Green White Tokens – Standard Magic: The Gathering Deck

This post has been ported over from my archetype thread on Wizards of the Coast’s Magic: The Gathering forums. (former, no-longer-working URL: http://community.wizards.com/forum/standard-deck-help/threads/2106816)

Note on Alt tags: Alt Text in the card images here will assume the reader is savvy to Magic: The Gathering shorthand, be consolidated to the most relevant info for this deck archetype, and use current oracle text from time of adding the text. Please see Gatherer for the most current and detailed card info.

Green White Tokens is an aggro deck that can take early board control, put the opponent on a very fast clock, and still recover from board sweepers quickly. In many cases, we can instrument a 5-6th turn kill. This deck is fast, strong in the midrange, and still a threat in the late game. It is incredibly consistent and… Who doesn’t love playing with Overrun???

It also houses answers to most other decks that are currently in the meta. Wrath of God allows us to clear the board to make room for our fast recovery, while Dauntless Escort protects us from the opponent’s sweepers. Qasali Pridemage breaks down Artifact and Enchantment threats, while Path to Exile takes care of singular creatures that are in our way.

Why should I play this?

If you like fast aggro, but are sick of losing to Black-White Tokens and Control, this is the deck for you. If you love seeing opponents facepalm after dropping a Cloudgoat Ranger right after they resolved Wrath of God, this is the deck for you. If you like forcing other aggro decks into defensive mode with speed and board presence, play this deck.

How do I play Green White Tokens?

The deck is pretty straight-forward. There are some points where we’ll be forced to choose between playing Garruk Wildspeaker or a Wilt-Leaf Liege. Or perhaps we’ll wonder if we should play Windbrisk Heights on turn 2 or 3. Much of this is dependent upon on build, but because we’re mostly proactive our hand should dictate our actions on curve.

If I have Spectral Procession in my hand, I will play Windbrisk as early as I possibly can without interrupting a Noble Hierarch ramp. Otherwise, I’d sooner play a Forest to get my Dauntless Escort out nice and early. Much of it is practice, just as with any deck.

Card Pool

In order of converted mana cost.

Noble Hierarch & Birds of Paradise

Ramp is one of the key advantages Green-White Tokens has over Black-White Tokens. Noble Hierarch and Birds of Paradise allow us to accelerate into a turn 2 Spectral Procession, turn 3 Windbrisk Heights activation, flipping over a turn 4 Overrun. An absolute 4-Of.

Llanowar Elves can also work. They’re good for ramping into an Overrun, but not helpful for Spectral Procession.

Figure of Destiny

A very good 1-drop, but it doesn’t have much synergy with this deck because our early and greedy mana usage leaves little to be spared to pump him up and our Forests can’t help.

Burrenton Forge-Tender

Useful in burn-heavy metas and/or builds that play Ranger of Eos.

Path to Exile

Arguably the best creature spot removal in standard.

Qasali Pridemage

A 2cc 2/2 Exalted creature that uses both our colors makes a great threat early and an even greater one with a Wilt-Leaf Liege in play. Add to that the ability to get rid of a Runed Halo, Bitterblossom, etc. and we’ve got a triple-threat.

Steward of Valeron

A nice mana accelerator in some decks, but I find him less useful in the 2-slot than Qasali Pridemage.

Knight of Meadowgrain

A strong and efficient 2-drop.

Elvish Visionary

A nice cantrip to help push into 3-attacker range for Windbrisk Heights.

Spectral Procession

Our token generator of choice, which also makes Windbrisk Heights amazing. 4-Of.

Kitchen Finks

One of the best creatures in the format, plus they’re in our colors. Excellent against burn and nice against Swans, too. Early life gain puts a damper on any aggro deck’s morale and scope.

Dauntless Escort

An efficient 3/3 in our colors, plus he can save us from board sweepers (including our own). He should be at least a 2-of with more in the sideboard.

Glorious Anthem

Obviously helpful, but I prefer Liege because it gives Qasali, Escort, Finks, Stewards, and other Lieges +2/+2 and it laughs at Blightning.

Stillmoon Cavalier

A very evasive creature that is mostly useful in the sideboard, but could also have main deck uses in the right metagame.

Behemoth Sledge

Can be very nice for breaking board stalls, but can slow down a hand if used before it can be equipped right away.

Wilt-Leaf Liege

Makes our Kitchen Finks into Thoctars and our tokens bigger than theirs. Even though Blightning is a bit out of style right now, it’s always a treat to be hit by with this guy in our hand.

Ranger of Eos

A good friend of Card Advantage. Helps us refill our hands if our deck is built with the right 1-drops.

Sigil Captain

A decent budget option, but not as effective as Wilt-Leaf Liege.

Wrath of God

Sometimes we’re a midrange deck. Did an aggro deck get an early start on us? Hold back some threats, reset the board with Wrath, and reload our side right after.

Ajani Goldmane, Garruk Wildspeaker, and Elspeth, Knight-Errant

All three of these Planeswalkers can be powerful additions to a Green White Tokens deck.

• Ajani can reset slain Kitchen Finks persist ability, give our tokens vigilance, gain life in a pinch, and permanently (cumulatively) buff our tokens.
• Garruk can provide acceleration, repeatable 3/3 token generation, and eventually a built-in (but unsurprising) Overrun.
• Elspeth generates weenies, buffs single units for big smashes through the air, and makes our board presence immovable if we haven’t won by the time she hits 8 Loyalty.

Hunting Triad & Gilt-Leaf Ambush

More token generators that work well with Windbrisk Heights.

Cloudgoat Ranger

Efficient token generator + a nice evasive 5/3 beater. An excellent late game play or Windbrisk Heights goodie. Don’t overextend with it into a sweeper.

Overrun

The most Timmy funneriffic alpha strike in standard right now.

Martial Coup

A very nice Wrath alternative that synergizes with our deck. It’s a little expensive for its main utility of course.

Lands

We generally stay at 24 total lands with 4 Hierarchs to be as consistent as possible.

Windbrisk Heights

One of the pivotal cards that make the deck work, Windbrisk Heights is also a strong turn 1 drop if we don’t have a Noble Hierarch or Birds of Paradise ready.

Treetop Village

Another threat we can drop on turn 1 if we like. This powerful creature land can sometimes even win games against control (or other sorcery-speed removal heavy) decks single-handedly.

Brushland

Because we have so many lands that come into play tapped, while still needing both of our colors as early as turn 2, pain lands are required. The 2-3 damage we generally suffer from them is rarely relevant.

Wooded Bastion

Great any time other than turn 1 or with too many copies in an opening hand.

Recommended Mana Base

This obviously depends on the non-lands we choose, but here’s a basic guideline.

• 4 x Windbrisk Heights
• 4 x Wooded Bastion
• 4 x Brushland
• 3 x Treetop Village
• 5-6 x Forest
• 3-4 x Plains

The Mana Curve

1. (4 Recommended) Noble Hierarch is an ideal first turn play, but Windbrisk Heights (CIPT) is a close second, so we don’t need too much 1cc.
2. (4-8 Recommended) Efficient beaters or mana acceleration can be placed here if desired.
3. (12-16 Recommended) The nice meaty center to our mana curve, filled with value creatures mostly.
4. (8-14 Recommended) Wrath of God, our Planeswalkers, and Lieges fill this spot up tightly.
5. (4-6 Recommended) Finishers and fast multi-threat creatures to refill the board after a sweeper.

Strong Opening Hand Examples

1. Brushland, Noble Hierarch
2. Plains, Spectral Procession
3. Forest, Ajani Goldmane
4. Forest, Overrun (goldfish opponent dead)

1. Windbrisk Heights
2. Wooded Bastion, Qasali Pridemage
3. Plains, Spectral Procession
4. Forest, Activate Windbrisk Heights, (2 mana left)

1. Treetop Village
2. Wooded Bastion, Qasali Pridemage
3. Plains, Behemoth Sledge
4. Forest, Wrath of God
5. Cloudgoat Ranger

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Sideboard

Additional Removal424340

Additional copies help greatly against any other creature aggro match-up or the mirror. A large part of controlling the board is keeping it clean on the opposite side.

Universal and specialized additional removal spells can help in a lot of situations where our creatures don’t line up well against theirs.

Dauntless Escort

Synergizes with the extra Wraths we may throw in, plus helps on its own against control decks with heavy sweepers.

Runed Halo & Pithing Needle

Massacres Swans, hurts 5cc, stops combo decks.

Guttural Response

Hurts nearly any control deck.

Austere Command

Mostly in there against Turbo-Fog to clear away their artifacts, but also useful in other situations. Too slow for use against aggro.

Primal Command

Anti-Mill, Anti-Recursion, find our Dauntless Escorts/Lieges, Gain 7 Life, remove Plainswalkers.

Cloudthresher

A great way to surprise an opponent that sides out their spot removal for mass (sorcery-speed or Volcanic Fallout) removal. Strong against Bitterblossom or as an immediate follow-up to a sweeper. Can drastically tilt the board in our favor and win the game alone.

Eyes of the Wisent

An excellent proactive 2-drop against Sanity Grinding, Turbo-Fog, 5CC, or even Faeries. Anyone running 8+ counters would hate to see this.

Relic of Progenitus

Stops recursion, or is a fine fill-in card for when we want to side out a dead card.

Sideboard Targets for Ranger of Eos

• Burrenton Forge-Tender has obvious utility against red decks, and sometimes even Jund.
• Elvish Hexhunter is a 1 mana alternative to Qasali Pridemage.
• Scattershot Archer is nice against Faeries and other Tokens decks.

Match-Ups

These are estimates based on my personal experience at FNM and local PTQs. (Let me know if you have differing experiences or tips!)

Black White Tokens: 66%

We nearly always outrun them, our Wraths get under their skin, our life gain is better than their Bitterblossom pains, and Overrun just rocks the house. We worry about Zealous Persecution (until we play a Liege) and Glorious Anthem should always be a target for our Qasalis. In general, we have answers for their threats more often than they have enough for ours.

Red-based Aggro: 66%

We throw a monkey wrench in their plans every time we play Kitchen Finks. They can’t block our flyers. If Ajani Goldmane stays in play, they lose. If they use all their burn spells for removal, they lose. If the game reaches turn 7+, they lose. This is a strong match-up as long as we main deck Kitchen Finks and 3+ Paths for their Hellspark Elementals.

Blightning Aggro: 80%

This is the more disruptive midrange version of Red-Black aggro, and we’re generally better at that tempo than them. They have a lot of trouble with Wilt-Leaf Lieges being dropped for free. The addition of disruption spells that generally do not work on us slows them down into the mid-game. See Red-based aggro for the rest.

White Weenie (Kithkin) 50%

They have similar strengths to us because of Kithkins’ ability to play big things fast and multiple things early. It is a straight-forward brawl of a match, but we can squeeze out advantage with a well-placed Wrath of God, which are even better with Dauntless Escort. The Kithkin deck has to extend itself to beat us quickly, so we must be patient and let them fall into the trap.

“Boat Brew” Red-White Kithkin/Tokens 33%

Intimidation Bolt hurts. Ajani Vengeant hurts. Fight to the Death hurts. In the hands of a skilled player, these things are deadly for us. Because these decks can vary a bit, our best bet is to try to scout their deck out before our match and play around their removal/tempo threats. If we know they use Intimidation Bolt, wait for them to tap out before popping Garruk’s Ultimate or flipping over that Overrun.

Our speed is about the same, but our threats are bigger. Their big thing is gaining board advantage, and we just do it better. This will not be an easy match-up, but our consistency and ability to get bigger threats than theirs out at the same time can give us an edge.

Finest Hour / Exalted Bant 55%

Our mana curves are similar, so the match will often go to the one who goes first if we don’t pull a Wrath. Ajani Goldmane on our side of the board is a godsend in this match. We can reliably chump their exalted bashers, but if we keep doing that without answering back with heavy hitters or sweepers of our own, we’re at a disadvantage. Luckily, our deck usually has more answers for them than they have for us, so we improve our match-up significantly post-sideboard.

Sanity Grinding: 60%

The Sanity Grinding Match-up is heavily dependent on their draws. If they draw the best hand possible, we will usually lose right before we kill them. If they don’t draw an ideal hand, they will only be able to slow us down for a few turns before we hit them very hard.

Turbo-Fog 35%

We don’t have a lot of answers for this match-up. Our best bet is to target their Howling Mines and Font of Mythos with our Qasali Pridemages. They only have 12 Fogs in their deck at best and taking away their drawing engines kills them. Sideboard in Primal Command and use them when they tap out to end their hopes of winning almost immediately.

In timed rounds, if we win the first game, they will have to play fast and loose (read: worse) to have enough time to win the second and third.

Jund Aggro: 70%

They can hit us slightly earlier than we can hit them, but our board control cleans out their hand. When they spend all their burn spells keeping us off of Windbrisk Heights activation, they will run out of steam and we will win with our 3-for-1 and 4-for-1 plays like Spectral Procession and Cloudgoat Ranger. If they are super-aggressive and directly burn us while ignoring our board, we can outpace them, assuming we get decent draws. Kitchen Finks help and so does sideboarding up to 4 Path to Exiles and 4 Dauntless Escorts.

5-Color Cruel Control: 70%

We are too fast and too unrelenting. They may be able to counter our Spectral Processions, but they will die to an onslaught of Treetop Villages and Garruk Tokens. Dauntless Escorts give them major migraines.

Reveillark Control: 55%

This match-up is heavily dependent on the Reveillark Control pilot. If he/she is a very strong player who is 100% familiar with our deck, the match-up is in their favor. Luckily everyone knows that we’re supposed to save our Path to Exile for Reveillark, right? The best advice I can give for this match would be to mulligan any hand that won’t get us ahead early. If we don’t put them on their heels early, we’ll be on ours soon.

PlanesRazer (Realm Razer + Planeswalkers): 50%

One of my teammates plays PlanesRazer as heavily as I play Green White Tokens, so we clash often. The keys to victory are: A.) Don’t over-extend our lands (5 is fine), B.) Keep a Path to Exile and a Plains ready for Realm Razer once they get close to enough mana, and C.) Know which Planeswalkers to kill (Sarkhan Vol kills us in three turns) and which to ignore (Elspeth, Knight-Errant).

Go for the throat in any situation where we’re not sure. Sideboard in Dauntless Escort, Path to Exile, and Pithing Needle. My Green White Tokens always win if I get their health to single digits before turn 5.

Also note that when lands come back into play from a Realm Razing they come back tapped, so Path the Realm Razer at the end of their turn.

Doran Rock / Dark Bant: 40%

On any decent draw for them, they can turn 1 ramp, turn 2 (Thoughtseize + Tidehollow Sculler) or Doran, the Siege Tower. Either sucks for us, since the only removal we generally use is Path to Exile. The disruption is tough to deal with and they have answers for nearly everything we have, including Maelstrom Pulse, Nameless Inversion (for the escorts), Path to Exile, big gnarly creatures, and Zealous Persecution in the sideboard. Find a way to use our Windbrisks and Planeswalkers effectively and don’t take too big of a hit early.

4-Color Doran tends to swing in for big numbers early, so if u can stay in double digit life until turn 4 and hold some board position we can probably pull it out.

Sideboard vs. Doran: Celestial Purge, Runed Halo, max out Path to Exiles, Wrath of Gods and/or Martial Coups.

Faeries: 70%

The people playing Faeries at my local shop are very experienced with it, so my estimate might be low. We generally Overrun them with bigger threats and their Bitterblossoms don’t like our Kitchen Finks.

5-Color Cascade Control: 90%

Unless we draw ridiculously badly, we kill them before they can really contain us. There isn’t much trick to it, beyond playing the deck as designed.

Green White Tokens by Propagandist (me)

This is my preferred list for my local meta in Las Vegas, NV. With it, I placed in the top 8 of a regional qualifier.

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When M10 Comes Out

I plan a few modifications.

Main Deck:

Sideboard:

Green White Tokens Pro Decklists

Star City Deck Archive Link: https://old.starcitygames.com/decks/results/format/1/start_date/01-09-2008/end_date/31-12-2009/simple_card_name_1/Cloudgoat%20Ranger/simple_card_name_2/Noble%20Hierarch/w_perc/0/g_perc/0/r_perc/0/b_perc/0/u_perc/0/a_perc/0/order_1/finish/limit/25/start_num/0/

Budget Green White Tokens by Dave Meeson (StarCityGames)

Green White Tokens by Tomy Vercety

1st Place – Magic Online Championship Series Season 1 – 05/03/2009

Green White Tokens by Hai Li

2nd Place – SCG 1k Roanoke – 05/17/2009

Green White Tokens by Joshua Scott Honingmann

4th Place – SCG 5k Indy – 03/28/2009

No matter which list you choose, try out Green White Tokens today!