Pro Tour Secrets of Strixhaven is in the books, and the Standard format got flipped on its head. Going in, Izzet decks made up nearly half the Day 1 metagame — Izzet Prowess, Izzet Spellementals, and Izzet Lessons were the consensus top picks. Coming out, green ate everyone’s lunch. Five of the Top 8 pilots were on base-green landfall shells, and the finals turned into a Selesnya Landfall mirror between Team Cosmos Heavy Play teammates Nathan Steuer and Christoffer Larsen. Steuer took it 3-2 in a five-game thriller for his second Pro Tour trophy.
Today we’re breaking down the deck that broke the format: Steuer’s championship Selesnya Landfall list, and why this build crushed a format full of Izzet.
The Big Idea
Selesnya Landfall is a turbo aggro-combo deck that abuses the fact that landfall payoffs in current Standard are wildly above the curve. The plan is simple: ramp into a payoff on turn two or three, then start dropping two, three, sometimes four lands per turn to put the game out of reach before the opponent untaps.
Mightform Harmonizer is the engine. Every land that enters doubles a creature’s power until end of turn — meaning a single Harmonizer plus two land drops in a turn turns your 2/2 Badgermole Cub into a 16-power attacker. Add the Warp cost and you can flash it in from exile later to dodge sorcery-speed removal entirely.
The Engine Pieces
Sazh’s Chocobo is the perfect one-drop for this shell. A {G} 1/1 that permanently grows every time a land enters is exactly the curve-out the deck needs. Drop it on turn one off Llanowar Elves, and by turn four you’re attacking with a 6/6 trampling chicken before you’ve even played a real threat.
Eight one-mana ramp creatures — four Llanowar Elves and four Sazh’s Chocobo — give you a 12-card opening hand of acceleration. This is what lets the deck deploy a payoff on turn two and start chaining lands before Izzet can stitch together a counter-burn package.
Earthbender Ascension is the namesake card and arguably the most broken thing the deck is doing. Three mana, fetches a basic, then every land you drop puts a quest counter on it. Hit four quests and you start animating lands as huge creatures. It’s a ramp spell, a payoff, and an inevitability engine stapled together at a price the rest of the format simply cannot match.
Badgermole Cub is the unsung hero. Two mana for a 2/2 that earthbends a land into a 0/0-with-a-+1/+1-counter creature means every cub is effectively two bodies, and that animated land becomes another doubling target for Mightform Harmonizer. The synergy density here is the entire reason this deck wins close races.
Removal and Reach
Erode is the perfect white removal spell for a landfall deck. One mana to kill a creature or planeswalker is already good — and the rider lets your opponent fetch a tapped basic, which sounds like a downside until you realize you don’t care, because you’ve already got eight landfall triggers in play on your side. Erode handles Izzet Prowess threats and Spellementals tokens without costing you tempo.
Lumbering Worldwagon is the top-end haymaker. A vehicle whose power equals your land count, that fetches another land every time it enters or attacks. By the time you crew this on turn five, you’re swinging for nine, ten, or more — and triggering every landfall payoff on board in the process.
Three copies of Ba Sing Se give the manabase a manland that can earthbend itself into a huge threat for {2}{G}. Combined with four Fabled Passage and three Escape Tunnel, the deck gets a staggering number of landfall triggers from its lands alone.
The Full Decklist
Nathan Steuer — 1st Place, Pro Tour Secrets of Strixhaven (Las Vegas, May 3, 2026)
Creatures (23)
- 4 Llanowar Elves
- 4 Sazh’s Chocobo
- 4 Badgermole Cub
- 2 Icetill Explorer
- 4 Mightform Harmonizer
- 2 Dyadrine, Synthesis Amalgam
- 1 Surrak, Elusive Hunter
- 1 Keen-Eyed Curator
- 1 Mossborn Hydra
Spells (12)
- 4 Erode
- 2 Bushwhack
- 2 Lumbering Worldwagon
- 4 Earthbender Ascension
Lands (25)
- 7 Forest
- 2 Plains
- 2 Temple Garden
- 4 Hushwood Verge
- 4 Fabled Passage
- 3 Escape Tunnel
- 3 Ba Sing Se
Sideboard (15)
- 3 Rest in Peace
- 3 Sheltered by Ghosts
- 2 Surrak, Elusive Hunter
- 2 Mossborn Hydra
- 2 Snakeskin Veil
- 1 Kutzil, Malamet Exemplar
- 1 Voice of Victory
- 1 Restoration Magic
Sideboarding Notes
Against Izzet decks, Sheltered by Ghosts is your MVP — it locks down their key threats and gains you the life you need to race their burn. Snakeskin Veil protects Mightform Harmonizer from removal during your attack steps. Versus graveyard-leaning decks, three Rest in Peace shuts off Spellementals and Lessons recursion entirely.
In the mirror (which is now a real concern), the extra Surrak, Elusive Hunter and Mossborn Hydra come in to grind through removal and out-trample the opponent. Voice of Victory shuts down their instant-speed plays in your turn.
Should You Pick It Up?
Selesnya Landfall is now the deck to beat in Standard. Until Wizards moves the format, expect every event for the next month to be Landfall mirrors and people trying to hate it out. The good news: most of the rare slots are repeatable Standard staples (Llanowar Elves, Temple Garden, Fabled Passage, Sheltered by Ghosts) that you’ll get mileage out of even if the meta shifts. The bad news: Mightform Harmonizer and Earthbender Ascension are not getting cheaper any time soon.
If you want to build it, now is the time — prices on the landfall package are climbing every day this week.
Pick Up Your Pieces at Mana Riot Games
We’re stocking Selesnya Landfall staples and the full Secrets of Strixhaven singles lineup at manariotgames.com. Whether you’re building Steuer’s exact 75 or sleeving up your own spicy brew, hit us up to grab what you need. And if you’re playing in this weekend’s local Standard event — good luck, and may all your lands land on curve.