MTG Salvation

So my wife said that she wants a deck, but she wants a semi competitive underwater ocean theme deck. The only ones I can find through the forums and Google are either terrible, old, or edh. Here's where I'm at so far...

Jori En, ruin diver
plaxmanta
kiora, the crashing wave
kiora, master of depths
harbinger of tides
spiketail hatchling
Kira, great-glass spinner

Numbers aren't tuned yet. She likes kiora and she likes the new Jori en (which I was able to pick up a play set of full art game day promos through trades at my lgs). My brother in law has a stock merfolk list and she doesn't want that, even though she likes the artwork of lord of Atlantis .

Initial thoughts were a control shell with:
mana leak
linessa, zephyr Mage
noxious revival
Plan being to recycle grandeur and get steady beats in with maybe lightning bolts etc. to close out.

I'm honestly at quite a loss here and any insight will be much appreciated. I know the deck won't be able to go toe to toe with stronger modern strats, but my goal is to make it strong enough to compete against like a mono black vampires build or something of that caliber. I want casual that doesn't roll over and die.

Budget isn't much of a concern, but theme very much so. I really wish man-o-war was modern legal.

quest for ula's temple?

its not, like, good... but it could win some games.

sage of epityr and augury owl work pretty well to enable, and inkwell leviathan is super dope.

Quote from tomsloger »

quest for ula's temple?

its not, like, good... but it could win some games.

sage of epityr and augury owl work pretty well to enable, and inkwell leviathan is super dope.

I like sage of epityr a lot and I think it fits the theme well.

I tried pushing judge's familiar already because I really do think it's a good card and she didn't want it. Birds are a hard sale. Should I go big with Jori en and shoot for cheating out big guys? Thanks!

i think the work augury owl does in getting her leviathans or octopi or whatever out faster might make it worthwhile to her? scry 3 on a cheap creature is pretty damn good with quest.

if every card has to be on theme, that build would be pretty rough.

Is a pretty good place to start for playing Quest for Ula's Temple.

You can look at adding some spreading seas, more big sea creatures & merfolk if you want.

Bird type creatures got the axe. Tried my sales pitch over lunch today and she just doesn't like birds. She used to like dragons but had wanted something a little faster. I like the sage idea a lot. There may be a few of the bigger baddies in the sea I could include but I'd want something with built in protection if I'm going to run it.

Thanks for the ideas. I'll probably brainstorm a bit tonight and follow up tomorrow after another round of gatherer and Google searches.

lol this is dumb

Pickles (vesuvan shapshifter brine elemental) control would be hilarious. It's kinda ocean themed!

Reprinted Time Warp is oceany, and Thassa is good in timewalk.dek.

Umm... Mono blue devotion? Would really just be bad merfolk but it would still win games.

You could also jump to legacy and play high tide, card is about as ocean themed as it gets. There even exist versions of the deck for less than 100$.

At this point, you might as well just play Merfolk. Fish isn't that expensive to create, and you don't necessarily need Caverns.

Well, just to mention, if she doesn't want a stock merfolk list... what about a *non* stock merfolk list? There are a *lot* of quality merfolk cards out there that are probably good enough for modern, which just don't make the 'stock' lists by virtue of being a little less consistent or being bad meta calls. Coralhelm Commander, Cosi's Trickster, Merfolk Sovereign, Thassa, God of the Sea... even more corner-case cards like Lullmage Mentor or Dakra Mystic aren't unplayable. Hey, throw a bit of red into the manabase and Jori En, Ruin Diver is playable too. As long as she's running enough lord effects it'll run away with some games in classic merfolk style, while maybe matching her aethetics/playstyle better (more combo-ish? Aggro-ish? concerned about art/theming?).

Does Boiling away the oceans count as an ocean-themed deck? You can run a Troll Merfolk deck, with Sea's Claim, Spreading Seas, Aquitect's Will and Boil. However the manabase might be expensive, since you need a lot of nonbasic lands that produce blue.

I think Jori En could be viable, but I don't see that deck ending up with much of an ocean theme. Lightning Bolt doesn't seem too ocean-y.