Hello everyone! This is my first primer and I'd like to be as detailed as I can. The topic, if it's not obvious, is Karador, Ghost Chieftain EDH. Now, this deck is made to play out fairly competitively and has been designed to handle both 1 v 1 and Multiplayer games. Oh, and I would like to point out that when I say 1v1, I am not referring to what is known as "French" EDH . I just mean that I play this deck against a single opponent quite frequently. That being said, because it's trying to handle two different things, you may want to consider optimizing it to fit better towards one or the other, depending on what you play most. So lets get into it.
Well, let's talk about why one would like to even play Karador. For me, I have always been a huge fan of Non Blue control because I hate counterspells. They don't require any thought. "Does that card win him the game? 'Yes', well then counter it", "Does that card stop me from winning the game 'yes', well then counter it". That's about what blue does. I prefer being more reactive to my opponents, knowing that somewhere, someway, my deck has the exact answer I need and it's my job to know it. So you want to play Karador (at least my version) if you like being rewarded for knowing your deck and it's interactions. You also enjoy creating card advantage while being unconcerned about your hand size. He makes it hard for your opponents to get rid of something because they either have to exile it or kill it and then remove it from the grave. Few decks can exile a card outright and as for removing it from the grave, that means they have to 2 for 1 you. The first spell to kill your creature and the second to remove it from the grave. You could also just want to play Karador because you like the colors.
Speaking of colors, I want to explain briefly what each color gives us. WGB gives us the absolute perfect combination for reanimation. Each color has it's fatties and utility creatures that we want to use, but utility is different. B gives us creatures that kill and maim their creatures and hands. W gives us creatures that do great jobs at recurring our things. And finally, G gives us mana, mana, some some other random things, and also, mana.
Like I said, this deck (my version specifically) is designed to grind games out. It controls the board while using the graveyard to amass card advantage. Eventually I have access to all my answers and can react immediately to whatever my opponent brings to bear. So you won't like Karador if you enjoy fast past games or feelings of luck brought about by top decks.
You also probably won't like him if you have problems keeping track of whats in your deck or you feel like that is to much work. Karador rewards you heavily for knowing what cards are in your deck to answer specific situations. So you have to know their CMC and abilities. It can be taxing to keep track of, so keep that in mind.
Ok, so now I want to get into the nitty gritty. For me, whenever I looked at primer's it was for two reasons. The first was to get ideas or thoughts on cards I either wanted to add or hadn't thought of adding. And the second reason was to figure out what synergies I had been missing out on. So That's where I'd like to focus this primer. You probably know by now if you even want to play Karador and if you do, then I want to provide you with the exact reasons I have chosen the cards I have, not added other cards, and what synergies the deck holds. So let's get to it!
So the first thing is to explain why cards are there. My rational behind them is usually straight forward, but sometimes I have weird thoughts so I'll be sure to explain those the best I can. First, let's talk mana ramp.
Yavimaya Granger I had no clue this card existed until I started searching out pieces for the deck, and I'm glad I found it. It's a nice 2/2 blocker for 3 that also puts you ahead on land. But the beauty of it, is the Echo. That means that, without any effort on your part, it will put itself into the grave to not only help you get Karador out faster. But it also gives Sun titan a target every turn and let's you keep recasting it with Karador for repeatable ramp.
Seedguide Ash is a card that most people forget about, which is a shame. I love this card because of the shear advantage to it. First off, he has a solid 4/4 body that can trade punches with quite a few things and it makes it something that is sizable enough that people don't want to get hit with it. It also nets you three forest cards, CARDS, when it dies. So you can go in and grab bosk, overgrown tomb, temple garden, etc.. and put yourself ahead of the curve by three turns by just tossing him to the grave. Which can be done easily by birthing pod or phyrexian tower.
and for the final creature, Diligent Farmhand This is a simple card. He's a simple one drop for a 1/1 rampant growth. I'll explain him more down the road when I start justifying my decisions.
The only non creature mana ramp I run is Mirari's Wake and that's just because it is to good not to run. It's a 5 drop that doubles all your lands mana AND pumps your creatures. It's an anthem, it's a mana ramp, it's just amazing.
I want to touch on Riftstone Portal. It's not mana ramp but it is mana fixing if you get it into your grave (discarding it, entomb it, etc...). It lets you not worry about finding W or G again. So you can focus on getting your swamps and having lands that can produce all colors. Pretty cool stuff.
Next up, we need ways to use all that beautiful, beautiful mana. That's where card advantage comes in. Card advantage is typically thought of as who has the bigger hand size or can draw the most cards. Well the beauty of Karador is his ability to turn your graveyard into card advantage. Making it hard to keep things gone. So let's get started:
Multani's Acolyte He's a simple 2/1 for GG that draws you a card. He also kills himself with the Echo to let you keep recasting as needed or just use once to cantrip and then feed into Karador's casting cost.
Solemn Simulacrum Yes he already showed up under mana ramp, but he also nets you a card when he dies. So he belongs here as well. Cast him, fetch a land, kill him, draw a card, rinse, repeat, love'em more and more each time.
Satyr Wayfinder You might be tempted to think of him as mana ramp, but he's really not. The reason is that even though he can help ensure you don't miss a land drop, his true value lies in the other three cards you don't keep. Putting them into the grave will usually give you at least one, if not more creatures. It's a good 1/1 for 2 that feeds your graveyard and helps you not miss land drops. He might not seem like much, but he's one of the better turn 2 plays the deck and even late game can do a TON of work by giving you access to 4 more cards.
Hermit Druid Ok folks. Here's the man himself. I'll start off by saying this, if you are not building this to be competitive DO NOT put him in here. He is the card advantage that all other card advantage wishes it was. He doesn't seem like much. But running a low basic land count combined with the fact that you are tutoring up basics during the first few turns means that turning him sideways is like turn a quarter of your deck upside down into the grave. It's hard to explain just how good he is if you haven't seen him play. But trust me, he gives you a land to play for your turn while putting a ton of goodies into the grave. That being said, you need to make sure you keep track of your basic and don't mill yourself out with him.
Golgari Grave-Troll He's here because he's the best dredger. He puts 6 cards into your graveyard (which means you should be hitting at least 2-4 creatures). Great for fueling Karador and his casting cost. He is also a fairly large creature that you can drop late game for the beats. I'll talk about why he's here and none of the others in the "why not those guys" section later on.
Eternal Witness Ok, So E. Wit belongs here. She's a straightforward girl. You want to recast that damnation? Here ya go. You want another land? Sure why not. Oh, you cast your creature per turn but need another one, Have at it!! She's a staple of the format for all the right reasons.
Sylvan Library & Sensei's Divining Top are two peas in a pod. They both let you see the top three and each have their advantages and disadvantages. Library let's you look for free and can draw you multiple cards a turn. So if you need all three you can have them, or if you want to the clear the top cards off so you can dig deeper you can. Top is nice because it's instant speed draw (if you want to protect grave troll or hide something away from a discard spell) and it also lets you use it multiple times. So you can spin top, not like what you see. Crack a fetch land and then spin again.
Now I want to move on to my tutor section. You'll notice the lack of demonic, diabolic, enlightening, worldy, or any other tutor of the like. That is strictly personal preference. This deck is built to be good without being to "cookie cutter" and plus, I think it's not really necessary. I have very good success without them and it keeps my deck from being reliant on them.
Dimir House Guard is under the tutor section because of his transmute ability. He gives you access to the other four drops in your deck WHILE putting a creature in the graveyard that calls to Karador to show up for cheaper. The main targets you can get with him are:
Birthing Pod
Damnation
Solemn Simulacrum
Spike Weaver
Erebos, God of the Dead
False Prophet
Mindslicer
Slum Reaper
Angel of Finality
Fauna Shaman is the creature version of survival (get to that in a bit). Basically she puts creatures into your graveyard and into your hand. She does it all. That being said, she's a very straight forward tutor, so let's move on to the rest.
Fierce Empath He is definitely one of my favorites. He's a creatures that you can Green Sun for and he get's so many good things. Magister of Worth, Sun Titan, Woodfall Primus, you know the deal. Once again though, a very straight forward tutor (pretty much all of them are).
Buried Alive is a great card for the deck. It gives you 3 mana for Karador and gives you 3 creatures to play with. You can toss in those utility creatures, or some power houses, or even both. Getting two small utility creatures and the Sun Titan to get them with is a nifty bit of tech.
Survival of the Fittest Ok, so this card. It's just pure power. It turns any creature you want into something useful while fueling your graveyard. You can just use extra mana at the end of your opponents turn to dig out useless creatures and pitch them to the grave. That will thin your deck and make Karador easier to cast. Or you can put all of the utility creatures in there to grab when you need. Or get combo pieces if that's the goal you are working towards. This card allows for a turn 4 Iona.
Entomb is an interesting card. It's big plus is the cost and the instant speed. It acts a tutor for Karador and can help mana fix. Now you are asking, how the hell can entomb mana fix? Well it's easy, just use it to toss Riftstone Portal into the grave! That means that any land you have will produce the G or W you need. So you can focus on grabbing any B mana source you want and it'll tap for any of your colors.
Birthing Pod Birthing Pod is a POWERHOUSE in the deck. Here's why. It's a combination sac outlet and Tutor. It let's you get bigger and bigger guys while netting you LTB triggers and letting you cast the cards again from the grave for even more ETB triggers. It's just all around a must have in the deck. That being said, if you include it, you have to start being careful to ensure that you have 3-4 creatures in each CMC and that you can remember what's where. Remember, this is a deck that rewards you for knowing whats in it.
Green Sun's Zenith is the last of the tutors in the deck. It grabs any creature you want (as long as it's green) but that gives you access to a huge amount of utility. It also lets you grab whatever CMC you need so it's not as restricting as pod. It puts it straight to the field, unlike survival. And perhaps it's biggest advantage, is that it shuffles itself back in for you to do it all over again.
So those are the tutor's that the deck runs. The next section I have to delve into are the utility cards that you want to tutor for. Oh, and I'll make the note here, that there are no delve cards in the deck. The reasons are pretty simple. The first being that there hasn't been any delve cards worth it so far. And also, you rarely have something you want to remove. and anything can be brought back by Eternal Witness if you need it later.
Moving onto the cards that you'll want to tutor for. This is a toolbox style so this is going to be the longest section (I think).
Artifact and enchantment destruction are a must have in any EDH deck. That being said, here's ours.
Qasali Pridemage gives that tiny extra boost of power and also blows stuff up. The big advantage to him is that he sacrifices himself to do it. Meaning that it makes abusing him with Karador much easier.
Reclamation Sage Typical arti/ench destruction. I'll talk him about VS harmonic sliver later on.
And last but not least. The big daddy of the arti/ench destroying world. The one, the only Bane of Progress. God. How much can I gush over a single card? I saw him and debated long and hard about putting him in here. Finally I broke down and made some room and HOLY MOTHER! He's just astounding. Here's why. He's a 6 drop, which means that Fierce Empath can search him up. He's green, so Green Sun's Zenith likes him, and he's a 2/2, so Reveillark greats him with a smile. But Ed, if he's only a 2/2, why the heck do I want to pay 4GG for him? Well it's simple my dear fellow. He gets bigger! Take a look at nearly any EDH deck and you'll find Sol Ring, Thran Dynamo, Gilded Lotus, etc... All of those things he eats up and grows bigger. He is especially powerful against any Non Green EDH deck. Non Green decks need mana ramp to, but the only access they have is based on mana rocks. So you can completely shut of a decks mana base with him alone. One of my best friends has a Niv-Mizzet, the Firemind EDH deck that is a combo deck. He had 7 mana by turn 3 but only 2 of them were lands. I was able to resolve bane against him and that was it, game over. Bane came in as a 7/7 and took my opponent down to two mana. It's just that strong.
Next, we have to be able to deal with other creatures. Nasty buggers like Consecrated Sphinx or Ulamog. So let's see how we go about destroying the troublesome creatures that appear on our opponents fields:
First let's talk targeted removal/singleton removal. Bone Shredder & Shriekmaw are two of the best. They both kill that troublesome creature without much effort on our part. They also both feed themselves to the graveyard so we can do it all over again later. Bone Shredder also makes a good flying chump blocker. Now, the big downside to those two is the restriction on what they can kill. They can't kill artifact creatures, or other black creatures. So you need to keep that in mind.
Shadowborn Demon is a new addition to the deck and so far, I highly approve. He is MUCH less restrictive about what he kills and he hs a heck of a body that even flys! His downside is that you have to sacrifice a creature during your upkeep. But, that's only if you have less than 6 creatures in your grave. So while you can run into times when yes, his drawback is actually a drawback, usually it's a moot point. That being said, even sacrificing something is something that you will usually want to do. You can sacrifice him to himself to recast and kill more stuff. You can sac an echo dude before they die to their own effect, or you can sacrifice another creature to recast it for more use. He's a solid flying body, a kill spell with a wide range, and a sac outlet.
Fleshbag Marauder & Slum Reaper are two cards that are good at what they do. They make your opponent's sacrifice their creatures. Yes you have to sacrifice too, but they even give you the body to sacrifice. Meaning that you play them, sacrifice them to themselves, and then can Karador them back for more fun. These are good to get around hexproof and indestructible. But be careful, you need to make sure you've cleared their board of everything else so they can't just chump sac.
Vish Kal, Blood Arbiter He's being mentioned here due to his killing ability. But I'll talk about him more in the win con's section of this primer. Just be aware that his ability to kill creatures is astounding. It may seem limiting that you have to remove all counter from him. But it is much less of a problem than it initially seems. Trust me, I had doubts too.
Finally, our mass board wipes. The things that kill everything, every time. Magister of Worth This card is just amazing. It's a 4/4 flyer which is decent in it's own right. But it's also a 6 drop, which might seem bad but it's actually not. Because that means that our main man Fierce Empath can tutor her up! Now, she is not always a board wipe true, but 9/10 she will be. Why? Because you have spent your whole game building up your graveyard. And while your opponents have a few cards in their yards they want back, you have a whole army to bring back! So usually your opponents will just opt to lose their board instead of trying to deal with yours. Remember though, even when she blows up the board, she sticks around. Giving you the only creature in play to take some swings with.
Elesh Norn, Grand Cenobite is a card I'll talk more about in my win con's section. But I want to mention her here because her -2/-2 ability is a lot of times a board wipe in and of itself. Weenies, Tokens, Mana dorks, etc... all just die to her, meaning they have much less things to just chump block with.
False Prophet is a very sound card. Being able to transmute into him is nice. And being able to pod him away, exile everything, and then grabbing the creature you need is perfect. I have yet to use him and lose more than one creature.
Really quick, before we move onto the rest of the utility beasties, I want to talk about some cards that fall under the destruction/removal categories but don't quite fit into one of the above.
The first is Acidic Slime. This card kills artifacts, enchantments and lands. Even though I'm morally opposed to land destruction, sometimes you just can't let them keep the Urborg and Cabal Coffers or that pesky Serra's Sanctum.
Woodfall Primus and Ashen Rider are the next two. They will take anything out (except for creatures in Woodfall's case) and then they decide to take more stuff out when they leave. Woodfall leaves and comes back with his persist ability, and Ashen Rider takes something for the road with him. Both are amazing and strong finishers that take out your opponents fields when they start going about their work.
Moving on;
These are the cards that bring stuff back from the dead to fight once more.
Sun Titan is possibly my favorite. You can grab him with Fierce Empath (man doesn't Empath seem to get around?) or you can grab Empath with him! It's a wonderful cycle. But seriously. He can pull back a whole host of useful things. Notable mentions include; Qasali Pridemage, Multani's Acolyte, Fleshbag Marauder, lands. Below is a list of the targets that have higher value with him:
Karmic Guide is the great revivalist. She comes in and brings back any creature you could possibly want from your grave. She also flys, has pro black, and has echo. The echo, in case you haven't noticed, is important for us because it lets us recur her and thereby recur other things over and over again. She basically reduces the cost of our high drops to a measly 3WW. Saving us valuable mana on that Ashen Rider, Elesh Norn, or whatever else you fancy. She is also a 2/2, which will be very important later on in our win con section.
Phyrexian Delver is the corrupted version of Karmic Guide. He's the same mana cost but has an extra point of attack damage. The other differences include that he doesn't have flying, or protection from anything, and he loses you life. But that all being said, he doesn't leave the field on his own which means he works better with Pod since you can pod into him one turn and then pod him away the next.
Loyal Retainers This is a card that is just plain good. If you look at our list, out of the 50 non Karador creatures, 8 are legendary. That may not seem like a lot, but let's take a look at some of our targets: Vish Kal, Elesh Norn, Iona, Yosei, and Kokusho. All of them are fantastic cards to bring back for only 2W. Loyal Retainers also enables silly things with Survival and Fauna Shaman. I'll talk more about that later in the interactions section.
Reveillark is the final recurring creature we have. This is a nifty card because not only does it pull two creatures back, but it also gives you the ability to pay one extra to evoke it. Meaning that it dies right away. Getting you the creatures back instantly and being ready to go again with Karador. Reveillark also has a 4/3 flying body which can easily get some beats in. Once again, another combo piece. But unlike Saffi, even if you choose not to include the combo, you should still run this card.
Next up, our life gainers and savers!
These are the dudes that either protect us or gain us the life we need to keep going. Obviously this deck will not win everytime and we will take damage. So we want some ways of mitigating that damage. First up is our Fog effects.
Spore Frog is the simplest one we have. He's a cute little 1/1 for G that let's use sacrifice him to save ourselves from damage. He comes back with Karador and let's you stall to your hearts content.
Spike Weaver is Spore Frog's big brother. He's a nice addition because you don't have to waste you Karador cast each turn to stall like you do with Frog. You cast him once and get three turns out of it. Meaning you can stabilize easier. He's also a 0/0 so he kills himself when the last counter is removed and also you can get him back with Reveillark.
Life gain is our next step to keeping ourselves alive. With shock lands, paying life to Pod, being punched in the face, it can slowly add up. So we need some ways to pull back from the brink.
Resolute Archangel is to life gain as Bane of Progress is to arti/ench destruction. The big Kahuna. Your opponent's spend the whole game fighting and clawing their way through your control and finally manage to take your life below 15. How do you repond? By using birthing pod to sacrifice Sun Titan and pull out Archangel, completely reseting your life total and making them all cry on the inside (and sometimes outside). Remember, you're a control deck. So most of your opponents will be targeting you because you're stopping them and you don't have the raw power to wipe a whole board at once. So having a single card that can reset your life value and dimish all their hard work is just great. But it's probably not the best for casual players since it may put your friends on tilt. If not, finding something that is a smaller cost with straight lifelink or something of the like is recommended.
Ok folks, just about wrapping up with one last section to go, the miscellaneous stuffs:
Graveyard hate is an important part of any deck. Because Karador is not the only one that can abuse graveyards or return cards to use again. Praetor's Counsel is used to great effect by green decks along with Eternal Witness and various other things. So to help combat that we have:
Scavenging Ooze is a great card. It's a 2/2 for 2 that eats any card in any graveyard for only one mana. It also gains us life and gets bigger as long as it's eating a creature.
Angel of Finality is the other piece of graveyard hate we have. She's a solid 3/ 4 flying body that comes down and exiles somebodies entire graveyard.
Bojuka Bog is the graveyard hating land. He comes in tapped but is a nigh uncounterable piece of graveyard hate.
I know I keep saying that this is a control deck, but haven't actually talked much about cards that do more than just react. So here are the couple pro active creatures we have on board.
First up is Gaddock Teeg. He is just a boss. For such a little guy he really stops a lot. Force of Will, Damnation, Supreme verdict, Green Sun, Decree of Pain, Cryptic Command, Day of judgement, Bribery, and soooo much more. Now, I'm also sure you noticed that I named a couple cards we run. Yes he does stop some of our cards, but it's well worth it. He only stops 6 cards in our whole deck, but he can completely shut down an opponents deck. Be careful with him, he's a priority target for almost any EDH you'll play against. Be sure that if you're going to play him, you are ready to be targeted. He's another card that casual players may want to consider not running. But he's also not that powerful where you can't at least test him out.
Aven Mindcensor is an efficient little bugger. But for such a small guy he sure speeds the game up since people aren't wasting all their time searching their decks.
Speaking of to powerful for casual, let's talk about [card]Iona, Shielf of Emeria[/card}]. The white she devil. She's a wopping 7/7 flyer that comes down and says “Hey, you wanna play that color, to bad”. That being said, she's not as bad as you would think. Against mono color decks she can just a victory but usually you'll run into at least to color decks. So you can shut off one color but the other can still find a way to deal with her. Once again, she is immensely powerful and should not be run in casual variants of this deck.
Finally, the card I love more than Iona herself, is the Mindslicer. He is everything that makes blue mages cry at night. Once he dies, he discards everyones hands. Now, you lose your hand too, but what do you care. That just makes Karador easier to cast and then once he's out, your graveyard is your hand. So while your opponent's are struggling to regain some semblance of card advantage, or at least to undo the disadvantage, you get to keep casting your creatures and moving your game forward.
The final control aspect is Yosei, the Morning Star. This beauty is a strong 5/5 flyer that can shut your opponent down for an entire turn. Giving you free reign to attack them mercilessly a second time or stop them from comboing out. In 1v1 matches, just having a sac outlet and Karador you can Yosei lock your opponent, or keep them from ever untapping their permanents. Easy to abuse, but if you aren't abusing it or are playing multiplayer, then it's probably ok to run in casual settings. If the play group is really casual then consider taking him out.
The final piece to the puzzle is our sac outlets. The cards that let us get rid of whats on our field so that we can do it all over again.
Varolz, the Scar-Striped is a 2/2 for 3 that is a free, instant speed sac outlet that somewhat protects himself and let's you find him with green sun. An overall decent card. Not very strong in this build but useful.
High Market & Phyrexian Tower are our land based sac outlets. Market gains you a life which isn't much, but you really just want it for the sacrifice effect. Tower is amazing because it sacrifices a creature and produces BB so you get a bit of ramp out of the whole deal.
Before I wrap up this section I want to go back to a card I've mentioned before and really want to talk about.
I mentioned him in a previous section but haven't talked about him since even though he belongs in most of the sections you just read. Here's why, he does 4 things that make him great. First, he gives you life. Second, he kills stuff. Third, he's an instant speed free sacrifice outlet. And finally, he's a win condition. He is an all star in the deck and a must have. For everything from casual to competitive he fits in the deck. He gets bigger by giving you what you need (a way to abuse your creatures) and he attacks to take your opponents out and give you life. Get him back with Karmic Guide and sacrifice her before her echo kills her and he's a 7/7 flying lifelink. Cast Golgari Grave-Troll who is a 8/8, sacrifice him so you can dredge him later and Vish Kal just became a 13/13. He really is just to good to not run.
The last three sections to talk about are my favorite sections. The first are a small list of synergies that the deck provides. There won't be many because you should discover them for yourselves. But I want to point out some things that you should have in your mind as a starting point. The second section is my attempt to defend the card choices I've made (as opposed to the possible cards) and then what cards I've been considering adding. That last section is important to me because like most Magic players, I want to make my deck better. So hearing your opinions on the cards is a great thing for me.
Karador, Ghost Chieftain I want to point out a ruling that interests me and one I have used several times to great advantage. If Karador leaves the battlefield and comes back, you can cast a second creature from the grave. So if you start your turn and cast Magister of Worth from your graveyard using Karador. She destroys everyone and then you RECAST Karador, you can cast a second creature from your grave that turn.
A second ruling about Karador to keep in mind is his cost reduction ability. Thanks to the rules, anything that increases the casting cost (i.e. the commander tax) are applied first. Then the cost reduction effects are applied. So if he dies and you want to cast him a second time and have 7 creatures in your graveyard, then congrats. Karador only costs WBG
Entomb works well as a generic creature tutor when you have Karador on the field. But other than that, it's a great way to mana fix using Riftstone Portal which let's worry about finding lands that produce B and letting the Portal do the rest. I also find myself frequently getting Golgari Grave-Troll on T1 or T2. This allows me to dredge 6 cards and usually gives Karador the chance to come down by T3 or T4.
Sun Titan is another card that does nice things. My favorites are Multani's Acolyte to ensure an extra draw each turn or Yavimaya Granger to fetch a land and thin the deck. He also get's Dauntless Escort allowing you to attack with the team and not worry about how they block, and finally he can control the board with Bone Shredder and [card]Fleshbag Maurader[card] killing creature's every time he attacks.
Iona, Shield of Emeria can be brought about on T4 by two different methods. The first is a bit harder to do because you need to have 5 creatures in your grave by T4 and a Birthing Pod. It's simple. You cast Birthing Pod on T3, then cast Karador on T4 and Pod him into Iona.
The second method involves Survival of the Fittest or Fauna Shaman. Simply cast one on T2. Then T3 you discard a creature card and get Iona (you can also get Elesh Norn, Grand Cenobite, Vish Kal, Blood Arbiter, or whatever legendary you want). Then on T4 you discard the legendary creature, search up Loyal Retainers and cast him. Then you use him to bring back your legendary and BOOM, you're a threat to the whole board.
First I want to talk about cards I have specifically left out of the deck.
Skullclamp This card is just insane. It draws you so many cards, fuels your graveyard and lets you get turn that Wood Elves into even more card advantage. That being said, I haven't included it for flavor reasons. I can't say anything bad about this card. It just doesn't really make the deck fun for me. Yes yes I know you want to shake your head and say “How is he telling me this is competitive when he's thinking about flavor” and the truth is, you're right. But I believe that I can retain the flavor of being creature based and still play competitively.
Necrotic Sliver just got the axe because even though he works nicely with Harmonic Sliver he really was just to mana intensive for me to warrant. I found myself rarely needing and usually he was just a three drop card that would sit in my hand because I had better things to do with my mana.
Mulch, Grisly Salvage and the like didn't make the cut based purely on them not being creatures. I want this deck to maximize creatures and their contributions and reduce the non creatures to a minimum.
Dryad Arbor I don't like Arbor. He's just, slow. And I hate the idea of losing a land to a board wipe or a kill spell. Plus since you don't cast him Karador makes him useless in the graveyard. Though the GSZ trick is nice, it's not enough for me to warrant his use. I may break down and add him back in over a basic forest, we'll see what the future brings.
Lord of Extinction is a popular card but one I just find unappealing. He is a very large body, no doubt. But he offers no utility. He has no evasion and no trample. He takes up a slot that I think is better put to use for some utility. I'll take Shadowborn over him any day because Shadowborn has evasion and is a kill spell on a stick.
Mikaeus, the Unhallowed is a fantastic card and posses a huge amount of power. He was in the deck for the longest time, but recently came out because he is a bit difficult to cast and I never needed him. He always occupied a 6 drop slot but was usually a “win more” card than anything. If I was winning, then he just added fuel to the fire which was nice. But if I was losing, he didn't help me progress my board state into a winning position. So he got the hammer and was replaced with something of a lower cost to ensure the deck doesn't become to top heavy.
Angel of Despair is a card I have left out because I don't feel like I have any room to make for another 7 drop slot. She could go in place of Resolute Archangel, but I feel like there is plenty of removal in the deck and Archangel provides a valuable service by letting us be assured that we have life gain when the situation arises.
Vorinclex, Voice of Hunger He just didn't make the cut for the 8 drop slots. Though trample and his ability make him an absolute beast. He may eventually make it in, but I haven't decided what I'll cut for him.
Saffi Eriksdotter goes into many decks for the combo finish. But I'm not a big fan of combo finishes, at least not in this deck. So she got the axe from the deck. My dislike of combo finishes also explains why the Spike Feeder/Archangel of Thune isn't in here.
Secondly, let's take a look as to why I choose some cards over others.
Diligent Farmhand won out over Dawntreader Elk because our highest concentration of creatures are 3 drops and I want to be able to play them on T3. Farmhand gives us 4 mana on T3 whereas Dawntreader puts us at 5 mana on T4. Let me explain. T1 we play Farmhand and T2 we sacrifice it to get a land. This means that at the start of T3 we have three lands and can start casting our three drops. But with Dawntreader, we need to play him on T2 and then use his ability on T3, not letting use play a 3 drop until the following turn.
Angel of Finality over Agent of Erebos. Agent is nice because constellation lets us use him more than once without having him die. But since we run so few enchantments (4) I think that having the bigger body and flying is more relevant.
Yavimaya Dryad Got beat out by Wood Elves and the other 3 drop mana ramps. I don't like having to find double Green and the others all seem to do a better job. Wood Elves brings the card in untapped. Yavimaya Granger sacrifices to itself letting you recur it easier. Farhaven Elf is better late game because he lets me get any basic I need. Yes Dryad can fetch forest cards, so I can find my duals. But I only run 4 fetchable duals and if I run out then I'm forced into only getting G. Dryad might eventually make me reconsider, but for the time being I don't think there's much need. Plus the other three are easier to cast since I only need a single G.
Golgari Grave-Troll was chosen out of the all the other dredge cards because he's the best. But that being said, there's a reason I didn't include any of the others. Having dredgers in here makes the deck put to much into the graveyard in a short amount of time. This means that you can easily get blown out by a Relic of Progenitus or something similar. Troll made the cut because you can Entomb him into the grave for a quick boost of your graveyard or use him later on to dig but because he's the only dredger, the deck isn't forced to go all in and risk losing to many valuable resources at once.
Multani's Acolyte got added over Elvish Visionary because I feel that the echo ability, or rather the fact that it send itself to the grave. Is worth having to find the second G mana. You can also argue that the stats are better, but that's rarely relevant since you won't usually be paying the cost and blocking in EDH doesn't usually kill things. But yes, Acolyte also has an extra power to him.
Reclamation Sage usurped Harmonic Sliver because he is just all around better. He is still a G creature so he's tutorable by Green Sun's Zenith. He's still a 3 drop. But he only requires one colored mana, his is a may ability (so you won't be forced to blow up your own stuff if there's no other targets), and he is a 2/1. If you are choosing to run other slivers though (i.e. Narcotic Sliver) then you may want to consider Harmonic just to have more creatures to use his ability.
Finally, I want to talk about the cards that I am considering for addition to the deck.
Riftsweeper Even though the deck can survive through graveyard hate quite effectively (just as long as you're not greedy) it is still nice to be able to pull back the fatties that your opponent's managed to exile. And even though Sweeper puts them back into your deck, it's still better than not having access to them at all. Also a good card to use against Jhiora of the Ghitu since it can tuck their suspended cards.
Loaming Shaman is a solid 3/2 for 3 that helps restock your library if you're in fear of milling yourself and also acts as graveyard hate. Fairly straightforward card with a lot of potential.
Massacre Wurm Has a very strong ETB effect that can board wipe a lot of stuff, plus it combo's well with Elesh Norn. Also causes my opponent to lose life for the death of their creatures. But BBB is a pretty heavy casting cost, and it takes up a 6 drop slot. Still undecided if the draw back is worth it's huge amount of power.
I'll update this more when I get the chance. If anyone has any suggestions or thoughts on the above cards please let me know!
Here are the changes I've been making.
October 16, 2014: Siege Rhino got switched for Oracle of Mul Daya: Rhino is a nice card. Has a good body and not the worst ETB effect. But he didn't progress my board state as much as I'd like. Testing out Oracle in it's place. Oracle is a great ramp card but is iffy because of the low amount of shuffle effects and deck manipulation.
Knight of the Reliquary Is being considered for removal. Not sure what I'd put in to fill her slot, but so far all the testing I've done she's fairly lack luster. At best she grabs either Bojuka Bog, Crypt of Agadeem, or Phyrexian Tower. Just doesn't seem to wow me. We'll see.
October 18, 2014
Switched out a Forest for Gavony Township. Little hesitant to put another colorless mana source in a three color deck. But I think the utility will be worth it. Will keep you all updated.
October 25, 2014
Oracle was taken out for Phyrexian Delver. Oracle didn't do enough considering how much mana ramp is being done and she didn't effect the board state hard enough late game. Delver made it in because I found myself really needing a 5 drop reanimator that I could pod into and would stick around so that I could then pod into my 6 drops.
Gavony Township has proven to be a very good card. Gives an nice extra bit of power to each attack.
November 13, 2014 Knight of the Reliquary has finally come out. She is being replaced by Kessig Cagebreakers. Knight just never had enough juice behind her. She could get fairly large but Cagebreakers is even more powerful. While Knight offered a bit of utility I found that it was never really enough. I think the power boost Cagebreakers brings outweighs the small amount of utility and the semi large (usually 7/7-10/10) body is outshone by Cagebreaker dropping 5-15 attacking wolfs. The swarm is harder to block and deal with plus the extra bodies gives our anthem effects a better result (Elesh Norn, Mirari's Wake).
November 18, 2014 Lieutenant Kirtar was just added on a trial run over Saffi Eriksdotter. I find myself needing to remove troublesome creatures that are either black or artifactss, which means that Bone Shredder and Shriekmaw can't touch them. So I want to see how Kirtar does.
False Prophet is being tested over Loxodon Hierarch. I need to see if I have enough sac outlets for this to work. Loxodon just doesn't do enough. I have yet to use the field regen ability since most people run board wipes like Damnation or wrath of God. We'll see what happens.
December 26, 2014
I know it's been a while since the last update. I haven't forgotten. False prophet has proved himself and is staying in the deck. Kirtar never got used so I'm trying Stonecloaker as a graveyard hate/ flying/ self creature bounce. Since this deck has the primary function of abusing ETB effects, I think he'll make a good addition, but as always. I'll let you know.
I have also been considering putting Knight of the Reliquary back in. Since the point of this deck is to find answers and work as a toolbox, I'm debating if I have just been forsaking a toolbox in the form of my land slots. I'm trying to think of what lands would be good for the deck that would warrant tutoring for them. I want to have 7-10 ideas before Knight goes back in since I don't think any less than that would be worth it. Here as some of the options I've thought of:
That's all I've thought of so far. Yes I have Gavony Township, which is nice, but I don't know if I would ever want to tutor for it. Seems like a better natural draw.
February 7, 2015
I've been testing and playing some but not as much as I'd like. So far the card I'm working on is Stonecloaker. I haven't drawn him that many times to see if he's worth it. He is on the chopping block in favor of Rift Sweeper. Wish I could update more but just haven't had the experience needed to make the decision as of yet.
February 18, 2015
Stonecloaker has gotten the axe. As far as EDH graveyard hate goes, he's pretty weak. I liked the thought of being able to abuse my ETB effects, but that hasn't panned out the way I was hoping. I also needed the room for an unusual idea.
Ray of Distortion seems like a really, really bad disenchant. Because it is. However in the meta I am in right now I have Humility running around. That means we have to get a non creature answer for it. I know there is Disenchant, Ray of Revelation and a bunch of other stuff, but the reason I'm choosing distortion is two fold. First off, once humility hits, the game slows to a crawl. This means that we can save up the 6 mana required for the flashback. This lets Entomb become a tutor for the card. It's also a 4CMC card, which lets us transmute Dimir House Guard into it. Remember, we can land a Survival of the Fittest and tutor up house guard to tutor up Ray. It's a long chain, but thats a guaranteed way to find it, unlike the other, cheaper versions.
February 20, 2015
After serious testing I found some cards that look like they should be great, really aren't. So let's do some spring cleaning early.
All of those cards look great at first glance but have serious flaws with gameplay. First is the Escort, he doesn't do what the deck wants. He wants to protect the threat we have on board but Karador is about the inevitable. If they board wipe, that's fine, we recover. If they Go for the Throat our Elesh Norn, we replay her.
Greater Good is a card revered by many EDH players and one that I find extrememly potent in the right deck. But we don't actually generate card advantage with it as most of our creatures are power 3 or less. Yes we get to toss cards into the yard, but without the up side of actual card advantage.
Kessig just hasn't measured up. He's very powerful, but overall very slow. We want things that are a bit more potent and give us an advantage but just hitting the board. I don't think Kessig is a bad choice, but I think that we can do better.
Kokusho, a very great card. Big beat stick, extra damage on death, and a nice bit of life gain. But I was never actually happy to him. I don't inifinite sac and recursion to combo of with him and when I want to pod into a 6 drop I never wanted him. Yosei is more potent, Sun Titan gets me card advantage. So I want him to become something that I'll actually want.
Decree of Pain is a personal favorite of mine. In any EDH deck it needs very serious consideration. However with Karador I don't cast it nearly as often as one would think. By the time I hit 8 mana I have better cards to board wipe with (Magister of Worth) so I think the card slot, like the others in this list, isn't being used to full effect.
Whisperwood Elemental is a very interesting card. One that I have played a bit casually and come to enjoy. With us running upwards of 50 creatures we have a 50/50 chance of straight up manifesting a creature. It gives us blockers, puts creatures onto our field (and if we block, into our yard), and gives us an out to board wipes. I don't like to try to justify cards with their single interactions, but keep in mind that Sensei's Top and Sylvan Library increase his value tremendously. I have used him several times in the past several days and have enjoyed him each time. My personal favorite is when I manifested Elesh Norn and flipped her during combat the next turn for a game changing blow out.
Ah Erebos, God of the Dead, how many times I have toyed with putting you in. I finally broke down and decided that this decks weakest portion came in it's lack of card advantage. I have claimed that our graveyard is equal to card advantage, and yes that's true. But it just doesn't draw us the cards we need to keep going. Erebos is a card that fits the 4CMC spot I've wanted and works as good card advantage that is neigh irremovable. The life prevention is nice though my meta doesn't have much life gain so it's irrelevant.
Genesis Hydra Has me on the fence. I have only been able to use him once and he worked out fine. He allows us to dig into our deck for the answer we need. We don't have the reclamation sage we need? Well let's do some digging and see what we find. We can also sac him and use Karador to re use. I don't know if he's to mana intensive, but we'll find out.
Aven Mindcensor is an efficient creature. He helps shorten the game by stopping the constant searching that occurs in EDH. Fetches, Pod, Survival, Diabolic tutor, Iname, etc... Whether or not he's to small a creature to be worth it, well, we'll have to see.
Linvala, Keeper of Silence - I don't want this deck to just become a prison deck. But I wanted a solid 4 CMC card that will impact my opponents early game and stopping mana dorks and random other things seems good. I admit, I'm waiting to see what the BG and BW dragons from Dragons of Tarkir are, to see if they are strong enough to replace her. I don't like the idea of putting her on the field and becoming to big a target to early on.
February 22, 2015
After playing and talking with other people I've realized that while Reliquary Tower is an EDH staple, it's just not relevant enough for us. Now, your meta might be different. But generally speaking we are not drawing an obxious amount of cards and if we draw to many we just pitch some creatures to the yard and life is good. I decided that having better access to colors is more important and so I put in Mana Confluence in it's place. I could have have added the tap land, but I try to avoid tap lands whenever possible.
Please let me know what you think of my primer. Any suggestions would be welcome! Sorry if I haven't flushed out more section better, but I will be updating this and working on it as I get time. Enjoy your games and I hope you enjoy playing such an amazing general!
as someone building a karador deck, how do you use false prophet? only when you have nothing else on the field? as a rattlesnake effect against other players to stop them from attacking you? Just curious, it seems like it could potentially backfire super hard
as someone building a karador deck, how do you use false prophet? only when you have nothing else on the field? as a rattlesnake effect against other players to stop them from attacking you? Just curious, it seems like it could potentially backfire super hard
Hmm, in my Karador deck, I run a lot of Sac Outlets, so most of the time I'll sac all my creatures in response, so they don't get exiled.
Yeah, I always had pretty solid results from false prophet in Karador. My deck, like this one, was a bit top heavy and took a while to really get cooking. Prophet was a good early drop as a rattlesnake that you sacced when you were ready to start dropping your big bombs. Having sac outlets for your important creatures is nice, but often not the end of the world if you lose a creature or two. I found Peacekeeper and Mindslicer played in a similar way, grind the game to a halt early, then sac them when you are ready to wreck it.
do you run Varolz, the Scar-Striped over other free sac outlets mainly for the fact that you can tutor it via green sun? i personally run Viscera Seer and love it. also makes sure that they cant exile my sac outlet either since he can sac himself as well. Is there a reason your not running Pernicious Deed? its interactions with Sun Titan are just too fun not to have in. Do you feel you consistently have enough sac outlets that you can abuse cards that dont auto kill themselves? or do you rely on their echo costs to get them into the yard? Cards like Fiend Hunter work wonders if you can regularly assure that you have a sac outlet. over things like boneshredder. the nonblack clause always made that card useless for me, though i suppose your playgroup may make its mileage vary. Lastly, i find that my Karador deck, which runs a grind non combo style of play often wins through opponents scooping more then it wins from making someones life total hit 0. do you run into similar experiences?
*Edit
Do you purposefully not combo with lark/karmic? i know you said you dont like combo finishes and AFAIK saffi is only needed to recur creatures larger then power 2. otherwise you can already create infinite loops of slime
Is there a reason why you're not running any black sorcery tutors? I'm a die hard karador player and it seems you've purposely omitted many karador "staples" like eternal witness, worldly tutor, sol ring and to a lesser extent sac outlets like Viscera Seer, Ashnod's Altar etc.
I read your reasoning to skullclamp so I completely understand why those aren't in there if that's the reason
Do you purposefully not combo with lark/karmic? i know you said you dont like combo finishes and AFAIK saffi is only needed to recur creatures larger then power 2. otherwise you can already create infinite loops of slime
Lark/Guide only will infinite loop with a free sac outlet, ie. Phyrexian Altar. As far as I can tell, the only free sac outlet in OP's list is Vish Kal.
That said, not playing Saffi because she can combo is like saying you won't play Black Lotus because Lotus can be used in combos. Saffi is amazing even just as a utility creature. She lets you get so much additional value with any creature and a sac outlet, and considering the nature of the deck, she is very easy to bring back. For example, consider Ashen Rider and Saffi - a single sac outlet and you're looking at getting rid of two permanents a turn.
Well, let's talk about why one would like to even play Karador. For me, I have always been a huge fan of Non Blue control because I hate counterspells. They don't require any thought. "Does that card win him the game? 'Yes', well then counter it", "Does that card stop me from winning the game 'yes', well then counter it". That's about what blue does. I prefer being more reactive to my opponents, knowing that somewhere, someway, my deck has the exact answer I need and it's my job to know it. So you want to play Karador (at least my version) if you like being rewarded for knowing your deck and it's interactions. You also enjoy creating card advantage while being unconcerned about your hand size. He makes it hard for your opponents to get rid of something because they either have to exile it or kill it and then remove it from the grave. Few decks can exile a card outright and as for removing it from the grave, that means they have to 2 for 1 you. The first spell to kill your creature and the second to remove it from the grave. You could also just want to play Karador because you like the colors.
Speaking of colors, I want to explain briefly what each color gives us. WGB gives us the absolute perfect combination for reanimation. Each color has it's fatties and utility creatures that we want to use, but utility is different. B gives us creatures that kill and maim their creatures and hands. W gives us creatures that do great jobs at recurring our things. And finally, G gives us mana, mana, some some other random things, and also, mana.
You also probably won't like him if you have problems keeping track of whats in your deck or you feel like that is to much work. Karador rewards you heavily for knowing what cards are in your deck to answer specific situations. So you have to know their CMC and abilities. It can be taxing to keep track of, so keep that in mind.
1 Spore Frog
1 Diligent Farmhand
2 Multani's Acolyte
2 Viridian Emissary
2 Satyr Wayfinder
2 Qasali Pridemage
2 Fauna Shaman
2 Gaddock Teeg
2 Scavenging Ooze
2 Hermit Druid
2 Sakura-Tribe Elder
3 Bone Shredder
3 Aven Mindcensor
3 Eternal Witness
3 Farhaven Elf
3 Fierce Empath
3 Fleshbag Maurader
3 Loyal Retainers
3 Reclamation Sage
3 Varolz the Scar-Stripped
3 Wood Elves
3 Yavimaya Granger
4 Angel of Finality
4 Dimir House Guard
4 Linvala, Keeper of Silence
4 Mindslicer
4 Slum Reaper
4 Solemn Simulacrum
4 Spike Weaver
4 Erebos, God of the Dead
4 False Prophet
5 Phyrexian Delver
5 Golgari Grave-Troll
5 Karmic Guide
5 Reveillark
5 Seedguide Ash
5 Whisperwood Elemental
5 Shadowborn Demon
5 Shriekmaw
6 Yosei, the Morning Star
6 Sun Titan
6 Bane of Progress
6 Magister of Worth
7 Resolute Archangel
7 Elesh Norn, Grand Cenobite
7 Vish Kal, Blood Arbiter
8 Karador, Ghost Chieftain
8 Woodfall Primus
8 Ashen Rider
9 Iona, Shield of Emeria
Artifacts:
1 Birthing Pod
1 Sensei's divining Top
Enchantments:
5 Mirari's Wake
2 Survival of the fitest
2 Sylvan library
Instants:
1 Entomb
4 Ray of Distortion
Sorcery:
5 Living Death
3 Buried Alive
1 Bayou
1 Woodland Cemetery
1 Tainted Wood
1 Overgrown Tomb
1 Verdant Catacombs
1 Savannah
1 Sunpetal Grove
1 Horizon Canopy
1 Temple Garden
1 Windswept Heath
1 Gavony Township
1 Scrubland
1 Tainted Field
1 Godless Shrine
1 Marsh Flats
1 Isolated Chapel
1 Murmuring Bosk
1 Command Tower
1 Reflecting Pool
1 High Market
1 Phyrexian tower
1 City of Brass
1 Riftstone Portal
1 Bojuka Bog
7 Snow- Covered Forest
2 Snow-Covered Plains
4 Snow Covered Swamps
Ok, so now I want to get into the nitty gritty. For me, whenever I looked at primer's it was for two reasons. The first was to get ideas or thoughts on cards I either wanted to add or hadn't thought of adding. And the second reason was to figure out what synergies I had been missing out on. So That's where I'd like to focus this primer. You probably know by now if you even want to play Karador and if you do, then I want to provide you with the exact reasons I have chosen the cards I have, not added other cards, and what synergies the deck holds. So let's get to it!
So the first thing is to explain why cards are there. My rational behind them is usually straight forward, but sometimes I have weird thoughts so I'll be sure to explain those the best I can. First, let's talk mana ramp.
Each of those cards is a nice straightforward mana ramp creature. They get you lands to the field and puts you a head of the curve. Now, some of the other mana ramp creatures that I want to explain a bit.
Yavimaya Granger I had no clue this card existed until I started searching out pieces for the deck, and I'm glad I found it. It's a nice 2/2 blocker for 3 that also puts you ahead on land. But the beauty of it, is the Echo. That means that, without any effort on your part, it will put itself into the grave to not only help you get Karador out faster. But it also gives Sun titan a target every turn and let's you keep recasting it with Karador for repeatable ramp.
Seedguide Ash is a card that most people forget about, which is a shame. I love this card because of the shear advantage to it. First off, he has a solid 4/4 body that can trade punches with quite a few things and it makes it something that is sizable enough that people don't want to get hit with it. It also nets you three forest cards, CARDS, when it dies. So you can go in and grab bosk, overgrown tomb, temple garden, etc.. and put yourself ahead of the curve by three turns by just tossing him to the grave. Which can be done easily by birthing pod or phyrexian tower.
and for the final creature, Diligent Farmhand This is a simple card. He's a simple one drop for a 1/1 rampant growth. I'll explain him more down the road when I start justifying my decisions.
The only non creature mana ramp I run is Mirari's Wake and that's just because it is to good not to run. It's a 5 drop that doubles all your lands mana AND pumps your creatures. It's an anthem, it's a mana ramp, it's just amazing.
I want to touch on Riftstone Portal. It's not mana ramp but it is mana fixing if you get it into your grave (discarding it, entomb it, etc...). It lets you not worry about finding W or G again. So you can focus on getting your swamps and having lands that can produce all colors. Pretty cool stuff.
Next up, we need ways to use all that beautiful, beautiful mana. That's where card advantage comes in. Card advantage is typically thought of as who has the bigger hand size or can draw the most cards. Well the beauty of Karador is his ability to turn your graveyard into card advantage. Making it hard to keep things gone. So let's get started:
Solemn Simulacrum Yes he already showed up under mana ramp, but he also nets you a card when he dies. So he belongs here as well. Cast him, fetch a land, kill him, draw a card, rinse, repeat, love'em more and more each time.
Satyr Wayfinder You might be tempted to think of him as mana ramp, but he's really not. The reason is that even though he can help ensure you don't miss a land drop, his true value lies in the other three cards you don't keep. Putting them into the grave will usually give you at least one, if not more creatures. It's a good 1/1 for 2 that feeds your graveyard and helps you not miss land drops. He might not seem like much, but he's one of the better turn 2 plays the deck and even late game can do a TON of work by giving you access to 4 more cards.
Hermit Druid Ok folks. Here's the man himself. I'll start off by saying this, if you are not building this to be competitive DO NOT put him in here. He is the card advantage that all other card advantage wishes it was. He doesn't seem like much. But running a low basic land count combined with the fact that you are tutoring up basics during the first few turns means that turning him sideways is like turn a quarter of your deck upside down into the grave. It's hard to explain just how good he is if you haven't seen him play. But trust me, he gives you a land to play for your turn while putting a ton of goodies into the grave. That being said, you need to make sure you keep track of your basic and don't mill yourself out with him.
Golgari Grave-Troll He's here because he's the best dredger. He puts 6 cards into your graveyard (which means you should be hitting at least 2-4 creatures). Great for fueling Karador and his casting cost. He is also a fairly large creature that you can drop late game for the beats. I'll talk about why he's here and none of the others in the "why not those guys" section later on.
Eternal Witness Ok, So E. Wit belongs here. She's a straightforward girl. You want to recast that damnation? Here ya go. You want another land? Sure why not. Oh, you cast your creature per turn but need another one, Have at it!! She's a staple of the format for all the right reasons.
Sylvan Library & Sensei's Divining Top are two peas in a pod. They both let you see the top three and each have their advantages and disadvantages. Library let's you look for free and can draw you multiple cards a turn. So if you need all three you can have them, or if you want to the clear the top cards off so you can dig deeper you can. Top is nice because it's instant speed draw (if you want to protect grave troll or hide something away from a discard spell) and it also lets you use it multiple times. So you can spin top, not like what you see. Crack a fetch land and then spin again.
Now I want to move on to my tutor section. You'll notice the lack of demonic, diabolic, enlightening, worldy, or any other tutor of the like. That is strictly personal preference. This deck is built to be good without being to "cookie cutter" and plus, I think it's not really necessary. I have very good success without them and it keeps my deck from being reliant on them.
Dimir House Guard is under the tutor section because of his transmute ability. He gives you access to the other four drops in your deck WHILE putting a creature in the graveyard that calls to Karador to show up for cheaper. The main targets you can get with him are:
Birthing Pod
Damnation
Solemn Simulacrum
Spike Weaver
Erebos, God of the Dead
False Prophet
Mindslicer
Slum Reaper
Angel of Finality
Fauna Shaman is the creature version of survival (get to that in a bit). Basically she puts creatures into your graveyard and into your hand. She does it all. That being said, she's a very straight forward tutor, so let's move on to the rest.
Fierce Empath He is definitely one of my favorites. He's a creatures that you can Green Sun for and he get's so many good things. Magister of Worth, Sun Titan, Woodfall Primus, you know the deal. Once again though, a very straight forward tutor (pretty much all of them are).
Buried Alive is a great card for the deck. It gives you 3 mana for Karador and gives you 3 creatures to play with. You can toss in those utility creatures, or some power houses, or even both. Getting two small utility creatures and the Sun Titan to get them with is a nifty bit of tech.
Survival of the Fittest Ok, so this card. It's just pure power. It turns any creature you want into something useful while fueling your graveyard. You can just use extra mana at the end of your opponents turn to dig out useless creatures and pitch them to the grave. That will thin your deck and make Karador easier to cast. Or you can put all of the utility creatures in there to grab when you need. Or get combo pieces if that's the goal you are working towards. This card allows for a turn 4 Iona.
Entomb is an interesting card. It's big plus is the cost and the instant speed. It acts a tutor for Karador and can help mana fix. Now you are asking, how the hell can entomb mana fix? Well it's easy, just use it to toss Riftstone Portal into the grave! That means that any land you have will produce the G or W you need. So you can focus on grabbing any B mana source you want and it'll tap for any of your colors.
Birthing Pod Birthing Pod is a POWERHOUSE in the deck. Here's why. It's a combination sac outlet and Tutor. It let's you get bigger and bigger guys while netting you LTB triggers and letting you cast the cards again from the grave for even more ETB triggers. It's just all around a must have in the deck. That being said, if you include it, you have to start being careful to ensure that you have 3-4 creatures in each CMC and that you can remember what's where. Remember, this is a deck that rewards you for knowing whats in it.
Green Sun's Zenith is the last of the tutors in the deck. It grabs any creature you want (as long as it's green) but that gives you access to a huge amount of utility. It also lets you grab whatever CMC you need so it's not as restricting as pod. It puts it straight to the field, unlike survival. And perhaps it's biggest advantage, is that it shuffles itself back in for you to do it all over again.
So those are the tutor's that the deck runs. The next section I have to delve into are the utility cards that you want to tutor for. Oh, and I'll make the note here, that there are no delve cards in the deck. The reasons are pretty simple. The first being that there hasn't been any delve cards worth it so far. And also, you rarely have something you want to remove. and anything can be brought back by Eternal Witness if you need it later.
Moving onto the cards that you'll want to tutor for. This is a toolbox style so this is going to be the longest section (I think).
Artifact and enchantment destruction are a must have in any EDH deck. That being said, here's ours.
Reclamation Sage Typical arti/ench destruction. I'll talk him about VS harmonic sliver later on.
And last but not least. The big daddy of the arti/ench destroying world. The one, the only Bane of Progress. God. How much can I gush over a single card? I saw him and debated long and hard about putting him in here. Finally I broke down and made some room and HOLY MOTHER! He's just astounding. Here's why. He's a 6 drop, which means that Fierce Empath can search him up. He's green, so Green Sun's Zenith likes him, and he's a 2/2, so Reveillark greats him with a smile. But Ed, if he's only a 2/2, why the heck do I want to pay 4GG for him? Well it's simple my dear fellow. He gets bigger! Take a look at nearly any EDH deck and you'll find Sol Ring, Thran Dynamo, Gilded Lotus, etc... All of those things he eats up and grows bigger. He is especially powerful against any Non Green EDH deck. Non Green decks need mana ramp to, but the only access they have is based on mana rocks. So you can completely shut of a decks mana base with him alone. One of my best friends has a Niv-Mizzet, the Firemind EDH deck that is a combo deck. He had 7 mana by turn 3 but only 2 of them were lands. I was able to resolve bane against him and that was it, game over. Bane came in as a 7/7 and took my opponent down to two mana. It's just that strong.
Next, we have to be able to deal with other creatures. Nasty buggers like Consecrated Sphinx or Ulamog. So let's see how we go about destroying the troublesome creatures that appear on our opponents fields:
First let's talk targeted removal/singleton removal.
Bone Shredder & Shriekmaw are two of the best. They both kill that troublesome creature without much effort on our part. They also both feed themselves to the graveyard so we can do it all over again later. Bone Shredder also makes a good flying chump blocker. Now, the big downside to those two is the restriction on what they can kill. They can't kill artifact creatures, or other black creatures. So you need to keep that in mind.
Shadowborn Demon is a new addition to the deck and so far, I highly approve. He is MUCH less restrictive about what he kills and he hs a heck of a body that even flys! His downside is that you have to sacrifice a creature during your upkeep. But, that's only if you have less than 6 creatures in your grave. So while you can run into times when yes, his drawback is actually a drawback, usually it's a moot point. That being said, even sacrificing something is something that you will usually want to do. You can sacrifice him to himself to recast and kill more stuff. You can sac an echo dude before they die to their own effect, or you can sacrifice another creature to recast it for more use. He's a solid flying body, a kill spell with a wide range, and a sac outlet.
Fleshbag Marauder & Slum Reaper are two cards that are good at what they do. They make your opponent's sacrifice their creatures. Yes you have to sacrifice too, but they even give you the body to sacrifice. Meaning that you play them, sacrifice them to themselves, and then can Karador them back for more fun. These are good to get around hexproof and indestructible. But be careful, you need to make sure you've cleared their board of everything else so they can't just chump sac.
Vish Kal, Blood Arbiter He's being mentioned here due to his killing ability. But I'll talk about him more in the win con's section of this primer. Just be aware that his ability to kill creatures is astounding. It may seem limiting that you have to remove all counter from him. But it is much less of a problem than it initially seems. Trust me, I had doubts too.
Finally, our mass board wipes. The things that kill everything, every time.
Magister of Worth This card is just amazing. It's a 4/4 flyer which is decent in it's own right. But it's also a 6 drop, which might seem bad but it's actually not. Because that means that our main man Fierce Empath can tutor her up! Now, she is not always a board wipe true, but 9/10 she will be. Why? Because you have spent your whole game building up your graveyard. And while your opponents have a few cards in their yards they want back, you have a whole army to bring back! So usually your opponents will just opt to lose their board instead of trying to deal with yours. Remember though, even when she blows up the board, she sticks around. Giving you the only creature in play to take some swings with.
Elesh Norn, Grand Cenobite is a card I'll talk more about in my win con's section. But I want to mention her here because her -2/-2 ability is a lot of times a board wipe in and of itself. Weenies, Tokens, Mana dorks, etc... all just die to her, meaning they have much less things to just chump block with.
False Prophet is a very sound card. Being able to transmute into him is nice. And being able to pod him away, exile everything, and then grabbing the creature you need is perfect. I have yet to use him and lose more than one creature.
Really quick, before we move onto the rest of the utility beasties, I want to talk about some cards that fall under the destruction/removal categories but don't quite fit into one of the above.
The first is Acidic Slime. This card kills artifacts, enchantments and lands. Even though I'm morally opposed to land destruction, sometimes you just can't let them keep the Urborg and Cabal Coffers or that pesky Serra's Sanctum.
Woodfall Primus and Ashen Rider are the next two. They will take anything out (except for creatures in Woodfall's case) and then they decide to take more stuff out when they leave. Woodfall leaves and comes back with his persist ability, and Ashen Rider takes something for the road with him. Both are amazing and strong finishers that take out your opponents fields when they start going about their work.
Moving on;
These are the cards that bring stuff back from the dead to fight once more.
Sun Titan is possibly my favorite. You can grab him with Fierce Empath (man doesn't Empath seem to get around?) or you can grab Empath with him! It's a wonderful cycle. But seriously. He can pull back a whole host of useful things. Notable mentions include; Qasali Pridemage, Multani's Acolyte, Fleshbag Marauder, lands. Below is a list of the targets that have higher value with him:
1 Bone Shredder
1 Satyr Wayfinder
1 Eternal Witness
1 Fierce Empath
1 Sakura-Tribe Elder
1 Sensei's Divining Top
1 Fauna Shaman
1 Viridian Emissary
1 Fleshbag Marauder
1 Sylvan Library
1 Wood Elves
1 Aven Mindcensor
1 Qasali Pridemage
1 Gaddock Teeg
1 Verdant Catacombs
1 Bojuka Bog
1 Marsh Flats
1 Survival of the Fittest
1 Hermit Druid
1 Loyal Retainers
1 Spore Frog
1 Scavenging Ooze
1 Farhaven Elf
1 Yavimaya Granger
1 Saffi Eriksdotter
1 Diligent Farmhand
1 Horizon Canopy
1 Windswept Heath
1 Multani's Acolyte
1 High Market
1 Reclamation Sage
Karmic Guide is the great revivalist. She comes in and brings back any creature you could possibly want from your grave. She also flys, has pro black, and has echo. The echo, in case you haven't noticed, is important for us because it lets us recur her and thereby recur other things over and over again. She basically reduces the cost of our high drops to a measly 3WW. Saving us valuable mana on that Ashen Rider, Elesh Norn, or whatever else you fancy. She is also a 2/2, which will be very important later on in our win con section.
Phyrexian Delver is the corrupted version of Karmic Guide. He's the same mana cost but has an extra point of attack damage. The other differences include that he doesn't have flying, or protection from anything, and he loses you life. But that all being said, he doesn't leave the field on his own which means he works better with Pod since you can pod into him one turn and then pod him away the next.
Loyal Retainers This is a card that is just plain good. If you look at our list, out of the 50 non Karador creatures, 8 are legendary. That may not seem like a lot, but let's take a look at some of our targets: Vish Kal, Elesh Norn, Iona, Yosei, and Kokusho. All of them are fantastic cards to bring back for only 2W. Loyal Retainers also enables silly things with Survival and Fauna Shaman. I'll talk more about that later in the interactions section.
Reveillark is the final recurring creature we have. This is a nifty card because not only does it pull two creatures back, but it also gives you the ability to pay one extra to evoke it. Meaning that it dies right away. Getting you the creatures back instantly and being ready to go again with Karador. Reveillark also has a 4/3 flying body which can easily get some beats in. Once again, another combo piece. But unlike Saffi, even if you choose not to include the combo, you should still run this card.
Next up, our life gainers and savers!
These are the dudes that either protect us or gain us the life we need to keep going. Obviously this deck will not win everytime and we will take damage. So we want some ways of mitigating that damage. First up is our Fog effects.
Spore Frog is the simplest one we have. He's a cute little 1/1 for G that let's use sacrifice him to save ourselves from damage. He comes back with Karador and let's you stall to your hearts content.
Spike Weaver is Spore Frog's big brother. He's a nice addition because you don't have to waste you Karador cast each turn to stall like you do with Frog. You cast him once and get three turns out of it. Meaning you can stabilize easier. He's also a 0/0 so he kills himself when the last counter is removed and also you can get him back with Reveillark.
Life gain is our next step to keeping ourselves alive. With shock lands, paying life to Pod, being punched in the face, it can slowly add up. So we need some ways to pull back from the brink.
Resolute Archangel is to life gain as Bane of Progress is to arti/ench destruction. The big Kahuna. Your opponent's spend the whole game fighting and clawing their way through your control and finally manage to take your life below 15. How do you repond? By using birthing pod to sacrifice Sun Titan and pull out Archangel, completely reseting your life total and making them all cry on the inside (and sometimes outside). Remember, you're a control deck. So most of your opponents will be targeting you because you're stopping them and you don't have the raw power to wipe a whole board at once. So having a single card that can reset your life value and dimish all their hard work is just great. But it's probably not the best for casual players since it may put your friends on tilt. If not, finding something that is a smaller cost with straight lifelink or something of the like is recommended.
Ok folks, just about wrapping up with one last section to go, the miscellaneous stuffs:
Graveyard hate is an important part of any deck. Because Karador is not the only one that can abuse graveyards or return cards to use again. Praetor's Counsel is used to great effect by green decks along with Eternal Witness and various other things. So to help combat that we have:
Scavenging Ooze is a great card. It's a 2/2 for 2 that eats any card in any graveyard for only one mana. It also gains us life and gets bigger as long as it's eating a creature.
Angel of Finality is the other piece of graveyard hate we have. She's a solid 3/ 4 flying body that comes down and exiles somebodies entire graveyard.
Bojuka Bog is the graveyard hating land. He comes in tapped but is a nigh uncounterable piece of graveyard hate.
I know I keep saying that this is a control deck, but haven't actually talked much about cards that do more than just react. So here are the couple pro active creatures we have on board.
First up is Gaddock Teeg. He is just a boss. For such a little guy he really stops a lot. Force of Will, Damnation, Supreme verdict, Green Sun, Decree of Pain, Cryptic Command, Day of judgement, Bribery, and soooo much more. Now, I'm also sure you noticed that I named a couple cards we run. Yes he does stop some of our cards, but it's well worth it. He only stops 6 cards in our whole deck, but he can completely shut down an opponents deck. Be careful with him, he's a priority target for almost any EDH you'll play against. Be sure that if you're going to play him, you are ready to be targeted. He's another card that casual players may want to consider not running. But he's also not that powerful where you can't at least test him out.
Aven Mindcensor is an efficient little bugger. But for such a small guy he sure speeds the game up since people aren't wasting all their time searching their decks.
Speaking of to powerful for casual, let's talk about [card]Iona, Shielf of Emeria[/card}]. The white she devil. She's a wopping 7/7 flyer that comes down and says “Hey, you wanna play that color, to bad”. That being said, she's not as bad as you would think. Against mono color decks she can just a victory but usually you'll run into at least to color decks. So you can shut off one color but the other can still find a way to deal with her. Once again, she is immensely powerful and should not be run in casual variants of this deck.
Finally, the card I love more than Iona herself, is the Mindslicer. He is everything that makes blue mages cry at night. Once he dies, he discards everyones hands. Now, you lose your hand too, but what do you care. That just makes Karador easier to cast and then once he's out, your graveyard is your hand. So while your opponent's are struggling to regain some semblance of card advantage, or at least to undo the disadvantage, you get to keep casting your creatures and moving your game forward.
The final control aspect is Yosei, the Morning Star. This beauty is a strong 5/5 flyer that can shut your opponent down for an entire turn. Giving you free reign to attack them mercilessly a second time or stop them from comboing out. In 1v1 matches, just having a sac outlet and Karador you can Yosei lock your opponent, or keep them from ever untapping their permanents. Easy to abuse, but if you aren't abusing it or are playing multiplayer, then it's probably ok to run in casual settings. If the play group is really casual then consider taking him out.
The final piece to the puzzle is our sac outlets. The cards that let us get rid of whats on our field so that we can do it all over again.
Varolz, the Scar-Striped is a 2/2 for 3 that is a free, instant speed sac outlet that somewhat protects himself and let's you find him with green sun. An overall decent card. Not very strong in this build but useful.
High Market & Phyrexian Tower are our land based sac outlets. Market gains you a life which isn't much, but you really just want it for the sacrifice effect. Tower is amazing because it sacrifices a creature and produces BB so you get a bit of ramp out of the whole deal.
Before I wrap up this section I want to go back to a card I've mentioned before and really want to talk about.
Vish Kal, Blood Arbiter
I mentioned him in a previous section but haven't talked about him since even though he belongs in most of the sections you just read. Here's why, he does 4 things that make him great. First, he gives you life. Second, he kills stuff. Third, he's an instant speed free sacrifice outlet. And finally, he's a win condition. He is an all star in the deck and a must have. For everything from casual to competitive he fits in the deck. He gets bigger by giving you what you need (a way to abuse your creatures) and he attacks to take your opponents out and give you life. Get him back with Karmic Guide and sacrifice her before her echo kills her and he's a 7/7 flying lifelink. Cast Golgari Grave-Troll who is a 8/8, sacrifice him so you can dredge him later and Vish Kal just became a 13/13. He really is just to good to not run.
The last three sections to talk about are my favorite sections. The first are a small list of synergies that the deck provides. There won't be many because you should discover them for yourselves. But I want to point out some things that you should have in your mind as a starting point. The second section is my attempt to defend the card choices I've made (as opposed to the possible cards) and then what cards I've been considering adding. That last section is important to me because like most Magic players, I want to make my deck better. So hearing your opinions on the cards is a great thing for me.
Karador, Ghost Chieftain I want to point out a ruling that interests me and one I have used several times to great advantage. If Karador leaves the battlefield and comes back, you can cast a second creature from the grave. So if you start your turn and cast Magister of Worth from your graveyard using Karador. She destroys everyone and then you RECAST Karador, you can cast a second creature from your grave that turn.
A second ruling about Karador to keep in mind is his cost reduction ability. Thanks to the rules, anything that increases the casting cost (i.e. the commander tax) are applied first. Then the cost reduction effects are applied. So if he dies and you want to cast him a second time and have 7 creatures in your graveyard, then congrats. Karador only costs WBG
Entomb works well as a generic creature tutor when you have Karador on the field. But other than that, it's a great way to mana fix using Riftstone Portal which let's worry about finding lands that produce B and letting the Portal do the rest. I also find myself frequently getting Golgari Grave-Troll on T1 or T2. This allows me to dredge 6 cards and usually gives Karador the chance to come down by T3 or T4.
Sun Titan is another card that does nice things. My favorites are Multani's Acolyte to ensure an extra draw each turn or Yavimaya Granger to fetch a land and thin the deck. He also get's Dauntless Escort allowing you to attack with the team and not worry about how they block, and finally he can control the board with Bone Shredder and [card]Fleshbag Maurader[card] killing creature's every time he attacks.
Iona, Shield of Emeria can be brought about on T4 by two different methods. The first is a bit harder to do because you need to have 5 creatures in your grave by T4 and a Birthing Pod. It's simple. You cast Birthing Pod on T3, then cast Karador on T4 and Pod him into Iona.
The second method involves Survival of the Fittest or Fauna Shaman. Simply cast one on T2. Then T3 you discard a creature card and get Iona (you can also get Elesh Norn, Grand Cenobite, Vish Kal, Blood Arbiter, or whatever legendary you want). Then on T4 you discard the legendary creature, search up Loyal Retainers and cast him. Then you use him to bring back your legendary and BOOM, you're a threat to the whole board.
First I want to talk about cards I have specifically left out of the deck.
Skullclamp This card is just insane. It draws you so many cards, fuels your graveyard and lets you get turn that Wood Elves into even more card advantage. That being said, I haven't included it for flavor reasons. I can't say anything bad about this card. It just doesn't really make the deck fun for me. Yes yes I know you want to shake your head and say “How is he telling me this is competitive when he's thinking about flavor” and the truth is, you're right. But I believe that I can retain the flavor of being creature based and still play competitively.
Necrotic Sliver just got the axe because even though he works nicely with Harmonic Sliver he really was just to mana intensive for me to warrant. I found myself rarely needing and usually he was just a three drop card that would sit in my hand because I had better things to do with my mana.
Mulch, Grisly Salvage and the like didn't make the cut based purely on them not being creatures. I want this deck to maximize creatures and their contributions and reduce the non creatures to a minimum.
Dryad Arbor I don't like Arbor. He's just, slow. And I hate the idea of losing a land to a board wipe or a kill spell. Plus since you don't cast him Karador makes him useless in the graveyard. Though the GSZ trick is nice, it's not enough for me to warrant his use. I may break down and add him back in over a basic forest, we'll see what the future brings.
Lord of Extinction is a popular card but one I just find unappealing. He is a very large body, no doubt. But he offers no utility. He has no evasion and no trample. He takes up a slot that I think is better put to use for some utility. I'll take Shadowborn over him any day because Shadowborn has evasion and is a kill spell on a stick.
Mikaeus, the Unhallowed is a fantastic card and posses a huge amount of power. He was in the deck for the longest time, but recently came out because he is a bit difficult to cast and I never needed him. He always occupied a 6 drop slot but was usually a “win more” card than anything. If I was winning, then he just added fuel to the fire which was nice. But if I was losing, he didn't help me progress my board state into a winning position. So he got the hammer and was replaced with something of a lower cost to ensure the deck doesn't become to top heavy.
Angel of Despair is a card I have left out because I don't feel like I have any room to make for another 7 drop slot. She could go in place of Resolute Archangel, but I feel like there is plenty of removal in the deck and Archangel provides a valuable service by letting us be assured that we have life gain when the situation arises.
Vorinclex, Voice of Hunger He just didn't make the cut for the 8 drop slots. Though trample and his ability make him an absolute beast. He may eventually make it in, but I haven't decided what I'll cut for him.
Saffi Eriksdotter goes into many decks for the combo finish. But I'm not a big fan of combo finishes, at least not in this deck. So she got the axe from the deck. My dislike of combo finishes also explains why the Spike Feeder/Archangel of Thune isn't in here.
Secondly, let's take a look as to why I choose some cards over others.
Diligent Farmhand won out over Dawntreader Elk because our highest concentration of creatures are 3 drops and I want to be able to play them on T3. Farmhand gives us 4 mana on T3 whereas Dawntreader puts us at 5 mana on T4. Let me explain. T1 we play Farmhand and T2 we sacrifice it to get a land. This means that at the start of T3 we have three lands and can start casting our three drops. But with Dawntreader, we need to play him on T2 and then use his ability on T3, not letting use play a 3 drop until the following turn.
Angel of Finality over Agent of Erebos. Agent is nice because constellation lets us use him more than once without having him die. But since we run so few enchantments (4) I think that having the bigger body and flying is more relevant.
Yavimaya Dryad Got beat out by Wood Elves and the other 3 drop mana ramps. I don't like having to find double Green and the others all seem to do a better job. Wood Elves brings the card in untapped. Yavimaya Granger sacrifices to itself letting you recur it easier. Farhaven Elf is better late game because he lets me get any basic I need. Yes Dryad can fetch forest cards, so I can find my duals. But I only run 4 fetchable duals and if I run out then I'm forced into only getting G. Dryad might eventually make me reconsider, but for the time being I don't think there's much need. Plus the other three are easier to cast since I only need a single G.
Golgari Grave-Troll was chosen out of the all the other dredge cards because he's the best. But that being said, there's a reason I didn't include any of the others. Having dredgers in here makes the deck put to much into the graveyard in a short amount of time. This means that you can easily get blown out by a Relic of Progenitus or something similar. Troll made the cut because you can Entomb him into the grave for a quick boost of your graveyard or use him later on to dig but because he's the only dredger, the deck isn't forced to go all in and risk losing to many valuable resources at once.
Multani's Acolyte got added over Elvish Visionary because I feel that the echo ability, or rather the fact that it send itself to the grave. Is worth having to find the second G mana. You can also argue that the stats are better, but that's rarely relevant since you won't usually be paying the cost and blocking in EDH doesn't usually kill things. But yes, Acolyte also has an extra power to him.
Reclamation Sage usurped Harmonic Sliver because he is just all around better. He is still a G creature so he's tutorable by Green Sun's Zenith. He's still a 3 drop. But he only requires one colored mana, his is a may ability (so you won't be forced to blow up your own stuff if there's no other targets), and he is a 2/1. If you are choosing to run other slivers though (i.e. Narcotic Sliver) then you may want to consider Harmonic just to have more creatures to use his ability.
Finally, I want to talk about the cards that I am considering for addition to the deck.
Riftsweeper Even though the deck can survive through graveyard hate quite effectively (just as long as you're not greedy) it is still nice to be able to pull back the fatties that your opponent's managed to exile. And even though Sweeper puts them back into your deck, it's still better than not having access to them at all. Also a good card to use against Jhiora of the Ghitu since it can tuck their suspended cards.
Loaming Shaman is a solid 3/2 for 3 that helps restock your library if you're in fear of milling yourself and also acts as graveyard hate. Fairly straightforward card with a lot of potential.
Massacre Wurm Has a very strong ETB effect that can board wipe a lot of stuff, plus it combo's well with Elesh Norn. Also causes my opponent to lose life for the death of their creatures. But BBB is a pretty heavy casting cost, and it takes up a 6 drop slot. Still undecided if the draw back is worth it's huge amount of power.
I'll update this more when I get the chance. If anyone has any suggestions or thoughts on the above cards please let me know!
Here are the changes I've been making.
October 16, 2014:
Siege Rhino got switched for Oracle of Mul Daya: Rhino is a nice card. Has a good body and not the worst ETB effect. But he didn't progress my board state as much as I'd like. Testing out Oracle in it's place. Oracle is a great ramp card but is iffy because of the low amount of shuffle effects and deck manipulation.
Knight of the Reliquary Is being considered for removal. Not sure what I'd put in to fill her slot, but so far all the testing I've done she's fairly lack luster. At best she grabs either Bojuka Bog, Crypt of Agadeem, or Phyrexian Tower. Just doesn't seem to wow me. We'll see.
October 18, 2014
Switched out a Forest for Gavony Township. Little hesitant to put another colorless mana source in a three color deck. But I think the utility will be worth it. Will keep you all updated.
October 25, 2014
Oracle was taken out for Phyrexian Delver. Oracle didn't do enough considering how much mana ramp is being done and she didn't effect the board state hard enough late game. Delver made it in because I found myself really needing a 5 drop reanimator that I could pod into and would stick around so that I could then pod into my 6 drops.
Gavony Township has proven to be a very good card. Gives an nice extra bit of power to each attack.
November 13, 2014
Knight of the Reliquary has finally come out. She is being replaced by Kessig Cagebreakers. Knight just never had enough juice behind her. She could get fairly large but Cagebreakers is even more powerful. While Knight offered a bit of utility I found that it was never really enough. I think the power boost Cagebreakers brings outweighs the small amount of utility and the semi large (usually 7/7-10/10) body is outshone by Cagebreaker dropping 5-15 attacking wolfs. The swarm is harder to block and deal with plus the extra bodies gives our anthem effects a better result (Elesh Norn, Mirari's Wake).
November 18, 2014
Lieutenant Kirtar was just added on a trial run over Saffi Eriksdotter. I find myself needing to remove troublesome creatures that are either black or artifactss, which means that Bone Shredder and Shriekmaw can't touch them. So I want to see how Kirtar does.
False Prophet is being tested over Loxodon Hierarch. I need to see if I have enough sac outlets for this to work. Loxodon just doesn't do enough. I have yet to use the field regen ability since most people run board wipes like Damnation or wrath of God. We'll see what happens.
December 26, 2014
I know it's been a while since the last update. I haven't forgotten. False prophet has proved himself and is staying in the deck. Kirtar never got used so I'm trying Stonecloaker as a graveyard hate/ flying/ self creature bounce. Since this deck has the primary function of abusing ETB effects, I think he'll make a good addition, but as always. I'll let you know.
I have also been considering putting Knight of the Reliquary back in. Since the point of this deck is to find answers and work as a toolbox, I'm debating if I have just been forsaking a toolbox in the form of my land slots. I'm trying to think of what lands would be good for the deck that would warrant tutoring for them. I want to have 7-10 ideas before Knight goes back in since I don't think any less than that would be worth it. Here as some of the options I've thought of:
Maze of Ith
Bojuka Bog (already running it)
Phyrexian Tower (already running it)
High Market (already running it)
Wasteland
That's all I've thought of so far. Yes I have Gavony Township, which is nice, but I don't know if I would ever want to tutor for it. Seems like a better natural draw.
February 7, 2015
I've been testing and playing some but not as much as I'd like. So far the card I'm working on is Stonecloaker. I haven't drawn him that many times to see if he's worth it. He is on the chopping block in favor of Rift Sweeper. Wish I could update more but just haven't had the experience needed to make the decision as of yet.
February 18, 2015
Stonecloaker has gotten the axe. As far as EDH graveyard hate goes, he's pretty weak. I liked the thought of being able to abuse my ETB effects, but that hasn't panned out the way I was hoping. I also needed the room for an unusual idea.
Ray of Distortion seems like a really, really bad disenchant. Because it is. However in the meta I am in right now I have Humility running around. That means we have to get a non creature answer for it. I know there is Disenchant, Ray of Revelation and a bunch of other stuff, but the reason I'm choosing distortion is two fold. First off, once humility hits, the game slows to a crawl. This means that we can save up the 6 mana required for the flashback. This lets Entomb become a tutor for the card. It's also a 4CMC card, which lets us transmute Dimir House Guard into it. Remember, we can land a Survival of the Fittest and tutor up house guard to tutor up Ray. It's a long chain, but thats a guaranteed way to find it, unlike the other, cheaper versions.
February 20, 2015
After serious testing I found some cards that look like they should be great, really aren't. So let's do some spring cleaning early.
Dauntless Escort
Greater Good
Kokusho, the Evening Star
Kessig, Cagebreakers
Decree of Pain
All of those cards look great at first glance but have serious flaws with gameplay. First is the Escort, he doesn't do what the deck wants. He wants to protect the threat we have on board but Karador is about the inevitable. If they board wipe, that's fine, we recover. If they Go for the Throat our Elesh Norn, we replay her.
Greater Good is a card revered by many EDH players and one that I find extrememly potent in the right deck. But we don't actually generate card advantage with it as most of our creatures are power 3 or less. Yes we get to toss cards into the yard, but without the up side of actual card advantage.
Kessig just hasn't measured up. He's very powerful, but overall very slow. We want things that are a bit more potent and give us an advantage but just hitting the board. I don't think Kessig is a bad choice, but I think that we can do better.
Kokusho, a very great card. Big beat stick, extra damage on death, and a nice bit of life gain. But I was never actually happy to him. I don't inifinite sac and recursion to combo of with him and when I want to pod into a 6 drop I never wanted him. Yosei is more potent, Sun Titan gets me card advantage. So I want him to become something that I'll actually want.
Decree of Pain is a personal favorite of mine. In any EDH deck it needs very serious consideration. However with Karador I don't cast it nearly as often as one would think. By the time I hit 8 mana I have better cards to board wipe with (Magister of Worth) so I think the card slot, like the others in this list, isn't being used to full effect.
Whisperwood Elemental
Erebos, God of the Dead
Aven Mindcensor
Genesis Hydra
Linvala, Keeper of Silence
Whisperwood Elemental is a very interesting card. One that I have played a bit casually and come to enjoy. With us running upwards of 50 creatures we have a 50/50 chance of straight up manifesting a creature. It gives us blockers, puts creatures onto our field (and if we block, into our yard), and gives us an out to board wipes. I don't like to try to justify cards with their single interactions, but keep in mind that Sensei's Top and Sylvan Library increase his value tremendously. I have used him several times in the past several days and have enjoyed him each time. My personal favorite is when I manifested Elesh Norn and flipped her during combat the next turn for a game changing blow out.
Ah Erebos, God of the Dead, how many times I have toyed with putting you in. I finally broke down and decided that this decks weakest portion came in it's lack of card advantage. I have claimed that our graveyard is equal to card advantage, and yes that's true. But it just doesn't draw us the cards we need to keep going. Erebos is a card that fits the 4CMC spot I've wanted and works as good card advantage that is neigh irremovable. The life prevention is nice though my meta doesn't have much life gain so it's irrelevant.
Genesis Hydra Has me on the fence. I have only been able to use him once and he worked out fine. He allows us to dig into our deck for the answer we need. We don't have the reclamation sage we need? Well let's do some digging and see what we find. We can also sac him and use Karador to re use. I don't know if he's to mana intensive, but we'll find out.
Aven Mindcensor is an efficient creature. He helps shorten the game by stopping the constant searching that occurs in EDH. Fetches, Pod, Survival, Diabolic tutor, Iname, etc... Whether or not he's to small a creature to be worth it, well, we'll have to see.
Linvala, Keeper of Silence - I don't want this deck to just become a prison deck. But I wanted a solid 4 CMC card that will impact my opponents early game and stopping mana dorks and random other things seems good. I admit, I'm waiting to see what the BG and BW dragons from Dragons of Tarkir are, to see if they are strong enough to replace her. I don't like the idea of putting her on the field and becoming to big a target to early on.
February 22, 2015
After playing and talking with other people I've realized that while Reliquary Tower is an EDH staple, it's just not relevant enough for us. Now, your meta might be different. But generally speaking we are not drawing an obxious amount of cards and if we draw to many we just pitch some creatures to the yard and life is good. I decided that having better access to colors is more important and so I put in Mana Confluence in it's place. I could have have added the tap land, but I try to avoid tap lands whenever possible.
Please let me know what you think of my primer. Any suggestions would be welcome! Sorry if I haven't flushed out more section better, but I will be updating this and working on it as I get time. Enjoy your games and I hope you enjoy playing such an amazing general!
Hmm, in my Karador deck, I run a lot of Sac Outlets, so most of the time I'll sac all my creatures in response, so they don't get exiled.
LegacyUBRDelverRBU
UGUPrime Speaker Seamonster RampUGU
WUGDerevi Does NothingWUG
RRRFeldon's Lovely LadiesRRR
*Edit
Do you purposefully not combo with lark/karmic? i know you said you dont like combo finishes and AFAIK saffi is only needed to recur creatures larger then power 2. otherwise you can already create infinite loops of slime
I read your reasoning to skullclamp so I completely understand why those aren't in there if that's the reason
Lark/Guide only will infinite loop with a free sac outlet, ie. Phyrexian Altar. As far as I can tell, the only free sac outlet in OP's list is Vish Kal.
That said, not playing Saffi because she can combo is like saying you won't play Black Lotus because Lotus can be used in combos. Saffi is amazing even just as a utility creature. She lets you get so much additional value with any creature and a sac outlet, and considering the nature of the deck, she is very easy to bring back. For example, consider Ashen Rider and Saffi - a single sac outlet and you're looking at getting rid of two permanents a turn.
Commander/EDH:
WU Hanna, Ship's Navigator WU
GW Saffi Eriksdotter GW
BW Selenia, Dark Angel BW
W Heliod, God of Sun W
Retired:
Jenara, Asura of War Thada Adel, Acquisitor Jaya Ballard, Task Mage Lin Sivvi, Defiant Hero Lyzolda, the Blood Witch Akroma, Angel of Wrath Nath of the Gilt-Leaf Tajic, Blade of the Legion Selvala, Explorer Returned Maga, Traitor to Mortals
Tiny Leaders:
W Mangara of Corondor W