THis deck has been running pretty well for me. There's been the occasional little stumble, but largely it's been setting up just fine and, barring one where an opponent played Insurrection and nobody had the counterspell, it's won every game it's had a good running in. (It's lost a few games, but sometimes in highlander formats you just don't get any synergy. That's life.)
I love the fact that you decided to do something with an original Elder Dragon!
But I have to say, and I really mean this in the nicest possible way: It all feels a bit random, meaning that there's no cohesion. I'm unsure what the goal with this deck is. It's not necessarily a bad thing. Goodstuff decks are great fun to play with! I'm going to make comment on a few cards that I feel are out of place or can be replaced with better ones.
- Nykthos, Shrine to Nyx: You play a 3-color deck so the chances of you getting a good yield out of this are pretty slim.
- Skarrg, the Rage Pits: can easily be replaced by the much better Kessig Wolfrun.
- Din of the Fireherd: While a great card, oustside of competitive this kind of land destruction is at least frowned upon.
- Firespout: Might end up hurting you alot. If it's flying creatures you're worried about Spidersilk Armor is men's best friend.
- Nature's Spiral: Replace with Regrowth or Recollect.
- Plague Wind: Normally, there's not alot of regenerating creatures in an EDH enviroment, I have replaced mine with In Garruk's Wake wich also destroys those pesky Planeswalkers.
- Fated Conflageration: This one has 3 red mana in it's casting cost. That's alot. If I play a card in a 3-color deck with 3 mana of one color in it, it has to do alot more than this one.
- Instill Energy & Scryb Ranger: I'm not sure if there's a combo I'm missing here..
- Ruric Thar, the Unbowed: You play around 28 creatures meaning that you play even more non-creatures. That's a world of hurt.
- Greed: Erebos, God of the Dead also prevents your opponents from gaining life.
- Nighthowler & Pharika, God of Affliction: Aside from being counterproductive, there's not enough creatures in the deck to have them really do anything. Nighthowler's still usefull if your opponents have creatures in their graveyard, but I would replace the other.
- Haunting Wind: You have 4 artifacts in your deck that tap or have to be activated. I love this card though! I would advise you to replace the Sensei's Divining Top with Sylvan Library, Coalition Relic with something like Fertilid, Kusari-Gama with Balefire Dragon and Sol Ring with Joraga Treespeaker or something similar. Pretty doable, except for the expensive Library.
I hope you find my comments helpful.
Nykthos works in the same kind of way as Xenagos + ability for me, in that it gives me just enough extra to be able to clear my hand AND still be able to pump Vaevictus a bit. It's never amazing, but it regularly gets me 6-8 mana off it's activation, which I think is enough
Skarrg - You're right, but I don't have/know anyone with a Kessig Wolf Run
Din of the Fireherd - The land destruction can get me quite a few bad reactions, but sometimes you need to wipe just that one guys board, and this does it better than anything else I have.
Firespout - I actually have a reasonable number of flyers myself, but other than tokens I don't kill much of my own board with either mode of Firespout, and the option to do one or both is really nice.
Nature's Spiral - Again, you're right. This one I'll switch.
Plague Wind - A lot of my friends are running stuff like Diluvian Primordial etc just now. Not hitting their planeswalkers to me is a fine trade off for them not hitting mine when it happens. Often. The no regenerate clause is a nice kicker thats came up at least once. I'd consider running both cards, to be honest.
Fated Conflagration - You're right, it's not amazing. Good cut here.
Instill Energy & Scryb Ranger - Mostly in the deck to let me block with Vaevictis or get multiple activations off tap effects like Xira Arien/Nettling Imp. Nothing amazing, but nice random effectiveness. Will likely cut Instill Energy (though the hate is nice.)
Ruric Thar - Most of my effective cards that I will be casting late game are big creatures, by and large, which means that I avoid it most of the time it's relevant, especially, again, compared with my spell heavy meta.
Greed - Yup, need to swap this for Erebos.
Nighthowler & Pharika - Largely agree. Keep Howler, cut the God.
Haunting Wind - Other than Kusari-Gama I'm not likely to be using the artifacts repeatedly, this is a "just in case" against the friends who have Sharuum and Sydri decks, to try and keep some of their interactions in check. (Plus, I loan out my Marchesa Artifact deck a lot, and that thing gets out of hand if nobody stops it.)
Top for Library - can't afford.
Relic for Fertilid - I'm already running more searchers than basics. The ratio is okay now, but I'd need to revamp the mana base (more than I am going to with fetches) to do this.
Sol Ring for Treespeaker - Having just the Ring and the Relic be shut down on my end (and maybe Top) is okay to stop much more on the opponents for when it's needed.
Balefire Dragon for Kusari-Gama - Kusari-Gama puts them in a no-win situation with Vaevictis whereby I will one-sided wrath them, or just commander damage them out.
Thanks for your comments, and I hope I didn't just brush off too much of what you said.
You're right in that this can feel like a "good stuff" deck, but that's because Vaevictis isn't particularly a "build-around" kind of commander.
Private Mod Note
():
Rollback Post to RevisionRollBack
To post a comment, please login or register a new account.
Anything you don't like or that I'm missing?
Creatures
1x Avenger of Zendikar
1x Birds of Paradise
1x Brooding Saurian
1x Caller of the Claw
1x Crypt Ghast
1x Eternal Witness
1x Generator Servant
1x Inferno Titan
1x Krosan Tusker
1x Mold Shambler
1x Nacatl War-Pride
1x Nettling Imp
1x Nighthowler
1x Ophiomancer
1x Pharika, God of Affliction
1x Prossh, Skyraider of Kher
1x Purphoros, God of the Forge
1x Reaper of the Wilds
1x Ruric Thar, the Unbowed
1x Sakura-Tribe Elder
1x Scryb Ranger
1x Shattergang Brothers
1x Soul of the Harvest
1x Terastodon
1x Verdant Force
1x Wall of Blossoms
1x Xenagos, God of Revels
1x Xira Arien
Enchantments
1x Dictate of Erebos
1x Greed
1x Haunting Wind
1x Instill Energy
1x Phyrexian Arena
1x Quest for Renewal
1x Whip of Erebos
1x Fated Conflagration
1x Fated Return
1x Harrow
1x Hit//Run
1x Putrefy
1x Slaughter
1x Sudden Death
1x Terminate
Sorcery
1x Decimate
1x Din of the Fireherd
1x Firespout
1x Kodama's Reach
1x Nature's SPiral
1x Plague Wind
1x Restore
Artifact
1x Coalition Relic
1x Kusari-Gama
1x Nevinyrral's Disk
1x Sensei's Divining Top
1x Sol Ring
1x Swiftfoot Boots
Planeswalkers
1x Garruk, Apex Predator
1x Liliana Vess
1x Vraska the Unseen
1x Xenagos, the reveler
Land
1x Akoum Refuge
1x Bojuka Bog
1x Command Tower
1x Evolving Wilds
4x Forest
1x Golgari Guildgate
1x Golgari Rot Farm
1x Grim Backwoods
1x Gruul Guildgate
1x Highland Weald
1x Jund Panorama
1x Karplusan Forest
1x Kazandu Refuge
1x Khalni garden
1x Kher Keep
1x Lavaclaw Reaches
1x Llanowar Reborn
1x Mountain
1x Nykthos, Shrine to Nyx
1x Opal Palace
1x Oran-Rief, the Vastwood
1x Rakdos Guildgate
1x Rupture Spire
1x Savage Lands
1x Skarrg, the Rage Pits
1x Spawning Pool
2x Swamp
1x Temple of Abandon
1x Temple of Malice
1x Temple of the False God
1x Terramorphic Expanse
1x Tranquil Thicket
1x Urborg, tomb of Yawgmoth
1x Vivid Grove
1x Vivid Marsh
(also posted on Tappedout: http://tappedout.net/mtg-decks/vaevictis-asmadi-an-actual-elder-dragon-deck/ )
Nykthos works in the same kind of way as Xenagos + ability for me, in that it gives me just enough extra to be able to clear my hand AND still be able to pump Vaevictus a bit. It's never amazing, but it regularly gets me 6-8 mana off it's activation, which I think is enough
Skarrg - You're right, but I don't have/know anyone with a Kessig Wolf Run
Din of the Fireherd - The land destruction can get me quite a few bad reactions, but sometimes you need to wipe just that one guys board, and this does it better than anything else I have.
Firespout - I actually have a reasonable number of flyers myself, but other than tokens I don't kill much of my own board with either mode of Firespout, and the option to do one or both is really nice.
Nature's Spiral - Again, you're right. This one I'll switch.
Plague Wind - A lot of my friends are running stuff like Diluvian Primordial etc just now. Not hitting their planeswalkers to me is a fine trade off for them not hitting mine when it happens. Often. The no regenerate clause is a nice kicker thats came up at least once. I'd consider running both cards, to be honest.
Fated Conflagration - You're right, it's not amazing. Good cut here.
Instill Energy & Scryb Ranger - Mostly in the deck to let me block with Vaevictis or get multiple activations off tap effects like Xira Arien/Nettling Imp. Nothing amazing, but nice random effectiveness. Will likely cut Instill Energy (though the hate is nice.)
Ruric Thar - Most of my effective cards that I will be casting late game are big creatures, by and large, which means that I avoid it most of the time it's relevant, especially, again, compared with my spell heavy meta.
Greed - Yup, need to swap this for Erebos.
Nighthowler & Pharika - Largely agree. Keep Howler, cut the God.
Haunting Wind - Other than Kusari-Gama I'm not likely to be using the artifacts repeatedly, this is a "just in case" against the friends who have Sharuum and Sydri decks, to try and keep some of their interactions in check. (Plus, I loan out my Marchesa Artifact deck a lot, and that thing gets out of hand if nobody stops it.)
Top for Library - can't afford.
Relic for Fertilid - I'm already running more searchers than basics. The ratio is okay now, but I'd need to revamp the mana base (more than I am going to with fetches) to do this.
Sol Ring for Treespeaker - Having just the Ring and the Relic be shut down on my end (and maybe Top) is okay to stop much more on the opponents for when it's needed.
Balefire Dragon for Kusari-Gama - Kusari-Gama puts them in a no-win situation with Vaevictis whereby I will one-sided wrath them, or just commander damage them out.
Thanks for your comments, and I hope I didn't just brush off too much of what you said.
You're right in that this can feel like a "good stuff" deck, but that's because Vaevictis isn't particularly a "build-around" kind of commander.