Xenphire, and I cannot wait for that! I'm glad to hear the update is still coming. To sate my commander hunger, I've built Daretti. It's not Ayli (I love her) but it's pretty fun to play.
How's the testing of Exquisite Archangel and Treasure Keeper going? Man, I got the promo Yahenni's Expertise and it's taking all of my strength not to jam it in here lol.
Glad to see appreciation for Yosei, the Morning Star Locking people out of the game isn't always fun, but when you need it this deck does it with gusto. I've had to recently lock a Wheel-style player out of the game after he wheeled twice making me discard Ugin and some other important cards in the very early game. I also do this against Artifact ramp decks, praying I can do so before they get Unwinding Clock online.
Kaalia's Army of AnnhilationRWB
Obzedat, Ghost Council - Life Gain MattersWB
Jarad, Golgari Lich Lord - Fatty Reanimator ToolboxBG
Nekusar, the Mindrazer - Draw to DieRBU
Marath, Will of the Wild - Token Pump and TapGWR
Roon of the Hidden Realm - Blink to BleedWBG
Maybe I'm missing something but you can't target stoneforge mystic with ranger of eos.
You're correct. Range of Eos looks for converted mana cost, now power.
Some of the cards above I have in the addendum (second post) in Other Favorites, or have suggested for other builds As far as the main deck is concerned:
Identity Crisis - very color intensive and expensive for what it does, being that it only targets a single player. The deck doesn't focus on discard, so the advantage of causing one opponent to discard their hand is pretty minimal, plus the main list has ample ways of dealing with threats played. More often than not a Bojuka Bog will have the same effect and provide an extra mana when it untaps the next turn.
Diablic Intent - Is a good Tutor and depending on how many tutors someone wishes to run, is an excellent include. I chose not to run it because of the condition of having to have a creature to sacrifice to play it. The deck has a lot of recursion, but often times I want to play Tutors at times I don't have that recursion or creatures available, in order to recover from losing that board state somehow.
Sidisi, Undead Vizier - More often than not Sidisi is a 5-mana Demonic Tutor, because I'd rather sacrifice her to herself than sacrifice something else in play. Sacrifice in the deck is pretty picky on what it wants to sacrifice and when. So with her being a 5-mana Demonic Tutor that sometimes has the upside of being a creature, it's pretty hit or miss. When I want a recurrable tutor effect I usually just go straight for reanimatingRune-scarred Demon.
Unburial Rites - A great reanimation card! Also in the addendum post. I removed it from the main post mainly because of it being Sorcery speed and my other available reanimation spells being a bit better. I have this listed in the Budget build, I believe.
Knight of the White Orchid - Also in the budget build for people who can't afford Weathered Wayfarer. I run very few basic lands so the Knight is actually low on available targets, which is why I probably wouldn't ever put it in the main deck.
Hatred - The deck isn't about dealing combat damage at all and doesn't particularly care to. Hatred is a great card in a deck that focuses on finishing opponents with Commander damage, but that's not something Ayli really does as a combo deck. Because of that, unless someone were to build a more aggro version of the deck (which isn't really BW's thing), Hatred would probably be better served as another combo piece, tutor or removal spell.
Aura of Silence - This is more of a stax card and I've never really been a fan of putting tax cards in a deck that isn't going full on with that theme (or Enchantments). It's a good card in the right deck, but BW has so many answers to Artifacts and Enchantments and one card out of the 99 that hinders those spells isn't really enough to be effective unless you can play it in the early game.
Debtors' Knell - This is another card that I used to run, but the high mana cost wasn't worth it for how slow the card is. For the same mana you can find Sheoldred, Whispering One, have a Swampwalk beater that can probably get through unimpeded thanks to Urborg, Tomb of Yawgmoth, make your opponents sacrifice protected creatures with Hexproof and Indestructible, and still get the same effect on your upkeep, plus the added bonus of being a creature you can reanimate easily. When you can so easily find Sheoldred, it's really hard to justify running another 7 mana enchantment that does less than half what she does. I admit I miss the card and would love to have a foil of it, though. The flavor and look/art of the card is fantastic.
Ranger of Eos - As mentioned above, Ranger looks for converted mana cost, so it has very very limited targets. If you're running a life gain/bleeder build with the Soul Sisters you can fetch a few of them (Soul Warden, Soul's Attendant), and Weathered Wayfarer or Viscera Seer in the main build. But that's really about it. If you're running life gain/bleeder you may run Serra Ascendant, but part of the reason we don't play aggro is because of the politics discussed in the first post.
Ah yes, not sure why I assumed why ranger of eos grabbed stoneforge mystic. In my version it's more token/enchantment focused with bitterblossom so sidisi, diabolic intent and aura of silence fit pretty well (I always like another target for Sun titan). Fair points!
One thing I keep in for fun is hatred. It's just too easy to finish someone off when it's you alone with someone, especially when youve had incremental lifegain all game. That, or you can buff someone else unwillingly to finish someone else off
The only thing I strongly disagree with is the exclusion of Knight of the white orchid, especially in a deck without coffers. Imo this effect and cmc is too good, especially when you are behind. Remember, it grabs scrubland and the shock land. Land ramp literally does not get cheaper in W/B. This is a different role than weathered wayfarer and expedition map land tutor imo as well. The only time it's bad is when you go first and you haven't missed a land.
Kaalia's Army of AnnhilationRWB
Obzedat, Ghost Council - Life Gain MattersWB
Jarad, Golgari Lich Lord - Fatty Reanimator ToolboxBG
Nekusar, the Mindrazer - Draw to DieRBU
Marath, Will of the Wild - Token Pump and TapGWR
Roon of the Hidden Realm - Blink to BleedWBG
Played two games, (4-person) stumbled with remarkable lack of drawing power.
When facing G/U players that can easily counter or control you (while keeping hand filled with for example Sylvan Library), extra cards mean win.
I scooped with an empty hand when my Necropotence got countered and no hope of leaving the top-deck mode. I think maybe of re-adding Promise of Power. Anyone any other ideas on how to draw better than Night's Whisper? (preferably from non-permanents)
Played two games, (4-person) stumbled with remarkable lack of drawing power.
When facing G/U players that can easily counter or control you (while keeping hand filled with for example Sylvan Library), extra cards mean win.
I scooped with an empty hand when my Necropotence got countered and no hope of leaving the top-deck mode. I think maybe of re-adding Promise of Power. Anyone any other ideas on how to draw better than Night's Whisper? (preferably from non-permanents)
I can't say that a lack of card draw has ever been an issue for me. I run a lot of tutors in my build. Between that and all the reanimation I don't really have any problems with coming up short on a hand. If you're having issues, re-adding Promise of Power is definitely something to look at. Dark Prophecy can serve as an on-demand Phyrexian Arena (already in the deck) with the right setup, and Grim Haruspex works similarly. In Kaladesh we got Morbid Curiosity which can be a big draw for cheap when used on reanimated fatties in the deck. You could add in Bloodgift Demon or Scroll Rack.
If I have a U player in my pods I 100% of the time I get Cavern of Souls and Boseiju, Who Shelters All out ASAP. With all the tutors, the Map, and Recruiter to get Wayfarer it's never an issue for me, personally. I hope some of the suggestions above might help you if you feel you need more draw, though
Thanks for your input Xenphire! It's really greatly appreciated.
I already had the exact same draw as you, (and also 8 tutors), but now I’ve added Promise of Power and replaced Phyrexian Arena with Kaya, Ghost Assassin. She’s only 1 mana more, but more versatile, I think. Also upped my landcount by 1 basic plains (to 38 lands total, including Maze of Ith).
Kaya, Ghost Assassin is really great! I will say that my Phyrexian Arena often gets targeted by removal because everyone acknowledges it's that good of card advantage. The great thing about Kaya is obviously that she can defend herself, you don't lose any life and cause opponents card disadvantage
Play report: increased drawing really helps. MVP's (once again) Sheoldred, Whispering One brutally keeping creatures of the table (thanks to Mr Meatbag)
Especially when I went T1 Entomb T2 Nezumi Graverobber. It has almost become a Sheoldred deck where Ayli temporarily holds the ground until Mrs Praetor arrives.
Just wanted to drop by and state that I've confirmed my previous reservations about playing Knight of the White Orchid. Despite the grief I gave him, I built Kambal, Consul of Allocation in a death and taxes style for a friend who recently began playing Magic, who I just introduced to EDH in the past couple weeks. In testing, it is more often than not a 2/2 with First Strike, which the deck does not need.
Here's are the notes I've made while playing it:
1. I usually have something I want to play that costs WB or B more than WW within the first two turns.
2. If I go first, my opponents almost always have the same (or less) amount of land that I do. I rarely play against decks running Green ramp in my meta, and even then, assuming there might be a ramp deck is a bit silly.
3. It is almost always a dead draw after the first 3-4 turns of the game.
4. If I do draw it early on, it sits in my hand waiting to get value besides being a French Vanilla 2/2 with First Strike.
5. It's better off as another tutor if you're playing it. I feel it is an okay-ish budget deck option, but nothing more.
Weathered Wayfarer is the closest comparison, but is Skullclampable, only requires one White source to start, can be dropped Turn 1, can activate on a whim, can be waiting to activate on the board instead of in your hand for the situation to arise, and when you do get him early on you can find very important utility lands to avoid disruption later in the game. I'd even run Kor Cartographer again over the Knight if anyone needs more land drops because if you want to do reanimate shenanigans, the Cartographer is an unconditional land drop and only requires one White mana to hard cast.
Super excited for Amonkhet spoilers to start! I hope everyone has had luck getting cheaper Damnations and other goodies for the deck with Modern Masters 2017! I may be revisiting the budget build here in the near future after the prices have settled.
Stopping by real quick for a quick EDH night report. There aren't too many details to go over. The two games I played tonight were dominated by the large removal package I always pack in Ayli, although I did win a couple unique ways. My first game I was able to win using Sorin, Grim Nemesis' ultimate for 45 Vampires. It's definitely one of the more uncommon ways that I win with the deck. Usually it's not by directly attacking anyone, but the board state told me I wouldn't have to worry about a board wipe, so I didn't need Vish Kal, Blood Arbiter or Ashnod's Altar + Exsanguinate to close the game down. I actually swung out with all the Vampires to kill the last remaining player. Game 2 was a little more along the lines of how a normal game goes. I won with Ashnod's Altar + Nim Deathmantle after a long grueling game of trying to keep them both on the board. They kept getting removed, but luckily we have a lot of ways to get Artifacts back in Orzhov colors. Reveillark was in my graveyard so I thought I was waiting to get a Karmic Guide to close the game, but I drew a Wurmcoil Engine after drawing a buttload with Reassembling Skeleton + Skullclamp. So, I used the Altar + Deathmantle + Wurmcoil to make infinite 3/3 Lifelink Wurm tokens and 3/3 Deathtouch tokens. Everyone scooped at that point.
Really anxious for Amonkhet and to see the new God cards. Heliod and Erebos doesn't really have a place in the deck, so I'm hoping perhaps the new Black or White gods might from Amonkhet might. I don't see the Embalm mechanic making much of a splash in the deck because of having to exile the Embalmed creature. We want our creatures to be puppets with strings to manipulate as we see fit - not in exile! Lastly I'm looking at a couple cards I've really glossed over: Kalitas, Traitor of Ghet and Scroll Rack. I've had Kalitas in another deck since I opened one in a pack I bought on a whim, and I've loved the effect he has on other opponent's graveyard shenanigans while not screwing myself over trying to run cards like Rest in Peace or Leyline of the Void. Bojuka Bog just isn't enough sometimes, and Kalitas can be brought back if destroyed or sent to the graveyard via sac outlet in response to exile effects. Scroll Rack, I think, is the one of the biggest cards the deck could use for consistency and it combos well with Sorin, Grim Nemesis. The potential to turn a dead hand into a winning hand is too good to pass up. I've been playing it in Sidisi, Brood Tyrant and fallen in love with it, then was reminded about it when putting a Masterpiece Sol Ring on layaway at my LGS today when I saw they had a Masterpiece Scroll Rack
Play report: The tandem of Sorin, Grim Nemesis and Kaya, Ghost Assassin provided adequate card advantage, while keeping the board clear with sweepers galore. I got Sorin at 9 loyalty several times, but opted to shoot opposing planeswalkers instead (one of our 'regular' commanders is Daretti). Why go for a risky instant win when you can make your opponents miserable with grinding games?
I second the hope for an amazing W or B God in Amonkhet!
Play report: The tandem of Sorin, Grim Nemesis and Kaya, Ghost Assassin provided adequate card advantage, while keeping the board clear with sweepers galore. I got Sorin at 9 loyalty several times, but opted to shoot opposing planeswalkers instead (one of our 'regular' commanders is Daretti). Why go for a risky instant win when you can make your opponents miserable with grinding games?
I second the hope for an amazing W or B God in Amonkhet!
Glad you're enjoying Sorin and Kaya, as well! Using Sorin's ultimate is indeed risky, but the conditions were right at the time with no other Planeswalkers out and having just wiped the board with Damnation and built 10 loyalty so I could keep him on the board afterwards. I believe I've only ever used his ultimate once before, when I had Vish Kal, Blood Abriter on the board and Vizkopa Guildmage activated. Sacrificed some absurd number of tokens and swung in with Vish Kal to gain more than I needed to drain the table for with Viskopa to win
I completely forgot to put Scroll Rack into my deck for EDH night, tonight >_< I'm pretty sure it will but I'll get back to you guys on what I'll be replacing for it when I do.
So tonight my first game of the night was a 6-player pod.
Most of the life loss this game was from Kambal since he sat on the board for a while before being dealt with. Much of my early game was spent controlling the board. The Nekusar player had Bloodchief Ascension out which immediately activated before the turn wheeled back around to him because of the life loss everyone was taking from Kambal. I had to use an early game Vindicate on one of the Yahenni player's Grave Pacts. I foresaw Enchantments getting out of control so I Demonic Tutored for mass removal. After that, the same player was able to get out Grave Betrayal and then Tainted Aether. We were all drawing extra cards from the Nekusar player putting Howling Mine out so I knew a giant Yahenni was quite possible shortly thereafter between all his draw and if anyone got a decent board state going. So, the turn following that mess I played the Merciless Eviction I tutored for, naming Enchantments. Also early game I was able to drop Sorin, Grim Nemesis and get a ton of card advantage out of him since I had Ayli on the board deterring both Yahenni players. Nekusar was hit with Adriana's Swords to Plowshares the first time, then my own StP the second time it came out, keeping him off the board for a while.
I had my Reliquary Tower out and had Sun Titan and Angelic Renewal in my hand, as well as Xiahou Dun, the One-Eyed and was about to start using reanimation effects to get Xiahou back to repeatedly return Demonic Tutor. The Kambal player had put Tainted Remedy out so I couldn't gain life without killing myself, but it was the only Enchantment on the board at the time so I didn't want to waste Xiahou to get Merciless Eviction back, yet. The Nekusar player knew he was dead in the water at that point and played Apocalypse, causing me to lose the Sorin, my Sol Ring, Urborg, Tomb of Yawgmoth, and all my lands. So, Fiend Hunter, Karmic Guide and the other combo pieces I mentioned went to my graveyard. The entire table went into topdeck mode. Eventually Nekusar played Underworld Dreams and one Yahenni player put down Mindcrank. So, we were all taking 1 damage and milling 1 every turn. My plan was to play Ugin, the Spirit Dragon next turn and deal with the remaining troublesome permanents on the board, but alas.
After playing Apocalypse the Nekusar player was hated out of the game pretty fast by everyone. He had been losing a ton of life all game from Tainted Remedy because he had Profane Memento on the board much of the game. He died first, so Underworld Dreams left. Adriana used Return to Dust on Mindcrank and the 2nd Yahenni player's Sword of the Animist. I drew into Necromancy and played it targeting Karmic Guide, then targeting Xiahou to reanimate him, to sacrifice him to bring Demonic Tutor back to my hand. At that point I played Demonic Tutor and searched for Blasting Station. The Yahenni player started swinging at me next since I had been keeping his attrition Enchantments in check all game. At that point I drew into Beacon of Unrest and played it to find Reveillark so I could put the game to an end and played the Blasting Station. The other players were having problems drawing into lands to recover after the Apocalypse, so not much was able to be done about it. The next turn I played Reveillark from my hand, sacrificed it to Blasting Station, targeting Karmic Guide and Fiend Hunter to reanimate, then beginning the loop.
With the Nekusar player building up his board state in the game early on, Kambal dinging everyone and Adrianna building an aggressive board state, I was able to play it pretty low key and no one even really cared about my Sorin. My original game plan was to find Ashnod's Altar and Exsanguinate and use all the vampires from Sorin to kill the table since the highest life total before Apocalypse was 54 (the Kambal player's). Tainted Remedy hosed that so I was going to find Blasting Station to use with Sun Titan and Angelic Renewal, but that plan went by the wayside when Apocalypse happened. This was one of those perfect games that really showcase how Ayli is meant to work! There's usually always a bigger threat at the table and playing low key card advantage early on like Sorin goes under the radar, even when he does 6 damage to the table off of his +1, because there's something like Nekusar or the Enchantments the Yahenni player was playing that need to be kept in check. Xiahou Dun was the MVP of the game. This is of course not hitting everything that happened in the span of that 2 hour game, but I probably recurred him various ways and got Demonic Tutor back about 4-5 times over the course of the game, and I could have easily got Merciless Eviction or Vindicate back if I needed to. Once I got Demonic Tutor back, it was used to find the Ugin I had in my hand at one point.
Keeping a low profile allowed me to be the arbiter that game and keep the table "fair" while moving my own plans forward. Being the one to answer threats like Tainted Aether and Grave Betrayal keeps the heat off of me because everyone is focused on the players who played those spells to begin with and they all just duke it out while I quietly set up for a game win and make secondary plans. I hadn't anticipated Apocalypse at all - there is truly nothing that can be done about that. But, with the combos I was sitting up in my hand it was only a matter of drawing into a tutor or reanimation spell to finish the job. It would've gone quite differently if I had been hit with a Bojuka Bog or if Adriana's Relic of Progenitus hadn't been exiled with the Apocalypse. But left unchecked, my graveyard still acted as an extension of my hand clear up until I closed the game out.
If you're wondering, the other Yahenni player basically did nothing most of the game. He had Extraplanar Lens out, Grim Haruspex and Dark Imposter but did nothing with the Dark Imposter to speak of, other than removing Kambal at one point. He did play Fleshbag Marauder causing me to sacrifice an Archon of Justice I had been waiting to use on Bloodchief Ascension if Nekusar tried to go infinite and play Mindcrank. Kambal killed Ayli with Gatekeeper of Malakir the turn before leaving only the Archon, so I only had it to sacrifice. I ended up nuking his Extraplanar Lens for his transgression.
In other news...
I'll probably end up finding a place to add Austere Command in addition to Scroll Rack once I get it in Invocation form This last month I've had several games come up where the modal benefits of the spell would have been too good to ignore. More updates on what I may replace with those and an Amonkhet set review when it's spoiled at the end of next week!
Amonkhet, so far...
It's too bad they fixed the templating on cards since Fiend Hunter/Angel of Serenity, otherwise the new Angel of Sanctions would have me kind of excited. Tattered Mummy could be a new toy for mass life drain in conjunction with Nim Deathmantle and Ashnod's Altar, although it only goes so far. If you're at the end of the game and opponents are sitting at lower life totals, it could be an easy win, though.
There's some interesting cards in here for a tokens build. Anointer Priest is another Soul Sister, but specifically for tokens. Throne of the God-Pharaoh could be fun, as well. I can imagine a tokens build using Behind the Scenes to get a lot of small creatures through and then having Throne of the God-Pharaoh trigger. The amount of life loss has potential to be pretty huge.
If you're running Black Sun's Zenith then Nest of Scarabs could be a pretty ridiculous card. In a build built with more hand disruption in mind, Archfiend of Ifnir wouldn't be too bad (and by proxy Miasma Mummy), as you could be generating tons of card advantage off of it with the Nest of Scarabs in play in addition to stuff like Geth's Grimoire, Waste Not and Geier Reach Sanitarium. I probably won't be running Nest or Archfiend in the main build because there's not enough crossover synergy to justify using them without changing a lot of other cards to make them work.
Bontu's Monument and Oketra's Monument are great but probably not for Ayli because we reanimate creatures more than we cast them, making it hard to cut something for those.
Hey there everyone. A few updates on what to expect this week!
#1 - Amonkhet set review! In the past I've gone back and forth on if I give cards a rating and talking about them overall, or forgetting ratings and just talking about potential inclusions in certain builds. In the next day or two I'll be posting the set review. Instead I'm going to start the review with a set of requirements that cards need to meet to be considered for the main build, and then follow up from there and talk about cards that could find spots in alternate builds. Spoiler: The vast majority of the cards I'll talk about will be for different builds from the Prime list. Most of what I love about this set belongs in other types of decks. I love what I've seen out of Amonkhet, but almost none of it meets some requirements for consideration that I'll be posting with the review.
#2 - The update was put on halt a while back because I got wind of an impending website upgrade a while back and didn't want to finish the thread update just to have it break. It'll be a bit longer while I test formatting and try to set it up to be the best it can be for mobile viewers.
The glory of the God-Pharaoh is upon us! Amonkhet is the 2nd block in recent times that plays host to graveyards mattering. Most of the graveyard themes deal with the Embalm and Aftermath mechanics, while depending on Cycling to put cards in said graveyard. I had previously spoken of making a set of guidelines to review with, but my time this week is limited and I wanted to get this out before everyone goes to their prerelease events this weekend so I don't want to delay any longer. Below are the Rares. Select Commons/Uncommons will be posted later tonight!
Part 1: Rares
Angel of Sanctions
Unlike Fiend Hunter and Angel of Serenity, Angel of Sanctions can Exile any non-land permanent. The down side is that the templating update during Theros block starting with Banishing Light means that the ETB/LTB triggers are part of one ability. Thus, we can't sacrifice him in response to his ETB trigger and leave his targets in Exile. We don't particularly care about him having a 3/4 body and flying because we aren't concerned as much with the Combat Zone - only that our creatures can serve their purpose multiple times. His Embalm cost is high and lets us cast him after we sacrifice him. He is ultimately very average and not worth replacing any of our current effects with. Because of the template difference, that which he exiles will probably come back to haunt you later.
Annointed Procession
While not effective in the primary build, this is nearly an auto-include in a tokens variant. However the primary build generally has very few effects that produce tokens, and already has ways to abuse those creatures.
Approach of the Second Sun
Alternate win conditions are something that have yet to prove very useful outside of something like Felidar Sovereign or Test of Endurance in a Life gain/Bleeder build of Ayli. For 7 mana you gain 7 life, which is dubious at best. To combine it with Vizkopa Guildmage would require a total of 7WWB to cause opponents to lose 7 life at the same time. If you're playing this though, hopefully that's not how you're intending to win with it, anyway. In the main build we have a decent amount of card draw and tutors to find this card and cast it, then find it and cast it again later on. You could cast this on their turn, wait and cast Vampiric Tutor at the end of the turn before your own, draw it on your next draw step and win the game that turn (assuming no counter magic or other hurdles are in the way). I'm currently looking at putting Scroll Rack in the main build still, and a hand of at least 7 cards would mean drawing into this again immediately if one would run Scroll Rack. Theoretically, finding the card again after casting it should be easy enough. Making room for this card as a sudden victory card is entirely plausible and would add another tool in our rather large tool box of ways to win out of nowhere.
Aven Mindcensor
I currently don't run this guy in the main build because it draws political ire and this deck is all about political finesse. It also doesn't actively help us move towards our goals. Most creatures in the deck have an ETB/LTB effect that can be immediately used (and abused repeatedly). Aven Mindcensor is by no means a bad card and probably a good include if you're facing a lot of combo in your meta who attempt to tutor for their win conditions a lot. But, outside of making a meta call, doesn't particularly fit into the scheme of things. If you want to run a more Stax/Taxes variant, it would be an auto-include.
Gideon of the Trials
With as much removal as we have at our disposal, his +1 is pretty irrelevant, and Ayli on Turn 2 or 3 usually deters would-be aggressors from attacking, anyway. We don't care much about his middle ability because we aren't looking to go into the red zone. His last ability, while cute, is ultimately less effective than similar options that we have available to us. If we want that effect, we're better off running Platinum Angel and being able to reanimate it or use it as sac fodder when needed, rather than babysitting Gideon the entire rest of the game.
Gideon's Intervention
A very narrow card in a 100-card singleton format. Nevermore plus an additional mana to prevent damage from the named source. It would only be relevant where you had it in your hand and could play it the turn after someone revealed a card they had searched for. But more often than not, you're going to see a card after it is already too late. We don't have bounce or Remand or a surefire way of knowing what to name. We can preemptively name a card knowing our meta, but he chances of it being removed is extremely high. These kind of effects are very rarely worth the slot.
Glory-Bound Initiate
No ETB/LTB effect and only good when attacking, if Exerted. Pass.
Oketra the True
Oketra wants you to be able to swing with her. It's why she has Double Strike and her clause is all about having other creatures on the battlefield to attack with. Being Indestructible is always an up-side, but is only relevant if the card should even be played to begin with. Controlling three or more creatures in this deck isn't too hard, but not something we need to be thinking about, and once again... this isn't a Combat-oriented deck. What we ultimately get is a creature that will sit on our board that lets us pay 3W for a 1/1 White Warrior creature token with Vigilance. That's not great. Or even really necessary. It doesn't even help Knight-Captain of Eos if you play her because they're Warriors instead of Soldiers. Assuming we even wanted to make small tokens for 4 each, Heliod, God of the Sun is better and harder to remove. As long as you don't have the required Devotion, opponents can't Swords to Plowshares Heldio, while Oketra just sadly waves before being sent off.
Regal Caracl
Well, this isn't a Cat tribal deck. It makes fodder when it enters the battlefield, but it's static ability only affects cats so even for a token or budget build, Angel of Invention is a way, way better option.
Archfiend of Ifnir
This is the kind of effect we really want. It gets around hexproof and shroud, it can whittle away opponent's creatures and has a body big enough to not be hit by most mini-Mutilate effects or Anger of the Gods type effects. The problem is, we actually don't really care much about hand disruption. Currently in the primary build I run Geier Reach Sanitarium as my only discard outlet to discard cards that I need to be in my graveyard. However if one were to run a more disruption-oriented build, a few switches such as bringing in Necrogen Mists, Cunning Lethemancer, Oppression, Bottomless Pit and others could make it worthwhile to run. He also combos every nicely with the Uncommon Nest of Scarabs. He's a pretty good card that I wouldn't warp my deck construction around, but if you run symmetrical hand disruption effects or more discard outlets for reanimating your creatures, he could definitely be worth it.
Bontu the Glorified
Here is a guy I'm very on the fence about. Bontu only costs 2B, so is really easy to cast. He has a big butt which means -X/-X takes some effort to get rid of him. He has Menace, so if you do want to swing in, he's harder to block. His ability to attack or Block depending on a creature dying is easy enough for us to manage. The biggest consideration is that he is an Indestructible sac outlet. I'm normally not a fan of sac outlets that require a mana cost. He's basically a much bigger Viscera Seer that requires 1B to activate and so as a bonus you get to bleed not just one opponent, but each opponent. He can still be exiled, but will likely survive any other form of removal without consideration for Cyclonic Rifts. For 3 mana we get a 4/6 Indestructible blocker with a built-in sac outlet. The 1B it costs to activate his sac outlet is the only downside. Most of the combos in the deck rely on the sac outlet being free to go infinite, or you risk running out of mana before you can finish the job. I feel Bontu will require testing. I'm looking at replacing Panharmonicon because over time it has proven to be cute but not often as effective as I'd like and it's a removal magnet. The other option is Spawning Pit. With the numerous sac outlets in the deck, cutting Spawning pit should theoretically not hurt us that badly. I very rarely use it for it's second ability to produce 2/2 Spawns, but only as a free sac outlet. The bonus of the rest of Bontu I feel has potential to be more advantageous even with the added cost. With all that said, I'll be testing one or the other for testing.
Cruel Reality
5 life is not as significant in EDH/Commander as it could be in 20-life formats. It's still a chunk of life, but for 5BB the effect is most likely not worth it. Getting rid of Planeswalkers and Creatures so opponents immediately face the trigger of losing 5 life is easy. But it's also only attached to one opponent. Eventually the Edict-effect trigger gets around someone's Hexproof and Shroud creatures, but at that point we could just cast Merciless Eviction, anyway. Not worthy!
Disposess
Purely a 60-card constructed, non-singleton format staple. A worse Cranial Extraction, if we cared about finding multiple copies of cards. If it let you search each opponent for the named card, you could troll people and exile their Sol Rings or something. But even then, it'd just be a troll card in this format. For the same mana you could use Praetors' Grasp and exile anything and probably cast it later for your own use. Not worthy.
Dread Wanderer
Of all of the variations on this creature archetype, this is one of the most narrow. We don't want to be in a position where we have next to no cards in our hand. Pass.
Liliana, Death's Majesty
For the sake of what we want to do, there is probably still no better Liliana than the original Liliana Vess. This may be the second or 3rd best, because for 3BB you can reanimate something the turn she comes into play with her -3. The thing is, her +1 creates a 2/2 Black Zombie creature token which is nice sac or block fodder... but then mills us for 2. Some of our most important cards are not creature spells that are easy to reanimate or get back from our graveyard. I'm not a fan of self-mill out of Sidisi, Brood Tyrant decks because it's too easy to self-mill the wrong thing at the wrong time and not have a way of getting back what you lost. If you aren't setup to retrieve something, it may get exiled with graveyard hate before you set up a way to retrieve whatever it was from your graveyard. Going to give her a pass.
Liliana's Mastery
We don't play enough Zombies for this to be useful, and we don't really need the tokens. Not worthy.
Shadow of the Grave
Unless we were forced by a Wheel effect to discard our hand and we happened to draw into this with our new hand, this would be really limited. Or if we were playing a hand disruption variant with a lot of symmetrical discard effects, such as Dark Deal. It's not really for the prime build, and still questionable in a disruption build.
Dusk//Dawn
In the main build we have much better removal available to us. This could, however, be useful in a tokens build.
Never//Return
A Sorcery speed Heroes' Downfall is not impressive. The back end of the card is even less impressive, as graveyard hate tends to be something you also want at Instant speed. Don't really care about the 2/2 bonus Zombie. Not worthy.
Oracle's Vault
We don't want our spells in Exile. We want them in our graveyard where we can grab them back again and again to keep playing. Not worthy.
Pyramid of the Pantheon
Compared to the ramp and color fixing we have available, this mana rock is far too slow. Wasting a total of 7 eventually turns it into a Gilded Lotus, which we already don't run or even need. Not worthy.
Throne of the God-Pharaoh
Being that we never have too many creatures on the battlefield at a time, and mostly untapped because we don't attack often, this won't see much use. It has potential use in a Tokens build, but that's about it.
Cascading Cataracts
Indestructible lands are great. But we will almost never need to filter five mana into WUBRG for any reason. Not worthy.
Love the decklist Xenphire, but I do have a few questions.
Is their any reason you are not running Animate Dead/Reanimate? I realize it might be because it's a single-use reanimating effect, but I feel like a quick reanimation in the early game could skyrocket you ahead.
Love the decklist Xenphire, but I do have a few questions.
Is their any reason you are not running Animate Dead/Reanimate? I realize it might be because it's a single-use reanimating effect, but I feel like a quick reanimation in the early game could skyrocket you ahead.
On Animate Dead/Reanimate: There's a lot of cards in the deck that reanimate currently and in various ways. Karmic Guide, Nighteyes the Desecrator, Puppeteer Clique, Reveillark, Sheoldred, Whispering One, Sun Titan, Necromancy, Corpse Dance and Beacon of Unrest. The deck isn't a true Reanimator archetype despite the fact that it employs a lot of those effects and it uses reanimation as a convenient way to get toolbox creatures. Because it's not an aggro strategy and the goal isn't to reanimate fatties out as soon as possible, it gets to a point where more reanimation spells tends to be overkill. Reanimating via triggered effects is a key to a lot of the winning combos in the deck. At this point there's truly not anything I feel like I could take out that would be adding to the deck rather than taking away from it were I to add more reanimation The deck - at least the version of it I've posted here that I employ - doesn't want to draw a ton of political hate by pumping out a huge fatty in the early game just to end up with it being hit with a removal spell and then having everyone's attention for the rest of the game.
On Utter End and Spawning Pit: When Anguished Unmaking was spoiled I was tempted to take out Utter End. I was already running Vindicate at the time, as well, so I did have a lot of spot removal. However because the deck plays the long game and sometimes I play more serious and competitive players than other times, it's not uncommon for a threat to come out that I can't handle with regular destruction effects. Often I find myself having to use either Utter End or Anguished Unmaking in the early game to disable combos and other threats that I don't have time to wait for 6 mana to cast. There have been a lot of games I've played where having the ability to Exile any non-land permanent has been a serious boon to my survival and continuing the game. Swords to Plowshares can only hit creatures, but if an opponent manages to make non-creature permanents Indestructible then there's only so much you can do about that because Vindicate merely destroys. Through a lot of years of playing the deck I've come to favor cheap spot Exile spells and Exile effects over everything else. There's just been too many times that things I destroy that go to the graveyard come back to haunt me later. There's also that when I used to play Austere Command, there were plenty of times where I only wanted one mode, but had to choose two. Austere Command demands that the situation be right to get the most out of it. There's a high chance of the second mode causing splash damage and ending up choosing to destroy some stuff you don't want to at an inopportune time to destroy the stuff you do want dead. That ultimately lead me to cutting it. I've been considering re-adding it, but if I do I probably won't be removing any existing removal and just taking out a utility card like Panharmonicon, which I've grown less and less impressed with.
Where Spawning Pit is concerned, I think Phyrexian Altar is a legitimate substitution. I mostly play it because it's a very low cost free sac outlet. It's very hard to recall any time the Spawn tokens from it have been very useful. More than anything, it's a very low key sac outlet that no one really looks at, though, which is something it has going for it. People see any artifact that lets you generate mana for sacrificing a creature and they start gunning for it, which is why I never play Ashnod's Altar unless I'm ready to combo off with it or have a way in my hand to get it back.
On replacements for Cavern of Souls and Boseiju, Who Shelters All: I actually don't run Cabal Coffers myself because I run so many utility lands that Cabal Coffers takes a really long time to actually serve any purpose before Urborg, Tomb of Yawgmoth. It's a dead land without Urborg in this deck, so I really don't want to draw it most of the time. Ayli is cheap enough to cast that I've never particularly considered running Command Beacon, myself, although it's not the worst option out there and has synergy with Sun Titan. Some possible options are Arcane Lighthouse for removing Hexproof and Shroud from troublesome permanents you really want to get rid of. The ability can also be a great political bargaining chip. Another great general utility Land is Thespian's Stage, because you can copy other people's useful lands. At worst you can turn it into a second copy of your own Maze of Ith, Geier Reach Sanitarium, or High Market for another sac outlet. Sometimes you might be able to target someone else's Dark Depths and get a 20/20 Marit Lage that you could swing with... or sacrifice to Ayli after activating Vizkopa Guildmage's second ability a couple times to hit the board for 40 life. All in all Thespian's Stage is a great second version of Vesuva that can become what you need when you need it. Buried Ruin is an option for getting important combo pieces back since our ability to get Artifacts back is somewhat limited. There's also the ramp from Ancient Tomb, which I may find a place for in the deck some day. I have yet to put it in because I'm usually able to respond to early aggression pretty well.
You seem to have misread the Cascading Cataracts.
It makes any combo of five mana. So BBBBB is possible too.
Maybe you still don't want it but it's better than you think.
Ah! I did misread it. I thought it was an Indestructible Crystal Quarry, so my mistake!
I do still feel skeptical that it's something I would include, at least in my build. I may try to test it out given how many utility lands produce colorless mana. I really can't think of any stand out examples of where it'd be too useful because getting colored mana hasn't ever been too difficult in the deck. Nothing in particular in the deck requires a lot of colored mana to be pumped into it. Black mana is the only color in the deck that benefits having a lot more produced and Urborg, Tomb of Yawgmoth already handles that easy enough by turning utility lands into Swamps. If I happen to come into possession of one I may have a look, though!
The main post got a bit out of hand since this last winter, and tonight I was able to dedicate some time to fixing a few glaring issues.
1.) The Spoiler tags are finally fixed! Even though how I display all this info will change soon(tm), the main post and all the broken spoiler tags made it look very sloppy. I was able to find the offending missing spoiler tags that caused the problem and fixed it
2.) The main list has been updated to reflect what I am currently running. It got out of hand and I realized I was even missing a card in the 99 all together. As part of this I updated the Change Log, which was very much out of date.
3.) Review of Commons/Uncommons from Amonkhet will be coming in the next day.
4.) Slight flavor update to the thread name. The thread title now references a saying from Game of Thrones, and a quote from H.P. Lovecraft's "The Nameless City" now hovers between the banner and Introduction header in the main post.
Deck Changes
First, I have not yet made any changes for inclusions from Amonkhet, yet. Nothing popped out at me as must haves from the set that fit what Ayli wants to be doing. There were a few that raised an eyebrow but nothing that made me immediately search for them at the prerelease for immediate testing. I do, however, have an update on some cards I've been testing and some discussion that I neglected or that I forgot to respond to here in the thread.
Before I get into the details of the changes, here's what I'm doing:
-Panharmonicon
-Verdant Catacombs
-Profane Command
-Fleshbag Marauder
+Scroll Rack
+Marsh Flats
+Knight-Captain of Eos
+Merciless Executioner
Change Backlog
Exquisite Archangel -> Kaya, Ghost Assassin - Gray24 had been asking how testing with the Exquisite Archangel was going. I seem to have completely neglected to mention that I cut Exquisite Archangel shortly after testing it to put Kaya in the deck. Exquisite Archangel has been a flex slot which I've used to test Demon of Dark Schemes and Magus of the Will this past year. A Exquisite Archangel never proved to be more than a dead card in most cases, and in the couple times where an infinite combo was going off, resetting my life total did not stop me from losing the game. Upon obtaining Kaya finally, Exquisite Archangel was cut and Kaya has been a mainstay of the deck ever since.
Today's Changes
Panharmonicon -> Scroll Rack - When Panharmonicon was first spoiled, I remember commenting that I thought it would be a "win more" card. Because of how many ETB effects are in the deck, I wanted to give it a shot. During the first bit that I played it, I got some cute interactions out of it... when it wasn't hit with removal. Removal is a fact of life. But ultimately what I wasn't happy about was that it didn't really add anything to the deck. I never had a scenario arise where tutoring for Panharmonicon would have saved me or won me the game. Because of how tight the tuning is in the deck, anything the deck could do with Panharmonicon, it could very much do without it. At the same time, up until recently I had never really had the pleasure to play with Scroll Rack until I got one for my Sidisi, Brood Tyrant EDH deck. The goals are similar yet different, but I quickly saw the advantage of being able to draw a new hand or throw dead cards back on top of the library and replace them. This obviously gets better with Vampiric Tutor, Imperial Seal and Enlightened Tutor. Not only does it let you easily get the card you put on top of your library, but you can respond to Wheel effects that would have you discard your hand if you really want to keep whats currently in your hand, draw your new cards then just draw your original hand you wanted to keep. Ultimately, whereas Panharmonicon was a Win More card, I've found that Scroll Rack adds another level of consistency to the deck. The only down side is it also adds play time. If you choose to play Scroll Rack as well, then much like Sensei's Divining Top, I suggest you try to be swift with your choices. Both cards can be notorious for adding time to turns in an already long-winded format.
Verdant Catacombs -> Marsh Flats - This change is something that only makes sense. Verdant Catacombs was a leftover from when I was first found the Ghost Council of Orzhova list years ago and copied it, whole cloth. I don't know if it was included for the sake of flavor, because Marsh Flats made more sense to me being the B/W Fetchland. Deck thinning is non-existent in EDH/Commander and color fixing is truly never an issue in the deck, so the need for multiple is unnecessary. Marsh Flats is also ultimately cheaper for anyone building the deck, and probably makes more sense anyway. Coincidentally I had to sell my Verdant Catacombs a while back when the dental bills happened and pulled a Marsh Flats from a Modern Masters 2017 pack, so it works out that this is what I'm playing now, anyway, and brought my attention to it.
Profane Command -> Knight-Captain of Eos - When updating the thread, I realized I was missing a card entirely from the 99. I had gone to remove Profane Command at one point but never recorded what I replaced it with. That card was Knight-Captain of Eos. After a long hiatus, I welcome the Knight-Captain back and have gotten a lot of use out of it since returning it to the fold. Profane Command is a redundant finisher with modes that are also rather ineffective given where the deck stands right now. Exanguinate can hit all players and ignores Hexproof effects by not targeting; there are much better reanimation effects in our toolbox; Ditto with the -X/-X removal aspect; and Fear is largely irrelevant. Knight-Captain on the other hand is retrievable with Recruiter of the Guard, creates worth of sac fodder (Ashnod's Altar) when it enters the battlefield, can prevent Aggro decks from killing players when you don't want to use a sweeper spell, can sacrifice the Recruiter of the Guard you used to fetch it to it's ability (opening up repeatable tutoring via other effects) and adds another infinite mana loop with Nim Deathmantle + Ashnod's Altar. One could even gain infinite life or 1/1 Soldiers creature tokens this way by sacrificing both Soldiers and Knight-Captain to Ashnod's for total then recurring Knight-Captain for leaving left; then, paying to sacrifice one of the solders to Ayli to gain 1 life and leave left; then, sacrificing Knight-Captain and the remaining soldier for for a total of again; paying Nim Deathmantle's cost of to bring back Knight-Captain to make two more Soldiers, leaving but then sacrificing both Soldiers and Knight-Captain once again with to get a total of . Every other loop you effectively gain one mana and 1 soldier for infinite soldiers, or infinite life.
Fleshbag Marauder -> Merciless Executioner - This change is purely for flavor reasons, as both are functionally the same card. It made more sense to me that the Orzhov or a cult would have a psychopathic executioner in their employ, rather than a grotesque fleshy zombie. The hooded executioner is always there waiting for the next sentence.
Here's a decklist is you wanna see it:
http://tappedout.net/mtg-decks/daretti-artifact-fun-times/
How's the testing of Exquisite Archangel and Treasure Keeper going? Man, I got the promo Yahenni's Expertise and it's taking all of my strength not to jam it in here lol.
I hope you're well. Thank you for everything.
I must say my new Yosei, the Morning Star looks really gorgeous in foil.
WB Ayli, Eternal Recursion WB - GUPir and Toothy GU - WBR Mathas, Fiend SeekerWBR
Here are some things I don't see mentioned in your main post that might open up new ideas:
Identity crisis - I hate that I can put this card in more decks. Insane hand and grave hate.
Diabolic intent - Low cost tutor offset even more due to the sac theme.
Sidisi, Undead Vizier - An easier to hard-cast rune-scarred demon offset by the sac theme.
Unburial rites - Slow, but the flashback is nice.
Necrotic sliver - Slow but recurrable with Sun titan.
Knight of the white orchid - Rare useful and reccurable ramp outside of green.
Hatred - A way to end the game outside of a combo. Perfect for a deck with decent life gain.
Aura of silence - More of a meta pick but reccurable with Sun titan.
Debtors' knell - If your deck can afford the high cmc it's a very flavorful w/b card.
Ranger of eos package - Perfect for this deck as all three of the targets are good. Stoneforge mystic for skullclamp, Weathered wayfarer and serra ascendant are the other usuals, among other possibilities like Viscera Seer.
Kaalia's Army of Annhilation RWB
Obzedat, Ghost Council - Life Gain Matters WB
Jarad, Golgari Lich Lord - Fatty Reanimator Toolbox BG
Nekusar, the Mindrazer - Draw to Die RBU
Marath, Will of the Wild - Token Pump and Tap GWR
Roon of the Hidden Realm - Blink to Bleed WBG
You're correct. Range of Eos looks for converted mana cost, now power.
Some of the cards above I have in the addendum (second post) in Other Favorites, or have suggested for other builds As far as the main deck is concerned:
Identity Crisis - very color intensive and expensive for what it does, being that it only targets a single player. The deck doesn't focus on discard, so the advantage of causing one opponent to discard their hand is pretty minimal, plus the main list has ample ways of dealing with threats played. More often than not a Bojuka Bog will have the same effect and provide an extra mana when it untaps the next turn.
Diablic Intent - Is a good Tutor and depending on how many tutors someone wishes to run, is an excellent include. I chose not to run it because of the condition of having to have a creature to sacrifice to play it. The deck has a lot of recursion, but often times I want to play Tutors at times I don't have that recursion or creatures available, in order to recover from losing that board state somehow.
Sidisi, Undead Vizier - More often than not Sidisi is a 5-mana Demonic Tutor, because I'd rather sacrifice her to herself than sacrifice something else in play. Sacrifice in the deck is pretty picky on what it wants to sacrifice and when. So with her being a 5-mana Demonic Tutor that sometimes has the upside of being a creature, it's pretty hit or miss. When I want a recurrable tutor effect I usually just go straight for reanimatingRune-scarred Demon.
Unburial Rites - A great reanimation card! Also in the addendum post. I removed it from the main post mainly because of it being Sorcery speed and my other available reanimation spells being a bit better. I have this listed in the Budget build, I believe.
Knight of the White Orchid - Also in the budget build for people who can't afford Weathered Wayfarer. I run very few basic lands so the Knight is actually low on available targets, which is why I probably wouldn't ever put it in the main deck.
Hatred - The deck isn't about dealing combat damage at all and doesn't particularly care to. Hatred is a great card in a deck that focuses on finishing opponents with Commander damage, but that's not something Ayli really does as a combo deck. Because of that, unless someone were to build a more aggro version of the deck (which isn't really BW's thing), Hatred would probably be better served as another combo piece, tutor or removal spell.
Aura of Silence - This is more of a stax card and I've never really been a fan of putting tax cards in a deck that isn't going full on with that theme (or Enchantments). It's a good card in the right deck, but BW has so many answers to Artifacts and Enchantments and one card out of the 99 that hinders those spells isn't really enough to be effective unless you can play it in the early game.
Debtors' Knell - This is another card that I used to run, but the high mana cost wasn't worth it for how slow the card is. For the same mana you can find Sheoldred, Whispering One, have a Swampwalk beater that can probably get through unimpeded thanks to Urborg, Tomb of Yawgmoth, make your opponents sacrifice protected creatures with Hexproof and Indestructible, and still get the same effect on your upkeep, plus the added bonus of being a creature you can reanimate easily. When you can so easily find Sheoldred, it's really hard to justify running another 7 mana enchantment that does less than half what she does. I admit I miss the card and would love to have a foil of it, though. The flavor and look/art of the card is fantastic.
Ranger of Eos - As mentioned above, Ranger looks for converted mana cost, so it has very very limited targets. If you're running a life gain/bleeder build with the Soul Sisters you can fetch a few of them (Soul Warden, Soul's Attendant), and Weathered Wayfarer or Viscera Seer in the main build. But that's really about it. If you're running life gain/bleeder you may run Serra Ascendant, but part of the reason we don't play aggro is because of the politics discussed in the first post.
(Also known as Xenphire)
One thing I keep in for fun is hatred. It's just too easy to finish someone off when it's you alone with someone, especially when youve had incremental lifegain all game. That, or you can buff someone else unwillingly to finish someone else off
The only thing I strongly disagree with is the exclusion of Knight of the white orchid, especially in a deck without coffers. Imo this effect and cmc is too good, especially when you are behind. Remember, it grabs scrubland and the shock land. Land ramp literally does not get cheaper in W/B. This is a different role than weathered wayfarer and expedition map land tutor imo as well. The only time it's bad is when you go first and you haven't missed a land.
Kaalia's Army of Annhilation RWB
Obzedat, Ghost Council - Life Gain Matters WB
Jarad, Golgari Lich Lord - Fatty Reanimator Toolbox BG
Nekusar, the Mindrazer - Draw to Die RBU
Marath, Will of the Wild - Token Pump and Tap GWR
Roon of the Hidden Realm - Blink to Bleed WBG
Played two games, (4-person) stumbled with remarkable lack of drawing power.
When facing G/U players that can easily counter or control you (while keeping hand filled with for example Sylvan Library), extra cards mean win.
I scooped with an empty hand when my Necropotence got countered and no hope of leaving the top-deck mode. I think maybe of re-adding Promise of Power. Anyone any other ideas on how to draw better than Night's Whisper? (preferably from non-permanents)
WB Ayli, Eternal Recursion WB - GUPir and Toothy GU - WBR Mathas, Fiend SeekerWBR
I can't say that a lack of card draw has ever been an issue for me. I run a lot of tutors in my build. Between that and all the reanimation I don't really have any problems with coming up short on a hand. If you're having issues, re-adding Promise of Power is definitely something to look at. Dark Prophecy can serve as an on-demand Phyrexian Arena (already in the deck) with the right setup, and Grim Haruspex works similarly. In Kaladesh we got Morbid Curiosity which can be a big draw for cheap when used on reanimated fatties in the deck. You could add in Bloodgift Demon or Scroll Rack.
I have:
Phyrexian Arena
Necropotence
Geier Reach Sanitarium
Skullclamp + Reassembling Skeleton (or other 1-toughness fodder)
Sorin, Grim Nemesis (effectively +1 card a turn)
On top of the tutor/search/library manipulation effects of:
Recruiter of the Guard
Rune-scarred Demon
Weathered Wayfarer
Entomb
Vampiric Tutor
Expedition Map
Sensei's Divining Top
Demonic Tutor
If I have a U player in my pods I 100% of the time I get Cavern of Souls and Boseiju, Who Shelters All out ASAP. With all the tutors, the Map, and Recruiter to get Wayfarer it's never an issue for me, personally. I hope some of the suggestions above might help you if you feel you need more draw, though
(Also known as Xenphire)
I already had the exact same draw as you, (and also 8 tutors), but now I’ve added Promise of Power and replaced Phyrexian Arena with Kaya, Ghost Assassin. She’s only 1 mana more, but more versatile, I think. Also upped my landcount by 1 basic plains (to 38 lands total, including Maze of Ith).
Had to remove my pet Deathbringer Liege though.
WB Ayli, Eternal Recursion WB - GUPir and Toothy GU - WBR Mathas, Fiend SeekerWBR
That is unfortunate about having to remove your Deathbringer Liege. I felt the same way about Divinity of Pride and Debtors' Knell when I eventually removed them
(Also known as Xenphire)
Especially when I went T1 Entomb T2 Nezumi Graverobber. It has almost become a Sheoldred deck where Ayli temporarily holds the ground until Mrs Praetor arrives.
Yosei, the Morning Star keeps oppressing and frustrating opponents.
WB Ayli, Eternal Recursion WB - GUPir and Toothy GU - WBR Mathas, Fiend SeekerWBR
Here's are the notes I've made while playing it:
1. I usually have something I want to play that costs WB or B more than WW within the first two turns.
2. If I go first, my opponents almost always have the same (or less) amount of land that I do. I rarely play against decks running Green ramp in my meta, and even then, assuming there might be a ramp deck is a bit silly.
3. It is almost always a dead draw after the first 3-4 turns of the game.
4. If I do draw it early on, it sits in my hand waiting to get value besides being a French Vanilla 2/2 with First Strike.
5. It's better off as another tutor if you're playing it. I feel it is an okay-ish budget deck option, but nothing more.
Weathered Wayfarer is the closest comparison, but is Skullclampable, only requires one White source to start, can be dropped Turn 1, can activate on a whim, can be waiting to activate on the board instead of in your hand for the situation to arise, and when you do get him early on you can find very important utility lands to avoid disruption later in the game. I'd even run Kor Cartographer again over the Knight if anyone needs more land drops because if you want to do reanimate shenanigans, the Cartographer is an unconditional land drop and only requires one White mana to hard cast.
Super excited for Amonkhet spoilers to start! I hope everyone has had luck getting cheaper Damnations and other goodies for the deck with Modern Masters 2017! I may be revisiting the budget build here in the near future after the prices have settled.
(Also known as Xenphire)
Stopping by real quick for a quick EDH night report. There aren't too many details to go over. The two games I played tonight were dominated by the large removal package I always pack in Ayli, although I did win a couple unique ways. My first game I was able to win using Sorin, Grim Nemesis' ultimate for 45 Vampires. It's definitely one of the more uncommon ways that I win with the deck. Usually it's not by directly attacking anyone, but the board state told me I wouldn't have to worry about a board wipe, so I didn't need Vish Kal, Blood Arbiter or Ashnod's Altar + Exsanguinate to close the game down. I actually swung out with all the Vampires to kill the last remaining player. Game 2 was a little more along the lines of how a normal game goes. I won with Ashnod's Altar + Nim Deathmantle after a long grueling game of trying to keep them both on the board. They kept getting removed, but luckily we have a lot of ways to get Artifacts back in Orzhov colors. Reveillark was in my graveyard so I thought I was waiting to get a Karmic Guide to close the game, but I drew a Wurmcoil Engine after drawing a buttload with Reassembling Skeleton + Skullclamp. So, I used the Altar + Deathmantle + Wurmcoil to make infinite 3/3 Lifelink Wurm tokens and 3/3 Deathtouch tokens. Everyone scooped at that point.
Really anxious for Amonkhet and to see the new God cards. Heliod and Erebos doesn't really have a place in the deck, so I'm hoping perhaps the new Black or White gods might from Amonkhet might. I don't see the Embalm mechanic making much of a splash in the deck because of having to exile the Embalmed creature. We want our creatures to be puppets with strings to manipulate as we see fit - not in exile! Lastly I'm looking at a couple cards I've really glossed over: Kalitas, Traitor of Ghet and Scroll Rack. I've had Kalitas in another deck since I opened one in a pack I bought on a whim, and I've loved the effect he has on other opponent's graveyard shenanigans while not screwing myself over trying to run cards like Rest in Peace or Leyline of the Void. Bojuka Bog just isn't enough sometimes, and Kalitas can be brought back if destroyed or sent to the graveyard via sac outlet in response to exile effects. Scroll Rack, I think, is the one of the biggest cards the deck could use for consistency and it combos well with Sorin, Grim Nemesis. The potential to turn a dead hand into a winning hand is too good to pass up. I've been playing it in Sidisi, Brood Tyrant and fallen in love with it, then was reminded about it when putting a Masterpiece Sol Ring on layaway at my LGS today when I saw they had a Masterpiece Scroll Rack
Anyway, I hope everyone is enjoying their games!
(Also known as Xenphire)
I second the hope for an amazing W or B God in Amonkhet!
WB Ayli, Eternal Recursion WB - GUPir and Toothy GU - WBR Mathas, Fiend SeekerWBR
Glad you're enjoying Sorin and Kaya, as well! Using Sorin's ultimate is indeed risky, but the conditions were right at the time with no other Planeswalkers out and having just wiped the board with Damnation and built 10 loyalty so I could keep him on the board afterwards. I believe I've only ever used his ultimate once before, when I had Vish Kal, Blood Abriter on the board and Vizkopa Guildmage activated. Sacrificed some absurd number of tokens and swung in with Vish Kal to gain more than I needed to drain the table for with Viskopa to win
(Also known as Xenphire)
Do you think Scroll Rack will make it in your list?
I pre-ordered a Invocation Vindicate....Ayli approves.
As of right now, Darett, Scrap Savant is taking more of my attention as I feel Ayli is where I want her to be. If you wanna see it, here is the decklist: http://tappedout.net/mtg-decks/daretti-artifact-fun-times/
I hope you're well.
So tonight my first game of the night was a 6-player pod.
Adriana, Captain of the Guard vs Kambal, Consul of Allocation vs 2x Yahenni, Undying Partisan players vs Nekusar, the Mindrazer vs Ayli, Eternal Pilgrim.
Most of the life loss this game was from Kambal since he sat on the board for a while before being dealt with. Much of my early game was spent controlling the board. The Nekusar player had Bloodchief Ascension out which immediately activated before the turn wheeled back around to him because of the life loss everyone was taking from Kambal. I had to use an early game Vindicate on one of the Yahenni player's Grave Pacts. I foresaw Enchantments getting out of control so I Demonic Tutored for mass removal. After that, the same player was able to get out Grave Betrayal and then Tainted Aether. We were all drawing extra cards from the Nekusar player putting Howling Mine out so I knew a giant Yahenni was quite possible shortly thereafter between all his draw and if anyone got a decent board state going. So, the turn following that mess I played the Merciless Eviction I tutored for, naming Enchantments. Also early game I was able to drop Sorin, Grim Nemesis and get a ton of card advantage out of him since I had Ayli on the board deterring both Yahenni players. Nekusar was hit with Adriana's Swords to Plowshares the first time, then my own StP the second time it came out, keeping him off the board for a while.
I had my Reliquary Tower out and had Sun Titan and Angelic Renewal in my hand, as well as Xiahou Dun, the One-Eyed and was about to start using reanimation effects to get Xiahou back to repeatedly return Demonic Tutor. The Kambal player had put Tainted Remedy out so I couldn't gain life without killing myself, but it was the only Enchantment on the board at the time so I didn't want to waste Xiahou to get Merciless Eviction back, yet. The Nekusar player knew he was dead in the water at that point and played Apocalypse, causing me to lose the Sorin, my Sol Ring, Urborg, Tomb of Yawgmoth, and all my lands. So, Fiend Hunter, Karmic Guide and the other combo pieces I mentioned went to my graveyard. The entire table went into topdeck mode. Eventually Nekusar played Underworld Dreams and one Yahenni player put down Mindcrank. So, we were all taking 1 damage and milling 1 every turn. My plan was to play Ugin, the Spirit Dragon next turn and deal with the remaining troublesome permanents on the board, but alas.
After playing Apocalypse the Nekusar player was hated out of the game pretty fast by everyone. He had been losing a ton of life all game from Tainted Remedy because he had Profane Memento on the board much of the game. He died first, so Underworld Dreams left. Adriana used Return to Dust on Mindcrank and the 2nd Yahenni player's Sword of the Animist. I drew into Necromancy and played it targeting Karmic Guide, then targeting Xiahou to reanimate him, to sacrifice him to bring Demonic Tutor back to my hand. At that point I played Demonic Tutor and searched for Blasting Station. The Yahenni player started swinging at me next since I had been keeping his attrition Enchantments in check all game. At that point I drew into Beacon of Unrest and played it to find Reveillark so I could put the game to an end and played the Blasting Station. The other players were having problems drawing into lands to recover after the Apocalypse, so not much was able to be done about it. The next turn I played Reveillark from my hand, sacrificed it to Blasting Station, targeting Karmic Guide and Fiend Hunter to reanimate, then beginning the loop.
With the Nekusar player building up his board state in the game early on, Kambal dinging everyone and Adrianna building an aggressive board state, I was able to play it pretty low key and no one even really cared about my Sorin. My original game plan was to find Ashnod's Altar and Exsanguinate and use all the vampires from Sorin to kill the table since the highest life total before Apocalypse was 54 (the Kambal player's). Tainted Remedy hosed that so I was going to find Blasting Station to use with Sun Titan and Angelic Renewal, but that plan went by the wayside when Apocalypse happened. This was one of those perfect games that really showcase how Ayli is meant to work! There's usually always a bigger threat at the table and playing low key card advantage early on like Sorin goes under the radar, even when he does 6 damage to the table off of his +1, because there's something like Nekusar or the Enchantments the Yahenni player was playing that need to be kept in check. Xiahou Dun was the MVP of the game. This is of course not hitting everything that happened in the span of that 2 hour game, but I probably recurred him various ways and got Demonic Tutor back about 4-5 times over the course of the game, and I could have easily got Merciless Eviction or Vindicate back if I needed to. Once I got Demonic Tutor back, it was used to find the Ugin I had in my hand at one point.
Keeping a low profile allowed me to be the arbiter that game and keep the table "fair" while moving my own plans forward. Being the one to answer threats like Tainted Aether and Grave Betrayal keeps the heat off of me because everyone is focused on the players who played those spells to begin with and they all just duke it out while I quietly set up for a game win and make secondary plans. I hadn't anticipated Apocalypse at all - there is truly nothing that can be done about that. But, with the combos I was sitting up in my hand it was only a matter of drawing into a tutor or reanimation spell to finish the job. It would've gone quite differently if I had been hit with a Bojuka Bog or if Adriana's Relic of Progenitus hadn't been exiled with the Apocalypse. But left unchecked, my graveyard still acted as an extension of my hand clear up until I closed the game out.
If you're wondering, the other Yahenni player basically did nothing most of the game. He had Extraplanar Lens out, Grim Haruspex and Dark Imposter but did nothing with the Dark Imposter to speak of, other than removing Kambal at one point. He did play Fleshbag Marauder causing me to sacrifice an Archon of Justice I had been waiting to use on Bloodchief Ascension if Nekusar tried to go infinite and play Mindcrank. Kambal killed Ayli with Gatekeeper of Malakir the turn before leaving only the Archon, so I only had it to sacrifice. I ended up nuking his Extraplanar Lens for his transgression.
In other news...
I'll probably end up finding a place to add Austere Command in addition to Scroll Rack once I get it in Invocation form This last month I've had several games come up where the modal benefits of the spell would have been too good to ignore. More updates on what I may replace with those and an Amonkhet set review when it's spoiled at the end of next week!
Amonkhet, so far...
It's too bad they fixed the templating on cards since Fiend Hunter/Angel of Serenity, otherwise the new Angel of Sanctions would have me kind of excited. Tattered Mummy could be a new toy for mass life drain in conjunction with Nim Deathmantle and Ashnod's Altar, although it only goes so far. If you're at the end of the game and opponents are sitting at lower life totals, it could be an easy win, though.
There's some interesting cards in here for a tokens build. Anointer Priest is another Soul Sister, but specifically for tokens. Throne of the God-Pharaoh could be fun, as well. I can imagine a tokens build using Behind the Scenes to get a lot of small creatures through and then having Throne of the God-Pharaoh trigger. The amount of life loss has potential to be pretty huge.
If you're running Black Sun's Zenith then Nest of Scarabs could be a pretty ridiculous card. In a build built with more hand disruption in mind, Archfiend of Ifnir wouldn't be too bad (and by proxy Miasma Mummy), as you could be generating tons of card advantage off of it with the Nest of Scarabs in play in addition to stuff like Geth's Grimoire, Waste Not and Geier Reach Sanitarium. I probably won't be running Nest or Archfiend in the main build because there's not enough crossover synergy to justify using them without changing a lot of other cards to make them work.
Bontu's Monument and Oketra's Monument are great but probably not for Ayli because we reanimate creatures more than we cast them, making it hard to cut something for those.
(Also known as Xenphire)
Also hurray (*) Xiahou Dun, the One-Eyed! Recently I was playing recruiter of the guard and almost automatically picked Karmic Guide from my deck, only to reconsider and decided to take Old One-Eye, who recursed my Sorin. Good Times.
Nothing stellar for Ayli in Amonkhet, so far, I think.
(* read this in the voice of Todd from BoJack Horseman)
WB Ayli, Eternal Recursion WB - GUPir and Toothy GU - WBR Mathas, Fiend SeekerWBR
#1 - Amonkhet set review! In the past I've gone back and forth on if I give cards a rating and talking about them overall, or forgetting ratings and just talking about potential inclusions in certain builds. In the next day or two I'll be posting the set review. Instead I'm going to start the review with a set of requirements that cards need to meet to be considered for the main build, and then follow up from there and talk about cards that could find spots in alternate builds. Spoiler: The vast majority of the cards I'll talk about will be for different builds from the Prime list. Most of what I love about this set belongs in other types of decks. I love what I've seen out of Amonkhet, but almost none of it meets some requirements for consideration that I'll be posting with the review.
#2 - The update was put on halt a while back because I got wind of an impending website upgrade a while back and didn't want to finish the thread update just to have it break. It'll be a bit longer while I test formatting and try to set it up to be the best it can be for mobile viewers.
#3 - Hope everyone has fun at their Open House and pre-release events! I have a lot of shiny to look out for! I decided I want to get all the Master Pieces for the deck, which means I have to hunt down Expedition Godless Shrine, Kor Haven, Marsh Flats and Strip Mine; Invention Solemn Simulacrum, Wurmcoil Engine, Mana Crypt and pay off the Sol Ring I have on layaway; then the Austere Command, Entomb and Vindicate. It's going to be a long term project
(Also known as Xenphire)
The glory of the God-Pharaoh is upon us! Amonkhet is the 2nd block in recent times that plays host to graveyards mattering. Most of the graveyard themes deal with the Embalm and Aftermath mechanics, while depending on Cycling to put cards in said graveyard. I had previously spoken of making a set of guidelines to review with, but my time this week is limited and I wanted to get this out before everyone goes to their prerelease events this weekend so I don't want to delay any longer. Below are the Rares. Select Commons/Uncommons will be posted later tonight!
Part 1: Rares
Angel of Sanctions
Unlike Fiend Hunter and Angel of Serenity, Angel of Sanctions can Exile any non-land permanent. The down side is that the templating update during Theros block starting with Banishing Light means that the ETB/LTB triggers are part of one ability. Thus, we can't sacrifice him in response to his ETB trigger and leave his targets in Exile. We don't particularly care about him having a 3/4 body and flying because we aren't concerned as much with the Combat Zone - only that our creatures can serve their purpose multiple times. His Embalm cost is high and lets us cast him after we sacrifice him. He is ultimately very average and not worth replacing any of our current effects with. Because of the template difference, that which he exiles will probably come back to haunt you later.
Annointed Procession
While not effective in the primary build, this is nearly an auto-include in a tokens variant. However the primary build generally has very few effects that produce tokens, and already has ways to abuse those creatures.
Approach of the Second Sun
Alternate win conditions are something that have yet to prove very useful outside of something like Felidar Sovereign or Test of Endurance in a Life gain/Bleeder build of Ayli. For 7 mana you gain 7 life, which is dubious at best. To combine it with Vizkopa Guildmage would require a total of 7WWB to cause opponents to lose 7 life at the same time. If you're playing this though, hopefully that's not how you're intending to win with it, anyway. In the main build we have a decent amount of card draw and tutors to find this card and cast it, then find it and cast it again later on. You could cast this on their turn, wait and cast Vampiric Tutor at the end of the turn before your own, draw it on your next draw step and win the game that turn (assuming no counter magic or other hurdles are in the way). I'm currently looking at putting Scroll Rack in the main build still, and a hand of at least 7 cards would mean drawing into this again immediately if one would run Scroll Rack. Theoretically, finding the card again after casting it should be easy enough. Making room for this card as a sudden victory card is entirely plausible and would add another tool in our rather large tool box of ways to win out of nowhere.
Aven Mindcensor
I currently don't run this guy in the main build because it draws political ire and this deck is all about political finesse. It also doesn't actively help us move towards our goals. Most creatures in the deck have an ETB/LTB effect that can be immediately used (and abused repeatedly). Aven Mindcensor is by no means a bad card and probably a good include if you're facing a lot of combo in your meta who attempt to tutor for their win conditions a lot. But, outside of making a meta call, doesn't particularly fit into the scheme of things. If you want to run a more Stax/Taxes variant, it would be an auto-include.
Gideon of the Trials
With as much removal as we have at our disposal, his +1 is pretty irrelevant, and Ayli on Turn 2 or 3 usually deters would-be aggressors from attacking, anyway. We don't care much about his middle ability because we aren't looking to go into the red zone. His last ability, while cute, is ultimately less effective than similar options that we have available to us. If we want that effect, we're better off running Platinum Angel and being able to reanimate it or use it as sac fodder when needed, rather than babysitting Gideon the entire rest of the game.
Gideon's Intervention
A very narrow card in a 100-card singleton format. Nevermore plus an additional mana to prevent damage from the named source. It would only be relevant where you had it in your hand and could play it the turn after someone revealed a card they had searched for. But more often than not, you're going to see a card after it is already too late. We don't have bounce or Remand or a surefire way of knowing what to name. We can preemptively name a card knowing our meta, but he chances of it being removed is extremely high. These kind of effects are very rarely worth the slot.
Glory-Bound Initiate
No ETB/LTB effect and only good when attacking, if Exerted. Pass.
Oketra the True
Oketra wants you to be able to swing with her. It's why she has Double Strike and her clause is all about having other creatures on the battlefield to attack with. Being Indestructible is always an up-side, but is only relevant if the card should even be played to begin with. Controlling three or more creatures in this deck isn't too hard, but not something we need to be thinking about, and once again... this isn't a Combat-oriented deck. What we ultimately get is a creature that will sit on our board that lets us pay 3W for a 1/1 White Warrior creature token with Vigilance. That's not great. Or even really necessary. It doesn't even help Knight-Captain of Eos if you play her because they're Warriors instead of Soldiers. Assuming we even wanted to make small tokens for 4 each, Heliod, God of the Sun is better and harder to remove. As long as you don't have the required Devotion, opponents can't Swords to Plowshares Heldio, while Oketra just sadly waves before being sent off.
Regal Caracl
Well, this isn't a Cat tribal deck. It makes fodder when it enters the battlefield, but it's static ability only affects cats so even for a token or budget build, Angel of Invention is a way, way better option.
Archfiend of Ifnir
This is the kind of effect we really want. It gets around hexproof and shroud, it can whittle away opponent's creatures and has a body big enough to not be hit by most mini-Mutilate effects or Anger of the Gods type effects. The problem is, we actually don't really care much about hand disruption. Currently in the primary build I run Geier Reach Sanitarium as my only discard outlet to discard cards that I need to be in my graveyard. However if one were to run a more disruption-oriented build, a few switches such as bringing in Necrogen Mists, Cunning Lethemancer, Oppression, Bottomless Pit and others could make it worthwhile to run. He also combos every nicely with the Uncommon Nest of Scarabs. He's a pretty good card that I wouldn't warp my deck construction around, but if you run symmetrical hand disruption effects or more discard outlets for reanimating your creatures, he could definitely be worth it.
Bontu the Glorified
Here is a guy I'm very on the fence about. Bontu only costs 2B, so is really easy to cast. He has a big butt which means -X/-X takes some effort to get rid of him. He has Menace, so if you do want to swing in, he's harder to block. His ability to attack or Block depending on a creature dying is easy enough for us to manage. The biggest consideration is that he is an Indestructible sac outlet. I'm normally not a fan of sac outlets that require a mana cost. He's basically a much bigger Viscera Seer that requires 1B to activate and so as a bonus you get to bleed not just one opponent, but each opponent. He can still be exiled, but will likely survive any other form of removal without consideration for Cyclonic Rifts. For 3 mana we get a 4/6 Indestructible blocker with a built-in sac outlet. The 1B it costs to activate his sac outlet is the only downside. Most of the combos in the deck rely on the sac outlet being free to go infinite, or you risk running out of mana before you can finish the job. I feel Bontu will require testing. I'm looking at replacing Panharmonicon because over time it has proven to be cute but not often as effective as I'd like and it's a removal magnet. The other option is Spawning Pit. With the numerous sac outlets in the deck, cutting Spawning pit should theoretically not hurt us that badly. I very rarely use it for it's second ability to produce 2/2 Spawns, but only as a free sac outlet. The bonus of the rest of Bontu I feel has potential to be more advantageous even with the added cost. With all that said, I'll be testing one or the other for testing.
Cruel Reality
5 life is not as significant in EDH/Commander as it could be in 20-life formats. It's still a chunk of life, but for 5BB the effect is most likely not worth it. Getting rid of Planeswalkers and Creatures so opponents immediately face the trigger of losing 5 life is easy. But it's also only attached to one opponent. Eventually the Edict-effect trigger gets around someone's Hexproof and Shroud creatures, but at that point we could just cast Merciless Eviction, anyway. Not worthy!
Disposess
Purely a 60-card constructed, non-singleton format staple. A worse Cranial Extraction, if we cared about finding multiple copies of cards. If it let you search each opponent for the named card, you could troll people and exile their Sol Rings or something. But even then, it'd just be a troll card in this format. For the same mana you could use Praetors' Grasp and exile anything and probably cast it later for your own use. Not worthy.
Dread Wanderer
Of all of the variations on this creature archetype, this is one of the most narrow. We don't want to be in a position where we have next to no cards in our hand. Pass.
Liliana, Death's Majesty
For the sake of what we want to do, there is probably still no better Liliana than the original Liliana Vess. This may be the second or 3rd best, because for 3BB you can reanimate something the turn she comes into play with her -3. The thing is, her +1 creates a 2/2 Black Zombie creature token which is nice sac or block fodder... but then mills us for 2. Some of our most important cards are not creature spells that are easy to reanimate or get back from our graveyard. I'm not a fan of self-mill out of Sidisi, Brood Tyrant decks because it's too easy to self-mill the wrong thing at the wrong time and not have a way of getting back what you lost. If you aren't setup to retrieve something, it may get exiled with graveyard hate before you set up a way to retrieve whatever it was from your graveyard. Going to give her a pass.
Liliana's Mastery
We don't play enough Zombies for this to be useful, and we don't really need the tokens. Not worthy.
Plague Belcher
See above. Not worthy.
Shadow of the Grave
Unless we were forced by a Wheel effect to discard our hand and we happened to draw into this with our new hand, this would be really limited. Or if we were playing a hand disruption variant with a lot of symmetrical discard effects, such as Dark Deal. It's not really for the prime build, and still questionable in a disruption build.
Dusk//Dawn
In the main build we have much better removal available to us. This could, however, be useful in a tokens build.
Never//Return
A Sorcery speed Heroes' Downfall is not impressive. The back end of the card is even less impressive, as graveyard hate tends to be something you also want at Instant speed. Don't really care about the 2/2 bonus Zombie. Not worthy.
Oracle's Vault
We don't want our spells in Exile. We want them in our graveyard where we can grab them back again and again to keep playing. Not worthy.
Pyramid of the Pantheon
Compared to the ramp and color fixing we have available, this mana rock is far too slow. Wasting a total of 7 eventually turns it into a Gilded Lotus, which we already don't run or even need. Not worthy.
Throne of the God-Pharaoh
Being that we never have too many creatures on the battlefield at a time, and mostly untapped because we don't attack often, this won't see much use. It has potential use in a Tokens build, but that's about it.
Cascading Cataracts
Indestructible lands are great. But we will almost never need to filter five mana into WUBRG for any reason. Not worthy.
(Also known as Xenphire)
Is their any reason you are not running Animate Dead/Reanimate? I realize it might be because it's a single-use reanimating effect, but I feel like a quick reanimation in the early game could skyrocket you ahead.
I took out Utter End and Spawning Pit for Austere Command and Phyrexian Altar. The Spawning Pit was nice, but most of the time I was just using it as a free sac outlet, which I feel Phyrexian Altar is just a little better in that sense. Utter End I feel was not necessary, as their is just so much targeted removal in this deck already. Austere Command with its modules has come in really handy.
Also, my meta does see much counterspells being played, so I opted to cut Cavern of Souls and Boseiju, who Shelters All. I put in Command Beacon and Cabal Coffers, but I could put something else there if necessary. Any recommendations?
Thanks for stopping by!
On Animate Dead/Reanimate: There's a lot of cards in the deck that reanimate currently and in various ways. Karmic Guide, Nighteyes the Desecrator, Puppeteer Clique, Reveillark, Sheoldred, Whispering One, Sun Titan, Necromancy, Corpse Dance and Beacon of Unrest. The deck isn't a true Reanimator archetype despite the fact that it employs a lot of those effects and it uses reanimation as a convenient way to get toolbox creatures. Because it's not an aggro strategy and the goal isn't to reanimate fatties out as soon as possible, it gets to a point where more reanimation spells tends to be overkill. Reanimating via triggered effects is a key to a lot of the winning combos in the deck. At this point there's truly not anything I feel like I could take out that would be adding to the deck rather than taking away from it were I to add more reanimation The deck - at least the version of it I've posted here that I employ - doesn't want to draw a ton of political hate by pumping out a huge fatty in the early game just to end up with it being hit with a removal spell and then having everyone's attention for the rest of the game.
On Utter End and Spawning Pit: When Anguished Unmaking was spoiled I was tempted to take out Utter End. I was already running Vindicate at the time, as well, so I did have a lot of spot removal. However because the deck plays the long game and sometimes I play more serious and competitive players than other times, it's not uncommon for a threat to come out that I can't handle with regular destruction effects. Often I find myself having to use either Utter End or Anguished Unmaking in the early game to disable combos and other threats that I don't have time to wait for 6 mana to cast. There have been a lot of games I've played where having the ability to Exile any non-land permanent has been a serious boon to my survival and continuing the game. Swords to Plowshares can only hit creatures, but if an opponent manages to make non-creature permanents Indestructible then there's only so much you can do about that because Vindicate merely destroys. Through a lot of years of playing the deck I've come to favor cheap spot Exile spells and Exile effects over everything else. There's just been too many times that things I destroy that go to the graveyard come back to haunt me later. There's also that when I used to play Austere Command, there were plenty of times where I only wanted one mode, but had to choose two. Austere Command demands that the situation be right to get the most out of it. There's a high chance of the second mode causing splash damage and ending up choosing to destroy some stuff you don't want to at an inopportune time to destroy the stuff you do want dead. That ultimately lead me to cutting it. I've been considering re-adding it, but if I do I probably won't be removing any existing removal and just taking out a utility card like Panharmonicon, which I've grown less and less impressed with.
Where Spawning Pit is concerned, I think Phyrexian Altar is a legitimate substitution. I mostly play it because it's a very low cost free sac outlet. It's very hard to recall any time the Spawn tokens from it have been very useful. More than anything, it's a very low key sac outlet that no one really looks at, though, which is something it has going for it. People see any artifact that lets you generate mana for sacrificing a creature and they start gunning for it, which is why I never play Ashnod's Altar unless I'm ready to combo off with it or have a way in my hand to get it back.
On replacements for Cavern of Souls and Boseiju, Who Shelters All: I actually don't run Cabal Coffers myself because I run so many utility lands that Cabal Coffers takes a really long time to actually serve any purpose before Urborg, Tomb of Yawgmoth. It's a dead land without Urborg in this deck, so I really don't want to draw it most of the time. Ayli is cheap enough to cast that I've never particularly considered running Command Beacon, myself, although it's not the worst option out there and has synergy with Sun Titan. Some possible options are Arcane Lighthouse for removing Hexproof and Shroud from troublesome permanents you really want to get rid of. The ability can also be a great political bargaining chip. Another great general utility Land is Thespian's Stage, because you can copy other people's useful lands. At worst you can turn it into a second copy of your own Maze of Ith, Geier Reach Sanitarium, or High Market for another sac outlet. Sometimes you might be able to target someone else's Dark Depths and get a 20/20 Marit Lage that you could swing with... or sacrifice to Ayli after activating Vizkopa Guildmage's second ability a couple times to hit the board for 40 life. All in all Thespian's Stage is a great second version of Vesuva that can become what you need when you need it. Buried Ruin is an option for getting important combo pieces back since our ability to get Artifacts back is somewhat limited. There's also the ramp from Ancient Tomb, which I may find a place for in the deck some day. I have yet to put it in because I'm usually able to respond to early aggression pretty well.
(Also known as Xenphire)
It makes any combo of five mana. So BBBBB is possible too.
Maybe you still don't want it but it's better than you think.
My meta: 3 or 4 player free for all, anything goes but boring games or broken decks cause a vote to end that game.
Ah! I did misread it. I thought it was an Indestructible Crystal Quarry, so my mistake!
I do still feel skeptical that it's something I would include, at least in my build. I may try to test it out given how many utility lands produce colorless mana. I really can't think of any stand out examples of where it'd be too useful because getting colored mana hasn't ever been too difficult in the deck. Nothing in particular in the deck requires a lot of colored mana to be pumped into it. Black mana is the only color in the deck that benefits having a lot more produced and Urborg, Tomb of Yawgmoth already handles that easy enough by turning utility lands into Swamps. If I happen to come into possession of one I may have a look, though!
(Also known as Xenphire)
The main post got a bit out of hand since this last winter, and tonight I was able to dedicate some time to fixing a few glaring issues.
1.) The Spoiler tags are finally fixed! Even though how I display all this info will change soon(tm), the main post and all the broken spoiler tags made it look very sloppy. I was able to find the offending missing spoiler tags that caused the problem and fixed it
2.) The main list has been updated to reflect what I am currently running. It got out of hand and I realized I was even missing a card in the 99 all together. As part of this I updated the Change Log, which was very much out of date.
3.) Review of Commons/Uncommons from Amonkhet will be coming in the next day.
4.) Slight flavor update to the thread name. The thread title now references a saying from Game of Thrones, and a quote from H.P. Lovecraft's "The Nameless City" now hovers between the banner and Introduction header in the main post.
Deck Changes
First, I have not yet made any changes for inclusions from Amonkhet, yet. Nothing popped out at me as must haves from the set that fit what Ayli wants to be doing. There were a few that raised an eyebrow but nothing that made me immediately search for them at the prerelease for immediate testing. I do, however, have an update on some cards I've been testing and some discussion that I neglected or that I forgot to respond to here in the thread.
Before I get into the details of the changes, here's what I'm doing:
-Panharmonicon
-Verdant Catacombs
-Profane Command
-Fleshbag Marauder
+Scroll Rack
+Marsh Flats
+Knight-Captain of Eos
+Merciless Executioner
Change Backlog
Exquisite Archangel -> Kaya, Ghost Assassin - Gray24 had been asking how testing with the Exquisite Archangel was going. I seem to have completely neglected to mention that I cut Exquisite Archangel shortly after testing it to put Kaya in the deck. Exquisite Archangel has been a flex slot which I've used to test Demon of Dark Schemes and Magus of the Will this past year. A Exquisite Archangel never proved to be more than a dead card in most cases, and in the couple times where an infinite combo was going off, resetting my life total did not stop me from losing the game. Upon obtaining Kaya finally, Exquisite Archangel was cut and Kaya has been a mainstay of the deck ever since.
Today's Changes
Panharmonicon -> Scroll Rack - When Panharmonicon was first spoiled, I remember commenting that I thought it would be a "win more" card. Because of how many ETB effects are in the deck, I wanted to give it a shot. During the first bit that I played it, I got some cute interactions out of it... when it wasn't hit with removal. Removal is a fact of life. But ultimately what I wasn't happy about was that it didn't really add anything to the deck. I never had a scenario arise where tutoring for Panharmonicon would have saved me or won me the game. Because of how tight the tuning is in the deck, anything the deck could do with Panharmonicon, it could very much do without it. At the same time, up until recently I had never really had the pleasure to play with Scroll Rack until I got one for my Sidisi, Brood Tyrant EDH deck. The goals are similar yet different, but I quickly saw the advantage of being able to draw a new hand or throw dead cards back on top of the library and replace them. This obviously gets better with Vampiric Tutor, Imperial Seal and Enlightened Tutor. Not only does it let you easily get the card you put on top of your library, but you can respond to Wheel effects that would have you discard your hand if you really want to keep whats currently in your hand, draw your new cards then just draw your original hand you wanted to keep. Ultimately, whereas Panharmonicon was a Win More card, I've found that Scroll Rack adds another level of consistency to the deck. The only down side is it also adds play time. If you choose to play Scroll Rack as well, then much like Sensei's Divining Top, I suggest you try to be swift with your choices. Both cards can be notorious for adding time to turns in an already long-winded format.
Verdant Catacombs -> Marsh Flats - This change is something that only makes sense. Verdant Catacombs was a leftover from when I was first found the Ghost Council of Orzhova list years ago and copied it, whole cloth. I don't know if it was included for the sake of flavor, because Marsh Flats made more sense to me being the B/W Fetchland. Deck thinning is non-existent in EDH/Commander and color fixing is truly never an issue in the deck, so the need for multiple is unnecessary. Marsh Flats is also ultimately cheaper for anyone building the deck, and probably makes more sense anyway. Coincidentally I had to sell my Verdant Catacombs a while back when the dental bills happened and pulled a Marsh Flats from a Modern Masters 2017 pack, so it works out that this is what I'm playing now, anyway, and brought my attention to it.
Profane Command -> Knight-Captain of Eos - When updating the thread, I realized I was missing a card entirely from the 99. I had gone to remove Profane Command at one point but never recorded what I replaced it with. That card was Knight-Captain of Eos. After a long hiatus, I welcome the Knight-Captain back and have gotten a lot of use out of it since returning it to the fold. Profane Command is a redundant finisher with modes that are also rather ineffective given where the deck stands right now. Exanguinate can hit all players and ignores Hexproof effects by not targeting; there are much better reanimation effects in our toolbox; Ditto with the -X/-X removal aspect; and Fear is largely irrelevant. Knight-Captain on the other hand is retrievable with Recruiter of the Guard, creates worth of sac fodder (Ashnod's Altar) when it enters the battlefield, can prevent Aggro decks from killing players when you don't want to use a sweeper spell, can sacrifice the Recruiter of the Guard you used to fetch it to it's ability (opening up repeatable tutoring via other effects) and adds another infinite mana loop with Nim Deathmantle + Ashnod's Altar. One could even gain infinite life or 1/1 Soldiers creature tokens this way by sacrificing both Soldiers and Knight-Captain to Ashnod's for total then recurring Knight-Captain for leaving left; then, paying to sacrifice one of the solders to Ayli to gain 1 life and leave left; then, sacrificing Knight-Captain and the remaining soldier for for a total of again; paying Nim Deathmantle's cost of to bring back Knight-Captain to make two more Soldiers, leaving but then sacrificing both Soldiers and Knight-Captain once again with to get a total of . Every other loop you effectively gain one mana and 1 soldier for infinite soldiers, or infinite life.
Fleshbag Marauder -> Merciless Executioner - This change is purely for flavor reasons, as both are functionally the same card. It made more sense to me that the Orzhov or a cult would have a psychopathic executioner in their employ, rather than a grotesque fleshy zombie. The hooded executioner is always there waiting for the next sentence.
(Also known as Xenphire)