I agree with Bobwayne17 in that the best play with Elves is still Scout+Elder+Ezuri. I can't see black adding too much to that gameplan though, except for Postmortem Lunge, which doesn't need the colored mana.
The missing piece is the second mana-producing Elf 1-drop. Assuming using Avacyn's Pilgrim or Birds of Paradise is passable, the core of the Elf deck is still intact. It's slower now, but it can still pull off the overkill wins. The only changes I'd make would be to add a copy of Kessig Cagebreakers as a Green Sun's Zenith target, and make use of a couple of Postmortem Lunge as redundancy for the 'combo'.
I'm wondering if anyone is having trouble flipping mayor and keeping him that way? I ran a bunch of games vs puresteel and lost all but one. Delver is a house. I was also testing counterpart and it doesn't seem worth it. I'll test some more but I feel like with the limited amount of creatures we run it's not worth cloning a 1 or 2 drop for 3. Even if it is at instant speed and can't be flipped back. I like counterpart on paper but in game it seemed average i suppose.
Strangely enough, my experience with Cackling Counterpart is the opposite. Most of my wins are either from a protected Delver or timely Cackling Counterparts targeting Delver or a flipped Mayor. I have seldom been disappointed with it, since we have draw, filtering, and very cheap threats. The instant-speed flashback has even been relevant at times.
As you said, keeping a Mayor flipped is difficult. It's easy to flip him by not playing spells on your turn, and following that up with a Cackling Counterpart on the opponents turn (usually in response to one or more spells cast) is a great tempo play, I find. IMO, it fits into the deck's gameplan much better than Phantasmal Image.
I run a list very close to that posted by Dreamwalker, though I chose to omit Snapcasters (which may or may not be correct). This deck has become one of my favorites.
That's a perfectly fine direction to take it in, in my opinion. I've moved away from the all-in, toolbox approach, myself. I'm trying a much more aggressive approach, which has been interesting.
I just have a theoretical question here, am I the only person that thinks that 1 drops are really bad in this deck? If not, please explain why they are good. I mean, Llanowar Elves? Seriously? Even Birds is kinda iffy to me. Doesn't seem to do that much for you. I'm testing a list without 1 drops atm, and it works fairly well...
Aside from letting you drop a turn two Birthing Pod, the fact that they generate additional mana for a low investment is the main reason that they're run. Without sufficient mana, this deck will be too slow. Birds of Paradise is needed to support the color requirements if you're running opposing colors or 3-color versions.
It should be fine making use of two drop mana accelerators, if that fits into your plan better. A number of RUG and RG builds mainly use Lotus Cobra, for example. Lotus Cobra can't fit in all builds, though, due to land/mana base considerations.
These decks are a blast to play. There's immense satisfaction in knowing that I have an answer for nearly anything my opponent throws my way. If only the knowing consistently translated into the doing...
I have tinkered with toolbox versions (BG, BRG, BUG, GU), which is the most obvious direction to take. The problem with that approach, as all of you know by now, is that the added versatility sacrifices consistency too much. A plethora of 1-ofs and not drawing into or managing to stick a Birthing Pod equates to a random pile of relatively narrow cards.
Birthing Pod allows reusable, efficient creature tutoring that can’t be countered. However, this comes at the cost of an initial mana investment often accompanied by a loss of tempo in the early turns. This deck is very mana-intensive; without a large mana supply, the deck becomes too slow and can be easily overrun.
Furthermore, creatures generally have summoning sickness, hence the heavy focus on creatures with ETB effects. There's tension between attacking and podding.
In the end, consistency is king, so I tried a different tack: use a more aggressive shell instead of a controlling one. I had two requirements:
1) The strategy benefits from efficiently tutoring the same cards over and over again, hopefully without much loss of tempo,
2) The deck works without drawing into a Birthing Pod.
Except for the mana producers, all other creatures either have haste or ETB effects.
Lotus Cobras and Joraga Treespeakers, to a lesser extent, power this deck. Sticking a Lotus Cobra leads to degenerate plays such as turn three Inferno Titans, with the potential to pod into more.
Vengevines and Urabrask have haste, which is as good, if not better, than ETB effects in a more aggressive build. Untapping with an Urabrask lets you have both. There’s a lot of power behind Urabrask into Inferno Titans or Precursor Golems, with recurring Vengevines on the side. Multiple Urabrasks are addressed by natural attrition or podding into an Inferno Titan, followed by another Urabrask. Naturally there are times when the draws are awful, but such is Magic.
The other utility creatures (e.g. Manic Vandal, Acidic Slime, Magma Phoenix, Obstinate Baloth) that I tried to cram into the main deck before have been relegated to sideboard duty. Birthing Pod, similar to Fauna Shaman, allows for silver bullets. My sideboard is likely crap, so there’s little point in posting it. I’m a casual player who enjoys deckbuilding more than playing, so I don’t pay too much attention to metas, I’m afraid. The concept is sound though.
Unfortunately, even with these changes, the deck is still more midrange than ramp. Midrange strategies aren't that effective right now, so I highly doubt this can ever be top tier. I have fun tuning and playing it though, so I’m not too concerned.
That looks fine to me, except for the low number of outs to Abyssal Persecutor. At minimum, I would run eight ways to get rid of him maindeck. I run around ten when I use him. For that reason alone, I'd max out Gatekeeper of Malakir, and possibly add a Geth's Verdict or two.
I personally wouldn't maindeck Suffer the Past, either, but that depends on what your meta is like. You'll need reliable outs to Planeswalkers in your 75 -- either Vampire Hexmages or Hex Parasites.
I was wondering the same thing, myself, since I wasn't playing when it was first printed. As with other cards such as this with (mostly) symmetric effects, you can manipulate the situation to break the symmetry and come out ahead. The effects that appear negative at first glance can turn out to be either advantageous or non-issues.
The loss of life can be part of your strategy (e.g. Death's Shadow) or be largely irrelevant (e.g. if you're the beatdown).
The discard can be part of your strategy (e.g. enabling the Madness mechanic, ditching Vengevine or other creatures for recursion/animation).
Saccing a creature is a non-issue if you don't have one on the board or don't use any at all.
Sacrificing a land can also be relatively painless if your deck operates with only a few or runs non-land mana sources.
This deck is far from dead, I think. The core of the deck is still there. W/G with Shamans, Vengevines and Lead the Stampede has been good for me, and there should be other directions that the deck can take. This deck handles Splinter Twin well, which is still a contender. I can't say much for the Valakut match-up, but if you can pull off the infinite-life combo, you'd be golden I suppose.
I've tinkered with Jinxed Idol, myself, and I've found that including it in a more aggressive shell works better. The more controlling list like what you have will have a very tough time against aggro, I think. While you're busy searching for Jinxed Idols, your opponent will be happily bashing face. They won't really mind taking the pain from an idol or two, either.
Are you set on keeping the deck in Jund colors? I think you can do away with the green cards; most of what you need can be found in red or black. Threaten effects, plenty of low cost quality creatures (especially Abyssal Persecutors, multiples of which love Jinxed Idol), mass removal, and card draw. I've found that a mix like that works well. That's probably a totally different deck though.
Keeping the list close to what you have, I would suggest taking out Noxious Revivals and adding Fauna Shamans (since you're already packing Bloodghasts) to search for bullets instead of keeping full sets of Bazaar Traders and Phyrexian Revokers, which are both situational. That also allows you to search for synergistic cards like Kozilek's Predator or Mitotic Slime. Vengevines could also work, making your deck more aggressive, as long as you keep your curve low.
The missing piece is the second mana-producing Elf 1-drop. Assuming using Avacyn's Pilgrim or Birds of Paradise is passable, the core of the Elf deck is still intact. It's slower now, but it can still pull off the overkill wins. The only changes I'd make would be to add a copy of Kessig Cagebreakers as a Green Sun's Zenith target, and make use of a couple of Postmortem Lunge as redundancy for the 'combo'.
Strangely enough, my experience with Cackling Counterpart is the opposite. Most of my wins are either from a protected Delver or timely Cackling Counterparts targeting Delver or a flipped Mayor. I have seldom been disappointed with it, since we have draw, filtering, and very cheap threats. The instant-speed flashback has even been relevant at times.
As you said, keeping a Mayor flipped is difficult. It's easy to flip him by not playing spells on your turn, and following that up with a Cackling Counterpart on the opponents turn (usually in response to one or more spells cast) is a great tempo play, I find. IMO, it fits into the deck's gameplan much better than Phantasmal Image.
I run a list very close to that posted by Dreamwalker, though I chose to omit Snapcasters (which may or may not be correct). This deck has become one of my favorites.
A mix of Arc Trails and Slagstorms/Pyroclasms should help.
Aside from letting you drop a turn two Birthing Pod, the fact that they generate additional mana for a low investment is the main reason that they're run. Without sufficient mana, this deck will be too slow. Birds of Paradise is needed to support the color requirements if you're running opposing colors or 3-color versions.
It should be fine making use of two drop mana accelerators, if that fits into your plan better. A number of RUG and RG builds mainly use Lotus Cobra, for example. Lotus Cobra can't fit in all builds, though, due to land/mana base considerations.
I have tinkered with toolbox versions (BG, BRG, BUG, GU), which is the most obvious direction to take. The problem with that approach, as all of you know by now, is that the added versatility sacrifices consistency too much. A plethora of 1-ofs and not drawing into or managing to stick a Birthing Pod equates to a random pile of relatively narrow cards.
Birthing Pod allows reusable, efficient creature tutoring that can’t be countered. However, this comes at the cost of an initial mana investment often accompanied by a loss of tempo in the early turns. This deck is very mana-intensive; without a large mana supply, the deck becomes too slow and can be easily overrun.
Furthermore, creatures generally have summoning sickness, hence the heavy focus on creatures with ETB effects. There's tension between attacking and podding.
In the end, consistency is king, so I tried a different tack: use a more aggressive shell instead of a controlling one. I had two requirements:
1) The strategy benefits from efficiently tutoring the same cards over and over again, hopefully without much loss of tempo,
2) The deck works without drawing into a Birthing Pod.
I ended up with this contraption:
4 Joraga Treespeaker
1 Birds of Paradise
4 Lotus Cobra
2 Cunning Sparkmage
2 Tuktuk the Explorer
4 Vengevine
4 Urabrask the Hidden
2 Precursor Golem
4 Inferno Titan
4 Lightning Bolt
Artifacts
4 Birthing Pod
Lands
4 Rootbound Crag
4 Copperline Gorge
4 Verdant Catacombs
2 Misty Rainforest
2 Raging Ravine
4 Forest
5 Mountain
Except for the mana producers, all other creatures either have haste or ETB effects.
Lotus Cobras and Joraga Treespeakers, to a lesser extent, power this deck. Sticking a Lotus Cobra leads to degenerate plays such as turn three Inferno Titans, with the potential to pod into more.
Vengevines and Urabrask have haste, which is as good, if not better, than ETB effects in a more aggressive build. Untapping with an Urabrask lets you have both. There’s a lot of power behind Urabrask into Inferno Titans or Precursor Golems, with recurring Vengevines on the side. Multiple Urabrasks are addressed by natural attrition or podding into an Inferno Titan, followed by another Urabrask. Naturally there are times when the draws are awful, but such is Magic.
The other utility creatures (e.g. Manic Vandal, Acidic Slime, Magma Phoenix, Obstinate Baloth) that I tried to cram into the main deck before have been relegated to sideboard duty. Birthing Pod, similar to Fauna Shaman, allows for silver bullets. My sideboard is likely crap, so there’s little point in posting it. I’m a casual player who enjoys deckbuilding more than playing, so I don’t pay too much attention to metas, I’m afraid. The concept is sound though.
Unfortunately, even with these changes, the deck is still more midrange than ramp. Midrange strategies aren't that effective right now, so I highly doubt this can ever be top tier. I have fun tuning and playing it though, so I’m not too concerned.
I personally wouldn't maindeck Suffer the Past, either, but that depends on what your meta is like. You'll need reliable outs to Planeswalkers in your 75 -- either Vampire Hexmages or Hex Parasites.
The loss of life can be part of your strategy (e.g. Death's Shadow) or be largely irrelevant (e.g. if you're the beatdown).
The discard can be part of your strategy (e.g. enabling the Madness mechanic, ditching Vengevine or other creatures for recursion/animation).
Saccing a creature is a non-issue if you don't have one on the board or don't use any at all.
Sacrificing a land can also be relatively painless if your deck operates with only a few or runs non-land mana sources.
It's an interesting card, to be sure.
Are you set on keeping the deck in Jund colors? I think you can do away with the green cards; most of what you need can be found in red or black. Threaten effects, plenty of low cost quality creatures (especially Abyssal Persecutors, multiples of which love Jinxed Idol), mass removal, and card draw. I've found that a mix like that works well. That's probably a totally different deck though.
Keeping the list close to what you have, I would suggest taking out Noxious Revivals and adding Fauna Shamans (since you're already packing Bloodghasts) to search for bullets instead of keeping full sets of Bazaar Traders and Phyrexian Revokers, which are both situational. That also allows you to search for synergistic cards like Kozilek's Predator or Mitotic Slime. Vengevines could also work, making your deck more aggressive, as long as you keep your curve low.