Wilt-Leaf Bant / Aggro Bant Knightfall

Modern* Aggro Combo GWU (Bant)

Purtagio

Creature (28)

• 1x Birds of Paradise
• 2x Geist of Saint Traft
• 4x Knight of the Reliquary
• 2x Loxodon Smiter
• 4x Noble Hierarch
• 2x Qasali Pridemage
• 1x Scavenging Ooze
• 3x Steppe Lynx
• 3x Voice of Resurgence
• 2x Wild Nacatl
• 4x Wilt-Leaf Liege

Land (22)

• 1x Breeding Pool
• 3x Flooded Strand
• 1x Forest
• 1x Hallowed Fountain
• 1x Misty Rainforest
• 2x Plains
• 1x Sacred Foundry
• 1x Sejiri Steppe
• 1x Stomping Ground
• 1x Sunhome, Fortress of the Legion
• 2x Temple Garden
• 4x Windswept Heath
• 3x Wooded Foothills

Enchantment (3)

• 3x Retreat to Coralhelm

Instant (7)

• 2x Dromoka's Command
• 4x Path to Exile
• 1x Stubborn Denial

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Sideboard

Creature (4)

• 2x Hangarback Walker
• 1x Kitchen Finks
• 1x Qasali Pridemage

Planeswalker (1)

• 1x Elspeth, Knight-Errant

Land (4)

• 1x Academy Ruins
• 2x Ghost Quarter
• 1x Kessig Wolf Run

Enchantment (1)

• 1x Stony Silence

Artifact (1)

• 1x Engineered Explosives

Instant (2)

• 1x Negate
• 1x Stubborn Denial

Sorcery (2)

• 2x Timely Reinforcements

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Maybeboard

Creature (3)

• 1x Courser of Kruphix
• 1x Dryad Militant
• 1x Wild Nacatl

Planeswalker (1)

• 1x Ajani, Mentor of Heroes

Land (2)

• 1x Gavony Township
• 1x Moorland Haunt

Enchantment (1)

• 1x Evolutionary Leap

Instant (1)

• 1x Simic Charm

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I am sorry for providing no nice paragraphing, it's the first time I'm doing this

I haven't tested jet, but the cards are on the way.

Thank you for reading

Knight of the Reliquary + Retreat to Coralhelm Combo in an aggressive Wilt-Leaf List

I see the deck as an aggro decks which applies so much pressure to free up a momentum of tapout/removal shortage to eventually win through a combo, or just win with efficient beaters.I see a problem with many Knightfall lists, which try to be "the next Twin" by getting cute with Collected Company's instant speed to mimic Pestermite, but without a good chance to filter through the deck or interact with the opponent, because Collected Company is so taxing on deck construction. I really liked most Zoo lists which incorporated the combo, but I wanted to try a slightly "bigger" approach.

Main merits of the deck:

• Turn 3 Combo-Kill of T1: Land + Noble Hierach into T2: Land + Knight of the Reliquary into T3: Retreat to Coralhelm (+ ideally an uncracked fetchland)

• other aggressive starts through Little Kid/ Wilt-Leaf core in addition to Steppe Lynx abuse (we play more (fetch-) lands than most aggressive decks so it stays big for longer and can get even bigger with Knight of the Reliquary activations)

• Mana dork + Retreat to Coralhelm + fetch land can provide a lot of mana to power out your beat sticks

• our beaters outclass most creatures in size (especially through Wilt-Leaf Liege)

• can adjust to a more tempo or control approach in G2 and G3 through blue

• We can run a higher number of spell interaction than CoCo decks as we do not rely on the creature count that much. We also can effectively play 2-3 Stubborn Denial over more expensive counters since we probably have enough 4 power beaters (see card choice) for mid- to late game Ferocious

Foreseeable Problems:

• currently not much resilience ( very few 2-for-1's, card selection and few spell lands) so we might run out of gas quite quickly without an direct way of reach (e.g. Lightning Bolt, Fliers)

• missing good aggressive 2 drops (I not convinced Tarmogoyf belongs here, since we play too less instants and no single sorcery) and thus are clogged on CMC 3 (already 7 for combo)

Position in the meta game:

• will be added

Where I could need help:

• Deciding on going more aggro (and what 1/2 drops to use for that) or not

• How would Cryptic Command with modes "tap all" + bounce the uncracked fetchland, Knight of the Reliquary or Retreat to Coralhelm during combat step work? Would cryptic be countered if we fetch Sejiri Steppe (in response to any of the targets, which are not Retreat to Coralhelm)? Which mode would happen first? If we want to keep our two lands and fetched for Sejiri Steppe

• We need any land etb with Retreat to Coralhelm out to untap knight AFTER Cryptic resolved. Therefor any of the targets would work against us

• Any other ideas and suggestions appreciated ;)

The combo shell (fetches/ shocks/ basics, Retreat to Coralhelm, Knight of the Reliquary and Noble Hierach) as well as the Academy Ruins + Hangarback Walker idea comes from:

http://www.mtgsalvation.com/forums/the-game/modern/deck-creation-modern/632942-knight-of-the-reliquary-combo

Also look at the video, it explains a lot and sparked some ideas.

Card Choice

• More details will be added later, for now:

  • Most main deck choices are apparent from the merge of Wilt-Leaf Abzan cutting black (Siege Rhino, Abrupt Decay and thoughtsize) for the Knight of the Reliquary + Retreat to Coralhelm combo

Alternatives:

Land choice alternatives:

• reduce shockland count, if we plan on producing mana during combo without mana dork, since we are likely to loose 8 life for full combo (see "mid combo damage scenarios").

• Main deck Sunhome, Fortress of the Legion over Kessig Wolf Run since we can normally tap 2-3 guys during combo if we don't untap mana dorks too often. This should be enough in most MUs if we can activate Sunhome for the win ; D ; eventually we will need less iterations of the combo cycle and thus take less damage (we still need 4 mana + Sunhome, Fortress of the Legion for activation...). This is important against almost all Lightning Bolt match ups, especially if they are aggressive and/or have Snapcaster Mage

• Main deck Kessig Wolf Run over Sunhome, Fortress of the Legion: we can have a lot of large beaters ( even more through Wilt-Leaf Liege and almost all creatures are G + W) and thus Kessig Wolf Run might be more efficient against tokens from Abzan / BW Tokens or generally outside of the combo

• No basic island:

  • can't be fetched away with KotR

  • almost no blue spells outside combo makes it really akward in the opening hand of an aggro deck which also happens to play 2-3 tapped/colourless sources (Sunhome, Fortress of the Legion, Kessig Wolf Run, Sejiri Steppe or Gavony Township)

  • if we get hit by Blood Moon our blue cards can't help us much against it (aside from scry) and are few in general

  • reduces max. length of combo

• we probably don't want Hallowed Fountain all that much, because for an aggressive start we don't really need it (Noble Hierach and Birds of Paradise also produce U and currently the only early game spells with U are Stubborn Denial and Geist of Saint Traft (which might be put to the sidebord for this reason) ). I still want a second blue (land) source main deck for now, so it stays for the next tests

Non-Lands:

• 1-3 Kitchen Finks might be needed to make late game combo still possible (through lifeloss)

• Qasali Pridemage vs. Hangarback Walker as meta game call for aggression/versatility vs. resilience and late game power (Hangarback Walker + Retreat to Coralhelm combo: untapping the walker several times)

• Stubborn Denial Protection against early combo (Amulet, Grishoalbrand, Storm etc) We also have enough creatures to turn on Ferocious in the midgame (Loxodon Smiter, Knight of the Reliquary, Scavenging Ooze, Wilt-Leaf Liege (even double pumped Steppe Lynx , if this ever coincides) Problem: as an aggressive deck we like to tap out in most cases. Denial might fit here because it's only one mana

Tipps:

• Play all plains/forests type land before starting the combo, or it will decrease the Knight of the Reliquary damage by 2 per land (the land and the fetch it grabs), even 4 if you use Sunhome, Fortress of the Legion

• Always generate mana from basic lands during the combo by tapping them BEFORE we activate Knight of the Reliquary for Kessig Wolf Run or Sunhome, Fortress of the Legion activations. Calculate how many shocklands we can afford to enter untapped.

• You always want to have Misty Rainforest and Sacred Foundry at the end of your combo to proceed in game with all colours available optimally if anything goes wrong

Combo Calculations:

• we can only fetch n - o times (n = plains/forests type lands; o = 3 number of lands serving as outs for unforeseen happenings (Pestermite tapping knight, removal, or even 2 removal etc.:

  • 2x lands for having all 4 colours to cast spells and one for "fetch for forest/plains, untap knight, fetch with knight for Sejiri Steppe" scenario, if needed)

  • --> with 8 plains/forests type land only 5 fetchable lands remain for combo so lands in GY are at most 12 + the ones fetched before

• Formular for lands in GY at end of combo (if we are at enough life):

  • |fetched before| + (|number of plains/forest type| - 2) * 2

  • in this current iteration of the deck it is: (9 - 3) * 2 + x = 12 + x making Knight into a 14/14

• taking "mid combo damage" scenarios (assuming no blockers etc.):

  • lagrely depends on the amount of damage you need to deal and the ability to generate mana for Sunhome, Fortress of the Legion activation and therefore on mana dorks and amount of untapped lands.

  • Best Case Scenario: Scenario 1/ T3 Kill for Sunhome, Fortress of the Legion: fetch shock lands tapped, because we have enough mana from Birds of Paradise (therefore no Exalted) and basics fetched + opponent at 20 life: 4 life from cracking fetch lands (--> 8 lands in GY --> 10/10 Knight), red for Sunhome, Fortress of the Legion can be produced by Birds so we lost at BEST 4. This doesn't change if we fetched our first two lands and would not have needed to get more into the GY

  • If we have Noble Hierach we crack the same number of fetches independent of the exalted trigger, but need to fetch Sacred Foundry untapped for R and therefore loosing at BEST 6 life

  • further will be added soon

Sidebord:

• Currently only a mess of ideas I had

• Sideboard plans are mainly:

  • Elspeth, Knight-Errant, Academy Ruins + Hangarback Walker for grindy MUs

• Kitchen Finks and Timely Reinforcements against more aggressive decks

• Negate and Stubborn Denial for combo / removal heavy / (burn?)

• Ghost Quarter against Tron and Amulet Blum (Jeskai Control?), even if Knight of the Reliquary + Ghost Quarter is to slow in most cases. In the opening hand it is still good. On the other hand racing might be more efficient ...

Date added	9 years
Last updated	9 years
Key combos	Knight of the Reliquary + Retreat to Coralhelm Academy Ruins + Hangarback Walker Hangarback Walker + Retreat to Coralhelm
Legality	This deck is Modern legal.
Rarity (main - side)	2 - 1 Mythic Rares 38 - 6 Rares 9 - 6 Uncommons 8 - 2 Commons
Cards	60
Avg. CMC	2.11
Tokens	Angel 4/4 W, Elemental */* GW, Emblem Elspeth, Knight-Errant, Soldier 1/1 W, Thopter 1/1 C