Elves

Leaf-crowned Visionary

February is (apparently) the month of love, and I love tribal decks. So this month, I'll look at iterations of some of my favorites, starting with elves. These will be Modern decks and (largely) with cards available on Arena.

I have previously posted about elves here. I have since continued to tweak my Elf tribal deck as new cards are released or I find flaws in my approach. My elf deck names are 'elf yourself'; here are the first two iterations:

Elf Yourself (1)

1 Allosaurus Shepherd (JMP) 28

3 Llanowar Elves (DAR) 168

3 Wildborn Preserver (ELD) 182

4 Llanowar Visionary (M21) 193

3 Elvish Clancaller (M19) 179

3 Marwyn, the Nurturer (DAR) 172

2 Beast Whisperer (GRN) 123

2 Wildheart Invoker (JMP) 444

3 Elvish Visionary (ORI) 175

3 Elvish Archdruid (JMP) 391

4 Imperious Perfect (LRW) 220

2 Rabid Bite (M19) 195

2 Broken Wings (ZNR) 181

3 Elvish Warmaster (KHM) 167

22 Forest (SLD) 108

Elf Yourself (2)

3 Allosaurus Shepherd (JMP) 28

3 Llanowar Elves (DAR) 168

4 Llanowar Visionary (M21) 193

3 Elvish Clancaller (M19) 179

3 Marwyn, the Nurturer (DAR) 172

2 Beast Whisperer (GRN) 123

2 Wildheart Invoker (JMP) 444

3 Elvish Visionary (ORI) 175

3 Elvish Archdruid (JMP) 391

4 Imperious Perfect (LRW) 220

2 Rabid Bite (M19) 195

2 Broken Wings (ZNR) 181

4 Elvish Warmaster (KHM) 167

22 Forest (SLD) 108

These two are pretty similar and previously discussed, so I won't belabor them here. The goal is to get a ton of elves on the board quickly and pump them up for maximum damage. These are aggro decks with plenty of card draw and low-cost spells, and they seem to work pretty well. But in Magic, more possibilities are always out there . . .

Elf Yourself (3)

3 Allosaurus Shepherd (JMP) 28

3 Llanowar Elves (DAR) 168

4 Llanowar Visionary (M21) 193

4 Elvish Clancaller (M19) 179

4 Beast Whisperer (GRN) 123

2 Wildheart Invoker (JMP) 444

4 Elvish Visionary (ORI) 175

3 Elvish Archdruid (JMP) 391

4 Imperious Perfect (LRW) 220

2 Rabid Bite (M19) 195

2 Broken Wings (ZNR) 181

4 Elvish Warmaster (KHM) 167

21 Forest (SLD) 108

In the third iteration, I dropped Marwyn, the Nurturer, to speed things up a bit and focus more on 'going wide' vs. pumping one single creature. In her place, I added an Elvish Clancaller and 2 Beast Whisperers. That worked . . . sometimes 'too' well, in that multiple Beast Whisperers on the battlefield sometimes made me draw cards too quickly. I was drawing more cards than I could play. Plus, Those four-cost cards (Beast and Wildheart Invoker) could be harder to see action. I could make some modifications, and Dominaria United gave me some cards to do it. I also wanted to make this deck more 'budget,' so those Allosaurus Shepherds had to go.

Elf Yourself (4)

4 Llanowar Stalker (DMU) 171

4 Llanowar Elves (DAR) 168

4 Llanowar Visionary (M21) 193

4 Elvish Clancaller (M19) 179

4 Might of the Masses (M20) 182

4 Elvish Visionary (ORI) 175

3 Elvish Archdruid (JMP) 391

4 Imperious Perfect (LRW) 220

2 Broken Wings (ZNR) 181

4 Elvish Warmaster (KHM) 167

2 Leaf-Crowned Visionary (DMU) 167

21 Forest (SLD) 108

Here is my latest iteration. I dropped all 4-cost spells and added Llanowar Stalker and Leaf-Crowned Visionary:

I prefer Leaf-Crowned Visionary to Beast Whisperer for two reasons:

1) it is cheaper

2) the card drawing ability is optional. It does cost {G} to activate, but that is generally not a problem.

Llanowar Stalker is a nice 1-drop that can get big fast if you're pumping out multiple elves per turn.

My final change was to drop Rabid Bite and add Might of the Masses. This instant enables me to pump an unblocked creature for the killing stroke. (This is superior to Marwyn, who can get big, but is a static target.)

If I were to make more changes, I might add 2 more Leaf-Crowned Visionaries (and remove 2 Might of the Masses). But that aside, I'm pretty happy with this.