Shalai, Voice of Saprolings

Hello everyone,

I love you guys so much that I want to squeeze in 1 more article before I prepare for my Thailand trip. Let’s talk about Saprolings for a minute, shall we? A lot of people have tried building Saprolings all over the internet and I find it refreshing to see some players who actually build these decks and bring them into local FNMs. Though I haven’t heard any saproling decks topping FNMs, I am not discounting the fact this tribe has the raw power.

Saprolings apparently have the most Lords in the format next to Constructs. Sporecrown Thalid is one of the best early lords that can save our 1/1 saprolings from the dreaded Goblin Chainwhirler.

The standard format has never been this cruel to 1 toughness creatures since Engineered Plague and Night of Soul’s Betrayal were legal. It hurts really bad getting wiped clean off the board and still have a 3/3 first striker headed your way.

Once we do get to more mana, Tendershoot Dryad instantly makes our fragile saprolings into gigantic 3/3 monstrosity, while churning 3/3 saprolings every turn. Metallic Mimic is not a lord but if he sticks, he safeguards your 1/1/s by making them 2/2s.

Slimefoot is the reason why people are toying with the saproling idea. The allure of making each of your saprolings drain for 1 when they die is there, but I don’t think Slimefoot is the real commander of our mushroom army.

Shalai, Voice of Plenty in my opinion is the best creature to give the much needed support to our saproling army. Alone she gives them hexproof and her ability makes them permanently bigger and not rely on the lords so much for survival. Lastly, she protects you from Settle the Wreckage which is super relevant to a go-wide deck.

To pay for Shalai’s ability we need tons of mana. Song of Freyalise makes every one a Llanowar Elf for 2 turns, and after Chapter 2 she pumps all our dudes by spreading the much needed +1/+1 counter. With Rishkar, Chapter 3 won’t be the last verse in Freyalise Saga because the mana just keeps flowing thanks to his ability. This continuous source of free mana will eventually make our army of 1/1s extremely huge.

We need to keep some of our key creatures alive to get to the midgame. Blossoming Defense allows our Sporecrown Thalid to stay alive, while Sheltering Light helps keep it that way. Both cost 1 which is quite important early on while we commit to the board and have that 1 mana to respond against removal. They can also be used later to protect Shalai so she keeps everybody else safe.

Here’s how this extremely fun deck looks like!

Creatures: 19

4 Metallic Mimic

4 Sporecrown Thallid

3 Rishkar, Peema Renegade

4 Shalai, Voice of Plenty

4 Tendershoot Dryad

Spells: 15

4 Saproling Migration

4 Spore Swarm

4 Blossoming Defense

3 Sheltering Light

Enchantment: 3

3 Song of Freyalise

Lands: 23

4 Sunpetal Grove

3 Scattered Grove

3 Shefet Dunes

4 Plains

9 Forest

Sideboard: 15

1 Sheltering Light

4 Tocatli Honor Guard

3 Prowling Serpopard

3 Huatli, Radiant Champion

2 Oketra the True

2 Heroic Intervention

If you hate Chainwhirler ruining the party, Tocatli Honor Guard stops all the triggers from ever happening. No more Chainwhirler, Khenra’s ability, and all ETB shenanigans! She also blocks 2/1s and 1/1s pretty well!

Huatli, Radian Champion can now call this deck home thanks her awesome emblem. Any token that hits the table essentially draws us a card. It will only take one tick up to get her to 8 loyalty in this deck anyway. Her -1 ability can also be relevant if you are stalled and can’t get through blockers. Not bad for sending a 10/10 saproling to shed half of your opponent’s life total.

Oketra gives us some longevity if our opponent is great at blocking or is packed with tons of removal. At the mid game, Oketra can help keep the threats coming and once you have enough she can join in the fray and hit for 6 each turn. Hopefully by that time, your opponent has ran out of removal spells.

Against sweeper, we have Heroic Intervention to make sure we don’t just lose to a Fumigate or Sweltering Suns. Hopefully we don’t see Golden Demise and Yahenni’s Expertise often.

Against control, the cat snake comes in to make sure we can still play a game of Magic and once Shalai gets through, your creatures are literally invincible with Heroic Intervention up!

That’s it for tonight, if you have these cards and decide to sleeve it up for an FNM, do let me know how it feels and let’s discuss in the comments section below!

Bye!

Vanson