There's an inherent tension with 168澳洲幸运5开奖网:Magic: The Gathering players who want to play big creatures such as dinosaurs. The best dinosaurs require a lot of mana to cast, which requires a lot of patience from the player. But the kind of player who wants to play big dinosaurs wants to play those dinosaurs now.

Enter Veloci-Ramp-tor from 168澳洲幸运5开奖网:The Lost Caverns of Ixalan. This deck seeks to꧅ ramp up your mana base quickly and efficiently so you can cast all those big, juicy dinosaurs faster than your opponents can respond. Get ready to unleash your inner dinosaur with this potent comm♊ander deck.

Veloci-Ramp-tor Commander Deck List

But first, let’s take a look at the deck list and see how it breaks down.

Veloci-Ramp-tor Commander Deck Key Themes

There's one major theme to the Veloci-Ramp-tor deck and one minor theme. The major theme is in the name: this deck is all about casting huge Dinosaurs as fast as you can. Play cards like Arcane Signet, Ixalli's Lorekeeper, and Cultivate to start tossing out larger and larger dinosaurs.

Eventually, you'll find something truly game-ending, like Zetalpa, Primal Dawn or Zacama, Primal Calamity. Enhancing the speed at which you find these big dinos is Pantlaza, Sun-Favored, who can discover your way to bigger and badder dinos the more dinosaurs you play.

The minor theme is something that will be familiar to Dinosaur players from the original Ixlan set. About a dozen cards in the deck have either the enrage keyword or a similar ability, which benefits the player for poking your dinosaur just enough to make it angry (without killing it, of course).

This enrage subtheme is supported by the secondary commander, Wayta, Trainer Prodigy, who can both cause two of your dinos to fight on the cheap while simultaneously doubling your Enrage trigg﷽ers.

You'll probably Use Wayta to fight your opponent's creatures more often than your own, however.

Wayta would benefit greatly from a deck that's more focused on the enrage mechanic. For this deck, it's fine to have Wayta present, but you'll get more consistent use out of Pantlaza, Sun-Favored.

Veloci-Ramp-tor Commander Deck Analysis

The overall structure of Veloci-Ramp-tor is pretty solid. You've got 40 creatures (aside from your commander) and 39 lands to ensure a decent opening hand. You've also got 16 cards that ramp your mana production (hence the name), including cards like Ixalli's Lorekeeper, Drover of the Mighty, Wayward Swordtooth, and several others.

With well over half the deck devoted to getting dinosaur boots on the ground, you're certain to get Pantlaza online and discovering dinos.

What's less certain is your early-game survival. Cards like Dinosaur Egg and Ranging Raptors should entice your opponents to leave you alone during the early stages of a game, but you'll be open to punishment if you don't draw one of these rattlesnake cards.

Thankfully, Veloci-Ramp-tor has a bit of life gain from Deathgorge Scavenger, Akroma's Will, Bronzebeak Foragers, Verdant Sun's Avatar, and Zacama, Primal Entity to get back what you lose. There's also Kinjalli's Sunwing and Temple Altisaur to further slow aggression.

As is typical with creature-heavy decks, Veloci-Ramp-tor is light on board wipes. You've got Wakening Sun's Avatar at a hefty eight mana, and Chandra's Ignition at a more reasonable five mana. Apex Altisaur can also theoretically hurt a lot of critters, and Fiery Confluence can clear boards of tokens, but you should generally expect to be on the receiving end of a board-clearing effect.

This leads us to one of the larger problems with Veloci-Ramp-tor. If the board gets cleared, you've really only got two cards that can bring dead things back to life: Atzocan Seer and From the Rubble.

What's worse, while you've got a significant number of draw cards, most of them depend on Dinosaurs to work (either by having those dinos deal or receive damage or having a big power value). Only Return of the Wildspeaker can be cast at instant speed (outside of dinos cast with Progenitor's Icon), so you're vulnerable to losing your board and having nothing left to draw a new hand.

Veloci-Ramp-tor is also a little unflexible, thanks to a lack of targeted removal and graveyard hate. We'll attempt to shore up these weaknesses with a few budget improvements.

Underperforming Cards

Most of these cards do too little for the price point. There's a vast gulf between Bellowing Aegisaur and Etali, Primal Storm or even Earthshaker Dreadmaw, for example. The same can be said for Raging Regisaur and Raging Swordtooth.

Cards like Shifting Ceratops and Thundering Spineback aren't terrible, but they're not great either – especially compared to some budget upgrade options we'll discuss below.

Fiery Confluence is an answer, but it's a little too situational. We can certainly replace it with something more flexible. Drover of the Mighty and Atzocan Seer can also be tossed in favor of cards that offer more options.

Veloci-Ramp-tor Commander Deck Budget Upgrades

A lot of Veloci-Ramp-tor's underperforming cards deal with the Enrage sub-theme, so the budget upgrades suggested are going to focus on what the deck does best: play big dinosaurs. Thankfully, we can b꧃oth play big dinos and still have the flexibility to deal with threats as they 💎arise.

Other Budget Upgrades To Consider

Instant-speed answers are a nice thing to have. Return to Nature, Tamiyo's Safekeeping, and Beast Within are all good additions.

Consider a few more board sweepers to turn the tables on your opponents. Blasphemous Act, Vanquish the Horde, or Chain Reaction are all good options, with Chain Reaction and Blasphemous Ac🃏t potentially adding to your Enrage triggers.

This deck simply cries out for Swiftfoot Boots, and Reap the Past is an excellent way to refill your hand after your opponents cast a board wipe.