Judging by the relative lack of data on Untapped.gg, Alchemy is not very popular right now. But with the release of Alchemy: New Capenna and the upcoming release of Alchemy Horizons: Baldur’s Gate on July 7, the format is getting pushed on MTG Arena. There will be an Alchemy Metagame Challenge on June 10 to 12, and there surely will be more premier Alchemy events on MTG Arena in the summer.
If you’re planning to dive into one of those events, then the deck that I would recommend is Mono-Green Aggro. It doesn’t use any cards from Streets of New Capenna or Alchemy: New Capenna, but it doesn’t need to. It’s fast and deadly.
Alchemy Mono-Green Aggro by Tiamkodubs
Creature (31)
Instant (2)
Enchantment (4)
To give some background, let me take you back to April, to the Alchemy Qualifier Weekend. I knew I wanted to play an aggro deck, and I had had a lot of success with Gruul Werewolves in Alchemy up to that point. Nevertheless, the nerfs to Town-Razer Tyrant and the printing of new green cards in Alchemy: Kamigawa made me wonder whether Mono-Green Aggro might not be superior. I looked over some deck lists on MTG Melee, saw Makoto Suda’s list, and fell in love. I copied that list, went 5-3 in the Qualifier Weekend, and knew it was the real deal.
Since then, snow versions with Blizzard Brawl have seemingly become the norm. Matt Nass went 7-2 in that Qualifier Weekend with such a version, and Tiamkodubs was crushing the Constructed ladder at the end of May. Several players, including mtgfletcher and gbordes picked up Tiamkodubs’s list and got incredible win rates as well.
Viewed from the lens of my own experiences with Mono-Green Aggro, I believe Tiamkodubs’s list is excellent, both in Best-of-Three and Best-of-One, which is why I’ve showed it above.
The standout card from Alchemy: Kamigawa was Forceful Cultivator. If you have drawn exactly two lands by turn two, then you can set up the dream curve of Ascendant Packleader into Forceful Cultivator. This allows you to attack with a 3/2 as early as turn two. If you have a Turntimber Symbiosis for turn three, then you could cast Ulvenwald Oddity, swing in for 10 damage, and crush your opponent with ease.
To enable such powerful Forceful Cultivator starts, the deck has 14 actual lands and 10 MDFCs. After running the numbers, I like this breakdown: the probability of drawing exactly two lands by turn two (barring mulligans, randomizing play/draw) is maximized with 14 lands. To be specific, it’s 33.1 percent. In any case, it’s not a big difference with the 32.8 percent you’d get with 15 lands, but it’s sweet when your land count is backed up by math.
The other standout from Alchemy: Kamigawa was Jukai Liberator. The dream is to pick up an unblocked Tenacious Pup on turn two, as that allows you to get another use out of the Pup’s enters-the-battlefield trigger.
Jukai Liberator also supports the relatively low land counts required by Forceful Cultivator, as seeking a land will usually put a basic into your hand, which allows you to keep curving out.
As I mentioned, the first Forceful Cultivator list I saw and played did not have Blizzard Brawl. Instead, it had a motley assortment of Tamiyo’s Safekeeping, Inscription of Abundance and Snakeskin Veil in the main deck. At first glance, this made sense to me – with so many MDFCs, the number of snow lands was too small to reliably give indestructible with Blizzard Brawl. But you don’t need indestructible.
With so many 4/4s and massive bodies in the deck, a regular one-mana fight is often already good enough. Besides, you’re still over 50 percent to draw three Snow-Covered Forests or Forceful Cultivator in your top 10 cards. Given the raw efficiency of Blizzard Brawl, there’s enough upside to risk it.
Giant Regrowth is not in the list, but it’s a funny design from Alchemy: New Capenna. I just wanted to mention that despite looking at the newly cards, I didn’t see anything that would fit the deck well. In particular, Giant Regrowth looks too slow. But hey, if a deck ain’t broke, don’t fix it! Mono-Green Aggro is one of the best decks available in Alchemy right now.
I’ve been playing this deck to great success in Alchemy over the past week, and I recommend cutting both the Lair of the Hydra for two more Snow-Covered Forest. I rarely activated Lair because you already have plenty of things to do with your mana between Ulvenwald Oddity and Ranger Class, and you’re already running 6 other tapped lands. This also makes Blizzard Brawl a little better.
However, the main reason is because of the non-synergy with Jukai Liberator. It’s very frequent that you’ll hit the opponent with Jukai Liberator and choose Land in order to get a land to play something powerful on curve, like an Old-Growth Troll. However, about 20% of the time, you’ll instead hit Lair of the Hydra, which comes into play tapped, and you won’t be able to make the powerful play you were planning on. I’d rather have the certainty of always getting an untapped land, especially since Lair was almost never activated anyways.
That’s a good suggestion! I’ve run into the same Jukai Liberator problems as you, and it can indeed be a massive downside to seek a tapped land. Switching to an all Snow-Covered Forest mana base sounds good to me.