“Just stayed in the fog, couldn’t face it.”
Art:Bellowing Tanglewurm
by JD
Table of Contents
Today’s Featured Commander Is:
We are back with another Stompy deck, which is one of my favorite archetypes within Pauper EDH. There are so many awesome options for commanders, and the card pool supports the strategy very well. One of the toughest parts of running any stompy deck within the format is that with so many creatures and creature-focused decks around the format, it can be really tough to get through without cards like Elvish Herder
or ways to make sure our creatures get through. Luckily for us, our commander allows us to be very strong against a variety of decks. In a lot of situations, our opponents will be unable to block our stuff, removing one of the biggest obstacles as a stompy deck. Outside of that, we are a traditional stompy deck. We can ramp up pretty quickly and fill up the board with some very threatening creatures quite quickly. This deck is a blast and removing one of the biggest hurdles of being a stompy deck allows us to be efficient and close out games quickly! Without further ado, let’s get it!
The Deck:
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Bellowing Tanglewurm Stompy!
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Why Bellowing Tanglewurm?
Bellowing Tanglewurm is a very large portion of our deck and one of the main reason that our deck works, if opponents start to get squirrely about them and don’t let them stick on the field, it is ok and the game is not over because we are a strong stompy deck through and through but having our commander allows us to really devastate our opponents in combat and be a force to be reckoned with. We do have some ways to protect the Tanglewurm from removal, like Snakeskin Veil
and Ranger's Guile
. Both of these can help us fight through the large amount of removal that is usually thrown our way.
Deck Matchups:
Since this is Pauper EDH, there are an absolute ton of things that can tip a game in your favor or out of it. While an archetype may seem favorable, there are absolutely good and bad commanders for our deck to go up against; I have included both these, which were all played among my testing groups using various decks, and I have included the sample size for clarity purposes. This is just meant to be a guide after testing a bunch of games with this deck!
The information below is notes about specific decks that were featured in our testing pods and how we fared against them. Naturally, Pauper EDH is a multiplayer game, so these are just a summary of my notes against different commanders and strategies. When we test these decks we try to test to its strengths and weaknesses to give a full spectrum of what the deck has to offer. Various commanders and archetypes/strategies are used to get the most accurate information.
Commanders, we have a good matchup against:
Wingmantle Chaplain
Record against Wingmantle Chaplain 5-1
Even though they are quite good at blocking we have a lot of huge creatures and in testing we often just ran them over, if we stumble and have a slow draw this can be a loseable matchup but for the most part if we have a good ramp-filled and aggressive hand we should have no trouble taking this one down.
Molderhulk
Record against Molderhulk 4-0
Besides their removal, there isn’t very much that they can do against us. We don’t really care about what they are doing, and once they get their commander out, we are usually bigger and better at going wide. I had no troubles with this matchup, and it feels a little better because most Molderhulk lists are a little light on removal compared to other Golgari decks within the format.
Wall of Blood
Record against Wall of Blood 4-2
I love testing against our deck’s inherent weaknesses, which is why I decided to go against a deck that has removal and is also great at blocking, and a wall of blood is certainly both of those things. This is a winnable and loseable matchup, it really depends on how quickly we can go, if we can have a strong early-mid game and put some additional pressure on their life total where it makes activating their commander a pain, it can be really good, this matchup can be tough I ran into quite a bit of removal but since they aren’t as heavy as something like a control deck we can fight through it. I like this matchup for our deck.
Commanders, we have a tough matchup against:
Nimble Larcenist
Record against Nimble Larcenist 0-3
Control decks are extremely tough matchups for us, and they are very rarely winnable; we can win if we gang up on the control player, but they are efficient and can really disrupt the stompy game plan. This can be a really rough one, in testing they kept my commander off of the field as well as disrupted my hand, this combination made this matchup nearly unnwinable and just a miserable experience. If you’re going against Nimble Larcenist regularly, you should make friends with your playgroup so you can gang up on them!
Crypt Rats
Record against Crypt Rats 0-4
The Crypt Rats deck isn’t the largest problem, but the Crypt Rats themselves can really disrupt our board, and board wipes in Pauper EDH are very hard to recover from; this is a very rough one, and I had no success against them.
Invisible Stalker
Record against Invisible Stalker 0-2
This is a speed matchup in a lot of ways, and we just aren’t fast enough to compete; it doesn’t help that we have nearly no way to interact with their commander. This is a terrible matchup, they can achieve commander damage kills at breakneck speeds as well so you always have to be careful around Invisible Stalker. The main strategy I employed here was to just play our gameplan and hope that you and your opponents can kill them before they kill all of us, in testing it was not successful, but I think with a larger sample size, I may have been able to steal a game, I got close a couple of times.
Strategy Overview:
Stomp them out:
While we don’t operate all the time like a typical aggressive deck, we are aggressive, and with our commander on the field, we should be swinging hard and be very aggressive towards our opponents. Sitting back is often not the move when playing this deck.
Protect your commander:
Our commander is a huge asset to our deck, allowing us to end games much easier and make combat a breeze for us. Because of this, it often draws a lot of attention from our opponents. Because of that, I always try to hold onto our removal protection for our commander; we don’t care if any of our other creatures die. The commander is king in this deck and should be protected at all costs.
Deck Overview:
This section contains information about cards in the deck and how they function within the deck! I also highlighted some of my favorite cards in the deck!
Creatures:
We have to start off with the foundation of our deck with our mana dorks, while I won’t stop calling them dorks, they are an integral part of our deck and help a ton with the overall gameplan, cards like Elvish Mystic
, Llanowar Elves
and Whisperer of the Wilds
are the foundation of our deck. Another one of my favorite creatures in the deck is Aerie Ouphes
. We can have a tough time dealing with flying creatures, so having a creature that can do it for us twice is very strong for our deck. Now let’s get into the cards that really shake up the game, like Ulamog's Crusher
, Eldrazi Devastator
and Hand of Emrakul
all of these are great finishers for the deck and when we cast them on turn five or six can really disrupt our opponents. Fin-Clade Fugitives
is another one of the strongest attackers in our deck and they can come out so early, I’ve been able to cast them on turn four and most decks just simply arent prepared to deal with that much attack that early. We have a ton of great support creatures throughout the deck as well with my personal favorite being Nylea's Huntmaster
, with our commander and a decent board this can kill an opponent, this combined with our commander is absolutely nasty and can turn a normal turn into a turn where we kill our opponent.
Instants:
Protection is a big part of our instant package. It allows us to keep our best creatures on the field and keep the game plan on the right track. We aren’t filled to the brim with protection, but we do have Ranger's Guile and Snakeskin Veil, which are arguably two of the best cards in the deck since they keep us in the game a lot of times. If we do end up falling behind and a combat deck tries to swing at us hard we have both Tangle
and Moment's Peace
, which can be really strong ways for us to survive even the best of the best attacks our opponents can put together.
Sorceries:
Ramp is truly the name of the game here with bangers like Cultivate
, Kodama's Reach
, and Nissa's Pilgrimage
, not a ton to say about these but if you see any of them in your opening hand and the hand is even semi-decent it is worth a keep, these can help set you up for the whole game. If we do have some of our creatures on the board and our opponents start getting out of hand, we can use cards like Outmuscle
and Smell Fear
to remove them, this is pretty much as good as it gets for us in terms of removal so if we fall behind we can be left in a pretty bad situation. We do have some more traditional removal for non-creatures like Atraxa's Fall
which is a nice and cheap support piece for the deck.
Artifacts:
Since we ramp so well in pretty much every other part of our deck, our artifact ramp is kind of lame, we do have Mind Stone
and Moss Diamond
, but in the case of Mind Stone we are really only running it for a little mana boost and most importantly some extra card draw which is something we always need and are always happy to have. Even though it may seem redundant because of our commander making things harder to block I still really like Wedding Invitation
which is card draw and unblockable no matter if our opponetns have a green creature, I think this is a great card for the deck.
Enchantments:
We like to maximize our damage as much as possible so we can get a ton of advantage out of Master Chef
, which increases our damage output and with how many creatures we throw out onto the board is a key piece to our deck. Rancor
and Predatory Hunger
are two other pieces that increase our damage output by quite a bit and can make us a force to be reckoned with in combat. Snake Umbra
is one of the few pieces of supplemental card draw that we have within the deck, so I always hold this one in high regard, and if opponents try to remove it and you have a protection spell, I would absolutely use it almost every time in that situation. We round out our tiny enchantment package with Wild Growth
, which is a cheap piece of ramp that can allow for some great early-game plays and overall just helps to speed out our gameplan.
Strengths of the Deck:
- We are really good in combat, both offensively and defensively, and decks with small creatures can struggle against us.
- We can get off of the ground pretty quickly with all of our ramp; while we may take some early-game damage from aggressive decks, it typically stops when we start running our bigger permanents out there.
- Unless we are at a table filled with other mono-green stompy decks we can get through a large majority of our damage completely unblocked which is very strong.
Weaknesses of the Deck:
- We don’t have much in the form of removal.
- If we can’t keep our board up, the removal we do have, like Ram Through
, will not be effective at all. - We can take a lot of early-game damage since we almost exclusively commit mana dorks to the board in the early turns.
Deck Stats:
Sample Hands:
Conclusion:
Thanks so much for reading to the end! I hope all of the green mages out there loved this one; I mean, how could you not? Bellowing Tanglewurm is a card that essentially makes a lot of our creatures unblockable or, at the very least, very annoying to block, which can be really good! This is a true stompy deck and embodies mono-green and its archetypes and whats its all about so well. I’ve built a ton of stompy decks in my time, and this one has been a ton of fun and truly feels like a powerhouse. Stay tuned and tap in!