A few articles ago, I was asked in the forums what I thought about Plated Geopede in Jund. I couldn’t answer that question, simply because I’d never tried it. Later that week, I started to play Jund with 4 Plated Geopedes, and I will talk about that in today’s article. Sadly (or not), I won’t be able to tell you a ton of negative stuff, simply because I have won around 90% of my sanctioned matches with the deck on Magic Online.
First — The final decklist:
Creatures (18)
Planeswalkers (1)
Lands (21)
Spells (20)
4 Savage Lands, 4 Raging Ravine, 1 Evolving Wilds
I think that 4 Savage Lands and the 4 Raging Ravines have to be played in any competitive Standard Jund deck. The singleton Evolving Wilds is here to help the Geopedes fight Wall of Omens. It is also pretty decent against Spreading Seas if you are drawing first. I think it is slightly better than yet another fetchland for its mana fixing aspect, but I wouldn’t be surprised if another fetchland would post better results. I would strongly advise against adding any more lands that enter the battlefield tapped, since the only times you want to play such a land are on turn 1 and (rarely) on turn 3 (but in post-board games, you often need to cast a three-drop on turn 3 too).
The Two Two-Drops
We all know the power of a Putrid Leech, and we wish we could have one on turn 2 every single game we play with Jund. Plated Geopede is a two-drop that Is as powerful (maybe even more powerful) if it doesn’t get destroyed by spot removal, and it is even a little easier to cast. Since Green/White decks are such a huge portion of the meta game nowadays, and those decks don’t have access to good spot removal, Plated Geopede becomes really powerful in the format. Against Mono Red, it helps us race them, and the only time it is bad is if it gets Searing Blazed, and our opponent wouldn’t have done anything better that turn. Against Control, we are happy that we have a threat that we can cast almost every single game, even if our opponent has Spreading Seas. Honestly, I couldn’t imagine myself not running the Geopede anymore.
Borderland Ranger
This card is very weak against all the Green/White aggro decks. Against any deck with Spreading Seas, it helps fix our manabase. In the mirror, it helps against Blightning and Goblin Ruinblaster, but sadly, its body doesn’t impact the game too much (as it is only able to trade with Bloodbraid Elf, Saproling Tokens, and from time to time the Goblin Ruinblaster). The important factor about the card is that it’s powering up the Geopede for another turn, and that we hit untapped lands for both turn 4 and turn 5. If you draw one of the expensive cards, you want to be sure that you are able to drop them as soon as possible. With the slightly more aggressive version of this list, you also like to activate Raging Ravine as early as possible to maximize the pressure.
Staggershock, Consuming Vapors, and Slave of Bolas
With the first version of the deck, I was running the set of Maelstrom Pulse over Consuming Vapors and Staggershock. But against any deck that doesn’t run Eldrazi Monument, the card was not satisfying. Then I switched over to the set of Staggershocks instead. Whenever I drew them, they were better than Pulse (unless I needed to kill Eldrazi Monument), but when cascaded into, they were pretty bad, since I had to experience it failing to rebound. Eventually I switched to the mix of 2 Consuming Vapors and 2 Staggershock. Even though both these cards usually only kill the small guys, killing those is important as well, as they can often stall out the game for an extra turn against Plated Geopede and Putrid Leech. Thanks to the rebound, you also don’t feel like you are losing cards in the process, and you often gain some tempo. The Slave of Bolas is here so you are able to deal with some big guys as well. Also, in the current metagame, it has some fantastic functions. It is really, really bad against Mono Red and Next Level Bant, and you probably only want to have two against Control. If you are playing against any other Bant list, you are more than happy to Slave a Rafiq of the Many, Baneslayer Angel, or an Eldrazi Conscription enchanted guy, and all of these scenario usually mean that you end up winning. Slave of Bolas, as I mentioned in an earlier article, is also the best answer to Sarkhan the Mad in the mirror and is more than decent at fighting Sprouting Thrinax (at least as long as your opponent keeps up Lightning Bolt to kill his own guy).
Sideboarding with the Deck
Versus Jund:
+1 Sarkhan the Mad
+1 Borderland Ranger
-2 Staggershock
Both Consuming Vapors and Staggershock are pretty bad in the mirror. Since you will cast Staggershock more often than the Vapors, thanks to Bloodbraid Elf, you wanna be cutting that card. Borderland Ranger and Sarkhan the Mad are obvious additions if you’ve ever cast one of them cards in the mirror.
Versus NLB:
+2 Doom Blade
+4 Cunning Sparkmage
+2 Basilisk Collar
+2 Maelstrom Pulse
-3 Slave of Bolas
-1 Sarkhan the Mad
-2 Borderland Ranger
-4 Blightning
Both Slave of Bolas and Sarkhan the Mad are not very exciting in the match-up, and they become easy cuts. Once you’ve cut all your five-drops, you don’t want to have any Borderland Rangers left in your deck. I am not a huge fan of Blightning in the match-up, even without M11 and the Dodecapod–Ravenous Baloth mix that is Obstinate Baloth. Cunning Sparkmage deals with all the X/1 creatures, so your Consuming Vapors get better —and with the help of Staggershock, it is also able to kill bigger guys. I didn’t run Basilisk Collar in the first few games , but it gives you such a powerful long game once you have Cunning Sparkmage. I wouldn’t pass on the situation. Maelstrom Pulse and Doom Blade are both unexciting in the matchup, but better than anything else you could have. Pulse is able to deal with some cards you don’t usually have a lot of trouble handling: Gideon Jura and Elspeth, Knight-Errant. I also happened to play against a NLB version that had an Eldrazi Monument or two.
Versus Conscription/Mythic:
+2 Doom Blade
+4 Cunning Sparkmage
+2 Basilisk Collar
+2 Maelstrom Pulse
-1 Sarkhan the Mad
-2 Borderland Ranger
-4 Blightning
-2 Staggershock
-1 Sprouting Thrinax
Against this deck, both Doom Blade and Maelstrom Pulse are excellent cards, as you absolutely have to kill Knight of the Reliquary. Staggershock becomes worse, since there is no Ranger of Eos that fetches up friends you have to destroy. Slave of Bolas, as previously mentioned, is really good in the match-up. I don’t like cutting Sprouting Thrinax, but with adding three-drops in Cunning Sparkmage, and not having to handle Vengevine, it is the worst card left in the deck. Blightning is a bad card in the match-up too, even though they don’t have access to Vengevine. The cards often don’t matter in the match-up, and it is more about you being able to handle their “I-Win-Threats,” and if they are able to stabilize from your aggressive starts.
Versus Mono Red:
-3 Slave of Bolas
-1 Sarkhan the Mad
-1 Consuming Vapors
+1 Borderland Ranger
+2 Basilisk Collar
+2 Doom Blade
Slave of Bolas and Sarkhan the Mad are both too expensive and not too powerful. Consuming Vapors should often target yourself, as it won’t be able to kill a guy from your opponent. Doom Blade is very effective against all their Ball Lightning effects, and gaining life points with Basilisk Collar is such an unreal effect in the match-up that it is hard to lose the game afterwards. Once again, I think the sideboarding is obvious.
Versus Control:
+3 Garruk Wildspeaker
+1 Borderland Ranger
+1 Sarkhan the Mad
+2 Maelstrom Pulse
-4 Lightning Bolt
-1 Slave of Bolas
-2 Staggershock
Consuming Vapors is by far the worst card you have in post-board games, but it can be decent against Baneslayer Angel and Wall of Omens (your opponent might not chump block a 5/5 Geopede on turn 3, expecting it to be smaller on the following turns). All the Planeswalkers are obvious additions, since it is the most powerful type of card against Control in modern Magic. Maelstrom Pulse usually finds a target, but once again is not very hot in the match-up. It ensures that you rarely lose to a Baneslayer Angel or a Planeswalker.
With the release of M11, I hope that Vampires is not on the rise (since they got some decent new cards), as Plated Geopede doesn’t perform well against any deck running Gatekeeper of Malakir. I think Obstinate Baloth will see a decent amount of play, especially in sideboards, but you shouldn’t pass on the powerful effect of Blighting — just play it with a little more caution. Mitotic Slime is another card that might see some play, since it seems really powerful against regular Jund decks, but when you run Slave of Bolas, you shouldn’t be too afraid of the card. Both the Baloth and the Slime are cards you might want to add to this Jund list’s sideboard to fight the mirror and, in case of the Baloth, to fight Mono Red. Dark Tutelage, even though not a powerful card by itself, might be a nice-to-have one-of against Control in the sideboard, since the only card that can deal with it is Oblivion Ring (yeah yeah, and Mana Leak and other Counterpsells).
Playing Plated Geopede after all this time has made me think. I feel stupid that I’ve not been playing it before now, and I suggest that you not only try it, but that you definitely play it. It will very unlikely that I’ll be playing Jund without Plated Geopede in the future. But of course, you never can tell…
Thanks for reading…
Manu B