Fauna Shaman will define Standard for the next year. Take my word for it; the guy is insane. My initial impressions of him led me to believe that he was mediocre, since he has to untap to get any value, but with such a powerful ability lies a hidden value that is much harder to decipher: giving your deck the ability to produce threat after threat that the opponent must immediately handle. In Standard, there are a plethora of amazing creatures that almost instantaneously need to be answered via a removal spell, including (but not limited to) Fauna Shaman, Lotus Cobra, and Knight of the Reliquary. These creatures will all push a game out of reach if left unchecked, and for multiple reasons. Today, we’re going to examine a variety of ways to build your deck around these creatures, and figure out what the best build could be for a Fauna Shaman deck based on what your expect your metagame to look like.
Fauna Shaman, while an amazing card in the current environment, is not particularly exciting in a vacuum. Additionally, Knight of the Reliquary and Lotus Cobra suffer from the same problem. Fauna Shaman would be much worse without the existence of Vengevine, while KotR and Cobra would be much worse without fetchlands. Since all of these cards are Standard legal, that makes for some pretty exciting Green-based decks. Deckbuilder rejoice! Fauna Shaman can help produce a vast number of new archetypes! Even if they all have a similar engine, the cards that you combine with them give you different options for attacking different problems. If you are afraid of the mirror match, then Cunning Sparkmage and Bloodbraid Elf are one avenue you could explore. This will also make it more likely you will play Stoneforge Mystic, giving you access to Basilisk Collar and possibly Sword of Vengeance. This toolbox within a toolbox gives you the ability to play many cards that a Bant-based Fauna Shaman deck would not even consider.
Here is a list that I ran to a 4-0 record in a recent Daily Event:
Creatures (33)
- 2 Birds of Paradise
- 1 Realm Razer
- 4 Noble Hierarch
- 4 Knight of the Reliquary
- 4 Bloodbraid Elf
- 3 Lotus Cobra
- 4 Cunning Sparkmage
- 1 Stoneforge Mystic
- 1 Linvala, Keeper of Silence
- 4 Vengevine
- 4 Fauna Shaman
- 1 Obstinate Baloth
Lands (25)
Spells (2)
While this list is far from perfect, it is a great starting point for exploiting the abilities of Fauna Shaman. More than likely, you will just grab your “engine” a la Vengevine and top it off with a Bloodbraid Elf to send a bunch of power into the red zone. However, the ability to grab a creature that is great in a particular situation, such as Realm Razer against Turboland, Linvala against the mirror, or Obstinate Baloth against a Red deck, gives your deck incredible diversity. If Fauna Shaman ever lives past the first turn, then you are probably going to win the game. It is just that good. The ability to put multiple Vengevines into the graveyard before popping out a Bloodbraid Elf is just absurd, and very few decks will be able to handle it.
Let’s take a look at both the strengths and weaknesses of this build, and figure out what we can do to make it better against a particular archetype. For one, the strengths of this build include Bloodbraid Elf being able to trigger Vengevine a very high percentage of the time. The only non-creatures that cost less than four-mana are the singleton pieces of equipment, so triggering your Vengevines by hitting a second creature should happen far more often than not. Second, Cunning Sparkmage combined with Stoneforge Mystic and Basilisk Collar is just absurd against an aggressive field, and should not be overlooked. In my view, this is the main reason for playing Red, since it gives you the ability to blow out other Noble Hierarch decks before the game even really starts. While I could see a potential build cutting down to one each of Cunning Sparkmage, Basilisk Collar, and Stoneforge Mystic, I don’t think that you would be able to assemble the combo early enough for it to matter, and especially so before the opponent does if they are packing any removal for your Fauna Shaman.
Bant variants of Fauna Shaman decks tend to be a little less cold to control and combo decks’ more powerful spells, which makes them a great choice for a field dominated by those types of decks. The reprinting of Mana Leak is going to give both of these archetypes headaches for quite some time to come, since the pairing of good Counter-magic with aggressive creatures is very tough for either archetype to deal with. However, the bane of these aggro-control decks have always been the really aggressive decks packing large quantities of removal, and this metagame is no different. Bant can just get steamrolled by a Naya build, since Cunning Sparkmage is so hard to handle. Linvala is a great answer, but expect people to be siding in lots of Path to Exile and possibly even Flame Slash to kill your threats. This means that you are probably gambling on what the most popular archetypes will be, but that isn’t necessarily a bad thing. You can often win your bad matchups just by getting a superior draw, and Linvala helps shut down all of their strengths against you.
Adding Blue to the mix instead of Red can give you a nice change of play, with access to Mana Leak; Jace, the Mind Sculptor; Sovereigns of Lost Alara; and potential sideboard cards like Negate or Meddling Mage. While these options are not as strong against aggressive strategies, they are quite amazing against Control and Combo. Magic Online is currently stuffed to the brim with UW Sun Titan and UR Pyromancer’s Ascension decks due to the recent results from French Nationals, and Fauna Shaman decks with Mana Leak should give them problems. If you can stick your Fauna Shaman and protect it with a Mana Leak, it will be very difficult for your opponent to recover. Just a single activation will put you into a position where you are getting whatever creature best suits your current situation, which is great news for you and generally awful news for your opponent.
Here is a Bant version I’ve been tinkering with lately:
Creatures (27)
- 2 Birds of Paradise
- 4 Noble Hierarch
- 4 Knight of the Reliquary
- 2 Baneslayer Angel
- 1 Linvala, Keeper of Silence
- 4 Vengevine
- 4 Fauna Shaman
- 1 Obstinate Baloth
- 4 Squadron Hawk
- 1 Sun Titan
Planeswalkers (4)
Lands (25)
Spells (4)
While the similarities are striking, I can assure you that the eight-card swap from Red to Blue changes the dynamics of how each matchup works. While Squadron Hawk is a poor excuse for a Bloodbraid Elf, he does a great job of recurring Vengevine, while acting as fuel for Fauna Shaman and Jace. He isn’t amazing by any means, but he has a job to do and doesn’t complain much about it. The absence of Lotus Cobra is something that can’t be helped, as you need a creature that helps you recur Vengevine, and Squadron Hawk takes that spot hands down.
While I’m sure I don’t need to explain why Jace is good, I think I do need to make a few points as to why he is so good in this deck. For one, he gives the Green deck a much needed source of card advantage, since you can just get obliterated by a removal-heavy draw from any deck. Jace lets you recoup that loss of card advantage, while bringing along his bag of awesome goodies. There is a reason he has such a high price tag, and he definitely pulls his weight in this deck. I have always said that I thought Jace was much better when you were abusing him, and this deck has a lot of ways to shuffle your deck after Brainstorming, increasing his value significantly.
While I would like to fit a Sovereigns of Lost Alara package into this deck, I don’t think it is needed, nor is it very smart to do so. With Mana Leak added into the Standard mix, it is much less appealing to rely on a six-mana creature to do your dirty work. Additionally, Jund is still a deck and is packing more removal than ever in order to fight off Fauna Shamans, so you will rarely have a creature for Sovereigns to stick Eldrazi Conscription to. Add in the fact that Condemn now exists, and you have a recipe for disaster when you move all in on your +10/+10 Aura. While Sun Titan is “safer” than Sovereigns, it is really only there to help recover against decks that are trying to one-for-one you to death.
As for the rest of Standard, here are a few of my opinions:
Jund:
Jund is still a real deck. People are vastly undervaluing Blightning at the moment, as that card is still ridiculous against any deck not packing multiples of Obstinate Baloth. Green decks rarely play the full four, so it’s even a solid card in game 1 and you can just board it out when they bring in their Baloths. Jund still has the best removal and awesome creatures, while also having the ability to play the best disruption. Duress and Goblin Ruinblaster put some real pain on any control deck, and sometimes disrupt combo decks just enough to give you the edge. Valakut Ramp might be a problem for you, since they will likely be playing some number of Obstinate Baloths in order to recoup lost life from an early rush, making Blightning much worse against them. Their large threats are hard to deal with in a one-for-one situation, and you might fall behind too quickly if they land multiples of any of their big baddies.
While Jund isn’t getting the respect it deserves, I think it could be built better. A card people are really undervaluing in the archetype is Cultivate. While being able to ramp you into your bigger spells, it allows you to hit your land drops against any Spreading Seas or Ruinblaster decks. This also gives you the ability to start playing Broodmate Dragon again, which I have sorely missed. The only reason not to play Broodmate Dragon in the past was that he was pretty mediocre in the mirror due to your inability to cast him reliably. This was caused by nuisances like Goblin Ruinblaster, Blightning, and even Mind Rot at one point. Now with Cultivate in the format, that shouldn’t be a problem, and I would recommend playing a ton of the more powerful five- and six-drops in the deck, making it worthwhile to play a ramp spell in your deck. You must also pick the right creatures for the deck, and I don’t think Grave Titan should make the cut. Grave Titan, while solid, is not quite as good as Broodmate Dragon, if only because of the evasion factor. It is incredibly difficult to race a Broodmate Dragon, and Grave Titan lacks any sort of real evasion.
UW Control:
Sun Titan is a great asset for this deck, and especially so given how often Standard games come down to attrition wars. Sun Titan is awesome at recurring Wall of Omens, Jace Beleren, or even an Oblivion Ring that was destroyed by a Qasali Pridemage. Fetchlands and Tectonic Edge are other solid targets, and can put decks like Jund or Naya out of their “big spell” range if you can Wasteland them enough times. Sun Titan is a constant source of recurring card advantage, which is something a “grinding” style deck really wants. Baneslayer Angel, while amazing in a race situation, is pretty terrible when your opponent just kills her then attacks you to death. At the very least, Sun Titan will let you replay your Arid Mesa so that you can cast Condemn or Path to Exile when your opponent starts their attack.
While UW Control has had a huge facelift as of late, moving towards a more counterspell-oriented deck, I’m not sure if people are doing it quite right. You want to tap out for your Planeswalkers, but you also want to hold back mana for your Mana Leaks. This can be a very tough decision to make at almost any point in the game, because one of the things that makes Mana Leak so good is its ability to protect your threats. If you don’t get value out of your Mana Leaks early, then they will quickly become dead cards once both boards are sufficiently developed. Choosing the correct time to hold up for Mana Leak and when to run your Jace onto the field will be a real skill tester in the new Standard.
Primeval Titan Ramp:
I’m going to lump these together, even though there are plenty of different ramp variants that use Primeval Titan. As I’ve said in previous articles, Primeval Titan is just bonkers. Comboing out with Valakut can be ridiculous, and he has a very solid body to boot. If he resolves, he will almost always win the game on the next turn if left unchecked, which is something a lot of six-drops can’t say in the format. I think that, of all the variants, Valakut is the best, and the one people should be most afraid of. Destructive Force is a great card, but I don’t think it can really compete with the ability to just kill your opponent. Additionally, cards like Summoning Trap make Valakut Ramp a bit better than they should be, since you can hit an Avenger of Zendikar at instant speed, or just play it after your fatty gets countered. If you plan on playing with Primeval Titan, here is a solid list for you to start with:
Creatures (18)
Lands (27)
Spells (15)
Sideboard
If you guys have any questions, feel free to hit me up in the forums. I hope you enjoyed this venture into current Standard. As far as playability goes, the format has multiple great decks and you should just choose whatever one fits your playstyle the best. As for me, I’m sticking with Fauna Shaman until someone gives me a reason to play something different. As always, thanks for reading!
Todd
strong sad on MTGO