MTG Salvation

Disclaimer
I originally wanted to try and write a primer, and this topic might be that someday. But for now, the deck is a work in progress and in need of some help.

Background
I play magic on paper exclusively and just last year I have discovered commander as a format. I'm a brewer at the core and this is the perfect format to let the urge to brew go free.

This deck started out about 6 months ago with Vial Smasher the Fierce and Ravos, Soultender at the helm. This was a high cmc punisher/group slug deck that really didn't use Ravos, Soultender that much due to the low creature count but those that were included were high inpact, expensive and reusable with Ravos. It didn't really work and i need more cardadvantage, which proved to be challenging in Mardu. So i swapped out Ravos for Tymna the Weaver and added creatures like Kari Zev, Skyship Raider, Hanweir Garrison, Hero of Bladehold and Leonin Warleader that attack multiple opponents at the same time to trigger Tymna the Weaver as much as possible and do some incremental damage in the process. I also added a healthy Sunforger package to trigger Vial Smasher the Fierce more often. This was a little better, but the avg. CMC went down considerably, making the Vial Smasher the Fierce triggers worse.
I love Vial Smasher the Fierce to bits but had to face the fact that, in the end, the mardu shell just didn't work out for this little guy. So back to the drawing board for him

My Meta
I play casually, but with some very competitive players. i'd say most decks are focussed and do what they do, and do it good. There are also decks that can be a little oppressive but that only drives more tweaking and tuning, which i like.
Amonst my own decks, the meta consists of: Animar, Soul of Elements, Endrek Sahr, Master Breeder, Muldrotha, the Gravetide, Marchesa, the Black Rose, Tuvasa the Sunlit, Aminatou, the Fateshifter, Edgar Markov, Kaalia of the Vast, Roon of the hidden Realm, Gisela, Blade of Goldnight and more.

In came Queen Marchesa Long may she reign
So i had this Mardu tokens shell, manabase, a sunforger package and some prison type stuff. I really liked the playstyle of the last itteration because it was pretty resillient to my meta, so i needed someone else at the helm. I also wanted a little less "fair".
While searching, i found her! She did everything i needed. Make an Assassin token, draw cards of off being the monarch, but never both…… Or does she????

Deck idea
With the printing of Justiciar's Portal the idea of flickering came up. What if i could get the assassin token AND draw the card of off the monarch every turn? I felt like with Justiciar's Portal amongst others, i now had a considerable amount of instant speed flicker effects to abuse her ETB effect. There are also an awful lot of value creatures in the colors that work well with this deck.
The prison type effects are there just for combat damage control. You don't nescesarrily need the assassin and being the monarch and getting that extra card every turn is just fine. If opponents do try to take the monarch. Prison is a way to manage how much you have to take.
I wanted the deck to curve well, be somewhat political, be very resilient, value driven and low to the ground.

The Deck
In its current form, this is what i've built.



The deck has a average CMC of 2,85 which is low enough to meet my demand.
The curve tops at 3CMC and usually curves into a T4 Queen natuarlly to get the ball rolling.


Playing and Winning
The deck tries to keep off attackers for as long as possible to gain maximum value out of being the monarch. In the meanwhile be political with what you can and will flicker and what you care to give away. In the mean while fill up the board with tokens, overwhelm opponents with card advantage and dig for your wincons. Those are mainly:

• Use Purphoros, god of the Forge and the like to ping opponents to death by abusing ETB triggers.
• Use Exsanguinate like effects. Sacrifice everything for mana and make a huge bleeding spell.

Going "infinite" with white creature based combo's Fiend Hunter, Sun Titan, Reveillark, Karmic Guide accelerate this process.

The backup plan is just to overrun the opponent with the token swarm. Grave Titan, Elesh Norn, Grand Cenobite, Ankle Shanker and Vault of the Archangel help alot with this.

The deck comes with some graveyard hate to stop opposing shenanigans, some instant speed answers to problem permanents and spells which are tutorable with Sunforger which fits the queen very well. This also helps protecting my own board against opposing answers.

Problems?
This deck is far from completed. Some cards are leftovers from the Vial Smasher the Fierce deck and there are probably angles/cards i havn't considered yet. Not like Aristocrats style. Dying could very well be exploited and the deck would be a natural fit for the new Teysa Karlov but for now i have chosen the other way to stay original in my playgroup.

One problem i have theoretically, and for wich i seek some advice, is the manabase.
Originally, the deck was Rakdos focussed and splashed white. This makes for a very easy manabase since allied color pairings are just so much better represented. The current deck is 4color, Orzhov focussed and has some challenging manacosts (tripple white, double black, double red @ 4cmc and upwards and colorless for the very important activated ability of Eldrazi Displacer). As a result, i have to run some ETB tapped lands. This still doesn't completely fill the requirements but as it is, i don't want to add more.

W Symbols: 29, W Mana: 24
B Symbols: 18, B Mana: 21
R Symbols: 14, R Mana: 17
C Symbols: 1, C Mana: 11

The current numbers haven't backfired on me yet in the games i've played so it might be ok.



End note
Thanks for reading and i'm curious to hear what you all think.
I'm very open to suggestions as to what would probably fit the deck.

Well, The deck works. But the resulting game was going on pretty long!
I had my fortress set up early and managed to stay clear of opposing attacks for most of the game. Had full control of the board with Eldrazi Displacer and Fiend Hunter, threathening to exile creatures that were being a problem for me.
The main problem however, despite my attempts to be political with my position, was that my opponents were not attacking into eachother. Instead they were figuring out how to beat me and the game became stale as a result. It took some time to get to my wincons as i was drawing tons of land. In the end, inevitably, i found Purphoros and i could combo off with Fiend Hunter and Sun Titan.

Now that i have played the deck a couple of times, i can say it functions the way it's supposed to, but fininshing the game can be troublesome if you don't find the right cards. In the example above, i had nothing to get offensive with, no token producers to blink every turn to gain the advantage in combat and early combo pieces got rightfully removed.
Going forward, i think i can put in another token producer and another wincon. i'm thinking somewhere along the lines of Warstorm Surge and another creature that upon entering, creates at least 2 tokens. This makes for another way to get to infinite mana or inifinite ETB triggers.
Possible targets at 4 or 5 cmc:
Sengir Autocrat 4cmc adds 3 tokens to abuse but can be vulnerable
Knight-Captain of Eos 5cmc adds 2 tokens and provides some added utility fitting to the theme
Siege-Gang Commander 5cmc, adds 3 tokens plus some added utlitity.
Angel of Invention 5cmc adds 2 tokens and provides some added value in combat. Can also just be a reasonable flyer.
Then there are some 4cmc bodies that just add two tokens so i can combo off with them, though they don't add much else. so at this point, i'm not considering them.

I'm not quite sure what to cut though. Seeing that game tend to go long if i'm set up correctly, i probably could go down another land.
Cutting a bit in the sunforger package is also an option.

Update:

Out:
Phyrexian Arena
Pia Nalaar

In:
Knight-Captain of Eos
Warstorm Surge

Maybe:
Marsh Flitter
Michiko Konda, Truth Seeker

I have noticed this topic/deck archetype is probably not very popular And i can see why. A few months have passed with this deck and it's pretty strong, but it has downsides for sure! It has a tendency to drag out games if, for some reason, the rest of the table does not battle out each other. I've had the "force combat / combat advantage" cards in it but they got cut as the category felt a little underrepresented. Elesh Norn, Grand Cenobite is the only one left becouse she's just a total blowout most of the time.

I'll be lying if i'd say this is my preferred deck to play in terms of table fun. But it sure plays very different from my other decks, which is what i'm trying to accomplish.
The card draw capabilities are what makes the deck tick. You will Always have a hand full of cards which is good. This, together with the low curve has resulted in many ways to gain value form the board alone, and keep up mana/cards for protection. Incidental damage or Various combo's will grant you the win eventually.

Over the past two months the deck has gone trough some minor changes and it looks like this.


Cards i'm currently own but don't exactly know what to take out for are: Delaying Shield and Conjurer's Closet.
These would fall in the "pillow fort" and "flicker value" category.
Other future addons could be pillow fort cards like Island Sanctuary and Solitary Confinement but those would probably only be added to lower or make up for the slightly higher curve the other two cards would yield.