MTG Salvation

This deck solely relies on Reveillark and the combos and interactions it can enable. In fact every creatures in the deck besides two can be brought back with Reveillark!



Why should I play this deck? You like to win. You like to play defensively. You like to play with Reveillark combos. You like walls. You like watching your opponents faces react while they start to realize you are progressively getting more and more impenetrable. The demoralizing look is priceless since you'll be accomplishing this with just puny little creatures, and it will be fast and consistent.

So why Jenara, Asura of War as a commander when the deck centers around a creature who is not the general? Well it started when I wanted to build a very, very defensive deck. One that uses a lot of the cool walls that were not being used in any of my other EDH decks. One thing that I noticed right away is that since all the walls have low attack, they all work with Reveillark to gain additional value. So I had to have white. Since I would be making a defensive combo deck I would need counters to protect it, hence blue. And since I would be relying on creatures to make it all work I would need creature tutors, and green has plenty of that. It just so turns out that all those colors have great walls or other Reveillark compatible creatures to fit every situation needed to turtle up and be very, very hard to kill. So I chose her for her colors and because she is a cheap and readily available flying blocker

Now you may be wondering what the Reveillark combo is. All you need is 1. Reveillark, 2. a sac outlet like Phyrexian Altar 3. Karmic Guide 4. and a creature in the graveyard that has two or less power. Sac Karmic Guide, then sac Reveillark targeting Karmic Guide and the creature with 2 or less power. Karmic Guide comes in bringing back Reveillark, and the creature with 2 or less power comes back in triggering its EBT (Enter the Battlefield Trigger). Sac that 2 or less creature, then you can do the whole thing again, infinitely. The best part is all this can be done at instant speed!

Here are some examples of combos that work in the deck and what they accomplish

Reveillark + Phyrexian Altar + Karmic Guide +

Acidic Slime = Blowing up all opponents lands
Venser , Shaper Savant = Bouncing all opponents permanents
Wall of Omens= Draw your deck
Farhaven Elf= Fetch all your basic lands
Kitchen Finks= Infinite Life
Duplicant= Exile all opponents creatures
Mystic Snake= Infinite counters
Kami of False Hope=Infinite Fogs

All that and infinite mana via Phyrexian Altar! Saffi Eriksdotter Body Double Ashnod's Altar and Sun Titan add resilience to this combo. With infinite mana you can win with Helix Pinnacle. Blasting Station as a sac outfit kills the table.

So the deck aims to get a game winning combo off as soon as possible and stay alive doing it. With a low mana curve you are going to be playing creatures fast and often, walling up. Most have ETB abilities so if they die it won't matter. They will either come back and combo or come back and keep you alive longer in order to combo. Many of them cantrip and draw cards to get you your combo pieces quicker, as do the numerous tutors. Once you have a combo setup there are many counters to protect it. Dedicated removal is not really needed and is very sparse since the deck often combos within the first 6 turns, and if it doesn't it becomes very hard for anyone to kill you. Since the combo is so important I included Riftsweeper to get back Reveillark and Karmic Guide. If they are exiled then the deck will probably lose. Keeping the graveyard intact is important so I included Feldon's Cane to protect it.

To your opponents you will be playing seemingly non-threatening creatures and you will never attack anyone until you get a combo, if at all, so you will probably not draw any hate until it's too late.

Besides the numerous Reveillark-fueled combos as win conditions Venser, the Sojourner is incredibly efficient in the deck. In fact I'd say that more times than not when I play him I get his ultimate off! His +2 works amazingly well with almost every creature in the deck, and since the deck is chock full of defensive creatures it's very easy to protect him.

Weaknesses? Cards that destroy ETB triggers like Torpor Orb, or neuter creatures like Godhead of Awe. Currently I only have two cards that are non-creature to deal with stuff like this besides counters, and in my meta it is sufficient. If stuff like this is more prevalent I suggest more non-creature removal like Beast Within.

Graveyard hate and exile effects can slow down the deck enough if you don't get an answer soon enough, which is Riftsweeper. Other preventitive cards like Ground Seal may be needed. Expect this if you play this deck enough for people to catch on.

CHANGELOG

Where is your Survival of the Fittest? It is the boss for setting up lark combo.

Love the deck. Survival might be better then congregation at dawn.

Quote from ISBPathfinder

Where is your Survival of the Fittest? It is the boss for setting up lark combo.

I knew this would be the first card brought up! It is currently card #101 and I should add a list of cards that I have not included and why. Mirror Entity and Tooth and Nail I think would be the next notable emissions. The first cards I would take out for Mirror and Survival would be Draining Whelk and Snapcaster Mage, which I feel are the weakest cards right now.

I didn't include Survival of the Fittest for several reasons.
1. I feel that the number of tutors is sufficient
2. It can draw a lot of hate, especially early game
3. I'd like to get use out of the creatures at least as a blocker before putting them in the graveyard.

Quote from XeroxedFool

Love the deck. Survival might be better then congregation at dawn.

Congregation at Dawn has been the all-star tutor in the deck. This is usually how it goes. . .
End of Turn -> Congregation at Dawn
Mulldrifter -> Reveillark -> Karmic Guide
Begin turn, draw Mulldrifter, cast it. Boom. Now you have your combo pieces in hand.

I'm going to add a lot to this deck's topic as I am really testing it a lot against various decks.

So far my conclusion as the best way to getting fast consistent wins has been because of one card - Intuition.

Use it to get Reveillark, Karmic Guide and Body Double. If you have a sac outlet no matter what they choose you are good to go! I won turn 4 in a recent game with just these relevant cards in my opening hand. Sol Ring, Intuition and Blasting Station.

Turn 1 - Sol Ring
Turn 2 - Blasting Station
Turn 3 - End of turn Intuition
Turn 4 - Body Double

Blasting Station'ed the table. Amazingly everyone laughed and were in good spirits as we shuffled up to play again.