Green/White Infect with Ajani, Caller of the Pride and Lost Leonin

August 17, 2012 | Posted by Dee

Rancor gave infect decks a huge boost, but it was not the only M13 card to do so. Ajani, Caller of the Pride also gave them a powerful buff effect.

The white planeswalker can pump up a creature every turn with his +1 ability. Also, you have the option of giving a creature flying and double strike until the end of turn with his -3 ability. Flying and double strike are very good with infect creatures.

Flying makes them much harder to block and a five power infect creature is lethal with double strike. With pump spells like Titanic Growth, Mutagenic Growth, and Rancor, it’s not hard to reach five power.

Against Grixis Control, I had a 3/3 Rot Wolf on the board with one +1/+1 counter from Ajani. My opponent had zero poison counters and just tapped out for a big Devil’s Play to kill Ajani with six loyalty counters.

I only had three mana to his seven mana but I played another Ajani, gave the Rot Wolf flying and double strike, and buffed it up to 5/5 with Mutagenic Growth. Then, I attacked with it to kill my opponent in one hit.

Ajani’s ultimate doesn’t affect infect creatures but it can easily give you 10 or more 2/2 Cat creatures for a lethal alpha strike next turn.

Here’s a Green/White (GW) Infect deck that did well in a Standard tournament on Magic Online last week. It was played by Atmapalazzo.

GW Infect

Creatures (15)

Spells (23)

Lands (22)

Sideboard (15)

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By playing white, you also gain access to Lost Leonin. This card is excellent because it is the only two power infect creature for two mana. All the other ones only have one power.

Rot Wolf gives the deck another two power infect creature. It costs one more than Lost Leonin but it doesn’t die to Gut Shot. Plus, in some situations, you can draw cards with it.

Gut Shot and Mental Misstep are metagame cards. You should change them if they don’t fit your metagame for cards that do. Gut Shot is mostly there to fight Birds of Paradise decks. Mental Misstep is mainly there to stop the one mana cards in Delver decks like Vapor Snag and Gut Shot.

Apostle’s Blessing makes the deck over Ranger’s Guile because it is more versatile. As well as protecting your creatures, it can make them unblockable.

For example, if your opponent has Wurmcoil Engine as a blocker, you can give your creature protection from artifacts so that it can attack past the 6/6 artifact creature.

Titanic Growth fits the deck well because it buffs up all your creatures to five or more power. Then, they can kill with one hit after you give them flying and double strike with Ajani.

In the sideboard, I like Oblivion Ring because it gets rid of Gideon Jura. That planeswalker is tough for this deck to beat. Gideon starts off with many loyalty counters and your creatures don’t have a lot of power.

Therefore, it’s hard to attack Gideon down to zero loyalty counters unless you spend multiple pump spells. You would much rather use the pump spells to kill your opponent but Gideon forces you to attack him instead.

Beating Melira, Sylvok Outcast with Regular Damage

This deck is strong enough to win even though there is a Melira on the board so don’t give up. You can draw an Oblivion Ring. Also, you can win with regular damage. I was able to do just that in a post-sideboard game against Wolf Run Blue.

First, I buffed up Ichorclaw Myr with Ajani and Rancor. He didn’t want Melira to die so he didn’t block with her. I dealt seven damage from two attacks, which brought him down to 13 life. Next, I played Lost Leonin as a blocker to protect Ajani.

At this point, Ichorclaw Myr was a 5/3 creature. I cast Titanic Growth to make it a 9/7 creature. Then, I gave it double strike and flying with Ajani and dealt 18 damage in the air to kill my opponent.