Nice deck! If you're playing against 3 other people though, how do you get away with them not teaming on you? Clearly, you will be seen as the biggest board threat the earliest...

Quote from ChrisLewis »

Nice deck! If you're playing against 3 other people though, how do you get away with them not teaming on you? Clearly, you will be seen as the biggest board threat the earliest...

I totally play through archenemy all the time with this deck. I have a very heavy tutor targeting towards unfair draw outlets such as Necropotence, Skullclamp, Dark Prophecy, Tymna the Weaver, Dark Confidant, Ad Nauseam, and Wheel of Fortune that normally I refill my hand very heavily as kind of the strategy I am going with. Its very easy to tempo your hand into play when the overall curve of the deck is so low and then I utilize some of these unfair draw outlets to replenish my hand quickly afterwards. Between all of the aggressive threats, life siphoning, and evasion its hard for my opponents in most cases to keep up with removing me.

The key really is to keep the draw going nicely and once you have your drawing going well its just a question of how frequently and how often they can answer you and if you are still chip damaging them or not through that.

I had a really good game a few weeks ago that I outlined that kind of shows what some of the power draw can do for the deck (link here).

Is the deck good? Absolutely.
Is it effective and affective? Absolutely.
Does it have a specific direction? Sort of...
Don't get me wrong, I love the deck. However, especially in tribal, you need to have a specific direction.
While I absolutely love Serra Ascendant, does it belong in a vampire deck...?
Are there more vampires out there that support all vampires that could replace other cards that don't fit the idea of the deck...?

Nice job on the deck!

Quote from TripleDebt »

Is the deck good? Absolutely.
Is it effective and affective? Absolutely.
Does it have a specific direction? Sort of...
Don't get me wrong, I love the deck. However, especially in tribal, you need to have a specific direction.
While I absolutely love Serra Ascendant, does it belong in a vampire deck...?
Are there more vampires out there that support all vampires that could replace other cards that don't fit the idea of the deck...?

Nice job on the deck!

Serra Ascendant is really only in the list because it fits the concept of a low curve aggro card that fits into moving its hand quickly and heavily. I could cut it and probably not feel bad about it but its also really strong which is why I have kept it in my list. It just takes a few tribal buffs to outclass the fact that it is a 6/6 for 1. In general I guess it takes about two anthem style of cards to equate to the card on its own.

Right now I am just waiting for spoiler season next week where I suspect there will probably be several changes to my list assuming we see any good vampires which I suspect we will given the state of standard right now I think they need to push their tribes to be a bit stronger to contest with energy decks so I look forward to what I assume will be a push to improve the tribes.

Quote from ISBPathfinder »

Quote from TripleDebt »

Is the deck good? Absolutely.
Is it effective and affective? Absolutely.
Does it have a specific direction? Sort of...
Don't get me wrong, I love the deck. However, especially in tribal, you need to have a specific direction.
While I absolutely love Serra Ascendant, does it belong in a vampire deck...?
Are there more vampires out there that support all vampires that could replace other cards that don't fit the idea of the deck...?

Nice job on the deck!

Serra Ascendant is really only in the list because it fits the concept of a low curve aggro card that fits into moving its hand quickly and heavily. I could cut it and probably not feel bad about it but its also really strong which is why I have kept it in my list. It just takes a few tribal buffs to outclass the fact that it is a 6/6 for 1. In general I guess it takes about two anthem style of cards to equate to the card on its own.

Right now I am just waiting for spoiler season next week where I suspect there will probably be several changes to my list assuming we see any good vampires which I suspect we will given the state of standard right now I think they need to push their tribes to be a bit stronger to contest with energy decks so I look forward to what I assume will be a push to improve the tribes.

That most certainly is true. Serra Ascendant is just a wonderful card. Especially in Commander.
By the way, not trying to push anything at you, but I would suggest you add cards like Vanquisher's Banner and Coat of Arms to the deck. They are absolutely wonderful in tribal.

Quote from TripleDebt »

That most certainly is true. Serra Ascendant is just a wonderful card. Especially in Commander.
By the way, not trying to push anything at you, but I would suggest you add cards like Vanquisher's Banner and Coat of Arms to the deck. They are absolutely wonderful in tribal.

No problem I always encourage suggestions as sometimes they are cards I have not considered. Other times I think there is valid discussion in talking about some other card options and the value in them.

• Vanquisher's Banner I like all of the things it does and really my only concern is probably its mana cost. As an example I used to have Null Profusion in my list and ultimately I cut the card because it required me to cast an expensive card, pass turn, and then the next turn it ideally gave me value. The question is just somewhat of how slowly you can move and do some of these cards. There is also a very big issue that generally speaking I cannot save my vampires to play them until after I play a 5 drop card. Its probably challenging to cast a 5 mana artifact and then chain a bunch of vampires as well so while I think all of the things it does are really cool, its at the top of the curve so my hand is probably mostly empty by the time I can cast it so it makes refilling really challenging. The anthem portion of this card is just ok as well because it is really what a 2-3 mana card can do for me but it also does not come with a body so the question of what if I get wrathed around turn 4-5 (kind of when I could cast this card) its possible it could give me a decent recovery plan at the cost of a turn but its also very reliant on having a bunch of vampires to play after this which seems a little questionable. Really, I love everything that this card does I just think that its mana cost is such that it is not very friendly towards an explosive start style of deck like this. If I could get this effect on a vampire body, or get just the draw portion of it for a discounted price I maybe would consider it but its cost keeps me from running it myself.
• Coat of Arms I do like this card but anytime I can pass turn on a board full of vampires and come back to them still being there is probably a good situation anyways. If I could curve my vampires out, not get wrathed, and then stick this on curve I think it probably would be good but it also drops kind of slow on our curve, is not a vampire, gives no evasion, and buffs my opponents. My concern is primarily towards an opposing token deck because they can potentially outclass us in numbers when you start looking at mid to late game. I think its potentially strong from the standpoint of curving into it if you have not been wrathed but beyond like the turn you could cast it I don't like it as much. I would actually prefer Eldrazi Monument over this card because it gives evasion, buff, and makes our board more robust. I have played both Eldrazi Monument and Coat of Arms before in the past before I went to a faster curve build and I found both to be a little more questionable in the low curve build in part because you want everything to be a little cheaper and faster so you can keep moving hands of cards.

I think both cards can fit tribal builds but in both cases I felt they were a little clunky and slow for the build I was objectively trying to make here.