MTG Salvation

Since C16 came out, I have been obsessed with the two blue-green partner commanders, Thrasios, Triton Hero and Kydele, Chosen of Kruphix. There's an obvious synergy: one produces colorless mana based on card draw and the other draws cards with colorless mana. I've been working on refining this deck for a while now, starting off as a fairly simple U/G goodstuff deck. Then, just a few months later, Aether Revolt came out with Walking Ballista, letting me convert infinite colorless mana into infinite damage. The deck started to lean more and more on combo, until I did a fairly substantial rebuild a couple months ago to focus in on going infinite as quickly as possible.

I've just about reached the limit of my prowess as far as this sort of thing goes, which is frustrating because I feel like the deck has more potential than I'm capable of giving it. That's why I'm asking for help to refine the list.

I don't really care about budget. Timetwister is the only thing that I've blanched completely on the price so far. There's a few other "obvious includes" (all the Ux fetch lands, for instance) that I haven't invested in yet, but plan to. I'm also not terribly interested in making this deck "fun" or "fair" - I have plenty of other decks for that, including a good-stuffy build I just threw together with Tishana, Voice of Thunder for U/G shenanigans.

The thing I wonder most about is the ramp package. Currently, it's focused on trying to enable the T3 Kydele drop (and hopeful T4 combo). I'd love ideas for how to improve it. I know that, even by my current strategy, I should have a Three Visits, but I hesitate to spend that much money until I'm sure the ramp package is on the right track. And half of me keeps expecting it to get reprinted in the next commander set...

I'm also trying to find the right balance between draw spells, counterspells, and ramp. It somehow always seems like I'm short of what I need in every game.

As for the combo itself, or "how jank like Conch Horn gets to play as if it were a real Magic card." Kydele hits the board, hopefully T3 or T4. The earlier she hits, the more essential it is for her to survive a turn and not rely on haste enablers. Then, once she can tap, I blow a few cheap draw spells and drop an artifact that lets her untap for just colorless mana. Umbral Mantle and Sword of the Paruns go infinite with 4 mana (so 3 extra cards drawn beyond the first for turn). Staff of Domination needs her to produce 5 mana (4 extra cards). Once I have infinite mana, Thrasios (or the Staff) can draw the deck until he hits Walking Ballista, which then nukes everyone else. It can be blazing fast and has the advantage that two of the three moving parts live in the command zone. But it hasn't really achieved the consistency or resilience that I want yet.

The most non-intuitive part of building this so far has been just how little the deck cares about card advantage - it only cares, really, about card draw. I think I've hit about the best of <3cc draw spells but there might be a hidden gem or two out there that I haven't seen (I was so happy when I discovered Credit Voucher, for instance).

And speaking of the combo, Sword of the Paruns is one of the clunkiest, most useless cards in the current list. I'd love to replace it, but it feels dangerous with the relatively few tutors I've been able to find in these colors for Staff of Domination and Umbral Mantle, which are the cards I really want. Any suggestions would be welcome!

So, here's the list.



I look forward to any feedback or ideas!

First round of changes (10/22/17):

Careful Conch seems worse than something like the new Chart a Course. Arcane Denial seems perfect for this deck, especially if you can use it on the turn before yours. Shadow Rift seems pretty bad, because you can't really use it t1. I would probably play Birds of Paradise over it, or the far superior Cerulean Wisps.

I think the 1 cmc mana dorks would be far superior to the 2cmc ramp spells, because t1 dork lets you play a support spell t2 (sylvan library, lightning greaves, thrasios, fabricate), into t3 Kydele, into t4 draw spell into win.

If you use the 2cmc ramp spells, it would more like go: t1 land, t2 ramp spell, t3 Kydele, t4 support spell (hope kydele lives again), t5 win.

A few awesome cards that might be really awesome here, just in case games go longer: Mind Over Matter, Dream Halls, Mox Diamond, Chrome Mox, Bazaar of Baghdad (+ Crop Rotation)

• Chart a Course: Yeah, that does seem like a pretty strict upgrade to Conch Horn. Good call, easy slot in.
• I never knew that Cerulean Wisps existed. I'll find a copy and toss that in over Shadow Rift, seems much better. Thanks!
• I worry with Arcane Denial about when I would be using it. Hopefully on the turns before I go off, I'm tapping out for ramp or Kydele; on the turn I go off, I want any counters to be either free or as cheap as possible, and the slowtrip wouldn't help.
• On changing the ramp package: I like what you're doing here, and it makes a lot of sense. That might be part of the reason why the ramp package has just never seemed to quite work out the way I wanted it to. I seem to recall that I had worried about the fragility of the T1 mana dorks, but this isn't a deck that's really playing for the long game. I'll rework the ramp package with dorks instead of 2cc spells and see how that shakes out.
• My biggest concern with cards like Mind over Matter and Dream Halls is that they're pretty useless unless the main plan has already failed. I worry that including them will dilute the density of draw spells that I need to chain into a victory.
• For the Moxen (chrome and diamond), those are probably great ideas to help with early game mana ramp. I can't believe I didn't think of them. I'll start shopping around for copies. (although I may have to save up for the diamond...)
• Bazaar of Baghdad, like Timetwister, is at a price point where it makes me hesitate right now. I bought the Tropical Island for my last birthday present to myself; I might consider one of those two for my next one. And with a Bazaar, I agree that Crop Rotation makes a lot of sense.

Thanks for all the suggestions! I'm going to run some tests, especially with a T1 ramp, and see if it works out better than the current shell. I think you're probably right in that regard, and I appreciate the second set of eyes to help me see it.

I've also been thinking about Mystical Tutor, to either fetch Long-Term Plans or Brainstorm, depending on if I'm missing one of my artifacts or a cheap mass draw spell. Any thoughts on that? It might slot into the Shadow Rift slot.

The thing about Arcane Denial, it really only matters if your opponent draws Force of Will or a blue card in those two draws. Statistically, you should be on the up and up for that.
Mystical Tutor makes Temporal Mastery a much better, as well as Cyclonic Rift. Maybe those would be interesting adds. If anything else, it makes Cerulean Wisps worth running. It doubles up on the cantrips that you are running.
Mind Over Matter and Dream Halls might be win-more, so they might be not worth running.
I would try to find room for Trickbind or Scavenging Ooze to help combat graveyard decks.

Oops, typo on my part. I'm already running Mystical Tutor; I meant to ask about Merchant Scroll. Sorry, got my blue tutors mixed up! Temporal Mastery is a very interesting suggestion, though - I'm going to have to think about it.

With Arcane Denial, I should specify that I'm not worried about the opponent double slow-tripping. I'm mostly worried that the turn I most want to be able to counter something - that is, the turn I'm comboing off - I wouldn't be able to benefit from my draw, which is the only real upside of the card. All the other counters I'm running are (effectively) zero or one mana, and I've found in goldfishing that even a single mana can make a huge difference in the combo turn. Meanwhile, I'll (hopefully) be tapping out every turn before the combo turn to either ramp or cast Kydele.

I'm fairly lucky that there aren't a lot of graveyard-focused decks in my meta, but they might become more of a threat to specifically the level of play that this deck aspires to. I wonder if one of them would be a better idea for the redundancy slot currently occupied by Eternal Witness (which I was thinking about cutting anyway)? I think the best graveyard hate might be Repopulate, strangely, since it can pop out at instant speed and at least cycles if it's not needed.

Thanks again for all your ideas!

It might be a bit high cmc, but Memory Jar seems to fit the bill.
As of ramp, what about High Tide? You could also be running Lotus Petal and maybe even Jeweled Amulet. Theres also Helm of Awakening.

Good suggestions! I was running Memory Jar in an early draft of this list, but it was always a little too clunky and mana intensive. While it could be dropped before the combo turn, it was rare that I had a chance to play a 5cc artifact before the 4cc Kydele. For the same reason, I am currently looking at cutting Recurring Insight and Time Reversal.

High Tide is an interesting suggestion, and one that I had not contemplated before. It's not quite like the other ramp options, since it's more useful on the combo turn than the setup turns. And every Timmy instinct I have screams for a High Tide into a Time Spiral. However, I'm not sure if with the retooling of the ramp package to focus on 1cc dorks that High Tide will have enough Islands around to really be effective.

Lotus Petal and Jeweled Amulet are both great suggestions. With the emphasis on speed for this combo, I think they'd need to go in. I like Helm of Awakening a lot too.

Speaking of the retool, I'm hoping to have it done by this afternoon and I'll update the OP shortly after that.

EDIT: I've also been thinking of adding a Sensei's Diving Top. Any thoughts?

I was thinking about this style deck some more, and I think that you might need a way to turn colorless mana into colored mana on your combo turn. Simic Signet might be the best card to do that.

One quick aside: Thought Reflection and Alhammarret's Archive have an interesting interaction with Sylvan Library and Brainstorm.

Is there a way to do tables to explain it?

Okay:

Sylvan Library + Thought Reflection = "draw 6, put 2 back" (You can keep one for 4 life or both for 8 life.)
Sylvan Library + Alhammarret's Archive = "draw 5, put 2 back"
Sylvan Library + both = "draw 10, put 2 back"

Brainstorm is similar, but either will draw you 6 and put 2 back, while both draw you 12 and put 2 back.

So, I finally got around the the initial retooling of the ramp package (the changes are in the OP). Like Akroma wisely suggested, the 1cc ramp dorks seem a lot better than the 2cc land acceleration package I was running. I think I may have gone a bit too heavy in that direction and might cut one or two dorks out. If anything, I seem to be lacking a bit of card draw at this point.

Are there any more 2cc "draw 2+" cards left that anyone knows of? I don't really care if they cause overall card disadvantage.

One thing I had been thinking about was Jace's Archivist. It's a Windfall on a stick, so that's pretty good. I had cut it initially because there wasn't a place to cast it before Kydele, but if the plan is now T1 ramp, T2 setup, T3 Kydele, then it seems to fit in pretty well. I'm thinking about possibly in place of Thousand-Year Elixir, which is nice in longer games (boo) but doesn't help win quickly, as I'm not really able to combo off early with a T2 TYE and a T3 Kydele. The 1UU cost is a bit heavy. I need to look into upgrading the land base with the Ux fetches and other UG duals as soon as possible.

Speaking of colors of mana, it would be nice to be able to wash colorless into blue mana on the combo turn. I'm just not sure how "worth a deck slot" it is. Right now, the only 2cc ramp spells are Helm of Awakening and Sapphire Medallion, which are their own sort of awesome in a class above the signet. Maygbe if there was, like, a Skyshroud Elf variant for green/blue? Or a Manamorphose. If wishes were fishes, I guess.

Thought Reflection and Alhammarret's Archive are super cool with things like Brainstorm indeed! I'm afraid their converted mana cost is just way, way too high for the combo build I'm looking at. I do run them in the more casual U/G Tishana, Voice of Thunder green-blue goodstuff deck I have.

I know I'm resurrecting an old thread here, but this is very interesting, I like this one! What is your win condition if Walking Ballista is countered or worse, counter-exiled? Maybe include a Buried Ruin just in case? And maybe something like Gaea's Blessing or a Feldon's Cane type of spell? Theoretically Repopulate would work too, I suppose. Or do you have a backup win plan aside from Walking Ballista? I guess there's always Laboratory Maniac!