Yeah these decks do hold up well against Bant Company as they only really have Dromoka's Command and Declaration in stone for removal which Declaration is a problem, but that card is honestly just a good spot removal. But Reflector mage and Queller are just easy to avoid.
Spirits is a little more annoying, but side in some Advanced Stitchwing to block super well, but with most of these decks the removal we carry mostly can wipe them out of the air. Maybe bring in Kozilek's Return to surprise clear their board or maybe Savage Alliance since most of their team have 1 toughness also the ability to give our zombie trample only makes them better.
The mono-white weenie decks are super painful matches. Remove those first strikers ASAP. Also good to side in Advanced Stitchwing for its big toughness and some kind of board wipe to clear the board.
Tokens well I really haven't seen much of it since EMN so I'm not sure if it is going to return as a major arch type, but honestly Displacement Wave and counters should do it in.
Please do let me know how that deck does work out. Thank you.
Hmmm interesting build. I can see where he is going with it, but I have a feeling I would want to replace Jace with Bedlam Reveler as it refills your hand and can be cheaper to cast with 19 spells in the deck but also a nice thing to pitch for Nahiri's Wrath. 8 damage to a single creature or pitch some land and that is a board wipe is some cases. I dunno might be too drastic of a change.
It definitely loves the mid-game, which is where the deck belongs. Burn for the early game and creatures for the mid game. I hate that there is only four madness targets out of all the cards. Looks good though. So have you tested it out?
So Wharf Infiltrator as a replacement for Prized in mono-blue is a good idea since we do miss the power Prized puts on the field. It has a card filtering and is good in multiples. Not bad. I would drop 2 Catalog for it.
Take Inventory is a definite help to almost all version of the deck as it is a good discard target and it will refill your hand in a pinch. I've drawn up to the 4 cards off of one and it fills good. My main problem is always hindering the Masterpiece as by the time I'm ready to cast it it only comes out as a 3/3 flier. Thus why I ended up cutting it. I might like the one copy, but otherwise it just hindered my hand. I would keep the 4 Nagging Thoughts and 4 Take Inventory as they are the decks early game plays really in mono-blue.
Also in mono-blue I'm going to switch the Artificer's Epiphany to 4 and Catalog to 2 since Declaration in stone gives an Artifact token which with Epiphany you essentially lost one creature to draw three cards.
1. It's land base seems very thin at only 21 lands; is this really enough lands? If not, what would you cut to add more?
Definitely with so much card draw and filtering your going to have up to ten lands before the end of the game. In my experience I have always hit my land drops every turn. I had more lands and it just put more land in my grave. You could add two more, but no more than that.
Quote from Borachon »
2. How useful would Drownyard Temple (4) or Geier Reach Sanitarium (2) be? The former seems like a pure improvement if the land base is larger; the later could give an emergency discard outlet when needed.
Drownyard Temple is okay, but honestly you never care if you discard an island as you probably have a lot either in hand or just a Catalog away. Now the Sanitarium could become very useful to help filter even more and madness more so you could drop a couple of islands for it.
Quote from Borachon »
3. I'm still pondering Crushing Grasp and Welcome to the Fold. The former seems useful against the new horrors and the later against things like the new Thalia. esp since the right looter can accelerate the later to instant speed.
Do you mean Crush of Tentacles? But yes I have been contemplating Engulf the Shore and Crush, but I don't want to return all our Zombies, but it would push us more midrange where the deck does belong. Its something to play around with. As for Welcome to the Fold honestly it is a good side board against the human and Collected Company decks as their creatures are mostly within the non-madness range of the card.
Quote from Borachon »
4. Both Salvage Drone or 1 or 2 Elder Deep-fiend are attractive. The former accelerates against weenies and the second can break stalls. I don't know what to put them in place of; perhaps sideboard?
Salvage Drone I'm not to crazy about as it is a 1 toughness creature with only Ingest and a loot. But the deck could use a 1-drop, but I feel it should be something more like Spontaneous Mutation that takes a big advantage from how full our graveyard gets over the game, or Clutch of Currents for the tempo. These stick to the game plan of delay to a later game. Elder Deep-Fiend is a great addition to this deck as it is gonna benefit with its emerge making it cost only two blue or maybe just 3. Plus with the land drops hitting frequently enough you can just cast it outright so it does fit in this deck no problem. Honestly I would drop the Masterpiece for it as with the Mono-blue build you do draw a lot of cards and Masterpiece just gets hindered by the fat hands the deck gives.
On another note:
An additional win con for the deck that can be shifted in would be Rise from the Tides which is great with all the Instant and Sorcerys.
@Ronnie your deck has been updated. Have you tested with Haunted Dead as it is two bodies for one and only costs the same as Stitchwing Skaab just black. You have an interesting point about Blessed Reincarnation as a sideboard card as it does work against the current meta pretty well. But I wonder if it isn't played due to the same reason as Reality Shift wasn't played, from fear over the value that is possible. Summary Dismissal on the other hand will be quite lovely against all the craziness that is probably going to occur with the eldrazi decks.
@Varkung Nantuko Husk is very plausible since we love the grave and despise exile.
Ok so full spoiler is up and the deck can benefit from a few of them. I really wish they gave us more creature with the same effect than just Haunted Dead(Which is very nice for the effect of getting two bodies) and Advanced Stitchwing(Gawd end its misery for it is so bad). But I really am liking the decks interaction with Emerge creatures, Elder Deep-Fiend and Wretched Gryff, also Distended Mindbender. The emerge would be perfect with our zombies since we cast them for almost no mana to then sac them in a stall to pay almost nothing for emerge.
Other options: Olivia's Dragoon: Free outlet to get the zombies in the grave Cryptbreaker: Is a nice discard outlet, but I fear we can't push to max potential since our return zombies come back tapped Collective Brutality: Nice Discard outlet and a nice effects to benefit Wharf Infiltrator: Gives me idea with all the creatures we discard through out a game
@Ronnie328: Every time I ran the version with Fevered Visions the opponent would immediately start dumping their hand like it was on fire and be able to put down more pressure along with drawing into their Declaration in Stone or some other exile removal. Visions just gives the opponent too much advantage versus this deck. If your up against aggro your just killing yourself faster since this deck is a midrange type of deck. Sure it can swing evasively big by turn 3 but that is with a good setup, but most of the time we are hitting consistently big around turn 4-6. Which is Avacyn, Company, or Always Watching time for the opponent and I rather not give them the fuel to find those cards quicker or the lands to play those cards. This Elemental Bond idea might actually be the mid-ground between this debate. Because most of our guy are 3 or greater power and green does have some good cards for drawing and siding.
@stewieG21: That is a pretty tight deck I like that engine as well. Why not try out Heir of Falkenrath for a little extra discard outlet? Oh oh Pale Rider of Trostad would work great since he is power 3 triggering Bond and allowing you to discard. Actually I really like that play as a turn 4 play to play Stitchwing Skaab after Pale Rider drawing two card off of Bond. Hm neat idea I wouldn't mind playing around with it. Also gives you the room to add in Clip Wings in side board for Avacyn and Dragons.
Oh man you can play The Gitrog Monster if you play with green. Discard two lands to Skaab draw two for monster.
@marckarlock I was thinking maybe Pore Over the Pages? Since it untaps three lands and draws a good bit along with discarding a card, because then you could use those lands untapped to play the discard or a zombie from the grave. It also prevent you from dumping cards that you may need for fuel to bring back a zombie.
The discard to Zombie/Madness ratio feels pretty on par as there are 15 discard outlets to 11 zombies and 6 madness. This was an issue I was severely having with the Fevered Visions being in the deck. It sure does draw you a lot of card, but my problem isn't drawing cards it was having enough outlets over the amount of zombies. Cause I would just keep drawing zombies with flipped Heirs. But with Tormenting Voice I was able to pitch off a zombie and draw two card off the top then pitch those two to bring back a zombie like Skaab.
Also the reason for the major Red influence is because I really love Sin Prodder in this deck because majority of the creatures cost a lot of mana and will likely go to the hand for discard fuel. He is also a good body for the CMC. And Bloodmad Vampire is just a really good madness creature that every opponent I've gone against has to deal with her because of her size and growth ability.
Ghoulsteed is tittering on being removed for more Geralf's Masterpiece because of not having any ability and his cost is a a bit high for the body.
The only thing I really hate is that this deck is really fun to play, but the fact that it just feels like it needs more oomph from Eldritch Moon is killing me inside. Either way the games I've played with the Grixis Build went fairly well and feels competitive enough. But people I've tested against are playing some wild brews so I'm trying to get the cards together and go to my LGS to see how it holds up.
You know its weird because I do run into the problem of running out of discard outlets. Thats why I pushed for Catalog and more Call the Bloodline. I was also thinking about Mindwrack Demon to just dump the zombies into the grave.
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Spirits is a little more annoying, but side in some Advanced Stitchwing to block super well, but with most of these decks the removal we carry mostly can wipe them out of the air. Maybe bring in Kozilek's Return to surprise clear their board or maybe Savage Alliance since most of their team have 1 toughness also the ability to give our zombie trample only makes them better.
The mono-white weenie decks are super painful matches. Remove those first strikers ASAP. Also good to side in Advanced Stitchwing for its big toughness and some kind of board wipe to clear the board.
Tokens well I really haven't seen much of it since EMN so I'm not sure if it is going to return as a major arch type, but honestly Displacement Wave and counters should do it in.
Please do let me know how that deck does work out. Thank you.
It definitely loves the mid-game, which is where the deck belongs. Burn for the early game and creatures for the mid game. I hate that there is only four madness targets out of all the cards. Looks good though. So have you tested it out?
Take Inventory is a definite help to almost all version of the deck as it is a good discard target and it will refill your hand in a pinch. I've drawn up to the 4 cards off of one and it fills good. My main problem is always hindering the Masterpiece as by the time I'm ready to cast it it only comes out as a 3/3 flier. Thus why I ended up cutting it. I might like the one copy, but otherwise it just hindered my hand. I would keep the 4 Nagging Thoughts and 4 Take Inventory as they are the decks early game plays really in mono-blue.
Also in mono-blue I'm going to switch the Artificer's Epiphany to 4 and Catalog to 2 since Declaration in stone gives an Artifact token which with Epiphany you essentially lost one creature to draw three cards.
@Ronnie: Have you played with Emerge creature in your version of the deck? What is you opinion of Elder Deep-Fiend and Distended Mindbender?
Edit: Updated both Mono-blue and Grixis build
Definitely with so much card draw and filtering your going to have up to ten lands before the end of the game. In my experience I have always hit my land drops every turn. I had more lands and it just put more land in my grave. You could add two more, but no more than that.
Drownyard Temple is okay, but honestly you never care if you discard an island as you probably have a lot either in hand or just a Catalog away. Now the Sanitarium could become very useful to help filter even more and madness more so you could drop a couple of islands for it.
Do you mean Crush of Tentacles? But yes I have been contemplating Engulf the Shore and Crush, but I don't want to return all our Zombies, but it would push us more midrange where the deck does belong. Its something to play around with. As for Welcome to the Fold honestly it is a good side board against the human and Collected Company decks as their creatures are mostly within the non-madness range of the card.
Salvage Drone I'm not to crazy about as it is a 1 toughness creature with only Ingest and a loot. But the deck could use a 1-drop, but I feel it should be something more like Spontaneous Mutation that takes a big advantage from how full our graveyard gets over the game, or Clutch of Currents for the tempo. These stick to the game plan of delay to a later game. Elder Deep-Fiend is a great addition to this deck as it is gonna benefit with its emerge making it cost only two blue or maybe just 3. Plus with the land drops hitting frequently enough you can just cast it outright so it does fit in this deck no problem. Honestly I would drop the Masterpiece for it as with the Mono-blue build you do draw a lot of cards and Masterpiece just gets hindered by the fat hands the deck gives.
On another note:
An additional win con for the deck that can be shifted in would be Rise from the Tides which is great with all the Instant and Sorcerys.
@Varkung Nantuko Husk is very plausible since we love the grave and despise exile.
Other options:
Olivia's Dragoon: Free outlet to get the zombies in the grave
Cryptbreaker: Is a nice discard outlet, but I fear we can't push to max potential since our return zombies come back tapped
Collective Brutality: Nice Discard outlet and a nice effects to benefit
Wharf Infiltrator: Gives me idea with all the creatures we discard through out a game
Will return to talk more.
@stewieG21: That is a pretty tight deck I like that engine as well. Why not try out Heir of Falkenrath for a little extra discard outlet? Oh oh Pale Rider of Trostad would work great since he is power 3 triggering Bond and allowing you to discard. Actually I really like that play as a turn 4 play to play Stitchwing Skaab after Pale Rider drawing two card off of Bond. Hm neat idea I wouldn't mind playing around with it. Also gives you the room to add in Clip Wings in side board for Avacyn and Dragons.
Oh man you can play The Gitrog Monster if you play with green. Discard two lands to Skaab draw two for monster.
Also the reason for the major Red influence is because I really love Sin Prodder in this deck because majority of the creatures cost a lot of mana and will likely go to the hand for discard fuel. He is also a good body for the CMC. And Bloodmad Vampire is just a really good madness creature that every opponent I've gone against has to deal with her because of her size and growth ability.
Ghoulsteed is tittering on being removed for more Geralf's Masterpiece because of not having any ability and his cost is a a bit high for the body.
The only thing I really hate is that this deck is really fun to play, but the fact that it just feels like it needs more oomph from Eldritch Moon is killing me inside. Either way the games I've played with the Grixis Build went fairly well and feels competitive enough. But people I've tested against are playing some wild brews so I'm trying to get the cards together and go to my LGS to see how it holds up.