Hello, I have been out of the game for some time now and recently came across my old collection.
I was big on the Ravnica block and now that there was a second block released I'm looking to build a casual deck for each of the Guilds using only Ravnica and RTR cards.
I don't know much about the RTR block so I could use some help and recommendations on solid cards.
If you have done something similar please share I would enjoy looking things over
Well we're about to get yet another ravnica block so you might want to wait a bit. I'm not going to go over cards for every guild, but let's talk RTR block mechanics.
Azorious - Detain is mostly a dud mechanic, but there are a few outliers. You'll want to look at cards that either repeatedly detain, or detain on entry with a relevant body. Martial Law, Lev Skyknight and Lavinia of the Tenth come to mind. Sphinx's Revalation is stupidly strong in guild, but doesn't detain.
Dimir - Cipher was kinda worthless in RTR, and the mill strategy got overshadowed by Phenax from Born of the Gods a year later. There's a few decent cards but not much here.
Rakdos - Unleash is excellent. Just type unleash into gatherer and you wont' be dissappointed. I wouldn't do over 4 cmc for this deck though. [card]
Rakdos, Lord of Riots[/card] also leads to some really inventive decks.
Gruul - I love Bloodrush. I built a block constructed pauper deck around this at pre-release and I still play it. The main thing to look at here is how much power you get for the minimum amount of mana. Toss in some token generation and pump anything that gets through.
Selesnya - Populate is pretty neat, but similar to Cipher, the cards printed with it were a bit lackluster. It encourages big tokens, but the pool of cards that you want to play to create those tokens is pretty shallow. Unlike cipher it is doable. Call of the Conclave is a must.
Orzhov - Extort has some excellent cards, but isn't cohesive as a deck. You'll need to focus on goodstuff and play the handful of good extort cards that are available. Blind Obedience is excellent.
Izzet - Overload has a few good cards, but most are trash. I'd probably go with a Nivix Cyclops and Wee Dragonauts deck.
Simic - I'm not a simic fan, but evolve is strong. You'll have to decide if you want to go more aggro or combo, but both are viable.
Golgari - Scavenge is mostly a dud mechanic that supports the simic evolve creatures, but there are a handful of agressively costed beaters. Golgari gave a lot to Modern and Eternal formats in the form of Death-rite Shaman and Varolz, the Scar-Striped, but I'm not sure where you would take a theme deck from this guild.
Thanks for the reply and it's a shame some of the mechanics were duds, gave you found any synergy between the old and new mechanics or it it basically u build a deck utilizing the new or or mechanic? I.e. Boris radiance and batallion or just one or the other?
I have a deckbox that resembles the guild of Ravnica. It's 10 decks of mostly common and uncommon that somehow represents each of the guilds. It's not a perfect representation but so far, it does its job in teaching new players and entertaining my coworker's.
Each deck follows a certain structure that goes:
4x Guildgate
Xx nonbasic land (for support)
Xx Basic lands
2x legendary creature (it has to be multicolor, of the guild color identity)
3x rare non-permanent mono-color spell (white for Azorius and Boros, blue for Dimir and Simic, black for Rakdos and Orzhov, red for Gruul and Izzet, green for Selesnya and Golgari)
3x artifact or enchantment
0x Planeswalkers
Xx fillers
Each of the guilds have the following deck identities:
Azorius - Prison/Lock deck
Dimir - Classic Control deck
Rakdos - Reanimator with randomness to it
Gruul - Classic Beatdown/Burn(ish)
Selesnya - Ramp/go big and go wide
Orzhov - Classic Midrange (discard/removal/creatures)
Izzet - Spell-based "combo"deck (storm-lite)
Golgari - Zombie Infestation engine (although I'm in the process of switching this to Tortured Existence midrange)
Boros - Soldier Tribal
Simic - Classic Tempo featuring Lorescale Coatl (I'm in the process of switching this to an Energy deck)
Original Ravnica also had some duds and some strong ones. Some mechanics synergize well with RTR guild mechanics. Others don't fit at all.
Selesnya - Convoke. It was also token-based, but about spamming lots of tokens on the board instead of populating a few fat tokens. Some Convoke spells are great. It just doesn't mesh well with Populate.
Izzet - Replicate. Never heard of it? That's because it's an even bigger dud than Overload. You could pay extra mana to make more copies of a spell. However most of the spells with it are terribad, to avoid anything broken like Storm was. The copies also don't trigger "when you cast an instant or sorcery", the other mechanic of this guild. The two mechanics have anti-synergy which is just awkward. It also has no synergy with Overload, the fixed version of Replicate. Wee Dragonauts and Izzet Guildmage are probably the only salavageable parts of this original guild.
Azorius - Forecast. You pay mana and reveal the card during your upkeep to get a marginal effect. It's very grindy long-term card advantage for slow control decks. The guild had some useful control pieces, but most Forecast cards were bad. Detain also slows down the game, which gives you time to forecast, but that's about all the synergy there is. However the cards do fit well for a slow control strategy.
Golgari - Dredge. Oops. This one broke the game. They meant it to be a grindy recursive engine to get back cards later in the game but didn't consider how easily the mechanic could be abused for self-mill shenanigans. You can dredge to put scavenge cards in the GY... or just dredge and win the game. Scavenge just isnt that good. Dredge is better with other stuff.
Rakdos - Hellbent. This was hyperaggro and rewarded you for dumping your hand fast. Some of it was card disadvantage and just bad, but some plays well with other aggro cards (like the Unleash mechanic!). New Rakdos should work with old Rakdoa for fast aggro.
Orzhov - Haunt. This let you reuse a spell or ETB effect after a creature died. It was a fun way to get extra card advantage. It doesn't fit that well with Extort, but you could try.
Gruul - Bloodthirst. This was the original set with it. +1/+1 counters if you dealt damage this turn. Good aggro. Bloodrush is also good aggro. It doesn't interact with Bloodthirst, but aggro + aggro = aggro so that seems good.
Simic - Graft. Also +1/+1 counters. It also gave abilities to creatures with +1/+1 counters, Graft plays very well with Evolve! Great synergy between blocks.
Dimir - mill. You could choose to mill X cards instead of deal X combat damage to opponent. This was a terrible terrible mechanic. Opponent starts with 60 cards and only 20 life. 1 life is not worth 1 card milled. It also has nothing to do with Cipher. The new mill cards are much better than the original Dimir mill.
Boros - Radiance. Copy effects for all creatures sharing a color. This has nothing to do with boros aggro or battalion. It's not a flavorful or synergistic mechanic. The guild was better at aggro - haste beaters and Lightning Helix. Those cards fit well into a Battalion deck, but not Radiance.
Hello, I have been out of the game for some time now and recently came across my old collection.
I was big on the Ravnica block and now that there was a second block released I'm looking to build a casual deck for each of the Guilds using only Ravnica and RTR cards.
I don't know much about the RTR block so I could use some help and recommendations on solid cards.
If you have done something similar please share I would enjoy looking things over
I don't think you can build a Ravnica guild Battle Box with just Ravnica/RTR cards. Just like FTW1987 mentioned, a lot of the guilds have mechanics that don't really reflect on their guild philosophy.
On my guild decks, I used these mechanics as the main ones (I built the deck so it has minimal set specific mechanic/keyword):
So, I realize they may not end up being th most competitive decks but I want to capture each guild in each deck. Maybe some day open them up with my children and relive some of my past.
To catch what I see represents each guild I have decided to include;
(Ravnica)
Bounce land
Guildhall
Signet
Guildmaster
Guild champion
Guildmage
Guild artifact
(RTR)
Guild charm
Guildmage
Guildmaster
Guild champion
Keyrune
Guildgate
Also must include keyword from each block (i.e. radiance and batallion for boros) decks may include other cards from Ravnica and RtR only,
I'm going to start with Boris so we'll see how this goes.
That's a good approach to capture flavor at least! You can always fill it out with other cards from the guild to help the deck run more smoothly. For example, any Boros deck is immediately better with Lightning Helix. Skyknight Legionnaire is a classic too.
Getting in a little late on this, but I like focus on Ravnica guilds. I’ve built several very fun decks lately focusing on Simic shenanigans, Boros aggression, and Orzhov drain. The decks aren’t completely block loyal, but are still pretty dedicated with a lot of dual-colored creatures, spells, and guild mechanics.
I found that building around a playset of Karlov gave me a focus for using my extort for more than just grindy drain, and add a life/death bend to it with Chalice of Life//Death. He’s a very fun legend to focus on, but Obzedat is also pretty fun.
The Simic deck isn’t built around a legend, but more the feel of shifty Simic battle tactics focused on Simic Combine creatures (mostly frogs) with a lot of transmogrify effects such as Turn to Frog, Beast Within, and so on. Basically, I throw combat into chaos and players can’t ever bank on landing a solid hit, which I then exploit to my advantage.
The Boros was built to maximize white/red creatures to generate insane boosts to p/t and Lightning Helix effects due to Balefire Liege. Extremely aggressive creature base that is more often than not indestructible with as many Helix effects as I can pack, and I can kill two players long before I run out of steam.
All of them do use some cards from other sets that still fit the guild themes. If you stick to strictly guild block cards, you’ll be a little more restricted. I can post the decks here if you wish to look, otherwise I’ll save the space. Good luck!
The Karlov deck is good for 1v1, 1v2, Emperor position (homeruled where everyone retains their creatures when they march), and team games. The extort & lifegain powers up Karlov for beatings and exiling, but also to enable the Blood Barons and Chalices of Death.
The Hypnotoad deck can play as both Emperor and wing deck, 1v1, 1v2, 2-HG, Star, and even 4 person FFA, making it very flexible for small groups. Omnibian, Plaxcaster Frogling, Spore Frog, Turn to Frog, Polymorphist’s Jest, and Beast Within mercilessly mess with combat status quo and make it almost impossible to guess how I’m going to disrupt opponent plans. Add Mystic Snake to Eternal Witness and Species Gorger recycling, and I can often maintain a full grip of control cards the entire game as I tighten the noose on opponents. Untargetable indestructibles? No problem.
The Boros deck is used for 1v1, 1v2, 2-HG, star games, and wing decks in Emperor format. Cast creatures, swing sideways for battalion mechanics and drop Lightning Helix effects to wildly swing life totals. Indestructible, battalion, buffed critters suck.
In each of the decks, I’ve used non-Ravnica cards to ensure I can handle most card types defensively for overall balance. None of them are especially competitive outside of my group, but are just the right level for my group.
I was big on the Ravnica block and now that there was a second block released I'm looking to build a casual deck for each of the Guilds using only Ravnica and RTR cards.
I don't know much about the RTR block so I could use some help and recommendations on solid cards.
If you have done something similar please share I would enjoy looking things over
Azorious - Detain is mostly a dud mechanic, but there are a few outliers. You'll want to look at cards that either repeatedly detain, or detain on entry with a relevant body. Martial Law, Lev Skyknight and Lavinia of the Tenth come to mind. Sphinx's Revalation is stupidly strong in guild, but doesn't detain.
Dimir - Cipher was kinda worthless in RTR, and the mill strategy got overshadowed by Phenax from Born of the Gods a year later. There's a few decent cards but not much here.
Rakdos - Unleash is excellent. Just type unleash into gatherer and you wont' be dissappointed. I wouldn't do over 4 cmc for this deck though. [card]
Rakdos, Lord of Riots[/card] also leads to some really inventive decks.
Gruul - I love Bloodrush. I built a block constructed pauper deck around this at pre-release and I still play it. The main thing to look at here is how much power you get for the minimum amount of mana. Toss in some token generation and pump anything that gets through.
Selesnya - Populate is pretty neat, but similar to Cipher, the cards printed with it were a bit lackluster. It encourages big tokens, but the pool of cards that you want to play to create those tokens is pretty shallow. Unlike cipher it is doable. Call of the Conclave is a must.
Boros - Batallion is probably one of the best mechanics from this set. You don't even need rares to make it work. Just jam some Boros Elite, Wojek Halberdiers and Daring Skyjek into a deck and top out with Skyknight Legionnaire.
Orzhov - Extort has some excellent cards, but isn't cohesive as a deck. You'll need to focus on goodstuff and play the handful of good extort cards that are available. Blind Obedience is excellent.
Izzet - Overload has a few good cards, but most are trash. I'd probably go with a Nivix Cyclops and Wee Dragonauts deck.
Simic - I'm not a simic fan, but evolve is strong. You'll have to decide if you want to go more aggro or combo, but both are viable.
Golgari - Scavenge is mostly a dud mechanic that supports the simic evolve creatures, but there are a handful of agressively costed beaters. Golgari gave a lot to Modern and Eternal formats in the form of Death-rite Shaman and Varolz, the Scar-Striped, but I'm not sure where you would take a theme deck from this guild.
Each deck follows a certain structure that goes:
4x Guildgate
Xx nonbasic land (for support)
Xx Basic lands
2x legendary creature (it has to be multicolor, of the guild color identity)
3x rare non-permanent mono-color spell (white for Azorius and Boros, blue for Dimir and Simic, black for Rakdos and Orzhov, red for Gruul and Izzet, green for Selesnya and Golgari)
3x artifact or enchantment
0x Planeswalkers
Xx fillers
Each of the guilds have the following deck identities:
Azorius - Prison/Lock deck
Dimir - Classic Control deck
Rakdos - Reanimator with randomness to it
Gruul - Classic Beatdown/Burn(ish)
Selesnya - Ramp/go big and go wide
Orzhov - Classic Midrange (discard/removal/creatures)
Izzet - Spell-based "combo"deck (storm-lite)
Golgari - Zombie Infestation engine (although I'm in the process of switching this to Tortured Existence midrange)
Boros - Soldier Tribal
Simic - Classic Tempo featuring Lorescale Coatl (I'm in the process of switching this to an Energy deck)
Selesnya - Convoke. It was also token-based, but about spamming lots of tokens on the board instead of populating a few fat tokens. Some Convoke spells are great. It just doesn't mesh well with Populate.
Izzet - Replicate. Never heard of it? That's because it's an even bigger dud than Overload. You could pay extra mana to make more copies of a spell. However most of the spells with it are terribad, to avoid anything broken like Storm was. The copies also don't trigger "when you cast an instant or sorcery", the other mechanic of this guild. The two mechanics have anti-synergy which is just awkward. It also has no synergy with Overload, the fixed version of Replicate. Wee Dragonauts and Izzet Guildmage are probably the only salavageable parts of this original guild.
Azorius - Forecast. You pay mana and reveal the card during your upkeep to get a marginal effect. It's very grindy long-term card advantage for slow control decks. The guild had some useful control pieces, but most Forecast cards were bad. Detain also slows down the game, which gives you time to forecast, but that's about all the synergy there is. However the cards do fit well for a slow control strategy.
Golgari - Dredge. Oops. This one broke the game. They meant it to be a grindy recursive engine to get back cards later in the game but didn't consider how easily the mechanic could be abused for self-mill shenanigans. You can dredge to put scavenge cards in the GY... or just dredge and win the game. Scavenge just isnt that good. Dredge is better with other stuff.
Rakdos - Hellbent. This was hyperaggro and rewarded you for dumping your hand fast. Some of it was card disadvantage and just bad, but some plays well with other aggro cards (like the Unleash mechanic!). New Rakdos should work with old Rakdoa for fast aggro.
Orzhov - Haunt. This let you reuse a spell or ETB effect after a creature died. It was a fun way to get extra card advantage. It doesn't fit that well with Extort, but you could try.
Gruul - Bloodthirst. This was the original set with it. +1/+1 counters if you dealt damage this turn. Good aggro. Bloodrush is also good aggro. It doesn't interact with Bloodthirst, but aggro + aggro = aggro so that seems good.
Simic - Graft. Also +1/+1 counters. It also gave abilities to creatures with +1/+1 counters, Graft plays very well with Evolve! Great synergy between blocks.
Dimir - mill. You could choose to mill X cards instead of deal X combat damage to opponent. This was a terrible terrible mechanic. Opponent starts with 60 cards and only 20 life. 1 life is not worth 1 card milled. It also has nothing to do with Cipher. The new mill cards are much better than the original Dimir mill.
Boros - Radiance. Copy effects for all creatures sharing a color. This has nothing to do with boros aggro or battalion. It's not a flavorful or synergistic mechanic. The guild was better at aggro - haste beaters and Lightning Helix. Those cards fit well into a Battalion deck, but not Radiance.
I don't think you can build a Ravnica guild Battle Box with just Ravnica/RTR cards. Just like FTW1987 mentioned, a lot of the guilds have mechanics that don't really reflect on their guild philosophy.
On my guild decks, I used these mechanics as the main ones (I built the deck so it has minimal set specific mechanic/keyword):
Azorius: Miracle
Dimir: Delirium
Rakdos: Annihilator
Gruul: Landfall
Selesnya: Cascade
Orzhov: Monarch
Izzet: Storm
Golgari: Dredge
Boros: Batallion
Simic: Energy
To catch what I see represents each guild I have decided to include;
(Ravnica)
Bounce land
Guildhall
Signet
Guildmaster
Guild champion
Guildmage
Guild artifact
(RTR)
Guild charm
Guildmage
Guildmaster
Guild champion
Keyrune
Guildgate
Also must include keyword from each block (i.e. radiance and batallion for boros) decks may include other cards from Ravnica and RtR only,
I'm going to start with Boris so we'll see how this goes.
I found that building around a playset of Karlov gave me a focus for using my extort for more than just grindy drain, and add a life/death bend to it with Chalice of Life//Death. He’s a very fun legend to focus on, but Obzedat is also pretty fun.
The Simic deck isn’t built around a legend, but more the feel of shifty Simic battle tactics focused on Simic Combine creatures (mostly frogs) with a lot of transmogrify effects such as Turn to Frog, Beast Within, and so on. Basically, I throw combat into chaos and players can’t ever bank on landing a solid hit, which I then exploit to my advantage.
The Boros was built to maximize white/red creatures to generate insane boosts to p/t and Lightning Helix effects due to Balefire Liege. Extremely aggressive creature base that is more often than not indestructible with as many Helix effects as I can pack, and I can kill two players long before I run out of steam.
All of them do use some cards from other sets that still fit the guild themes. If you stick to strictly guild block cards, you’ll be a little more restricted. I can post the decks here if you wish to look, otherwise I’ll save the space. Good luck!
4 Karlov of the Ghost Council
4 Thrull Parasite
4 Tithe Drinker
4 Basilica Screecher
4 Blood Baron of Vizkopa
4 Vindicate
2 Tsabo's Decree
1 Vampiric Tutor
1 Demonic Tutor
1 Necropotence
4 Blind Obedience
Artifacts:
4 Chalice of Life (to flip to Chalice of Death ASAP)
4 Pristine Talisman
Land:
4 Orzhov Basilica
8 Plains
8 Swamp
4 Orzhov Guildgate
The Karlov deck is good for 1v1, 1v2, Emperor position (homeruled where everyone retains their creatures when they march), and team games. The extort & lifegain powers up Karlov for beatings and exiling, but also to enable the Blood Barons and Chalices of Death.
4 Spore Frog
4 Coiling Oracle
4 Eternal Witness
4 Plaxcaster Frogling
4 Omnibian
4 Mystic Snake
4 Species Gorger
1 Experiment Kraj
4 Turn to Frog
4 Beast Within
4 Polymorphist's Jest
Land:
4 Simic Guildgate
4 Simic Growth Chamber
6 Forest
6 Island
4 Desert
The Hypnotoad deck can play as both Emperor and wing deck, 1v1, 1v2, 2-HG, Star, and even 4 person FFA, making it very flexible for small groups. Omnibian, Plaxcaster Frogling, Spore Frog, Turn to Frog, Polymorphist’s Jest, and Beast Within mercilessly mess with combat status quo and make it almost impossible to guess how I’m going to disrupt opponent plans. Add Mystic Snake to Eternal Witness and Species Gorger recycling, and I can often maintain a full grip of control cards the entire game as I tighten the noose on opponents. Untargetable indestructibles? No problem.
4 Figure of Destiny
4 Battlegate Mimic
4 Frontline Medic
4 Firemane Avenger
4 Spark Trooper
4 Balefire Liege
1 Tajic, Blade of the Legion
4 Swords to Plowshares
4 Oblivion Ring
4 Boros Charm
4 Lightning Helix
Lands:
4 Boros Guildgate
4 Boros Garrison
8 Plains
8 Mountains
The Boros deck is used for 1v1, 1v2, 2-HG, star games, and wing decks in Emperor format. Cast creatures, swing sideways for battalion mechanics and drop Lightning Helix effects to wildly swing life totals. Indestructible, battalion, buffed critters suck.
In each of the decks, I’ve used non-Ravnica cards to ensure I can handle most card types defensively for overall balance. None of them are especially competitive outside of my group, but are just the right level for my group.
(Ravnica)
Bounce land, Guildhall, Signet, Guildmaster, Guild champion, Guildmage, Guild artifact
(RTR)
Guild charm, Guildmage, Guildmaster, Guild champion, Keyrune, Guildgate
3 Boros Recruit
1 Boros Guildmage
1 Sunhome Guildmage
2 Boros Swiftblade
3 Boros Reckoner
3 Frontline Medic
1 Tajic, Blade of the Legion
4 Firemane Avenger
1 Agrus Kos, Wojek Veteran
1 Aurelia, the Warleader
2 Foundry Champion
1 Razia, Boros Archangel
4 Boros Charm
1 Lightning Helix
2 Warleader's Helix
2 Rally the Righteous
2 Master Warcraft
2 Assemble the Legion
Artifact
1 Boros Keyrune
1 Boros Signet
2 Sunforger
9 Plains
8 Mountain
1 Sunhome, Fortress of the Legion
1 Boros Guildgate
1 Boros Garrison