MTG Salvation

My playgroup is pretty casual, I don't usually see anything super competitive. Most of my decks aren't suited well for multiplayer mostly for being too aggressive or doing degenerate things and winning the game too quickly. I'm looking for a grindy control deck that is a blast to play in two-headed giant and free for all variants.

I was thinking about the interactions of these cards specifically: Sphinx of the Chimes, Punishing Fire, and Grove of the Burnwillows. With these cards in the right places, Sphinx (with burnwillows in play) basically reads - RR: Opponent gains 1 life and you draw 4 cards.

I have no idea where to take the deck from here, but I thought that since we're in RUG colors, the Nightshade Peddler / Izzet Staticaster combo might fit as well.

Some other synergistic cards that can take advantage of recurring Punishing Fire would be great as well (for example, Liliana of the Veil and punishing fire make her + ability pretty one sided). I need as many suggestions for these as you can come up with.

Lets Brew!

I would play some sort of Life from the Loam deck and possibly abuse Gigapede to either create a bunch of untargetable 6/1s to block for me but also to draw me cards (aka get a ton more Dredges). Ultimately you could win with a Worm Harvest or two.

Peddle Staticaster is just much worse than Basilisk Collar and Goblin Sharpshooter. Sharpshooter and any piece of DT equipment for that matter. Still, I would just play Devastating Dreams or Wildfire or something since you can always use Loam to fuel them. Seismic Assault could work well too.

Blue is going to make the deck worse than a straight RG version but if you're dead-set on playing Sphinx you could make it work I'm sure.

Thanks for the suggestions! Unfortunately, I'm not a big fan of loam so I don't really want to go in that direction. I agree that Collar + Sharpshooter is a much better combo, unfortunately, I don't have any of those. I do think that subbing Nightshade Peddler for Gorgon's Head and Izzet Staticaster would be (slightly) less fragile though. Maybe Dismiss into Dream with P. Fires as repeatable hard removal?

As for actually winning, I was wondering that myself, I know a grindy engine is worthless without a resilient end game. I don't have much faith in Sphinx beats, even with a 5/6 flying body.

I used to play astral slide and win by eventually entwining Rude Awakening, but without sweepers that doesn't seem possible without overloading cyclonic rift at the EOT. And manlands were a big part of that deck.

Are there any combos in RUG colors that read "I win"?

I'm honestly putting fun factor over competitiveness, but I don't want players saying, "Oh, he's playing that pile, focus on that guy." or do I?

Wait what? Why wouldn't you make this a Loam deck? You need tons of mana, multiple Pk-Fires, a Grove, etc. it even allows you to play Thespian Stage and Dark Depths as an "I win" combo. Everything that this deck needs Loam provides. To say that you're not playing Loam... uhhh... I'm kind of speechless.

Lol I just don't like loam because lands are lame and not very interactive with everyone else. Also, trying to keep a reasonable 100 dollar budget with this deck, so 20 dollar cards are out. 10 dollar cards are okay, especially if they're handy for commander or modern. I really like the idea of deathtouch pingers so I want some number of death touch enablers and staticaster/gelectrode as combined with punishing fire they become more threatening even without death touch. That should curb off early aggro (in multiplayer?) Ditching green doesn't let me ramp, but then again I can run more power and utility in those slots. I like dark depths combo, but getting them is the only problem. But then my six drop ideally would be primetime anyway.

Any thoughts on the niv curiosity combo? Seems like a fair combo, and in a pinch it could create some card advantage with gelectrode. I'll probably play more two headed sruff, so sitting back on my spells and running counters and removal can be a valid strategy if my partner can take advantage of the windows I can create.