Latest addition was Champion of the Parish, it provides nice beatdown plan and draw path's or bolt's from dark confidant. Sideboard is a bit messy. I always get wrecked by some deck and instantly tweek side to beat it, so... Thalia, Burrenton and stony silence are there from the beggining tho. I also decided to get rid of 3 Return to the ranks and trying new Amonketh card. So far it seems to always have bad timing, so can't decide. Be carefull that Dark confidant drains you for 9 when revealing it cause of new rullings. Found out the painful way.
If you're risking a 9 point ping I would want that card to win you a good chunk of games when it's played. Has that been the case? Might it be better suited to the sideboard?
I don't think its better either, just couldn't resist to try it out. It has few problems, namely elves, misses walking balista and kinda misses affinity. on the other hand when you look at modern meta, you can see it has potential: Abzan, Jund, Death Shadow's, Merfolk, Eldrazi tron, Bant eldrazi, Death and taxes. What i hate is when on other side of the table is sitting scooze eating your grave and healing, Endbringer chewing your board, Reality Smasher which you can't chump. Against Deathshadow Jund, you cant risk to chump 9/9 shadow and get Temur Battle rage and chumping each turn 2 Goyfs and 1 Shadow usually won't win you game without Artist, which you don't have bc Fatal PushThoughtseize. If merfolk has more than 1 lord, its one sided wrath. When rules said 4 damage by Bob, i played 3 maindeck to test it. Now its a bit risky and that might be the reason to put it in side.
Like the way deck is performing. Still need to work on sideboard.... Think I am trying yo cover too many decks but not well, vs covering less but better.
I'm enjoying this deck so far! The interaction between Witness/Lingering Souls along with Copter/Satyr is nice, you can Witness for Rally/CoCo and do it all over again, Lingering Souls gives a bigger amount of flying bodies than Doomed Traveler, you can make voice of resurgence's token a humongous beast with rally and CoCo. I'm unsure about using Renegade Rallier, though. Any thoughts? (I'm using rally rather than return because it can ress Witness, and with birds/satyr the extra mana is not a problem)
Its flexible casting cost and mana sink ability make it good with ramp, but most decks dipping into Green for ramp are also running CoCo, which is not compatible with Hangarback. Walker is also incompatible with powerful enabler cards like Return to the Ranks or Rally the Ancestors. It's most commonly cast as a less efficient 2 CMC functional equivalent of Doomed Traveler.
Hey, I'm new to the deck, just discovered this thread and it did help enlighten ways of playing Aristocrats for me. Thanks for all this input, guys.
Quick question: given I'm more Orzhov oriented, even though some people do claim abzan is a better build, what do you guys think of this new card, Tattered Mummy as a potential burner for the combo? I've been puzzled about it, because in a Rally/Return build it could mean something between 4 and 8 damage easily.
It is similar to Perilous Myr which (mostly) doesn't see play and is usually better (against creature decks).
Besides the sac' outlets and drain creatures the deck mostly needs creatures that leave tokens behind or have persist/undying, so creatures that have on death triggers that deal damage aren't as good when you aren't comboing off.
Does anyone have a list for Mardu version? Ive been trying to build a good list but theres so much i dont know what to do.
Ive been trying to do a version with Gravecrawler and Bloodghast with Lilianas to make us both discard. Cryptbreaker, Messenger, and Falk Arist main dudes. and course Blood Artists and Lingering souls.
Results - MTGO Friendly League: 2-3
Just giving a report on recent mtgo friendly league I played with WB Aristocrats. I felt the deck was very competitive, and really enjoyed playing despite the overall result. Here is the deck:
MATCHES
1. Bant Knightfall - LOST(0-2). I just can't seem to beat this deck. Game 1, faced 2 Scavenging Ooze so nothing to Return for. I was still in game with flying tokens and just needed one more Drain Creature to sac and win, but didn't get there. Game 2, multiple Spell Queller blocked the air assault, and Ghost Quarter my Vault. Eventually multiple CoCo's brought in Izzet Staticaster before I could get Drainer on board to sac.
2. Grixis DS - Win (2-0). Game 1 got in some early damage and double Return to the Ranks got me there. Game 2, He mulled to 4 and I had Thoughtseize to take care of his hand. He was way behind but tried. I got there with beats.
3. Affinity - Win (2-1) Game 1 an early Path to Exile removed a Ravenger, while multiple Lingering Souls gave me enough blockers on a Plated Inkmoth. Got in some damage and then sac'd for win. Game 2 I had Fragmentize, Paths, and Stony Silence, so kept his board light, but I only saw 2 lands and eventually died to 3 Ornithopter beaters with Signal Pest. Game 3, he kept a greedy opener with no lands and a Mox Opal, which I hit with Fragmentize. Pumped a Champion and multiple beats early on, he scooped.
4. Vizier/Druid Combo - Lost 0-2). Game 1, he went off on Turn 4, and I had no removal for the combo. Game 2 went really long. I drew removal and hand disruption. We both threw down a lot of creatures and I was setting up to sac for the win. But he played Linvala, Keeper of Silence to stall my sac, and then Chorded for combo again.
5. Jeskai Control - Lost (1-2). Jeskai is also a very tough MU in my opinion. Games went super long. I wish I had a Liliana for this MU. Game 1 I grinded out and eventually sac'd for win. Game 2 was very tense. I stayed in game with tight play against his counters, and Returned twice to keep pressure. He was at 8 life and I was down to 1 life with attackers for 5 and a Blood Artist but no sac creature. He had a Restoration Angel on the field. I had a Wrath of God in hand and he had an unknown card in hand. I attack, he blocks, and second main I wrath. Turns out his card was Lightning Helix for the win. Game 3. We grinded out and I was at 19 life and he was down to 4, but I lost on time. He ended with 25 sec.!!!!!
Still a blast to play. Shelldell, I teied for a while the Abzan version you posted but just found it too slow, though I admit would have been better against the control decks I faced. Just feel more comfortable with the faster Orzhov version. Will continue to look to tweak the deck and play more leagues.
@nekro_surge, I'm running a Mardu list currently and have been having moderate success (a 2-2 result mixed in between a couple of 3-1 results at FNM).
I don't have a solid list yet as I am playing around with it a lot but some thoughts on the card's you've mentioned in a Mardu shell;
Collective Brutality can be Gravecrawler and Bloodghast's best friend in this rendition of the deck (even more so than a flip-lili). Turn 2 brutality ditching a bloodghast and a Gravecrawler, or even better, 2 bloodghast, feels almost like cheating.
Flip-Lili; is a house but usually will come into her own in grindy games. Flipping her off a sacced doomed traveler and then immediately returning the doomed traveler is pretty nice though, and this process is repeatable every turn to net 3 sacs per turn. In faster match-ups you most likely will prefer to play a lingering souls / promise of bunrei to get more bodies on the field so that you can start chaining life drain, keep up with a race or close out the game before things get out of hand.
Bloodghast; Drawing him (especially in multiples) without an early discard outlet can slow your curve down enormously. Without the 'free' aspect bloodghast is simply another 2 drop competing with our artists and cutthroats. In most mardu versions mogg war marshall is far more reliable and provides better value in 90% of games since it provides at the minimum 2 and in many circumstances 3 immediate bodies for the same CMC. It also goes without saying that to maximise bloodghast you must pack fetch-lands.
I have never tested a zombie theme in a Mardu shell but from a distance the best way to get Gravecrawler to be a reliable bomb is with some playset or so of Mutavault. Unfortunately playing 3 colours limits the amount of colourless land we can play. (Mutavault can also be used as sac fodder for Falkenrath Aristocrat since it will count as human for a +1+1 counter) Also, BBB on turn 3 in the mardu shell can (not always) sometimes be tough for messenger.
You might also try Bloodsoaked Champion as an alternative or complimentary to Gravecrawler.
Be prepared for graveyard hate if you build a version that relies on discard and recursion.
A list I ran a 2 weeks ago for a 3-1 with wins against Skred Red, Bushwhacker Zoo, and UW Control and a loss against a Tron variety. This is a fairly stock mardu list with some tuning done to it (A similar one was posted a few pages back and originated from LordSnow) and runs pretty smoothly. Without rally/return it does tend to lean on a big falkenrath attack. I also do not have access to Bob/Dark Confidant.
Another version I ran to a 3-1 had the following adjustments to the above list, I tuned it to play a grindier, recursion-based game and would be a little more in line with what you are brewing (without the zombies). It gets clogged with 2-drops which is why collective brutality + discarding bloodghast/nether traitor/bloodsoaked champion/lingering souls becomes so important so you can keep or re-gain tempo on turns 3, 4, and 5 while rapidly gaining value out of nether traitors or free bloodghasts. The interaction between hasty bloodghasts, hasty nether traitors and bloodsoaked champions raid is pretty neat too. Really strong against spell based combo and most control shells. I took a deck with these changes to 3-1 with wins against Grixis Death's Shadow, Jeskai Control, a bye, and a loss against Mono-Green Devotion.
For any others and yourself included reading this, this is my first ever post on MTGSalvation after years of using this website and admiring the community. Any feedback on the list I used would be ace! Sideboards are also a work in progress as I am actually new to modern after 5 years break from magic and formerly playing mostly casual and legacy. I will work on getting the full list I'm taking to the next FNM on here soon. Not many Mardu variants running around these days (I understand the advantages of the other versions, but I only play aristocrats in orzhov or mardu for flavour reasons mostly). Sorry if the formatting doesn't turn out perfectly either.
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Modern Decks
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I'm now using 4x renegade ralliers and I think they're insanely strong in this deck, so I'm ordering 2x saffi because infinite combo, I'm taking my blisterpods out and replacing them with birds. Has anyone tested eldritch evolution with renegade rallier/saffi combo? I'll post deck list after some testing
The deck has 3 main stratagies: saffi+rallier combo, rally and sac-wave and voice/aristocrat beating with their bare fists. I'm now thinking of going Vizier company...
The deck has 3 main stratagies: saffi+rallier combo, rally and sac-wave and voice/aristocrat beating with their bare fists. I'm now thinking of going Vizier company...
Am I correct to assume the last 8 cards of your deck are 4CoCo and 4 Rally? What about your sideboard? What decks did you face? Thanks.
My main worry is how reliable we can combo turn 3/4 against unfair decks. [...]
We have to think about what our gameplan if we play this combo. For fast combo abzan company has much better tools than we have. […] The rallier saffi viscera seer zulaport cutthroat combo is more difficult to assemble. I fear a single 4 creature combo without disruption is too slow against many unfair decks even with the help of chord of calling. So I come to the conclusion that unlike abzan company we are not primarily a combo deck.
The strength of abzan aristocrats and the reason I started playing it is it's superb grinding ability with cards like return to the ranks/rally the ancestors. Yes it is slower but if we have some disruption and survive the early game we are very likely to win. My thinking was that the addition of a few renegade rallier and saffi's might give us some extra free wins every now and then. However, I don't think focusing on the combo is playing to this archetypes strengths, abzan company does a way better job at that.
Having said that I don't know how to fit in disruption, a way to fill the graveyard (satyr wayfinder), the combo and rally the ancestors/Coco all while having a reasonable curve. Maybe what I want is not possible.. We need a 1 mana satyr wayfinder!
Sorry for the slow response, I’ve been giving this some thought over the last month.
I see your points and I’m not sure there’s a good solution. I keep coming back to this archetype when I get excited by new support cards but IMO the problem is that the core Aristocrat cards aren’t efficient enough. For example, a “5 card combo” of 1x Seer + 2x Cutthroat + 2x Doomed Traveler drains for 11 life, and you have to add another Artist, Value creature, or Rally effect (a 6 card combo) to hit lethal. Until you reach that critical mass and specific composition, cards such as Seer, Artist, Cutthroat, Rally all do very little to present a clock or disrupt your opponent.
To prop up this core you can squeeze in powerful cards that align with the deck’s goals, like Collected Company, Lingering Souls, Voice of Resurgence, Dark Confidant, and so forth and you will certainly win games off their backs against fair decks at smaller events. But the Aristocrat core of the deck is still inefficient relative to tiered strategies, and gutting it and replacing it with better cards gives you a better deck, like Vizier Company, Junk Value, or BW(r) tokens.
As you pointed out, the main advantage that Aristocrats brings to the table is its added resilience through recursion effects, which help it grind through removal and discard better than similar decks. Resistance to spot removal and discard is actually great in the current meta! However, we can only reap the benefits of this advantage if we aren’t faced with too much graveyard hate, and the prevalence of Dredge, Storm, and others ensures that most players will be packing a significant amount of hate for the foreseeable future.
With all of this in mind I see three options: (1) You go all-in on combo but dodge graveyard hate by switching to something like Vizier Company, (2) you replace the aristocrats core with more interaction and value and end up at Junk Value or BW tokens, or (3) you accept that aristocrats is competitively inferior to similar archetypes, play it because you love the cards, sideboard as best you can and take the losses against fast linear unfair decks and grave hate. I just don't think there will be a 75 that addresses all of the concerns because until they print more efficient, strictly better aristocrats and artists there won't really be enough room to pack in enough interaction against combo & hate while maintaining the deck's gameplan.
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Today I went 3-0-1 and won a 13-man-championship [...]
The deck has 3 main stratagies: saffi+rallier combo, rally and sac-wave and voice/aristocrat beating with their bare fists. I'm now thinking of going Vizier company...
Per my post above, if you are serious about playing competitively especially at larger events then switching into Vizier Company would probably be in your best interest. If not, your deck looks solid.
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I don't mean to scare everyone off from the archtype and thread... I'll still probably mess around with Aristocrat lists here and there. Hopefully I'm off on my analysis and there really is a list that irons out some of these problems. But for now play what you love and I will try to help tune if I can
You're correct, it is 4x Rally and 4x CoCo, sorry! I did some testing with 3x Rally, 4x CoCo and 1x Eldritch Evolution (the value of sac'ing Voice, getting rallier, a token and returning voice is insane) but I didn't test enough.
I'm saving this list so I can later use it, because I had a lot of fun with this deck. Here were my matchups:
First Match: I played against a burn deck, I find the match against burn fairly easy, I filled the board quickly and got some points of life through blood artist. The post-sideboard match I added 2x Kitchen Finks, which combined with saffi have an even greater value. I try to fetch only basic lands (as I never know when they're using blood-*******-moon as main, and fetching for shocklands against burn is often not a good idea). On the second game he managed to deal me so much damage, so fast, that I just couldn't keep up. Ended up 2-1.
Second Match: I played against a Jeskai that employed the Nahiri/Emrakul combo, together with the Restoration Angel/Kiki Jiki combo. The match was fairly easy, even though my voice of resurgence always gets exiled, I managed to beat him with a massive rally sac-wave in the first game and comboing for infinite dmg/life with blood artist+ saffi+viscera+rallier on the second. I only sideboarded path to exile in. 2-0
Third Match: This was a really good game for my self esteem, as I always lose to this guy. He has a nasty mardu deck, with paths, fatal push's and Kalitas. The first game he had some bad luck and flooded with lands. I managed to combo him with aristocrat/saffi/rallier+artist pretty fast. On the second one he casted Kalitas, but I still managed to beat him by attacking with an unblockable aristocrat on my turns while blocking his Kalitas and sac'ing my blockers before damage was applied on his turns, preventing lifelink. I sideboarded paths and Qasali (which were useless, as he uses Nihil spellbomb, and he only casted it the moment I already had some considerable graveyard)
Fourth Match: Against a friend of mine, we just decided to split prize but played anyway. His deck is an abzan midrange with 4x goyfs that managed to beat the ***** out of me. Satyr wayfinder only grew his goyfs and Ooze, and guess what he uses a Kalitas as well. I managed to win first game by beating him with massive elemental tokens, but in the second and third games the hate was just too strong. p.s: In the third game I could've actually won, had I played better. I managed an infinite scry with viscera/rallier/saffi and I left a rally/land sequence on top of my deck. He casted a kozilek and I discarded the rally on the next turn. Had I found a land/rally sequence I'd have won. I didn't put a CoCo on top because he extracted them'all from me.
This deck is insanely fun to play, and I also find the blisterpod/doomed traveler version together with Abzan Ascendancy and Copters really fun. I tested both and this one I'm using was more to my taste. My sideboarded is adjusted to my local game store (combo decks, affinity, burn) and I strongly suggest that you come up with your own as well!
I don't mean to scare everyone off from the archtype and thread... I'll still probably mess around with Aristocrat lists here and there. Hopefully I'm off on my analysis and there really is a list that irons out some of these problems. But for now play what you love and don't get your sights set on tiered status
I agree. Our engine requires more pieces to fit everything together, while other decks can do the same thing with fewer pieces (e.g. Vizier+Devoted Druid). I think that's also good, I mean, when you put together all those combo pieces, when you rally into a huge sac-wave with 3 blood artists or when your voice tokens are so freaking huge and you just mow your opponent down with them, killing his goyfs and dreams... that's priceless
How did the 2x Tidehollow Scullers perform for you? How long did they stick to the board? Did you mostly have to ETB sac them to keep important cards exiled?
I love that the Scullers afford an interactive angle that the rest of the deck lacks, but I'm a little jaded from the times I've had Sculler quickly zapped & the exiled card returned the opponent and used against me. Definitely seems useful against combo decks with low removal like Storm, Dredge, Ad Nauseum etc, but somewhat of a liability against other decks.
I only keep them on the board if my opponent has no removals at all, which is a very rare match-up (e.g. monogreen devotion, auras). It is safe to say I always ETB sac them, attempting to exile something of greater value and gaining knowledge of the opponent's hand (and scrying is always good). For this very reason I find them better than fiend hunter, personally. My LGS is filled with fatal pushes, lightning bolts and path to exiles, it's insane.
My birds die very young. I think the main reason I'm changing to Vizier Company is because the graveyard hate here is still pretty heavy, and people over there use Kalitas and Ooze main deck. It feels like I'm always fightning an uphill battle, y'know?
You're correct, it is 4x Rally and 4x CoCo, sorry! I did some testing with 3x Rally, 4x CoCo and 1x Eldritch Evolution (the value of sac'ing Voice, getting rallier, a token and returning voice is insane) but I didn't test enough.
This is the correct list:
...
I'm saving this list so I can later use it, because I had a lot of fun with this deck. Here were my matchups:
...
This deck is insanely fun to play, and I also find the blisterpod/doomed traveler version together with Abzan Ascendancy and Copters really fun. I tested both and this one I'm using was more to my taste. My sideboarded is adjusted to my local game store (combo decks, affinity, burn) and I strongly suggest that you come up with your own as well!
Thanks for the write-up. I am still playing Orzhov version I listed a page or so back. I couldn't get enough speed in the Abzan version though when it would go off, it was insane! May test the Saffi/Rallier version some more down the road....
I am in another league and will do a fuller write-up after I complete it. Right now I am 2-1, with victories over Jund and Eldrazi & Taxes, and loss to Living End. Loss was due to a misplay on my part, so I think the deck has action, tho unfair decks can really be a challenge. I play 3 Path and 2 Push in main plus 1 Wrath and 3 thoughseize in the SB. Definitely need removal and hand disruption.... good luck all!
You're correct, it is 4x Rally and 4x CoCo, sorry! I did some testing with 3x Rally, 4x CoCo and 1x Eldritch Evolution (the value of sac'ing Voice, getting rallier, a token and returning voice is insane) but I didn't test enough.
I'm saving this list so I can later use it, because I had a lot of fun with this deck. Here were my matchups:
First Match: I played against a burn deck, I find the match against burn fairly easy, I filled the board quickly and got some points of life through blood artist. The post-sideboard match I added 2x Kitchen Finks, which combined with saffi have an even greater value. I try to fetch only basic lands (as I never know when they're using blood-*******-moon as main, and fetching for shocklands against burn is often not a good idea). On the second game he managed to deal me so much damage, so fast, that I just couldn't keep up. Ended up 2-1.
Second Match: I played against a Jeskai that employed the Nahiri/Emrakul combo, together with the Restoration Angel/Kiki Jiki combo. The match was fairly easy, even though my voice of resurgence always gets exiled, I managed to beat him with a massive rally sac-wave in the first game and comboing for infinite dmg/life with blood artist+ saffi+viscera+rallier on the second. I only sideboarded path to exile in. 2-0
Third Match: This was a really good game for my self esteem, as I always lose to this guy. He has a nasty mardu deck, with paths, fatal push's and Kalitas. The first game he had some bad luck and flooded with lands. I managed to combo him with aristocrat/saffi/rallier+artist pretty fast. On the second one he casted Kalitas, but I still managed to beat him by attacking with an unblockable aristocrat on my turns while blocking his Kalitas and sac'ing my blockers before damage was applied on his turns, preventing lifelink. I sideboarded paths and Qasali (which were useless, as he uses Nihil spellbomb, and he only casted it the moment I already had some considerable graveyard)
Fourth Match: Against a friend of mine, we just decided to split prize but played anyway. His deck is an abzan midrange with 4x goyfs that managed to beat the ***** out of me. Satyr wayfinder only grew his goyfs and Ooze, and guess what he uses a Kalitas as well. I managed to win first game by beating him with massive elemental tokens, but in the second and third games the hate was just too strong. p.s: In the third game I could've actually won, had I played better. I managed an infinite scry with viscera/rallier/saffi and I left a rally/land sequence on top of my deck. He casted a kozilek and I discarded the rally on the next turn. Had I found a land/rally sequence I'd have won. I didn't put a CoCo on top because he extracted them'all from me.
This deck is insanely fun to play, and I also find the blisterpod/doomed traveler version together with Abzan Ascendancy and Copters really fun. I tested both and this one I'm using was more to my taste. My sideboarded is adjusted to my local game store (combo decks, affinity, burn) and I strongly suggest that you come up with your own as well!
I don't mean to scare everyone off from the archtype and thread... I'll still probably mess around with Aristocrat lists here and there. Hopefully I'm off on my analysis and there really is a list that irons out some of these problems. But for now play what you love and don't get your sights set on tiered status
I agree. Our engine requires more pieces to fit everything together, while other decks can do the same thing with fewer pieces (e.g. Vizier+Devoted Druid). I think that's also good, I mean, when you put together all those combo pieces, when you rally into a huge sac-wave with 3 blood artists or when your voice tokens are so freaking huge and you just mow your opponent down with them, killing his goyfs and dreams... that's priceless
How crucial is the satyr wayfinder? I have not tested a build with that particular card. Is it just the ability to net a land and try to dig to our pieces faster?
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4x Doomed Traveler
4x Champion of the Parish
3x Viscera seer
4x Zulaport Cutthroat
2x Blood Artist
4x Dark Confidant
4x Cartel Aristocrat
3x Liliana, Heretical Healer
Spells
4x Path to exile
4x Lingering souls
2x Dawn/Dusk
3x Godless Shrine
4x Shambling Vent
4x Concealed Courtyard
4x Marsh Flats
3x Swamp
2x Plains
2x Vault of the Archangel
3x Lost Legacy
3x Thalia, Guardian of Thraben
2x Stony Silence
2x Orzhov Pontiff
2x Burrenton Forge-tender
1x Anguished Unmaking
1x Return to the Ranks
Latest addition was Champion of the Parish, it provides nice beatdown plan and draw path's or bolt's from dark confidant. Sideboard is a bit messy. I always get wrecked by some deck and instantly tweek side to beat it, so... Thalia, Burrenton and stony silence are there from the beggining tho. I also decided to get rid of 3 Return to the ranks and trying new Amonketh card. So far it seems to always have bad timing, so can't decide. Be carefull that Dark confidant drains you for 9 when revealing it cause of new rullings. Found out the painful way.
4 Doomed Traveler
4 Champion of the Parish
3 Viscera Seer
4 Cartel Aristocrat
2 Blood Artist
4 Zulaport Cutthroat
4 Dark Confidant
3 Liliana, Heretical Healer
Spells
1 Fatal Push
3 Path to Exile
2 Return to the Ranks
4 Lingering Souls
2 Plains
2 Swamp
3 Caves of Koilos
2 Concealed Courtyard
4 Marsh Flats
4 Godless Shrine
2 Shambling Vent
2 Vault of the Archangel
1 Cavern of Souls
2 Thalia, Guardian of Thraben
2 Nihil Spellbomb
2 Orzhov Pontiff
2 Burrenton Forge-Tender
2 Inquisition of Kozilek
2 Stony Silence
2 Fragmentize
1 Wrath of God
Like the way deck is performing. Still need to work on sideboard.... Think I am trying yo cover too many decks but not well, vs covering less but better.
I'm using this one:
2x Eternal Witness
4x Satyr Wayfinder
2x Smuggler's Copter
2x Tidehollow sculler
4x Blood Artist
3x Zulaport Cutthroat
4x Viscera Seer
2x Cartel Aristocrat
4x Voice of Resurgence
3x Collected Company
3x Rally the Ancestors
20x lands
2x Path to Exile
3x Qasali Pridemage
1x Fiend Hunter
1x Kataki, War's Wage
2x Abrupt Decay
2x Disenchant
I'm enjoying this deck so far! The interaction between Witness/Lingering Souls along with Copter/Satyr is nice, you can Witness for Rally/CoCo and do it all over again, Lingering Souls gives a bigger amount of flying bodies than Doomed Traveler, you can make voice of resurgence's token a humongous beast with rally and CoCo. I'm unsure about using Renegade Rallier, though. Any thoughts? (I'm using rally rather than return because it can ress Witness, and with birds/satyr the extra mana is not a problem)
Though (IMO) suboptimal in many standard lists, Zac Elsik brewed a list around Hangerback Walker if you are interested.
Quick question: given I'm more Orzhov oriented, even though some people do claim abzan is a better build, what do you guys think of this new card, Tattered Mummy as a potential burner for the combo? I've been puzzled about it, because in a Rally/Return build it could mean something between 4 and 8 damage easily.
Besides the sac' outlets and drain creatures the deck mostly needs creatures that leave tokens behind or have persist/undying, so creatures that have on death triggers that deal damage aren't as good when you aren't comboing off.
Ive been trying to do a version with Gravecrawler and Bloodghast with Lilianas to make us both discard. Cryptbreaker, Messenger, and Falk Arist main dudes. and course Blood Artists and Lingering souls.
Just giving a report on recent mtgo friendly league I played with WB Aristocrats. I felt the deck was very competitive, and really enjoyed playing despite the overall result. Here is the deck:
4 Doomed Traveler
2 Tidehollow Sculler
2 Viscera Seer
2 Blood Artist
4 Cartel Aristocrat
4 Zulaport Cutthroat
4 Champion of the Parish
4 Dark Confidant
4 Return to the Ranks
4 Lingering Souls
3 Path to Exile
1 Fatal Push
4 Godless Shrine
2 Shambling Vent
2 Swamp
2 Vault of the Archangel
4 Marsh Flats
1 Caves of Koilos
4 Concealed Courtyard
2 Leyline of Sanctity
2 Nihil Spellbomb
1 Zealous Persecution
2 Burrenton Forge-Tender
3 Thoughtseize
2 Stony Silence
2 Fragmentize
1 Wrath of God
MATCHES
1. Bant Knightfall - LOST(0-2). I just can't seem to beat this deck. Game 1, faced 2 Scavenging Ooze so nothing to Return for. I was still in game with flying tokens and just needed one more Drain Creature to sac and win, but didn't get there. Game 2, multiple Spell Queller blocked the air assault, and Ghost Quarter my Vault. Eventually multiple CoCo's brought in Izzet Staticaster before I could get Drainer on board to sac.
2. Grixis DS - Win (2-0). Game 1 got in some early damage and double Return to the Ranks got me there. Game 2, He mulled to 4 and I had Thoughtseize to take care of his hand. He was way behind but tried. I got there with beats.
3. Affinity - Win (2-1) Game 1 an early Path to Exile removed a Ravenger, while multiple Lingering Souls gave me enough blockers on a Plated Inkmoth. Got in some damage and then sac'd for win. Game 2 I had Fragmentize, Paths, and Stony Silence, so kept his board light, but I only saw 2 lands and eventually died to 3 Ornithopter beaters with Signal Pest. Game 3, he kept a greedy opener with no lands and a Mox Opal, which I hit with Fragmentize. Pumped a Champion and multiple beats early on, he scooped.
4. Vizier/Druid Combo - Lost 0-2). Game 1, he went off on Turn 4, and I had no removal for the combo. Game 2 went really long. I drew removal and hand disruption. We both threw down a lot of creatures and I was setting up to sac for the win. But he played Linvala, Keeper of Silence to stall my sac, and then Chorded for combo again.
5. Jeskai Control - Lost (1-2). Jeskai is also a very tough MU in my opinion. Games went super long. I wish I had a Liliana for this MU. Game 1 I grinded out and eventually sac'd for win. Game 2 was very tense. I stayed in game with tight play against his counters, and Returned twice to keep pressure. He was at 8 life and I was down to 1 life with attackers for 5 and a Blood Artist but no sac creature. He had a Restoration Angel on the field. I had a Wrath of God in hand and he had an unknown card in hand. I attack, he blocks, and second main I wrath. Turns out his card was Lightning Helix for the win. Game 3. We grinded out and I was at 19 life and he was down to 4, but I lost on time. He ended with 25 sec.!!!!!
Still a blast to play. Shelldell, I teied for a while the Abzan version you posted but just found it too slow, though I admit would have been better against the control decks I faced. Just feel more comfortable with the faster Orzhov version. Will continue to look to tweak the deck and play more leagues.
Welcome any feedback.
I don't have a solid list yet as I am playing around with it a lot but some thoughts on the card's you've mentioned in a Mardu shell;
Collective Brutality can be Gravecrawler and Bloodghast's best friend in this rendition of the deck (even more so than a flip-lili). Turn 2 brutality ditching a bloodghast and a Gravecrawler, or even better, 2 bloodghast, feels almost like cheating.
Flip-Lili; is a house but usually will come into her own in grindy games. Flipping her off a sacced doomed traveler and then immediately returning the doomed traveler is pretty nice though, and this process is repeatable every turn to net 3 sacs per turn. In faster match-ups you most likely will prefer to play a lingering souls / promise of bunrei to get more bodies on the field so that you can start chaining life drain, keep up with a race or close out the game before things get out of hand.
Bloodghast; Drawing him (especially in multiples) without an early discard outlet can slow your curve down enormously. Without the 'free' aspect bloodghast is simply another 2 drop competing with our artists and cutthroats. In most mardu versions mogg war marshall is far more reliable and provides better value in 90% of games since it provides at the minimum 2 and in many circumstances 3 immediate bodies for the same CMC. It also goes without saying that to maximise bloodghast you must pack fetch-lands.
I have never tested a zombie theme in a Mardu shell but from a distance the best way to get Gravecrawler to be a reliable bomb is with some playset or so of Mutavault. Unfortunately playing 3 colours limits the amount of colourless land we can play. (Mutavault can also be used as sac fodder for Falkenrath Aristocrat since it will count as human for a +1+1 counter) Also, BBB on turn 3 in the mardu shell can (not always) sometimes be tough for messenger.
You might also try Bloodsoaked Champion as an alternative or complimentary to Gravecrawler.
Be prepared for graveyard hate if you build a version that relies on discard and recursion.
A list I ran a 2 weeks ago for a 3-1 with wins against Skred Red, Bushwhacker Zoo, and UW Control and a loss against a Tron variety. This is a fairly stock mardu list with some tuning done to it (A similar one was posted a few pages back and originated from LordSnow) and runs pretty smoothly. Without rally/return it does tend to lean on a big falkenrath attack. I also do not have access to Bob/Dark Confidant.
3x Fatal Push
3x Path to Exile
4x Doomed Traveler
4x Viscera Seer
2x Bloodsoaked Champion
3x Blood Artist
3x Zulaport Cutthroat
2x Mogg War Marshal
1x Collective Brutality
1x Liliana, Heretical Healer
1x Kolaghan's Command
4x Lingering Souls
1x Promise of Bunrei
4x Falkenrath Aristocrat
1x Sorin, Lord of Innistrad
1x Westvale Abbey
1x Vault of the Archangel
21x other lands
Another version I ran to a 3-1 had the following adjustments to the above list, I tuned it to play a grindier, recursion-based game and would be a little more in line with what you are brewing (without the zombies). It gets clogged with 2-drops which is why collective brutality + discarding bloodghast/nether traitor/bloodsoaked champion/lingering souls becomes so important so you can keep or re-gain tempo on turns 3, 4, and 5 while rapidly gaining value out of nether traitors or free bloodghasts. The interaction between hasty bloodghasts, hasty nether traitors and bloodsoaked champions raid is pretty neat too. Really strong against spell based combo and most control shells. I took a deck with these changes to 3-1 with wins against Grixis Death's Shadow, Jeskai Control, a bye, and a loss against Mono-Green Devotion.
+1 liliana, Heretical Healer
+3 collective brutality
+3 bloodghast
+2 nether traitor
+2 cartel aristocrat
-1 promise of bunrei
-2 mogg war marshal
-1 sorin, lord of innistrad
-2 falkenrath aristocrat
-1 kolaghan's command
-1 fatal push
-1 path to exile
-2 lingering souls
For any others and yourself included reading this, this is my first ever post on MTGSalvation after years of using this website and admiring the community. Any feedback on the list I used would be ace! Sideboards are also a work in progress as I am actually new to modern after 5 years break from magic and formerly playing mostly casual and legacy. I will work on getting the full list I'm taking to the next FNM on here soon. Not many Mardu variants running around these days (I understand the advantages of the other versions, but I only play aristocrats in orzhov or mardu for flavour reasons mostly). Sorry if the formatting doesn't turn out perfectly either.
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URW Jeskai Control
GUWRB Amulet Titan
GR Ponza
3x Fatal Push
2x Path to Exile
4x Doomed Traveler
4x Viscera Seer
3x Blood Artist
3x Zulaport Cutthroat
3x Bloodghast
3x Nether Traitor
2x Asylum Visitor
4x Collective Brutality
2x Bloodthrone Vampire
2x Cartel Aristocrat
3x Liliana, Heretical Healer
22x Lands
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URW Jeskai Control
GUWRB Amulet Titan
GR Ponza
I believe this could be a nice beater along the recently added Bontu the glorified.
Green @ it's best
2x Cartel Aristocrat
4x Blood Artist
2x Zulaport Cutthroat
4x Satyr wayfinder
4x Renegade Rallier
2x Saffi Eriksdotter
4x Birds of Paradise
4x Voice of Resurgence
2x Tidehollow Sculler
1x Dryad Arbor
2x Marsh Flats
2x Verdant Catacombs
1x Forest
2x Plains
1x Swamp
2x Temple Garden
2x Overgrown Tomb
1x Godless Shrine
2x Razorverge Thicket
The deck has 3 main stratagies: saffi+rallier combo, rally and sac-wave and voice/aristocrat beating with their bare fists. I'm now thinking of going Vizier company...
I see your points and I’m not sure there’s a good solution. I keep coming back to this archetype when I get excited by new support cards but IMO the problem is that the core Aristocrat cards aren’t efficient enough. For example, a “5 card combo” of 1x Seer + 2x Cutthroat + 2x Doomed Traveler drains for 11 life, and you have to add another Artist, Value creature, or Rally effect (a 6 card combo) to hit lethal. Until you reach that critical mass and specific composition, cards such as Seer, Artist, Cutthroat, Rally all do very little to present a clock or disrupt your opponent.
To prop up this core you can squeeze in powerful cards that align with the deck’s goals, like Collected Company, Lingering Souls, Voice of Resurgence, Dark Confidant, and so forth and you will certainly win games off their backs against fair decks at smaller events. But the Aristocrat core of the deck is still inefficient relative to tiered strategies, and gutting it and replacing it with better cards gives you a better deck, like Vizier Company, Junk Value, or BW(r) tokens.
As you pointed out, the main advantage that Aristocrats brings to the table is its added resilience through recursion effects, which help it grind through removal and discard better than similar decks. Resistance to spot removal and discard is actually great in the current meta! However, we can only reap the benefits of this advantage if we aren’t faced with too much graveyard hate, and the prevalence of Dredge, Storm, and others ensures that most players will be packing a significant amount of hate for the foreseeable future.
With all of this in mind I see three options: (1) You go all-in on combo but dodge graveyard hate by switching to something like Vizier Company, (2) you replace the aristocrats core with more interaction and value and end up at Junk Value or BW tokens, or (3) you accept that aristocrats is competitively inferior to similar archetypes, play it because you love the cards, sideboard as best you can and take the losses against fast linear unfair decks and grave hate.
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Per my post above, if you are serious about playing competitively especially at larger events then switching into Vizier Company would probably be in your best interest. If not, your deck looks solid.
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I don't mean to scare everyone off from the archtype and thread... I'll still probably mess around with Aristocrat lists here and there. Hopefully I'm off on my analysis and there really is a list that irons out some of these problems. But for now play what you love and I will try to help tune if I can
This is the correct list:
2x Cartel Aristocrat
4x Blood Artist
2x Zulaport Cutthroat
4x Satyr wayfinder
4x Renegade Rallier
2x Saffi Eriksdotter
4x Birds of Paradise
4x Voice of Resurgence
2x Tidehollow Sculler
1x Dryad Arbor
4x Collected Company
4x Rally the Ancestors
4x Windswept Heath
2x Marsh Flats
2x Verdant Catacombs
1x Forest
2x Plains
1x Swamp
2x Temple Garden
2x Overgrown Tomb
1x Godless Shrine
2x Razorverge Thicket
1x Abrupt decay
2x Qasali Pridemage
2x Kataki, War's Wage
1x Abzan Ascendancy
1x Surgical Extraction
1x Eternal Witness
2x Kitchen Finks
2x Stain the mind
I'm saving this list so I can later use it, because I had a lot of fun with this deck. Here were my matchups:
First Match: I played against a burn deck, I find the match against burn fairly easy, I filled the board quickly and got some points of life through blood artist. The post-sideboard match I added 2x Kitchen Finks, which combined with saffi have an even greater value. I try to fetch only basic lands (as I never know when they're using blood-*******-moon as main, and fetching for shocklands against burn is often not a good idea). On the second game he managed to deal me so much damage, so fast, that I just couldn't keep up. Ended up 2-1.
Second Match: I played against a Jeskai that employed the Nahiri/Emrakul combo, together with the Restoration Angel/Kiki Jiki combo. The match was fairly easy, even though my voice of resurgence always gets exiled, I managed to beat him with a massive rally sac-wave in the first game and comboing for infinite dmg/life with blood artist+ saffi+viscera+rallier on the second. I only sideboarded path to exile in. 2-0
Third Match: This was a really good game for my self esteem, as I always lose to this guy. He has a nasty mardu deck, with paths, fatal push's and Kalitas. The first game he had some bad luck and flooded with lands. I managed to combo him with aristocrat/saffi/rallier+artist pretty fast. On the second one he casted Kalitas, but I still managed to beat him by attacking with an unblockable aristocrat on my turns while blocking his Kalitas and sac'ing my blockers before damage was applied on his turns, preventing lifelink. I sideboarded paths and Qasali (which were useless, as he uses Nihil spellbomb, and he only casted it the moment I already had some considerable graveyard)
Fourth Match: Against a friend of mine, we just decided to split prize but played anyway. His deck is an abzan midrange with 4x goyfs that managed to beat the ***** out of me. Satyr wayfinder only grew his goyfs and Ooze, and guess what he uses a Kalitas as well. I managed to win first game by beating him with massive elemental tokens, but in the second and third games the hate was just too strong. p.s: In the third game I could've actually won, had I played better. I managed an infinite scry with viscera/rallier/saffi and I left a rally/land sequence on top of my deck. He casted a kozilek and I discarded the rally on the next turn. Had I found a land/rally sequence I'd have won. I didn't put a CoCo on top because he extracted them'all from me.
This deck is insanely fun to play, and I also find the blisterpod/doomed traveler version together with Abzan Ascendancy and Copters really fun. I tested both and this one I'm using was more to my taste. My sideboarded is adjusted to my local game store (combo decks, affinity, burn) and I strongly suggest that you come up with your own as well!
I agree. Our engine requires more pieces to fit everything together, while other decks can do the same thing with fewer pieces (e.g. Vizier+Devoted Druid). I think that's also good, I mean, when you put together all those combo pieces, when you rally into a huge sac-wave with 3 blood artists or when your voice tokens are so freaking huge and you just mow your opponent down with them, killing his goyfs and dreams... that's priceless
I love that the Scullers afford an interactive angle that the rest of the deck lacks, but I'm a little jaded from the times I've had Sculler quickly zapped & the exiled card returned the opponent and used against me. Definitely seems useful against combo decks with low removal like Storm, Dredge, Ad Nauseum etc, but somewhat of a liability against other decks.
My birds die very young. I think the main reason I'm changing to Vizier Company is because the graveyard hate here is still pretty heavy, and people over there use Kalitas and Ooze main deck. It feels like I'm always fightning an uphill battle, y'know?
Thanks for the write-up. I am still playing Orzhov version I listed a page or so back. I couldn't get enough speed in the Abzan version though when it would go off, it was insane! May test the Saffi/Rallier version some more down the road....
I am in another league and will do a fuller write-up after I complete it. Right now I am 2-1, with victories over Jund and Eldrazi & Taxes, and loss to Living End. Loss was due to a misplay on my part, so I think the deck has action, tho unfair decks can really be a challenge. I play 3 Path and 2 Push in main plus 1 Wrath and 3 thoughseize in the SB. Definitely need removal and hand disruption.... good luck all!
How crucial is the satyr wayfinder? I have not tested a build with that particular card. Is it just the ability to net a land and try to dig to our pieces faster?