We all have a default deck or archetype. That deck you take out when you're bored with a format because at its most base level, the deck is just more fun to play than anything else. For the last few months, my default deck has been Temur Ramp. I'm a Timmy/Johnny at heart and the deck allows me to go big and then finish my opponent off in creative ways.

With the arrival of Tarkir: Dragonstorm, Ramp has become a puzzle, because adding actual Temur clan cards to the deck, gives you a lot of options to consider. Doppelgang still has my heart as the best card to cast when you have a ton of mana, but there are some cards in Tarkir: Dragonstorm that are giving it a run for its money.

Temur Ramp | Standard | Travis Hall

• Creatures (7)
• 1 Ureni, the Song Unending
• 2 Songcrafter Mage
• 4 Overlord of the Hauntwoods

• Spells (17)
• 1 Auroral Procession
• 1 Into the Flood Maw
• 2 Pawpatch Formation
• 2 Torch the Tower
• 1 Worldsoul's Rage
• 2 Doppelgang
• 4 Ill-Timed Explosion
• 4 Stock Up

• Enchantments (6)
• 3 Dragonback Assault
• 3 Roaring Furnace // Steaming Sauna

• Artifacts (4)
• 4 Lumbering Worldwagon

• Lands (26)
• 3 Island
• 3 Mountain
• 4 Forest
• 1 Commercial District
• 1 Fountainport
• 1 Hedge Maze
• 1 Thundering Falls
• 2 Thornspire Verge
• 2 Willowrush Verge
• 4 Fabled Passage
• 4 Frontier Bivouac

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Cards to Consider

When Foundations was first released, I played around a bit with a landfall deck using Rampaging Baloths. It wasn't that the deck was bad, it just had a hard time digging itself out of a hole, and Rampaging Baloths often had to be played on turn 7 instead of turn 6 so that you could immediately make a land drop and get value due to the amount of spot removal that was (and still is) seeing play.

As an enchantment, Dragonback Assault is going to be harder remove than the Baloths, and if you play it on turn 6 you can still get value. It digs you out of the hole before it starts making you creatures, and while it can't attack as a 6/6, the 4/4 dragon tokens it makes are going to be better than the tokens made by the Baloths. This might still be too expensive for the effect, but I think it warrants strong consideration and this is the first direction I'm going to try with the deck. I can't wait to target this and some lands with Doppelgang...

I really wanted to fit a second one of these in the deck, but 8 mana is a lot. Like the Assault, this does help clear the board when it enters, and it only takes a couple swings to end most games. What really sets this apart is the Protection from Black and White. Other than bounce, this thing will be immune to almost all of the targeted removal in the format, and will be a genuine nightmare for most opponents.

I'm taking a flier on this one because it is incredibly flexible and I've been a longtime fan of Snapcaster Mage. This costs more, and is harder to cast, but if you can pay the Temur mana cost, this has the potential to be BETTER than Snapcaster Mage. This one is going to take some experimentation, but I could see this ending up as one of the best cards in the set. It should pair nicely with Stock Up, but I really hope to give Worldsoul's Rage the harmonize ability and then tap Ureni to blast my opponent for 10+ damage.

A lot of people are overlooking this, but this is the best Regrowth variant we've ever gotten. Ramp is a deck that can often afford to pay a little more for its spells, and this can almost work like a tutor in the late game. I could see 2 or even 3 copies of this making their way into the deck at some point.

I'm not certain that this is the best three-mana accelerator, but it's where I want to start. There aren't many creatures in the deck, but the dragon tokens spit out by Dragonback Assault can crew the Worldwagon, let it attack to find a land, and create another dragon token. It also curves naturally into Overlord of the Hauntwoods, allowing you to explode with mana as early as turn 4.

I considered Ugin, Eye of the Storms for a while for this deck, but it felt like I would need to twist the deck to accommodate too many colorless cards to maximize Ugin, and that wasn't the direction I was willing to take at this point. But, rest assured, I am working on a Ramp deck specifically for Ugin. Hedron Archive is Standard-legal after all.

Tarkir: Dragonstorm looks amazing, and feels like a real palette cleanser after Aetherdrift. The set feels powerful and offers a bunch of cards that seem able to create entirely new deck archetypes.

You can find more of my Magic musings on Twitter/X @travishall456 and on Bluesky: https://bsky.app/profile/anakinsdad.bsky.social