Many years ago, I visited a Plane that was not a particularly popular destination. The mana and land there was rich with power and intrigue, but the plane was a dangerous place full of the unexpected - traps and powerful beasts.

I happened to be visiting and exploring the richness of green mana on the plane in a unique forest called The Vastwood, when I encountered another Planeswalker. A powerful creature beared down upon him, but his connection to the land seemed to surge through him with extraordinary strength and he wrestled it down to it's side.

Garruk. When he acknowledged me and my peaceful intentions, that was all the introduction I could get from him. He said I could watch so long as I stay out of the way of him and the baloth tribe's hunt. So it was to be. I hid myself amongst the trees and watched his interaction with the baloths and their interactions with the world around them.

Now, a baloth is nothing more than a large and fierce beast upon the field of battle when it is threatened, but here they were simply struggling to survive amongst those who would stumble into their territory or come intentionally hunting them for meat, materials, and game. And they found in their lands, they would often lure threats into natural mazes, mires of quicksand, or into the depths of the Vastwood where they could focus the might of the land itself.

In exchange for their service, feeding, renewing and guarding the land, they the tribe would seem rewarded upon the death of one of these massive beasts, often with new growth and expanded territory, or with a speedy restoration of the tribe through new life.

My time watching Garruk live amongst the baloths was short, but I learned many things about him and the beast to which he chose to bond.

A friend and I had a random conversation the other day about baloths, specifically how it seems like WotC has given us a lot of baloths lately. We named a few off the top of our heads and surprisingly came up with a nearly complete list. It seems that perhaps Zendikar is the ancestral home plane of baloths, as it has been the largest influx of baloths in Magic.

A quick word on what a Baloth is and is not from a technical point of view. Baloth is not a creature type, according to the rules, but it is, flavor-wise, a type of beast. The use of ‘baloth' allows the artists and the R&D team to have a basic form to flavor around. Technically as far as the rules care though, they are no different from Plowbeasts, Gnarlids, or any other Beast. I use this to my advantage in this build by considering the 3/3 Beast token that Garruk summons to be, for our purposes, a young baloth.

[cardlist]

[Lands]

11 Forest

3 Mystifying Maze

3 Oran-Rief, the Vastwood

4 Quicksand

3 Tectonic Edge

[/Lands]

[Creatures]

4 Leatherback Baloth

4 Obstinate Baloth

4 Rampaging Baloths

[/Creatures]

[Spells]

4 Cultivate

4 Explore

2 Garruk Wildspeaker

2 Harrow

2 Momentous Fall

4 Nature's Spiral

2 Realms Uncharted

4 Vines of Vastwood

[/Spells]

[/cardlist]

Making this deck was particularly challenging in that Mono-Green, while great at powering out board altering threats, can't handle threats very well at all. I try to address this with a Realms Uncharted package that can fetch creature neutralizers like Quicksand and Mystic Maze, leave you with bigger baloths thanks to Oran-Reif the Vastwood, or allow you to take out mana fixing dual lands or bothersome manlands with Tectonic Edge. Oh, and what about the two lands your opponent pitch? Nature's Spiral will put them back in your hand, rewarding the keepers of the land with more space to roam and grow.

Baloths are often very territorial and quite ready to fight to the death in battle. Should this occur, they too can come back to serve the land with a new generation of life, thanks to Nature's Spiral, or they can spark growth in their final moments with Monumental Fall.

The real crux is that Baloths are not small creatures. Even the most efficient of them are three mana, so the early game will be using mana ramp, and in the late game, that mana ramp will help you trigger off the Rampaging Baloths' landfall ability to secure the win.

In choosing the cards I did, I tried to immerse myself into how a Discovery channel type show would portray the baloths. They can use the environment to their advantage; they roam their lands and expand their tribe. They even seem to have a connection with the land in death. Some of the suggested sideboard cards are a little harder to justify, but still feel right with Garruk running along the tribe and lending a hand.