MTG Salvation

Quote from MRHblue »

Quote from Rav »

The fact that Prossh is even being considered for banning is completely baffling to me.

Where is this "fact" stated?

Sheldon posted an article a couple weeks ago that was an interview with Prossh. He brought up that some people want Prossh banned in that article. It would be easily dismissed if it was any random person saying it, but having the face of the format use Prossh's power level as the driving force behind three of his last four articles raises some red flags.

On topic: Yes, every Jund deck is better with Prossh as the general in the same way that every RUG deck is better with Maelstrom Wanderer as the general. He's a powerful creature that lines up perfectly with what the colors want to do in a way that no other legend in his colors can match. It's more of a testament to the fact that the alternatives are so lackluster than to anything Prossh does himself.

The fact that Prossh is even being considered for banning is completely baffling to me. Arcum, Azami, Zur, Sharuum, etc, have all been around for years with the potential to combo kill anyone very quickly if the pilot so desires and the response to that was to either not play the combos in the decks or to not play those generals. The social contract took care of those problems. How is Prossh different? Yes, he can general kill one person at a time in an efficient manner. Rafiq can kill a player on turn 4 with a signet and anything that gives +7/+7 (of which there are a lot). Nobody is clamoring to ban Rafiq.

There are 4 banned generals in Commander. 2 of them (Erayo and Braids) directly prevent players from playing the game. Rofellos generates an absurd amount of resources starting on turn 3 every game. Prossh does neither of these things. He can combo with a variety of cards, but so can multiple other generals and they're in no danger of getting banned. The whole idea behind this format is to let the social contract take care of situations like this so that the banned list isn't arm-length. So let it do its work.

I posted an article about drafting aggro on this forum awhile back. I covered what kinds of cards you're looking for when drafting along with deck construction and some basic matchup analyses and decklists. You can find it here.

As far as when to move in on aggro, it's basically based on what I'm feeling that day. I am the type of drafter that likes to force things, so if I want to be attacking, I'll pick basically any small creature, burn spell, or disruption piece and go all in.

Niv-Mizzet, Dracogenius
Chainer, Dementia Master
Child of Alara
Nicol Bolas
Glissa, the Traitor
Wort, the Raidmother

I made a few changes to smooth out the curve a little.

Radiate -> Phantasmal Image
Evacuation -> Phyrexian Furnace
Hypersonic Dragon -> Trinket Mage
Mystic Remora -> Elixir of Immortality

Radiate was by far the most situational card in the deck. Sometimes it could be a huge blowout, but really all it did was sit in my hand.

Same with Evacuation. I've held that card in my hand from turn 1 until the end of the game without ever wanting to cast it. Either there was no need, or I'd just bounce a bunch of utility guys and my opponent's would thank me. I don't think I'm going to miss it.

Hypersonic Dragon is pretty weak as a flash enabler in my deck. Most of my cards are already instants and the cards I really want to give flash to are creatures and artifacts, not sorceries.

Mystic Remora is just a generic draw spell. Sometimes it was amazing, sometimes not so much. Really, I just don't want to deal with cumulative upkeep anymore.

As for the incoming cards, there's another graveyard hate spell, a little lifegain+recursion in the Elixir, a Trinket Mage that fetches both, and the best Clone ever printed. Not much else to say about it. I still need to pick up some actual duals for the deck but that will probably have to wait until next month.

Honestly, I have no suggestions for you that you haven't already covered. I just wanted to let you know I like the list and it made me giggle a little; makes me want to start a similar build.

Thanks. I laugh a lot while playing this deck because every game something silly happens. Last night I was playing a game where Player A dropped an Avenger of Zendikar for a dozen odd plants, so I cloned Player B's Stuffy Doll twice and then cast Chain Reaction, blasting Player A for over 30 damage. After he died, I strapped someone else's Argentum Armor to the now useless Stuffy Doll and went beatdown to kill a second player with it. Good times.

dominate, rhystic study, rite of replication, i have a love/hate relation with dreamstone hedron instead of chalice.

Rite of Replication is in the deck already. I don't own a Rhystic Study online, but I'll look into picking one up. It could be a good replacement for Mystic Remora or Jace's Ingenuity. Dominate is a card I had considered, but it's expensive to use. I've never been a fan of Dreamstone Hedron because it always costs 6. Chalice can be dropped on turn 2 to boost me early, or I can sink a ton of mana into it if I draw it later.

not exactly what you are looking for but since you already have turnabout, and reiterate witch is infinite mana at 10+ lands how about adding one fireball effect?

I had Comet Storm in the deck until I realized if I have infinite mana, Niv-Mizzet, Dracogenius takes care of that job already.

Thanks for the comments everyone.

The whole point of this deck is to create silly stories. Every game is different because the only way I can win is to do what my opponents do, but better. My gameplan is to splice a creature from player A with a spell from player B to create something no one ever intended. Every game ends with some absurd situation, like the time I used Dance of Many on one opponent's Chancellor of the Spires to plunder a Coursers' Accord from a third player's graveyard, letting me proliferate an infinite number of Chancellors and centaur tokens.

I'm looking to streamline the deck to make it more mana efficient. To be clear, this is not a chaos deck and I'm not really interested in permanent theft (Blatant Thievery Aside). I know I need to pick up Bribery, Acquire, Phantasmal Image, Fork, and a better manabase. Anything I'm overlooking?

Changes

One thing to consider when building a control deck is how you're going to win. If your general isn't capable of dealing 21 on their own in a reasonable time frame, you're going to have to devote slots in your deck to win conditions. This isn't so bad if you're going for a combo finish, but I'm not one who likes to sit around and wait for my combo, so I have to fill my deck with awkward fatties that sit useless in my hand if drawn at the wrong time. I've found a better strategy is to run zero win conditions in my deck and rely exclusively on my general for kills. This unfortunately rules out common generals like Angus, Azami, or even Lady Evangela because they can't close games on their own.

To this end, my favorite control general has to be Jenara, Asura of War. She can come down early and block if needed, she's cheap to recast, has an instant speed mana sink if you have nothing else to do with it, and is fully capapble of dealing 21 in one hit. She also is in the three best colors, giving access to copious amounts of counters, removal, and ramp. She also lets you do shenanigans like Seedborn Muse + Alchemy's Refuge.

For reference, this is the list I ran with her.

The deck is not capable of dictating what every opponent does on every turn. It only interferes with the board state in two circumstances: when it's being directly threatened and when someone else is about to win. It has the tools to deal with any situation, but it will never have a threatening board position so nobody has reason to notice it. The goal is to survive until it becomes 1v1 and then bury the last opponent in card advantage.

The neat thing about this list is that other than Seedborn Muse and Alchemy's Refuge, every other slot is completely open. It's looking for types of cards and which card you choose to fill that function is very customizable.

The thing about the Eternal nature of Commander is that there are so many utility lands that one can use in the case of mana flood. These lands tap for mana, but also act as spells. I'd rather run extra land, fill the slots with utility lands, and be mana flooded (yet still have something to do thanks to all these lands with abilities) than run fewer lands and have to work at digging to find more land. A properly constructed Commander deck should be able to utilize all of its mana every turn, no matter how many or how few lands that deck has in play. I'm perfectly okay running 45 lands in most decks because I know that I want to hit a land drop every turn for the entire game.

For example, a Kaalia deck can run:

• Volrath's Stronghold
  
• Shinka, the Bloodsoaked Keep
  
• Shizo, Death's Storehouse
  
• Mistveil Plains
  
• Eiganjo Castle
  
• Spinerock Knoll
  
• Windbrisk Heights

Strip Mine et. al

• Dust Bowl
  
• High Market
  
• Winding Canyons
  
• Bojuka Bog
  
• Vault of the Archangel
  
• Sunhome, Fortress of Legions

It's better to have too much land than too few, especially with how high most Commander decks go on the curve.

What kind of control deck are you running? If your deck is running heavy on the board sweepers, you're actually causing the problem that you're trying to solve. I've found that in most board states, a spot removal spell will do the exact same thing (remove a problem permanent) that a board sweeper will do, but it leaves everyone else's creatures on the board and doesn't give them incentive to attack you. If you are patient with your instant removal and only use it when you are directly threatened (or to gain political favors), you will discourage people from attacking you and encourage them to attack each other, thereby reducing the amount of damage you have to do to finish everyone else off.

Think of it this way: The other people in the game are your win conditions. Your goal is to sit back, act only when threatened, remove the offending permanent(s) only when necessary, and let the other people take each other out. Then all you have to do is keep a reasonable amount of cards in hand (5-7, anything more and you just draw attention to yourself) and watch as your opponents help you win. When the time is right, you drop something bomby like Rite of Replication or Mindslaver, wreck the board, and clean up the remains.

An example: I was playing a three player game with my Numot, the Devastator deck. Both of my opponent's had armies that could crush me, but if either one of them attacked me, the other one would kill them and win. I was holding a sweeper in my hand the entire game, but I never used it because I was counting on their rationality and sense of self-preservation to prevent either one of them from attacking me. Meanwhile, I was drawing cards and sculpting my hand to take advantage of their armies, eventually Mindslavering one of them, wrecking them both, and cleaning up afterwards.

This strategy is not quick. It requires patience and good judgment to decide what you can ignore, what needs to be addressed, and when to strike. However, it's what true control is all about: the ability to manipulate your opponents into doing your bidding. Don't be a wrecking crew, be a puppet master.

Zedruu has a strategy that differs from most other decks. Instead of just playing good cards that help you, she encourages you to play cards that have significant drawbacks so you can give them away. the hard part comes from balancing how many of those cards you want to run versus having a lot of really bad cards if she somehow gets dealt with. The other generals are more straightforward.

I was in a 4 player MTGO game using Riku where I was able to cast Eternal Dominion, copy it, Radiate it, and copy the Radiate all in one turn for six Dominions a turn for the rest of the game. "Epic" has never been so accurate.

Dizzy Spell does a pretty good impression of Grim Tutor for you.

Quote from Sheldon

One of my locals has made an all-commons Child of Alara deck that's been in every game he's played it. Really clever design. I'll see if I can get the list. Or maybe I've already written about it and just forgot

d0su has a thread about that deck posted here. One could probably buy the entire deck off of a website for under $20 and it's certainly effective.

A part of the charm of the format comes in its relative simplicity and adding additional rules creates unnecessary confusion and complexity. The handful of cards impacted by this rule change is not significant enough to warrant the extra bookkeeping.