Evacuation is a lock in most of my heavy blue decks. It's castable three turns sooner than Cyclonic Rift, which is kind of important versus aggressive hexproof generals and boardstates. It's also easier to cast in addition to other spells, which is something I'm often concerned with doing in spell-slingy decks.
I'm pretty sure this format is intended for dueling, which makes it probably a comparable environment, speedwise, to Modern (fewer cards per deck and a deeper pool, but less consistency aside from commander). It looks to me here like you're trying to make a deck intended for standard battlecruiser EDH (tons of mana, big creatures, big plays) by playing around the CMC restriction with x-spells and expensive late-game activated abilities. Which is fine in a control deck, but it looks like you're playing for token aggro instead.
I'm no wizard with the format, having just learned about it a couple days ago on the forum here, but I'm willing to bet you'll do better by embracing the lower curve. Targeted burn, one-shot token generation and overruns like Trumpet Blast, etc.
I've played a few duels between the decks. Green stomped red, then lost to black, then beat black, then lost to blue.
Frankly though, win results from playing duels with EDH precons is about 10% deck power and 90% luck of the draw. You're talking about 100-card singleton decks with no tutors and limited draw, designed for a multiplayer environment where you have buffers of politics and multiple opponents to build up a board position and draw through a rough opening. Even tuned, consistent multiplayer decks can roll over in a duel environment to an early Serra Ascendant or a lucky Sword of protection-from-your-deck.
Jhoira's biggest problem is that once you've suspended some huge threats, your opponents have all the time in the world to dig in and prepare responses. I think most Jhoira players' reasoning is that any way you can disrupt your opponent's calculations on that account is worth playing. They also allow you to play reactively with your suspended cards, which otherwise is not an option.
The number of decks I keep built has continually increased since I started; at this point I have 15 that rotate continually, with probably 60 or 70 built since I got into it. Sig is totally out of date.
For a long time I tried to stick to a tight cycle of 5 monocolor decks, but I decided that there were too many interesting multicolor options to play with. Go figure, WotC has gone and enabled that behavior again.
I definitely spend way more time building decks than actually playing them, though. The puzzle of fitting together an effective, synergistic machine with a functional curve is oftentimes a lot more satisfying than smashing that machine into my playgroup's drunken slugfests.
The non-optional draw gives this card an extra layer of threat to the controller, which is an interesting dynamic. I'm envisioning putting this in my Vorel of the Hull Clade deck, doubling the counters a couple times and swinging at someone, then finding a way to donate it to someone else as a boardwipe hits. Drawing 10 cards is awesome, but drawing 80 can be dangerous.
I chuckle at the fact that there is only one card in the red deck that allows for Flamekin Village to enter the battlefield untapped.
Anyway, I think the decks are alright, but blue definetely got shafted. I'm also a little disappointed in the lack of Portal reprints. Last year they did so well with that, bringing down the price of cards such as Hua Tuo, Honored Physician. Also, last year I think they just printed better value Okay, I know TNN was a big mess up, but stuff such as Baleful Strix and Toxic Deluge. They look really fun to play, though. I love the red one, which they seemed to push a little more than the others.
That really is funny, only one elemental in the deck. I guess they just really wanted to complete that Llorwyn land cycle.
sad that StoneForge Mystic isn't in the white one but it's okay i'll be ordering one hopefully before the price goes if it does
I've noticed there aren't any nonland tutor effects in these decks, despite some very obvious potential reprints. Like in previous Commander releases, I think there's been a deliberate effort to avoid cards that would make decks too consistent. In the land of battlecruiser magic, I'm supposing they'd rather not have a lot of easy combo enabling.
White: I didn't expect this deck to be so swarm-y - I count 15 cards that generate multiple token creatures. I'm also a bit disappointed with the equipment here - the stuff is solid, but there isn't a lot of really dynamic choices. Where's the Batterskull, Tatsumasa, the Dragon's Fang, or Quietus Spike?
Blue: Bounce, tap and draw. The deck looks very solid, but like Teferi at the helm, it doesn't have much personality. I'll be glad for another copy of Rite of Replication.
Black: We already had this one spoiled, but it looks fun. I think it might be *overly* stocked with ways to kill creatures, but I may be biased. I wish the bleed subtheme was strong enough in monoblack to really aim a deck towards, but I suspect too much of it is attached to white/black as a color combination.
Red: They really committed to the artifact theme, which is both cool and a bit unfortunate. Artifacts certainly patch up monored's shortcomings in EDH, but I wish they'd taken the chance to make a few more competitive red cards (instead of more dumb dragons). The deck is screaming for Kurkesh, Onakke Ancient and Rings of Brighthearth.
Green: A bit too similar to the token swarm in the white deck, if you ask me, without enough "cares about elves" cards to justify the done-to-death theme. The only intriguing part of this is the land sacrifice subtheme in support of Titania, Protector of Argoth. Well, that and some of the new cards; the green lieutenant is definitely exciting enough to consider in the right competitive decks.
Personally, I'm pretty satisfied with all of them. None are really carried through to their extreme version - Red could be running 40 artifacts and be even more dangerous, while white is missing a lot of the equipment shenanigans like leonin shikari, but there's a lot of good staples all around.
Except for freaking green. Tribal elves?! Get out.
True-Name Nemesis was the real offender in Mind Seize. None of the new cards spoiled so far approaches that level of playability in legacy, and all the money reprints will plummet in value as this set is printed to demand.
This seems like the easiest situation to make this decision. If someone else is the threat and swinging at two smaller people, one of which might have beneficial blocks if their things weren't tapped, I would snap this off in an instant (literally) to give them both a chance.
Well obviously you cast it. I'm just talking about how this effect multiplies the already headache-inducing scramble of everyone flipping through their graveyards, other people's graveyards, activating tops, cracking fetchlands, considering tutor targets, and negotiating with other players for enabling their own schemes. "If you can sacrifice that, I can reanimate it, and I'll target him with the draw ETB ability so he can pull that kill spell on top of his library, which will kill that lord there which ticks the damage below lethal, so then you can ping the others, and I'll have mana up to counter that trick we know he pulled from his graveyard last turn..."
Or maybe it's just my games that end up like that.
I can already picture the game slowdowns that will happen thanks to Intellectual Offering. It's an extra multiplier on top of the normal EDH decision paralysis. Imagine the negotiations when the lead player at a table of 4 swings at two others for lethal, but someone has mana up for this spell...
In general though the deck has some focus which I like. I remember playing the Marath, Will of the Wild deck last time and the whole time I was just like WTF is this deck doing.
To be fair as well, the deck plays around a bit of a life syphoning plan so it should be possible to play a bit slower. It still has some early spot removal too so I wouldn't worry too much about it. Precon decks rarely come out swinging fast.
I definitely like that the deck has a tighter zombie/demon token + murder theme. I'm actually surprised there's no Blood Speaker, considering how many demons are in the deck. I just know there's few things more tedious than an EDH game where I only get to drop one spell per go-around because my curve is bloated. Really kills my enthusiasm when I'm trying to build a board position and all I have is a fistful of 4- and 5-drop manasink creatures.
I'm no wizard with the format, having just learned about it a couple days ago on the forum here, but I'm willing to bet you'll do better by embracing the lower curve. Targeted burn, one-shot token generation and overruns like Trumpet Blast, etc.
Frankly though, win results from playing duels with EDH precons is about 10% deck power and 90% luck of the draw. You're talking about 100-card singleton decks with no tutors and limited draw, designed for a multiplayer environment where you have buffers of politics and multiple opponents to build up a board position and draw through a rough opening. Even tuned, consistent multiplayer decks can roll over in a duel environment to an early Serra Ascendant or a lucky Sword of protection-from-your-deck.
For a long time I tried to stick to a tight cycle of 5 monocolor decks, but I decided that there were too many interesting multicolor options to play with. Go figure, WotC has gone and enabled that behavior again.
I definitely spend way more time building decks than actually playing them, though. The puzzle of fitting together an effective, synergistic machine with a functional curve is oftentimes a lot more satisfying than smashing that machine into my playgroup's drunken slugfests.
That really is funny, only one elemental in the deck. I guess they just really wanted to complete that Llorwyn land cycle.
I think you might be underestimating the value of some of the new cards, though. Containment Priest is going to be a crazy chase card in the spirit of TNN, and there's a lot of other really respectable legacy/EDH cards to watch: Reef Worm, Malicious Affliction, Wake the Dead, Dualcaster Mage, Song of the Dryads, Masterwork of Ingenuity...
I've noticed there aren't any nonland tutor effects in these decks, despite some very obvious potential reprints. Like in previous Commander releases, I think there's been a deliberate effort to avoid cards that would make decks too consistent. In the land of battlecruiser magic, I'm supposing they'd rather not have a lot of easy combo enabling.
White: I didn't expect this deck to be so swarm-y - I count 15 cards that generate multiple token creatures. I'm also a bit disappointed with the equipment here - the stuff is solid, but there isn't a lot of really dynamic choices. Where's the Batterskull, Tatsumasa, the Dragon's Fang, or Quietus Spike?
Blue: Bounce, tap and draw. The deck looks very solid, but like Teferi at the helm, it doesn't have much personality. I'll be glad for another copy of Rite of Replication.
Black: We already had this one spoiled, but it looks fun. I think it might be *overly* stocked with ways to kill creatures, but I may be biased. I wish the bleed subtheme was strong enough in monoblack to really aim a deck towards, but I suspect too much of it is attached to white/black as a color combination.
Red: They really committed to the artifact theme, which is both cool and a bit unfortunate. Artifacts certainly patch up monored's shortcomings in EDH, but I wish they'd taken the chance to make a few more competitive red cards (instead of more dumb dragons). The deck is screaming for Kurkesh, Onakke Ancient and Rings of Brighthearth.
Green: A bit too similar to the token swarm in the white deck, if you ask me, without enough "cares about elves" cards to justify the done-to-death theme. The only intriguing part of this is the land sacrifice subtheme in support of Titania, Protector of Argoth. Well, that and some of the new cards; the green lieutenant is definitely exciting enough to consider in the right competitive decks.
[EDIT]: Image gallery is here: http://magic.wizards.com/en/articles/archive/en-day-1-2014-10-23
Personally, I'm pretty satisfied with all of them. None are really carried through to their extreme version - Red could be running 40 artifacts and be even more dangerous, while white is missing a lot of the equipment shenanigans like leonin shikari, but there's a lot of good staples all around.
Except for freaking green. Tribal elves?! Get out.
Well obviously you cast it. I'm just talking about how this effect multiplies the already headache-inducing scramble of everyone flipping through their graveyards, other people's graveyards, activating tops, cracking fetchlands, considering tutor targets, and negotiating with other players for enabling their own schemes. "If you can sacrifice that, I can reanimate it, and I'll target him with the draw ETB ability so he can pull that kill spell on top of his library, which will kill that lord there which ticks the damage below lethal, so then you can ping the others, and I'll have mana up to counter that trick we know he pulled from his graveyard last turn..."
Or maybe it's just my games that end up like that.
I definitely like that the deck has a tighter zombie/demon token + murder theme. I'm actually surprised there's no Blood Speaker, considering how many demons are in the deck. I just know there's few things more tedious than an EDH game where I only get to drop one spell per go-around because my curve is bloated. Really kills my enthusiasm when I'm trying to build a board position and all I have is a fistful of 4- and 5-drop manasink creatures.