[Budget] Secret Force

[Sakurazukamori]

A new store just opened in my area and they've been having Type 1 tournaments for the past couple of weeks. No one in the area has Power, however, which makes the tournaments pretty wide-open. I've been playing around with Secret Force builds for months -- for use in Type 1.5, but am thinking of porting it over to Type 1. Here is the current (mono-G) build:

4 Natural Order
4 Pattern of Rebirth
4 Skullclamp

4 Llanowar Elves
4 Fyndhorn Elves
4 Priest of Titania
4 Quirion Ranger
4 Elvish Spirit Guide
1 Lotus Petal
1 Channel
1 Mana Vault
1 Regrowth


2 Eternal Witness
2 Verdant Force
2 Plated Slagwurm
1 Phantom Nishoba
1 Darksteel Colossus

16 Forest

I am tempted to make this deck G/W and add StP, but currently have no Savannahs. I'm also a little bit concerned that another color could dilute some of my mono-G speed. I can usually get out a fat creature by turn 3 (and turn 2 is not uncommon). I've found Pattern of Rebirth to be excellent in this deck, and effectively gives me Natural Order 5-8 when combined with any Elf and Skullclamp.

I'm currently testing another build without all of the elf acceleration, but it seems to have less ability to come back after disruption. I have also thought about dropping some of the questionable (but fun cards) like Regrowth, Mana Vault and Channel in favor of 3x Winter Orb, since my deck needs very little land.

Comments are welcome -- I'm always hoping to improve this deck (as it is my favorite) and I thought this would be a good place to get some criticism.

[Cavius The Great]

maybe 12 Forest and 4 Land Grant would make the deck more consistant.

I also would choose Mana Crypt in a heartbeat over Mana Vault.

[LotusHead]

A lucky Sliver Queen is another good Natural Order target.  She's Green!

Verdant Force makes dork tokens, but so does the Sliver Queen. The Sliver tokens are colorless which may or may not make a difference.

Also, Spidersilk Armour makes great defences against flying creatures (perhaps for a sideboard), but with the Skullclamp engine, may net you 4 cards for 2 mana (as opposed to a mere 2 cards for 1 mana).

Good luck!

[Cavius The Great]

A lucky Sliver Queen is another good Natural Order target. She's Green!

How is Sliver Queen better than Verdant Force?  

[CwaM]

A lucky Sliver Queen is another good Natural Order target. She's Green!

How is Sliver Queen better than Verdant Force?  

lots of elves = more tokens

but sliverqueen can be REBed or BEBed though

[Freelancer]

Also, Spidersilk Armour makes great defences against flying creatures (perhaps for a sideboard), but with the Skullclamp engine, may net you 4 cards for 2 mana (as opposed to a mere 2 cards for 1 mana).

In my testing with skullclamp you really want to have your creatures x/1 unless you have somehow managed to draw double clamp (at wich point you should already be winning) in most cases you don't want to cast spidersilk armor and being able to block fliers is not that important...there are two creatures with flying you want to block (angel and morphling) why sideboard for that...

[Sakurazukamori]

I agree that Sliver Queen is bad for the deck. Verdant Force makes tokens for free, after all.

Does anyone think more maindeck answers are necessary here? My Legacy build includes maindeck Naturalize and has Survival of the Fittest to fish out Eternal Witnesses, but in Vintage I think Pattern of Rebirth gains a lot more utility since I can use Skullclamp to kill the Pattern target -- I think the redundancy built into the deck is enough that I don't really need to worry about recurring the Orders and Patterns.

[Fominian]

Out of curiousity: Have you concidered cards such as Glimpse of Nature and Gaea's Cradle?

You do run enough creatures for both to work with in the confines of the deck, and may even allow you to expand your deck in new ways.

[Sakurazukamori]

Glimpse of Nature is a great card, as is Gaea's Cradle, but I don't really think that I need them here.  I could definitely get some use out of Glimpse, but Skullclamp is much better at drawing cards.  The Cradle is also very good, but I don't really need that much mana.  I've already got Priest of Titania, which in this deck is really just a Cradle with legs.  Mana is also quite tight with this deck -- I've found that 16 Forests is just the right number and I'm worried about getting a Cradle instead of a forest in my opening hand. This can cripple me in the long term.

The Glimpse is a good idea, though. I don't think it's right for the Vintage deck, but I'll definitely have to try it in the Legacy version where the loss of Skullclamp really hurts.