Background

I have been experimenting with proactive combo-oriented Lands builds in many forms for a long time. I started with creating Ad Nauseam lands way back in the Miracles meta, and have gone through many iterations of Treasure Hunt memes.

While Crop Rotation and Dark Depths are very powerful cards, and key parts of traditional Lands and Turbo Depths, they take up a lot of deck space and provide a point of weakness against common hate like Force of Will and Wasteland.

I discovered Mulch while testing a Treasure Hunt Lands list. Even though the upside was nowhere near as crazy as Treasure Hunt, the consistency was far higher, and it got me excited about diving even deeper into the Mulch plan.

Deck Card Choices

The deck is based on using traditional Exploration as well as Manabond to get as many lands into play as possible to power the land threats Field of the Dead and Urza’s Saga. To back this up, we use land-advantage spells like Life from the Loam, Mulch and Winding Way, which all can easily be 3-for-1 land card advantage.

The printing of several new powerful cards enabled this deck to rise in strength, making it a new viable archetype:

Urza’s Saga – A more consistent and powerful threat than Dark Depths. It doesn’t require tutor support to put on pressure.

Boseiju, Who Endures – Flexible card that gives a maindeckable, recurrable, tutorable answer to common problems such as Dark Depths, Blood Moon, and Leyline of the Void.

Winding Way – Mulch 5-8. With access to 8 Mulches, we can consistently find them.

Roadside Reliquary – This land is very easy to turn on with Urza’s Saga alone easily covering both card types. Divination on a land gives the deck another line of card advantage that is not disrupted by graveyard hate.

Commune with Spirits – This awkward cantrip actually works in this deck, since it adds consistency at hitting the 1 mana enchantments in green.

Decklist(s):

12-0 Match streak, showcasing the raw power of the deck. Shoutout to isthetim for ending my streak with LANDS. Here are some of the lists I and others have done well with.

5-0 By Me, Bryanftw

Safer version with less power:

5-0 By Me, Bryanftw:

5-0 By PunishingWaterfalls learned of the deck, got excited, and took it for a spin.

Bonus Memes for high rollers:

Matchups

Fast Combo 
(Storm, Belcher, Doomsday, Omnitell)
These are very bad matchups, as they are for most land-based decks

GY Combo
Reanimator, Dredge, Oops
Can be favorable with enough sideboarding

Delver
Slightly favorable, but can get delvered just like everyone else

Slow Control
(Bant, Miracles, etc)
This is why we play the deck, if you have an uncontested exploration, you WILL win.

Land-based
(Lands, Depths)
Skill matchup, slightly favorable since we are faster and have many tools to answer depths

Death and Taxes
Very favored, bury them in inevitability

Prison
Very favored, good luck with Blood Moon or Chalice of the void against Boseiju. If you get a basic forest against Moon Stompy you win the game.

Hullbreacher/Day’s Undoing Combo
Unfavored, we don’t have enough answers for hullbreacher, narset

Elves
Even-ish. We have Cage and Spirit out of the board, but rely heavily on Tabernacle like traditional Lands

Gameplay Examples

Making zombies is fun. Winning a G1 against a reanimated Griselbrand and Archon is also fun.

In addition to the screenshot, there are a number of gameplay videos thanks to PunishingWaterfalls, who played the deck to a 22nd place finish in the 2/26/22 Legacy Challenge. Their content can be found on Twitch and on YouTube (and just below).

Challenge run:

League Matches:

Closing thoughts

I don’t know what the best version of this deck is. I just know that there’s enough power here for the 8-mulch deck to become its own archetype. Should we splash blue for Uro and flusterstorm? Red for Valakut Exploration and blasts? Is there space for inevitability engines such as Hall of Heliod’s Generosity?  I would love for you to come join in enjoying the archetype to help figure it out.