Gruul Ponza Sideboard Guide

Introduction

Gruul Ponza is a ramp deck that spends its early turns doing two things at once: building its own mana far ahead of schedule with Arbor Elf, Utopia Sprawl, and Wild Growth, and tearing down the opponent's mana with Thermokarst and Mwonvuli Acid-Moss. Once that gap opens, cascade creatures like Annoyed Altisaur and Boarding Party land on top of whatever the opponent still has and bury it.

The deck is a steady presence in the format at 2.4% of the field, and it has been putting up results: Cachorrowo won the September 6 Pauper Challenge with it, josepcv took 2nd at the SuperPauper IslandTCG FT. Mansion Markov event on September 20, and the deck followed up with League 5-0s from MisterTwin on September 30 and babamm on October 1.

The deck beats slow decks that need many lands to function and cannot afford to lose one early, along with fair midrange and creature decks that trade one for one and cannot punish a tapped-out turn. It is favored against Monster Tron, Golgari Gardens, Familiars, Madness Burn, White Aggro, and Flicker Tron, and slightly favored against Dimir Terror.

It struggles against fast, cheap-spell decks that run on one or two lands, kill the mana creature on sight, and race while it taps out to set up, and against combo decks that ignore the board entirely. It is unfavored against Mono Red Madness, Blue Terror, Elves, Spy Combo, Jund Wildfire, Mono Blue Faeries, Bogles, Grixis Affinity, and Black Sacrifice.

General Strategy

Gruul Ponza plays a mana war. Every game you are trying to be the player with more usable mana, and you attack that from both sides: Arbor Elf with Utopia Sprawl or Wild Growth on a Forest gives you a big-spell turn far earlier than a normal curve allows, and Thermokarst and Mwonvuli Acid-Moss take a land away from the opponent while they are still trying to hit their drops. The most important thing the pilot does is convert that gap into pressure before it closes: the land destruction is not the win, it is the turn you buy so that Annoyed Altisaur, Boarding Party, and Avenging Hunter arrive against an opponent who cannot answer them.

The engine is one enchanted Forest. Utopia Sprawl and Wild Growth each make a land produce extra mana whenever it is tapped, and Arbor Elf untaps that land so you tap it a second time in the same turn. One land carrying both auras, untapped once by the elf, produces the bulk of a big-spell turn by itself. On top of that, Writhing Chrysalis and Eldrazi Repurposer leave Eldrazi Spawn tokens behind, each a one-shot mana source you can bank and spend together to reach the top of the curve a turn ahead of your land count.

A typical game has three phases. Setup is the first turn: an accelerant on a Forest, ideally Arbor Elf or Utopia Sprawl. The payoff turn comes immediately after, and it goes one of two ways: either Mwonvuli Acid-Moss or Thermokarst destroys a land (Mwonvuli Acid-Moss also puts a Forest onto your side, so it widens the gap from both directions), or Writhing Chrysalis comes down with its two Spawn to hold the ground. is a third piece of permanent removal that can hit an artifact instead of a land. The close is a creature every turn: takes the initiative and starts venturing, and each cascade into a free spell as you cast them, and those oversized bodies, together with a grown , win in combat.

The Cards

Arbor Elf

The elf is the piece that makes one enchanted land count twice: tap the Forest, untap it with the elf, tap it again. On its own it is only a second mana from the second turn on, but with Utopia Sprawl and Wild Growth on the same land it is the difference between a normal turn and a seven-mana turn. It also untaps Highland Forest, since that land is a Forest. Expect it to eat the first cheap removal spell the opponent draws; it is the card most hands cannot afford to lose.

Utopia Sprawl

The better of the two auras, because the extra mana it adds can be any color you choose as it enters. With only a couple of red lands in the deck, a Utopia Sprawl naming red is often your red source for the whole game, which is what puts Writhing Chrysalis and Boarding Party on the table. It can only go on a Forest, but Highland Forest qualifies. The color is locked in when it enters, so decide it against the hand in front of you rather than the hand you hope to draw.

Wild Growth

Green only, but it enchants any land and does the same job: one more mana each time the land is tapped, doubled by Arbor Elf whenever it sits on a Forest, and best of all on the same Forest as Utopia Sprawl. It is the aura you want for the double-green land-kill spells, and the second aura that pushes a two-land board to the top of the curve.

Role Assignment

Gruul Ponza is a ramp deck with a tempo-positive early game and medium inevitability. Its interaction is almost entirely land destruction, with two copies of Skred as the only creature removal and no countermagic, so its role in a matchup is decided by one question: does taking a land away from this opponent actually cost them a turn? When it does, the deck is the beatdown and should push hard. When it does not, the land-kill spells are close to blank, and the deck has to play a more defensive game around its creatures.

Vs. Aggro. Against fast creature decks you are the control. Their curve fits on two lands, so Thermokarst and Mwonvuli Acid-Moss cost you a full turn without slowing them, and every turn you tap out to ramp is a turn they attack freely. The axes here are whether they kill Arbor Elf before the ramp snowballs and whether they can end the race before your top end arrives. The play that shows the role is skipping the land kill to cast Writhing Chrysalis early and holding both Spawn as chump blockers, then stabilizing behind reach bodies until Annoyed Altisaur outclasses everything they have.

Vs. Midrange. Against fair midrange decks you are the beatdown, because your threats are bigger than theirs and each one brings extra value. Their one-for-one removal falls behind cascade: killing Boarding Party still leaves whatever it cascaded into, and Eldrazi Repurposer leaves a Spawn behind. Land destruction matters most here when it targets a color they need, since midrange decks lean on multiple colors and a single dual land. The defining play is Mwonvuli Acid-Moss on their only source of a splash color, followed by a threat a turn ahead of schedule.

Vs. Control. Against control you are unambiguously the beatdown, and this is where the land destruction is strongest. Control decks need to reach four or five lands before they operate, and each land you destroy pushes their sweepers and card-draw engines back a turn while your mana keeps climbing. The axis is whether they can hold up a counterspell for every threat, and cascade breaks that math: a countered still resolves its cascaded spell. The play that shows the role is a second-turn off and an aura before they have countermagic mana, then a cascade creature every turn until they run out of answers.

Play Patterns

Put Utopia Sprawl and Wild Growth on the same Forest that Arbor Elf untaps. The elf untaps one land, so every aura on that land is paid out twice per turn while an aura on any other land is paid out once. Concentrating them is what reaches the seven-mana turn a full turn early. With Forest, Forest, Arbor Elf, Utopia Sprawl, Wild Growth, and Annoyed Altisaur: land and elf on turn one, then on turn two the second Forest pays for Utopia Sprawl on the first Forest, and tapping that enchanted Forest pays for Wild Growth on the same land. On turn three, even without a third land, the double-enchanted Forest makes three, the elf untaps it for three more, and the second Forest makes seven: Annoyed Altisaur. Split the auras across both Forests and the same board caps at six. Spread them out only when you have no elf, since then nothing doubles and putting both on one land just means one removal spell takes everything.
Once Avenging Hunter takes the initiative, block to keep every point of combat damage off your life total, even with Eldrazi Spawn. The opponent steals the initiative the moment any of their creatures deals combat damage to you, and then they are the one venturing every upkeep. A 0/1 Spawn dying in a chump block keeps the designation yours, and each clean turn cycle ventures you further into Undercity. The initiative also survives the hunter dying, so what you protect is your life total, not the creature: it is fine to trade Avenging Hunter off in combat as long as nothing connects.
When both land-kill spells are castable, cast Mwonvuli Acid-Moss before Thermokarst. The expensive one is the one that ramps you: the Forest it puts onto the battlefield compounds your mana lead and pulls the cascade turns closer, while the cheaper slots more easily alongside another play on a later turn. Leading with the cheap spell to save mana this turn gives up the free land and leaves the four-mana spell as a clunky follow-up when you would rather be casting a threat.

Black Sacrifice

Carrion Feeder - emblematic card for this matchup — Read the Black Sacrifice primer →

Matchup - Unfavored

We are the slower deck here, and the matchup is unfavored. Black Sacrifice attacks with one-drops from the first turns and casts its whole deck off two Swamps, so Thermokarst and Mwonvuli Acid-Moss barely slow them, and our ten land-kill cards are near-dead draws in Game 1. That puts us in the control role: hold the ground with bigger creatures, kill the creatures that grow, and turn the corner with trample and cascade only once their sacrifice synergies are gone. Our big creatures have to land and stick before Carrion Feeder and Mortician Beetle outgrow our blockers. The play matters more to us than to them, because on the draw they get an extra attack and another turn of growth before our first blocker arrives.

Spend the early accelerated turns on creatures, not land destruction. Eldrazi Repurposer or Writhing Chrysalis meets their first attacks. A land-kill spell is for a turn with no creature to cast, and it goes at their second Swamp to delay their two-mana cards. Keep hands the same way: a land-kill spell doesn't count toward a keep, and Utopia Sprawl or Wild Growth is a better accelerant than Arbor Elf, which dies to Shambling Ghast's death trigger or Tragic Slip, while nothing they play removes a land or an enchantment. Then block rather than race. Every creature they play has 1 toughness before counters and Carrion Feeder can't block, so our 3-toughness creatures hold the ground, and Writhing Chrysalis and Annoyed Altisaur also stop Infestation Sage's flying Insects.

Once the board stalls, the long game is ours. We draw cascade creatures that bring a free spell, and their 1/1s mostly have to chump-block our 5- and 6-power creatures, while their one-drops do little on their own. Turn the corner carefully, though. Cast Avenging Hunter only when our blockers can stop every attacker they have, because one creature getting through takes the initiative and they then venture into Undercity every upkeep. Don't attack with Boarding Party into an untapped Bloodthrone Vampire when they have creatures to sacrifice: one sacrifice makes it a 3/3 blocker that kills our 6/3. Annoyed Altisaur is the attacker that breaks through, since trample pushes damage past the 1/1 tokens their death triggers leave behind as chump blockers.

Key Threats

Carrion Feeder is the creature that grows past our blockers. Any of their creatures about to die, whether a blocked attacker or a removal target, can be sacrificed to it for a counter, so our blocks and removal tend to feed it instead of killing anything cleanly. Point Skred, our only creature removal in Game 1, at it while their board is small. Every land we play is snow, so each land adds a point of damage they can only match by sacrificing another creature in response. On the draw, a hand with Skred beats one with an extra accelerant, because their first growing creature will be on the battlefield before our first blocker.

Mortician Beetle is the other Skred target, and it grows off our sacrifices as well as theirs. Until it is dead, sacrifice an Eldrazi Spawn for mana only when that gets a cascade creature out a turn early, because every other Spawn we cash in is a permanent counter on one of their attackers. Many builds add Sadistic Glee, which grows its creature off every one of those deaths too.

Rite of Consumption is how they get damage past our blockers. Once our big creatures stall their attacks, they sacrifice a grown Carrion Feeder or a pumped Bloodthrone Vampire after combat to drain us for its power, so a creature we ignore because it can't attack through us still becomes damage. Kill the growing creature when we can, and chump a grown attacker with an Eldrazi Spawn rather than take the hit, because the same creature can hit us for its power a second time after combat.

Accursed Marauder shows up in many builds and takes our big creature whenever it is our only nontoken creature, since Eldrazi Spawn can't be given up in its place. Keep Arbor Elf or Eldrazi Repurposer on the battlefield as the creature we sacrifice instead. Eldrazi Repurposer even leaves a Spawn behind.

Snuff Out is in some lists as a free answer to any creature we play, and Tragic Slip does the same job for one mana once a sacrifice turns on morbid. Tap out for Avenging Hunter or another creature that didn't cascade, and they answer our whole turn while still spending their mana on one-drops. Lead with Boarding Party or Annoyed Altisaur instead: the cascade spell resolves first, so their removal only answers half the card.

Sideboard Plan

In:

2 Breath Weapon
2 Cast into the Fire
2 Suplex
2 Monstrous Emergence
2 Weather the Storm

Out:

4 Thermokarst
4 Mwonvuli Acid-Moss
2 Structural Distortion

Breath Weapon comes in because every creature card they play has 1 toughness, so it wipes their board at instant speed while only killing Arbor Elf and Eldrazi Spawn on our side. Supernatural Stamina can bring one creature back, but a wide board still shrinks to a few creatures our blockers handle.

Cast into the Fire kills two of their 1-toughness creatures for two mana at instant speed: Carrion Feeder or Mortician Beetle, Infestation Sage's flying Insects, or the tokens chump-blocking our tramplers. Any creature they save by sacrificing in response costs them another body.

Suplex handles any of their creatures that hasn't grown past 3 toughness. When they can't sacrifice the target in response, the exile also stops its death trigger, Supernatural Stamina's return and a later Unearth.

Monstrous Emergence is the answer to a Carrion Feeder or Mortician Beetle that has grown too big for our other removal. Revealing Boarding Party or Annoyed Altisaur from hand makes it a two-mana kill.

Weather the Storm belongs on their turn, in response to Rite of Consumption at the latest. Their turns are chains of one-mana spells and it gets a copy for every spell already cast that turn, which offsets the drain and their wide attacks while our big blockers take over.

Thermokarst goes out: they run their whole curve off one or two Swamps, so a three-mana land kill barely slows them. These slots go to removal for the one-drops that are actually attacking us.

Mwonvuli Acid-Moss goes out for the same reason at a higher price. Over three-quarters of their nonland cards cost one mana, and the Forest it fetches isn't worth a turn without a blocker or removal spell against their wide board.

Structural Distortion goes out because their only artifacts are cheap sideboard cards like Nihil Spellbomb and Sylvok Lifestaff, and they never need more than two lands. Here it is a four-mana land kill whose 2 damage does nothing about the creatures attacking us.

Sideboarding moves this matchup moderately in our favor. Ten near-dead land-kill cards become removal and life gain against a deck whose creature cards all have 1 toughness, which is a bigger swing than the extra removal and Mesmeric Fiend they bring in.

Post-board Strategy

With all ten land-kill cards gone, near-dead draws become answers to their 1-toughness board and life to survive Rite of Consumption. We stop trying to take their lands and play to stabilize, with the new removal joining Skred to sweep or pick off their creatures while our big creatures take over. Name red with Utopia Sprawl now. The early double-green costs left with the land destruction, only three of our lands make red, and Breath Weapon, Cast into the Fire, Suplex, Skred, Writhing Chrysalis and Boarding Party all need it. Cascade improves too, since Boarding Party and Annoyed Altisaur now hit a removal spell much more often.

Time Breath Weapon around their sacrifice outlets. In response they can sacrifice spare creatures to Carrion Feeder or Bloodthrone Vampire to push them past 2 toughness, and each sacrifice also grows Mortician Beetle. The tokens from creatures the sweep itself kills arrive afterward and survive. Cast it when they have few spare creatures to sacrifice, ideally before we add Arbor Elf or Eldrazi Spawn of our own. If they save a creature or two, Suplex or Monstrous Emergence finishes what our blockers can't.

Expect Mesmeric Fiend and more Tragic Slip from nearly every list, extra Accursed Marauder from most, and Snuff Out or Spinning Darkness from some. Tapping out for a single big creature is riskier than in Game 1, so have a spare nontoken creature on the battlefield first. If Spinning Darkness targets Writhing Chrysalis, sacrifice an Eldrazi Spawn in response to make it a 3/4 that survives the 3 damage. Mesmeric Fiend takes a cascade creature or Breath Weapon from our hand. If they sacrifice it with its enters trigger still on the stack, the card is gone for good, but if it is still on the battlefield after the trigger resolves, killing it with Skred or Cast into the Fire returns the card.