GW Infect Revisited

It's been a while since I talked about an Infect deck, so today I'd like to bring back a deck that I think has some great promise, Green/White Infect.



Green/White Infect may seem an odd choice at first, but White actually gives us access to several powerful spells. Lost Leonin is the cheapest 2 power Infect creature that was printed, and Priests of Norn have a high enough toughness to put them out of reach of nearly every burn spell or early game attackers.

I've modified my Green/White deck slightly since the last time we saw it (way back at the beginning of June). Here's how it sits currently:

G/W Infect
Lands - 22 4 Inkmoth Nexus 4 Sunpetal Grove 4 Razorverge Thicket 6 Forest 4 Plains Creatures - 15 4 Glistener Elf 4 Priests of Norn 4 Lost Leonin 3 Ichorclaw Myr	Pump - 18 4 Vines of Vastwood 4 Groundswell 4 Mutagenic Growth 4 Apostle's Blessing 2 Emerge Unscathed Artifacts - 2 2 Livewire Lash Spells - 3 3 Silence	Sideboard: 3 Viridian Corrupter 4 Nature's Claim 4 Beast Within 4 Leyline of Sanctity

As you can see, not a whole lot has changed. I dropped the main deck quests for Silence instead. And over on the sideboard I brought in Leyline of Sanctity to help against control decks and Valakut.

Silence in the maindeck is pretty amazing. You can drop it on the beginning of your turn to have your creatures remain more or less entirely unmolested, and that means you can overextend your pump all you want. You can also drop it on your opponents turn to shut them off completely for a whole turn.

So, how does it play?

Match 1: Valakut
I open with a Glistener Elf, and he starts with a tapped Valakut. Turn 2 I drop a Sunpetal Grove and double Groundswell. He untaps his Valakut and draws, and then concedes.

I side in the 4 Leylines and side out 2 Emerge Unscathed and 2 Ichorclaw Myr.

Game 2 I start with a Leyline in my hand and put it out. He plays a Mountain and passes. I draw and play an Inkmoth. He draws and plays a Forest, followed by a Lotus Cobra. I drop a Forest, activate Inkmoth, and Mutagenic Growth it to get in for 3 poison. He plays a Valakut and taps his Forest to play Explore, then drops a Fetch land, and fetches with it, getting another Explore off, and plays a Mountain, and passes. I untap, play a Razorverge and play Priests of Norn, passing back. He untaps, plays a Forest and drops an Inferno Titan plus a Lightning Bolt to kill off my Priest, and attacks with the Cobra. I draw a Vines and play another Inkmoth. I activate Inkmoth using my other Inkmoth and then attack with a kicked Vines, putting him at 8 poison counters. He draws and only has 2 cards in hand, he attacks with the Titan and the Cobra, dealing 3 damage to his own Titan, and passes back. I untap and play a 5th land, activating both Inkmoths, he goes to Lightning Bolt one of them, but I have an Apostle's Blessing in hand, swinging for the last 2 counters and the win, he shows me his last card is a Mountain.

1-0

Match 2: Blue/Green Ramp

I win the roll and keep my opening hand, despite the lack of pump. I start with a Razorverge Thicket and a Glistener Elf, and pass the turn. My opponent plays a Tectonic Edge and passes. I draw a Mutagenic Growth and Attack for 3, leaving my Razorverge untapped with a Emerge Unscathed in hand. My opponent drops a Forest and a Lotus Cobra and passes back. I play another Forest and attack with my Elf, and he doesn't block. I tap a Forest to play another Glistener and end my turn. He plays a Forest, and taps 3 for a Brindle Boar, ending his turn. I play a Priest of Norn and pass back, keeping my land in hand with 3 on the field. My opponent drops a Fetch Land, and uses the mana from it to cast a Lead the Stampede, finding 2 Acidic Slimes. He then taps out to play another Lead the Stampede, finding a Lotus Cobra, another Acidic Slime, and a Fauna Shaman.

I cast the Emerge Unscathed on an Elf, and attack with the Elf and Priest. He's up to 4 counters. My opponent untaps, plays the second Lotus Cobra, and plays a Fetch Land, then uses the mana to play an Acidic Slime and destroy a Forest. I use the rebound on my Elf again, and draw a Silence. I send the Elf in alone to take him up to 5 poison. During his upkeep I cast Silence, he plays a land and passes back to me. I draw a Vines of Vastwood and play it on my Priest of Norn, he lets it go through, and then I cast Apostle's Blessing on him, giving him protection from Green, and getting in for 5 poison and we're off to game 2.

Game 2 and he opens with a Forest. I mulligan down to 6 and have a hand with 3 land, a Glistener Elf, a Mutagenic Growth, and a Livewire Lash. I draw a Plains and open with the Elf and pass back. My opponent drops a second Forest and plays a Fauna Shaman. I draw a second Mutagenic Growth, I play a Forest, and put Livewire Lash in. My opponent untaps and uses Fauna Shaman to ditch a Vengevine, fetching another Vengevine from his Library. He then casts a Green Sun Zenith for 1, fetching a Joraga Treespeaker. I draw a Vines of Vastwood and start counting to see if I can make it. I equip the Livewire Lash onto the Elf, then use a Mutagenic Growth to pop off the Treespeaker, Elf is 5/3. I cast the second Mutagenic Growth, dealing poison to his face, 2 poison, 7/5 Elf. Finally, I cast an unkicked Vines on the Elf, dealing 2 more poison, and then attacking for 7, 11 poison in one turn on turn 3.

2-0

I'm very happy with this deck. The results that I had in this match were actually fairly typical. If you look at this deck compared to the mono-green that I use, it has nearly the same number of pump spells, but forgoes the Dismembers to instead have Apostle's Blessings and Emerge Unscathed.

The Priests of Norn may actually be a little slow for the deck, and if I had room I would put them in the Sideboard rather than keep them in the main, but our Sideboard is already pretty stuffed.

I think that I would definitely run this version over my mono-green if I had the dual lands that I needed. Maybe if I can find them all by Friday I'll try this out at FNM.

Thanks for reading!