x Kessig Dire Swine
• 1x Korozda Monitor
• 1x Krosan Avenger
• 1x Krosan Restorer
• 1x Leafcrown Dryad
• 1x Moldgraf Scavenger
• 1x Nantuko Tracer
• 1x Nightsoil Kami
• 1x Nimble Mongoose
• 1x Nyxborn Wolf
• 1x Oakheart Dryads
• 1x Orchard Spirit
• 1x Petalmane Baku
• 1x Promised Kannushi
• 1x Scion of Ugin
• 1x Shinen of Life's Roar
• 1x Somberwald Spider
• 1x Springing Tiger
• 1x Thrashing Mossdog
• 1x Traproot Kami
• 1x Ulvenwald Bear
• 1x Undergrowth Scavenger
• 1x Venerable Kumo
• 1x Vine Kami
• 1x Werebear
• 1x Woodland Sleuth

Instant (11)

• 1x Evolution Charm
• 1x Gnaw to the Bone
• 1x Grapple with the Past
• 1x Hunger of the Howlpack
• 1x Might Beyond Reason
• 1x Moment's Peace *list*
• 1x Pulse of Murasa
• 1x Reclaim
• 1x Repopulate
• 1x Vines of Vastwood
• 1x Wildwood Rebirth

Enchantment (10)

• 1x Cartouche of Strength
• 1x Elephant Guide
• 1x Moldervine Cloak
• 1x Nature's Kiss
• 1x Night Soil
• 1x Rancor
• 1x Seton's Desire
• 1x Snake Umbra
• 1x Spidersilk Armor
• 1x Vineweft

Artifact (3)

• 1x Conjurer's Bauble
• 1x Feldon's Cane
• 1x Relic of Progenitus

Commander (1)

Land (29)

• 1x Ash Barrens
• 1x Command Tower
• 1x Crumbling Vestige
• 22x Forest
• 1x Quicksand
• 1x Slippery Karst
• 1x Tranquil Thicket
• 1x Tree of Tales

Sorcery (8)

• 1x Elven Cache
• 1x Far Wanderings
• 1x Kruphix's Insight
• 1x Lead the Stampede
• 1x Monstrify
• 1x Revive
• 1x Rofellos's Gift
• 1x Salvage

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Part of the Pauper EDH commander challenge

Intro:

The fearsome Hermit Druid, banned in legacy due to it's potential to be one of the best combo enablers for graveyard decks, finds it's way into PEDH. But what are we supposed to do with this guy in PEDH without all the good stuff from legacy, you might ask? Well, as it turns out, this guy is a pretty good build-around card that still interacts with the graveyard, but in slightly different ways: Threshold, Delirium, Dredge, Scavenge, etc. He also provides us with more slots in the deck due to his incredible ability to make the deck super consistent with land drops and allows us to run as few as 29 lands. So let's delve right into it.

Gameplan:

First three turns are incredibly simple: Get a hand with 2 lands, have 2 untapped lands on turn 2, play hermit druid, and on turn 3, activate him. From that point on, you should activate him every turn until you accumulate a nice enough mass in your graveyard. You've got a good bunch of cards that get you cards back, as well as reshuffle effects that stop you from decking out late game. Most of the cards interact with the graveyard in one way or another, so not only you're getting a land drop for the turn, you're also getting valuable cards you can use with or from your graveyard. The 3 main packages are:

Enchantments: There's a bunch of great, classic even (looking at you, Rancor), enchantments at your disposal. There's cards that let you get amazing value from enchantments (Kruphix's Insight and Rofelo's Gift), while others simply recur pretty well (Vineveft or Moldervine Cloak).

Spirits/Soulshift: Spirits and Soulshift cards are simply amazing here. Soulshift allows you to get tons of value from the graveyard by simply going top to bottom by soulshift value (all the way up at 7, down to 2), or grab a card that might be more useful along the way (Scion of Ugin at 6, Feral Deceiver at 4, Traproot Kami at 1, etc).

Threshold/Delirium/Morbid/Scavenge/Dredge/Delve: Very broad category of cards, all of which (except for probably morbid) care about graveyard to provide you with more value. Morbid used to be a bigger thing in starting iterations of this deck, when it included more sacrifices, but since your opponent will have to do unfavourable trades constantly, morbid is going to trigger either way (the reason for the unfavourable trades is that graveyard-maters cards are gonna be very cost efficient for their stats, as well as being green inherently makes the creatures good statwise). End goal is pretty simple: value town from the graveyard.

Games should be closed out with a huge mass of stat efficient creatures, as well as making your opponent block one creature only, having big tramplers, or simply a huge Undergrowth Scavenger. Sometimes the game plan will simply (soul)shift towards playing a big creature or scion of ugin, and then growing them with enchantments/counters/scavenge abilities and trampling your way to victory.

Your biggest worry is your commander getting destroyed on turn 2. Expect that from red/black decks, especially if the opponent is going to play something like Enigma Drake bolt tribal. Your second biggest worry is gravehate, and pretty much everyone plays at least 1-2 cards for gravehate in their decks, so expect it and prepare for it.

Top Ranked	Achieved #23 position overall 6 years ago
Date added	6 years
Last updated	6 years
Legality	This deck is Pauper EDH legal.
Cards	100
Avg. CMC	2.96
Tokens	Elephant 3/3 G, Saproling 1/1 G
Folders	Nice