Infinite Mana In Standard

It’s true. Devotion is dead.

The days of chaining Burning-Tree Emissary and Nightveil Specters into massive Nykthos activations and on-line Gods on the curve has ended. Fanatic of
Xenagos, Master of Waves, and even the often-oppressive Gray Merchant of Asphodel aren’t darkening any doors anymore. While some have attempted to
capitalize on this has-been mechanic, most have fallen by the wayside and have been relegated to the “needs-to-be-updated” deck logs of players around the
world.

Well, except for green.

Green, which was already the best color at ramping, survives with its Nykthos, Shrine to Nyx intact. Arguably the most unchanged list among Theros relics
in Khans Standard, green tends to splash a color to leverage its mana ramping power into off-color threats; splash black for Doomwake Giant to go along
with your suite of enchantments, or go red for a big Crater’s Claws, or to go the more monster-oriented path with Ashcloud Pheonix and Stormbreath Dragon.

Despite the power of generating lots of mana, one particular green devotion card has been absent from almost every list concocted so far.

This 1/4 druid seems like it could muscle out a lot of mana, funding your favorite monstrous project or multi-creature casting spree. But it hasn’t, and
there seem to be three major reasons.

1. This can be a really expensive Elvish Mystic.

By itself, you’re paying four mana for a Horned Turtle that taps for G. It’s heavily reliant on already being in a position of heavy board presence. In the
same way that Gyre Sage, a cheaper and potentially faster alternative, was not ubiquitous in Standard pre- or post-Theros, the Acolyte is already pegged
down from a competitive level.

2. There’s no room.

The decks that want a creature like this already play lots of mana dorks. I mean, it’s worse than Voyaging Satyr in any instance where you have a Nykthos,
and that’s half the cost.

3. Turn 3 or 4 is a time for a threat.

When you have the option of casting this or a 5/5, nine times out of ten you’ll cast Polukranos, World Eater. It doesn’t fight well, not even having the
decency of being a 2/4 like its Centaur cousin. Man, Courser of Kruphix set the bar pretty high.

So why are we spending time on this irrelevant, underpowered critter? Well, it’s because I tricked you! We’re not actually talking about a green card
today, we’re talking about a blue card.

Singing Bell Strike is one of my favorite development cards in Khans of Tarkir. I love blue aggro, and this little spell gives you a real two-mana
Claustrophobia. You can prevent a creature from attacking or blocking for a long time, which is about all you can ask for. I’ve tried its previous
iterations (Ice Cage, Runner’s Bane), but none are as solid as this Strike.

While I’d love to talk about this card in an aggro context, notice that you can target any creature, including your own. Like your own Karametra’s Acolyte.
You can pay six colorless mana to untap it, which the Acolyte can power herself. Thus, if you can make seven mana or more, you can pay six to untap and
keep one in your pool. Repeat ad infinitum for infinite green mana.

I’d fiddled with this when Thassa’s Ire came out, but this enchantment lets you actually net mana (you’d have to have an extra blue mana each time you
wanted to untap, which the Acolyte could not provide). Now was the time!

At first glance, this feels like a two-card combo, but it really isn’t. For this deck to work, we need lots of green devotion and we need an outlet for all
that mana that can really matter that’s infinite. Some green devotion plays can create twenty or thirty mana, so it has to be big enough to
actually benefit from ultimate cosmic power.

Naturally, the “X” nature of hydras (hydrae?) lend themselves to the prospect of infinite mana. Many are playable too, so let’s get to building!

G/U Ramp

Matt Higgs

Test deck on 12-09-2014

Standard

Creatures (30)

Lands (22)

Spells (8)

Sideboard

Now, a lot of this gonna look pretty familiar, and that’s all thanks to the Twelve Disciples of Green, the twelve creatures most every green-centric deck
plays these days. Elvish Mystic, Sylvan Caryatid, and Courser of Kruphix are right where most green decks want to be. Courser is incremental advantage
until the cows come home, the Caryatid is untouchable mana-fixing that provides a blocker and a green devotion, and Elvish Mystic, probably the least
stable of them, helps get anything online one turn earlier. The deck, even with its blue splash, still has adequate Forests for a turn-1 Mystic. We can
afford to do that because of those two aforementioned powerhouses.

The other four-ofs, Polukranos, World Eater and Karametra’s Acolyte, are always good, even in multiples. Acolytes in multiples let you simulate having a
Nykthos, and they do block well. They easily chain together. Play an Acolyte, untap, play an Acolyte, etc. And although I was dissing a 1/4 earlier, it
still does block a lot of red cards, including Lightning Strike and Magma Jet. Polukranos, besides being a theme-friendly Hydra, is incredible. You know
that though. Its monstrous ability is enough to make it an infinity/infinity with the Acolyte combo, letting you kill your opponent’s infinity creatures
and smash for infinity. Everyone’s having fun when you say the word “infinity” in Magic, even your opponent. No, ignore those tears, they’re laughing
inside.

From there, we’ve got a couple more Hydras. Genesis Hydra seems like a natural choice too. This offers an uncounterable way (Genesis Hydra trigger occurs
when cast) to cast any spell in the deck, so long as you have enough mana. Make a 60/60, pull out whatever you want, and shuffle up. Nice! Hooded
Hydra, similarly, allows you to make an infinitely large hydra that, if you fail to untap with it, still provides infinite 1/1 Snake Hydras to fill its
gap. The deck produces enough mana that you can also cast it for morph and flip it up at any time without having to worry about spending two turns casting
one creature. Kiora’s Follower is analogous to Voyaging Satyr, except instead of a certain legendary land, you’re righting a tapped Karametra’s Acolyte for
extra mana.

Finally, there’s four singleton targets for your suite of Chord of Calling; Nylea, God of the Hunt allows you to fetch up an instant trampler, and with
infinite mana her ability lets you pump the whole squad as much as you like. Arbor Colossus is an underrated creature in many ways; I mean, it’s a 6/6 for
5 with all upside. Here though, it’s a very tight, efficient devotion supporter. Hydra Broodmother is a way to generate as many hydras as you want on
demand and as large as you want. Most decks can’t deal with five 5/5s. Finally, Hornet Queen is the most hilarious tutor target for Chord of Calling,
especially in combat. It does provide three devotion as well.

The spells directly support the creatures, so they might as well go here. Chord of Calling, with the abundance of mana and creatures, seemed okay as a
playset. I’m not totally sure if we’re gonna stay there, but it’s fine for now. Singing Bell Strike is a good card without Karametra’s Acolyte, so it
passes that tried and true deckbuilding test. It efficiently stops problem flyers (the only things a big green deck worries about creature-wise), and by
the time they can untap it, you’ll have things under control.

The land base is simple. There’s no need to dress it up, and I’m not even sure Nykthos, Shrine to Nyx is good. Amateur hour is over.

From the sideboard, we have a straightforward plan. Negate comes in over Singing Bell Strike against control; it’s so unlikely for me to have enough
permanents on the board to achieve the necessary seven devotion, and it rarely has other targets. Four Nylea’s Disciple come in against any kind of aggro
deck, naturally, and Mistcutter Hydra comes in to fight any deck that plays blue but not black. Finally, you can jam three more Arbor Colossus if a random
6/6 is going to completely stop them.

In truth, this first attempt was built on the backbone of a well-known and tested shell. In many cases, if I didn’t draw the Acolyte or a Singing Bell
Strike, it basically would be a mono-green devotion deck. I tested it for a few matches online to see if there was anything here.

It didn’t do badly.

I won three out of five matches, two of which were on the back of the combo. The three matches I won, mono-red, another mono-green devotion, and a Mardu
good-stuff deck, all proved that you can go over the top of any deck. The mono-red deck was an easy 2-0, but that deck didn’t need a huge guy to
win that game. Against another mono-green deck, I didn’t have to worry about much in the way of removal, and it helped me make an enormous Polukranos and
an infinite Genesis Hydra with Nylea to close out the match. Mardu has some mana problems without our friend the Caryatid, and I’m convinced his own mana
kept him down. Siding into Arbor Colossus against Butcher of the Horde felt outstanding, by the way.

I lost to another mono-red deck, which had on-time removal to deal with Coursers, and it was able to ignore the three Polukranos I cast over the course of
the match. Nylea’s Disciple was close, but I only cast one and it gained three life, so it didn’t do a lot. My final match, against Jeskai Midrange, also
proved to be a problem. The Jeskai deck could mess with almost everything I cast. It was only after I sideboarded into Mistcutter Hydra that I had much of
a chance. The final game of the day was perhaps the most exciting, where a 7/7 Hydra began hacking away at his 30+ life total, only to be burned out of the
game with double Jeskai Charm plus Stoke the Flames.

The games I lost were honest losses. Most creatures performed well, and the correction was mostly a numbers game. I wiggled the deck a bit, hoping some of
the dross would fall out, and…

G/U Ramp

Matt Higgs

Test deck on 12-09-2014

Standard

Creatures (32)

Lands (22)

Spells (6)

Sideboard

This takes out the Kiora’s Follower (mostly just a 2/2) and a few Chord of Calling for a fuller creature base. Hooded Hydra was never a card I wanted to
draw (and I never did), while Genesis Hydra always got something nice, like a Courser of Kruphix. With three more Arbor Colossus, it could more often get
ultimate value.

The sideboard features Bassara Tower Archer, a high-devotion blocker for the aggro decks. When you need to stick a blocker that won’t die to Magma Jet or
Chandra, Pyromaster that can still kill a Goblin Rabblemaster, this can do the trick. Two together kill a Stormbreath Dragon, for what that’s worth. Negate
was never great, even when I boarded it in against the Jeskai deck. It felt awkward.

I love Singing Bell Strike, and as I said, I’ll bring it back in its aggro form soon. Have you all figured out a neat way to use this aura’s side effect?
Am I leaving out something critical that could really polish this deck up?