Okay; Minamo was sort of a last-minute addition - I saw it mentioned in the Merfolk Primer as having really good synergy with Wake Thrasher.
That's alright, it's not a very significant part of the deck's strategy anyway =P ...any comments on the rest of the deck?
Minamo, School at Water's Edge can further buff the Thrasher by untapping itself repeatedly, limited only by the amount of blue mana you have available.
If you have an opportunity for the Wake Thrasher to swing through unblocked, or if you just want to pump him up to easily overpower any blockers on the field, Minamo gives a cheap and easy way to do that.
Hey all, I've been batting around a possible deck idea, using the following cards. I haven't tested it or anything (cuz I don't have most of these cards at this point, haha), but I'd love some input:
Deck is fairly self-explanatory, I think ...the goal is to keep your opponent's side of the board locked down with cards like the Lawkeeper, Sleep, and Opposition, as well as a number of counter/exile spells. At the same time, there are a number of potential win-cons in the deck, which concentrate on getting the best value for each of the cards chosen - maximizing the cards' abilities to get the maximum benefit from them.
Examples:
...Every card that taps your opponent's creatures gives you a +1/+1 counter on Gideon's Avenger. Since there are so many different options available for this, you could potentially be gaining power and toughness equal to the number of creatures your opponent has on the field, EVERY turn, with EACH of your Avengers.
...Every card that taps YOUR permanents gives Wake Thrasher +1/+1 on your next turn, which could potentially be equal to all of your Lands AND Creatures. Minamo, School at Water's Edge can further buff the Thrasher by untapping itself repeatedly, limited only by the amount of blue mana you have available.
...So, cards like Gideon's Lawkeeper, Opposition, and Sleep will buff both your Avengers and the Thrashers at the same time.
...After A) you cast sleep B) you tap all of your opponent's creatures on their turn using Opposition/Lawkeeper or C) your opponent commits to an all-in attack, drop a Sunblast Angel to nuke all creatures on your opponent's side of the field.
This deck has a bunch of cards that can pack a huge punch, and another thing that I feel it would do really well is create opportunities for those heavy hitters to get through, because while this deck has an excellent defence, it also excels at picking apart and dismantling your opponent's defences. Having all your blockers either tapped or exiled (which should be easily achieved by this deck) is pretty sucky when your opponent is swinging in with two or three 12/12 Wake Thrashers (which is also very easy to accomplish) ...which becomes 200% worse if True Conviction is also in play.
So, what do you guys think? Is this deck idea workable? Is the mana-base/mana-curve okay, or unusable? A lot of these cards require more than one non-generic mana to cast, and most of them require 3+ mana to cast. Is the deck too slow? ...also, assuming a 24-land mana base, what would you recommend for the remaining 2 spots? Something like Betrayal? Palliation Accord?
I thought it was an interesting deck concept ...a nice mix of control and aggro, shutting down your opponent's side of the board while pumping up your beaters like crazy. Sounds like fun? I welcome your feedback.
Yes; if you want to play without the vial and still be able to play out your cards quickly, you'll want to include Stonybrook Banneret and Merrow Reejerey.
Yes, I'd say that a budget Merfolk Aggro deck is very possible =P the least budget-friendly Merfolk Aggro card that I know of is Aether Vial, which is about $11-$15 each, but you could build a deck without them.
Hey everyone,
It's been a while since I posted here... probably cuz it's been a while since I played any Magic? =P Anyway, I've really enjoyed my Merfolk Deck, but I feel it could use a bit of tweaking to be more focused - as it stands, I think it may be trying to do too many things at once. I just purchased a bunch of different cards to modify my deck, and I figured I would be able make three distinctly different (or, at least somewhat different =P) decks. I would appreciate some input. It would be nice if I could stick with the cards I've got, since I just spent a bunch of money on new ones, but if there are more that I'm missing, I'm open to suggestions.
Anyway, here are the three decks:
Looking at it now, I realize that this just leaves space for 20 lands ...is that okay considering how low the casting cost of the creatures is (further aided by the inclusion of Banneret/Reejerey), or would I be better off running 22 or 24, for more consistent land drawing? Also, I know Aether Vial is ace, but I didn't have the budget for it at the moment.
The Leviathan and Levitation don't REALLY need to be in there, but I thought they could be fun... the Leviathan is pretty expensive and isn't a Merfolk, but if the game DOES drag on that long, he would make a great beatstick (and does have good synergy with an Islandwalk Aggro deck). Thoughts?
This is a bit of a departure from what I've done before, in that it's much more Control-focused. I have a few questions about this one too...
Should Fallowsage be a 4-of? I know it's a bit on the Heavy-Casting-Cost side for a Merfolk, but again, with the Banneret and Reejerey I don't think that will be too bad? ...plus, with Opposition and Merrow Commerce on the field, I could gain some major card advantage from him - more, I think, than from Silvergill Adept? ...or is that a better choice due to its cheaper casting cost?
Also, does this deck cover its bases well enough? It has several ways to deal with whatever the opponent does, whether it's countering cards or locking down stuff that's already on the field. It seems to me that this deck would rely on lots of token-generation to overwhelm the opponent (as well as creating tap-fest fodder for Opposition). Would this work? Does it need more of anything (removal?)?
Again, this is quite different from anything I've played before. I think that with Drowner, Thief, Schoolmaster, Fallowsage, and Judge on the field, I could be in a pretty nice position - heavy milling, card advantage, life gain, and token production (which results in more of all of the above), all of which is increased by 100% for each copy of Merrow Commerce I have out. What I'm wondering is...
Which would be more beneficial in this deck - Counterspell or Sage's Dousing? I'd like to run one of them. I guess SD would be a bit more situational - its cost is reduced by the Bannerets and it cantrips, but it's not quite as fool-proof as Counterspell.
As far as the other undecided spells go, I'm mostly wondering about quantities, and which would be best to include. 3-4 Counters? 3-4 Merrow Commerce? 2-4 Silvergill Adept? 2-3 Oblivion Ring?
Sorry for all the text ...thanks for reading all of it though =D ...unless of course you didn't, in which case you probably... aren't... reading... this . . . ha.
I appreciate your input guys =) Cheers!
I've been really enjoying my Merfolk deck, and I was thinking of trying out some new things - specifically, focusing on Milling.
I was just wondering, which are the most important cards to include, and which ones don't really fit? ...because I don't think fitting all of these in is very realistic =P
It should work really well ...I haven't been able to test it with Merrow Commerce yet because I have yet to get ahold of it, but running Wake Thrasher with Opposition was great - getting the Wake Thrasher to 10/10+ was no problem.
Running Merrow Commerce at the same time would make things that much better, since I could use any of my creatures to attack on my turn AND shut my opponent down on their turn with Opposition.
Yeah, it does, because all your cards will untap at the end of your opponent's turn. Thus, he gets no bonus for your turn either, as there is nothing to untap apart from your lands that you tapped during their end step.
What if you are running Wake Thrasher and Merrow Commerce AND Opposition?
All of your Merfolk would untap at the end of your turn, but you would then be tapping them on your opponent's turn to lock down their creatures/mana, right? ...and once your untap step comes, you would be untapping your lands AND your creatures, boosting the Wake Thrasher quite a bit more... or am I wrong?
Whatever bonus the Wake Thrasher had on it from the beginning of your turn would be cancelled anyway though when your turn ends, right? ...so, does it make that much difference?
Hey guys, not sure if this is the right place for this question, but maybe some of you can shed some light on this?
...I was wondering about what happens when you have Wake Thrasher AND Merrow Commerce out. When MC un-taps all your creatures at the end of your turn, does the WT have the +x/+x for your opponent's turn, or does that get immediately canceled?
Hey everyone, I tweaked my deck idea a bit, trimming out some of the unnecessary stuff and (hopefully) getting it a bit more focused. What do you think?
A few things:
I thought that the Stormtide Leviathan would work well, since it limits my opponent's attacking capabilities while simultaneously bringing Islandwalk into effect (since it makes all lands islands in addition to their actual type) - a lot of the Merfolk have Islandwalk already, and if the LoA is on the field, ALL my Merfolk would have it, effectively making my whole army unblockable. I also thought that it would be good as a later-game bully creature ...am I wrong?
Also, if I were to sub out the Grimoire Thieves, what would be a good replacement? Would I be better off having 4 of something instead of 2, or getting 2 other cards? Perhaps Aquitect's Will ?
Finally, do y'all think it would be best for me to drop the spell-canceling cards in favor of something else? I know the deck is a bit more aggression-focused, but having the ability to mess with the opponent and protect myself doesn't seem like a bad thing...
I know it would probably be simpler to start with a beast deck or something, but I prefer a bit more finesse over brute force. *Shrug*
Hey y'all, I'm extremely new to MtG; it's a bit tough knowing where/how to start, but I've been trying to read up on stuff and figure out what I'd like to do for my first deck. Here's a rough idea for a Merfolk-themed deck - clearly, this would only be for casual play with friends at this point.
Also, since this is the first deck concept I have tried to put together, I expect that it will have quite a few major flaws to be addressed... I would appreciate any input from you guys =) thanks a lot!
That's alright, it's not a very significant part of the deck's strategy anyway =P ...any comments on the rest of the deck?
If you have an opportunity for the Wake Thrasher to swing through unblocked, or if you just want to pump him up to easily overpower any blockers on the field, Minamo gives a cheap and easy way to do that.
4 Gideon's Lawkeeper
4 Gideon's Avenger
4 Wake Thrasher
4 Wall of Frost
2 Sunblast Angel
4 Counterspell / Mana Leak
4 Swords to Plowshares
Enchantments/Sorceries:
3 Sleep
3 Opposition
2 True Conviction
2 Oblivion Ring
4 Glacial Fortress
4 Sejiri Refuge
1 Minamo, School at Water's Edge
Deck is fairly self-explanatory, I think ...the goal is to keep your opponent's side of the board locked down with cards like the Lawkeeper, Sleep, and Opposition, as well as a number of counter/exile spells. At the same time, there are a number of potential win-cons in the deck, which concentrate on getting the best value for each of the cards chosen - maximizing the cards' abilities to get the maximum benefit from them.
Examples:
...Every card that taps your opponent's creatures gives you a +1/+1 counter on Gideon's Avenger. Since there are so many different options available for this, you could potentially be gaining power and toughness equal to the number of creatures your opponent has on the field, EVERY turn, with EACH of your Avengers.
...Every card that taps YOUR permanents gives Wake Thrasher +1/+1 on your next turn, which could potentially be equal to all of your Lands AND Creatures. Minamo, School at Water's Edge can further buff the Thrasher by untapping itself repeatedly, limited only by the amount of blue mana you have available.
...So, cards like Gideon's Lawkeeper, Opposition, and Sleep will buff both your Avengers and the Thrashers at the same time.
...After A) you cast sleep B) you tap all of your opponent's creatures on their turn using Opposition/Lawkeeper or C) your opponent commits to an all-in attack, drop a Sunblast Angel to nuke all creatures on your opponent's side of the field.
This deck has a bunch of cards that can pack a huge punch, and another thing that I feel it would do really well is create opportunities for those heavy hitters to get through, because while this deck has an excellent defence, it also excels at picking apart and dismantling your opponent's defences. Having all your blockers either tapped or exiled (which should be easily achieved by this deck) is pretty sucky when your opponent is swinging in with two or three 12/12 Wake Thrashers (which is also very easy to accomplish) ...which becomes 200% worse if True Conviction is also in play.
So, what do you guys think? Is this deck idea workable? Is the mana-base/mana-curve okay, or unusable? A lot of these cards require more than one non-generic mana to cast, and most of them require 3+ mana to cast. Is the deck too slow? ...also, assuming a 24-land mana base, what would you recommend for the remaining 2 spots? Something like Betrayal? Palliation Accord?
I thought it was an interesting deck concept ...a nice mix of control and aggro, shutting down your opponent's side of the board while pumping up your beaters like crazy. Sounds like fun? I welcome your feedback.
It's been a while since I posted here... probably cuz it's been a while since I played any Magic? =P Anyway, I've really enjoyed my Merfolk Deck, but I feel it could use a bit of tweaking to be more focused - as it stands, I think it may be trying to do too many things at once. I just purchased a bunch of different cards to modify my deck, and I figured I would be able make three distinctly different (or, at least somewhat different =P) decks. I would appreciate some input. It would be nice if I could stick with the cards I've got, since I just spent a bunch of money on new ones, but if there are more that I'm missing, I'm open to suggestions.
Anyway, here are the three decks:
4 Lord of Atlantis
4 Merrow Reejerey
4 Coralhelm Commander
4 Wake Thrasher
4 Stonybrook Banneret
4 Silvergill Adept
4 Harpoon Sniper
2 Stormtide Leviathan (?)
4 Aquitect's Will
4 Oblivion Ring
2 Levitation (?)
Looking at it now, I realize that this just leaves space for 20 lands ...is that okay considering how low the casting cost of the creatures is (further aided by the inclusion of Banneret/Reejerey), or would I be better off running 22 or 24, for more consistent land drawing? Also, I know Aether Vial is ace, but I didn't have the budget for it at the moment.
The Leviathan and Levitation don't REALLY need to be in there, but I thought they could be fun... the Leviathan is pretty expensive and isn't a Merfolk, but if the game DOES drag on that long, he would make a great beatstick (and does have good synergy with an Islandwalk Aggro deck). Thoughts?
4 Merrow Reejerey
4 Cursecatcher
4 Stonybrook Schoolmaster
4 Fallowsage (?)
4 Stonybrook Banneret
4 Judge of Currents
3 Merrow Commerce
3 Opposition
2 Summon the School
4 Counterspell
4 Sage's Dousing
This is a bit of a departure from what I've done before, in that it's much more Control-focused. I have a few questions about this one too...
Should Fallowsage be a 4-of? I know it's a bit on the Heavy-Casting-Cost side for a Merfolk, but again, with the Banneret and Reejerey I don't think that will be too bad? ...plus, with Opposition and Merrow Commerce on the field, I could gain some major card advantage from him - more, I think, than from Silvergill Adept? ...or is that a better choice due to its cheaper casting cost?
Also, does this deck cover its bases well enough? It has several ways to deal with whatever the opponent does, whether it's countering cards or locking down stuff that's already on the field. It seems to me that this deck would rely on lots of token-generation to overwhelm the opponent (as well as creating tap-fest fodder for Opposition). Would this work? Does it need more of anything (removal?)?
4 Merrow Reejerey
4 Drowner of Secrets
4 Grimoire Thief
4 Stonybrook Schoolmaster
4 Fallowsage (?)
4 Stonybrook Banneret
4 Judge of Currents
Again, this is quite different from anything I've played before. I think that with Drowner, Thief, Schoolmaster, Fallowsage, and Judge on the field, I could be in a pretty nice position - heavy milling, card advantage, life gain, and token production (which results in more of all of the above), all of which is increased by 100% for each copy of Merrow Commerce I have out. What I'm wondering is...
Which would be more beneficial in this deck - Counterspell or Sage's Dousing? I'd like to run one of them. I guess SD would be a bit more situational - its cost is reduced by the Bannerets and it cantrips, but it's not quite as fool-proof as Counterspell.
As far as the other undecided spells go, I'm mostly wondering about quantities, and which would be best to include. 3-4 Counters? 3-4 Merrow Commerce? 2-4 Silvergill Adept? 2-3 Oblivion Ring?
Sorry for all the text ...thanks for reading all of it though =D ...unless of course you didn't, in which case you probably... aren't... reading... this . . . ha.
I appreciate your input guys =) Cheers!
I've been really enjoying my Merfolk deck, and I was thinking of trying out some new things - specifically, focusing on Milling.
I was just wondering, which are the most important cards to include, and which ones don't really fit? ...because I don't think fitting all of these in is very realistic =P
Stonybrook Banneret
Merrow Reejerey
Judge of Currents
Silvergill Adept
Grimoire Thief
Drowner of Secrets
Stonybrook Schoolmaster
Fallowsage
Merrow Commerce
Summon the School
Swords to Plowshares
Shared Discovery
Jace's Erasure
Jace Beleren
Magus of the Moat
Running Merrow Commerce at the same time would make things that much better, since I could use any of my creatures to attack on my turn AND shut my opponent down on their turn with Opposition.
What if you are running Wake Thrasher and Merrow Commerce AND Opposition?
All of your Merfolk would untap at the end of your turn, but you would then be tapping them on your opponent's turn to lock down their creatures/mana, right? ...and once your untap step comes, you would be untapping your lands AND your creatures, boosting the Wake Thrasher quite a bit more... or am I wrong?
...I was wondering about what happens when you have Wake Thrasher AND Merrow Commerce out. When MC un-taps all your creatures at the end of your turn, does the WT have the +x/+x for your opponent's turn, or does that get immediately canceled?
4 Stonybrook Bannerets
4 Lord of Atlantis
4 Wake Thrasher
4 Merrow Reejerey
4 Judge of Currents
4 Sejiri Merfolk
2 Sygg, River Guide
3 Opposition
3 Aquitect's Will
19 Islands
5 Plains
A few things:
I thought that the Stormtide Leviathan would work well, since it limits my opponent's attacking capabilities while simultaneously bringing Islandwalk into effect (since it makes all lands islands in addition to their actual type) - a lot of the Merfolk have Islandwalk already, and if the LoA is on the field, ALL my Merfolk would have it, effectively making my whole army unblockable. I also thought that it would be good as a later-game bully creature ...am I wrong?
Also, if I were to sub out the Grimoire Thieves, what would be a good replacement? Would I be better off having 4 of something instead of 2, or getting 2 other cards? Perhaps Aquitect's Will ?
Finally, do y'all think it would be best for me to drop the spell-canceling cards in favor of something else? I know the deck is a bit more aggression-focused, but having the ability to mess with the opponent and protect myself doesn't seem like a bad thing...
I know it would probably be simpler to start with a
Thanks for all the input, everyone
Also, since this is the first deck concept I have tried to put together, I expect that it will have quite a few major flaws to be addressed... I would appreciate any input from you guys =) thanks a lot!
19 Islands
5 Plains
Creatures
4 Stonybrook Bannerets
4 Lord of Atlantis
4 Wake Thrasher
2 Sygg, River Guide
2 Judge of Currents
2 Merrow Reejerey
2 Grimoire Thief
2 Stormtide Leviathan
2 Aether Vial
Spells
2 Summon the School
2 Merrow Commerce
4 Force of Will
4 Mana Drain