[Q & A] What Does Worldwake Bring to RG Valakut Combo?
February 19, 2010
This post is part of the Q & A section. Use the contact form if you want to submit a question.
Don asks:
I’m really enjoying Valakut Combo and I think I’ll make it my main Standard deck.
What are your thoughts on:
Comet Storm? In testing I think it is pretty sweet. It is a good finisher and good control card all in one.
Searing Blaze? This gives the deck a bit more early game control. With Harrow and Khalni, it’s not that hard to get a land out on their turn to get the landfall effect off.
Explore? I think this is better than Rampant Growth in this deck.
Raging Ravine? Seems like it may slow down the combo, but it will give you something to do with the mana sitting around.
I also saw this creature variant.
I’ll talk about the cards Don mentioned as well as other possible Worldwake additions.
Comet Storm could be great but I think Bloodbraid Elf is necessary to fight the new decks with Jace, the Mind Sculptor. Comet Storm is a dead cascade so I won’t be playing it.
Searing Blaze is probably a good replacement for Burst Lightning. I don’t think Searing Blaze is better than Lightning Bolt because there are blue decks that only play shroud creatures, which makes Searing Blaze a dead card. Also, if your meta has a lot of those blue decks, then Searing Blaze is strictly a sideboard card.
I think Rampant Growth is better than Explore. With Valakut Combo you want a land from Explore at least 80% of the time. You want a land for a couple reasons:
- to ramp up to turn 3 Bloodbraids/Ruinblasters and turn 4 Siege-Gangs
- to get Valakut online one turn earlier
- to deal six damage to Baneslayer or Abyssal Persecutor when you have an active Valakut and your only other card is a Mountain
- to trigger Khalni Heart
So it’s just better to play Rampant Growth. I would hate to cast Explore on turn two with no lands in hand and draw another spell.
Raging Ravine might be a 1 or 2-of but I don’t really like it. You already have a 8 lands that enter the battlefield tapped and adding 1 or 2 more can really slow down your combo. Plus, playing the manland means you have to play more lands or cut some of the other lands. Playing more lands will lead to flooding and the current lands seem better than Raging Ravine.
The creature variant is very different from the combo version. I’ve only played the combo version so I can’t really comment on the creature version. It does look pretty interesting though. The creature version is much slower than the combo version so Raging Ravine is a better fit there.
I think Tectonic Edge is a good sideboard card against Grixis Control to keep them off Cruel Ultimatum mana.
Slingbow Trap is great versus Baneslayer and the flying Vampires because it’s not a dead cascade like Windstorm.
A couple players are trying out Chain Reaction but I still like Earthquake better because it hits planewalkers.
17 Responses to “[Q & A] What Does Worldwake Bring to RG Valakut Combo?”
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What do you say to Justin Corbett’s Pro Tour-San Diego 2010 Valakut-Deck? maindeck it’s nearly the same as your list, but its Sideboard differs in some points:
Sideboard
3 Avenger of Zendikar
2 Bogardan Hellkite
3 Chain Reaction
3 Chandra Nalaar
4 Grazing Gladehart
Sorry, forgot the Link to the Top Decks-Article: http://www.wizards.com/magic/magazine/article.aspx?x=mtg/daily/eventcoverage/ptsd10/topstddecks
@Dennis
I haven’t tried the new sideboard cards but here’s my initial thoughts. It looks like he thought Tectonic Edge would be a big problem so he goes with the creature plan in game 2. However, he had to cut a lot of cards for RDW and Bushwhacker. But maybe that’s not too bad since those matchups are pretty unfavorable already.
Avenger of Zendikar and Bogardan Hellkite seems good against Grixis and midrange control decks. Chain Reaction is curious. Not sure why he didn’t play Earthquake instead. Earthquake is often cheaper and it can hit walkers. It could be that he expected a lot of Vampires and Chain Reaction is better versus Vampires than Earthquake.
Actually, I’ve been testing RG Valakut and Tectonic Edge is a big problem. Based on William Spaniel’s rankings, RG Valakut has had a big drop in winning percentage, from 59.4% to 46.2%.
I think we have to adapt. The best way to go seems to be depending more on creatures and adding Warp World.
Here’s a list that went 3-1 in an MTGO Daily:
4 Forest
2 Jund Panorama
11 Mountain
2 Naya Panorama
4 Terramorphic Expanse
4 Valakut, the Molten Pinnacle
27 lands
4 Bloodbraid Elf
2 Borderland Ranger
4 Oracle of Mul Daya
4 Rampaging Baloths
4 Siege-Gang Commander
18 creatures
1 Explore
4 Harrow
4 Khalni Heart Expedition
3 Lightning Bolt
3 Warp World
15 other spells
Sideboard
2 Caldera Hellion
2 Dragon’s Claw
4 Goblin Ruinblaster
3 Grazing Gladehart
4 Magma Spray
The Warp World version is posting more top finishes on MTGO than the traditional version.
Here is Justin’s tournament report. Looks like he’s boarding in Avenger versus Jund.
What do you think about Tectonic Edge? I use it to destroy other Textonics; also, in mirrormatches it’s quite a good card.
Tectonic Edge does seem to be a good card in the mirror. Also, it can hurt decks with a lot of non-basic lands like Grixis and Esper. I have 2 in my sideboard.
Why not play trace abundance in the SB? It protects your Valakut and gives you an extra mana of any color allowing you to sac a forest and search for double mountains off your Harrows… Seems good versus tect. edge.
Hi guys,
I’ve been playing Valakut since the beginning and I’m active in “the big threads” regarding Valakut. I really like Justin’s list as it’s fast and efficient, I’d like to discuss a couple cards that haven’t received much attention imo:
Dragonmaster Outcast
Sure, he’s a 1/1 Vanilla, but he:
1) Doubles as a win-con (if they wasted their removal on BBE/Siege-Gang)
2) He can be cascaded into (I find efficient cascading very important for Valakut deck)
3) Mike Flores said he’s an auto-include into Valakut deck. (just kidding… not)
This card has just been overall great for me.
Lightning Bolt
Most people say this card is an automatic 4-off. The card itself is awesome and versatile and I agree with them to some extend and I also play 4 of them, but… it doesn’t really fit the idea of this deck. 4 Bolts seem pretty random to me in this kind of deck.
Avenger of Zendikar
While Rampaging Baloths didn’t receive much love, this guy made it in the sideboard of most Valakut decks and some even put him in the maindeck. The double-green is troubling me a bit as it prolongs the time required to get your Valakut(s) online.
K4m1k4z3, thanks for your input.
How many Dragonmaster Outcasts do you play?
Bolt is an interesting card. It’s great versus fast decks but there was a top eight Valakut deck at a 5k tournament pre-WWK that cut them so that every cascade card was mana ramp (except for Map, of course).
I thought Avenger of Zendikar would be great against Jund but in my experience Maelstrom Pulse takes away the advantage you can get from an army of plant creatures.
I no longer play ‘em. =/ I figured we want stuff to do something the moment it hits play and Outcasts died way too fast, indeed.
I was thinking of running Avengers maindecked but I’m not sold on it (-4 RB, +3 Avenger +1 Burst). I guess that depends on your metagame. Ruinblaster is the card I usually side out the most and I’ve started debating its usefulness in the maindeck.
Has anybody tried Goblin Assaults? 2-3 could be nice against control I suppose. Control isn’t played much in my area so I don’t know.
Oh and what are your views on big Eldrazi fatties? I was thinking 1 Kozilek couldn’t hurt (probably in SB though).
Ruinblaster does feel like the weakest link especially with Jund playing more lands and mana ramp. I’ve seen some decks playing Borderland Rangers instead. Rangers don’t ramp but they do provide so defense against Blightning. Plus, trading with Bloodbraid is a good thing.
The Eldrazi fatties seem too expensive imo.
do we have to put goblin ruinmasters,bloodraid elf, and siege-gang commander? is there any other options?
I think those are the best cards in the current metagame. I wouldn’t cut Siege-Gang Commander, but you can try Borderland Ranger and Grazing Gladehart in place of Ruinblaster and Bloodbraid.
I’ve been testing Windstorm and Slingbow Trap in the side versus Vamps. Both are working well. Anyone else have any thoughts?
I haven’t tried it since Vampires is pretty unpopular in my meta, but thanks for sharing. Those cards seem great against Vamps.
Hey, ROE is now out and I’ve recently gotten back into standard. Any idea how Valakut is doing? I’ve revamped my old Warp World Revolution deck into a Valakut one. How’s ROE changing the lists?
And I’ve continually been baffled by the Ruinblaster. Not impressed when they come out. Their in there against man lands is that correct? Anybody taking em out of maindeck?
Thanks.
my valakut is pritty strong its not got the sige-gangs in it just slows the deck down, insted i run Deathforge Shaman, coz with all that ramp its a finisher. also i run howling min for the extra card draw, it helps it along pritty quick,(draw 2 land play 2 land with the oracle your gunna get an actvie valakut quick), anyways here my deck list see wot you think.
2 Forest
13 Mountin
3 Raging Ravine
1 Misty Rainforest
1 Arid Mesa
2 Scalding Tarn
4 Valakut, the Molten Pinnacle
2 Deathforge Shaman
3 Oracle of Mul Daya
4 Bloodbraid Elf
3 Howling mine
4 Expedition map
4 Khalni Heart Expedition
4 Rampant Growth
4 Lightning Bolt
2 Lavaball Trap
4 Harrow
well thats my deck let me know wot you think of it, come jion my facebook page where you can talk about other pepoles deck the groups called: Magic the Gathering (deck listings).