MTG Salvation

My deck works around a couple main themes, Derevi letting me abuse both my mana base and a couple cheap tap effects for card advantage.
The deck is still in the starting phases so any suggestions would be appreciated.

I rely on Roon, Mistmeadow Witch, Conjurers Closet or Venser to do my flickering, their main flicker targets are the primordials, karmic guide for recovering from a board wipe, mimic or metamorph to change my copy target and possibly get extra CITP abilities.

Derevi also lets me abuse certain tap abilities with the combat triggers on the stack, Azami, Skyward Eye Prophets and Banishing Knack abuse that greatly. Derevi's untap ability can also be greatly abused with cards like mana vault and gilded lotus for easy renewable mana, or in the case of Blue Sun Zenith, refill your hand on the quick by having multiple triggers target a lotus or vault and get a ton of mana in your pool and cast zenith before the second main phase.

Food Chain brings a lot to the table being able to flow through the top end of the deck easily since derevi can always come back at a gain, between the fact that he goes out for 4 mana of any one color, and comes back in to untap a land or a mana rock.

Tooth and Nail can virtually finish the game bringing out multiple combinations depending on the opponent and board state, the most resiliant is Avacyn/Iona which can virtually shut down opposing deck options. Other tooth combos include either clone effect if theres a viable target already on board, sylvan primordial and acidic slime to pop multiple targets at once, Im planning to add a dead eye navigator to give even more possibilities both off tooth and in tandem with derevi.

Commandeer is a fun thing i think to add in because you can give the illusion of being tapped out, only to capture their Karn/Nicol Bolas/ or decent mana rock all which doubly hinder your opponents at your advantage.

Have you tried Eternal Witness? In my Derevi deck that I am putting together it is a champ.

Yea, ive definitely considered witness, its pretty powerful for getting things back with blink effects, but im not sure what would be best to take out for a witness, maybe a daxos.... but i like daxos a lot for 2 reasons, 1 i can take my opponents threats, and 2 hes virtually unblockable ensuring derevi triggers.

maybe you can offer a better suggestion to what i should switch out for Witness?

Quote from RuneWalsh

maybe you can offer a better suggestion to what i should switch out for Witness?

beck/call?

Its a pretty average card and isn't really on theme. 8 mana for dudes and mediocre draw is pretty meh.

normally i would agree, but the evaluation becomes a bit different when it comes to derevi, you get the benefit of untapping permanants when you have creatures that deal damage to a player so 4 flyers in 1 shot is pretty powerful there, but the beck half has many other uses, with avenger of zendikar you suddenly draw cards equal to the number of land you control, and using both halves still fills your hand nicely in a pinch.

do people think i should try to get more effects that gain benefit from tap/untap effects? if so what are good suggestions?

Quote from RuneWalsh

do people think i should try to get more effects that gain benefit from tap/untap effects? if so what are good suggestions?

If you want to run blink, you might do better with Roon or Jenera. Derevi is about the untap, and right now you are splitting yourself between two entirely different strategies.

Derevi provides the Mana base to do the things this deck does, something roon cannot do.

Also the deck has ample blink and copy effects without a general who adds more

anybody else?

I too have a Derevi deck similar in build to yours although I stuck more rigidly to a theme. I used many more legendary creatures.

Captain Sisay is awesome in a Derevi deck. Some more cards from my deck you may enjoy.

Arcanis, the Omnipotent I feel is strictly better than the Skyward Eye Prophets and being legendary can be tutored by Captain Sisay.

Birthing Pod is pretty powerful and downright amazing when you can continually sac your general and tutor out a 4cc creature. So I loaded up on the 4cc mana slot in my deck with creatures like, Surgespanner, Tradewind Rider, Glen Elendra Archmage.

When I get a chance I'll look up my deck and tell you more from it.

the huge benefit skyward eye offers in derevi is the ability to put lands directly into play when revealed, so u dont get them stuck in your hand, yes arcanis is awesome, but in his case i would also need to run azusa to deal with the land drops, not a bad option but not optimal, i do like the idea of running birthing pod though, seems to offer lots of options, do you like food chain in this deck? lets you do nuts things with mana

I personally don't care for Food Chain. Yes it allows some nutso things, but I just don't like the "feel" of it. I hear what your saying about the Skyward eye Prophets, but at six mana themselves and the power of Derevi untapping mana sources, how much more mana do you need? I'd much rather draw say 9 cards than put 3 lands directly into play, but YMMV. You don't need Azusa to "deal" with the land drops and even so she isn't a bad card to run anyway and she is legendary and thus tutorable by Captain Sisay :).

Oh and another card you NEED in this deck and it isn't even an option is Prophet of Kruphix. Seriously replace it with any creature in this deck and the deck is better. If you cast this and your opponents don't remove it they are braindead and you just win the game.

So how does Daxos work out for you? I've been seriously thinking of picking up a copy and trying that guy out. His ability just seems so "weird".

daxos is a card that depends on your play group, typically ive gotten a lot of good use out of him when i play him and he has some avoidance which is good when you need to get damaage through for derevi. prophet is definitely going in at some point

I was reading through the comments and finally came across one card that any deck that runs B/G needs and that is Prophet of Kruphix your deck will get instantly better being able to flash in those creatures.

Bident of Thassa/Coastal Piracy for CA?
Thassa, God of the Sea to get through?

No Bloom Tender or Edric? That is wrong I tell you

Im not sure i need bloom tender but it wouldnt be bad in there, I dunno about edric though, he doesnt fit the deck's playstyle and typically i dont want people other than me drawing cards.
I was thinking of getting a flagstones of trokair and put in a Knight of the reliquary
earthcraft might be decent as well