So last year I attempted to do this challenge with the preconstructed deck featuring Daxos the Returned. While the challenge itself was fun, after getting nearly halfway through, I realized that I absolutely hated playing with Daxos. Yes, I could have swapped the whole thing around for something entirely different, however, I had spent so much time on the project/I was really frustrated by my revelation, that I really didn't feel like continuing.
Fast forward to the present and I have once again decided to try out this challenge. My chosen deck is now the Breed Lethality preconstructed deck featuring Atraxa, Praetors' Voice. In addition to the rules below, I will try and keep a simple game log. I would love to get any and all feedback as to what cards (or genre of cards) should be added next to increase the deck's chances of winning.
Rules of the Challenge:
1 full game multiplayer (2+ opponents) game = +1 experience point
1 win = +1 experience point
At level 50, 1 win = +2 experience points, 1 full game = 0 experience points
At level 75, 1 win = +1 experience point, 1 full game = 0 experience points
Experience points may be used on a 1 for 1 basis to change cards from the original decklist to any legal card of my choosing. Once a card from the original decklist has been replaced, that slot is "permanently unlocked" and may be changed without spending additional experience points.
So my first outing with the deck was tonight. The first match was a 3 player game against an unchanged Stalwart Unity precon, and a semi-tuned Marchesa, the Black Rose. The game started off pretty solid, however, as group hug does, things got quickly out of hand. Since Marchesa was the best tuned to take advantage of it, she quickly surged ahead. While I managed to put up a decent fight (mostly due to decent hits from T&K's Oath of Druids), Cycolnic Rift ultimately did me in, allowing T&K to Rubblehulk me out. Surprisingly, K&T managed to hold on and capitalized on Marchesa's misplay, stealing her Zealous Conscripts from the yard (through weird Reins of Power shenanigans) while Marchesa's Kiki-Jiki, Mirror Breaker was on the field.
Game 2 was all the same decks plus a Karrthus, Tyrant of Dragons joined in. This game also devolved quickly due to the group hug (I really hate group hug...). I was doing pretty well, I even managed to kill off Marchesa with perfect lethal. However, after some further back and forth, I eventually got smacked by Karrthus (second time) with Bear Umbra when a Furnace of Wrath was in play. Again, somehow, K&T managed to stick it out and ultimately won with a Rubblehulk.
Game 3 Karrthus changed to Rhys the Redeemed and he got off to a very fast start generating tons of mana. I started off stupid slow, my first play being a Cathar's Crusade into Ghave, Guru of Spores into Migratory Route. All the while Marchesa and K&T were pretty turtled up. Rhys eventually dropped an Eldrazi Monument to which a collective cry of dismay was uttered. However, the turn before the big alpha strike, I managed to topdeck a Putrefy. When Rhys attacked (which would have been lethal to both myself and Marchesa), I popped his monument while K&T popped his Heedless One. I went down to 15 or so but i was still alive. Marchesa and I then killed Rhys the subsequent round. My following turn I topdecked Ikra Shidiqi, the Usurper, doubled my already 8/8 bird tokens with Solidarity of Heroes and smacked Marchesa into the red and gained a bunch of life. Marchesa was then dispatched leaving me against T&K while I had a full grip and a morphed Bane of the Living. He attempted to swing at me with 12 1/1 bird tokens with both an Edric, Spymaster of Trest and a Sidar Kondo of Jamuraa but I put a stop to it and won it!
Those were some pretty epic games which was nice.
Things that I learned about the deck: first, most of the creatures are nothing more than growing beatsticks. I hate beatsticks in Commander. That is definitely going to have to change. Second, I need both more graveyard hate and artifact/enchantment hate-Marchesa was driving me up a wall with both aspects. A few cards really surprised me (Ikra Shidiqi and Solidarity of Heroes were way better than expected) while others were dreadful (Orzhov Advokist and Necroplasm were pretty big duds). Other than that, I can't really say anything for certain because the group hug deck skewed things so much. I have no idea what to spend my 4 experience points on. I figure I do need to fix the mana base and I need more card draw (it isn't always that an opponent's deck will let me draw and ramp so much). I would also like something other than +1/+1 counters to proliferate (having to cast Atraxa on an already clogged field feels risky). Any suggestions on additions would be really helpful!
Jace SHOULD be unbanned in modern. I hate all the people saying "JACE IS BROKEN OHMYGOD HE'LL TAKE OVER AND CAWBLADE WILL REIGN SUPREME AGAIN" when bloodbraid elf literally comes down after jace and kicks jace right in the crotch, takes jace's lunch money, and jace is left to bleed out on the sidewalk in agonizing pain.
So, for every multiplayer game you play, you get to change one card (more if you win)? And you have to play until you reach level 100?
How many cards do you expect to change?
Changelog and Swaps are empty right now, but you don't have any points left. Did you change anything, yet?
Yep pretty much. Last year I got around 40 cards in. It is totally doable, it just takes a while. It does help that I am the sort of player that prefers to play and master only one deck. I expect to change most of the deck as I recently took apart my old Mimeoplasm deck for this.
As for the 0 points, that was because I had added a few things in between games, but they were mostly placeholders as it was all I had on hand. Plus, it was late last night when I posted this so I missed it (I will edit that now). Also, I totally meant to post this in the multiplayer decklist forum so my apologies there. Later today I will message one of the moderators to move this and I will post my thoughts on what I should add, so yea, I would love to hear everyone's ideas then.
Ok so I messaged a moderator so this will most likely get moved soon (just as a heads up).
Otherwise, here are my thoughts on the early point allocations: first, the deck obviously needs a better mana base. People were lauding the Odyssey dual land reprints, but oh man, I really hate them. Also, the number of lands in this deck is super high at the moment, so I will be slowly cutting them as the overall average cmc lowers. I would love to put Deathrite Shaman in as that would also cover my need for more grave hate, however, I don't have enough lands that go to the yard to support it being a source of ramp. So I think 2 fetchlands would probably be the first logical swaps. From there, the deck needs better draw/some tutors. Finally, I would like to find things to proliferate that aren't lame beatstick creatures.
For draw I think Sylvan Library is an excellent choice (one swing with Atraxa gives me a card). For the proliferate target, I have no idea. Any thoughts?
As for cards to swap out, Orzhov Advokist is pretty awful. Yes, the deck does lack some adequate means of getting counters on creatures that don't start with them, but geez this just sat in my hand every game (admittedly, facing a Marchesa deck didn't help). So she is out. I think Grip of Phyresis will be the other card to come out. It is just too cute and wound up being dead for the most part.
maybe defeating a zombie horde, and in the horde, you add in a couple of 'exp' cards, like artifacts that give the horde a small bonus, but when destroyed by a player gets to add more new cards into the deck.
or maybe its a planechase variant, but as you flip over planes, you also flip over exp cards (npc creatures (locals), artifacts, enchantments etc) that give players various bonuses, and if a player manages to destroy it, they can upgrade their decks more.
or maybe if you have the kill the hydra/the minotaur hordes, you could have that for a run.
can shake up your games a bit when you add weird side-things like that. i'd hate to play the same 4p pods with the same deck that morphs very slowly over time; i'd want to play the same deck but against different variants.
edit: i noticed in the changelog that you shifted out some enters the battlefield untapped lands instead of the etbt lands. was that really a good idea? is having one less colour in darkwater catacombs that much worse than being delayed one turn with Arcane Sanctum for example? i'd even consider the ravnica karoo lands to be significantly worse; a 'for value' sinkhole sets you back pretty badly.
I like the idea. Hope you will keep updating this thread.
Obviously, you need the first few changes to improve the general performance of the deck (as you did, with Fetches and draw). But what is your strategy from now on?
Do you have the future decklist writen down and change everything as soon as you can?
Which direction should the deck go? Superfriends, Infect, Stax, ...?
The boring me would propably start with the obvious tutors (Demonic + Vampiric) and maybe your favorite Planeswalker (for me Tezzeret the Seeker and Teferi).
Chromatic Lantern competes with the green mana ramp (Cultivate and such) for fixing.
Honstly, I am not I am not sure what my strategy will be. I have a sorta decklist written down but I have no idea if it is any good; the deck is kinda a mash of superfriends, stax, and a single infect piece. I do, however, want to make this deck decently competitive, my only requirement being that I don't win the same way all the time (my Mimeoplasm was more combo focused and it annoyed people a lot).
maybe defeating a zombie horde, and in the horde, you add in a couple of 'exp' cards, like artifacts that give the horde a small bonus, but when destroyed by a player gets to add more new cards into the deck.
or maybe its a planechase variant, but as you flip over planes, you also flip over exp cards (npc creatures (locals), artifacts, enchantments etc) that give players various bonuses, and if a player manages to destroy it, they can upgrade their decks more.
or maybe if you have the kill the hydra/the minotaur hordes, you could have that for a run.
can shake up your games a bit when you add weird side-things like that. i'd hate to play the same 4p pods with the same deck that morphs very slowly over time; i'd want to play the same deck but against different variants.
edit: i noticed in the changelog that you shifted out some enters the battlefield untapped lands instead of the etbt lands. was that really a good idea? is having one less colour in darkwater catacombs that much worse than being delayed one turn with Arcane Sanctum for example? i'd even consider the ravnica karoo lands to be significantly worse; a 'for value' sinkhole sets you back pretty badly.
Side missions would be interesting, but first, I would be afraid of it getting overly difficult or too easy. Second, said side-missions might make it difficult to discern what changes need to be made to the deck. And third, I don't want to have to build an entirely different type of deck to do this (at least that is what it seems like you are suggesting). One of the reasons I am doing this challenge is to slow my buying habits (plus it is super fun to watch something get better in my opinion). I will not be playing in the same pod-it just depends on whatever the people at whichever lgs I attend bring to play with. That being said, if you have any thoughts on how to make this happen I would love to hear them.
As for the point spending, I am less concerned with speed at the moment than I am with getting the colors that I need. That being said, I goldfished a couple of times and I realized that I really should have some true dual lands to fetch before I play fetchlands. Therefore, I will swap out the fetches for duals with basic land types attached (good catch btw).
Very interesting idea and projects like this are always good.
You definitely need to come up with the direction you want to ultimately take the deck, and decide how competitive you want to make it.
A card I think that could work well with the deck is Odric, Lunarch Marshal. He just turns your army of creatures into something rather scary.
Also as schweinefett suggested maybe have a challenge which either you or the mtg community can decide for each week (you could create a poll and then let the public vote).
For example:
- Kill with General damage
- Play four spells in a turn
- Win three games in a row
You could make some very hard but reward you with more experience points, whilst the easier ones reward less.
Essentially you have many directions you can take this and would say experiment with them. What you do not want is to get burned out by feeling you have to carry on with this project but know it is taken a long time to reach your final goal.
Good luck and enjoy!
As I mentioned above, I do want to make this deck pretty competitive. However, other than not combo, I don't know what direction to take it in. For now I am fine with adding more obvious support stuff (removal, draw, lands, etc.) over clearly strategy based cards.
I do like the challenges idea-while super similar to schweinefett's side missions, however, they seem a little more simple only if because they can be done in a normal game. I also, so long as the community wants to take part, like the idea of voting on them. Unless you have other suggestions, I will write some up and post them soonish.
So a couple of things before my update: first, I have been contemplating the idea of "challenges" and I have come to the conclusion that it is something that I want to do, but not yet. Currently the deck is pretty weak meaning that any challenges that I come up with will either be pretty lame, or unobtainable. This is no good. Additionally, I don't want to tailor the challenges too much to suit the deck. So I will wait until level 50 before trying them out. This will also help to keep the deck steadily moving as (per the rules above) experience becomes harder to attain past level 50.
Second, I decided to be lame and add Demonic Tutor in place of Grip of Phyresis. I really just couldn't pick anything, so you can't go wrong with DT. I has a fail.
In other news, here are my game reports from Tuesday (pretty fuzzy due to early work start that day). Game 1: me against Muzzio, Visionary Architect almost preconstructed deck Prossh, Skyraider of Kher (young kid, wasn't very good), and Merieke Ri Berit. I get off to a slow start until I manage to get down Fathom Mage, Corpsejack Menace, Hardened Scales, and Atraxa and start drawing like crazy. Muzzio gets his engine going, however, I see him counting his lands and right after he flashes in a Darksteel Forge via Shimmer Myr, I hit it with a Sylvan Reclamation. Felt good. The rest of the game was mostly us developing boardstates with the most notable moments being determined by my timing of boardwipes. The first instance was when the board was getting rather rough due to Prossh doing what Prossh does and I had to Divine Exhalation. The second, I Bane of the Living'ed to save Muzzio from Prossh allowing me to attain an ally. The third and most epic was when Merike had Sharuum, the Hegemon, Sphinx of the Steel Wind, and another creature on the field. I swung with Atraxa (with a bunch of counters on her) with Elite Scaleguard in play into Merike tapping down both flyers. He responded by casting Cackling Counterpart to target the Sphinx giving him a blocker. This, however, tapped him out, allowing me to cast Merciless Eviction naming artifacts which destroyed both his and Muzzio's board. I easily took over from there.
Game 2: Merike switches to Karrthus, Tyrant of Jund, Prossh leaves and is replaced by a guy playing General Tazri, and Muzzio switches to Rashmi, Eternities Crafter. Not a whole lot to report here as Tazri unwittingly drops a Panharmonicon followed by an Omniscience and proceeds to Ally all over us. It was mostly our faults cause no one was running spot removal. However, it was kinda annoying because the Tazri player was a pretty slow player (really nice guy though).
Game 3: Me against Tazri and Karrthus again while Rashmi changes to K&T and basically did nothing all game (was a defender theme deck and he got stuck on mana for a bit). Tazri and Karrthus were mostly playing off of each other while I turtled a bit. The pivotal moment occurred when Tazri decided to attack Karrthus instead of me (due to Atraxa being able to kill two creatures with Brave the Sands) after pumping his team with a Tajuru Warcaller for a total of +8/+8. This forced Karrthus to use his all his untapped mana on Necrogenesis for blockers. This allowed me to drop Elite Scaleguard and swing at Karrthus for 27 damage. This pissed off Karrthus enough that he pumped up Karrthus, gave it unblockable with a Rogue's Passage, and then gave it infect with Tainted Strike and swung at me for the kill as an act of taking me down with him. I responded to this by casting an overloaded Cyclonic Rift that I had been sandbagging for over half of the game. This then allowed me to alpha strike both Karrthus and Tazri on my following turn. I killed K&T the turn after. The Karrthus player seemed pretty stunned afterwards so yea, I better watch out next time I play him...
These games felt really good because I felt like I was legitimately outplaying people, not just drawing well or playing with a superior deck. I haven't had that experience in a long while. It is good to be playing magic again.
If you check the list above, you will see that I still have one more slot to fill and I could use some feedback. I found I could definitely use more spot removal (so many high priority artifacts and enchantments), and something to slow down opposing ramp, so I was thinking of adding one of the following: Anguished Unmaking, Beast Within, Aura of Silence, or Tangle Wire. Which should I add?
What do you think of removal that can shoot more than once?
Like Aura Shards or Bane of Progress?
Would they be flexible enough? Are you afraid of collateral damage (from Bane)?
If you plan to get more answers that are attached to a creature, you could include the green creature tutors, like Survival of the Fittest or Birthing Pod.
Honestly, my initial inclination was to do the opposite and run things like Torpor Orb and Humility to better provide support for any planeswalkers I might add. However, I am unsure if that would be the most effective. That being said, after seeing the blowout that both Sylvan Reclamation and Cyclonic Rift did the other night, I am more inclined to add things that interact with the stack. I think that is a key component when comparing the power level of decks.
First game was against mostly stock Breya, Etherium Shaper and Grenzo, Havoc Raiser. I got off to a really fast start with a turn 1 command tower into sol ring, turn 2 crystaline Crawler with 2 counters on it, and turn 3 Atraxa. My opponents just couldn't keep up.
Out: Murmuring Bosk, Duelist's Heritage. In: Scrubland, Rhystic Study
Second game Breya switched to Jori En, Ruin Diver and a fourth player joined as Silas Renn, Seeker Adept partnered with Vial Smasher the Fierce. I got off to a slower start and took hits because I had become more feared. That is until I dropped a Migratory Route with a Hardened Scales and a Juniper Order Ranger in play then followed it with Atraxa. I was slowly able to kill off Jori and Grenzo, however, Silas/Vial Cyclonic Rifted my board to stall for time. I played Atraxa and then C. Rifted her board for the kill (she was at 3 life).
Out: Dreadship Reef, Disdainful Stroke. In: Misty Rainforest, Mana Drain.
Third game (and arguably my favorite of the night), Breya/Jori switched to Yidris, Maelstrom Wielder, Grenzo switched to Sydri, Galvanic Genius, and Silas/Vial switched to Doran, the Siege Tower.
Things went pretty back and forth especially because I was still getting targetted. The biggest turns occurred when Yidris nuked all creatures and then Ghastly Conscriptioned for like 8-10 creatures. Sydri then followed that by going infinite with Pincher tokens and mana and plays a bunch of things including Blightsteel Colossus. Doran had nothing and I had to bail because my ride had come, however, I decided I wanted to leave my mark on the game (mind you, had I been able to stay I would have done a similar move, but one that would have benefited me more). So my turn comes and I cast Duneblast choosing an indestructible creature that Doran had, but then tapped Cauldron of Souls giving all creatures other than Sydri's persist. This meant that Doran got back all of the manifested creatures but face up and Sydri lost her infinite. I asked them to let me know how things turned out next time I see them.
So before I begin, I gotta ask, is anyone still following this? Is this at all entertaining for anyone? Cause if not I will just update the opening post without worrying about game recaps.
Anyhoo, game 1 was me versus a land heavy Boborygamos Enraged, Tymna the Weaver+Ludevic, Necro-Alchemist pillowfort/group hug, and Gonti, Lord of Luxury. The game was decently all over the place until Boborygamos decided to swing at me with Bobo himself as well as a 27/27 Centaur Vinecrasher. I responded with a Beast Within on the Vinecrasher to which Tymna/Ludevic decided to Grab the Reins with entwine the Vinecrasher and zing it at me. This left me at such a low life that I basically couldn't do anything as Bobo could just shoot me at any time (which he did after a turn or two). Other than the fact that my Atraxa was threatening Tymna/Ludevic with commander damage, there was really no reason for T/L to make that play as I had almost no board otherwise and would have preferred T/L had lived to deal with Bobo and Gonti (who were both getting out of hand). It didn't even win him the game as he was killed next and then Gonti was able to take things over (Bobo was out of cards). I really really hate losing to bimbo threat assessment.
Game 2 Bobo left and T/L continued while Gonti switched to Depala, Pilot Exemplar. This game had a ton of boardwipes (I felt bad for Depala as he really wasn't able to come back after a while). The turning point occurred when Depala swung at T/L with a Juggernaut and a Bomat Bazaar Barge which were pumped a bit. He then played Relentless Assault, and for some reason, instead of swinging at T/L to put some pressure on him (as he had the best board but was tapped out), he decided to swing at me and I chumped with an Elspeth token and some other small creature. Complete misplay. From there, T/L took over and won. Lost again due to bad threat assessment. I'm seeing a trend.
As you can see above, I was a bit salty from the previous two games, thus my inclusion of Static Orb... I would remove it after the night was over, but for this third game it made a strong appearance. T/L switched to Reaper King and Depala switched to Saskia the Unyielding. I started off really fast plopping an Elspeth, followed by Atraxa, followed by Static Orb. Atraxa was removed at some point, but I managed to get her out again. This was interesting because Saskia managed to prevent me from ulting Elspeth via swinging at RK with Saskia and redirecting the damage from me to Elspeth herself. Good job on them for figuring it out. Still Atraxa managed to eventually beat them down via the +3/+3 from Elspeth. Felt good until there was some grumbling about how disliked the Static Orb was...I have an opinion on that. Let me know if you would like to hear it.
Game 4 we got a fourth player, the Silas Renn/Vial Smasher from two weeks before playing the same deck, Reaper King stayed and Saskia switched to something I can't remember (this game is very much a blur because it was late and we had to rush due to the store closing). It was a really long game with too many board wipes (many were mine), but I did pretty well and had the game sewn up (killed off both Reaper King and whatever the Saskia player was playing). However, Renn/Vial wound up stalling (Evacuation followed by a Cyclonic Rift) til the store closed. She couldn't have won either. I would say I deserved it had she been involved in my Static Orb play, but she wasn't there for that so it was just kinda rude. Aw well.
My changes are primarily to protect Atraxa (greaves) and my board state (counterspells) as you can see above. Thanks!
I'm still following and will continue doing so
I understand that Static Orb is disliked, but that's okay as long as people treat it as it is: just a good card!
Bad thread assessment can be frustrating. I think the people I play with, got better after a while...
Cool, just needed to make sure I wasn't too overly self-indulgent.
Yea Static Orb (and worse) will make a return once the deck can more easily abuse it. For right now though, I will play "fair."
I drop in every now and then. I really like the idea, and will do something similar when I get another precon. Also, pity about Daxos not working out for you in the end.
So I had a few games last night and it reminded me about how much I hate planechase (at least in Commander). The variant too often comes down to one of two scenarios: either we land on a plane that no one cares about and people pretty much forget to try and roll the die (or do it just as a thing to do) or we land on a plane that benefits maybe 1-2 people and people start rolling frantically to get off of it. It cheapens wins and creates random frustrating losses.
Game 2 the Riku player left and was replaced by a Radha, Heir to Keld dragons deck, K&T was still around and then we got a fourth player playing The Gitrog Monster. I had my suspicions about the Git monster due to it being a foil Japanese card, him playing a foil Deathrite Shaman and a Lion's Eye Diamond, but no one seemed to listen because after rolling chaos on Skybreen and targeting the GM, Radha rolled a chaos and targeted me, then GM rolled a chaos and targeted me. So turn 3 I was at 25 life with 3 lands and a simic signet. Turn 4, GM combo'ed off with Dakmor Salvage... I don't enjoy saying this, but this game tilted the hell out of me. First, it was attack of both poor threat assessment and planechase. Second, and more importantly, the GM player pulled a really jerk move by playing the way he did. Mind you, GM comboing off turn 4 is not why I got annoyed (though it didn't help). In all honesty, I hope to get this deck to a decently competitive point, so that I might give that GM deck a good game. I got annoyed because, not only did he bring a gun to a knife fight, it turns out that this was his first game of Commander in Portland as he had recently moved. His old meta was super cutthroat (which is fine) and so he decided, for some ridiculous reason, that we were too. I seem to recall seeing a recent thread discussing acts like this: the appropriate thing to do when in a new place is to play something so so just to get the lay of the land. If you get annihilated then you move to your competitive deck, and if not then you haven't disrupted anyone's fun. By choosing to play that deck he made it obvious that he has no understanding of social etiquette, which in turn annoys me because he is feeding into the socially awkward stereotype that the magic community is trying to move away from. I'd like to say that I will be the bigger person and move on, but I don't know if he would learn anything if I did that if I saw him again, so I don't know.
Game 3, the only change is that GM switches to his Geist of Saint Traft 1v1 deck. Yea not much better. This game went on way too long-K&T had to leave in the middle of it. Things were pretty back and forth throughout the game with Geist buffing up his commander a ton (I was pretty close to death via commander damage), Radha getting both Xenagos and Atarka in play, and K&T pushing us all around with Edric and Gahiji. Despite Planechase screwing me over with a turn order switch right before my turn, I somehow managed to drop a Deepglow Skate with Elspeth, Knight-Errant at 6 counters and ult her. This put me in a very good position especially when we walked to Norn's Dominion and on my next turn I my first roll was to walk. This blew up everyone's board except for my own. We then walked to the myriad plane (can't remember the name). It was slow but I eventually managed to win despite Radha getting very close to killing both Geist and myself. Sadly, Radha was pretty unhappy with this game as Geist (being a 1v1 deck) spent most of his removal/counters on him (I got a little bit, but not nearly the same amount).
Overall a pretty crummy evening of magic. I will never play planechase again unless it is with precons/new players.
Hello there! I just stumbled across your thread here, and I must say that I like the idea. There are a few players at my LGS that I'm going to pitch this idea to, as I think it'd be a fun experience for multiple players to participate in.
Anyway, I've played lots of decks over the years that like to do stuff with +1/+1 counters, so I have a few ideas that might interest you.
First, you mentioned how slowly growing beaters isn't that engaging or exciting, and I agree with you. I think one of the more interesting things you can do with Atraxa as your general is throw in some creatures that do things when you *remove* counters from themselves or others, rather than just piling them on and swinging. If you want to draw cards, which is something you've already expressed concerns over, look towards creatures like Zameck Guildmage, Sage of Fables, Academy Elite, and Mindless Automaton. Need some ramp? Talk to Fertilid or Realm Seekers. If you want to go wide and really get some mileage out of Cathars' Crusade, be sure not to overlook Twilight Drover and Custodi Soulbinders. You can even find some removal options with cards like Shinewend, Karlov of the Ghost Council, or Vish Kal, Blood Arbiter (Retribution of the Ancients is also worth a mention here, even though you can't directly proliferate it). You can't protect your life total in a +1/+1 counters deck much better than playing Spike Weaver. And if you want to keep spreading the counter-y goodness, Mikaeus, the Lunarch is your man.
I have to assume you've already considered the other forms of reliable, repeatable proliferation, those being Contagion Clasp, Contagion Engine, and Inexorable Tide. Running those in conjunction with Atraxa can also open the door to some other wincon cards that would be a pretty slow grind with only one source of proliferate: Decimator Web and Darksteel Reactor.
I hope my suggestions have at least given you some ideas on something else to do other than slowly grow big dumb beaters. The world of +1/+1 counters has so much more to offer
@EbonRose: Hey sorry for not responding to this sooner. For some reason it never showed up that you wrote this. Weird. Anyhoo, thanks so much for the feedback! I will definitely keep it all in consideration as the journey continues. Let me know what your playgroup thinks of it.
So last Tuesday was a pretty rubbish gaming night if I do say so myself. I get to the store and almost everyone has started a game. A group of three who I have mostly played with before wave me over saying that I can join in once they are done. About 30-45 minutes later the game finishes. I wasn't crusty about the wait-it was kinda fun watching though I should have realized what was to come based off the super slow play of one player and the super misplays of the other. I finally get into a game. Me versus everything taps Riku, a stock Atraxa list and a stock Ydris list, however, he was using Vial Smasher and Thrasios instead.
I get mana screwed early on and the other Atraxa gets a huge board presence. We are all trying to draw some sort of board wipe, however, Vial/Thrasios won't play his wheel effect for some stupid reason. We finally get to the turn where if something doesn't happen Atraxa will destroy all of us. V/T has an Yidris on the board and both myself and Riku say we won't block if he swings just so that we might be able to get out of this situation. V/T then proceeds to cascade into Waste Not and the game goes to hell. He starts chaining wheels and generating tons of mana and whatnot. His turn takes somewhere between 20 and 25 minutes (mostly due to his inability to play properly) and he does not proceed to win. He is left with a huge board which is then nuked by his own Boompile when Riku attempts to kill him with a Mob Rule. It was the biggest waste of time I have ever had in a game of magic. Atraxa then proceeds to take over again and kill everyone. By then it was too late for a second game and I left feeling pretty sure that I never want to play with that kid again. To add insult to injury, the V/T player attempts to say "see and the deck didn't even need Ydris to do it" before all three of us told him how wrong he was. Why do I keep playing with people like this? Am I being to harsh? Maybe it's me?
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Fast forward to the present and I have once again decided to try out this challenge. My chosen deck is now the Breed Lethality preconstructed deck featuring Atraxa, Praetors' Voice. In addition to the rules below, I will try and keep a simple game log. I would love to get any and all feedback as to what cards (or genre of cards) should be added next to increase the deck's chances of winning.
Rules of the Challenge:
1 full game multiplayer (2+ opponents) game = +1 experience point
1 win = +1 experience point
At level 50, 1 win = +2 experience points, 1 full game = 0 experience points
At level 75, 1 win = +1 experience point, 1 full game = 0 experience points
Experience points may be used on a 1 for 1 basis to change cards from the original decklist to any legal card of my choosing. Once a card from the original decklist has been replaced, that slot is "permanently unlocked" and may be changed without spending additional experience points.
Current Decklist: Level 24/100,
1 Atraxa, Praetors' Voice
Creature (23)
1 Deathrite Shaman
1 Thrummingbird
1 Scavenging Ooze
1 Abzan Falconer
1 Tuskguard Captain
1 Champion of Lambholt
1 Reyhan, Last of the Abzan
1 Vorel of the Hull Clade
1 Crystalline Crawler
1 Forgotten Ancient
1 Bane of the Living
1 Ishai, Ojutai Dragonspeaker
1 Corpsejack Menace
1 Fathom Mage
1 Master Biomancer
1 Elite Scaleguard
1 Reveillark
1 Deepglow Skate
1 Kalonian Hydra
1 Vulturous Zombie
1 Juniper Order Ranger
1 Ghave, Guru of Spores
1 Sun Titan (Foil)
Artifact (11)
1 Sol Ring
1 Fellwar Stone
1 Golgari Signet
1 Lightning Greaves (Foil)
1 Orzhov Signet
1 Simic Signet
1 Chromatic Lantern (Foil)
1 Commander's Sphere
1 Darksteel Ingot
1 Cauldron of Souls
1 Astral Cornucopia
1 Hardened Scales
1 Brave the Sands
1 Sylvan Library (Chinese)
1 Bred for the Hunt
1 Rhystic Study (Foil)
1 Citadel Siege
1 Cathar's Crusade
Instants (10)
1 Swan Song (Foil)
1 Vampiric Tutor
1 Counterspell (Foil)
1 Cyclonic Rift (Foil)
1 Mana Drain (Signed)
1 Lim-Dûl's Vault
1 Beast Within (Foil)
1 Mortify
1 Putrefy
1 Sylvan Reclamation
Sorcery (10)
1 Demonic Tutor
1 Manifold Insights
1 Languish
1 Tezzeret's Gambit
1 Migratory Route
1 Merciless Eviction
1 Spitting Image
1 Sublime Exhalation
1 Duneblast
1 Treasure Cruise
Planeswalkers (1):
1 Elspeth, Knight-Errant
Land (37)
1 Arcane Sanctum
1 Ash Barrens
1 Bayou
1 Command Tower
1 Evolving Wilds
1 Exotic Orchard
1 Misty Rainforest (Foil)
1 Opal Palace
1 Opulent Palace
1 Polluted Delta (Japanese)
1 Sandsteppe Citadel
1 Savannah
1 Scrubland
1 Seaside Citadel
1 Temple of the False God
1 Tropical Island
1 Tundra
1 Underground River
1 Underground Sea (Signed)
1 Windswept Heath
4 Plains
4 Island
4 Swamp
5 Forest
Games Played: 17
Total Number of Wins: 7
Currently Remaining Experience Points: 0
1 Atraxa, Praetors' Voice
Creature (27)
1 Thrummingbird
1 Festercreep
1 Scavenging Ooze
1 Abzan Falconer
1 Orzhov Advokist
1 Tuskguard Captain
1 Necroplasm
1 Champion of Lambholt
1 Reyhan, Last of the Abzan
1 Vorel of the Hull Clade
1 Crystalline Crawler
1 Custodi Soulbinders
1 Forgotten Ancient
1 Bane of the Living
1 Ishai, Ojutai Dragonspeaker
1 Corpsejack Menace
1 Fathom Mage
1 Master Biomancer
1 Elite Scaleguard
1 Reveillark
1 Deepglow Skate
1 Kalonian Hydra
1 Ikra Shidiqi, the Usurper
1 Vulturous Zombie
1 Juniper Order Ranger
1 Ghave, Guru of Spores
1 Enduring Scalelord
1 Sol Ring
1 Fellwar Stone
1 Golgari Signet
1 Orzhov Signet
1 Simic Signet
1 Commander's Sphere
1 Darksteel Ingot
1 Cauldron of Souls
1 Astral Cornucopia
Enchantment (6)
1 Hardened Scales
1 Brave the Sands
1 Duelist's Heritage
1 Bred for the Hunt
1 Citadel Siege
1 Cathar's Crusade
Instants (9)
1 Disdainful Stroke
1 Solidarity of Heroes
1 Grip of Phyresis
1 Inspiring Call
1 Mortify
1 Putrefy
1 Ancient Excavation
1 Mirrorweave
1 Sylvan Reclamation
Sorcery (9)
1 Manifold Insights
1 Languish
1 Tezzeret's Gambit
1 Migratory Route
1 Merciless Eviction
1 Spitting Image
1 Sublime Exhalation
1 Duneblast
1 Treasure Cruise
1 Arcane Sanctum
1 Ash Barrens
1 Azorius Chancery
1 Command Tower
1 Darkwater Catacombs
1 Dreadship Reef
1 Evolving Wilds
1 Exotic Orchard
1 Golgari Rot Farm
1 Murmuring Bosk
1 Opal Palace
1 Opulent Palace
1 Sandsteppe Citadel
1 Seaside Citadel
1 Sungrass Prairie
1 Temple of the False God
1 Terramorphic Expanse
1 Underground River
5 Plains
4 Island
5 Swamp
7 Forest
11/15/16 (date of accrued experience points)
Darkwater Catacombs--->Underground Sea
Sungrass Prairie--->Savannah
Orzhov Advokist--->Sylvan Library
Grip of Phyresis--->Demonic Tutor
11/22/16
Azorius Chancery--->Tundra
Necroplasm--->Cyclonic Rift
Golgari Rot Farm--->Bayou
Forest--->Tropical Island
Custodi Soulbinders--->Beast Within
11/29/16
Murmuring Bosk--->Scrubland
Dreadship Reef--->Misty Rainforest
Duelist's Heritage--->Rhystic Study
Disdainful Stroke--->Mana Drain
Enduring Scalelord--->Elspeth, Knight-Errant
12/13/16
Plains--->Windswept Heath
Forest--->Chromatic Lantern
Festercreep--->Lightning Greaves
Mirrorweave--->Counterspell
Solidarity of Heroes--->Swan Song
12/20/16
Swamp--->Polluted Delta
Terramorphic Expanse--->Deathrite Shaman
Ancient Excavation--->Vampiric Tutor
Inspiring Call--->Sun Titan
12/27/16
Ikra Shidiqi, the Usurper--->Lim-Dûl's Vault
For future use
Game 2 was all the same decks plus a Karrthus, Tyrant of Dragons joined in. This game also devolved quickly due to the group hug (I really hate group hug...). I was doing pretty well, I even managed to kill off Marchesa with perfect lethal. However, after some further back and forth, I eventually got smacked by Karrthus (second time) with Bear Umbra when a Furnace of Wrath was in play. Again, somehow, K&T managed to stick it out and ultimately won with a Rubblehulk.
Game 3 Karrthus changed to Rhys the Redeemed and he got off to a very fast start generating tons of mana. I started off stupid slow, my first play being a Cathar's Crusade into Ghave, Guru of Spores into Migratory Route. All the while Marchesa and K&T were pretty turtled up. Rhys eventually dropped an Eldrazi Monument to which a collective cry of dismay was uttered. However, the turn before the big alpha strike, I managed to topdeck a Putrefy. When Rhys attacked (which would have been lethal to both myself and Marchesa), I popped his monument while K&T popped his Heedless One. I went down to 15 or so but i was still alive. Marchesa and I then killed Rhys the subsequent round. My following turn I topdecked Ikra Shidiqi, the Usurper, doubled my already 8/8 bird tokens with Solidarity of Heroes and smacked Marchesa into the red and gained a bunch of life. Marchesa was then dispatched leaving me against T&K while I had a full grip and a morphed Bane of the Living. He attempted to swing at me with 12 1/1 bird tokens with both an Edric, Spymaster of Trest and a Sidar Kondo of Jamuraa but I put a stop to it and won it!
Those were some pretty epic games which was nice.
Things that I learned about the deck: first, most of the creatures are nothing more than growing beatsticks. I hate beatsticks in Commander. That is definitely going to have to change. Second, I need both more graveyard hate and artifact/enchantment hate-Marchesa was driving me up a wall with both aspects. A few cards really surprised me (Ikra Shidiqi and Solidarity of Heroes were way better than expected) while others were dreadful (Orzhov Advokist and Necroplasm were pretty big duds). Other than that, I can't really say anything for certain because the group hug deck skewed things so much. I have no idea what to spend my 4 experience points on. I figure I do need to fix the mana base and I need more card draw (it isn't always that an opponent's deck will let me draw and ramp so much). I would also like something other than +1/+1 counters to proliferate (having to cast Atraxa on an already clogged field feels risky). Any suggestions on additions would be really helpful!
Yep pretty much. Last year I got around 40 cards in. It is totally doable, it just takes a while. It does help that I am the sort of player that prefers to play and master only one deck. I expect to change most of the deck as I recently took apart my old Mimeoplasm deck for this.
As for the 0 points, that was because I had added a few things in between games, but they were mostly placeholders as it was all I had on hand. Plus, it was late last night when I posted this so I missed it (I will edit that now). Also, I totally meant to post this in the multiplayer decklist forum so my apologies there. Later today I will message one of the moderators to move this and I will post my thoughts on what I should add, so yea, I would love to hear everyone's ideas then.
Otherwise, here are my thoughts on the early point allocations: first, the deck obviously needs a better mana base. People were lauding the Odyssey dual land reprints, but oh man, I really hate them. Also, the number of lands in this deck is super high at the moment, so I will be slowly cutting them as the overall average cmc lowers. I would love to put Deathrite Shaman in as that would also cover my need for more grave hate, however, I don't have enough lands that go to the yard to support it being a source of ramp. So I think 2 fetchlands would probably be the first logical swaps. From there, the deck needs better draw/some tutors. Finally, I would like to find things to proliferate that aren't lame beatstick creatures.
For draw I think Sylvan Library is an excellent choice (one swing with Atraxa gives me a card). For the proliferate target, I have no idea. Any thoughts?
As for cards to swap out, Orzhov Advokist is pretty awful. Yes, the deck does lack some adequate means of getting counters on creatures that don't start with them, but geez this just sat in my hand every game (admittedly, facing a Marchesa deck didn't help). So she is out. I think Grip of Phyresis will be the other card to come out. It is just too cute and wound up being dead for the most part.
maybe defeating a zombie horde, and in the horde, you add in a couple of 'exp' cards, like artifacts that give the horde a small bonus, but when destroyed by a player gets to add more new cards into the deck.
or maybe its a planechase variant, but as you flip over planes, you also flip over exp cards (npc creatures (locals), artifacts, enchantments etc) that give players various bonuses, and if a player manages to destroy it, they can upgrade their decks more.
or maybe if you have the kill the hydra/the minotaur hordes, you could have that for a run.
can shake up your games a bit when you add weird side-things like that. i'd hate to play the same 4p pods with the same deck that morphs very slowly over time; i'd want to play the same deck but against different variants.
edit: i noticed in the changelog that you shifted out some enters the battlefield untapped lands instead of the etbt lands. was that really a good idea? is having one less colour in darkwater catacombs that much worse than being delayed one turn with Arcane Sanctum for example? i'd even consider the ravnica karoo lands to be significantly worse; a 'for value' sinkhole sets you back pretty badly.
Legacy - Solidarity - mono U aggro - burn - Imperial Painter - Strawberry Shortcake - Bluuzards - bom
Honstly, I am not I am not sure what my strategy will be. I have a sorta decklist written down but I have no idea if it is any good; the deck is kinda a mash of superfriends, stax, and a single infect piece. I do, however, want to make this deck decently competitive, my only requirement being that I don't win the same way all the time (my Mimeoplasm was more combo focused and it annoyed people a lot).
Side missions would be interesting, but first, I would be afraid of it getting overly difficult or too easy. Second, said side-missions might make it difficult to discern what changes need to be made to the deck. And third, I don't want to have to build an entirely different type of deck to do this (at least that is what it seems like you are suggesting). One of the reasons I am doing this challenge is to slow my buying habits (plus it is super fun to watch something get better in my opinion). I will not be playing in the same pod-it just depends on whatever the people at whichever lgs I attend bring to play with. That being said, if you have any thoughts on how to make this happen I would love to hear them.
As for the point spending, I am less concerned with speed at the moment than I am with getting the colors that I need. That being said, I goldfished a couple of times and I realized that I really should have some true dual lands to fetch before I play fetchlands. Therefore, I will swap out the fetches for duals with basic land types attached (good catch btw).
As I mentioned above, I do want to make this deck pretty competitive. However, other than not combo, I don't know what direction to take it in. For now I am fine with adding more obvious support stuff (removal, draw, lands, etc.) over clearly strategy based cards.
I do like the challenges idea-while super similar to schweinefett's side missions, however, they seem a little more simple only if because they can be done in a normal game. I also, so long as the community wants to take part, like the idea of voting on them. Unless you have other suggestions, I will write some up and post them soonish.
Second, I decided to be lame and add Demonic Tutor in place of Grip of Phyresis. I really just couldn't pick anything, so you can't go wrong with DT. I has a fail.
In other news, here are my game reports from Tuesday (pretty fuzzy due to early work start that day). Game 1: me against Muzzio, Visionary Architect almost preconstructed deck Prossh, Skyraider of Kher (young kid, wasn't very good), and Merieke Ri Berit. I get off to a slow start until I manage to get down Fathom Mage, Corpsejack Menace, Hardened Scales, and Atraxa and start drawing like crazy. Muzzio gets his engine going, however, I see him counting his lands and right after he flashes in a Darksteel Forge via Shimmer Myr, I hit it with a Sylvan Reclamation. Felt good. The rest of the game was mostly us developing boardstates with the most notable moments being determined by my timing of boardwipes. The first instance was when the board was getting rather rough due to Prossh doing what Prossh does and I had to Divine Exhalation. The second, I Bane of the Living'ed to save Muzzio from Prossh allowing me to attain an ally. The third and most epic was when Merike had Sharuum, the Hegemon, Sphinx of the Steel Wind, and another creature on the field. I swung with Atraxa (with a bunch of counters on her) with Elite Scaleguard in play into Merike tapping down both flyers. He responded by casting Cackling Counterpart to target the Sphinx giving him a blocker. This, however, tapped him out, allowing me to cast Merciless Eviction naming artifacts which destroyed both his and Muzzio's board. I easily took over from there.
In: Tundra and Cyclonic Rift. Out: Azorius Chancery and Necroplasm
Game 2: Merike switches to Karrthus, Tyrant of Jund, Prossh leaves and is replaced by a guy playing General Tazri, and Muzzio switches to Rashmi, Eternities Crafter. Not a whole lot to report here as Tazri unwittingly drops a Panharmonicon followed by an Omniscience and proceeds to Ally all over us. It was mostly our faults cause no one was running spot removal. However, it was kinda annoying because the Tazri player was a pretty slow player (really nice guy though).
In: Bayou. Out: Golgari Rot Farm
Game 3: Me against Tazri and Karrthus again while Rashmi changes to K&T and basically did nothing all game (was a defender theme deck and he got stuck on mana for a bit). Tazri and Karrthus were mostly playing off of each other while I turtled a bit. The pivotal moment occurred when Tazri decided to attack Karrthus instead of me (due to Atraxa being able to kill two creatures with Brave the Sands) after pumping his team with a Tajuru Warcaller for a total of +8/+8. This forced Karrthus to use his all his untapped mana on Necrogenesis for blockers. This allowed me to drop Elite Scaleguard and swing at Karrthus for 27 damage. This pissed off Karrthus enough that he pumped up Karrthus, gave it unblockable with a Rogue's Passage, and then gave it infect with Tainted Strike and swung at me for the kill as an act of taking me down with him. I responded to this by casting an overloaded Cyclonic Rift that I had been sandbagging for over half of the game. This then allowed me to alpha strike both Karrthus and Tazri on my following turn. I killed K&T the turn after. The Karrthus player seemed pretty stunned afterwards so yea, I better watch out next time I play him...
These games felt really good because I felt like I was legitimately outplaying people, not just drawing well or playing with a superior deck. I haven't had that experience in a long while. It is good to be playing magic again.
If you check the list above, you will see that I still have one more slot to fill and I could use some feedback. I found I could definitely use more spot removal (so many high priority artifacts and enchantments), and something to slow down opposing ramp, so I was thinking of adding one of the following: Anguished Unmaking, Beast Within, Aura of Silence, or Tangle Wire. Which should I add?
Honestly, my initial inclination was to do the opposite and run things like Torpor Orb and Humility to better provide support for any planeswalkers I might add. However, I am unsure if that would be the most effective. That being said, after seeing the blowout that both Sylvan Reclamation and Cyclonic Rift did the other night, I am more inclined to add things that interact with the stack. I think that is a key component when comparing the power level of decks.
First game was against mostly stock Breya, Etherium Shaper and Grenzo, Havoc Raiser. I got off to a really fast start with a turn 1 command tower into sol ring, turn 2 crystaline Crawler with 2 counters on it, and turn 3 Atraxa. My opponents just couldn't keep up.
Out: Murmuring Bosk, Duelist's Heritage. In: Scrubland, Rhystic Study
Second game Breya switched to Jori En, Ruin Diver and a fourth player joined as Silas Renn, Seeker Adept partnered with Vial Smasher the Fierce. I got off to a slower start and took hits because I had become more feared. That is until I dropped a Migratory Route with a Hardened Scales and a Juniper Order Ranger in play then followed it with Atraxa. I was slowly able to kill off Jori and Grenzo, however, Silas/Vial Cyclonic Rifted my board to stall for time. I played Atraxa and then C. Rifted her board for the kill (she was at 3 life).
Out: Dreadship Reef, Disdainful Stroke. In: Misty Rainforest, Mana Drain.
Third game (and arguably my favorite of the night), Breya/Jori switched to Yidris, Maelstrom Wielder, Grenzo switched to Sydri, Galvanic Genius, and Silas/Vial switched to Doran, the Siege Tower.
Things went pretty back and forth especially because I was still getting targetted. The biggest turns occurred when Yidris nuked all creatures and then Ghastly Conscriptioned for like 8-10 creatures. Sydri then followed that by going infinite with Pincher tokens and mana and plays a bunch of things including Blightsteel Colossus. Doran had nothing and I had to bail because my ride had come, however, I decided I wanted to leave my mark on the game (mind you, had I been able to stay I would have done a similar move, but one that would have benefited me more). So my turn comes and I cast Duneblast choosing an indestructible creature that Doran had, but then tapped Cauldron of Souls giving all creatures other than Sydri's persist. This meant that Doran got back all of the manifested creatures but face up and Sydri lost her infinite. I asked them to let me know how things turned out next time I see them.
Anyhoo, game 1 was me versus a land heavy Boborygamos Enraged, Tymna the Weaver+Ludevic, Necro-Alchemist pillowfort/group hug, and Gonti, Lord of Luxury. The game was decently all over the place until Boborygamos decided to swing at me with Bobo himself as well as a 27/27 Centaur Vinecrasher. I responded with a Beast Within on the Vinecrasher to which Tymna/Ludevic decided to Grab the Reins with entwine the Vinecrasher and zing it at me. This left me at such a low life that I basically couldn't do anything as Bobo could just shoot me at any time (which he did after a turn or two). Other than the fact that my Atraxa was threatening Tymna/Ludevic with commander damage, there was really no reason for T/L to make that play as I had almost no board otherwise and would have preferred T/L had lived to deal with Bobo and Gonti (who were both getting out of hand). It didn't even win him the game as he was killed next and then Gonti was able to take things over (Bobo was out of cards). I really really hate losing to bimbo threat assessment.
Out: Plains, In: Windswept Heath
Game 2 Bobo left and T/L continued while Gonti switched to Depala, Pilot Exemplar. This game had a ton of boardwipes (I felt bad for Depala as he really wasn't able to come back after a while). The turning point occurred when Depala swung at T/L with a Juggernaut and a Bomat Bazaar Barge which were pumped a bit. He then played Relentless Assault, and for some reason, instead of swinging at T/L to put some pressure on him (as he had the best board but was tapped out), he decided to swing at me and I chumped with an Elspeth token and some other small creature. Complete misplay. From there, T/L took over and won. Lost again due to bad threat assessment. I'm seeing a trend.
Out: Mirrorweave, In: Static Orb
As you can see above, I was a bit salty from the previous two games, thus my inclusion of Static Orb... I would remove it after the night was over, but for this third game it made a strong appearance. T/L switched to Reaper King and Depala switched to Saskia the Unyielding. I started off really fast plopping an Elspeth, followed by Atraxa, followed by Static Orb. Atraxa was removed at some point, but I managed to get her out again. This was interesting because Saskia managed to prevent me from ulting Elspeth via swinging at RK with Saskia and redirecting the damage from me to Elspeth herself. Good job on them for figuring it out. Still Atraxa managed to eventually beat them down via the +3/+3 from Elspeth. Felt good until there was some grumbling about how disliked the Static Orb was...I have an opinion on that. Let me know if you would like to hear it.
Game 4 we got a fourth player, the Silas Renn/Vial Smasher from two weeks before playing the same deck, Reaper King stayed and Saskia switched to something I can't remember (this game is very much a blur because it was late and we had to rush due to the store closing). It was a really long game with too many board wipes (many were mine), but I did pretty well and had the game sewn up (killed off both Reaper King and whatever the Saskia player was playing). However, Renn/Vial wound up stalling (Evacuation followed by a Cyclonic Rift) til the store closed. She couldn't have won either. I would say I deserved it had she been involved in my Static Orb play, but she wasn't there for that so it was just kinda rude. Aw well.
My changes are primarily to protect Atraxa (greaves) and my board state (counterspells) as you can see above. Thanks!
Cool, just needed to make sure I wasn't too overly self-indulgent.
Yea Static Orb (and worse) will make a return once the deck can more easily abuse it. For right now though, I will play "fair."
I hope people get better. I really really do...
So game 1 was against Kynaios and Tiro of Meletis grouphug/pillowfort (getting really sick of grouphug) and Riku of Two Reflections. Things were pretty back and forth, the planes being important but not game winning until K&T and I had to deal with Riku's doubled Eldritch Evolution into Arcanis the Omnipotent and Niv-Mizzet, the Firemind. One of us boardwiped, but not after Riku drew a bunch of cards. Then we walked to Naar Isle. After K&T and myself trying to walk off of it and Riku not, Riku doubled an entwinted Tooth and Nail into Heartless Hidetsugu, Kiora's Follower, Kamahl, Pit Fighter, and something else (all had haste due to a Temur Ascendancy. After bringing us down pretty low, I unmorphed Bane of the Living and wiped his board. It didn't matter though cause the Isle killed both K&T and I before we could have our turns. God I hate Planechase...
Game 2 the Riku player left and was replaced by a Radha, Heir to Keld dragons deck, K&T was still around and then we got a fourth player playing The Gitrog Monster. I had my suspicions about the Git monster due to it being a foil Japanese card, him playing a foil Deathrite Shaman and a Lion's Eye Diamond, but no one seemed to listen because after rolling chaos on Skybreen and targeting the GM, Radha rolled a chaos and targeted me, then GM rolled a chaos and targeted me. So turn 3 I was at 25 life with 3 lands and a simic signet. Turn 4, GM combo'ed off with Dakmor Salvage... I don't enjoy saying this, but this game tilted the hell out of me. First, it was attack of both poor threat assessment and planechase. Second, and more importantly, the GM player pulled a really jerk move by playing the way he did. Mind you, GM comboing off turn 4 is not why I got annoyed (though it didn't help). In all honesty, I hope to get this deck to a decently competitive point, so that I might give that GM deck a good game. I got annoyed because, not only did he bring a gun to a knife fight, it turns out that this was his first game of Commander in Portland as he had recently moved. His old meta was super cutthroat (which is fine) and so he decided, for some ridiculous reason, that we were too. I seem to recall seeing a recent thread discussing acts like this: the appropriate thing to do when in a new place is to play something so so just to get the lay of the land. If you get annihilated then you move to your competitive deck, and if not then you haven't disrupted anyone's fun. By choosing to play that deck he made it obvious that he has no understanding of social etiquette, which in turn annoys me because he is feeding into the socially awkward stereotype that the magic community is trying to move away from. I'd like to say that I will be the bigger person and move on, but I don't know if he would learn anything if I did that if I saw him again, so I don't know.
Game 3, the only change is that GM switches to his Geist of Saint Traft 1v1 deck. Yea not much better. This game went on way too long-K&T had to leave in the middle of it. Things were pretty back and forth throughout the game with Geist buffing up his commander a ton (I was pretty close to death via commander damage), Radha getting both Xenagos and Atarka in play, and K&T pushing us all around with Edric and Gahiji. Despite Planechase screwing me over with a turn order switch right before my turn, I somehow managed to drop a Deepglow Skate with Elspeth, Knight-Errant at 6 counters and ult her. This put me in a very good position especially when we walked to Norn's Dominion and on my next turn I my first roll was to walk. This blew up everyone's board except for my own. We then walked to the myriad plane (can't remember the name). It was slow but I eventually managed to win despite Radha getting very close to killing both Geist and myself. Sadly, Radha was pretty unhappy with this game as Geist (being a 1v1 deck) spent most of his removal/counters on him (I got a little bit, but not nearly the same amount).
Overall a pretty crummy evening of magic. I will never play planechase again unless it is with precons/new players.
Anyway, I've played lots of decks over the years that like to do stuff with +1/+1 counters, so I have a few ideas that might interest you.
First, you mentioned how slowly growing beaters isn't that engaging or exciting, and I agree with you. I think one of the more interesting things you can do with Atraxa as your general is throw in some creatures that do things when you *remove* counters from themselves or others, rather than just piling them on and swinging. If you want to draw cards, which is something you've already expressed concerns over, look towards creatures like Zameck Guildmage, Sage of Fables, Academy Elite, and Mindless Automaton. Need some ramp? Talk to Fertilid or Realm Seekers. If you want to go wide and really get some mileage out of Cathars' Crusade, be sure not to overlook Twilight Drover and Custodi Soulbinders. You can even find some removal options with cards like Shinewend, Karlov of the Ghost Council, or Vish Kal, Blood Arbiter (Retribution of the Ancients is also worth a mention here, even though you can't directly proliferate it). You can't protect your life total in a +1/+1 counters deck much better than playing Spike Weaver. And if you want to keep spreading the counter-y goodness, Mikaeus, the Lunarch is your man.
On an individual note, Glen Elendra Archmage has some brutal synergy with two cards you already have, Master Biomancer and Cathars' Crusade, and would gain additional synergy if you decide to run Sage of Fables or another card that can help get the party started on any of your creatures, the always useful Mikaeus, the Unhallowed.
I have to assume you've already considered the other forms of reliable, repeatable proliferation, those being Contagion Clasp, Contagion Engine, and Inexorable Tide. Running those in conjunction with Atraxa can also open the door to some other wincon cards that would be a pretty slow grind with only one source of proliferate: Decimator Web and Darksteel Reactor.
I hope my suggestions have at least given you some ideas on something else to do other than slowly grow big dumb beaters. The world of +1/+1 counters has so much more to offer
So last Tuesday was a pretty rubbish gaming night if I do say so myself. I get to the store and almost everyone has started a game. A group of three who I have mostly played with before wave me over saying that I can join in once they are done. About 30-45 minutes later the game finishes. I wasn't crusty about the wait-it was kinda fun watching though I should have realized what was to come based off the super slow play of one player and the super misplays of the other. I finally get into a game. Me versus everything taps Riku, a stock Atraxa list and a stock Ydris list, however, he was using Vial Smasher and Thrasios instead.
I get mana screwed early on and the other Atraxa gets a huge board presence. We are all trying to draw some sort of board wipe, however, Vial/Thrasios won't play his wheel effect for some stupid reason. We finally get to the turn where if something doesn't happen Atraxa will destroy all of us. V/T has an Yidris on the board and both myself and Riku say we won't block if he swings just so that we might be able to get out of this situation. V/T then proceeds to cascade into Waste Not and the game goes to hell. He starts chaining wheels and generating tons of mana and whatnot. His turn takes somewhere between 20 and 25 minutes (mostly due to his inability to play properly) and he does not proceed to win. He is left with a huge board which is then nuked by his own Boompile when Riku attempts to kill him with a Mob Rule. It was the biggest waste of time I have ever had in a game of magic. Atraxa then proceeds to take over again and kill everyone. By then it was too late for a second game and I left feeling pretty sure that I never want to play with that kid again. To add insult to injury, the V/T player attempts to say "see and the deck didn't even need Ydris to do it" before all three of us told him how wrong he was. Why do I keep playing with people like this? Am I being to harsh? Maybe it's me?