by Johnny Cycles, February 21st, 2025
This month I’m porting one of my favorite Modern decks into Pioneer! We’re looking to ramp into a Lukka, Coppercoat Outcast, then use his -2 to turn one of our mana dorks into… PROGENITUS!
Deck List – Lukka Suprise with Progenitus
by Johnny Cycles
Format: Pioneer
Creatures (11)
| 4 Paradise Druid | |
| 4 Sylvan Caryatid | |
| 1 Atraxa, Grand Unifier | |
| 1 Progenitus | |
| 1 Emrakul, the Promised End |
Planeswalkers (4)
| 4 Lukka, Coppercoat Outcast |
Spells (8)
| 3 Fatal Push | |
| 3 Thoughtseize | |
| 2 Torch the Tower |
Enchantments (13)
| 1 Footfall Crater | |
| 4 Oath of Nissa | |
| 4 Bitter Reunion | |
| 4 Fable of the Mirror-Breaker |
Lands (24)
Sideboard (15)
| 2 Duress | |
| 2 Torch the Tower | |
| 2 Sheoldred’s Edict | |
| 1 Brotherhood’s End | |
| 2 Go Blank | |
| 3 Pulse of Murasa | |
| 1 Herald of Eternal Dawn | |
| 1 Cityscape Leveler | |
| 1 Worldspine Wurm |
Deck Tech
Primary Game Plan
Ours is a pretty straightforward strategy. We’re looking to ramp into Lukka, Coppercoat Outcast, then use his -2 to target one of our mana dorks and turn it into…Progenitus! Or Atraxa, Grand Unifier, or Emrakul, the Promised End. The rest of our deck can be divided into ways to manage the board (kill spells and hand disruption) and ways to find our pieces (Oath of Nissa, Fable of the Mirror-Breaker).
We play two cards that do double duty beyond helping us dig deeper for our pieces. Big threats are great and all, but having to wait to untap to attack with them is not always a winning strategy. For the cost of a single mana, we can give the big fatty we cheated in haste to close out the game on the spot, or gain enough life via Atraxa to stabilize.
Why 2-mana Mana Dorks?
Elvish Mystic and Llanowar Elves are extremely fragile. Sure, they can ramp us into a turn 3 Lukka and Progenitus, but they also die to Fatal Push, Torch the Tower, and any number of other cheap removal spells. Meanwhile, in the 2-mana slot, we have two mana dorks with hexproof. Sylvan Caryatid is our all-star, while Paradise Druid does a fair impression of the 0/3 Plant.
Why These Finishers?
Progenitus is new to the format and so I was excited to try it out. Protection from everything seems like a winning stat when attached to a 10/10. But even without playing a game, I new it wouldn’t be game over the way Emrakul, the Aeons Torn is in my Modern version of Lukka Surprise. We could be too far behind on life to survive a hit after the Hyrdra Avatar resolves. It doesn’t have annihilate. It hits for less.
Atraxa, Grand Unifier is more fragile than Progenitus, but at least we get something on her ETB, while if we do get a swing in with her, the lifegain is often enough to let us pull ahead. Furthermore, she has flying, which is highly relevant in Pioneer, a format full of evasive threats. Progenitus is great and all, but it doesn’t block Arclight Phoenix or Archfiend of the Dross.
Emrakul, the Promised End was first included as a nod to my Modern version of the deck. The reality, though, is her flying and trample is the kind of evasion we need, and, unlike the other two, we have a pretty decent chance of hard-casting her if she’s in hand.
I’ll say right now, though, that there are other finishers worth considering, some of which I’ve included in the board. I know I’m overlooking some more obvious inclusions, as well, so let me know in the comments what I’m forgetting. I think it’s definitely worth testing out other finishers if you’re interested in this archetype, but more on that after the game play.
So why these three in the board? Cityscape Leveler‘s front end is a nonbo with Lukka, but it gives us an answer to problematic permanents on attack. It has recursion, of course, and it’s a threat we can hard-cast in the late game.
Herald of Eternal Dawn is there for the go-wide strategies like Humans, Ninjas, and Goblins. There will be games when cheating in any other fatty won’t be good enough, while this one will win us the game.
Worldspine Wurm is a guilty pleasure as much as anything else. It can punch through damage on a clogged board, though, and it replaces itself should our opponent kill it. Another bonus is that it shuffles our graveyard back into our library if we discard it. Thus, if we’ve discarded one of our other big fatties to Bitter Reunion or Fable of the Mirror-Breaker, this puts it back in our deck.
The rest of the sideboard is more removal, some graveyard hate to fight Arclight, more hand disruption, and Pulse of Murasa. The lifegain seems relevant to bring in against some of the aggressive decks out there, while we can use it to return one of our fatties to our hand, should we be in a position to hard-cast it.
A note on the game play. The videos are only very slightly edited. My kids missed more days this week because of snow and I just haven’t had the chance to edit them in a way that would cut out dead time during turns.
League Match 1 vs. Grixis Control
League Match 2 vs. Dimir Ninjas
League Match 3 vs. G/W Collector’s Cage
League Match 4 vs. Izzet Phoenix
League Match 5 vs. Humans
Overall Record: 2-3
Impressions from League Play
What started out so promising (5-0 in games halfway through Match 3) ended in our typically disappointing 2-3 fashion. Overall, though, the deck was a ton of fun to play! Lukka, Coppercoat Outcast into Progenitus or Atraxa, Grand Unifier was as fun as it sounds. However, neither offered us a true game-ending threat the turn they resolved/attacked the way Emrakul, the Aeons Torn does in Modern.
But before I go making changes, both had their moments. There were games we wouldn’t have won without our Progenitus. And there were games we wouldn’t have won without Atraxa. There was even a game we won on the back of Herald of Eternal Dawn.
So what’s the main problem? I think we’re just a little too slow. The matches we had our combo pieces or found them early usually resulted in us winning. However, when we had to spend our early turns digging and digging, we were often too far behind to come back once we did find Lukka, Coppercoat Outcast.
Compounding this problem is that people playing Pioneer really like their low-to-the-ground aggressive strategies. If we have to spend our early turns searching for pieces, then that probably means we’re taking hits from an ever-growing board of synergistic dorks. Turning a Sylvan Caryatid into a Progenitus on turn 6 against a horde of Goblins or Humans just isn’t good enough.
Lukka Surprise 2.0?
I think the reason my 2-drop Lukka Surprise deck in Modern performed better than this one is because our 2-drops represented legitimate threats that could win us games on their own. Cards like Tarmogoyf and Orcish Bowmasters don’t need Lukka, Coppercoat Outcast to compete. Should we try a similar strategy in Pioneer?
Would the above pictured cards give us a similarly powerful Midrange strategy that just happens to play an oops-I-win-the-game combo? Or do we eschew altogether and play a Rakdos shell? Boros?
I think there is plenty of room for exploring other options here. Let me know in the comments which you think is most viable!
Our do we speed our gameplan up with 1-drop mana dorks? Sure, they’re more fragile than our current choices, but the upside is a turn 3 Progenitus. Seems worth trying out!
After losing to so many aggressive strategies, I do think having more sweepers in our 75 is a necessary evil. With access to , we don’t have to play our go-to Red sweeper, but it’s still a powerful option. I’d probably cut some number of Pulse of Murasa or Torch the Tower to make room for more of these.
Is Atraxa, Grand Unifier Better than Progenitus?
As mentioned, we won some games with Progenitus that we wouldn’t have with Atraxa, Grand Unifier. Still, it’s hard to argue against all those keywords AND that ETB. I definitely want to try the deck out with just Atraxa as our finisher. And, if we do so in a 2-drop tribal deck full of legitimate threats, there’s a good chance she’ll live to gain us back the life we need before attacking our opponent to death, all after having filled our hand with what we need to stabilize further.
Conclusion
Lukka Surprise in Pioneer is a super fun deck that can compete with the best decks in the format. Sure, we didn’t crush our league, but we won enough to show that the deck has serious potential. And with a few tweaks to the 75, I think the deck can be even more powerful! So, if you love cheating big fatties into play or have the heart of a Jund player and are looking for an option in Pioneer, check out Lukka Surprise!
As always, thanks for reading and watching! I’ll catch y’all on the next one!
