I'm trying to make the most combolicious multiplayer PDH deck around Izzet Guildmage, and use as many combos as possible to have multiple avenues to finish the game, all while playing like a controlling deck with card draw, removal and permission. At the moment, all the combos I have are based either around High Tide or Desperate Ritual, and I have some tutors for either. The decklist:
Sorcery Path: This is the simplest path: you splice Desperate Ritual onto either Lava Spike for infinite damage to all players, onto Eye of Nowhere to bounce all permanents, or onto Ideas Unbound to draw your entire deck. Because of the nature of Splice, the Ritual's text is added to the arcane of your choice, and when you copy it, the copies will also have the spliced effect, thus generating RRR that you can use to power out another copy. Here are the steps:
1) Play an arcane spell, for example, Lava Spike on an empty stack, and splice Desperate Ritual onto it (1RR needed)
3) Let the copy resolve. It will deal 3 damage to a player of your choice and add RRR to your mana pool. Now, while the original Lava Spike is still on the stack, don't allow it to resolve: instead spend those RRR to copy it again and create an infinite loop that will take down all players regardless of life total (you can even win against a player that has somehow managed to gain infinite life)
Remember that if you used Ideas Unbound or Eye of Nowhere you just have to start with 1RUU + 2R instead of 1RR + 2R.
If you go for Ideas Unbound, you're going to draw your entire deck in order to play another of the combos, and that you want either Feldon's Cane or Conjurer's Bauble into Feldon's Cane to make sure you don't die on the spot if you screw up the combo turn.
Instant Path: This is a little bit more complicated and can have a lot of finish, be it decking the opponents, fireballing them, establishing a Capsize hard lock, pinging them to death, or simply replicating a Lightning Bolt ad nauseam. Here's how:
1.5) Optional step: you can replicate High Tide if you have enough mana to make the process faster, but you're going to achieve infinite anyways so it's kind of overkill
2) Play Snap. With Snap on the stack, replicate it (U + 1U + 2U = 3UUU needed)
3) Let the copy resolve. Untap two islands, then tap them to generate UUUU. Use three of them to replicate Snap again. This generates U per loop.
4) Once you've achieved infinite Blue mana, start using it to power the Snap copies, and use them to untap Mountains instead of islands. This way, you'll also achieve infinite Red mana.
Now the possibilities to end the game are a few:
- Pump all the mana into Fireball or Rolling Thunder to kill all the players.
- Replicate an instant draw spell to draw into the Lava Spike + Desperate Ritual combo.
- Play Dream Twist and replicate it ad nauseam, decking everyone out of the game.
- Do a Capsize hard lock by bouncing all the table and then bouncing and recasting two times either Scrivener, Monastery Loremaster, Izzet Chronarch or Archaeomancer to get back both High Tide and Snap in order to maintain the loop turn after turn.
- Infinitely replicate a Lightning Bolt effect to burn everyone out.
- Use and replicate an instant draw spell as many times as needed to draw into Viridian Longbow and Freed from the Real and ping everyone to death.
The deck has been working wonders, but I might be missing some combos. If so, please, post them here! Now moving on the things I'd like to add:
Interesting! Have you seen the Peregrine Drake combo list? It can combo out without High Tide, but I can't say by inspection which of the decks that will assemble combo the most easily. Even if Drake is more consistent though, that doesn't mean Izzet isn't feasible - the addition of red might even make surviving the early game more easy.
Can you do tricksy stuff with Rewind making the copies target themselves somehow and getting a net gain of mana?
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Rewind would be awesome and it would have been an instant include, but Izzet Guildmage can only copy 2 CMC or less, that's why there's no hardcore sweepers like Pyrotechnics or Swirling Sandstorm. I've found that I might need Sandstorm though as replicating wraths to deal with X/4's has proven to be a little bit difficult.
I've found in my testings that the deck is mana hungry, so I'd want to include a bit more of mana rocks (preferably in the 2 CMC range) and 1-2 lands. Freed from the Real can go, as it's useless if I don't have the combo and is one of the weakest pieces. I'd also need a little bit more of protection since once people know what's going around, they kill my commander each time it's cast, so I'll need Alexi's Cloak, Neurok Stealthsuit and some good 2 CMC counterspell.
Finally, I believe I'll need to have some blockers, so cards like Emrakul's Hatcher are mandatory. I'll be taking out the weakest redundant combo pieces (the ones that don't do anything on their own) like Dream Twist since there aren't effects to prevent an infinite amount of burn to the head in PDH anyways.
I updated the list taking out the weaker combo pieces in favor of some more much needed blockers, ramp and protection. The list is sitting at 106 cards counting the Commander, which means 6 of them have to go. Here's the updated list:
Valakut Invoker, while odd, serves as an additional blocker that can take care of 2/X's as long as it's needed, and it's also a pretty good mana sink if I feel the need to dump my mana without wasting cards in hand, or if I simply don't have Guildmage out or burn spells at the moment.
As I said, I need to take out 6 cards out of the list, but I don't know which ones should I take out. I also want to add Rewind because although it can't be copied, it's a hard counterspell that untaps my lands mid combo or at worst still gives me my mana back, and I've exhausted all my good <= 2 CMC options. I'd also want one more <= 2 CMC Instant burn spells that isn't a bad card like Shock or Lightning Strike. I've got my eyes on Spawning Breath since on top of doing damage it creates additional blockers per copy that can be sacrificed to power out more copies, but the 1 damage might be too low.
Draw: Wild Guess and Tormenting Voice seems like clear cuts to me. Possibly Think Twice too.
Holding the Gates: Flood and Wall of Kelp look strong, the rest not so much so cuts can probably be made here. Have you considered a tutorable wizard with tap down potential here? There is also Tumble Magnet and off course Serrated Arrows (which should be lots better than Stinging Barrier for the mana cost).
Sweepers: No Swirling Sandstorm??
Protection: I'd definitely cut Diplomatic Immunity. Possibly Whispersilk Cloak too - it's a bit clumsy in this deck with so little fat and no voltron commander.
Recursion: Lots of fairly subpar card here. Loremaster is the worst one (doesn't work with Ghostly Flicker combo and 8 mana to get a card back is really bad). Feldon's Cane and Conjurer's Bauble look like cards that are there to make Trinket Mage better, but they are not very necessary themselves so I'd cut the lot of them. Anarchist and Scrivener are possible cuts, but not nearly as bad as the others. I think Vedalken Aethermage is more important than either of them though.
I'd also want one more <= 2 CMC Instant burn spells that isn't a bad card like Shock or Lightning Strike. I've got my eyes on Spawning Breath since on top of doing damage it creates additional blockers per copy that can be sacrificed to power out more copies, but the 1 damage might be too low
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Wild Guess and Tormenting Voice are both super efficient when copied with the Guildmage, drawing you 4 cards and discarding one for 5 mana, but if one has to go it's Wild Guess since it's harder to cast.
Think Twice is an instant card draw spell that can be replicated to draw the entire deck if I get the High Tide engine going, so it's like the analog of Ideas Unbound for drawing my deck through the instant route. And it has Flashback so I can re-cast it after the first round!
I agree Monastery Loremaster should be cut, but all other pieces are there for redundancy should something happen to the pieces or should I fizzle mid-combo, on top of also fulfilling the role of blockers, which I desperately need. Rukh Egg, Beetleback Chief and Coral Barrier also seem good at this. Eldrazi Skyspawner and Ghirapur Gearcrafter power up my flying defenses alongside walls equipped with Spidersilk Net. Stonybrook Angler is the only tap-down Wizard I could find and he asks for 2 mana to tap something down, but I'll see if I can find a place for him.
Conjurer's Bauble can also go out, although I'm skeptical to let it go since it can recover a lost combo piece or one that I've been forced to use outside of the combo. Feldon's Cane, however, is my failsafe for when I draw my entire deck with Ideas Unbound or some other draw spell and need to discard EOT because I didn't manage to combo out.
Whispersilk Cloak can go away for the time being, and if I'm missing some more protection (since the Commander usually attracts all the hate on the table) I'll reconsider it. I'm also cutting Darksteel Ingot and I'll revisit it if I feel the need of more ramp, although I'd probably use Izzet Cluestone first now that I remembered about it since I can cash it in for cards later in the game.
I don't use Ghostly Flicker because it can't be cloned with Guildmage and I don't have too many ETB creatures, although if I add some of the ETB token producing guys I might revisit the idea.
Now the deck sits at 101 cards, with three more needing to be cut (because I want to make room for both Jilt and Swirling Sandstorm, so it makes for 103 cards).
There is also Rimewind Taskmage, but he requires a snow mana base so...
IMO, there's not a single Ux PDH deck that shouldn't be running the Ghostly Flicker engine. You're even more set-up than the average deck thanks to Izzet Chronarch and Anarchist so I'd run it regardless of what your commander can do. Consider it a protection piece if you need to make room (take out Diplomatic Immunity for it?)
I wonder if you really need all those 1 damage sweepers with Jilt and Sandstorm coming in. I'd say keep the best one as a 2 CMC tutor target. Jilt has the advantage of being burn that you can grab with Merchant Scroll, so you really increase your number of burn sources +1 there.
Not sure I have much more to contribute beyond that, I think the list is starting to look tight and you might need to play test to see what can go and what must stay for the final few slots. IMO, you can always drop non-essential draw spells like Peek for now and keep them on the bench to make it 99 cards - then when you find something that wasn't as useful as you thought, you have a solid substitute at the ready.
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The draw section is starting to get dangerously short, so it makes sense to tweak it next. I'm overall happy with this configuration, just needs some extra draw. Cards I'm looking to include:
Excellent! One more thing on the Ingot vs. Armillary Sphere debate: Traumatic Visions. The fact that this card tutors with Merchant Scroll has enabled me to hit WUBRG in Child of Alara at two occasions when I really had no business doing so otherwise. I swear by it and always miss it when I try to cut it. And late game, any counter >> any mana source so you really can't go wrong with it. If you need to save slots, you can do the radical thing and replace Ingot/Sphere AND Rewind with Traumatic Visions and see how you like it. My experience with Peasant Spring Tide tells me that the use of Rewind mid combo won't be as great as you'd hope. It's still a good card of course, especially with the Ghostly Flicker engine.
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Loved this deck, will try this after I finish my new Jenara idea. Urdjur, I'll ask you some help
Some thoughts:
- no Chain Ligtning?
- your last build has 95 cards, 33 being lands. You already have 4 slots
- Provided you already have dorks recurring instantes, Izzet Boilerworks and Ghostly Flicker, I'd add Cloud of Faeries and Grapeshot. Another instakill w/o commander help quite clunky but effective as another (unexpected?) way to kill.
- Library of Leng is uncommon in my book. YMMV. I'd LOVE to use it against discard decks in Tiny Leaders, but...
- if you choose the Trinket Mage route, don't forget to put the 2 artifact lands and Expedition Map. Exp Map fetches non-basics, which is yummy.
Actually there were 97 cards because I didn't count Great Furnace and Seat of the Synod, so I will replace them with Snow-Covered Mountain and Island respectively.
Chain Lightning being a sorcery makes it impossible to replicate to the infinite with Snap + High Tide combo, so that's why I didn't add it in. About Library of Leng, it was printed as a common on MTGO Masters Edition, so we agreed it's fair game. Grapeshot and Cloud of Faeries are kind of weak on their own though so I'd rather devote those slots to utility cards.
Traumatic Visions is a great option, but I'm going to likely cut something else than Armillary Sphere, since providing two lands to a mana-hungry deck and half-powering up Rimewind Taskmage or adding two more damage to Skred (and also more fuel to replicate it!) is greater value. However, I'm going to look at what to cut for it, possibly Alexi's Cloak, since as you said it's a pretty flexible and good card.
I'm trying to make the most combolicious multiplayer PDH deck around Izzet Guildmage, and use as many combos as possible to have multiple avenues to finish the game, all while playing like a controlling deck with card draw, removal and permission. At the moment, all the combos I have are based either around High Tide or Desperate Ritual, and I have some tutors for either. The decklist:
2 Izzet Guildmage
Tutoring (6)
1 Dizzy Spell
2 Merchan Scroll
2 Muddle the Mixture
2 Vedalken Æthermage
3 Trinket Mage
3 Drift of Phantasms
Ramp (6)
1 Wayfarer's Bauble
2 Mind Stone
2 Izzet Sign
3 Commander's Sphere
4 Ur-Golem's Eye
4 Sisay's Ring
Card draw (15)
1 Preordain
1 Sleight of Hand
1 Opt
1 Peek
2 Think Twice
2 Peer Through Depths
2 Ideas Unbound
2 Tormenting Voice
2 Wild Guess
2 Thought Courier
3 Sea Gate Oracle
3 Rhystic Study
4 Deep Analysis
4 Foresee
4 Mulldrifter
8 Treasure Cruise
1 Conjurer's Bauble
1 Feldon's Cane
4 Archaeomancer
4 Monastery Loremaster
5 Anarchist
5 Scrivener
5 Mnemonic Wall
5 Izzet Chronarch
Board control (9)
1 Flood
1 Electrickery
1 Burst Lightning
1 Lightning Bolt
1 Skred
2 Incinerate
2 Telekinesis
2 Seismic Shudder
2 Boiling Earth
2 Scouring Sands
Combo pieces (10)
1 Lava Spike
1 Dream Twist
1 Viridian Longbow
1 Fireball
2 Desperate Ritual
2 Eye of Nowhere
2 Snap
2 Rolling Thunder
3 Freed From the Real
3 Capsize
2 Arcane Denial
2 Deprive
2 Counterspell
2 Diplomatic Immunity
3 Whispersilk Cloak
4 Elgaud Shieldmate
Land (35)
1 Seat of the Synod
1 Great Furnace
1 Evolving Wilds
1 Terramorphic Expanse
1 Grixis Panorama
1 Halimar Depths
1 Izzet Boilerworks
1 Swiftwater Cliffs
1 Izzet Guildgate
1 Rupture Spire
1 Transguild Promenade
13 Snow-Covered Island
10 Snow-Covered Mountain
The combos:
Sorcery Path: This is the simplest path: you splice Desperate Ritual onto either Lava Spike for infinite damage to all players, onto Eye of Nowhere to bounce all permanents, or onto Ideas Unbound to draw your entire deck. Because of the nature of Splice, the Ritual's text is added to the arcane of your choice, and when you copy it, the copies will also have the spliced effect, thus generating RRR that you can use to power out another copy. Here are the steps:
1) Play an arcane spell, for example, Lava Spike on an empty stack, and splice Desperate Ritual onto it (1RR needed)
2) Copy the Lava Spike with the Desperate Ritual spliced to it with Izzet Guildmage (1RR from before + 2R to copy = 3RRR needed)
3) Let the copy resolve. It will deal 3 damage to a player of your choice and add RRR to your mana pool. Now, while the original Lava Spike is still on the stack, don't allow it to resolve: instead spend those RRR to copy it again and create an infinite loop that will take down all players regardless of life total (you can even win against a player that has somehow managed to gain infinite life)
Remember that if you used Ideas Unbound or Eye of Nowhere you just have to start with 1RUU + 2R instead of 1RR + 2R.
If you go for Ideas Unbound, you're going to draw your entire deck in order to play another of the combos, and that you want either Feldon's Cane or Conjurer's Bauble into Feldon's Cane to make sure you don't die on the spot if you screw up the combo turn.
If you go for Eye of Nowhere, make sure you bounce Anarchist, Monastery Loremaster, Mnemonic Wall, Archaeomancer or Izzet Chronarch at the end of the loop after you've bounced the entire table so you can retrieve Eye of Nowhere next turn and establish an inescapable hard lock.
Instant Path: This is a little bit more complicated and can have a lot of finish, be it decking the opponents, fireballing them, establishing a Capsize hard lock, pinging them to death, or simply replicating a Lightning Bolt ad nauseam. Here's how:
1) Play High Tide (U needed)
1.5) Optional step: you can replicate High Tide if you have enough mana to make the process faster, but you're going to achieve infinite anyways so it's kind of overkill
2) Play Snap. With Snap on the stack, replicate it (U + 1U + 2U = 3UUU needed)
3) Let the copy resolve. Untap two islands, then tap them to generate UUUU. Use three of them to replicate Snap again. This generates U per loop.
4) Once you've achieved infinite Blue mana, start using it to power the Snap copies, and use them to untap Mountains instead of islands. This way, you'll also achieve infinite Red mana.
Now the possibilities to end the game are a few:
- Pump all the mana into Fireball or Rolling Thunder to kill all the players.
- Replicate an instant draw spell to draw into the Lava Spike + Desperate Ritual combo.
- Play Dream Twist and replicate it ad nauseam, decking everyone out of the game.
- Do a Capsize hard lock by bouncing all the table and then bouncing and recasting two times either Scrivener, Monastery Loremaster, Izzet Chronarch or Archaeomancer to get back both High Tide and Snap in order to maintain the loop turn after turn.
- Infinitely replicate a Lightning Bolt effect to burn everyone out.
- Use and replicate an instant draw spell as many times as needed to draw into Viridian Longbow and Freed from the Real and ping everyone to death.
The deck has been working wonders, but I might be missing some combos. If so, please, post them here! Now moving on the things I'd like to add:
- Valakut Invoker and Volcanic Rambler as both creatures to hold the gates and more combo finisher with infinite mana
- Some more instant speed burn that can affect both creatures or players (if I have to choose, preferably creatures)
- A little suite of fat to hold the gates and win through smashing face if needed be: Ulamog's Crusher, Hand of Emrakul, Harbor Serpent, Emrakul's Hatcher, Glacial Crasher and Eldrazi Devastator
Any help appreciated!
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Can you do tricksy stuff with Rewind making the copies target themselves somehow and getting a net gain of mana?
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Rewind would be awesome and it would have been an instant include, but Izzet Guildmage can only copy 2 CMC or less, that's why there's no hardcore sweepers like Pyrotechnics or Swirling Sandstorm. I've found that I might need Sandstorm though as replicating wraths to deal with X/4's has proven to be a little bit difficult.
I've found in my testings that the deck is mana hungry, so I'd want to include a bit more of mana rocks (preferably in the 2 CMC range) and 1-2 lands. Freed from the Real can go, as it's useless if I don't have the combo and is one of the weakest pieces. I'd also need a little bit more of protection since once people know what's going around, they kill my commander each time it's cast, so I'll need Alexi's Cloak, Neurok Stealthsuit and some good 2 CMC counterspell.
Finally, I believe I'll need to have some blockers, so cards like Emrakul's Hatcher are mandatory. I'll be taking out the weakest redundant combo pieces (the ones that don't do anything on their own) like Dream Twist since there aren't effects to prevent an infinite amount of burn to the head in PDH anyways.
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2 Izzet Guildmage
Tutoring (6)
1 Dizzy Spell
2 Merchant Scroll
2 Vedalken Æthermage
2 Muddle the Mixture
3 Drift of Phantasms
3 Trinket Mage
Ramp (8)
1 Wayfarer's Bauble
2 Prismatic Lens
2 Mind Stone
2 Izzet Signet
3 Darksteel Ingot
3 Commander's Sphere
4 Ur-Golem's Eye
4 Sisay's Ring
Card draw (12)
1 Preordain
1 Opt
1 Peek
2 Tormenting Voice
2 Wild Guess
2 Ideas Unbound
2 Impulse
2 Think Twice
3 Sea Gate Oracle
4 Foresee
5 Mulldrifter
8 Treasure Cruise
Combo pieces (8)
1 Lava Spike
1 High Tide
2 Desperate Ritual
2 Snap
2 Eye of Nowhere
2 Rolling Thunder
3 Capsize
3 Valakut Invoker
1 Flood
2 Ætherflame Wall
2 Minamo Scrollkeeper
2 Wall of Kelp
3 Flowstone Wall
4 Stinging Barrier
5 Emrakul's Hatcher
Sweepers (4)
1 Electrickery
2 Seismic Shudder
2 Boiling Earth
2 Scouring Sands
Commander and combo protection (10)
0 Spidersilk Net
1 Slagwurm Armor
2 Neurok Stealthsuit
2 Alexi's Cloak
2 Diplomatic Immunity
2 Arcane Denial
2 Counterspell
2 Deprive
3 Whispersilk Cloak
4 Elgaud Shieldmate
Recursion (8)
1 Conjurer's Bauble
1 Feldon's Cane
4 Archaeomancer
4 Monastery Loremaster
5 Anarchist
5 Scrivener
5 Izzet Chronarch
5 Mnemonic Wall
1 Lightning Bolt
1 Burst Lightning
1 Skred
2 Incinerate
2 Twin Bolt
2 Telekinesis
Land (35)
1 Seat of the Synod
1 Great Furnace
1 Halimar Depths
1 Izzet Boilerworks
1 Izzet Guildgate
1 Swiftwater Cliffs
1 Command Tower
1 Transguild Promenade
1 Rupture Spire
1 Evolving Wilds
1 Terramorphic Expanse
1 Grixis Panorama
13 Snow-Covered Island
10 Snow-Covered Mountain
The combos have been reduced to the Lava Spike / Eye of Nowhere + Desperate Ritual infinite path and to the High Tide + Snap for infinite mana with Capsize, Rolling Thunder, Valakut Invoker or replicating a burn spell ad nauseam as ways to dump the mana and win. This way, I've achieved that all the cards are strong on their own except for Desperate Ritual and Lava Spike, but that combo is too powerful and easy to assemble to pass up anyways.
Valakut Invoker, while odd, serves as an additional blocker that can take care of 2/X's as long as it's needed, and it's also a pretty good mana sink if I feel the need to dump my mana without wasting cards in hand, or if I simply don't have Guildmage out or burn spells at the moment.
As I said, I need to take out 6 cards out of the list, but I don't know which ones should I take out. I also want to add Rewind because although it can't be copied, it's a hard counterspell that untaps my lands mid combo or at worst still gives me my mana back, and I've exhausted all my good <= 2 CMC options. I'd also want one more <= 2 CMC Instant burn spells that isn't a bad card like Shock or Lightning Strike. I've got my eyes on Spawning Breath since on top of doing damage it creates additional blockers per copy that can be sacrificed to power out more copies, but the 1 damage might be too low.
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Tutoring: Possibly Trinket Mage
Ramp: Possibly Darksteel Ingot
Draw: Wild Guess and Tormenting Voice seems like clear cuts to me. Possibly Think Twice too.
Holding the Gates: Flood and Wall of Kelp look strong, the rest not so much so cuts can probably be made here. Have you considered a tutorable wizard with tap down potential here? There is also Tumble Magnet and off course Serrated Arrows (which should be lots better than Stinging Barrier for the mana cost).
Sweepers: No Swirling Sandstorm??
Protection: I'd definitely cut Diplomatic Immunity. Possibly Whispersilk Cloak too - it's a bit clumsy in this deck with so little fat and no voltron commander.
Recursion: Lots of fairly subpar card here. Loremaster is the worst one (doesn't work with Ghostly Flicker combo and 8 mana to get a card back is really bad). Feldon's Cane and Conjurer's Bauble look like cards that are there to make Trinket Mage better, but they are not very necessary themselves so I'd cut the lot of them. Anarchist and Scrivener are possible cuts, but not nearly as bad as the others. I think Vedalken Aethermage is more important than either of them though.
You might also consider Glacial Ray, Jilt and Magma Spray. Firebolt is another good card you're not running, though it's a sorcery.
EDIT: Where did Ghostly Flicker go??
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Think Twice is an instant card draw spell that can be replicated to draw the entire deck if I get the High Tide engine going, so it's like the analog of Ideas Unbound for drawing my deck through the instant route. And it has Flashback so I can re-cast it after the first round!
I agree Monastery Loremaster should be cut, but all other pieces are there for redundancy should something happen to the pieces or should I fizzle mid-combo, on top of also fulfilling the role of blockers, which I desperately need. Rukh Egg, Beetleback Chief and Coral Barrier also seem good at this. Eldrazi Skyspawner and Ghirapur Gearcrafter power up my flying defenses alongside walls equipped with Spidersilk Net. Stonybrook Angler is the only tap-down Wizard I could find and he asks for 2 mana to tap something down, but I'll see if I can find a place for him.
Conjurer's Bauble can also go out, although I'm skeptical to let it go since it can recover a lost combo piece or one that I've been forced to use outside of the combo. Feldon's Cane, however, is my failsafe for when I draw my entire deck with Ideas Unbound or some other draw spell and need to discard EOT because I didn't manage to combo out.
Whispersilk Cloak can go away for the time being, and if I'm missing some more protection (since the Commander usually attracts all the hate on the table) I'll reconsider it. I'm also cutting Darksteel Ingot and I'll revisit it if I feel the need of more ramp, although I'd probably use Izzet Cluestone first now that I remembered about it since I can cash it in for cards later in the game.
I don't use Ghostly Flicker because it can't be cloned with Guildmage and I don't have too many ETB creatures, although if I add some of the ETB token producing guys I might revisit the idea.
Cuts I've made:
- Wild Guess
- Monastery Loremaster
- Conjurer's Bauble
- Whispersilk Cloak
- Darksteel Ingot
Now the deck sits at 101 cards, with three more needing to be cut (because I want to make room for both Jilt and Swirling Sandstorm, so it makes for 103 cards).
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IMO, there's not a single Ux PDH deck that shouldn't be running the Ghostly Flicker engine. You're even more set-up than the average deck thanks to Izzet Chronarch and Anarchist so I'd run it regardless of what your commander can do. Consider it a protection piece if you need to make room (take out Diplomatic Immunity for it?)
I wonder if you really need all those 1 damage sweepers with Jilt and Sandstorm coming in. I'd say keep the best one as a 2 CMC tutor target. Jilt has the advantage of being burn that you can grab with Merchant Scroll, so you really increase your number of burn sources +1 there.
Not sure I have much more to contribute beyond that, I think the list is starting to look tight and you might need to play test to see what can go and what must stay for the final few slots. IMO, you can always drop non-essential draw spells like Peek for now and keep them on the bench to make it 99 cards - then when you find something that wasn't as useful as you thought, you have a solid substitute at the ready.
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1 Wayfarer's Bauble
2 Izzet Signet
2 Mind Stone
2 Prismatic Lens
3 Commander's Sphere
4 Ur-Golem's Eye
4 Sisay's Ring
Card draw (9)
1 Opt
1 Preordain
2 Tormenting Voice
2 Impulse
2 Peer Through Depths
3 Rhystic Study
3 Sea Gate Oracle
5 Mulldrifter
8 Treasure Cruise
Tutoring (5)
1 Dizzy Spell
2 Muddle the Mixture
2 Vedalken Æthermage
2 Merchant Scroll
3 Drift of Phantasms
Combo Pieces (8)
1 Lava Spike
1 High Tide
2 Eye of Nowhere
2 Desperate Ritual
2 Snap
2 Rolling Thunder
3 Capsize
3 Valakut Invoker
1 Flood
2 Rimewind Taskmage
2 Ætherflame Wall
2 Wall of Kelp
2 Minamo Scrollkeeper
3 Flowstone Wall
4 Stinging Barrier
5 Emrakul's Hatcher
5 Prescient Chimera
Recursion (5)
4 Archaeomancer
5 Anarchist
5 Scrivener
5 Izzet Chronarch
5 Mnemonic Wall
Protection (8)
2 Alexi's Cloak
2 Diplomatic Immunity
2 Neurok Stealthsuit
2 Arcane Denial
2 Counterspell
2 Deprive
3 Ghostly Flicker
4 Elgaud Shieldmate
Board control (11)
1 Burst Lightning
1 Lightning Bolt
1 Skred
1 Electrickery
2 Twin Bolt
2 Incinerate
2 Telekinesis
2 Seismic Shudder
2 Scouring Sands
2 Jilt
4 Swirling Sandstorm
1 Terramorphic Expanse
1 Evolving Wilds
1 Grixis Panorama
1 Rupture Spire
1 Transguild Promenade
1 Command Tower
1 Halimar Depths
1 Izzet Boilerworks
1 Swiftwater Cliffs
1 Izzet Guildgate
12 Snow-Covered Island
11 Snow-Covered Mountain
The draw section is starting to get dangerously short, so it makes sense to tweak it next. I'm overall happy with this configuration, just needs some extra draw. Cards I'm looking to include:
- Peek
- Think Twice
- Sleight of Hand
- Rewind
And a little Trinket package with Trinket Mage, Slagwurm Armor, Feldon's Cane and Library of Leng (makes me keep all the cards due to maximum hand size, failsafe against Ideas Unbound and Tormenting Voice's discard).
I know I can fit everything, so I'll try to fit in 4 of these 8 cards and then slowly work my way towards the rest.
Thanks to DNC from Heroes of the Plane Studios for the sig
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Some thoughts:
- no Chain Ligtning?
- your last build has 95 cards, 33 being lands. You already have 4 slots
- Provided you already have dorks recurring instantes, Izzet Boilerworks and Ghostly Flicker, I'd add Cloud of Faeries and Grapeshot. Another instakill w/o commander help quite clunky but effective as another (unexpected?) way to kill.
- Library of Leng is uncommon in my book. YMMV. I'd LOVE to use it against discard decks in Tiny Leaders, but...
- if you choose the Trinket Mage route, don't forget to put the 2 artifact lands and Expedition Map. Exp Map fetches non-basics, which is yummy.
So for now i'd add Chain Ligtning, Cloud of Faeries and Grapeshot, and 2 more lands (basics?) to complete the skinny 35.
Commander: Child of Alara BURGW, Adeliz, the Cinder Wind UR
Tiny Leaders: Gwafa, Hazid Profiteer UW
Regular Pauper: Stompy G, Mono-G Tron G, Infect G
Chain Lightning being a sorcery makes it impossible to replicate to the infinite with Snap + High Tide combo, so that's why I didn't add it in. About Library of Leng, it was printed as a common on MTGO Masters Edition, so we agreed it's fair game. Grapeshot and Cloud of Faeries are kind of weak on their own though so I'd rather devote those slots to utility cards.
Traumatic Visions is a great option, but I'm going to likely cut something else than Armillary Sphere, since providing two lands to a mana-hungry deck and half-powering up Rimewind Taskmage or adding two more damage to Skred (and also more fuel to replicate it!) is greater value. However, I'm going to look at what to cut for it, possibly Alexi's Cloak, since as you said it's a pretty flexible and good card.
I already cut Prescient Chimera and Telekinesis for Peek and Wild Guess, and as I said I will possibly cut Cloak for Visions. Now the cuts I'm looking forwards to are some for Trinket Mage, Library of Leng, and 2-3 trinkets from Conjurer's Bauble, Feldon's Cane, Slagwurm Armor, Expedition Map and Spidersilk Net
EDIT: Of course gotta find a place for the newly spoiled Mind Rock. Surprised to see this at common.
Thanks to DNC from Heroes of the Plane Studios for the sig
Check my Pauper Cube!