Teysa, Orzhov Scion for 1v1 EDH (MWS Banlist)
brought to you by Khymera and MCR
“The darkest hour is just before the dawn.”
I must first state that this deck is not for everyone. I know I wasn’t a believer at first; a pile of janky combos and synergies that hang by threads, how could this deck possibly win? Hatched from the very peculiar mind of Khymera, Teysa is a deck based on elegant combos, the might of banned cards, all cradled by the inexorable strength of the black white combination. This list is weaved together by complexity and depth, a combination that can only be understood through trial, error, and experience. You might question card choices; you might scoff at my results; but I assure you that Teysa works and is to be reckoned with.
I wanted to wait until I had some real results with the deck, as well as a more optimized list, before coming back and making a whole huge thread about it. I struggled a lot with this general, trying to wrap my head around dozens of interactions and then both optimizing my playstyle as well as the list at the same time. At one point I almost gave up and just wanted to play a dumbed down Ghost Council deck. But I persisted and managed to do fairly well against some very strong generals in the format, as well as break into the top 8 of my first EDH tournament. There’s something very real about this deck - people don’t talk about it that much, but they always seem to secretly dread the matchup.
I quit EDH for a few months and recently came back. Upon my return, I was quickly ushered by a few old friends into the fourth online tournament. I had no idea what I wanted to play, and as I was sifting through old deck lists I finally came across my original project: Teysa, Orzhov Scion. After Khymera released his initial list earlier this year, I tried it out and we worked together to optimize it. While the core of the deck remains unchanged, several edits were made prior to this tourney based on a handful of play test matches. The deck had a lot of chaff and cards that were good on paper, but rather poor in practice. My experiences playing this deck have taught me many valuable things and I wish to share some observations with you guys. I think there are several choices that we need to reassess in order to more optimize the list.
I was going to post this after the tournament, but then I realized that I don't really care if people know what my list looks like or not. The point is I want to make Teysa the best she can be and that will only happen through everyone's feedback.
Let’s go through my initial thought process for the changes I made prior to the tournament. Keep in mind that this entire section was written prior to the tournament and may not necessarily reflect my current opinions on certain cards.
I managed to play a few games against Thada Adel and Jenara, Asura of War. Hardly the proper spectrum of generals, I know, but enough to let me see right away things that didn’t deserve their spots in the list.
Changes for EDH IV:
Volrath’s Stronghold -> Library of Alexandra: Volrath was never one of the cards I cared for. I’ve had it in so many lists before this one as well and it never seemed to pull its weight. I can acknowledge how good it is with cards like Eternal Witness, but I have never once needed to use this card. In fact, I actually grimace when it’s in my opening hand - that colorless mana definitely needs to be kept at a minimum. Library on the other hand has just been phenomenal the games I’ve had it in. I used to omit the card because I could not afford it, but since I’m playing online for the tournament I said: what the heck, why not. Boy was I mistaken for not running it before.
Academy Rector -> Reassembling Skeleton: Rector is cute. Too cute. Really though, after we cut Debtor’s Knell, she just was never worth it. Slow AND you required a sac outlet. I have more important things to be doing on turn 4 than casting a creature with no immediate board impact. Since my enchantments are basically all utility ones now, her value diminishes as she can never get anything that’ll instantly win me the game. Reassembling Skeleton was the latest addition to the clamp crew and has been insane ever since its inclusion. Sometimes you just have those land-light hands that are unable to abuse Bloodghast; Reassembling Skeleton rectifies this problem by providing a cheap way to constantly bring back a sacrificial (or clampable) body. The advent of Bloodghast’s new partner in crime has also led me to question the usefulness of Nether Traitor (and the Phyrexian Altar combo altogether) which I will discuss later.
Yosei, The Morning Star: was always so slow on his own. In 20/20 hindsight, this might’ve been a mistake. I’m actually considering putting him back into the deck, but I’ll explain that later. For my justification of cutting him prior to the tourney, I just never wanted to see him. I would always go for the Iona/Painter/Ghast combo in the yard anyways. After playing the deck much more extensively, I now recognize his value. It was not a direct replacement here, but after I cut Yosei I added Chrome Mox which has been solid so far. I felt like I needed more mana, which will bring me into the next card discussion.
Coldsteel Heart -> Mox Diamond: Coldsteel Heart is another card that I’d probably want to include in the future, even after cutting it. During my test runs though, I opened with Land Tax so often that I wanted to test Mox Diamond in this slot. It’s really a toss up between the two, as diamond is awful without proper support and Coldsteel Heart conflicts with your turn 2 plays. I’m considering Dark Ritual in this slot (no joke).
Sign in Blood -> Dark Confidant: While a strong card, when making cuts for efficiency, Sign and Night’s Whisper were under heavy scrutiny. Yes they help you dig and sift, but as this deck grew more and more efficient, the need for these cards weren’t as apparent. I opted to cut Sign and keep Whisper because of the slightly more prohibitive mana cost of Sign. Replacing it would be our favorite black creature, Dark Confidant. Serving as draw, a clampable body, and a sacrificial body, he was more than welcome to join the crew. Granted there are a few high CC cards in the deck, the curve for the most part is fairly low.
Castigate -> Inquisition of Kozilek : Castigate’s mana cost was really a tad too difficult sometimes. I still do really like this card and think it has a place, but I opted to run the turn 1 card instead. Other interesting choices I’m looking into are Mesmeric Fiend and Tidehollow Sculler, since they serve as sacrificial bodies as the game progresses on.
Damnation -> Devour in Shadow: I wanted to make sure that I had more ways to deal with Rofellos and Braids before it was too late. I bumped up the spot removal a bit to address this. Not much to say here. Nothing is wrong with Damnation, but I do feel like I care a lot less about mass removal in 1v1 and more about just buying enough time for myself to power out a combo. This deck is decently fast and disruptive - if I fall to zerg aggro I probably deserved to lose anyways.
Living Death -> Sun Titan: I never really liked Living Death here. Although it is a pretty good effect in this deck, I don’t think it’s necessary with all the reanimation spells we have now. It’s a bit overkill and at an uncomfortable spot on the curve. Sun Titan was a last minute add (literally changed my list like an hour before it was due). I was yearning for a way to return destroyed combo pieces from the GY, and Sun Titan looked perfect for the job (along with the fact that he is both a decent reanimation target and an even more decent beater). He can Strip lock people on occasion as well. How has he been in practice? I haven’t had the chance to do anything insane, but I foresee him being a solid roleplayer in the future. And while we’re on the subject of insurance cards, a lot of people really wonder why Yawgmoth’s Will is missing from a combo deck. The answer is simple: almost all of our combos require the use of the graveyard. While we may be able to save things here and there, we cannot win the turn we play Will, and that greatly diminishes its value (in my eyes at least).
Snuff Out -> Oblivion Ring: I often tutor for or play Darkest Hour early on in the game, meaning Snuff Out is at a very clear disadvantage in comparison to the other removal cards in the deck. As I played the deck more, I actually felt like the deck was overstocked on removal so I let this one go. I reread the entire Teysa thread and kept thinking about how Khymera was trying to defend the inclusion of Idyllic Tutor. I then decided: why don’t we just up the value of Idyllic Tutor zby running more enchantments? Oblivion Ring has been amazing in all of my games (usually serving as artifact removal, funny enough) as an all-purpose answer to anything.
Return to Dust -> Seal of Cleansing: Dust was too expensive. The effect is great, but in the end I opted to run a quicker, more efficient spell, Seal of Cleansing. Like Oblivion Ring before it, the value of Idyllic Tutor jumps up significantly with the inclusion of this card. Another very interesting card that I want to add is Runed Halo, which effectively trumps most general beatdown strategies (think Godo, Thraximundar, and even Tendrils of Agony, etc). On its own it acts as a pseudo, but effective enough, removal spell. Definitely worth considering. Many other people have suggested Aura of Silence, but the WW in the cost is very counter-productive to this deck’s earlier plays, many of which involve a turn 2 BB.
Exhume -> Animate Dead: I will go into further detail later about why I chose Animate Dead, but the short story is that it is another enchantment card that can be tutored for with Idyllic etc without any major prerequisites. Recurring Nightmare requires you to have a creature in play and sometimes you just don’t have the luxury. By running Animate Dead, you allow yourself much more consistent and realistic turn 2-3 Iona. Exhume does the same thing, but cannot be fetched by either Enlightened nor Idyllic Tutors.
I also added Wasteland to the list in order to have more game with Weathered Wayfarer.
I entered into the tournament with the above changes. The deck has worked fairly well for me, though I do have many, many more things I want to say about cards that have been great and cards that have just been blah.
I had the chance to run this against Uril, the Miststalker piloted by bimmerbot as well as Akroma, Angel of Fury piloted by mutedequilibrium the following day. My record vs each came out to be 5-3 vs Uril and 1-2 vs Akroma. I felt confident in both matchups, though my games vs Akroma were much more tight due to the fact that Akroma could still be played under Iona if painter was not around.
The tournament itself is still going on right now, so I'll update here as soon as we're finished. As of this posting, I am in the top 4.
Understanding Teysa
This section may contain a lot of things that are both obvious but subtle (if that makes any sense), but I feel the need to point them out. While this may be an odd way to go about a primer, I think it’s best if I unraveled everything slowly in the same way that I learned the deck. I will be writing in a sort of ‘stream of consciousness’, as the deck makes much more sense if I move from thought to thought, rather than chop it up into rigid sections. The multiple stances that the deck can take are truly astounding and I want to make sure everyone understands that.
It’s also important, I suppose, to state that we will rarely (if ever) use Teysa’s first ability. The requirements for it are quite costly and the fact that our primary combos turn all creatures black further shies away from the ability. That was never her forte, so this deck was designed with only her second ability in mind.
What Pushes the Deck to a Competitive Level?
Banned cards.
When Khymera first built Teysa, I’m sure he had a clear mission to abuse the hell out of all the cards that were originally banned in the multiplayer list. Now I understand that such cards were banned for a reason. Balance, Recurring Nightmare, Painter’s Servant, and Library of Alexandria are all cards are so disgustingly effective at what they do that the deck is able to stand toe to toe with some of the best generals in the format. By granting the Iona, Shield of Emeria and Painter’s Servant combo, you have a very solid primary reanimation plan backed by a plethora of combos with Teysa. However, the raw strength of the deck comes purely through the brutality of its color combination. I have never experienced nor witnessed a color pair so riddled with efficient answers to just about anything in the format. On top of this, black and white offer the best tutors for finding all of the combo pieces, creating an envious level of consistency. The greater idea however, born from a culmination of different facets of abuse and combos, is a truly unique approach to 1v1 EDH and a very formidable playstyle.
Deckbuilding Philosophies
The original list came from Khymera, who drew inspiration from two things: combos based off banned cards and synergy. Just about every card in here has more than one function, and it takes a lot more than a card “being good” to make it into this list. Because we cannot run the full sets of tutors, we have to resort to transmute cards and weaker tutors (such as Idyllic Tutor), and thus we must maximize their potential. Luckily, that isn’t a problem at all. The way I like to build decks is with an efficient curve. While others place more value in acceleration, allowing them to keep their curve higher, I’d rather come out the gates with strong plays and control the entire early game. I’ve tried very hard to optimize the list in terms of flexibility, which I will talk about in the next section. As for the efficiency of the list itself, barring reanimation targets and larger effect cards like Hallowed Burial, the average CMC of this entire deck rests at a very comfortable 2.44. It’s not wonder I’m so infatuated with the black white color combination - all of its spells are cheap and efficient to the core. It also helps that virtually all of my combo pieces cost 3 or less, meaning matchups against Gaddock Teeg and land destruction aren’t so painful. All this said, my card choices follow two simple rules: aid the combos or impede the opponent immediately. Simple as that. Oftentimes cards in here will do both, and that’s when you know you truly have a gem.
Varying Mana Costs and Card Types
While playing the deck, I realized the importance of maximizing the utility and flexibility of each slot available to the deck. Because there is never one straight forward plan, this deck must be played flexibly. In order to enable this, it is no coincidence that Weathered Wayfarer and Devout Witness (now Necrotic Sliver), both cards that could possibly be replaced, are still in the deck. Why? Because they fulfill different mana slots during different situations. What if you had Victimize in hand and only enough mana to tutor and play a 1CC creature? What if you needed a creature to sacrifice and Dimir Machinations was your only tutor in hand? These very tight, niche situations arise more than you would think. A good example of improving value while still promoting flexibility was how I opted to include many more enchantments into the deck that cope with various situations. Instead of Exhume, Animate Dead was chosen in order to fill the 2CC slot for Shred Memory while still enabling Enlightened Tutor and Idyllic Tutor in a situation where you do not have a creature to sacrifice to Recurring Nightmare . There is a more intricate purpose for each card, and I want people who look at this deck to ponder, understand, and appreciate that fact. This leads me directly into the very unique playstyle of this deck...
Variability and Deception: A Deck of Many Combos
Playing this deck requires a very clear understanding of the combos available. The beauty of this deck, however, is that its more intricate combos are hard to attack. What I mean by this is that your opponent will often have to choose between stopping one piece or another, and since each piece is a part of multiple combos, judging which is more important to counter or destroy becomes nearly impossible. While this does indeed force Teysa to play a risky game at times, it is precisely the variability in combo pieces that makes this deck so powerful.
Before I continue on about the centric combo pieces and multiple angles of attack, I want to make sure you’re acquainted with all of the primary combos available to the deck (even if some of them may come in or out of the deck over time):
Here’s a more sorted way to interpret the various Teysa combo pieces:
A. Infinite creature generator: Teysa, Orzhov Scion + Painter’s Servant/Darkest Hour; Karmic Guide + Reveillark
B. Combo finishers: Blasting Station, Phyrexian Altar, Altar of Dementia
C. Alternate lock: Yosei, The Morning Star + Recurring Nightmare
The primary and most simple win condition for the deck is indeed reanimating Iona, with or without Painter’s Servant. Her value in certain matchups fluctuates a bit, as mutli-colored decks will generally have answers in more than one color, meaning playing her without painter is a risk. Against mono-colored decks however, finding Entomb + Reanimate/Animate Dead with the kind of tutor density this list packs is not difficult at all. In fact, having Iona out by herself is not an uncommon turn 2-3 play. It’s only when you must have both painter and her out simultaneously that things begin to get a little tricky, since you will most likely need to go with a tutor for Buried Alive (fetching Iona, painter, ghast), followed by a Victimize the next turn on the ghast.
While the first combo is the primary method of victory, you might be asking: why Teysa? Teysa herself is a combo piece that enables an infinite generation of tokens by altering her second ability with Darkest Hour or Painter’s Servant. Coupled with a sacrifice effect and a creature to sacrifice, you can use cards such as Blasting Station or Altar of Dementia to win instantly by generating an infinite number of sacrifices. With this in mind, a very combo-centric piece to tutor for is Painter’s Servant. He is the crux of many combos, including the primary Iona one. You will almost always name ‘black’, as this allows you to combo off with Teysa in play. While he may not always be the first thing you tutor for (and often he’s not very safe to run out there early, as he still is just a creature), it is important to remember that he is a core card. Darkest Hour, while not able to combo with Iona, allows for virtually the same thing at a very, very efficient cost of B. It is also an enchantment and difficult to get rid of. The other very important card that leads into virtually all of your combos (even the most elaborate ones) is Buried Alive. You’re able to set up any game plan based off your starting hand, but again be wary because this is a sort of “all in” type of card that is subject to graveyard hate.
So now that we understand the primary Teysa combo, it’s now important to discover what you can do with individual pieces. Phyrexian Altar is a peculiar piece because it has an interesting role in this deck. It is clearly the less efficient combo in comparison to Blasting Station because you will need an alternate means to win after you generate infinite mana. So why do we bother keeping this around over, say, Altar of Dementia which allows you to virtually win right on the spot? To be absolutely honest, Altar of Dementia may rightfully take this spot, but hear the following points and ponder the advantages and disadvantages. Phyrexian Altar is less likely to be destroyed or countered over, say, Painter’s Servant or Skullclamp. This allows you to play it with some liberty, because even if it is destroyed you don’t really mind. In fact, you almost welcome it over the destruction of painter. However, because it is often left alone, a single tutor for Nether Traitor will allow you to generate infinite mana with Teysa in play. You sacrifice the traitor to create a 1/1 spirit, which you then sacrifice and use the initial mana to bring traitor back - this nets you 1 mana each time you perform this cycle. After you have infinite mana, there are two primary cards that will lead you to victory: Skullclamp and Profane Command. Yes, some of these combos may feel like they have too many pieces, but you’re going to realize that while playing this deck pieces just fall into your lap and you can make do with any combo, really. With the tutor density, there’s really not much to worry about. So, in short, if your opponent decided that he’d rather stop your painter and NOT your altar, you go with this plan and win without the need to turn all of your creatures black. Variability.
Sometimes you’ll dump a bunch of stuff into your yard, like ghast, traitor, Iona, painter, etc, and your opponent will demolish your ensuing plays with a well-timed graveyard hate card. It’s times like these that we look for yet ANOTHER backup plan. The infamous duo, Karmic Guide and Reveillark, combined with either of the other combo finishers will allow you to sacrifice an infinite amount of times. This combination is powerful because it does not require Teysa nor painter/darkest hour. The one major drawback is the cost of executing this plan - you often need to reach 5 mana to cast either Reveillark or Karmic Guide. However, with the use of reanimation effects, you are able to cheat these guys into play. It’s quite simple to cast Buried Alive for both of these if you already have a Blasting Station in play and a reanimate spell in hand. The other reason these creatures are here is because they are both good on their own! Karmic Guide serves as another reanimation spell and Reveillark can bring back several important pieces (such as painter). Once again, more back up plans, and more subtle flexibility.
While this may or may not be included into the deck, I should not fail to mention BW’s easy access to the Yosei, the Morning Star + Recurring Nightmare combo. This is the plan C, should games ever go that far. If you have any other creature, you can constantly sacrifice it to bring Yosei back and then use Recurring Nightmare to sacrifice Yosei and bring that creature back. Repeat forever and tap your opponent out, allowing you to do whatever you want. I would never actively go for this combo, as it does not guarantee you an ‘instant’ win and it’s fairly slow, unless you’re in a gamestate that would allow you to lock your opponent out or it just conveniently falls into your lap.
You should also never rule out the option that some games you just won’t have anything at all, though they may be few and far between. That’s when you’re going to have to rely on token beats to get the job done. Given a few fairly strong stand-alone cards in here, winning in this matter is not completely foreign. A few key cards that allow this are Elspeth, Knight-Errant, Bitterblossom, and Sun Titan. It’s also worth noting that Sun Titan pairs particularly well with Strip Mine, Seal of Cleansing, and Necrotic Sliver.
Weaknesses
This deck is far from infallible. In fact, while it does have very strong plays, there are often hands that meander about and accomplish nothing significant on their own. It’s these games, where you only have access to so little, that you must depend on BW’s answers to keep you aloft long enough to buy a win. Go for card advantage plays, such as Skullclamp or Phyrexian Arena that allow you to swing yourself back into the game.
The one archetype that Teysa struggles most against are generals that have a heavy amount of blue in them. Versus any other type of deck, aggro or combo, Teysa is much more more well-equipped in both disruption and removal, backed by rather quick wins when unmolested. Blue is the complete opposite, as they can always meddle with your plans. I’ve tried to include as much hand disruption as possible, but it will come down to how well you can utilize your mana and tutors to play deceptively, forcing them to counter the wrong spells while meticulously setting up an angle of attack. Nothing will teach you how to fight blue as a combo deck other than play experience, and I can assure you that any veteran would tell you the same thing. All this said, blue is a rather popular choice in EDH, so prepare yourself should you chose to partake this road.
Intense amounts of artifact/enchantment destruction is also rough for this deck, forcing you to go the reanimation route. Any time a player can recur artifact hate is bad times for Teysa (ie. Kiki-Jiki). Luckily those same matchups usually allow for Iona without painter.
Graveyard hate is always an issue, but thanks to the fact that you have so many options, you’re almost never putting all your eggs in one basket. Even in games where I’ve had my entire yard removed twice, I still felt like I was 100% in the game. Just be wary about what your opponent is capable of so that you don’t walk into these traps mindlessly.
When I have more time...
I will fill this section with important matchups and how to deal with them!
Ideas and Reassessment
While I think the list is great as it is, there are still many cards that may not be optimal. I’m going to list them here and see what you guys think. This is EDH and that means the list will always be growing with each set and evolving with every new metagame. There are actually tons of cards that people can argue the inclusion of - here are a few that I think stick up above the crowd:
Increasing Reanimation Target Count
Because reanimation is still the primary role of this deck, increasing its value and power only seems natural. However, the reason why this strategy is so powerful in the first place is because the deck is always trying to lock the game out with Iona. There are very few other targets than can seal a win away like she can, which has basically led me to question whether or not I even wanted to have secondary targets. Oftentimes though, I feel like if we could just add in another great reanimation target, it would go a long way to helping out games plagued by hate. There have been several choices, and while they are all inferior to Iona in terms of strictly winning, they are efficient role players that can quickly swing the game.
Angel of Despair: BW’s utility at its best. The problem with Angel of Despair is that she doesn’t actually win you the game. In fact, her contributions to the greater goal of the deck are virtually non-existent. Sure a 5/5 flier is nothing to scoff at, but we’re looking for something that packs a bigger punch.
Blazing Archon: In attempts to find a card that will create instant board impact, Blazing Archon looks like an amazing show stopper. Sure it’s a powerful effect, but he’s just as fragile as the next creature. There are just those times when the board is so full of creatures that it’s too late to bring Iona/painter out - this is where he would be valuable.
Pestilence Demon: Discussed amongst a few fellow playtest partners, Pestilence Demon is probably the most powerful of the bunch in terms of being both a show stopper and ending the game on his own. His Pestilence ability is borderline insane in EDH and his body is huge. I see great potential for this card, especially in the aggro matchup.
Yosei, The Morning Star: I had originally cut this card, but I sort of want it back in again just because he forms a two-card combo with Recurring Nightmare. Granted, it is slightly slow (since you have to use Recurring Nightmare twice to have him sacrificed - bring him back then use it again), it seems like a powerful show stopper against any time of deck, not just aggro. In the end, the fact that Yosei is part of an infinite lock might prove more valuable than Pestilence Demon. I don’t want to bump my fat creature count up too high for several reason, so only one of the above will make its way in.
In the end, no additional reanimation target may be necessary either as we’re looking for game winners and Iona is the only one that can truly accomplish that task.
The Battle of Altars
The first iteration of the deck utilized both of the altars, Phyrexian Altar and Altar of Dementia. However, Khymera made the point that the introduction of the Eldrazi invalidated the mill combo with Altar of Dementia. At that point, Blasting Station was brought on board as the alternative ‘instant win’ artifact. A great deal of my victories have been thanks to Blasting Station, and I find myself rarely ever ‘going’ for the Phyrexian Altar combo unless I exclusively have Nether Traitor in my staring hand. This brings me to the issue of Nether Traitor and Profane Command. Both cards, while not terrible on their own, are definitely weaker cards in the deck. I always go for Bloodghast or Reassembling Skeleton because I can bring them back to be used with clamp or nightmare rather easily. Nether Traitor on the other hand requires you to have another creature entering the graveyard first AND the black mana available. Even though this means drawing extra cards with clamp, it is often just overkill. The function of the card is practically backwards for this deck. That said, I think the introduction of Reassembling Skeleton dwarfs the utility that Nether Traitor brings to the table. Profane Command on the other hand is not a terrible card per se, but I haven’t found it useful outside of the infinite mana combo with Phyrexian Altar. The deck just doesn’t ever reach that kind of mana to gain proper mileage out of the various options on the card, so its utility is virtually wasted here. Now bringing the conversation in a roundabout way, it seems the Eldrazi do not plague the 1v1 lists much like they do to multiplayer, meaning that playing Altar of Dementia may not be so bad. Just scanning over the various viable decks, the only lists that actually play Eldrazi are mono-green decks that use them primarly as win conditions. It could be as simple as not going for the dementia combo against green and using it against everything else. If we run Altar of Dementia, this means we can cut three spots: Phyrexian Altar, Nether Traitor, and Profane Command - all of which are very sub par cards in here. The one thing that has me walking the fence is the fact that you absolutely need to resolve either Painter’s Servant or Darkest Hour for these combos, otherwise you cannot go infinite unless you have the Karmic Guide/Reveillark duo. The way I see it though, is that even though the infinite mana combo only requires Teysa, Phyrexian Altar, and traitor, you still need to have the win condition (or a tutor in hand). In this sense, it is no different than just streamlining the combo process and require sticking a painter effect, but you gain the benefit of two stronger slots. At this point we have to weigh a sub par set of cards that create variability against more powerful cards that aid a more streamlined, but predictable, combo.
The Necessity for more Hand Disruption
This is just a small section, but I feel that I could go with another hand disruption spell or two. IMO, hand disruption goes a long way in EDH, and oftentimes it’s not even just for securing your own win but for taking someone out of the game entirely. Snatching a key play out of an opponent’s hand is invaluable and I think this deck could use some more of that. To counter this deficiency, I propose the addition of Mesmeric Fiend and Tidehollow Sculler. We may not be able to abuse their abilities using the stack all the time, but they offer sacrificial bodies on top of their pinpoint discard, something that the deck is always fond of. As long as you can halt your opponent long enough to allow a combo, you’re good to go, and these cards do exactly that while providing fodder for infinite sacrifice combos. By the time you go off, whatever card you snatched from their hand will more than most likely become irrelevant.
Fickle Mana
One of the few drawbacks of the BW color combination is how fickle the mana can be. There are tons of BB, WW, and WB casting costs that need to be met by the second and third turns. Maximizing the amount of lands able to produce both B and W become crucial, so I’ve shaved down a lot of chaff. However, three lands in particular have become somewhat of a hindrance to the natural early game development of the deck, and they are:Bojuka Bog, Orzhov Basilica and Salt Flats. It’s pretty much decided that enemy color decks will have to run CIPT lands just to make sure they can consistently make their hearvy-colored plays. Bojuka Bog is never there when I want it to be and is often just a CIPT Swamp. I’ve consulted Evergreen and a few other players about this, and they all concur that bog is best left out of more aggressive decks; I’m going to replace it with City of Brass. Salt Flats is sub par to Vivid Marsh (and Meadow) in much too many ways. I’m going to replace it with the aforementioned card; same for Orzhov Basilica.
Cards that Should Be in Here but Aren’t
And this is what many people consider the most fun part about EDH - your deck is never perfect. There are always slots that can be changed depending on your metagame or as new sets are introduced. Ahead is a list of cards that I personally think are powerful enough to warrant inclusion. However, I have not managed to find room for them. Most of these cards, while very powerful in their own respects and would be auto-include in any other BW list, often do not share enough synergy with the combos at hand. Therefore they are omitted not due to lack of power, but because they lack harmony. Most of these I have tried, some of these I have not. If you have a particularly good counter argument for any of these, I will gladly hear it.
Khymera, if you’re reading this, I’d like you to make comments on these choices.
Elspeth Tirel - lot of buzz over this card. The verdict? She’s not good enough here. She’s expensive and doesn’t aid the gameplan in any way except make tokens (and potentially disk the board). You may argue that this is a lot, but you have to take a look at the larger picture, and that is she doesn’t aid our combos enough and she doesn’t provide any immediate control. Those are the criteria for earning a spot in the deck and she just barely falls short in both categories.
Damnation - definitely a good card, definitely deserves a spot. However, I don’t think the deck even needs it. It pretty much ignores creatures en-mass by comboing before that happens and carries plenty of spot removal for ones you do care about. Mass removal like Damnation just isn’t really necessary, and if it REALLY is, we can always opt to either Balance, Sickening Dreams, or Hallowed Burial.
Yawgmoth’s Will - cannot combo the turn you cast it, making it fairly weak in here. I’ve thought long and hard about this, and the disadvantage is just so blatantly annoying that I can’t bring myself to run it. You can’t even go Will -> Buried Alive, which is one of the spells that gets countered the most. However, I must admit that Yawgmoth’s Will is still EXTREMELY powerful, especially in a deck that has so many efficient tools, such as Balance. This alone may warrant its inclusion, as I don’t think many decks should ever pass up the opportunity to play this card.
Serra Ascendant - this is another card people have been talking about endlessly. Simply put, I cannot consistently cast him turn 1 without starting at 29 life. Yes a 6/6 flying lifelinker is still good on turn 2, but if you remember back to my section about the deck philosophy, this card neither helps to immediately control the game nor provide aid to my combos (other than being a sacrificial creature, which I doubt will happen since it’s a magnet). You might beat them very low, but then what? This deck wasn’t designed to get in the red zone, so chances are you won’t even be able to finish the opponent off. Coupled with tons of lifeloss in this deck, I can’t consistently keep him at a 6/6 early on, so if he’s not in my opening hand he’s just a big fail.
Salvage Scout - a card almost designed for this deck. It’s unfortunate that he can’t also get back enchantments - that would make him an auto-include. Runed Halo - I really honestly love this card. However, I just can’t find room or justify it replacing another card in here. Mortify - no room. Unmake - no room. Grasp of Darkness - no room. Oust - could be good, but I’ve yet to test it. Identity Crisis - too expensive. Diabolic Intent - better on paper than in play. Diabolic Tutor - slightly too expensive. Consideration. Pithing Needle - is this better than some of the cards in the deck? Luminarch Ascension - slow in 1v1. Argivian Find - better than Sun Titan? Dark Ritual - unnecessary 1-shot ramp. Gideon Jura - unnecessary, does not further gameplan. Sorin Markov - unnecessary, does not further gameplan. Liliana Vess - too slow. Moat - consideration. Aura of Silence - double white hurts. Mind Slash - better on paper than in play. Condemn - might replace Devour in Shadow. Thoughts? Guul Draz Assassin - not worth the mana investment. Royal Assassin - pretty decent, but not worth the slot? Preacher - same as Royal Assassin. Cabal Therapy - in essence it should be good, but I still think it’s too narrow. Fallen Ideal - another enabler, pretty good one too, I just hate using the red zone to win. Orim’s Chant - decent, but no room.
Prospective Changes
Given all of the observations above, I have concluded that these changes should be made to the deck in order to bolster its effectiveness. Whether you all agree or disagree, I’d love to hear opinions!
- Bojuka Bog
- Salt Flats
- Orzhov Basilica
- Phyrexian Altar
- Nether Traitor
- Profane Command
- Smallpox
- Insidious Dreams
- Devout Witness
- Corpse Connoisseur
+ City of Brass
+ Vivid Meadow
+ Vivid Marsh
+ Altar of Dementia
+ Living Death
+ Tithe
+ Mesmeric Fiend
+ Tidehollow Sculler
+ Necrotic Sliver
+ Dark Tutelage
These changes basically tackle the Altar Battle argument. By removing the Phyrexian Altar combo, you effectively free up an extra two slots, which I then filled with Living Death and Tithe. Living Death fulfills two roles in this deck, a sweeper that I wish I had just a bit more often as well as another reanimation effect, which just makes this better than a plain Damnation; it also allows you to play more aggressively with painter, as now you have more ways to bring him back from the dead for a combo kill. Tithe is amazing for making sure we hit our land drops as well as fix for our more difficult early plays (insane with Mox Diamond!) I was also originally worried I couldn’t deal with Rofellos or Braids in time, but Smallpox is coming out because I feel like its power level in here is so insignificant. It is true that we can use the discard to our advantage and that it’s our only edict effect, but In the long run I think we could do without the card. I felt like some of the ‘discard as an extra cost’ cards were just too overwhelmingly bad in multiples (or without Land Tax), so I opted to exclude the weakest one, Insidious Dreams. This slot should honestly be replaced with Diabolic Tutor, but I wanted to address the areas that the deck could use the most help in, and that would be adding a tad more discard. I then added in Mesmeric Fiend and Tidehollow Sculler because they provide two advantages: a powerful hand disruption effect backed by a body, which I can then use to sacrifice into my combos. It’s a good thing I’m going to put these guys again and I have no idea why I even cut them in the earlier iterations of the deck. The necessity of having a combo start is a very common problem with this deck; and while it isn’t hard to find a body, I’d rather just up the creature density so that annoyance becomes much less frequent. Devout Witness was cut because she just didn’t carry the kind of punch I thought she would. Once again, discarding a card is a bit much unless you have one of the cards that allow you to enter surplus (Library, Tax, Wayfarer), and she’s a bit slow. I’ve opted to try Necrotic Sliver in this slot, since he fulfills the 3CC slot for Dimir Machinations should I need to tutor for a creature. I still foresee the sliver being a bit too slow for my tastes, but we’ll see how he pans out. However, he has two subtle saving graces that are: comboing with Sun Titan and solid when I’m being liberal with excess reanimation effects.
I’ve been continually unimpressed by Corpse Connoisseur. The three suggested cards, Dark Tutelage, Salvage Scout, Serra Ascendant are all cards that I think are much more useful. Corpse Connoisseur seems like he’d be the perfect setup card, but in reality he’s just way too slow. The most ideal scenario I can think of is having Altar of Dementia or Blasting Station in play with a reanimate spell in hand. If you play Corpse Connoisseur, barring any interruptions, that is an instant win via Karmic Guide and Reveillark, but it’d cost a whopping 9 mana. Dark Tutelage should probably be in the deck regardless, as it’s these kinds of cards that will gain you a great advantage over the course of a game. Argivian Find has always been on my watch list because it’s pretty good against blue decks to try and force through a certain piece, or getting back clamp (which is a huge deal). I think the better card, now that it’s out, is Salvage Scout. Not only is a creature for Victimize and combo starting fodder, but he gets back artifacts! The only things you really need to get back are usually Skullclamp, Painter’s Servant and either altar or station - so this is perfect! Anytime we can include a creature that will either aid our combos or help to disrupt our opponent is the double green light, and I think he fits the bill perfectly. he only downside to this is I hate running reactive cards, so at least Salvage Scout provides that combo fodder / clampable (irony?) aspect. It can’t get back Recurring Nightmare or Darkest Hour, so I’ll leave the verdict up to you guys. Serra Ascendant is kind of weird. Everyone tells me that it’s insane, but I don’t think I can justify running it in here with so much early life loss. I only have 5 Plains and a total of 8 ways to produce W on turn 1 without taking a hit. It can be good, as even a 6/6 flying lifelinker on turn 2 is awesome, but I’m afraid it just doesn’t do enough for the gameplan as a whole. I still would also like to run Yawgmoth’s Will, if you read the section above.
Overall I’m still trying to find the balance between answers and combo. I find that I’m really drawn to cards like Dark Confidant because they fulfill so many roles in this deck, including aiding consistency. If there is a creature variant of a spell, you bet that I’ll most likely be running it. I’ve said it a thousand times already, but it is CRUCIAL that we have combo starting fodder here! It’s just really difficult to plan the deck so that it fairs well against such a diverse array of generals. Sometimes I feel my deck is too removal light against voltron generals or Rofellos. Then sometimes I feel like my deck is too hand disruption light versus control and combo decks. In the end I’ll never be happy, but I’m just glad that the color combination offers such amazing options like Vindicate.
The last card I want to mention here is the one that I’ve been eyeing for a few weeks now. Scroll Rack has been ridiculous. And what I mean by that is that it’s either really good or it’s really bad. Yes it lets me see much deeper, but at the same time it can really throw some plays off and is a bit of a pain to constantly sink mana in to. Yes it is insane with Land Tax and whatnot, I know, that’s not what I’m complaining about. I’m complaining about those average hands where you don’t have an insane card drawing engine that Scroll Rack will only ever let you dig 3 cards deep. It’s just slightly annoying. I’ve pondered what replacements I could find, and I really think Yawgmoth’s Will might take its place. Otherwise, another very interesting card is Plunge into Darkness. I know Khymera has a hard on for Scroll Rack, but I’ve been skeptical about it since the orginal list. It has proven itself to me, but that doesn’t mean it’s not streaky enough to make me question its inclusion.
Latest Updates
I have been playing with this list a decent amount and I can say that it is much more comfortable than any of the earlier iterations. I really cut out a lot of fat cards and now it’s a stream of efficiency. I’m interested now to hear everyone else’s opinions!
I’ll first give credit where credit is most due. I want to thank Khymera, foremost, for the skeleton and input that went into this deck. Without his guidance, I would still be playing Ghost Council with geddon.
mutedequilibrium - An old friend and an excellent player. If not for Chris, my interest in EDH would not have been rekindled. I’m sure we’re to have many more EDH endeavours in the future. Evergreen - Another old friend and excellent player, I always enjoy talking about combo decks and Magic in general with him. It also helps that we’re both infatuated with black LennonMarx - a good listener and one who provides solid feedback all the time (and for putting up with me complaining endlessly about how shoddy my mana base is >.< ) xCHRISTIANx - disss guyyy. Some Thrax kid who thinks he’s cool at life and signets. Surging Chaos - for his support of both the format and my deck, thanks so much
Thank you too, readers, if you managed to scour the entire thing. I’m always open to constructive feedback and am looking forward to your thoughts on how to optimize this list!
For probably the only other person on this planet that has played this type of Teysa deck, with so many different combos, knows what I am about to comment on right now. I will address the nuances of the deck below. There might be fixes, there might not. They may simply be the shortcomings of the deck itself and cannot be rectified, but I feel the need to point them out so that we may possibly address them, be it through existing cards or future sets:
Not having creatures to sacrifice
Most of the combos in here require a creature to sac and that is a very big annoyance. Actually, I have lost games where I have Altar of Dementia with Darkest Hour, but cannot find a creature for the life of me. As a result I’ve added creatures like Mesmeric Fiend and Tidehollow Sculler to help, and they’ve been great for that, but it’s still a problem sometimes, as they are pretty high priority targets anyways. My idea was that they soak up removal and artifact destruction spells that would have otherwise been pointed at your more important combo pieces, so they pass. There’s also the issue that whatever they have removed you don’t want to see happen to you mid combo, such as removal for Teysa while he first trigger is on the stack or even cards like Krosan Grip. I even went as far as to look for more non-discriminate creatures that’ll serve as removal (ie. Nekretaal or Shriekmaw), but the fact that they only kill non-black is a very annoying drawback.
Never having enough mana
The curve of this deck is beautiful. I really like the fact that the average CC is 2.44, that just makes me all giddy inside. However, since we don’t have very many lands, the problem of casting transmute cards and then waiting an entire turn before comboing off is a large nuisance. I really hate just throwing stuff out there and passing the turn, so I usually want to save my second and third combo pieces till I can play them both (usually Teysa is the third). I want to do a lot of things, but I don’t always have the mana. Chrome Mox and Mox Diamond have both been VERY helpful here, but i do wonder if the inclusion of one-shot cards like Dark Ritual are worth their weight in gold here.
Having enough removal, having enough consistency
This is a delicate balance. I tried adding and removing card draw, and I feel like the ones that build you an advantage over time are the best, like Dark Confidant and Dark Tutelage. The problem is that we don’t have enough mana each turn to actually use all of our cards each turn, even though our curve is extremely low. So I’ve also tried bumping up the spot removal as a way to “buy time” for us to play more lands and set up our combos. That backfired, as I was often flooded with removal and could never find my combo pieces. The current setup is decent, but I feel like I’m barely handling the aggressive generals and still a bit short on reaching a greater consistency. I suppose this is fine, and the fact that I don’t feel like there’s actually a significant deficiency in either probably means I’ve found something close to balance. Just wanted your opinion, because EDH is a format of extremes. Bump up the removal and lose to combo, bump up the consistency and lose to Rofellos (though not really lol).
This section is reserved for tournament reports, large deck overhaul analysis, and change logs:
-Yosei The Morning Star
-Recurring Nightmare
-Skeletal Scrying
-Necrotic Sliver
-Elspeth, Knight Errant
-Oblivion Ring
-Persecute
-Vivid Meadow
+Altar of Dementia
+Leaden Myr
+Golden Myr
+Seal of Doom
+Mother of Runes
+Preacher (Peacekeeper?)
+Cabal Therapy
+Orzhov Basilica
So the main things to note here are that we opted to drop the Yosei/Nightmare combo altogether. In all honesty, we don't really need it and it is definitely on the slower side because Yosei costs 6 mana to bring out. Yes you can reanimate him to cheat, but most of the time you'd rather be going for Iona. Our greatest problems with this iteration of the deck is two-fold: having enough mana to play out our combo pieces and having a creature to sacrifice to our Teysa combos (or Victimize). We've decided to really hone in on the advantage of running more modular pieces in the deck and cutting out ALL of the fat. We want to push the idea of creature accelerants by introducing myr into the deck and more defensive measure for them via Mother of Runes. Cutting out more expensive and risky spells like Persecute and Elspeth allow us to run more efficient cards such as Cabal Therapy or Peacekeeper. Another slower creature, Necrotic Sliver, was replaced by Seal of Doom! We were pondering the idea that Necrotic Sliver was so good with Sun Titan, but the card itself was too slow. Now we get the best of both worlds - a decent speed removal spell that can be returned with Sun Titan! Another change that my surprise you is the cutting of Elspeth. She really is just a 4CC Bitterblossom here and would be better served as another creature instead.
This is a huge leap for the deck and I fully expect these changes to have a very positive impact on the list. Of course I will be keeping an eye out, since we're effectively shaving down on removal and reanimation, but I don't think that'll be too big of an issue.
K. Stronghold is nice sometimes, but definitely not essential (or useful in most games). Library is obviously insane, and is particularly good in this deck (Weathered Wayfarer).
Rector is definitely not so great when all the enchantments cost less than 4. We have enough ways to sacrifice her that she's still alright, but perhaps not good enough. I like the Skeleton quite a bit. It's impressed me in decks like Rakdos and Lyzolda, and it seems fine here.
I will say that I'd like to see one more way to abuse recurring creatures, now that we've got Bloodghast, Recurring Skeleton, and Bitterblossom. Skullclamp is obviously the best, but there isn't much else in here...Recurring Nightmare and Victimize don't really count. However, the next best card I can think of is Braids, Cabal Minion, which is powerful (and another creature) but doesn't really fit the strategy. Maybe she's worth trying anyway.
I always considered Yosei to be uncuttable. The Recurring Nightmare combo is just so good, and not hard to set up. Seeing that you cut him made me really consider him...but I still think he should be included.
By considering Yosei "Plan C," I think you're underrating him. I've won roughly as many games through a Yosei lock as through a Teysa combo, and it's occasionally a better reanimation target than Iona. It's also the only combo that can't be disrupted with artifact/enchantment destruction, which can be very important.
If you do cut him though, you should probably cut Recurring Nightmare too. Without Yosei, it's worse than cheaper reanimation in this deck.
I don't really want to cut Coldsteel Heart. My biggest problem with this deck was always having enough acceleration/colorfixing, and Coldsteel Heart is one of the better cards to help with that. I do like both Mox Diamond and Chrome Mox though, and am happy including both.
I agree that Inquisition is better than Castigate in this deck. However, I'm not convinced that Mesmeric Fiend and Tidehollow Sculler are better than Castigate. I've rarely had that much trouble finding a creature to sacrifice, and sometimes you simply can't afford to sacrifice these creatures anyway. More importantly though, I'm just not sure they're good enough. Most decks have plenty of removal, which just makes these...pretty bad, assuming that you want to take more than a removal spell. Nothing sucks more than playing Tidehollow Sculler and seeing 2 removal spells (and even with just one, you're forced to take the removal). This disadvantage is mitigated if you have something like Blasting Station to sac the creature before the trigger resolves, but at that point you might as well not be playing a creature.
At this point, I think I'll try your setup, but with Castigate instead of Tidehollow Sculler. Same cost, and I'd rather exile a card forever than make it so easy to get back. I'll try out Mesmeric Fiend to see if I like it, but I would be surprised if it makes the cut in the long run.
I see you've re-added Living Death to your most recent list, but I'll discuss it anyway. I do feel that it's potentially cuttable, but I'm loathe to do so. Sort of like Balance (but even more so), Living Death is one of those cards that just completely reverses the game state. There are lots of situations where nothing else could possibly save you, and Living Death not only saves you, but wins you the game. It's true that there are also lots of situations where you don't really want to cast it, but at least if it's in your hand (or you have a tutor), you can sculpt a situation where it will be good. It's also versatile, in that it's basically 2 cards in one--it's not ideal, but if you absolutely need a sweeper or a reanimate, Living Death gets the job done.
That said, I definitely like the addition of Sun Titan. It's one of my favorite cards, and it seems particularly good here. It is quite pricy for this deck, but I think it's still reasonable. It's competing with Yawgmoth's Will for this slot, and I prefer the Titan.
I definitely agree with cutting Snuff Out. I'm not sure if Oblivion Ring is necessary, but it's not too bad. I don't really care that you can find it with Idyllic Tutor...I considered Idyllic Tutor justified with fewer targets, because it could often just win the game. I really don't want to be tutoring for Oblivion Ring, ever. Not saying it couldn't happen, but I don't like my odds anyway if I'm that desperate. You say it's been good though, so I don't mind trying it out.
This is a reasonable change. I'm not a big fan of Seal of Cleansing, but I suppose it's fine here. Especially with Sun Titan in the deck, I don't have a problem playing Seal.
This is a good change. I'm not sure why we didn't just play Animate Dead initially. I know we were considering it and decided against it, but I have no idea why.
I also added Wasteland to the list in order to have more game with Weathered Wayfarer.
Sure. I didn't include Wasteland initially because I was worried about the mana requirements, but even so, it's good in any deck. I would probably count it as only half a land though, for the purpose of figuring out the mana base.
Increasing Reanimation Target Count
I used to play Angel of Despair. It was really bad. I'm not really interested in Blazing Archon or Pestilence Demon either. The demon is better, but I just don't think I want to to try to win with it. It's still too fragile. I'd almost rather go with It That Betrays, though I don't want to play that either. I don't really consider Yosei to be a "reanimation target," but I think he still belongs in the deck, so I guess that covers it. Keep in mind that you've got access to Sun Titan too, which is not the worst reanimation target in the world. I wouldn't worry about this.
The Battle of Altars
My view on this is a little different than yours. I never considered Altar of Dementia and Phyrexian Altar to be competing for space. They're different combos. The Altar of Dementia combo is definitely better, but the Phyrexian Altar combo was still tempting because it didn't require Painter's Servant/Darkest Hour. Now that Reassembling Skeleton has invalidated the need for Nether Traitor, I no longer consider the Phyrexian Altar combo to be worth playing. That gives you 3 more slots (Phyrexian Altar, Nether Traitor, Profane Command) to comfortably replace.
Fickle Mana
I'm fine with swapping Bojuka Bog for City of Brass (though it's a little sad with Weathered Wayfarer in the deck). Salt Flats is almost the same as the Vivid lands, so that doesn't make much difference, but I would keep Orzhov Basilica. I've found it to be very important in those games where you open with Land Tax or Weathered Wayfarer, and your opponent tries to keep them inactive by slow-rolling a land. In this situation, Basilica is the best land you could have, as it lets you keep developing your mana without adding to your land count. This situation comes up often enough that I think the Basilica is worth keeping. (It's also like having an extra land in land-light hands, which can help a lot.)
Cards that Should Be in Here but Aren’t
Elspeth Tirel: Meh. The +2 is useless, and the -6 isn't what we want at all. The -2 is somewhat interesting just because it's instant removal with Teysa, but that's not enough to make her better than Conquerer's Pledge. She's not for this deck.
Yawgmoth's Will: Seriously overrated in 1v1 EDH. It can be good in some decks (as a rule of thumb, it tends to be worthwhile in decks that play Dark Ritual), but this really doesn't seem to be the right deck for it. Sun Titan does everything I want from Yawgmoth's Will anyway.
Serra Ascendant: It's very good in aggro decks, and useless in anything else. Does this look like an aggro deck?
Salvage Scout: Interesting that you noticed this. I just breezed over it, but it's not that bad. However, it's still just a slightly better Treasure Hunter most of the time. It's closer than I would have thought, but this isn't good enough.
Runed Halo: I've played this a fair amount in other decks, and it's really failed to impress me. Sometimes it's quite good, but more commonly it's almost useless. Not what this deck needs.
Pithing Needle: This would be okay, but I don't find it necessary at all. I'd rather play anything with more synergy.
Argivian Find: I don't think the deck wants this, but I might be wrong. Do you often find yourself in situations where you could win if you just had that 1 artifact/enchantment in your graveyard? I don't think this comes up to much, but maybe I'm wrong. I like Sun Titan better overall, for the potential to reuse multiple permanents. If everything you've played has been swept away, Sun Titan can reassemble everything you need in a turn or two. Argivian Find...not so much. The cost isn't a huge issue at this point, as you only really need this later in the game.
Condemn: I prefer Devour in Shadow. I really don't like Condemn in EDH anymore. There are too many decks where it's too hard to hit the right creature at the right time.
Guul Draz Assassin: You might be underrating this one a little bit. I've played him a little bit in other decks, and been reasonably happy with him. He's definitely not your first line of defense against Rofellos, but he's a great second or third line. I still don't think he quite makes the cut here, but only because of how mana hungry this deck is all the time.
Preacher: This is the one card on the list I think you SHOULD play. It's actually kind of like Guul Draz Assassin, but way better. It's nothing like Royal Assassin. Even in decks without sacrifice outlets, he's quite good. If you do have a sacrifice outlet, he's insane. This deck happens to have quite a few sacrifice outlets anyway. Just play him. When he doesn't eat removal, he usually wins the game.
You didn't mention it, but I'd also consider adding Nihil Spellbomb. I think this card is so good in EDH. You don't really have any graveyard hate at all right now, which can be a big problem (especially with Living Death). This Spellbomb is never dead (like Tormod's Crypt), never hurts you (like Relic of Progenitus), and suitably answers graveyard shenanigans at instant speed (unlike Bojuka Bog).
Other stuff on that list...unnecessary or not good enough.
- Bojuka Bog
- Salt Flats
- Orzhov Basilica
- Phyrexian Altar
- Nether Traitor
- Profane Command
- Smallpox
- Insidious Dreams
- Devout Witness
- Corpse Connoisseur
+ City of Brass
+ Vivid Meadow
+ Vivid Marsh
+ Altar of Dementia
+ Living Death
+ Tithe
+ Mesmeric Fiend
+ Tidehollow Sculler
+ Necrotic Sliver
+ Dark Tutelage
This looks pretty good overall. The only cuts I don't like is Orzhov Basilica, for reasons already stated. I'm also not sure I like cutting Smallpox, though it might be okay. I wouldn't say that an edict, a discard, and land destruction for 2 mana is an "insignificant" power level. In the right situation, Smallpox practically wins you the game, and I'm always happy to see it in my opening hand against general-centric decks like Rofellos or Zur. The question is just whether it's useful enough of the time to warrant its inclusion. I think the answer is probably yes, but I might well be wrong.
I don't want to add Tidehollow Sculler, for reasons already stated. I'm also not sure if you really need Altar of Dementia. It's wholly redundant with Blasting Station, and I'm not certain you need multiples of that effect. I was always pretty happy with one. If you do want more than Altar of Dementia is a good choice, but think about whether you actually need it.
I like Necrotic Sliver, though I'm not sure it's efficient enough for this deck. I think I played it once, in the beginning, and found it too costly, but I still like the versatility. As far as 3cc removal creatures go, I think Preacher is just better, but I'd still consider playing Necrotic Sliver over Oblivion Ring.
I don't see what your problem with Scroll Rack is. I guess I do recommend it in many decks, but it's so good here. Even in an "average" hand where it doesn't do that much, it lets you sculpt that average hand into a good hand. "Only" digging 3 cards deep isn't as good as seeing even more cards, but it's not insignificant. If Scroll Rack can't save you in such a situation, probably nothing else would have either...nothing lets you see more cards. If Scroll Rack is "really throwing some plays off," you must be doing something wrong. It gives you so much information about the top of your deck (and lets you draw those cards at any time) that it enables all sorts of tricky plays. I can't really think of any that it throws off, if used correctly. As for sinking mana in, it doesn't use any more than SDT, and you get a much bigger effect. I would cut SDT before cutting Scroll Rack.
Not having creatures to sacrifice
I'm familiar with the issue. It's just something you have to deal with occasionally. It's not that bad to work around. You're approaching it the right way, trying to add creatures, though I'm not convinced Mesmeric Fiend/Tidehollow Sculler are going to do the trick. If you really want a "Nekrataal," Skinrender might be your best bet (though I still wouldn't play it).
Never having enough mana
This was always my biggest problem. Somehow it always feels like you don't have enough mana to do what you need. All you can do is play good accelerators. The Moxes are a good addition. Reintegrating Coldsteel Heart would probably be a good idea too, but I don't think you can do much beyond that.
Having enough removal, having enough consistency
I think the current balance looks good. Consistency is more important than removal, since you can still combo and win with a bunch of creatures on the board, but you just can't win if you flood on removal and can't find a combo.
So, the current list looks really good. I suggest the following minor changes.
-Tidehollow Sculler
-Oblivion Ring
-Altar of Dementia
-Persecute
-Skeletal Scrying
-Vivid Meadow
+Castigate
+Preacher
+Yosei, the Morning Star
+Coldsteel Heart
+Nihil Spellbomb
+Orzhov Basilica
Persecute and Skeletal Scrying have both been really underwhelming for me much of the time. They both have high-curve costs for effects we want low in the curve. Persecute is often mediocre by the time it resolves, and Skeletal Scrying is just awkward to use (and the instant speed is almost irrelevant). I usually wind up playing it in the midgame for just 2 or 3, which isn't really very good.
I will say that I'd like to see one more way to abuse recurring creatures, now that we've got Bloodghast, Recurring Skeleton, and Bitterblossom. Skullclamp is obviously the best, but there isn't much else in here...Recurring Nightmare and Victimize don't really count. However, the next best card I can think of is Braids, Cabal Minion, which is powerful (and another creature) but doesn't really fit the strategy. Maybe she's worth trying anyway.
Trust me when I say that I want the same thing as you. These guys are so ripe for abuse! Sometimes I manage to squeeze a few points of damage using Blasting Station, but you're right that there's nothing that particularly stands out when it comes to really taking advantage of creatures that come back from the yard. You make a good point though, and I'll definitely investigate. Braids, while good, will probably ONLY be good if I have one of my few enablers out, so I wouldn't want to add her.
I always considered Yosei to be uncuttable. The Recurring Nightmare combo is just so good, and not hard to set up. Seeing that you cut him made me really consider him...but I still think he should be included.
By considering Yosei "Plan C," I think you're underrating him. I've won roughly as many games through a Yosei lock as through a Teysa combo, and it's occasionally a better reanimation target than Iona. It's also the only combo that can't be disrupted with artifact/enchantment destruction, which can be very important.
If you do cut him though, you should probably cut Recurring Nightmare too. Without Yosei, it's worse than cheaper reanimation in this deck.
I have won games with him too, and I actually didn't cut him till one of my more recent conversations with mutedequillibrum. In my experience, he really is just a tad slow. I've never despised him, but I think it's more the fact that he himself is so high on the curve that really bugs me. I originally add him back in because he has the ability to stop aggro outright, and that's when I decided to add Living Death back in.
I've considered cutting Recurring Nightmare as well, funny that you mention that. Without Yosei, the card loses a lot of value. In the end I'll probably keep Yosei in here. Gonna test this thoroughly and pass final verdict one day.
I don't really want to cut Coldsteel Heart. My biggest problem with this deck was always having enough acceleration/colorfixing, and Coldsteel Heart is one of the better cards to help with that. I do like both Mox Diamond and Chrome Mox though, and am happy including both.
I agree that Inquisition is better than Castigate in this deck. However, I'm not convinced that Mesmeric Fiend and Tidehollow Sculler are better than Castigate. I've rarely had that much trouble finding a creature to sacrifice, and sometimes you simply can't afford to sacrifice these creatures anyway. More importantly though, I'm just not sure they're good enough. Most decks have plenty of removal, which just makes these...pretty bad, assuming that you want to take more than a removal spell. Nothing sucks more than playing Tidehollow Sculler and seeing 2 removal spells (and even with just one, you're forced to take the removal). This disadvantage is mitigated if you have something like Blasting Station to sac the creature before the trigger resolves, but at that point you might as well not be playing a creature.
At this point, I think I'll try your setup, but with Castigate instead of Tidehollow Sculler. Same cost, and I'd rather exile a card forever than make it so easy to get back. I'll try out Mesmeric Fiend to see if I like it, but I would be surprised if it makes the cut in the long run.
You bring up a good point and basically the same point that a lot of other people have used to argue against the inclusion of these guys. You guys may be right, although I've had great success with these guys. Them being creatures does make this difficult, but I'm going to fight to make a case for these guys. Upping both the creature count AND hand disruption count was a huge blessing for me - let's see if we can try and keep that consistent.
I see you've re-added Living Death to your most recent list, but I'll discuss it anyway. I do feel that it's potentially cuttable, but I'm loathe to do so. Sort of like Balance (but even more so), Living Death is one of those cards that just completely reverses the game state. There are lots of situations where nothing else could possibly save you, and Living Death not only saves you, but wins you the game. It's true that there are also lots of situations where you don't really want to cast it, but at least if it's in your hand (or you have a tutor), you can sculpt a situation where it will be good. It's also versatile, in that it's basically 2 cards in one--it's not ideal, but if you absolutely need a sweeper or a reanimate, Living Death gets the job done.
As I've stated about, the fact that it reverses the game state is pretty much why I added it in. Damnation was good because it was efficient, but I think that in the end Living Death is still the better sweeper for all of the reasons you've mentioned above.
That said, I definitely like the addition of Sun Titan. It's one of my favorite cards, and it seems particularly good here. It is quite pricy for this deck, but I think it's still reasonable. It's competing with Yawgmoth's Will for this slot, and I prefer the Titan.
I like Necrotic Sliver, though I'm not sure it's efficient enough for this deck. I think I played it once, in the beginning, and found it too costly, but I still like the versatility. As far as 3cc removal creatures go, I think Preacher is just better, but I'd still consider playing Necrotic Sliver over Oblivion Ring.
Sun Titan has been nothing short of amazing. The only thing keeping him at 'amazing' and not 'stone cold nuts' is his casting cost, which is usually not too much a problem because by the time he's relevant, I'd have about that much mana anyways. I feel the need to mention Necrotic Sliver alongside Sun Titan because I have actually won games off this small interaction. I'm not sure if this more justifies Necrotic Sliver, but I've bad a pretty 'meh' time with the sliver as well. My question is whether or not Necrotic Sliver is still worth keeping around solely because of this small combo. At some point I'd almost rather run Mortify.
I definitely agree with cutting Snuff Out. I'm not sure if Oblivion Ring is necessary, but it's not too bad. I don't really care that you can find it with Idyllic Tutor...I considered Idyllic Tutor justified with fewer targets, because it could often just win the game. I really don't want to be tutoring for Oblivion Ring, ever. Not saying it couldn't happen, but I don't like my odds anyway if I'm that desperate. You say it's been good though, so I don't mind trying it out.
Oblivion Ring to me is a lot like counterspells in limited. You don't NEED to run it but it will always have a target, and sometimes stopping that target can just win you the game. I am an avid fan of indiscriminate removal, and Oblivion Ring is exactly that. I understand that it may be a 'liability' in some matchups, but I still think it's better than the little credit you're giving it.
My view on this is a little different than yours. I never considered Altar of Dementia and Phyrexian Altar to be competing for space. They're different combos. The Altar of Dementia combo is definitely better, but the Phyrexian Altar combo was still tempting because it didn't require Painter's Servant/Darkest Hour. Now that Reassembling Skeleton has invalidated the need for Nether Traitor, I no longer consider the Phyrexian Altar combo to be worth playing. That gives you 3 more slots (Phyrexian Altar, Nether Traitor, Profane Command) to comfortably replace.
I never considered them to be competing in the old list - I was more commenting on the fact that I don't like the cards surrounding Phyrexian Altar and think they should be cut and replaced with Altar of Dementia, which would then in return become my second Blasting Station. I'm not quite sure I'm down with cutting Altar of Dementia from the list, although it is plausible. I'm not sure how your games went, but the ones I've been playing my combo pieces don't always resolve or they get blown up. That's the whole reason I brought up the Argivian Find/Salvage Scout/Yawgmoth's Will thing. Adding redundancy to the combo helps a lot, and if we only have one Blasting Station/Altar of Dementia, don't you think that'll hurt our chances of comboing off?
I'm fine with swapping Bojuka Bog for City of Brass (though it's a little sad with Weathered Wayfarer in the deck). Salt Flats is almost the same as the Vivid lands, so that doesn't make much difference, but I would keep Orzhov Basilica. I've found it to be very important in those games where you open with Land Tax or Weathered Wayfarer, and your opponent tries to keep them inactive by slow-rolling a land. In this situation, Basilica is the best land you could have, as it lets you keep developing your mana without adding to your land count. This situation comes up often enough that I think the Basilica is worth keeping. (It's also like having an extra land in land-light hands, which can help a lot.)
I'm still walking the fence here. I know also that there are even more subtle interactions that the card brings to the table, but I just don't know if it's worth the risk. I'm gonna keep an eye out on my Vivid slots to ever see if they'd be better as Basilica and get back to you. Actually, I might just cut Wasteland. That card has been great half the time and just a color-screwer the other. The honest bottomline is that we probably don't need to take the LD route, so Strip Mine should suffice if we really need to get rid of something.
Argivian Find: I don't think the deck wants this, but I might be wrong. Do you often find yourself in situations where you could win if you just had that 1 artifact/enchantment in your graveyard? I don't think this comes up to much, but maybe I'm wrong. I like Sun Titan better overall, for the potential to reuse multiple permanents. If everything you've played has been swept away, Sun Titan can reassemble everything you need in a turn or two. Argivian Find...not so much. The cost isn't a huge issue at this point, as you only really need this later in the game.
Once again, things don't always work according to plan, especially against blue decks or ones that pack a lot of artifact/enchantment removal. That's where this card really helps out, and I do find myself in situations where I'm always missing one piece cause it's in my yard (which also relates to the fact that I never have enough mana to play all my pieces out at once, meaning I often have to play one piece and pass the turn before I can play the next two). Sun Titan is obviously better, but it's also really high on the curve, so that's why I'm still considering cards like this one and Salvage Scout.
Preacher: This is the one card on the list I think you SHOULD play. It's actually kind of like Guul Draz Assassin, but way better. It's nothing like Royal Assassin. Even in decks without sacrifice outlets, he's quite good. If you do have a sacrifice outlet, he's insane. This deck happens to have quite a few sacrifice outlets anyway. Just play him. When he doesn't eat removal, he usually wins the game.
I can dig this. I just added it to my long "list of considered cards" for the sake of completeness, but after much more experience with the deck I do think this is a very good card. I just am annoyed by the fact that you have to wait till next turn to use it and it's a creature, which means it will still fall victim to a lot of removal it'd almost be like a control magic version of Tidehollow Sculler and Mesmeric Fiend (exactly, actually). You're right that it will dominate some matchups if resolved though (much like Guul Draz Assassin), so I'll be willing to give this a shot.
The way I see it is that he'll be a removal magnet. The difference is he will be a great asset if left alive than Mesmeric Fiend will ever be. My main beef with him is that he requires a full turn to come into effect. The early WW is also a problem. I usually don't have any issues getting to BB on turn 2 and WW by turn 5, but asking for it on turn 3 is a bit rough.
You didn't mention it, but I'd also consider adding Nihil Spellbomb. I think this card is so good in EDH. You don't really have any graveyard hate at all right now, which can be a big problem (especially with Living Death). This Spellbomb is never dead (like Tormod's Crypt), never hurts you (like Relic of Progenitus), and suitably answers graveyard shenanigans at instant speed (unlike Bojuka Bog).
Yea I actually thought about it, but then I began to ask myself what graveyard stuff I was really worried about. I can go toe-to-toe in speed versus Iname because I have access to Iona, which is probably the most fearsome use of the graveyard to date. Sure there are survival and loam shenanigans - but how much do I care about that? Yes, Nihil Spellbomb is never dead, but how badly do I want or even need it? I may have a completely incorrect perspective on this, so if I do, please enlighten me.
This looks pretty good overall. The only cuts I don't like is Orzhov Basilica, for reasons already stated. I'm also not sure I like cutting Smallpox, though it might be okay. I wouldn't say that an edict, a discard, and land destruction for 2 mana is an "insignificant" power level. In the right situation, Smallpox practically wins you the game, and I'm always happy to see it in my opening hand against general-centric decks like Rofellos or Zur. The question is just whether it's useful enough of the time to warrant its inclusion. I think the answer is probably yes, but I might well be wrong.
Smallpox has won me games, but it's also a very big annoyance, especially when you consider the fact that we are also 1) a deck that is light on lands and 2) one that needs creatures to begin our combos with. Those two drawbacks are EXTREMELY annoying. If we yet another quick answer to faster general decks, I would just consider running Grasp of Darkness. No it doesn't give you the LD, but it's fast and hits just about most relevant creatures in the format.
I don't want to add Tidehollow Sculler, for reasons already stated. I'm also not sure if you really need Altar of Dementia. It's wholly redundant with Blasting Station, and I'm not certain you need multiples of that effect. I was always pretty happy with one. If you do want more than Altar of Dementia is a good choice, but think about whether you actually need it.
I'm going to try cutting Altar of Dementia for now and re-inserting Yosei. This way I'll still have access to more combos if something happens to Blasting Station. I also really want to try Salvage Scout >.< . I guess I just prefer playing it more safely? He gets back clamp too! But yea, he's an overly defensive card in a fairly aggressive deck.
I'm familiar with the issue. It's just something you have to deal with occasionally. It's not that bad to work around. You're approaching it the right way, trying to add creatures, though I'm not convinced Mesmeric Fiend/Tidehollow Sculler are going to do the trick. If you really want a "Nekrataal," Skinrender might be your best bet (though I still wouldn't play it).
-Tidehollow Sculler
-Oblivion Ring
-Altar of Dementia
-Persecute
-Skeletal Scrying
-Vivid Meadow
+Castigate
+Preacher
+Yosei, the Morning Star
+Coldsteel Heart
+Nihil Spellbomb
+Orzhov Basilica
Persecute and Skeletal Scrying have both been really underwhelming for me much of the time. They both have high-curve costs for effects we want low in the curve. Persecute is often mediocre by the time it resolves, and Skeletal Scrying is just awkward to use (and the instant speed is almost irrelevant). I usually wind up playing it in the midgame for just 2 or 3, which isn't really very good.
I disagree with your assessment of Persecute and Skeletal Scrying. Persecute has always been an insanely good play against any opponent, even if it only nets you two cards. Against mono-colored decks, stealing half or more of their hands is just devastating. I don't think this card should ever be cut. Skeletal Scrying is something I adore because it scales with the game. Early on it helps you filter out your draws and late game it acts as a recharge spell. I've never been disappointed with the card. I SUPPOSE Skeletal could become Nihil Spellbomb though.
I'm not sure how I want to make these changes, as moving around cards really disrupts the flow of the deck. I know I've used Shred Memory MANY times as the final tutor for Altar of Dementia for a Teysa kill, so I'm just not sure if I want to get rid of that. Taking away Tidehollow Sculler and Mesmeric Fiend is fine, but dropping the creature count hurts a lot more than you probably thing it does. I need to find some creature replacements for some spells in order to bump the count back up again. Are running the two myr a terrible idea? They don't fix, but at least they help accelerate and are complete fodder later on. Yea they enable opponent removal, but they're more likely to let them slide since they don't 'do anything relevant'.
I will be trying the following changes:
-Mesmeric Fiend
-Tidehollow Sculler
-Altar of Dementia
-Wasteland
(-Skeletal Scrying)
+Preacher/Salvage Scout/Mesmeric Fiend - maybe just Diabolic Tutor
+Castigate
+Yosei, The Morning Star
+Orzhov Basilica
(+Nihil Spellbomb)
Once again thanks for the feedback, it's always appreciated.
Yet another great deck to emerge from California. Props to MCR. I know I don't have as much as experience with the deck but here it goes.
Do you state that Salt flats is inferior because of the 1 damage per turn?
Now I'm a little skeptical of o-ring as well, just because If you look at your tutor box. If you have idelix tutor/
enlightened you can always find a out to pretty much anything but planes walkers. With Arrest you can take care of any creatures
and with Seal of Cleansing you can deal with enchantment/Artifact. If your grabbing something with a 3cc
transmute tutor you can just grab Vindicate.
Thats just an Idea, I know you just may have wanted a extra removal spell.
Sickening Dreams? Is this card just because Helaphatio played in the tournament. It is a sweeper though against annoying
dudes as well in the 2cc package.
In Funlicker'ss Adun build he runs cabal therapy and its nothing short of amazing. At worst in
this deck it's another way to abuse bloodghast/Skeleton. With another discard spell, It rips
a hand apart. This adds to two things you wanted with being another way to abuse and it's discard.
It's even nice when someone demonic tutors for something and you know their deck well enough
to name what they get. It's even good with entomb in emergencies
Tidehollow/Fiend Actually do everything you said they do. Its really just a preference if you want to run them.
I think they're always good just because their tempo and even if they do eat removal
they can buy you enough time anyway to win. They are nice with Living death though.
But hope this kinda helps, it's no khymera post but it'll have to do.
Yet another great deck to emerge from California. Props to MCR. I know I don't have as much as experience with the deck but here it goes.
Do you state that Salt flats is inferior because of the 1 damage per turn?
Now I'm a little skeptical of o-ring as well, just because If you look at your tutor box. If you have idelix tutor/
enlightened you can always find a out to pretty much anything but planes walkers. With Arrest you can take care of any creatures
and with Seal of Cleansing you can deal with enchantment/Artifact. If your grabbing something with a 3cc
transmute tutor you can just grab Vindicate.
Thats just an Idea, I know you just may have wanted a extra removal spell.
Sickening Dreams? Is this card just because Helaphatio played in the tournament. It is a sweeper though against annoying
dudes as well in the 2cc package.
In Funlicker'ss Adun build he runs cabal therapy and its nothing short of amazing. At worst in
this deck it's another way to abuse bloodghast/Skeleton. With another discard spell, It rips
a hand apart. This adds to two things you wanted with being another way to abuse and it's discard.
It's even nice when someone demonic tutors for something and you know their deck well enough
to name what they get. It's even good with entomb in emergencies
Tidehollow/Fiend Actually do everything you said they do. Its really just a preference if you want to run them.
I think they're always good just because their tempo and even if they do eat removal
they can buy you enough time anyway to win. They are nice with Living death though.
But hope this kinda helps, it's no khymera post but it'll have to do.
I'll be at Blizzcon - let me know when you guys plan to come down I'll introduce you to the locals!
@Salt Flats
It really is just an inferior Vivid Land. My biggest problems with the deck were reaching my colors consistently within the first three turns. Anytime after that was usually fine. Since the Vivids already tap for the basic mana, they never had the drawback of constantly pinging myself. I consider them strictly superior.
@Oblivion Ring
Do you guys really not like this card? Regardless of whether or not I'm tutoring for this card, it's still a great answer-all by itself! I've had strong success with this card. I actually used to run Aura of Silence in this slot, but the double white was really killing me. I now use Oblivion Ring as a way to deal with just about anything; it's just like Vindicate's weaker brother. If there's something I'm obviously missing, please let me know.
@Sickening Dreams
The reason we decide to run dream cards is because they help us discard reanimation targets. We can also discard creatures like Bloodghast or Reassembling Skeleton, grinding even more value out of it. In all honesty, it's a very good turn 2 play against fast generals, it's a cheap answer to anything token related, and it helps fulfill a secondary role (discarding stuff) in the deck. Also note that his deck is pretty good at overfilling the hand, be it with Library or clamp.
@Cabal Therapy
I'm actually very interested in seeing funlicker's deck. I had always suspected that Jund was a very powerful combination to play, it's just that no one actually went all the way through with it. Cabal Therapy does seem very interesting, although I'm slightly afraid it might be dead by itself. How much discard, if he doesn't mind me asking, does he run to get full mileage out of Cabal Therapy? It's definitely a card I want to consider running. I don't know if I like the idea of cutting Persecute at all, but if I were to find a slot for Cabal Therapy it might just end up taking that slot (depending on how good it is)
@Tidehollow Sculler and Mesmeric Fiend
This is it. I'm going to write my huge defense thing here about these two guys, because I think they deserve their slots. Khymera and mutedequilibrium do bring up good points, but these guys have been so stellar for me that I want to write about not only the tempo advantage they bring, but the fact that they are bodies as well.
It may be just that I see the Teysa combo pieces more often than Khymera, but I go for that setup fairly often. If you have one piece of the four (Darkest Hour, Painter's Servant, Blasting Station, Altar of Dementia), you only need ONE tutor to have the core engine ready. The problem lies in the fact that even though you have Teysa, Painter effect, and sacrifice engine out, you need a creature to start things off with. As Khymera has mentioned, anyone who has ever touched this deck will not be foreign to this idea, especially when looking at cards like Recurring Nightmare and Victimize. This said, ANY TIME that the deck can bring in creature variants of their respective spells (ie. Dark Confidant over Sign in Blood) is highly valued. Scratch that - EXTREMELY VALUED. Thus, I opted to bring in Mesmeric Fiend and Tidehollow Sculler both to up my discard count and to provide more fodders to begin my combos with.
The first issue with these two creatures is that while they let you effectively 'Thoughtseize' your opponent, they are able to return the card if they manage to get rid of your dude. This is 100% true and an obvious strike against them. However, the way this deck plays, you might want to reconsider how some of your choices go down. When you cast Mesmeric Fiend, for instance, your gut reaction is to take the removal spell. While this is obvious, you technically aren't gaining any great advantage over your opponent, as 1) spot removal is only good against the deck if you're going for Teysa combo and 2) they'll continue to play whatever else is in their hand. The real advantage is when you play Mesmeric Fiend and take a mana accelerant or even a bomb out of their hand. You force them to spend the turn removing Fiend, effectively delaying their acceleration plan. Buying turns like these has been a very powerful exchange. If they for whatever reason don't have a removal spell or just have a counterspell, even better for you.
Another argument is that if you start off your Teysa combo by sacrificing a Mesmeric Fiend, you're giving your opponent back his removal spell and effectively nullifying your combo (since he can use the removal spell on Teysa). This is all the more reason why I emphasize that you don't always have to take the removal spell and you can have him waste his turn by blowing up your Fiend. If he did, that spell won't be used on Teysa later or on your one creature to fizzle Victimize. At that point, wouldn't I just rather run a creatureless discard spell? Yes and no. Yes because I won't have to deal with this and no because I lose all of the advantages that this deck gets out of it. And sometimes if you've exiled something that'll affect your game, like a Krosan Grip, it's even as simple as NOT using your guy as the first sacrifice target. It's just nice to have that option there.
I also want to talk about how it's been fairly rare for me to see two removal spells (quick ones, at least) in someone's hand. Since this deck has actually jumped up in discard count, it's very common to see games where I am able to do a turn 1/2 Thoughtseize/Hymn/Duress/whatever into a turn 2/3 Sculler/Fiend have been entirely crushing. You basically snatch all of the early plays out of your opponents' hands and continue unimpeded for several turns. The difference is now you're able to more aggressively tutor for your Teysa combo pieces and just go off, or even for Buried Alive into Victimize. By the time you use either a sac engine or Victimize, the card that is returned to your opponent will most likely become irrelevant, especially if you took a bomb or mana accelerant.
Another case for these guys is that I've found them great against blue. With their lower removal count, you're able to get away with these guys fairly easily. I also feel the need to point out that when you get the Victimize hands, these guys are especially good since you couldn't care less what they get back after you resolve your Iona/Painter combo.
All this said, yes I have had situations where these guys did not shine, but for the most part they've performed admirably. I can see argument for either side now though, so I will try running actual discard in their place to see how badly I miss them or not. I can already see your guys' rebuttals in my head, so I'll leave testing to be the final judge of this.
Thank you for your response, Hunter245. It's always a pleasure to see seasoned players stop by
I'm still pondering the Yosei/Nightmare lock too. I might want to try keeping Altar of Dementia and running Exhume alongside it. Moar testing!
Lastly, if ANYONE else has played with or against Preacher, I'd like to hear opinions and thoughts.
Welp, Khymera and I played today in the semifinals of EDH IV and I lost to Gaddock Teeg! This matchup is supposed to be in my favor, but he managed to destroy enough of my combo pieces early on for him to Squirrelcraft me out of the game. I literally had the win next turn before it happened, but a series of events that were in perfect order kept me from accomplishing that goal. Playing an older iteration of the list bugs the crap out of me! Game 2 I mulled down and had my Orzhov Basilica Strip Mined, which basically cost me the game as I never drew another land for about 6 turns. All in all, it was a good run and even though I didn't get to play as many games as I would have liked to, I'm still very glad that Teysa performed well the times she did. Playing this deck, I always feel like I have a chance of winning and that losing is either very close or because of my own play errors. This is a deck, as Khymera once told me, that grows in potential the more exposure the pilot has had playing it. This could not be more true and I have a blast playing Teysa always. Another shoutout to Khymera
We talked for a while after the tourney about what was actually working in the deck and what wasn't. It's really surprising to take a step back and really analyze what cards have and haven't been working. This following list of changes is most likely going to surprise you, but we both agreed upon these rather unique choices:
-Yosei The Morning Star
-Recurring Nightmare
-Skeletal Scrying
-Necrotic Sliver
-Elspeth, Knight Errant
-Oblivion Ring
-Persecute
-Vivid Meadow
+Altar of Dementia
+Leaden Myr
+Golden Myr
+Seal of Doom
+Mother of Runes
+Preacher (Peacekeeper?)
+Cabal Therapy
+Orzhov Basilica
So the main things to note here are that we opted to drop the Yosei/Nightmare combo altogether. In all honesty, we don't really need it and it is definitely on the slower side because Yosei costs 6 mana to bring out. Yes you can reanimate him to cheat, but most of the time you'd rather be going for Iona. Our greatest problems with this iteration of the deck is two-fold: having enough mana to play out our combo pieces and having a creature to sacrifice to our Teysa combos (or Victimize). We've decided to really hone in on the advantage of running more modular pieces in the deck and cutting out ALL of the fat. We want to push the idea of creature accelerants by introducing myr into the deck and more defensive measure for them via Mother of Runes. Cutting out more expensive and risky spells like Persecute and Elspeth allow us to run more efficient cards such as Cabal Therapy or Peacekeeper. Another slower creature, Necrotic Sliver, was replaced by Seal of Doom! We were pondering the idea that Necrotic Sliver was so good with Sun Titan, but the card itself was too slow. Now we get the best of both worlds - a decent speed removal spell that can be returned with Sun Titan! Another change that my surprise you is the cutting of Elspeth. She really is just a 4CC Bitterblossom here and would be better served as another creature instead.
This is a huge leap for the deck and I fully expect these changes to have a very positive impact on the list. Of course I will be keeping an eye out, since we're effectively shaving down on removal and reanimation, but I don't think that'll be too big of an issue.
First off, the culmination of this deck and its subsequent primer are just amazing beyond words. I know I've talked to you a ton on AIM about this deck and helping you make changes and adjustments to the deck, and I really like the product currently. But like any product, it can continue to become better.
First off, I hate Seal of Doom over O-Ring. Hate it hate it hate it. Seal of Doom is a much more narrow answer card, and worst off all its a total blank against generals like Braids, Thrax, and Nath. O-Ring is just a flat-out amazing answer. You don't need Sun Titan to make the card good. O-Ring is just an incredible standalone card, period. It is virtually never dead.
Orzhov Basilica is really risky IMO, because mana denial decks are big in 1v1 EDH and they love to prey off of a bouneland. Bouncelands are more suited for multiplayer, but even then they can be risky given the playgroup. Obviously though, we're talking about 1v1. Pretty much all decks will be running Strip Mine and Wasteland, and others will have Dust Bowl too. Hell even a simple bounce spell from a blue deck is enough to really put you in a world of hurt.
Mesmeric Fiend and Tidehollow Sculler are great, and I wouldn't think about cut them. They disrupt your opponent effectively and they are bodies for Teysa. You need all the powerful disruption you need against blue and combo decks.
I've talked to you about Peacekeeper over AIM MCR, but I'm going to reiterate: I think Peacekeeper is overrated in 1v1 EDH. I know Khymera is going to wonder what's going through my mind, but just stop and think for one second: How many of the top decks in EDH actually win through the combat step? Not many, as most of those decks either win through comboing out or by forcing a concession.
Preacher is much better suited for this format due to the increased focus on generals. He ups the threat density, which is something I'm always a big fan of.
That's all I have for now. W/B is just such a sickly powerful color combination.
Thanks for your voice here, SC, it's always appreciated.
Peacekeeper was mostly my idea, mainly because sometimes I face down a board with lots of damage and I need ways to stop it for more than one turn. It's also noteworthy that I'd play against Thraximundar, Doran, Uril, and Akroma, Angel of Fury mostly, so it's almost like a metagame call.
I agree that Seal of Doom is a bit iffy, but after playing the deck a few more times, I feel like we could go with something more useful for the deck. I've decided to add Sign in Blood back in, because I really feel like the deck could use more early filtering cards. The list is efficient enough that you can answer all types of situations and combo off, but the enemy of combo decks will always be consistency. Thankfully this deck is packed with powerful answers, but without a way to filter through mediocre draws, you're going to be stuck with a lot of dead turns.
I've decided to cut Tidehollow Sculler and run Castigate instead mainly because Sculler is vulnerable to two types of hate, while Mesmeric Fiend is only vulnerable to one. I'm considering just cutting both already though, as I think I'd rather have Persecute in the Mesmeric Fiend slot anyways. I know Khymera and I have discussed that card, but I still think it's way good in here.
As for Orzhov Basilica, I've felt the same way. Even though the deck is light on lands and could both use this as a way to count it as a 1.5 land and allow certain plays, I've been blown out several times because of it. I think I'm going to revert back to Vivid Meadow - it's just less risky.
On a side note, I've really been liking the myr! Also, Cabal Therapy has been useful for helping me discard Iona more than once! Great changes!
With cabal Therapy funlicker really doesn't run too much discard that peeks (the normal 3 along with fiend). It's still a all star, with Bob/Dark tutelage being one of the most powerful card advantage engines in edh. Also it's pretty sad but that even in constructed edh you can still hit a relevant card.
I'm just curious in what you mean when you say
"I've decided to cut Tidehollow Sculler and run Castigate instead mainly because Sculler is vulnerable to two types of hate, while Mesmeric Fiend is only vulnerable to one. I'm considering just cutting both already though, as I think I'd rather have Persecute in the Mesmeric Fiend slot anyways."
If you do cut them then aren't you still getting the problem that you don't have enough creatures to combo off. I know these are pretty bad but the W/B urza manlands produce colored mana, and are relatively cheap to activate. Thats just something to think about because I know mishra's factory and friends are out do to the fact they produce colorless mana. But like the discard friends they let you have a creature to sacrifice to victimize and such.
One final question is persecute a card that I see in most black lists. You seem strongly attached to it (same with evergreen). Is this just a amazing card? It seems slow But its a crippling blow just like mind twist. Mind twist is too slow but is persecute mana cost just right. You can accelerate into it, We've been interested in it for awhile now, care to elaborate?
With cabal Therapy funlicker really doesn't run too much discard that peeks (the normal 3 along with fiend). It's still a all star, with Bob/Dark tutelage being one of the most powerful card advantage engines in edh. Also it's pretty sad but that even in constructed edh you can still hit a relevant card.
Now I'm really interested in hearing how funlicker's results have been running Fiend
"I've decided to cut Tidehollow Sculler and run Castigate instead mainly because Sculler is vulnerable to two types of hate, while Mesmeric Fiend is only vulnerable to one. I'm considering just cutting both already though, as I think I'd rather have Persecute in the Mesmeric Fiend slot anyways."
If you do cut them then aren't you still getting the problem that you don't have enough creatures to combo off. I know these are pretty bad but the W/B urza manlands produce colored mana, and are relatively cheap to activate. Thats just something to think about because I know mishra's factory and friends are out do to the fact they produce colorless mana. But like the discard friends they let you have a creature to sacrifice to victimize and such.
The reason I found it okay to cut Mesmeric Fiend / Tidehollow Sculler is because we added in a bunch of creatures in other areas. The introduction of the two myr as well as Mother of Runes and Preacher maintain the integrity of the creature count (which as previously @ 14 with Fiend/Sculler, and now still is, even after we cut Yosei and Necrotic Sliver). While I admit I still like both of these cards, I'm willing to try without them for a while. Castigate is pretty good, but I'm not too sold on Distress just yet. That said, let's talk about Persecute.
One final question is persecute a card that I see in most black lists. You seem strongly attached to it (same with evergreen). Is this just a amazing card? It seems slow But its a crippling blow just like mind twist. Mind twist is too slow but is persecute mana cost just right. You can accelerate into it, We've been interested in it for awhile now, care to elaborate?
I don't see Persecute as slow, the casting cost is perfect for what it does. In a sense, yes, it is 1v1 EDH's Mind Twist. The primary argument is that it's on the peak of the curve as far as discard goes, and while that may be true, I have definitely completely kicked people out of the game because of it. Assuming it's in your opening hand, you cast it on turn 4 against any mono-colored deck you're bound to net at least two cards that will either be answers or high-casting cost spells, essentially halting your opponent's game plan. If you can cast it on turn 3 with acceleration, you're probably going to take away his chance to even develop properly. Against blue decks it's virtually a must-counter threat and against multi-colored decks, Teysa only cares about whatever color the removal is in. I've actually never been disappointed to have the card around. I can see that against faster or multi-colored decks you won't net as many cards, but even when it's not as good, it'll more than most likely still net you two cards and give you hand information.
I'm curious as to why this deck doesn't play grindstone, considering that the deck relies on painter a lot and the insane amount of tutors the deck offers.
Would Fallen Ideal have a place in this deck? I'm not all that into competitive magic so I apologize if this suggestion is terrible, but it seems like a decent fit for a few reasons.
1. You already have all the other cards needed to combo with it and create an arbitrarily large, flying goon. You would only need to exchange one slot.
2. It goes back to your hand if things go wrong.
3. It costs 3 mana, and only one of it B, so it fits into your general curve well and recurs with Sun Titan.
4. The only likely targets for the aura are recursive or tokens, so it's target being destroyed while the spell is on the stack would likely not be a 2for1.
I think in most cases you would rather see Blasting Station, but it seems a fitting fallback when it breaks or you find yourself holding an Idyllic Tutor
Would Fallen Ideal have a place in this deck? I'm not all that into competitive magic so I apologize if this suggestion is terrible, but it seems like a decent fit for a few reasons.
1. You already have all the other cards needed to combo with it and create an arbitrarily large, flying goon. You would only need to exchange one slot.
2. It goes back to your hand if things go wrong.
3. It costs 3 mana, and only one of it B, so it fits into your general curve well and recurs with Sun Titan.
4. The only likely targets for the aura are recursive or tokens, so it's target being destroyed while the spell is on the stack would likely not be a 2for1.
I think in most cases you would rather see Blasting Station, but it seems a fitting fallback when it breaks or you find yourself holding an Idyllic Tutor
Hey Blal, thanks for chiming in.
If you look under the cards that I have considered, Fallen Ideal is definitely one of them. Unfortunately, the reality is that the card requires you to have a creature available to swing, which usually means you need Teysa and TWO creatures instead of one. The second major strike is that creature removal is rampant in the format, much more than artifact or enchantment destruction, which is why the altars and station are much more appealing. I thank you for pointing out the advantages of the card, though I don't believe it's strong enough compared to our other alternative combo sac outlets.
There is the link for my deck list. It's more about getting a combo off, and if not possible it's about making tokens, then proceeding to abuse said tokens.
If you could check it out and give me some feedback that would be much appreciated. = ]
BRG Xira Arien BRG UR Melek, Izzet Paragon UR WUG Jenara, Asura of War WUG WRG Mayael the Anima WRG WB Triad of Fates WB BG Mazirek, Kraul Death Priest BG BR Rakdos, Lord of Riots BR WR Aurelia the Warleader WR WBG Ghave, Guru of Spores WBG WUBRG Horde of Notions WUBRG
HOLY ☺☺☺☺! This is the deck I have been trying to craft. It is really difficult due to the bans on balance, recurring nightmare, and most of all, painters servant. Due to this, I actually use GCO as my general. I will be adding preacher to my deck though.
There is the link for my deck list. It's more about getting a combo off, and if not possible it's about making tokens, then proceeding to abuse said tokens.
If you could check it out and give me some feedback that would be much appreciated. = ]
See look at your decklist and look at his. Sure you don't need to quite net deck. But MCR runs a strong Iona reanimate stragedy. You run fat like Akroma with no reliable way to cast them.
Speaking of that you want to avoid the higher cc spells. Especially spells that are blocked by teeg.
Where is the Discard? Thoughtseize, Duress, Inquestion, Hymn, Tidehollar Scullar, Mesmeric Fiend..... These are format staples for a reason.
I saw on the first page you needed more ways to abuse your token creatures generated-- I have two suggestions. First is sadistic hypnotist. That guy eats hands alive and with lots of tokens is very good. The second suggestion would be contamination, as it can just randomly lock people out of the game, again, a very good effect.
I haven't played this list in a while (been in the multiplayer zone mostly), but I wasn't even aware of the Sun Titan combos at the time. Yes, shame on me, but now that I do understand how it functions, I may draft my list differently to abuse this.
@WolSHaman
I've considered adding in locks with my token generators, but honestly Contamination hurts this deck as much as it hurts my opponents'. I can see Sadistic Hypnotist being okay, but without a token generator he doesn't do too well on his own. I'll have to see about both.
Have you considered Thoughtpicker Witch? Not quite hand disruption, but a potentially more devastating effect filtering and potentially locking out your opponents' draws. It's an absolute beating. Really really.
Bumping this due to a desperately needed update with the new french list. Apparently, a teysa build made it pretty far in the most recent french tournament, and with a little work, I think it could place in the T8 of this tourney.
Now for some decisions:
Phyrexian alter vs alter of dementia:
Personally I side with altar of dementia over phyrexian altar. The chance that you will run into any eldrazi is really slim. Additionally, PA requires a seperate card to be a win con, taking up another slot. Final nail in the coffin is AoD drops one turn earlier than PA.
Which combos to include:
Initially, I was fond of simply pushing any combo I found relavent, into the deck. I am streamlining my deck to revolve around two combos, BS and altar combos, and blooghast/reanimating skeleton combos. BS combos include lark + karmic, nether traiter + teysa, and teysa+ darkest hour. RS combos include contamination lock and skullclamp.
Where to focus:
Traditionally, control decks prey on combo deck, with combo decks wrecking aggro decks. The french meta seems dominated by aggro-control decks, utilizing small, evasive creatures to put other decks on a clock, while protecting their position. This is why I have included stoneforge and srods/jitte in the deck. I have played sygg and edric and both decks have trouble fighting through jitte.
Final product? None yet. I haven't even decided if she is good enough to run in the tourney over sygg. I will keep thinking though.
Its funny that you mention Jitte, I'm finding that card to be quite amazing. I sometimes even go for it over clamp with stoneforge, just because its keeps the board clear that easily.
This deck is combo heavy, this is why I usually overrun any aggro strategy but lose to Blue control (Clique/Venser). "Oups I win" happens quite frequently.
My finishers are 1 card only, meaning no Fallen Ideal, no Phyrexian Altar + Drain, etc..
Contamination and Iona combos are easier to assemble and are for people that kept their board empty of threats. But I am considering cutting both for Yosei and Recurring nightmare, or maybe Sun Titan and Angelic Renewal.
Tainted Pact requires a strange manabase, but is awesome when you need to find the last peace for your combo.
No mass removal, if you can't win before they kill you, then you don't deserve to win. Moreover, tutoring for a removal is generally a bad idea as it will slow you more than them. Some spot removals for problematic stuff that makes people go crazy, or messes with your combo.
Teysa, Orzhov Scion for 1v1 EDH (MWS Banlist)
brought to you by Khymera and MCR
“The darkest hour is just before the dawn.”
I must first state that this deck is not for everyone. I know I wasn’t a believer at first; a pile of janky combos and synergies that hang by threads, how could this deck possibly win? Hatched from the very peculiar mind of Khymera, Teysa is a deck based on elegant combos, the might of banned cards, all cradled by the inexorable strength of the black white combination. This list is weaved together by complexity and depth, a combination that can only be understood through trial, error, and experience. You might question card choices; you might scoff at my results; but I assure you that Teysa works and is to be reckoned with.
I wanted to wait until I had some real results with the deck, as well as a more optimized list, before coming back and making a whole huge thread about it. I struggled a lot with this general, trying to wrap my head around dozens of interactions and then both optimizing my playstyle as well as the list at the same time. At one point I almost gave up and just wanted to play a dumbed down Ghost Council deck. But I persisted and managed to do fairly well against some very strong generals in the format, as well as break into the top 8 of my first EDH tournament. There’s something very real about this deck - people don’t talk about it that much, but they always seem to secretly dread the matchup.
I quit EDH for a few months and recently came back. Upon my return, I was quickly ushered by a few old friends into the fourth online tournament. I had no idea what I wanted to play, and as I was sifting through old deck lists I finally came across my original project: Teysa, Orzhov Scion. After Khymera released his initial list earlier this year, I tried it out and we worked together to optimize it. While the core of the deck remains unchanged, several edits were made prior to this tourney based on a handful of play test matches. The deck had a lot of chaff and cards that were good on paper, but rather poor in practice. My experiences playing this deck have taught me many valuable things and I wish to share some observations with you guys. I think there are several choices that we need to reassess in order to more optimize the list.
I was going to post this after the tournament, but then I realized that I don't really care if people know what my list looks like or not. The point is I want to make Teysa the best she can be and that will only happen through everyone's feedback.
Please refer to Khymera’s original Teysa thread to view the earliest developmental stages of the deck.
Development Circa EDH IV (September 2010)
Let’s go through my initial thought process for the changes I made prior to the tournament. Keep in mind that this entire section was written prior to the tournament and may not necessarily reflect my current opinions on certain cards.
1 Teysa, Orzhov Scion
Lands:
7 Plains
8 Swamp
1 Flooded Strand
1 Windswept Heath
1 Bloodstained Mire
1 Polluted Delta
1 Marsh Flats
1 Verdant Catacombs
1 Arid Mesa
1 Flagstones of Trokair
1 Caves of Koilos
1 Fetid Heath
1 Godless Shrine
1 Orzhov Basilica
1 Salt Flats
1 Tainted Fields
1 Scrubland
1 Urborg, Tomb of Yawgmoth
1 Volrath's Stronghold
1 Kor Haven
1 Bojuka Bog
1 Strip Mine
1 Kjeldoran Outpost
Creatures:
1 Weathered Wayfarer
1 Painter's Servant
1 Stoneforge Mystic
1 Bloodghast
1 Nether Traitor
1 Devout Witness
1 Academy Rector
1 Corpse Connoisseur
1 Reveillark
1 Karmic Guide
1 Yosei, the Morning Star
1 Iona, Shield of Emeria
1 Elspeth, Knight-Errant
Artifacts:
1 Skullclamp
1 Sensei's Divining Top
1 Orzhov Signet
1 Coldsteel Heart
1 Scroll Rack
1 Coalition Relic
1 Phyrexian Altar
1 Blasting Station
Enchantments:
1 Darkest Hour
1 Land Tax
1 Bitterblossom
1 Recurring Nightmare
1 Phyrexian Arena
1 Arrest
Sorceries:
1 Imperial Seal
1 Reanimate
1 Thoughtseize
1 Duress
1 Castigate
1 Hymn to Tourach
1 Smallpox
1 Exhume
1 Demonic Tutor
1 Balance
1 Sign in Blood
1 Night's Whisper
1 Beseech the Queen
1 Buried Alive
1 Victimize
1 Grim Tutor
1 Idyllic Tutor
1 Dimir Machinations
1 Last Rites
1 Vindicate
1 Persecute
1 Damnation
1 Living Death
1 Hallowed Burial
1 Profane Command
1 Vampiric Tutor
1 Enlightened Tutor
1 Entomb
1 Swords to Plowshares
1 Skeletal Scrying
1 Hero's Demise
1 Sickening Dreams
1 Shred Memory
1 Snuff Out
1 Insidious Dreams
1 Return to Dust
I managed to play a few games against Thada Adel and Jenara, Asura of War. Hardly the proper spectrum of generals, I know, but enough to let me see right away things that didn’t deserve their spots in the list.
Changes for EDH IV:
Volrath’s Stronghold -> Library of Alexandra: Volrath was never one of the cards I cared for. I’ve had it in so many lists before this one as well and it never seemed to pull its weight. I can acknowledge how good it is with cards like Eternal Witness, but I have never once needed to use this card. In fact, I actually grimace when it’s in my opening hand - that colorless mana definitely needs to be kept at a minimum. Library on the other hand has just been phenomenal the games I’ve had it in. I used to omit the card because I could not afford it, but since I’m playing online for the tournament I said: what the heck, why not. Boy was I mistaken for not running it before.
Academy Rector -> Reassembling Skeleton: Rector is cute. Too cute. Really though, after we cut Debtor’s Knell, she just was never worth it. Slow AND you required a sac outlet. I have more important things to be doing on turn 4 than casting a creature with no immediate board impact. Since my enchantments are basically all utility ones now, her value diminishes as she can never get anything that’ll instantly win me the game. Reassembling Skeleton was the latest addition to the clamp crew and has been insane ever since its inclusion. Sometimes you just have those land-light hands that are unable to abuse Bloodghast; Reassembling Skeleton rectifies this problem by providing a cheap way to constantly bring back a sacrificial (or clampable) body. The advent of Bloodghast’s new partner in crime has also led me to question the usefulness of Nether Traitor (and the Phyrexian Altar combo altogether) which I will discuss later.
Yosei, The Morning Star: was always so slow on his own. In 20/20 hindsight, this might’ve been a mistake. I’m actually considering putting him back into the deck, but I’ll explain that later. For my justification of cutting him prior to the tourney, I just never wanted to see him. I would always go for the Iona/Painter/Ghast combo in the yard anyways. After playing the deck much more extensively, I now recognize his value. It was not a direct replacement here, but after I cut Yosei I added Chrome Mox which has been solid so far. I felt like I needed more mana, which will bring me into the next card discussion.
Coldsteel Heart -> Mox Diamond: Coldsteel Heart is another card that I’d probably want to include in the future, even after cutting it. During my test runs though, I opened with Land Tax so often that I wanted to test Mox Diamond in this slot. It’s really a toss up between the two, as diamond is awful without proper support and Coldsteel Heart conflicts with your turn 2 plays. I’m considering Dark Ritual in this slot (no joke).
Sign in Blood -> Dark Confidant: While a strong card, when making cuts for efficiency, Sign and Night’s Whisper were under heavy scrutiny. Yes they help you dig and sift, but as this deck grew more and more efficient, the need for these cards weren’t as apparent. I opted to cut Sign and keep Whisper because of the slightly more prohibitive mana cost of Sign. Replacing it would be our favorite black creature, Dark Confidant. Serving as draw, a clampable body, and a sacrificial body, he was more than welcome to join the crew. Granted there are a few high CC cards in the deck, the curve for the most part is fairly low.
Castigate -> Inquisition of Kozilek : Castigate’s mana cost was really a tad too difficult sometimes. I still do really like this card and think it has a place, but I opted to run the turn 1 card instead. Other interesting choices I’m looking into are Mesmeric Fiend and Tidehollow Sculler, since they serve as sacrificial bodies as the game progresses on.
Damnation -> Devour in Shadow: I wanted to make sure that I had more ways to deal with Rofellos and Braids before it was too late. I bumped up the spot removal a bit to address this. Not much to say here. Nothing is wrong with Damnation, but I do feel like I care a lot less about mass removal in 1v1 and more about just buying enough time for myself to power out a combo. This deck is decently fast and disruptive - if I fall to zerg aggro I probably deserved to lose anyways.
Living Death -> Sun Titan: I never really liked Living Death here. Although it is a pretty good effect in this deck, I don’t think it’s necessary with all the reanimation spells we have now. It’s a bit overkill and at an uncomfortable spot on the curve. Sun Titan was a last minute add (literally changed my list like an hour before it was due). I was yearning for a way to return destroyed combo pieces from the GY, and Sun Titan looked perfect for the job (along with the fact that he is both a decent reanimation target and an even more decent beater). He can Strip lock people on occasion as well. How has he been in practice? I haven’t had the chance to do anything insane, but I foresee him being a solid roleplayer in the future. And while we’re on the subject of insurance cards, a lot of people really wonder why Yawgmoth’s Will is missing from a combo deck. The answer is simple: almost all of our combos require the use of the graveyard. While we may be able to save things here and there, we cannot win the turn we play Will, and that greatly diminishes its value (in my eyes at least).
Snuff Out -> Oblivion Ring: I often tutor for or play Darkest Hour early on in the game, meaning Snuff Out is at a very clear disadvantage in comparison to the other removal cards in the deck. As I played the deck more, I actually felt like the deck was overstocked on removal so I let this one go. I reread the entire Teysa thread and kept thinking about how Khymera was trying to defend the inclusion of Idyllic Tutor. I then decided: why don’t we just up the value of Idyllic Tutor zby running more enchantments? Oblivion Ring has been amazing in all of my games (usually serving as artifact removal, funny enough) as an all-purpose answer to anything.
Return to Dust -> Seal of Cleansing: Dust was too expensive. The effect is great, but in the end I opted to run a quicker, more efficient spell, Seal of Cleansing. Like Oblivion Ring before it, the value of Idyllic Tutor jumps up significantly with the inclusion of this card. Another very interesting card that I want to add is Runed Halo, which effectively trumps most general beatdown strategies (think Godo, Thraximundar, and even Tendrils of Agony, etc). On its own it acts as a pseudo, but effective enough, removal spell. Definitely worth considering. Many other people have suggested Aura of Silence, but the WW in the cost is very counter-productive to this deck’s earlier plays, many of which involve a turn 2 BB.
Exhume -> Animate Dead: I will go into further detail later about why I chose Animate Dead, but the short story is that it is another enchantment card that can be tutored for with Idyllic etc without any major prerequisites. Recurring Nightmare requires you to have a creature in play and sometimes you just don’t have the luxury. By running Animate Dead, you allow yourself much more consistent and realistic turn 2-3 Iona. Exhume does the same thing, but cannot be fetched by either Enlightened nor Idyllic Tutors.
I also added Wasteland to the list in order to have more game with Weathered Wayfarer.
I entered into the tournament with the above changes. The deck has worked fairly well for me, though I do have many, many more things I want to say about cards that have been great and cards that have just been blah.
EDH Tournament IV
1 Teysa, Orzhov Scion
Lands:
5 Plains
9 Swamp
1 Flooded Strand
1 Windswept Heath
1 Bloodstained Mire
1 Polluted Delta
1 Marsh Flats
1 Verdant Catacombs
1 Arid Mesa
1 Flagstones of Trokair
1 Caves of Koilos
1 Fetid Heath
1 Godless Shrine
1 Orzhov Basilica
1 Salt Flats
1 Tainted Fields
1 Scrubland
1 Urborg, Tomb of Yawgmoth
1 Kor Haven
1 Bojuka Bog
1 Strip Mine
1 Wasteland
1 Kjeldoran Outpost
1 Library of Alexandria
Creatures:
1 Weathered Wayfarer
1 Painter's Servant
1 Stoneforge Mystic
1 Dark Confidant
1 Bloodghast
1 Nether Traitor
1 Reassembling Skeleton
1 Devout Witness
1 Corpse Connoisseur
1 Reveillark
1 Karmic Guide
1 Sun Titan
1 Iona, Shield of Emeria
1 Elspeth, Knight-Errant
Artifacts:
1 Chrome Mox
1 Mox Diamond
1 Skullclamp
1 Sensei's Divining Top
1 Orzhov Signet
1 Scroll Rack
1 Coalition Relic
1 Phyrexian Altar
1 Blasting Station
Enchantments:
1 Darkest Hour
1 Land Tax
1 Bitterblossom
1 Animate Dead
1 Recurring Nightmare
1 Phyrexian Arena
1 Arrest
1 Oblivion Ring
1 Seal of Cleansing
Sorceries:
1 Imperial Seal
1 Reanimate
1 Thoughtseize
1 Duress
1 Inquisition of Kozilek
1 Hymn to Tourach
1 Smallpox
1 Demonic Tutor
1 Balance
1 Sign in Blood
1 Night's Whisper
1 Beseech the Queen
1 Buried Alive
1 Victimize
1 Grim Tutor
1 Idyllic Tutor
1 Dimir Machinations
1 Last Rites
1 Vindicate
1 Persecute
1 Hallowed Burial
1 Profane Command
1 Vampiric Tutor
1 Enlightened Tutor
1 Entomb
1 Swords to Plowshares
1 Skeletal Scrying
1 Devour in Shadow
1 Hero's Demise
1 Sickening Dreams
1 Shred Memory
1 Insidious Dreams
I had the chance to run this against Uril, the Miststalker piloted by bimmerbot as well as Akroma, Angel of Fury piloted by mutedequilibrium the following day. My record vs each came out to be 5-3 vs Uril and 1-2 vs Akroma. I felt confident in both matchups, though my games vs Akroma were much more tight due to the fact that Akroma could still be played under Iona if painter was not around.
The tournament itself is still going on right now, so I'll update here as soon as we're finished. As of this posting, I am in the top 4.
Understanding Teysa
This section may contain a lot of things that are both obvious but subtle (if that makes any sense), but I feel the need to point them out. While this may be an odd way to go about a primer, I think it’s best if I unraveled everything slowly in the same way that I learned the deck. I will be writing in a sort of ‘stream of consciousness’, as the deck makes much more sense if I move from thought to thought, rather than chop it up into rigid sections. The multiple stances that the deck can take are truly astounding and I want to make sure everyone understands that.
It’s also important, I suppose, to state that we will rarely (if ever) use Teysa’s first ability. The requirements for it are quite costly and the fact that our primary combos turn all creatures black further shies away from the ability. That was never her forte, so this deck was designed with only her second ability in mind.
What Pushes the Deck to a Competitive Level?
Banned cards.
When Khymera first built Teysa, I’m sure he had a clear mission to abuse the hell out of all the cards that were originally banned in the multiplayer list. Now I understand that such cards were banned for a reason. Balance, Recurring Nightmare, Painter’s Servant, and Library of Alexandria are all cards are so disgustingly effective at what they do that the deck is able to stand toe to toe with some of the best generals in the format. By granting the Iona, Shield of Emeria and Painter’s Servant combo, you have a very solid primary reanimation plan backed by a plethora of combos with Teysa. However, the raw strength of the deck comes purely through the brutality of its color combination. I have never experienced nor witnessed a color pair so riddled with efficient answers to just about anything in the format. On top of this, black and white offer the best tutors for finding all of the combo pieces, creating an envious level of consistency. The greater idea however, born from a culmination of different facets of abuse and combos, is a truly unique approach to 1v1 EDH and a very formidable playstyle.
Deckbuilding Philosophies
The original list came from Khymera, who drew inspiration from two things: combos based off banned cards and synergy. Just about every card in here has more than one function, and it takes a lot more than a card “being good” to make it into this list. Because we cannot run the full sets of tutors, we have to resort to transmute cards and weaker tutors (such as Idyllic Tutor), and thus we must maximize their potential. Luckily, that isn’t a problem at all. The way I like to build decks is with an efficient curve. While others place more value in acceleration, allowing them to keep their curve higher, I’d rather come out the gates with strong plays and control the entire early game. I’ve tried very hard to optimize the list in terms of flexibility, which I will talk about in the next section. As for the efficiency of the list itself, barring reanimation targets and larger effect cards like Hallowed Burial, the average CMC of this entire deck rests at a very comfortable 2.44. It’s not wonder I’m so infatuated with the black white color combination - all of its spells are cheap and efficient to the core. It also helps that virtually all of my combo pieces cost 3 or less, meaning matchups against Gaddock Teeg and land destruction aren’t so painful. All this said, my card choices follow two simple rules: aid the combos or impede the opponent immediately. Simple as that. Oftentimes cards in here will do both, and that’s when you know you truly have a gem.
Varying Mana Costs and Card Types
While playing the deck, I realized the importance of maximizing the utility and flexibility of each slot available to the deck. Because there is never one straight forward plan, this deck must be played flexibly. In order to enable this, it is no coincidence that Weathered Wayfarer and Devout Witness (now Necrotic Sliver), both cards that could possibly be replaced, are still in the deck. Why? Because they fulfill different mana slots during different situations. What if you had Victimize in hand and only enough mana to tutor and play a 1CC creature? What if you needed a creature to sacrifice and Dimir Machinations was your only tutor in hand? These very tight, niche situations arise more than you would think. A good example of improving value while still promoting flexibility was how I opted to include many more enchantments into the deck that cope with various situations. Instead of Exhume, Animate Dead was chosen in order to fill the 2CC slot for Shred Memory while still enabling Enlightened Tutor and Idyllic Tutor in a situation where you do not have a creature to sacrifice to Recurring Nightmare . There is a more intricate purpose for each card, and I want people who look at this deck to ponder, understand, and appreciate that fact. This leads me directly into the very unique playstyle of this deck...
Variability and Deception: A Deck of Many Combos
Playing this deck requires a very clear understanding of the combos available. The beauty of this deck, however, is that its more intricate combos are hard to attack. What I mean by this is that your opponent will often have to choose between stopping one piece or another, and since each piece is a part of multiple combos, judging which is more important to counter or destroy becomes nearly impossible. While this does indeed force Teysa to play a risky game at times, it is precisely the variability in combo pieces that makes this deck so powerful.
Before I continue on about the centric combo pieces and multiple angles of attack, I want to make sure you’re acquainted with all of the primary combos available to the deck (even if some of them may come in or out of the deck over time):
Combos in the Deck
1. Iona, Shield of Emeria + any reanimation spell (w/ Painter’s Servant)
2. Blasting Station via Darkest Hour/Painter’s Servant + Teysa, Orzhov Scion + any creature
3. Blasting Station via Karmic Guide + Reveillark
4. Phyrexian Altar via Nether Traitor + Teysa, Orzhov Scion + Profane Command
5. Phyrexian Altar via Darkest Hour/Painter’s Servant + Teysa, Orzhov Scion + creature + Profane Command
6. Phyrexian Altar via Karmic Guide + Reveillark
7. Altar of Dementia via Darkest Hour/Painter’s Servant + Teysa, Orzhov Scion + creature
8. Altar of Dementia via Karmic Guide + Reveillark
9. Yosei, The Morning Star + Recurring Nightmare + any creature
Here’s a more sorted way to interpret the various Teysa combo pieces:
A. Infinite creature generator: Teysa, Orzhov Scion + Painter’s Servant/Darkest Hour; Karmic Guide + Reveillark
B. Combo finishers: Blasting Station, Phyrexian Altar, Altar of Dementia
C. Alternate lock: Yosei, The Morning Star + Recurring Nightmare
The primary and most simple win condition for the deck is indeed reanimating Iona, with or without Painter’s Servant. Her value in certain matchups fluctuates a bit, as mutli-colored decks will generally have answers in more than one color, meaning playing her without painter is a risk. Against mono-colored decks however, finding Entomb + Reanimate/Animate Dead with the kind of tutor density this list packs is not difficult at all. In fact, having Iona out by herself is not an uncommon turn 2-3 play. It’s only when you must have both painter and her out simultaneously that things begin to get a little tricky, since you will most likely need to go with a tutor for Buried Alive (fetching Iona, painter, ghast), followed by a Victimize the next turn on the ghast.
While the first combo is the primary method of victory, you might be asking: why Teysa? Teysa herself is a combo piece that enables an infinite generation of tokens by altering her second ability with Darkest Hour or Painter’s Servant. Coupled with a sacrifice effect and a creature to sacrifice, you can use cards such as Blasting Station or Altar of Dementia to win instantly by generating an infinite number of sacrifices. With this in mind, a very combo-centric piece to tutor for is Painter’s Servant. He is the crux of many combos, including the primary Iona one. You will almost always name ‘black’, as this allows you to combo off with Teysa in play. While he may not always be the first thing you tutor for (and often he’s not very safe to run out there early, as he still is just a creature), it is important to remember that he is a core card. Darkest Hour, while not able to combo with Iona, allows for virtually the same thing at a very, very efficient cost of B. It is also an enchantment and difficult to get rid of. The other very important card that leads into virtually all of your combos (even the most elaborate ones) is Buried Alive. You’re able to set up any game plan based off your starting hand, but again be wary because this is a sort of “all in” type of card that is subject to graveyard hate.
So now that we understand the primary Teysa combo, it’s now important to discover what you can do with individual pieces. Phyrexian Altar is a peculiar piece because it has an interesting role in this deck. It is clearly the less efficient combo in comparison to Blasting Station because you will need an alternate means to win after you generate infinite mana. So why do we bother keeping this around over, say, Altar of Dementia which allows you to virtually win right on the spot? To be absolutely honest, Altar of Dementia may rightfully take this spot, but hear the following points and ponder the advantages and disadvantages. Phyrexian Altar is less likely to be destroyed or countered over, say, Painter’s Servant or Skullclamp. This allows you to play it with some liberty, because even if it is destroyed you don’t really mind. In fact, you almost welcome it over the destruction of painter. However, because it is often left alone, a single tutor for Nether Traitor will allow you to generate infinite mana with Teysa in play. You sacrifice the traitor to create a 1/1 spirit, which you then sacrifice and use the initial mana to bring traitor back - this nets you 1 mana each time you perform this cycle. After you have infinite mana, there are two primary cards that will lead you to victory: Skullclamp and Profane Command. Yes, some of these combos may feel like they have too many pieces, but you’re going to realize that while playing this deck pieces just fall into your lap and you can make do with any combo, really. With the tutor density, there’s really not much to worry about. So, in short, if your opponent decided that he’d rather stop your painter and NOT your altar, you go with this plan and win without the need to turn all of your creatures black. Variability.
Sometimes you’ll dump a bunch of stuff into your yard, like ghast, traitor, Iona, painter, etc, and your opponent will demolish your ensuing plays with a well-timed graveyard hate card. It’s times like these that we look for yet ANOTHER backup plan. The infamous duo, Karmic Guide and Reveillark, combined with either of the other combo finishers will allow you to sacrifice an infinite amount of times. This combination is powerful because it does not require Teysa nor painter/darkest hour. The one major drawback is the cost of executing this plan - you often need to reach 5 mana to cast either Reveillark or Karmic Guide. However, with the use of reanimation effects, you are able to cheat these guys into play. It’s quite simple to cast Buried Alive for both of these if you already have a Blasting Station in play and a reanimate spell in hand. The other reason these creatures are here is because they are both good on their own! Karmic Guide serves as another reanimation spell and Reveillark can bring back several important pieces (such as painter). Once again, more back up plans, and more subtle flexibility.
While this may or may not be included into the deck, I should not fail to mention BW’s easy access to the Yosei, the Morning Star + Recurring Nightmare combo. This is the plan C, should games ever go that far. If you have any other creature, you can constantly sacrifice it to bring Yosei back and then use Recurring Nightmare to sacrifice Yosei and bring that creature back. Repeat forever and tap your opponent out, allowing you to do whatever you want. I would never actively go for this combo, as it does not guarantee you an ‘instant’ win and it’s fairly slow, unless you’re in a gamestate that would allow you to lock your opponent out or it just conveniently falls into your lap.
You should also never rule out the option that some games you just won’t have anything at all, though they may be few and far between. That’s when you’re going to have to rely on token beats to get the job done. Given a few fairly strong stand-alone cards in here, winning in this matter is not completely foreign. A few key cards that allow this are Elspeth, Knight-Errant, Bitterblossom, and Sun Titan. It’s also worth noting that Sun Titan pairs particularly well with Strip Mine, Seal of Cleansing, and Necrotic Sliver.
Weaknesses
This deck is far from infallible. In fact, while it does have very strong plays, there are often hands that meander about and accomplish nothing significant on their own. It’s these games, where you only have access to so little, that you must depend on BW’s answers to keep you aloft long enough to buy a win. Go for card advantage plays, such as Skullclamp or Phyrexian Arena that allow you to swing yourself back into the game.
The one archetype that Teysa struggles most against are generals that have a heavy amount of blue in them. Versus any other type of deck, aggro or combo, Teysa is much more more well-equipped in both disruption and removal, backed by rather quick wins when unmolested. Blue is the complete opposite, as they can always meddle with your plans. I’ve tried to include as much hand disruption as possible, but it will come down to how well you can utilize your mana and tutors to play deceptively, forcing them to counter the wrong spells while meticulously setting up an angle of attack. Nothing will teach you how to fight blue as a combo deck other than play experience, and I can assure you that any veteran would tell you the same thing. All this said, blue is a rather popular choice in EDH, so prepare yourself should you chose to partake this road.
Intense amounts of artifact/enchantment destruction is also rough for this deck, forcing you to go the reanimation route. Any time a player can recur artifact hate is bad times for Teysa (ie. Kiki-Jiki). Luckily those same matchups usually allow for Iona without painter.
Graveyard hate is always an issue, but thanks to the fact that you have so many options, you’re almost never putting all your eggs in one basket. Even in games where I’ve had my entire yard removed twice, I still felt like I was 100% in the game. Just be wary about what your opponent is capable of so that you don’t walk into these traps mindlessly.
When I have more time...
I will fill this section with important matchups and how to deal with them!
Ideas and Reassessment
While I think the list is great as it is, there are still many cards that may not be optimal. I’m going to list them here and see what you guys think. This is EDH and that means the list will always be growing with each set and evolving with every new metagame. There are actually tons of cards that people can argue the inclusion of - here are a few that I think stick up above the crowd:
Increasing Reanimation Target Count
Because reanimation is still the primary role of this deck, increasing its value and power only seems natural. However, the reason why this strategy is so powerful in the first place is because the deck is always trying to lock the game out with Iona. There are very few other targets than can seal a win away like she can, which has basically led me to question whether or not I even wanted to have secondary targets. Oftentimes though, I feel like if we could just add in another great reanimation target, it would go a long way to helping out games plagued by hate. There have been several choices, and while they are all inferior to Iona in terms of strictly winning, they are efficient role players that can quickly swing the game.
Angel of Despair: BW’s utility at its best. The problem with Angel of Despair is that she doesn’t actually win you the game. In fact, her contributions to the greater goal of the deck are virtually non-existent. Sure a 5/5 flier is nothing to scoff at, but we’re looking for something that packs a bigger punch.
Blazing Archon: In attempts to find a card that will create instant board impact, Blazing Archon looks like an amazing show stopper. Sure it’s a powerful effect, but he’s just as fragile as the next creature. There are just those times when the board is so full of creatures that it’s too late to bring Iona/painter out - this is where he would be valuable.
Pestilence Demon: Discussed amongst a few fellow playtest partners, Pestilence Demon is probably the most powerful of the bunch in terms of being both a show stopper and ending the game on his own. His Pestilence ability is borderline insane in EDH and his body is huge. I see great potential for this card, especially in the aggro matchup.
Yosei, The Morning Star: I had originally cut this card, but I sort of want it back in again just because he forms a two-card combo with Recurring Nightmare. Granted, it is slightly slow (since you have to use Recurring Nightmare twice to have him sacrificed - bring him back then use it again), it seems like a powerful show stopper against any time of deck, not just aggro. In the end, the fact that Yosei is part of an infinite lock might prove more valuable than Pestilence Demon. I don’t want to bump my fat creature count up too high for several reason, so only one of the above will make its way in.
In the end, no additional reanimation target may be necessary either as we’re looking for game winners and Iona is the only one that can truly accomplish that task.
The Battle of Altars
The first iteration of the deck utilized both of the altars, Phyrexian Altar and Altar of Dementia. However, Khymera made the point that the introduction of the Eldrazi invalidated the mill combo with Altar of Dementia. At that point, Blasting Station was brought on board as the alternative ‘instant win’ artifact. A great deal of my victories have been thanks to Blasting Station, and I find myself rarely ever ‘going’ for the Phyrexian Altar combo unless I exclusively have Nether Traitor in my staring hand. This brings me to the issue of Nether Traitor and Profane Command. Both cards, while not terrible on their own, are definitely weaker cards in the deck. I always go for Bloodghast or Reassembling Skeleton because I can bring them back to be used with clamp or nightmare rather easily. Nether Traitor on the other hand requires you to have another creature entering the graveyard first AND the black mana available. Even though this means drawing extra cards with clamp, it is often just overkill. The function of the card is practically backwards for this deck. That said, I think the introduction of Reassembling Skeleton dwarfs the utility that Nether Traitor brings to the table. Profane Command on the other hand is not a terrible card per se, but I haven’t found it useful outside of the infinite mana combo with Phyrexian Altar. The deck just doesn’t ever reach that kind of mana to gain proper mileage out of the various options on the card, so its utility is virtually wasted here. Now bringing the conversation in a roundabout way, it seems the Eldrazi do not plague the 1v1 lists much like they do to multiplayer, meaning that playing Altar of Dementia may not be so bad. Just scanning over the various viable decks, the only lists that actually play Eldrazi are mono-green decks that use them primarly as win conditions. It could be as simple as not going for the dementia combo against green and using it against everything else. If we run Altar of Dementia, this means we can cut three spots: Phyrexian Altar, Nether Traitor, and Profane Command - all of which are very sub par cards in here. The one thing that has me walking the fence is the fact that you absolutely need to resolve either Painter’s Servant or Darkest Hour for these combos, otherwise you cannot go infinite unless you have the Karmic Guide/Reveillark duo. The way I see it though, is that even though the infinite mana combo only requires Teysa, Phyrexian Altar, and traitor, you still need to have the win condition (or a tutor in hand). In this sense, it is no different than just streamlining the combo process and require sticking a painter effect, but you gain the benefit of two stronger slots. At this point we have to weigh a sub par set of cards that create variability against more powerful cards that aid a more streamlined, but predictable, combo.
The Necessity for more Hand Disruption
This is just a small section, but I feel that I could go with another hand disruption spell or two. IMO, hand disruption goes a long way in EDH, and oftentimes it’s not even just for securing your own win but for taking someone out of the game entirely. Snatching a key play out of an opponent’s hand is invaluable and I think this deck could use some more of that. To counter this deficiency, I propose the addition of Mesmeric Fiend and Tidehollow Sculler. We may not be able to abuse their abilities using the stack all the time, but they offer sacrificial bodies on top of their pinpoint discard, something that the deck is always fond of. As long as you can halt your opponent long enough to allow a combo, you’re good to go, and these cards do exactly that while providing fodder for infinite sacrifice combos. By the time you go off, whatever card you snatched from their hand will more than most likely become irrelevant.
Fickle Mana
One of the few drawbacks of the BW color combination is how fickle the mana can be. There are tons of BB, WW, and WB casting costs that need to be met by the second and third turns. Maximizing the amount of lands able to produce both B and W become crucial, so I’ve shaved down a lot of chaff. However, three lands in particular have become somewhat of a hindrance to the natural early game development of the deck, and they are:Bojuka Bog, Orzhov Basilica and Salt Flats. It’s pretty much decided that enemy color decks will have to run CIPT lands just to make sure they can consistently make their hearvy-colored plays. Bojuka Bog is never there when I want it to be and is often just a CIPT Swamp. I’ve consulted Evergreen and a few other players about this, and they all concur that bog is best left out of more aggressive decks; I’m going to replace it with City of Brass. Salt Flats is sub par to Vivid Marsh (and Meadow) in much too many ways. I’m going to replace it with the aforementioned card; same for Orzhov Basilica.
Cards that Should Be in Here but Aren’t
And this is what many people consider the most fun part about EDH - your deck is never perfect. There are always slots that can be changed depending on your metagame or as new sets are introduced. Ahead is a list of cards that I personally think are powerful enough to warrant inclusion. However, I have not managed to find room for them. Most of these cards, while very powerful in their own respects and would be auto-include in any other BW list, often do not share enough synergy with the combos at hand. Therefore they are omitted not due to lack of power, but because they lack harmony. Most of these I have tried, some of these I have not. If you have a particularly good counter argument for any of these, I will gladly hear it.
Khymera, if you’re reading this, I’d like you to make comments on these choices.
Elspeth Tirel - lot of buzz over this card. The verdict? She’s not good enough here. She’s expensive and doesn’t aid the gameplan in any way except make tokens (and potentially disk the board). You may argue that this is a lot, but you have to take a look at the larger picture, and that is she doesn’t aid our combos enough and she doesn’t provide any immediate control. Those are the criteria for earning a spot in the deck and she just barely falls short in both categories.
Damnation - definitely a good card, definitely deserves a spot. However, I don’t think the deck even needs it. It pretty much ignores creatures en-mass by comboing before that happens and carries plenty of spot removal for ones you do care about. Mass removal like Damnation just isn’t really necessary, and if it REALLY is, we can always opt to either Balance, Sickening Dreams, or Hallowed Burial.
Yawgmoth’s Will - cannot combo the turn you cast it, making it fairly weak in here. I’ve thought long and hard about this, and the disadvantage is just so blatantly annoying that I can’t bring myself to run it. You can’t even go Will -> Buried Alive, which is one of the spells that gets countered the most. However, I must admit that Yawgmoth’s Will is still EXTREMELY powerful, especially in a deck that has so many efficient tools, such as Balance. This alone may warrant its inclusion, as I don’t think many decks should ever pass up the opportunity to play this card.
Serra Ascendant - this is another card people have been talking about endlessly. Simply put, I cannot consistently cast him turn 1 without starting at 29 life. Yes a 6/6 flying lifelinker is still good on turn 2, but if you remember back to my section about the deck philosophy, this card neither helps to immediately control the game nor provide aid to my combos (other than being a sacrificial creature, which I doubt will happen since it’s a magnet). You might beat them very low, but then what? This deck wasn’t designed to get in the red zone, so chances are you won’t even be able to finish the opponent off. Coupled with tons of lifeloss in this deck, I can’t consistently keep him at a 6/6 early on, so if he’s not in my opening hand he’s just a big fail.
Salvage Scout - a card almost designed for this deck. It’s unfortunate that he can’t also get back enchantments - that would make him an auto-include.
Runed Halo - I really honestly love this card. However, I just can’t find room or justify it replacing another card in here.
Mortify - no room.
Unmake - no room.
Grasp of Darkness - no room.
Oust - could be good, but I’ve yet to test it.
Identity Crisis - too expensive.
Diabolic Intent - better on paper than in play.
Diabolic Tutor - slightly too expensive. Consideration.
Pithing Needle - is this better than some of the cards in the deck?
Luminarch Ascension - slow in 1v1.
Argivian Find - better than Sun Titan?
Dark Ritual - unnecessary 1-shot ramp.
Gideon Jura - unnecessary, does not further gameplan.
Sorin Markov - unnecessary, does not further gameplan.
Liliana Vess - too slow.
Moat - consideration.
Aura of Silence - double white hurts.
Mind Slash - better on paper than in play.
Condemn - might replace Devour in Shadow. Thoughts?
Guul Draz Assassin - not worth the mana investment.
Royal Assassin - pretty decent, but not worth the slot?
Preacher - same as Royal Assassin.
Cabal Therapy - in essence it should be good, but I still think it’s too narrow.
Fallen Ideal - another enabler, pretty good one too, I just hate using the red zone to win.
Orim’s Chant - decent, but no room.
Prospective Changes
Given all of the observations above, I have concluded that these changes should be made to the deck in order to bolster its effectiveness. Whether you all agree or disagree, I’d love to hear opinions!
- Bojuka Bog
- Salt Flats
- Orzhov Basilica
- Phyrexian Altar
- Nether Traitor
- Profane Command
- Smallpox
- Insidious Dreams
- Devout Witness
- Corpse Connoisseur
+ City of Brass
+ Vivid Meadow
+ Vivid Marsh
+ Altar of Dementia
+ Living Death
+ Tithe
+ Mesmeric Fiend
+ Tidehollow Sculler
+ Necrotic Sliver
+ Dark Tutelage
These changes basically tackle the Altar Battle argument. By removing the Phyrexian Altar combo, you effectively free up an extra two slots, which I then filled with Living Death and Tithe. Living Death fulfills two roles in this deck, a sweeper that I wish I had just a bit more often as well as another reanimation effect, which just makes this better than a plain Damnation; it also allows you to play more aggressively with painter, as now you have more ways to bring him back from the dead for a combo kill. Tithe is amazing for making sure we hit our land drops as well as fix for our more difficult early plays (insane with Mox Diamond!) I was also originally worried I couldn’t deal with Rofellos or Braids in time, but Smallpox is coming out because I feel like its power level in here is so insignificant. It is true that we can use the discard to our advantage and that it’s our only edict effect, but In the long run I think we could do without the card. I felt like some of the ‘discard as an extra cost’ cards were just too overwhelmingly bad in multiples (or without Land Tax), so I opted to exclude the weakest one, Insidious Dreams. This slot should honestly be replaced with Diabolic Tutor, but I wanted to address the areas that the deck could use the most help in, and that would be adding a tad more discard. I then added in Mesmeric Fiend and Tidehollow Sculler because they provide two advantages: a powerful hand disruption effect backed by a body, which I can then use to sacrifice into my combos. It’s a good thing I’m going to put these guys again and I have no idea why I even cut them in the earlier iterations of the deck. The necessity of having a combo start is a very common problem with this deck; and while it isn’t hard to find a body, I’d rather just up the creature density so that annoyance becomes much less frequent. Devout Witness was cut because she just didn’t carry the kind of punch I thought she would. Once again, discarding a card is a bit much unless you have one of the cards that allow you to enter surplus (Library, Tax, Wayfarer), and she’s a bit slow. I’ve opted to try Necrotic Sliver in this slot, since he fulfills the 3CC slot for Dimir Machinations should I need to tutor for a creature. I still foresee the sliver being a bit too slow for my tastes, but we’ll see how he pans out. However, he has two subtle saving graces that are: comboing with Sun Titan and solid when I’m being liberal with excess reanimation effects.
I’ve been continually unimpressed by Corpse Connoisseur. The three suggested cards, Dark Tutelage, Salvage Scout, Serra Ascendant are all cards that I think are much more useful. Corpse Connoisseur seems like he’d be the perfect setup card, but in reality he’s just way too slow. The most ideal scenario I can think of is having Altar of Dementia or Blasting Station in play with a reanimate spell in hand. If you play Corpse Connoisseur, barring any interruptions, that is an instant win via Karmic Guide and Reveillark, but it’d cost a whopping 9 mana. Dark Tutelage should probably be in the deck regardless, as it’s these kinds of cards that will gain you a great advantage over the course of a game. Argivian Find has always been on my watch list because it’s pretty good against blue decks to try and force through a certain piece, or getting back clamp (which is a huge deal). I think the better card, now that it’s out, is Salvage Scout. Not only is a creature for Victimize and combo starting fodder, but he gets back artifacts! The only things you really need to get back are usually Skullclamp, Painter’s Servant and either altar or station - so this is perfect! Anytime we can include a creature that will either aid our combos or help to disrupt our opponent is the double green light, and I think he fits the bill perfectly. he only downside to this is I hate running reactive cards, so at least Salvage Scout provides that combo fodder / clampable (irony?) aspect. It can’t get back Recurring Nightmare or Darkest Hour, so I’ll leave the verdict up to you guys. Serra Ascendant is kind of weird. Everyone tells me that it’s insane, but I don’t think I can justify running it in here with so much early life loss. I only have 5 Plains and a total of 8 ways to produce W on turn 1 without taking a hit. It can be good, as even a 6/6 flying lifelinker on turn 2 is awesome, but I’m afraid it just doesn’t do enough for the gameplan as a whole. I still would also like to run Yawgmoth’s Will, if you read the section above.
Overall I’m still trying to find the balance between answers and combo. I find that I’m really drawn to cards like Dark Confidant because they fulfill so many roles in this deck, including aiding consistency. If there is a creature variant of a spell, you bet that I’ll most likely be running it. I’ve said it a thousand times already, but it is CRUCIAL that we have combo starting fodder here! It’s just really difficult to plan the deck so that it fairs well against such a diverse array of generals. Sometimes I feel my deck is too removal light against voltron generals or Rofellos. Then sometimes I feel like my deck is too hand disruption light versus control and combo decks. In the end I’ll never be happy, but I’m just glad that the color combination offers such amazing options like Vindicate.
The last card I want to mention here is the one that I’ve been eyeing for a few weeks now. Scroll Rack has been ridiculous. And what I mean by that is that it’s either really good or it’s really bad. Yes it lets me see much deeper, but at the same time it can really throw some plays off and is a bit of a pain to constantly sink mana in to. Yes it is insane with Land Tax and whatnot, I know, that’s not what I’m complaining about. I’m complaining about those average hands where you don’t have an insane card drawing engine that Scroll Rack will only ever let you dig 3 cards deep. It’s just slightly annoying. I’ve pondered what replacements I could find, and I really think Yawgmoth’s Will might take its place. Otherwise, another very interesting card is Plunge into Darkness. I know Khymera has a hard on for Scroll Rack, but I’ve been skeptical about it since the orginal list. It has proven itself to me, but that doesn’t mean it’s not streaky enough to make me question its inclusion.
Latest Updates
I have been playing with this list a decent amount and I can say that it is much more comfortable than any of the earlier iterations. I really cut out a lot of fat cards and now it’s a stream of efficiency. I’m interested now to hear everyone else’s opinions!
1 Weathered Wayfarer
1 Mesmeric Fiend
1 Tidehollow Sculler
1 Stoneforge Mystic
1 Dark Confidant
1 Bloodghast
1 Reassembling Skeleton
1 Painter’s Servant
1 Necrotic Sliver
1 Karmic Guide
1 Reveillark
1 Sun Titan
1 Iona, Shield of Emeria
Planeswalkers:
1 Elspeth, Knight-Errant
Artifacts:
1 Chrome Mox
1 Mox Diamond
1 Skullclamp
1 Sensei's Divining Top
1 Orzhov Signet
1 Scroll Rack
1 Coalition Relic
1 Altar of Dementia
1 Blasting Station
Enchantments:
1 Darkest Hour
1 Land Tax
1 Bitterblossom
1 Animate Dead
1 Seal of Cleansing
1 Recurring Nightmare
1 Phyrexian Arena
1 Dark Tutelage
1 Arrest
1 Oblivion Ring
1 Imperial Seal
1 Reanimate
1 Thoughtseize
1 Duress
1 Inquisition of Kozilek
1 Hymn to Tourach
1 Demonic Tutor
1 Balance
1 Night's Whisper
1 Beseech the Queen
1 Buried Alive
1 Victimize
1 Grim Tutor
1 Idyllic Tutor
1 Dimir Machinations
1 Last Rites
1 Vindicate
1 Persecute
1 Living Death
1 Hallowed Burial
Instants:
1 Vampiric Tutor
1 Enlightened Tutor
1 Entomb
1 Swords to Plowshares
1 Tithe
1 Skeletal Scrying
1 Devour in Shadow
1 Hero's Demise
1 Sickening Dreams
1 Shred Memory
9 Swamp
5 Plains
1 Flooded Strand
1 Windswept Heath
1 Bloodstained Mire
1 Polluted Delta
1 Marsh Flats
1 Verdant Catacombs
1 Arid Mesa
1 Flagstones of Trokair
1 Caves of Koilos
1 Fetid Heath
1 Godless Shrine
1 Vivid Marsh
1 Vivid Meadow
1 Tainted Fields
1 Scrubland
1 City of Brass
1 Urborg, Tomb of Yawgmoth
1 Kor Haven
1 Strip Mine
1 Wasteland
1 Kjeldoran Outpost
1 Library of Alexandria
Credits
I’ll first give credit where credit is most due. I want to thank Khymera, foremost, for the skeleton and input that went into this deck. Without his guidance, I would still be playing Ghost Council with geddon.
mutedequilibrium - An old friend and an excellent player. If not for Chris, my interest in EDH would not have been rekindled. I’m sure we’re to have many more EDH endeavours in the future.
Evergreen - Another old friend and excellent player, I always enjoy talking about combo decks and Magic in general with him. It also helps that we’re both infatuated with black
LennonMarx - a good listener and one who provides solid feedback all the time (and for putting up with me complaining endlessly about how shoddy my mana base is >.< )
xCHRISTIANx - disss guyyy. Some Thrax kid who thinks he’s cool at life and signets.
Surging Chaos - for his support of both the format and my deck, thanks so much
Thank you too, readers, if you managed to scour the entire thing. I’m always open to constructive feedback and am looking forward to your thoughts on how to optimize this list!
For probably the only other person on this planet that has played this type of Teysa deck, with so many different combos, knows what I am about to comment on right now. I will address the nuances of the deck below. There might be fixes, there might not. They may simply be the shortcomings of the deck itself and cannot be rectified, but I feel the need to point them out so that we may possibly address them, be it through existing cards or future sets:
Not having creatures to sacrifice
Most of the combos in here require a creature to sac and that is a very big annoyance. Actually, I have lost games where I have Altar of Dementia with Darkest Hour, but cannot find a creature for the life of me. As a result I’ve added creatures like Mesmeric Fiend and Tidehollow Sculler to help, and they’ve been great for that, but it’s still a problem sometimes, as they are pretty high priority targets anyways. My idea was that they soak up removal and artifact destruction spells that would have otherwise been pointed at your more important combo pieces, so they pass. There’s also the issue that whatever they have removed you don’t want to see happen to you mid combo, such as removal for Teysa while he first trigger is on the stack or even cards like Krosan Grip. I even went as far as to look for more non-discriminate creatures that’ll serve as removal (ie. Nekretaal or Shriekmaw), but the fact that they only kill non-black is a very annoying drawback.
Never having enough mana
The curve of this deck is beautiful. I really like the fact that the average CC is 2.44, that just makes me all giddy inside. However, since we don’t have very many lands, the problem of casting transmute cards and then waiting an entire turn before comboing off is a large nuisance. I really hate just throwing stuff out there and passing the turn, so I usually want to save my second and third combo pieces till I can play them both (usually Teysa is the third). I want to do a lot of things, but I don’t always have the mana. Chrome Mox and Mox Diamond have both been VERY helpful here, but i do wonder if the inclusion of one-shot cards like Dark Ritual are worth their weight in gold here.
Having enough removal, having enough consistency
This is a delicate balance. I tried adding and removing card draw, and I feel like the ones that build you an advantage over time are the best, like Dark Confidant and Dark Tutelage. The problem is that we don’t have enough mana each turn to actually use all of our cards each turn, even though our curve is extremely low. So I’ve also tried bumping up the spot removal as a way to “buy time” for us to play more lands and set up our combos. That backfired, as I was often flooded with removal and could never find my combo pieces. The current setup is decent, but I feel like I’m barely handling the aggressive generals and still a bit short on reaching a greater consistency. I suppose this is fine, and the fact that I don’t feel like there’s actually a significant deficiency in either probably means I’ve found something close to balance. Just wanted your opinion, because EDH is a format of extremes. Bump up the removal and lose to combo, bump up the consistency and lose to Rofellos (though not really lol).
One-Eyed Black | Orzhov Combo | Ooze Reanimator | Mindwheeling Pain
-Yosei The Morning Star
-Recurring Nightmare
-Skeletal Scrying
-Necrotic Sliver
-Elspeth, Knight Errant
-Oblivion Ring
-Persecute
-Vivid Meadow
+Altar of Dementia
+Leaden Myr
+Golden Myr
+Seal of Doom
+Mother of Runes
+Preacher (Peacekeeper?)
+Cabal Therapy
+Orzhov Basilica
So the main things to note here are that we opted to drop the Yosei/Nightmare combo altogether. In all honesty, we don't really need it and it is definitely on the slower side because Yosei costs 6 mana to bring out. Yes you can reanimate him to cheat, but most of the time you'd rather be going for Iona. Our greatest problems with this iteration of the deck is two-fold: having enough mana to play out our combo pieces and having a creature to sacrifice to our Teysa combos (or Victimize). We've decided to really hone in on the advantage of running more modular pieces in the deck and cutting out ALL of the fat. We want to push the idea of creature accelerants by introducing myr into the deck and more defensive measure for them via Mother of Runes. Cutting out more expensive and risky spells like Persecute and Elspeth allow us to run more efficient cards such as Cabal Therapy or Peacekeeper. Another slower creature, Necrotic Sliver, was replaced by Seal of Doom! We were pondering the idea that Necrotic Sliver was so good with Sun Titan, but the card itself was too slow. Now we get the best of both worlds - a decent speed removal spell that can be returned with Sun Titan! Another change that my surprise you is the cutting of Elspeth. She really is just a 4CC Bitterblossom here and would be better served as another creature instead.
This is a huge leap for the deck and I fully expect these changes to have a very positive impact on the list. Of course I will be keeping an eye out, since we're effectively shaving down on removal and reanimation, but I don't think that'll be too big of an issue.
One-Eyed Black | Orzhov Combo | Ooze Reanimator | Mindwheeling Pain
I'm not going to be able to put everything I have to say in one post, but I guess I'll just read through it and try to address things in order.
K. Stronghold is nice sometimes, but definitely not essential (or useful in most games). Library is obviously insane, and is particularly good in this deck (Weathered Wayfarer).
Rector is definitely not so great when all the enchantments cost less than 4. We have enough ways to sacrifice her that she's still alright, but perhaps not good enough. I like the Skeleton quite a bit. It's impressed me in decks like Rakdos and Lyzolda, and it seems fine here.
I will say that I'd like to see one more way to abuse recurring creatures, now that we've got Bloodghast, Recurring Skeleton, and Bitterblossom. Skullclamp is obviously the best, but there isn't much else in here...Recurring Nightmare and Victimize don't really count. However, the next best card I can think of is Braids, Cabal Minion, which is powerful (and another creature) but doesn't really fit the strategy. Maybe she's worth trying anyway.
I always considered Yosei to be uncuttable. The Recurring Nightmare combo is just so good, and not hard to set up. Seeing that you cut him made me really consider him...but I still think he should be included.
By considering Yosei "Plan C," I think you're underrating him. I've won roughly as many games through a Yosei lock as through a Teysa combo, and it's occasionally a better reanimation target than Iona. It's also the only combo that can't be disrupted with artifact/enchantment destruction, which can be very important.
If you do cut him though, you should probably cut Recurring Nightmare too. Without Yosei, it's worse than cheaper reanimation in this deck.
I don't really want to cut Coldsteel Heart. My biggest problem with this deck was always having enough acceleration/colorfixing, and Coldsteel Heart is one of the better cards to help with that. I do like both Mox Diamond and Chrome Mox though, and am happy including both.
Fine. Confidant is better.
I agree that Inquisition is better than Castigate in this deck. However, I'm not convinced that Mesmeric Fiend and Tidehollow Sculler are better than Castigate. I've rarely had that much trouble finding a creature to sacrifice, and sometimes you simply can't afford to sacrifice these creatures anyway. More importantly though, I'm just not sure they're good enough. Most decks have plenty of removal, which just makes these...pretty bad, assuming that you want to take more than a removal spell. Nothing sucks more than playing Tidehollow Sculler and seeing 2 removal spells (and even with just one, you're forced to take the removal). This disadvantage is mitigated if you have something like Blasting Station to sac the creature before the trigger resolves, but at that point you might as well not be playing a creature.
At this point, I think I'll try your setup, but with Castigate instead of Tidehollow Sculler. Same cost, and I'd rather exile a card forever than make it so easy to get back. I'll try out Mesmeric Fiend to see if I like it, but I would be surprised if it makes the cut in the long run.
Fine. There's enough mass removal still.
I see you've re-added Living Death to your most recent list, but I'll discuss it anyway. I do feel that it's potentially cuttable, but I'm loathe to do so. Sort of like Balance (but even more so), Living Death is one of those cards that just completely reverses the game state. There are lots of situations where nothing else could possibly save you, and Living Death not only saves you, but wins you the game. It's true that there are also lots of situations where you don't really want to cast it, but at least if it's in your hand (or you have a tutor), you can sculpt a situation where it will be good. It's also versatile, in that it's basically 2 cards in one--it's not ideal, but if you absolutely need a sweeper or a reanimate, Living Death gets the job done.
That said, I definitely like the addition of Sun Titan. It's one of my favorite cards, and it seems particularly good here. It is quite pricy for this deck, but I think it's still reasonable. It's competing with Yawgmoth's Will for this slot, and I prefer the Titan.
I definitely agree with cutting Snuff Out. I'm not sure if Oblivion Ring is necessary, but it's not too bad. I don't really care that you can find it with Idyllic Tutor...I considered Idyllic Tutor justified with fewer targets, because it could often just win the game. I really don't want to be tutoring for Oblivion Ring, ever. Not saying it couldn't happen, but I don't like my odds anyway if I'm that desperate. You say it's been good though, so I don't mind trying it out.
This is a reasonable change. I'm not a big fan of Seal of Cleansing, but I suppose it's fine here. Especially with Sun Titan in the deck, I don't have a problem playing Seal.
This is a good change. I'm not sure why we didn't just play Animate Dead initially. I know we were considering it and decided against it, but I have no idea why.
Sure. I didn't include Wasteland initially because I was worried about the mana requirements, but even so, it's good in any deck. I would probably count it as only half a land though, for the purpose of figuring out the mana base.
I used to play Angel of Despair. It was really bad. I'm not really interested in Blazing Archon or Pestilence Demon either. The demon is better, but I just don't think I want to to try to win with it. It's still too fragile. I'd almost rather go with It That Betrays, though I don't want to play that either. I don't really consider Yosei to be a "reanimation target," but I think he still belongs in the deck, so I guess that covers it. Keep in mind that you've got access to Sun Titan too, which is not the worst reanimation target in the world. I wouldn't worry about this.
My view on this is a little different than yours. I never considered Altar of Dementia and Phyrexian Altar to be competing for space. They're different combos. The Altar of Dementia combo is definitely better, but the Phyrexian Altar combo was still tempting because it didn't require Painter's Servant/Darkest Hour. Now that Reassembling Skeleton has invalidated the need for Nether Traitor, I no longer consider the Phyrexian Altar combo to be worth playing. That gives you 3 more slots (Phyrexian Altar, Nether Traitor, Profane Command) to comfortably replace.
I'm fine with swapping Bojuka Bog for City of Brass (though it's a little sad with Weathered Wayfarer in the deck). Salt Flats is almost the same as the Vivid lands, so that doesn't make much difference, but I would keep Orzhov Basilica. I've found it to be very important in those games where you open with Land Tax or Weathered Wayfarer, and your opponent tries to keep them inactive by slow-rolling a land. In this situation, Basilica is the best land you could have, as it lets you keep developing your mana without adding to your land count. This situation comes up often enough that I think the Basilica is worth keeping. (It's also like having an extra land in land-light hands, which can help a lot.)
Elspeth Tirel: Meh. The +2 is useless, and the -6 isn't what we want at all. The -2 is somewhat interesting just because it's instant removal with Teysa, but that's not enough to make her better than Conquerer's Pledge. She's not for this deck.
Damnation: I agree, we don't need it. Balance, Hallowed Burial, Sickening Dreams, Living Death is plenty of sweepers.
Yawgmoth's Will: Seriously overrated in 1v1 EDH. It can be good in some decks (as a rule of thumb, it tends to be worthwhile in decks that play Dark Ritual), but this really doesn't seem to be the right deck for it. Sun Titan does everything I want from Yawgmoth's Will anyway.
Serra Ascendant: It's very good in aggro decks, and useless in anything else. Does this look like an aggro deck?
Salvage Scout: Interesting that you noticed this. I just breezed over it, but it's not that bad. However, it's still just a slightly better Treasure Hunter most of the time. It's closer than I would have thought, but this isn't good enough.
Runed Halo: I've played this a fair amount in other decks, and it's really failed to impress me. Sometimes it's quite good, but more commonly it's almost useless. Not what this deck needs.
Pithing Needle: This would be okay, but I don't find it necessary at all. I'd rather play anything with more synergy.
Argivian Find: I don't think the deck wants this, but I might be wrong. Do you often find yourself in situations where you could win if you just had that 1 artifact/enchantment in your graveyard? I don't think this comes up to much, but maybe I'm wrong. I like Sun Titan better overall, for the potential to reuse multiple permanents. If everything you've played has been swept away, Sun Titan can reassemble everything you need in a turn or two. Argivian Find...not so much. The cost isn't a huge issue at this point, as you only really need this later in the game.
Condemn: I prefer Devour in Shadow. I really don't like Condemn in EDH anymore. There are too many decks where it's too hard to hit the right creature at the right time.
Guul Draz Assassin: You might be underrating this one a little bit. I've played him a little bit in other decks, and been reasonably happy with him. He's definitely not your first line of defense against Rofellos, but he's a great second or third line. I still don't think he quite makes the cut here, but only because of how mana hungry this deck is all the time.
Preacher: This is the one card on the list I think you SHOULD play. It's actually kind of like Guul Draz Assassin, but way better. It's nothing like Royal Assassin. Even in decks without sacrifice outlets, he's quite good. If you do have a sacrifice outlet, he's insane. This deck happens to have quite a few sacrifice outlets anyway. Just play him. When he doesn't eat removal, he usually wins the game.
You didn't mention it, but I'd also consider adding Nihil Spellbomb. I think this card is so good in EDH. You don't really have any graveyard hate at all right now, which can be a big problem (especially with Living Death). This Spellbomb is never dead (like Tormod's Crypt), never hurts you (like Relic of Progenitus), and suitably answers graveyard shenanigans at instant speed (unlike Bojuka Bog).
Other stuff on that list...unnecessary or not good enough.
This looks pretty good overall. The only cuts I don't like is Orzhov Basilica, for reasons already stated. I'm also not sure I like cutting Smallpox, though it might be okay. I wouldn't say that an edict, a discard, and land destruction for 2 mana is an "insignificant" power level. In the right situation, Smallpox practically wins you the game, and I'm always happy to see it in my opening hand against general-centric decks like Rofellos or Zur. The question is just whether it's useful enough of the time to warrant its inclusion. I think the answer is probably yes, but I might well be wrong.
I don't want to add Tidehollow Sculler, for reasons already stated. I'm also not sure if you really need Altar of Dementia. It's wholly redundant with Blasting Station, and I'm not certain you need multiples of that effect. I was always pretty happy with one. If you do want more than Altar of Dementia is a good choice, but think about whether you actually need it.
I like Necrotic Sliver, though I'm not sure it's efficient enough for this deck. I think I played it once, in the beginning, and found it too costly, but I still like the versatility. As far as 3cc removal creatures go, I think Preacher is just better, but I'd still consider playing Necrotic Sliver over Oblivion Ring.
I don't see what your problem with Scroll Rack is. I guess I do recommend it in many decks, but it's so good here. Even in an "average" hand where it doesn't do that much, it lets you sculpt that average hand into a good hand. "Only" digging 3 cards deep isn't as good as seeing even more cards, but it's not insignificant. If Scroll Rack can't save you in such a situation, probably nothing else would have either...nothing lets you see more cards. If Scroll Rack is "really throwing some plays off," you must be doing something wrong. It gives you so much information about the top of your deck (and lets you draw those cards at any time) that it enables all sorts of tricky plays. I can't really think of any that it throws off, if used correctly. As for sinking mana in, it doesn't use any more than SDT, and you get a much bigger effect. I would cut SDT before cutting Scroll Rack.
I'm familiar with the issue. It's just something you have to deal with occasionally. It's not that bad to work around. You're approaching it the right way, trying to add creatures, though I'm not convinced Mesmeric Fiend/Tidehollow Sculler are going to do the trick. If you really want a "Nekrataal," Skinrender might be your best bet (though I still wouldn't play it).
This was always my biggest problem. Somehow it always feels like you don't have enough mana to do what you need. All you can do is play good accelerators. The Moxes are a good addition. Reintegrating Coldsteel Heart would probably be a good idea too, but I don't think you can do much beyond that.
I think the current balance looks good. Consistency is more important than removal, since you can still combo and win with a bunch of creatures on the board, but you just can't win if you flood on removal and can't find a combo.
So, the current list looks really good. I suggest the following minor changes.
-Tidehollow Sculler
-Oblivion Ring
-Altar of Dementia
-Persecute
-Skeletal Scrying
-Vivid Meadow
+Castigate
+Preacher
+Yosei, the Morning Star
+Coldsteel Heart
+Nihil Spellbomb
+Orzhov Basilica
Persecute and Skeletal Scrying have both been really underwhelming for me much of the time. They both have high-curve costs for effects we want low in the curve. Persecute is often mediocre by the time it resolves, and Skeletal Scrying is just awkward to use (and the instant speed is almost irrelevant). I usually wind up playing it in the midgame for just 2 or 3, which isn't really very good.
Trust me when I say that I want the same thing as you. These guys are so ripe for abuse! Sometimes I manage to squeeze a few points of damage using Blasting Station, but you're right that there's nothing that particularly stands out when it comes to really taking advantage of creatures that come back from the yard. You make a good point though, and I'll definitely investigate. Braids, while good, will probably ONLY be good if I have one of my few enablers out, so I wouldn't want to add her.
I have won games with him too, and I actually didn't cut him till one of my more recent conversations with mutedequillibrum. In my experience, he really is just a tad slow. I've never despised him, but I think it's more the fact that he himself is so high on the curve that really bugs me. I originally add him back in because he has the ability to stop aggro outright, and that's when I decided to add Living Death back in.
I've considered cutting Recurring Nightmare as well, funny that you mention that. Without Yosei, the card loses a lot of value. In the end I'll probably keep Yosei in here. Gonna test this thoroughly and pass final verdict one day.
Coldsteel Heart is okay to keep in.
You bring up a good point and basically the same point that a lot of other people have used to argue against the inclusion of these guys. You guys may be right, although I've had great success with these guys. Them being creatures does make this difficult, but I'm going to fight to make a case for these guys. Upping both the creature count AND hand disruption count was a huge blessing for me - let's see if we can try and keep that consistent.
As I've stated about, the fact that it reverses the game state is pretty much why I added it in. Damnation was good because it was efficient, but I think that in the end Living Death is still the better sweeper for all of the reasons you've mentioned above.
Sun Titan has been nothing short of amazing. The only thing keeping him at 'amazing' and not 'stone cold nuts' is his casting cost, which is usually not too much a problem because by the time he's relevant, I'd have about that much mana anyways. I feel the need to mention Necrotic Sliver alongside Sun Titan because I have actually won games off this small interaction. I'm not sure if this more justifies Necrotic Sliver, but I've bad a pretty 'meh' time with the sliver as well. My question is whether or not Necrotic Sliver is still worth keeping around solely because of this small combo. At some point I'd almost rather run Mortify.
Oblivion Ring to me is a lot like counterspells in limited. You don't NEED to run it but it will always have a target, and sometimes stopping that target can just win you the game. I am an avid fan of indiscriminate removal, and Oblivion Ring is exactly that. I understand that it may be a 'liability' in some matchups, but I still think it's better than the little credit you're giving it.
I never considered them to be competing in the old list - I was more commenting on the fact that I don't like the cards surrounding Phyrexian Altar and think they should be cut and replaced with Altar of Dementia, which would then in return become my second Blasting Station. I'm not quite sure I'm down with cutting Altar of Dementia from the list, although it is plausible. I'm not sure how your games went, but the ones I've been playing my combo pieces don't always resolve or they get blown up. That's the whole reason I brought up the Argivian Find/Salvage Scout/Yawgmoth's Will thing. Adding redundancy to the combo helps a lot, and if we only have one Blasting Station/Altar of Dementia, don't you think that'll hurt our chances of comboing off?
I'm still walking the fence here. I know also that there are even more subtle interactions that the card brings to the table, but I just don't know if it's worth the risk. I'm gonna keep an eye out on my Vivid slots to ever see if they'd be better as Basilica and get back to you. Actually, I might just cut Wasteland. That card has been great half the time and just a color-screwer the other. The honest bottomline is that we probably don't need to take the LD route, so Strip Mine should suffice if we really need to get rid of something.
Once again, things don't always work according to plan, especially against blue decks or ones that pack a lot of artifact/enchantment removal. That's where this card really helps out, and I do find myself in situations where I'm always missing one piece cause it's in my yard (which also relates to the fact that I never have enough mana to play all my pieces out at once, meaning I often have to play one piece and pass the turn before I can play the next two). Sun Titan is obviously better, but it's also really high on the curve, so that's why I'm still considering cards like this one and Salvage Scout.
I can dig this. I just added it to my long "list of considered cards" for the sake of completeness, but after much more experience with the deck I do think this is a very good card. I just am annoyed by the fact that you have to wait till next turn to use it and it's a creature, which means it will still fall victim to a lot of removal it'd almost be like a control magic version of Tidehollow Sculler and Mesmeric Fiend (exactly, actually). You're right that it will dominate some matchups if resolved though (much like Guul Draz Assassin), so I'll be willing to give this a shot.
The way I see it is that he'll be a removal magnet. The difference is he will be a great asset if left alive than Mesmeric Fiend will ever be. My main beef with him is that he requires a full turn to come into effect. The early WW is also a problem. I usually don't have any issues getting to BB on turn 2 and WW by turn 5, but asking for it on turn 3 is a bit rough.
Yea I actually thought about it, but then I began to ask myself what graveyard stuff I was really worried about. I can go toe-to-toe in speed versus Iname because I have access to Iona, which is probably the most fearsome use of the graveyard to date. Sure there are survival and loam shenanigans - but how much do I care about that? Yes, Nihil Spellbomb is never dead, but how badly do I want or even need it? I may have a completely incorrect perspective on this, so if I do, please enlighten me.
Smallpox has won me games, but it's also a very big annoyance, especially when you consider the fact that we are also 1) a deck that is light on lands and 2) one that needs creatures to begin our combos with. Those two drawbacks are EXTREMELY annoying. If we yet another quick answer to faster general decks, I would just consider running Grasp of Darkness. No it doesn't give you the LD, but it's fast and hits just about most relevant creatures in the format.
I'm going to try cutting Altar of Dementia for now and re-inserting Yosei. This way I'll still have access to more combos if something happens to Blasting Station. I also really want to try Salvage Scout >.< . I guess I just prefer playing it more safely? He gets back clamp too! But yea, he's an overly defensive card in a fairly aggressive deck.
Fuggedaboutit.
I disagree with your assessment of Persecute and Skeletal Scrying. Persecute has always been an insanely good play against any opponent, even if it only nets you two cards. Against mono-colored decks, stealing half or more of their hands is just devastating. I don't think this card should ever be cut. Skeletal Scrying is something I adore because it scales with the game. Early on it helps you filter out your draws and late game it acts as a recharge spell. I've never been disappointed with the card. I SUPPOSE Skeletal could become Nihil Spellbomb though.
I'm not sure how I want to make these changes, as moving around cards really disrupts the flow of the deck. I know I've used Shred Memory MANY times as the final tutor for Altar of Dementia for a Teysa kill, so I'm just not sure if I want to get rid of that. Taking away Tidehollow Sculler and Mesmeric Fiend is fine, but dropping the creature count hurts a lot more than you probably thing it does. I need to find some creature replacements for some spells in order to bump the count back up again. Are running the two myr a terrible idea? They don't fix, but at least they help accelerate and are complete fodder later on. Yea they enable opponent removal, but they're more likely to let them slide since they don't 'do anything relevant'.
I will be trying the following changes:
-Mesmeric Fiend
-Tidehollow Sculler
-Altar of Dementia
-Wasteland
(-Skeletal Scrying)
+Preacher/Salvage Scout/Mesmeric Fiend - maybe just Diabolic Tutor
+Castigate
+Yosei, The Morning Star
+Orzhov Basilica
(+Nihil Spellbomb)
Once again thanks for the feedback, it's always appreciated.
One-Eyed Black | Orzhov Combo | Ooze Reanimator | Mindwheeling Pain
Do you state that Salt flats is inferior because of the 1 damage per turn?
Now I'm a little skeptical of o-ring as well, just because If you look at your tutor box. If you have idelix tutor/
enlightened you can always find a out to pretty much anything but planes walkers. With Arrest you can take care of any creatures
and with Seal of Cleansing you can deal with enchantment/Artifact. If your grabbing something with a 3cc
transmute tutor you can just grab Vindicate.
Thats just an Idea, I know you just may have wanted a extra removal spell.
Sickening Dreams? Is this card just because Helaphatio played in the tournament. It is a sweeper though against annoying
dudes as well in the 2cc package.
In Funlicker'ss Adun build he runs cabal therapy and its nothing short of amazing. At worst in
this deck it's another way to abuse bloodghast/Skeleton. With another discard spell, It rips
a hand apart. This adds to two things you wanted with being another way to abuse and it's discard.
It's even nice when someone demonic tutors for something and you know their deck well enough
to name what they get. It's even good with entomb in emergencies
Tidehollow/Fiend Actually do everything you said they do. Its really just a preference if you want to run them.
I think they're always good just because their tempo and even if they do eat removal
they can buy you enough time anyway to win. They are nice with Living death though.
But hope this kinda helps, it's no khymera post but it'll have to do.
I'll be at Blizzcon - let me know when you guys plan to come down I'll introduce you to the locals!
@Salt Flats
It really is just an inferior Vivid Land. My biggest problems with the deck were reaching my colors consistently within the first three turns. Anytime after that was usually fine. Since the Vivids already tap for the basic mana, they never had the drawback of constantly pinging myself. I consider them strictly superior.
@Oblivion Ring
Do you guys really not like this card? Regardless of whether or not I'm tutoring for this card, it's still a great answer-all by itself! I've had strong success with this card. I actually used to run Aura of Silence in this slot, but the double white was really killing me. I now use Oblivion Ring as a way to deal with just about anything; it's just like Vindicate's weaker brother. If there's something I'm obviously missing, please let me know.
@Sickening Dreams
The reason we decide to run dream cards is because they help us discard reanimation targets. We can also discard creatures like Bloodghast or Reassembling Skeleton, grinding even more value out of it. In all honesty, it's a very good turn 2 play against fast generals, it's a cheap answer to anything token related, and it helps fulfill a secondary role (discarding stuff) in the deck. Also note that his deck is pretty good at overfilling the hand, be it with Library or clamp.
@Cabal Therapy
I'm actually very interested in seeing funlicker's deck. I had always suspected that Jund was a very powerful combination to play, it's just that no one actually went all the way through with it. Cabal Therapy does seem very interesting, although I'm slightly afraid it might be dead by itself. How much discard, if he doesn't mind me asking, does he run to get full mileage out of Cabal Therapy? It's definitely a card I want to consider running. I don't know if I like the idea of cutting Persecute at all, but if I were to find a slot for Cabal Therapy it might just end up taking that slot (depending on how good it is)
@Tidehollow Sculler and Mesmeric Fiend
This is it. I'm going to write my huge defense thing here about these two guys, because I think they deserve their slots. Khymera and mutedequilibrium do bring up good points, but these guys have been so stellar for me that I want to write about not only the tempo advantage they bring, but the fact that they are bodies as well.
It may be just that I see the Teysa combo pieces more often than Khymera, but I go for that setup fairly often. If you have one piece of the four (Darkest Hour, Painter's Servant, Blasting Station, Altar of Dementia), you only need ONE tutor to have the core engine ready. The problem lies in the fact that even though you have Teysa, Painter effect, and sacrifice engine out, you need a creature to start things off with. As Khymera has mentioned, anyone who has ever touched this deck will not be foreign to this idea, especially when looking at cards like Recurring Nightmare and Victimize. This said, ANY TIME that the deck can bring in creature variants of their respective spells (ie. Dark Confidant over Sign in Blood) is highly valued. Scratch that - EXTREMELY VALUED. Thus, I opted to bring in Mesmeric Fiend and Tidehollow Sculler both to up my discard count and to provide more fodders to begin my combos with.
The first issue with these two creatures is that while they let you effectively 'Thoughtseize' your opponent, they are able to return the card if they manage to get rid of your dude. This is 100% true and an obvious strike against them. However, the way this deck plays, you might want to reconsider how some of your choices go down. When you cast Mesmeric Fiend, for instance, your gut reaction is to take the removal spell. While this is obvious, you technically aren't gaining any great advantage over your opponent, as 1) spot removal is only good against the deck if you're going for Teysa combo and 2) they'll continue to play whatever else is in their hand. The real advantage is when you play Mesmeric Fiend and take a mana accelerant or even a bomb out of their hand. You force them to spend the turn removing Fiend, effectively delaying their acceleration plan. Buying turns like these has been a very powerful exchange. If they for whatever reason don't have a removal spell or just have a counterspell, even better for you.
Another argument is that if you start off your Teysa combo by sacrificing a Mesmeric Fiend, you're giving your opponent back his removal spell and effectively nullifying your combo (since he can use the removal spell on Teysa). This is all the more reason why I emphasize that you don't always have to take the removal spell and you can have him waste his turn by blowing up your Fiend. If he did, that spell won't be used on Teysa later or on your one creature to fizzle Victimize. At that point, wouldn't I just rather run a creatureless discard spell? Yes and no. Yes because I won't have to deal with this and no because I lose all of the advantages that this deck gets out of it. And sometimes if you've exiled something that'll affect your game, like a Krosan Grip, it's even as simple as NOT using your guy as the first sacrifice target. It's just nice to have that option there.
I also want to talk about how it's been fairly rare for me to see two removal spells (quick ones, at least) in someone's hand. Since this deck has actually jumped up in discard count, it's very common to see games where I am able to do a turn 1/2 Thoughtseize/Hymn/Duress/whatever into a turn 2/3 Sculler/Fiend have been entirely crushing. You basically snatch all of the early plays out of your opponents' hands and continue unimpeded for several turns. The difference is now you're able to more aggressively tutor for your Teysa combo pieces and just go off, or even for Buried Alive into Victimize. By the time you use either a sac engine or Victimize, the card that is returned to your opponent will most likely become irrelevant, especially if you took a bomb or mana accelerant.
Another case for these guys is that I've found them great against blue. With their lower removal count, you're able to get away with these guys fairly easily. I also feel the need to point out that when you get the Victimize hands, these guys are especially good since you couldn't care less what they get back after you resolve your Iona/Painter combo.
All this said, yes I have had situations where these guys did not shine, but for the most part they've performed admirably. I can see argument for either side now though, so I will try running actual discard in their place to see how badly I miss them or not. I can already see your guys' rebuttals in my head, so I'll leave testing to be the final judge of this.
Thank you for your response, Hunter245. It's always a pleasure to see seasoned players stop by
I'm still pondering the Yosei/Nightmare lock too. I might want to try keeping Altar of Dementia and running Exhume alongside it. Moar testing!
Lastly, if ANYONE else has played with or against Preacher, I'd like to hear opinions and thoughts.
One-Eyed Black | Orzhov Combo | Ooze Reanimator | Mindwheeling Pain
We talked for a while after the tourney about what was actually working in the deck and what wasn't. It's really surprising to take a step back and really analyze what cards have and haven't been working. This following list of changes is most likely going to surprise you, but we both agreed upon these rather unique choices:
-Yosei The Morning Star
-Recurring Nightmare
-Skeletal Scrying
-Necrotic Sliver
-Elspeth, Knight Errant
-Oblivion Ring
-Persecute
-Vivid Meadow
+Altar of Dementia
+Leaden Myr
+Golden Myr
+Seal of Doom
+Mother of Runes
+Preacher (Peacekeeper?)
+Cabal Therapy
+Orzhov Basilica
So the main things to note here are that we opted to drop the Yosei/Nightmare combo altogether. In all honesty, we don't really need it and it is definitely on the slower side because Yosei costs 6 mana to bring out. Yes you can reanimate him to cheat, but most of the time you'd rather be going for Iona. Our greatest problems with this iteration of the deck is two-fold: having enough mana to play out our combo pieces and having a creature to sacrifice to our Teysa combos (or Victimize). We've decided to really hone in on the advantage of running more modular pieces in the deck and cutting out ALL of the fat. We want to push the idea of creature accelerants by introducing myr into the deck and more defensive measure for them via Mother of Runes. Cutting out more expensive and risky spells like Persecute and Elspeth allow us to run more efficient cards such as Cabal Therapy or Peacekeeper. Another slower creature, Necrotic Sliver, was replaced by Seal of Doom! We were pondering the idea that Necrotic Sliver was so good with Sun Titan, but the card itself was too slow. Now we get the best of both worlds - a decent speed removal spell that can be returned with Sun Titan! Another change that my surprise you is the cutting of Elspeth. She really is just a 4CC Bitterblossom here and would be better served as another creature instead.
This is a huge leap for the deck and I fully expect these changes to have a very positive impact on the list. Of course I will be keeping an eye out, since we're effectively shaving down on removal and reanimation, but I don't think that'll be too big of an issue.
One-Eyed Black | Orzhov Combo | Ooze Reanimator | Mindwheeling Pain
First off, I hate Seal of Doom over O-Ring. Hate it hate it hate it. Seal of Doom is a much more narrow answer card, and worst off all its a total blank against generals like Braids, Thrax, and Nath. O-Ring is just a flat-out amazing answer. You don't need Sun Titan to make the card good. O-Ring is just an incredible standalone card, period. It is virtually never dead.
Orzhov Basilica is really risky IMO, because mana denial decks are big in 1v1 EDH and they love to prey off of a bouneland. Bouncelands are more suited for multiplayer, but even then they can be risky given the playgroup. Obviously though, we're talking about 1v1. Pretty much all decks will be running Strip Mine and Wasteland, and others will have Dust Bowl too. Hell even a simple bounce spell from a blue deck is enough to really put you in a world of hurt.
Mesmeric Fiend and Tidehollow Sculler are great, and I wouldn't think about cut them. They disrupt your opponent effectively and they are bodies for Teysa. You need all the powerful disruption you need against blue and combo decks.
I've talked to you about Peacekeeper over AIM MCR, but I'm going to reiterate: I think Peacekeeper is overrated in 1v1 EDH. I know Khymera is going to wonder what's going through my mind, but just stop and think for one second: How many of the top decks in EDH actually win through the combat step? Not many, as most of those decks either win through comboing out or by forcing a concession.
Preacher is much better suited for this format due to the increased focus on generals. He ups the threat density, which is something I'm always a big fan of.
That's all I have for now. W/B is just such a sickly powerful color combination.
Peacekeeper was mostly my idea, mainly because sometimes I face down a board with lots of damage and I need ways to stop it for more than one turn. It's also noteworthy that I'd play against Thraximundar, Doran, Uril, and Akroma, Angel of Fury mostly, so it's almost like a metagame call.
I agree that Seal of Doom is a bit iffy, but after playing the deck a few more times, I feel like we could go with something more useful for the deck. I've decided to add Sign in Blood back in, because I really feel like the deck could use more early filtering cards. The list is efficient enough that you can answer all types of situations and combo off, but the enemy of combo decks will always be consistency. Thankfully this deck is packed with powerful answers, but without a way to filter through mediocre draws, you're going to be stuck with a lot of dead turns.
I've decided to cut Tidehollow Sculler and run Castigate instead mainly because Sculler is vulnerable to two types of hate, while Mesmeric Fiend is only vulnerable to one. I'm considering just cutting both already though, as I think I'd rather have Persecute in the Mesmeric Fiend slot anyways. I know Khymera and I have discussed that card, but I still think it's way good in here.
As for Orzhov Basilica, I've felt the same way. Even though the deck is light on lands and could both use this as a way to count it as a 1.5 land and allow certain plays, I've been blown out several times because of it. I think I'm going to revert back to Vivid Meadow - it's just less risky.
On a side note, I've really been liking the myr! Also, Cabal Therapy has been useful for helping me discard Iona more than once! Great changes!
So, in short, a few more minor changes:
-Seal of Doom
-Mesmeric Fiend
-Orzhov Basilica
+Sign in Blood
+Persecute
+Vivid Meadow
One-Eyed Black | Orzhov Combo | Ooze Reanimator | Mindwheeling Pain
I'm just curious in what you mean when you say
"I've decided to cut Tidehollow Sculler and run Castigate instead mainly because Sculler is vulnerable to two types of hate, while Mesmeric Fiend is only vulnerable to one. I'm considering just cutting both already though, as I think I'd rather have Persecute in the Mesmeric Fiend slot anyways."
If you do cut them then aren't you still getting the problem that you don't have enough creatures to combo off. I know these are pretty bad but the W/B urza manlands produce colored mana, and are relatively cheap to activate. Thats just something to think about because I know mishra's factory and friends are out do to the fact they produce colorless mana. But like the discard friends they let you have a creature to sacrifice to victimize and such.
One final question is persecute a card that I see in most black lists. You seem strongly attached to it (same with evergreen). Is this just a amazing card? It seems slow But its a crippling blow just like mind twist. Mind twist is too slow but is persecute mana cost just right. You can accelerate into it, We've been interested in it for awhile now, care to elaborate?
Now I'm really interested in hearing how funlicker's results have been running Fiend
The reason I found it okay to cut Mesmeric Fiend / Tidehollow Sculler is because we added in a bunch of creatures in other areas. The introduction of the two myr as well as Mother of Runes and Preacher maintain the integrity of the creature count (which as previously @ 14 with Fiend/Sculler, and now still is, even after we cut Yosei and Necrotic Sliver). While I admit I still like both of these cards, I'm willing to try without them for a while. Castigate is pretty good, but I'm not too sold on Distress just yet. That said, let's talk about Persecute.
I don't see Persecute as slow, the casting cost is perfect for what it does. In a sense, yes, it is 1v1 EDH's Mind Twist. The primary argument is that it's on the peak of the curve as far as discard goes, and while that may be true, I have definitely completely kicked people out of the game because of it. Assuming it's in your opening hand, you cast it on turn 4 against any mono-colored deck you're bound to net at least two cards that will either be answers or high-casting cost spells, essentially halting your opponent's game plan. If you can cast it on turn 3 with acceleration, you're probably going to take away his chance to even develop properly. Against blue decks it's virtually a must-counter threat and against multi-colored decks, Teysa only cares about whatever color the removal is in. I've actually never been disappointed to have the card around. I can see that against faster or multi-colored decks you won't net as many cards, but even when it's not as good, it'll more than most likely still net you two cards and give you hand information.
One-Eyed Black | Orzhov Combo | Ooze Reanimator | Mindwheeling Pain
1. You already have all the other cards needed to combo with it and create an arbitrarily large, flying goon. You would only need to exchange one slot.
2. It goes back to your hand if things go wrong.
3. It costs 3 mana, and only one of it B, so it fits into your general curve well and recurs with Sun Titan.
4. The only likely targets for the aura are recursive or tokens, so it's target being destroyed while the spell is on the stack would likely not be a 2for1.
I think in most cases you would rather see Blasting Station, but it seems a fitting fallback when it breaks or you find yourself holding an Idyllic Tutor
360-cube - Suggestions welcome!
Hey Blal, thanks for chiming in.
If you look under the cards that I have considered, Fallen Ideal is definitely one of them. Unfortunately, the reality is that the card requires you to have a creature available to swing, which usually means you need Teysa and TWO creatures instead of one. The second major strike is that creature removal is rampant in the format, much more than artifact or enchantment destruction, which is why the altars and station are much more appealing. I thank you for pointing out the advantages of the card, though I don't believe it's strong enough compared to our other alternative combo sac outlets.
One-Eyed Black | Orzhov Combo | Ooze Reanimator | Mindwheeling Pain
http://forums.mtgsalvation.com/showthread.php?t=289071
There is the link for my deck list. It's more about getting a combo off, and if not possible it's about making tokens, then proceeding to abuse said tokens.
If you could check it out and give me some feedback that would be much appreciated. = ]
Currently running:
BRG Xira Arien BRG
UR Melek, Izzet Paragon UR
WUG Jenara, Asura of War WUG
WRG Mayael the Anima WRG
WB Triad of Fates WB
BG Mazirek, Kraul Death Priest BG
BR Rakdos, Lord of Riots BR
WR Aurelia the Warleader WR
WBG Ghave, Guru of Spores WBG
WUBRG Horde of Notions WUBRG
My H/W list
See look at your decklist and look at his. Sure you don't need to quite net deck. But MCR runs a strong Iona reanimate stragedy. You run fat like Akroma with no reliable way to cast them.
Speaking of that you want to avoid the higher cc spells. Especially spells that are blocked by teeg.
Where is the Discard? Thoughtseize, Duress, Inquestion, Hymn, Tidehollar Scullar, Mesmeric Fiend..... These are format staples for a reason.
I haven't played this list in a while (been in the multiplayer zone mostly), but I wasn't even aware of the Sun Titan combos at the time. Yes, shame on me, but now that I do understand how it functions, I may draft my list differently to abuse this.
@WolSHaman
I've considered adding in locks with my token generators, but honestly Contamination hurts this deck as much as it hurts my opponents'. I can see Sadistic Hypnotist being okay, but without a token generator he doesn't do too well on his own. I'll have to see about both.
Thanks!
One-Eyed Black | Orzhov Combo | Ooze Reanimator | Mindwheeling Pain
Glissa, the Traitor, Ulasht, the Hate Seed, The Mimeoplasm
Now for some decisions:
Phyrexian alter vs alter of dementia:
Personally I side with altar of dementia over phyrexian altar. The chance that you will run into any eldrazi is really slim. Additionally, PA requires a seperate card to be a win con, taking up another slot. Final nail in the coffin is AoD drops one turn earlier than PA.
Which combos to include:
Initially, I was fond of simply pushing any combo I found relavent, into the deck. I am streamlining my deck to revolve around two combos, BS and altar combos, and blooghast/reanimating skeleton combos. BS combos include lark + karmic, nether traiter + teysa, and teysa+ darkest hour. RS combos include contamination lock and skullclamp.
Where to focus:
Traditionally, control decks prey on combo deck, with combo decks wrecking aggro decks. The french meta seems dominated by aggro-control decks, utilizing small, evasive creatures to put other decks on a clock, while protecting their position. This is why I have included stoneforge and srods/jitte in the deck. I have played sygg and edric and both decks have trouble fighting through jitte.
Final product? None yet. I haven't even decided if she is good enough to run in the tourney over sygg. I will keep thinking though.
My H/W list
This is the Teysa Combo EDH I have been playing lately in 1v1 dueling with French banlist.
1 Teysa, Orzhov Scion
//39 Lands
1 Ancient Den
1 Arid Mesa
1 Barren Moor
1 Bloodstained Mire
1 Cabal Pit
1 Caves of Koilos
1 City of Brass
1 Command Tower
1 Eiganjo Castle
1 Fetid Heath
1 Flagstones of Trokair
1 Flooded Strand
1 Ghost Quarter
1 Godless Shrine
1 Isolated Chapel
1 Kjeldoran Outpost
1 Kor Haven
1 Marsh Flats
1 New Benalia
1 Orzhov Basilica
1 Phyrexian Tower
1 Plains
1 Polluted Delta
1 Reflecting Pool
1 Scrubland
1 Secluded Steppe
1 Shizo, Death's Storehouse
1 Snow-Covered Plains
1 Snow-Covered Swamp
1 Swamp
1 Tainted Field
1 Tectonic Edge
1 Urborg
1 Urborg, Tomb of Yawgmoth
1 Vault of Whispers
1 Verdant Catacombs
1 Volrath's Stronghold
1 Wasteland
1 Windswept Heath
1 Solemn Simulacrum
1 Weathered Wayfarer
1 Coalition Relic
1 Coldsteel Heart
1 Orzhov Signet
1 Tithe
//Combo Stuff
1 Iona, Shield of Emeria
1 Karmic Guide
1 Painter's Servant
1 Reassembling Skeleton
1 Reveillark
1 Viscera Seer
1 Vish Kal, Blood Arbiter
1 Altar of Dementia
1 Blasting Station
1 Contamination
1 Darkest Hour
//14 Tutors
1 Academy Rector
1 Stoneforge Mystic
1 Enlightened Tutor
1 Entomb
1 Shred Memory
1 Tainted Pact
1 Beseech the Queen
1 Buried Alive
1 Cruel Tutor
1 Demonic Tutor
1 Diabolic Intent
1 Dimir Machinations
1 Idyllic Tutor
1 Rhystic Tutor
//8 Draw
1 Dark Confidant
1 Graveborn Muse
1 Wall of Omens
1 Skullclamp
1 Phyrexian Arena
1 Skeletal Scrying
1 Night's Whisper
1 Sign in Blood
1 Mesmeric Fiend
1 Tidehollow Sculler
1 Imp's Mischief
1 Duress
1 Inquisition of Kozilek
1 Thoughtseize
1 Timely Reinforcements
//Other
1 Bloodghast
1 Necrotic Sliver
1 Nether Traitor
1 Orzhov Pontiff
1 Elspeth, Knight-Errant
1 Sorin, Lord of Innistrad
1 Animate Dead
1 Oblivion Ring
1 Devour in Shadow
1 Disenchant
1 Swords to Plowshares
1 Reanimate
1 Victimize
1 Vindicate
This deck is combo heavy, this is why I usually overrun any aggro strategy but lose to Blue control (Clique/Venser). "Oups I win" happens quite frequently.
Teysa, Orzhov Scion + Darkest Hour/Painter's Servant + Altar of Dementia
Teysa, Orzhov Scion + Heure sombre/Servant du peintre + Blasting Station
Teysa, Orzhov Scion + Heure sombre/Servant du peintre + Vish Kal, Blood Arbiter
Teysa, Orzhov Scion + Heure sombre/Servant du peintre + Viscera Seer
Karmic Guide + Reveillark + Altar of Dementia
Karmic Guide + Reveillark + Blasting Station
Karmic Guide + Reveillark + Vish Kal, Blood Arbiter
Karmic Guide + Reveillark + Viscera Seer
Iona, Shield of Emeria + Painter's Servant
Contamination + Reassembling Skeleton
My finishers are 1 card only, meaning no Fallen Ideal, no Phyrexian Altar + Drain, etc..
Contamination and Iona combos are easier to assemble and are for people that kept their board empty of threats. But I am considering cutting both for Yosei and Recurring nightmare, or maybe Sun Titan and Angelic Renewal.
Tainted Pact requires a strange manabase, but is awesome when you need to find the last peace for your combo.
No mass removal, if you can't win before they kill you, then you don't deserve to win. Moreover, tutoring for a removal is generally a bad idea as it will slow you more than them. Some spot removals for problematic stuff that makes people go crazy, or messes with your combo.
Possible inclusions:
Anyway I am looking forward to Gatecrash in order to see some Orzhov magic in the set