This deck is the real deal: grindy but still fast and capable of attacking the most powerful, meta-defining decks from unexpected angles that they are not built to deal with. Congratulations on brewing the best Meren on the internet, pao2, and thank you for taking over for me as the foremost contributor to Meren's ongoing development.

The only thing left to do is surpass Honorbru Meren's high water mark of the 13th most popular deck on the site. Good luck!

Great primer. I've been in the Meren discord for a few months now and it's been an amazing trip to see her develop up to the point she is in now. Definitely going to be swapping out mike/ball for melira combo and squirrelcraft combo after seeing how good it is

Is it possible to include Dosan the Falling Leaf in a protean hulk combo. I'm having a hard time coming up with the appropriate other 3cmc of creatures. My thoughts are: if the protean hulk's ability resolves, and we get dosan out then it's already too late to answer. If we can use the other 3 cmc worth of creatures to generate enough experience counters for meren, then we can return protean hulk at end of turn using her ability and combo off while moone else can respond.

jamezbl0nde - Dosan is largely unnecessary, that's what Sylvan Safekeeper is there for. Relying on having Meren out in order to get a second Hulk trigger is not where you want to be - you should be able to Hulk win without Meren out. If you happen to have done your lines with Razaketh, you can even grab Veil of Summer mid-chain.

pao2 unfortunately my main problem in my meta is the popularity in trickbind effects. Which cant be stopped by veil of summer. Meanwhile protean hulk in other colors usually carry's protection like grand abolisher. And while I find sylvan safekeeper to be a great protection tool 90% of the time. Its protection that gets turned off by linvala, cursed totem etc.

jamezbl0nde - Trickbind stops the first Hulk trigger anyway, no way to play around that. You can't always play around everything, and you shouldn't play around such a narrow effect. Don't play bad cards to play around bad/narrow answer cards like that.

Fair enough. Thanks for the input. Love the build.

This is easily the best Meren build. Great work

Hey pao2 so since you cut the 5 and 6 drops from the deck doesn't that limit the usefulness of birthing pod? Since you cant climb up into protein hulk or razaketh.

Frostman1255 you typically don't pod up into Hulk or Razaketh anyway; Pod just functions as a toolbox effect and there's no need to climb the chain since you can't untap it in this deck anyway.

pao2 thats fair. Ive managed it before thanks for the reply though

Hey pao2, love the deck! Thoughts on Forbidden Orchard and Underrealm Lich ?

SpottedGee - orchard is really bad, kind of a non-bo with Plaguecrafter and Oakhame Adversary. Lich simply costs too much mana and doesn't really do anything.

pao2 is it worth running Razaketh if I don't have an LED? If not, what would you replace it with?

Dopesauce Personally i think its still worth it. You can still do win lines with razaketh witout LED. So the line i use if LED isnt available needs 2 lands and a mana dork. Tap the dork to float mana. Sac it for to search life/death and cast it. Float mana from the two lands and go get entomb and reanimate You entomb protean hulk. Then reanimate it. You can then sac it and go into your combo.

Why run Minister of Pain over something else? I’m just curious.

Dopesauce, Raz is still worth running as long as you have Earthcraft.

MrDimir cEDH is dominated by dork-fueled green decks. Take a look at all the top decks and you'll see a large percentage of them are dork-heavy.

What stops you from finding a slot for blood artist? Seems like it adds redundancy and allows for a win on the spot without protean hulk?

daishi777 the card is dead on its own and doesnt fit neatly into a hulk pile.

I hear that - it just seems like if disciple or protean hulk is out of game you cant win on the spot (unless Im mistaken you can only go inf with squirrels and attack/gain life). Blood just seems like it loves squirrels nest/yawgmoth even when not going inf, can extend Raz lines when your low on life and create less neat redundancy with protean - Melira, masticore, blood artist (youd need a sac in play). I guess Im looking at the Frostfang and wondering if its really that much better (I've never tried it in my Meren builds but its good with Pod, but bad from a CMC perspective).

The deck is already playing enough cards that are dead outside of combo, I do not want to be playing more. The whole point of this build was to maximize individual card quality. Blood Artist is a bad card, period. It requires you to already have a sac outlet, a payoff, and enough creatures in order to make it good.

Infinite squirrels already wins on the spot - make infinite life with Plunge into Darkness and use fast mana to assemble an unbeatable board state, Mindslicer them, or when all else fails manually assemble the Hulk combo.

Frostfang is infinitely better than Blood Artist.

Any additions from THB? Or possible for a budget list?

artificium nothing from THB. The deck is essentially dead now though due to Thassa's Oracle and the ubiquity of Fish Hulk decks.

Could you elaborate on the synergy between Dryad Arbor, Sylvan Safekeeper, and Meren please?

Also I was surprised to see no Culling the Weak or Dark Ritual.

Why do you say the deck is dead? I’ve been running it as is without the Imperial Seal and it’s been doing well.