I use Sunder almost strictly as a finisher. Being an instant is very important as it allows you to set it up much easier and also makes it easy to tutor for. EOT Evacuation into Sunder into flash in Wydwen then drop a land and equip Empyrial Plate is the ideal scenario but just casting Sunder when the board is relatively clear, flashing in Wydwen and equipping her gets me a lot of wins too. This is a very very slow deck, I almost never cast Wydwen unless I can leave up the U/B needed to bounce her so the mana rocks are mostly just in there to ramp a little bit. Most of the time I just try and stay alive and protect myself while my opponents fight it out then when it gets down to 2 people I wait for a chance to kill one of them and turn it into a 1v1 match where this deck is excellent at that late stage of the game. Don't worry so much about the mana, I hit just about every single land drop throughout the game and I rarely try and finish people until it gets down to just 1 or 2 people left unless I can just randomly take someone out.
Magosi the Waterveil is deceptively powerful and I skip my turns with it quite often. At some point in the game I'll have built up my mana with a full grip of tricks and pass with all my mana untapped. Sometimes I need to react but other times nobody does anything that I need to respond to so at EOT of the opponent on my right I'll just skip my turn since all my mana is still untapped. Once you get the counter on Magosi you can use it to great effect to basically tap out main phase, take an extra turn then untap and pass with your counterspell wall up. If it gets hit by a Strip Mine and you don't have Stifle it isn't that bad because you just skipped a turn where you weren't going to do anything anyways.
I have thought a ton about Isochron Scepter in here because as you point out this is one of the very few decks that could make use of it but every time I go through my list it seems like I'd need just 1 or 2 more really good targets for it. I'd be interested in brainstorming up some ideas of other instants I could put on it because it is very powerful. Or maybe I have enough already and I'm just being paranoid.
Keep in mind the number of tutors that the deck has. If you dont have a good target in hand how often could you go and tutor into a good target for it? The deck is so full of tutors and card draw that I think it should be fairly easy to tutor up the right target for it assuming you draw or need it.
My big question would be how big of a target it would it paint you for playing it... This deck does rely a bit on deturring people from attacking and targeting you. An artifact that promises to be abused every turn sounds like it might draw some hate.
Other than that I think it would make for an amazing bit of reusable utility for this deck. Back it with a counterspell / a bounce / or a kill spell and you can just torment your opponents with it.
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I have officially moved to MTGNexus. I just wanted to let people know as my response time to salvation decks being bumped is very hit or miss.
Used your list a lot when I was making my Wydwen list so I just thought to post some of my thoughts.
Of the games that were hard fought victories two cards really stood out that wrecked my day.
Mystifying Maze and Maze of Ith. It hurts enough that I now see why Expedition Map is in the deck.
I also put in a few extra fetches mainly to be used as shuffle effects for top and to get Underground Sea/Watery Grave asap. I've never had so much trouble getting colors in a 2 color deck, there are just so many UU/BB/UUU/BBB cards it made it tough and there were a few games were I just got cut on colors due to Terastadon/Acidic Slime.
I made room for a Drift of Phantasms, it tutors up the majority of the equipment as well as Forbid, Rhystic Study, Arena, Hinder, Ostone, etc. I also put in a Diabolic Tutor since I just like the card too much to say no.
I also stuffed in a few playgroup calls such as Bribery. Theres no way I can say no to a T5 10/10 Annhilator 4 indestructible. Plus it makes them regret playing the Eldrazi, opening up a Hinder/Tunnel Vision win in the future games. :]
Just some personal spice I suppose. It makes the deck far more sorcery reliant than what your list is, but I also like letting people go crazy sometimes and then trying to recover. It isn't elegant, but this is EDH and I like to watch people have their fun. I've been known to let Genesis Waves for 10-20+ resolve just because.
Thanks for posting your list and logic. It was quite helpful.
So time for some overdue updates. I found a very nice gem for the deck in Reset so that is an add for sure. Also Spell Crumple is close to strictly better than Hinder and I don't feel like I need the redundancy here so that's an easy swap. Since my playgroup doesn't allow for proxies in decks and I don't like switching cards around I haven't been able to put my Mana Drain in here since it's in my cube. I've decided to just go ahead and make a proxy of it for my cube and use the real one here instead. My playgroup won't be too happy but since I built and maintain the cube that I let them use for free they'll just have to deal with it. This I think gives me enough cheap instants that I can finally try out Isochron Scepter as well. Cuts are getting rough since everything in the list has done very well for me so far.
This is where I'm at right now. I can skip Isochron Scepter, cut Counterspell and keep Stifle or Spin Into Myth or cut something else that has tested very positively and I'm not sure what that would be. Any thoughts or suggestions?
EDIT: Isochron Scepter also opens up the possibility of running Visions of Beyond over Jace's Ingenuity but it seems a little inconsistent for my tastes.
I guess my least favorite cards on your list are as follows:
Telepathy I know it is your little baby but I still have the make the reccomendation. This is in part though because people hate on me just because it is me and I win most games. So letting people know what the other player has sometimes backfires in the case of someone having a bad hand thus they can hate on me more. Plus people hate having this disadvantage so I would draw hate from having this in play.
Misdirection very situational. Honestly I when I ran Wydwen I didnt see much hate come my way. It is more likely that they shoot their spot removal at each other as Wydwen isnt that great of a target. I know you can tutor this up at instant speed but it is still very very situational in where it works.
Sudden Spoiling I hate this card because it requires assistance to kill. This deck is so creature light that it is hard to rely on Wydwen to block them so usually it requires a second card to kill anything with the spoiling.
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I have officially moved to MTGNexus. I just wanted to let people know as my response time to salvation decks being bumped is very hit or miss.
Those are some good suggestions but of course I've got to stick up for Telepathy again. Telepathy never backfires on me, I have it in 2 decks and I've played it for years and I cannot think of a single time where I've lost when it was in play. It may have happened but at worst it's exceptionally rare. It does get blown up more frequently now that my playgroup understands how ridiculous it is for me but I can forgive that since it's a 1 mana spell. Misdirection is indeed narrow and rarely used but losing it makes it impossible for me to make people miss with their spells though this is probably fine as I can still counter stuff. Sudden Spoiling has done great work for me in the past but as you say I rarely kill things with it and it's a fog most of the time I cast it. So while both of these effects are unique there are admittedly rarely tutored for. I think it's between the 2 of them and I'd be willing to cut both if there was another quality card I could put on the scepter.
Well if you are looking for another solid instant for the scepter I might suggest Echoing Truth. It works really well vs token strategies which I had had a lot of problems with when I was running Wydwen (especially Bitterblossom >_<). Even if you aren't playing against token tactics it is still a decent bounce effect.
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I have officially moved to MTGNexus. I just wanted to let people know as my response time to salvation decks being bumped is very hit or miss.
How about change Misdirection to Redirect and you can put it on the scepter? That way you keep the functionality of the card but you get another target for the scepter.
Generally speaking in this list you have most of your mana open in a turn anyways. If you stuck a Redirect on a scepter it would be counterspell and spot removal protection for you which would be even more fun than simply having one copy of it. People wouldn't want to target your stuff at all unless you tapped out.
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I have officially moved to MTGNexus. I just wanted to let people know as my response time to salvation decks being bumped is very hit or miss.
That's a pretty good idea. I've also been thinking of cutting Wipe Away for Into the Roil which gives me another target. I don't want to go overboard and Scepter support though. That would give me the following:
All these changes seem very reasonable. I lose a couple tools but it still keeps my toolbox diverse and looks like it will be an overall improvement. Thanks for the feedback.
Even without the scepter though I prefer Redirect over Misdirection simply because usually this list has mana open to do things like use Redirect. I would hate to actually pay the 5 mana for Misdirection though when 2 would have done the same thing.
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I have officially moved to MTGNexus. I just wanted to let people know as my response time to salvation decks being bumped is very hit or miss.
Actually I changed my mind. If I only get to keep a Fog effect or a Deflection effect I'd rather have Fog so I'm going to add Darkness. 3 mana Fog has been good so 1 mana Fog that I can put on Scepter should be even better.
EDIT: Also sticking Word of Command on Scepter could be pretty nasty. I'd probably give it a try if it wasn't $40+.
I am thinking of giving Wydwen a shot at 1on1. How is your build holding up in 1on1 matches and if not so well any suggestions what to change?
Wydwen is a pretty established 1v1 commander and there's probably some tuned 1v1 lists in the 1v1 commander forum. My assumption is that there are the Thoughtsiezes, less or no equipment and significantly more removal and counterspells or it could be heavy blue like the Clique lists just splashing black.
As far as my particular build I only play 1v1 against other multiplayer lists and only when me and another guy get knocked out early or there's just 2 of us and we don't have time for winston cube draft. That said it's probably my most effective deck at 1v1.
Have you considered Teferi's Veil? I can't speak highly enough on this card. It protects your creatures after they swing as well as any equipment attached to them from sweepers.
I am thinking about building something much like your deck, though with more creatures and perhaps a faerie sub theme. I plan to try using Sunder with either Sword of War and Peace or Empyrial Plate as a finisher.
Have you considered Teferi's Veil? I can't speak highly enough on this card. It protects your creatures after they swing as well as any equipment attached to them from sweepers.
I am thinking about building something much like your deck, though with more creatures and perhaps a faerie sub theme. I plan to try using Sunder with either Sword of War and Peace or Empyrial Plate as a finisher.
Not for this list but it's certainly good in theory allowing me to cast Wydwen and not worry about sweepers until Veil is destroyed with the added benefit of not having to reequip (and it protects my equipment as well). It's really cheap to cast too which is nice. The only real downside is losing the threat of bouncing Wydwen, recasting her and blocking which deters the occasional utility dork from attacking but that's not such a big deal. I'll see if I can find room for it, since my general has built in sweeper protection and all my other creatures are utility guys it might just not be useful enough for my build to warrant a slot.
I think from the Innistrad spoilers I'm going to add Snapcaster Mage. Nothing else seemed really exciting.
Not for this list but it's certainly good in theory allowing me to cast Wydwen and not worry about sweepers until Veil is destroyed with the added benefit of not having to reequip (and it protects my equipment as well). It's really cheap to cast too which is nice. The only real downside is losing the threat of bouncing Wydwen, recasting her and blocking which deters the occasional utility dork from attacking but that's not such a big deal. I'll see if I can find room for it, since my general has built in sweeper protection and all my other creatures are utility guys it might just not be useful enough for my build to warrant a slot.
I think from the Innistrad spoilers I'm going to add Snapcaster Mage. Nothing else seemed really exciting.
Man... I cant even think of a decklist that Snapcaster Mage fits into better than this list. I am tempted to go back to playing Wydwen almost soley on how good the mage seems like it would be here alone.
Plus I have sort of wanted a really heavy control based deck to fall back on.
As a side note... what do you think of tossing Army of the Damned into the list??? I know you try to keep things to instant speed best you can but it feels like it would be a great push to finish off a few players. The fact that it has built in 2 uses feels really great.
Yeah, Snapcaster Mage's awesomeness seems tailor made for this list. Most places were out last time I placed an order so I don't have 1 just yet.
Army of the Damned - My thinking here is that not only is it expensive but it's also slow since the tokens ETB tapped (I know this is a really slow deck but still). You can get wins with 2 & 3 mana equipment so I don't see any reason to add in something so expensive. I cut Myojin of Night's Reach, who is excellent but also expensive, because an 8 mana sorcery speed spell simply isn't needed, especially one that doesn't outright win the game.
Reassembling Skeleton - This is an interesting card. It's cheap and the ability to reanimate functions at instant speed. Plus he can pick up equipment if needed and chump block all day.
Darksteel Sentinel - Another interesting card. He's defensive, has flash (huge plus) and carries equipment like a champ. I'm definitely tempted to give him a try...I really like being able to look through my deck when I make cuts so I'll try and find room when I get home.
EDIT: Also I'd like to report that Isochron Scepter has been great so far. Imprinting a counter can grind a game to a halt and it makes people really cautious about casting spells, especially their commanders.
EDIT 2: You and your edits! Not a fan of edict effects in Commander. I really like controlling what gets killed and this deck can deal with indestructibles and shrouded creatures reasonably well already. I do run both Skeletal Scrying and Suffer the Past, Scrying is great and Suffer the Past is serviceable. It's important for me to have multiple pieces of graveyard hate in my meta.
Forbidden Alchemy - I thought these types of cards were great for a long time, I ran Impulse and Flash of Insight for years and they were both solid but in the end I felt it was better to run more toolbox cards. Sometimes casting Impulse or Lim-Dul's Vault is awkward in this deck because I don't really need anything, this is just a deck filled with a lot of toolbox cards. Do I need that Sudden Death or that Darkness or whatever? Really depends on what my opponents are going to do. The only thing they're really good at is digging for tutors but you can't run them as tutors because you look at so few cards. Additionally adding in the whole Forbidden Alchemy, Impulse, Flash of Insight, Lim-Dul's Vault, Ponder, Preordain, Brainstorm package cuts into the toolbox cards so you end up with more ways to dig but not as much to dig for. This deck doesn't really run key cards that I want to make sure I see every game.
Random sidenote: Flash of Insight was actually pretty awesome when I ran Cunning Wish (mostly to get back Mystical Teachings, no wishboard) because I used it to rfg a card then grab it with Cunning Wish. And yes I'm bitter WOTC changed the wishes and stopped me from using my savage tech.
Also... do you think Go for the Throat -> Victim of Night might be something to look at??? What are the chances you need to kill an artifact creature vs a zombie / vampire in EDH??? It might seem small but these things bug me and at the same cost I have had some success already with Victim. I dont think that the BB cost is that big of a deal here.
I will just recoup what I edited in the last post as well:
Forbidden Alchemy also seems sort of promising as it has built in flashback which we can do and it is instant speed. (you caught the edit)
EDIT:Jace's Ingenuity how do you feel that this would differ if we changed it to Opportunity or brought it down to Thirst for Knowledge? I guess I am just a bit currious as to why this card was chosen specifically.
Also... do you think Go for the Throat -> Victim of Night might be something to look at??? What are the chances you need to kill an artifact creature vs a zombie / vampire in EDH??? It might seem small but these things bug me and at the same cost I have had some success already with Victim. I dont think that the BB cost is that big of a deal here.
I will just recoup what I edited in the last post as well:
Forbidden Alchemy also seems sort of promising as it has built in flashback which we can do and it is instant speed. (you caught the edit)
EDIT:Jace's Ingenuity how do you feel that this would differ if we changed it to Opportunity or brought it down to Thirst for Knowledge? I guess I am just a bit currious as to why this card was chosen specifically.
The BB isn't that big of a deal but it's enough of an annoyance that I'm going to stick with Go for the Throat. I'm tutoring up Islands a lot with my fetches for Vedalken Shackles (and usually Strata Scythe) so I don't always have a lot of swamps in play. So for me I don't run into enough artifact creatures that I need to kill to make that switch but they're very close and it may be the right call for your meta.
Jace's Ingenuity - This used to be Opportunity but I didn't really need to draw 4 cards with it since my card advantage is already pretty good so I went with the slightly cheaper Jace's Ingenuity which seems to draw just the right amount of cards and I've been pretty happy with it. That said Blue Sun's Zenith has been awesome and it is sort of reusable, especially if I draw a tutor with it, so I was thinking Jace's Ingenuity might be the cut to try out Darksteel Sentinel. They are functionally very different but the mana cost is similar and I don't have a like for like card I can cut for the Sentinel.
I should also mention Meditate as another card drawing option since it is quite common for me to do literally nothing other than play a land during my turn/opponents turn and I have all my mana untapped so this could be a cheap option. You miss your land drop but get 3 draw steps worth of cards.
EDIT: Also I haven't tried out Thirst for Knowledge but it seems good. I don't want to cut anything for it however.
So I'm giving this deck a shot. I was playing on Cockatrice last night vs a Riku and a Nin the pain artist. I swapped the Jitte for a Trepanation blade in my deck. This Riku is going all out on Primeval Titan tutoring has 25 land out on the board. I flash in Wydwen end of his turn and equip Trepanation blade and he discards 44 cards and makes Wydwen a 47/47 he was able to block but this discarded his entire library so he died next turn
So I'm giving this deck a shot. I was playing on Cockatrice last night vs a Riku and a Nin the pain artist. I swapped the Jitte for a Trepanation blade in my deck. This Riku is going all out on Primeval Titan tutoring has 25 land out on the board. I flash in Wydwen end of his turn and equip Trepanation blade and he discards 44 cards and makes Wydwen a 47/47 he was able to block but this discarded his entire library so he died next turn
lol, looks like the Riku player got a little greedy with his ramp.
Land, a mana stone, and a tutor would be fantastic generally speaking as it opens you up based on whatever might be appropriate.
This deck is a toolbox deck so each match up could require a different hand so it is hard to say that any one particular thing is appropriate for an opening hand. Generally speaking though the equipment does the same thing in every match. The control aspects of this deck change though based on the opponents for every game. A counterspell like Hinder might be amazing if you are facing a commander like Uril but it might suck against other decks who rely on their commanders far less. It is hard to pin down a specific good hand. Defensive cards are good though vs a lot of decks though.
EDIT: Ignore the fact that Donald does not run Hinder for the above example lol. You get what I was trying to say regardless.
Also Donald have you experimented with Darksteel Sentinel yet or did you change your mind on it?
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I have officially moved to MTGNexus. I just wanted to let people know as my response time to salvation decks being bumped is very hit or miss.
I was going to post but ISB beat me to it and his advice is excellent. You really do not want to miss land drops in this deck so I will rarely risk keeping land light hands but against slower decks a 5 land hand is perfectly fine.
I'm excited to try out the Sentinal though he hasn't seen play yet. Since I don't have a version of this deck on MTGO I have to test with my regular playgroup and we won't be getting together for several weeks. Everyone is pretty spread out so we usually only get together once every 6 weeks or so for a 3-4 day long Commander/Cube weekend. That and even if I did have an MTGO list I'm probably going to play an absurd amount of Innistrad limited so I wouldn't be able to test anyways :P.
Keep in mind the number of tutors that the deck has. If you dont have a good target in hand how often could you go and tutor into a good target for it? The deck is so full of tutors and card draw that I think it should be fairly easy to tutor up the right target for it assuming you draw or need it.
My big question would be how big of a target it would it paint you for playing it... This deck does rely a bit on deturring people from attacking and targeting you. An artifact that promises to be abused every turn sounds like it might draw some hate.
Other than that I think it would make for an amazing bit of reusable utility for this deck. Back it with a counterspell / a bounce / or a kill spell and you can just torment your opponents with it.
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Of the games that were hard fought victories two cards really stood out that wrecked my day.
Mystifying Maze and Maze of Ith. It hurts enough that I now see why Expedition Map is in the deck.
I also put in a few extra fetches mainly to be used as shuffle effects for top and to get Underground Sea/Watery Grave asap. I've never had so much trouble getting colors in a 2 color deck, there are just so many UU/BB/UUU/BBB cards it made it tough and there were a few games were I just got cut on colors due to Terastadon/Acidic Slime.
I made room for a Drift of Phantasms, it tutors up the majority of the equipment as well as Forbid, Rhystic Study, Arena, Hinder, Ostone, etc. I also put in a Diabolic Tutor since I just like the card too much to say no.
I also stuffed in a few playgroup calls such as Bribery. Theres no way I can say no to a T5 10/10 Annhilator 4 indestructible. Plus it makes them regret playing the Eldrazi, opening up a Hinder/Tunnel Vision win in the future games. :]
Just some personal spice I suppose. It makes the deck far more sorcery reliant than what your list is, but I also like letting people go crazy sometimes and then trying to recover. It isn't elegant, but this is EDH and I like to watch people have their fun. I've been known to let Genesis Waves for 10-20+ resolve just because.
Thanks for posting your list and logic. It was quite helpful.
+Mana Drain
+Isochron Scepter
+Reset
+Spell Crumple
-Hinder
-Stifle
-Spin Into Myth
-?
This is where I'm at right now. I can skip Isochron Scepter, cut Counterspell and keep Stifle or Spin Into Myth or cut something else that has tested very positively and I'm not sure what that would be. Any thoughts or suggestions?
EDIT: Isochron Scepter also opens up the possibility of running Visions of Beyond over Jace's Ingenuity but it seems a little inconsistent for my tastes.
Telepathy I know it is your little baby but I still have the make the reccomendation. This is in part though because people hate on me just because it is me and I win most games. So letting people know what the other player has sometimes backfires in the case of someone having a bad hand thus they can hate on me more. Plus people hate having this disadvantage so I would draw hate from having this in play.
Misdirection very situational. Honestly I when I ran Wydwen I didnt see much hate come my way. It is more likely that they shoot their spot removal at each other as Wydwen isnt that great of a target. I know you can tutor this up at instant speed but it is still very very situational in where it works.
Sudden Spoiling I hate this card because it requires assistance to kill. This deck is so creature light that it is hard to rely on Wydwen to block them so usually it requires a second card to kill anything with the spoiling.
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Generally speaking in this list you have most of your mana open in a turn anyways. If you stuck a Redirect on a scepter it would be counterspell and spot removal protection for you which would be even more fun than simply having one copy of it. People wouldn't want to target your stuff at all unless you tapped out.
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Cuts
All these changes seem very reasonable. I lose a couple tools but it still keeps my toolbox diverse and looks like it will be an overall improvement. Thanks for the feedback.
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EDIT: Also sticking Word of Command on Scepter could be pretty nasty. I'd probably give it a try if it wasn't $40+.
Or it makes for some safe Hatred plays.
It makes for a lot of safe plays.:D
Wydwen is a pretty established 1v1 commander and there's probably some tuned 1v1 lists in the 1v1 commander forum. My assumption is that there are the Thoughtsiezes, less or no equipment and significantly more removal and counterspells or it could be heavy blue like the Clique lists just splashing black.
As far as my particular build I only play 1v1 against other multiplayer lists and only when me and another guy get knocked out early or there's just 2 of us and we don't have time for winston cube draft. That said it's probably my most effective deck at 1v1.
I am thinking about building something much like your deck, though with more creatures and perhaps a faerie sub theme. I plan to try using Sunder with either Sword of War and Peace or Empyrial Plate as a finisher.
Not for this list but it's certainly good in theory allowing me to cast Wydwen and not worry about sweepers until Veil is destroyed with the added benefit of not having to reequip (and it protects my equipment as well). It's really cheap to cast too which is nice. The only real downside is losing the threat of bouncing Wydwen, recasting her and blocking which deters the occasional utility dork from attacking but that's not such a big deal. I'll see if I can find room for it, since my general has built in sweeper protection and all my other creatures are utility guys it might just not be useful enough for my build to warrant a slot.
I think from the Innistrad spoilers I'm going to add Snapcaster Mage. Nothing else seemed really exciting.
Man... I cant even think of a decklist that Snapcaster Mage fits into better than this list. I am tempted to go back to playing Wydwen almost soley on how good the mage seems like it would be here alone.
Plus I have sort of wanted a really heavy control based deck to fall back on.
As a side note... what do you think of tossing Army of the Damned into the list??? I know you try to keep things to instant speed best you can but it feels like it would be a great push to finish off a few players. The fact that it has built in 2 uses feels really great.
Also I was considering Reassembling Skeleton and Darksteel Sentinel. The sentinel is tutorable off of Mystical Teachings plus is primarily defensive which most people don't like answering.
The more I think about it the more I think I want to come back to playing Wydwen. I should go dust off my list...
EDIT: What do you think of Tribute to Hunger??? I love that it gives us another source of lifegain. I was also sort of considering Suffer the Past and Skeletal Scrying
EDIT 2: Forbidden Alchemy also seems sort of promising.
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Army of the Damned - My thinking here is that not only is it expensive but it's also slow since the tokens ETB tapped (I know this is a really slow deck but still). You can get wins with 2 & 3 mana equipment so I don't see any reason to add in something so expensive. I cut Myojin of Night's Reach, who is excellent but also expensive, because an 8 mana sorcery speed spell simply isn't needed, especially one that doesn't outright win the game.
Reassembling Skeleton - This is an interesting card. It's cheap and the ability to reanimate functions at instant speed. Plus he can pick up equipment if needed and chump block all day.
Darksteel Sentinel - Another interesting card. He's defensive, has flash (huge plus) and carries equipment like a champ. I'm definitely tempted to give him a try...I really like being able to look through my deck when I make cuts so I'll try and find room when I get home.
EDIT: Also I'd like to report that Isochron Scepter has been great so far. Imprinting a counter can grind a game to a halt and it makes people really cautious about casting spells, especially their commanders.
EDIT 2: You and your edits! Not a fan of edict effects in Commander. I really like controlling what gets killed and this deck can deal with indestructibles and shrouded creatures reasonably well already. I do run both Skeletal Scrying and Suffer the Past, Scrying is great and Suffer the Past is serviceable. It's important for me to have multiple pieces of graveyard hate in my meta.
Forbidden Alchemy - I thought these types of cards were great for a long time, I ran Impulse and Flash of Insight for years and they were both solid but in the end I felt it was better to run more toolbox cards. Sometimes casting Impulse or Lim-Dul's Vault is awkward in this deck because I don't really need anything, this is just a deck filled with a lot of toolbox cards. Do I need that Sudden Death or that Darkness or whatever? Really depends on what my opponents are going to do. The only thing they're really good at is digging for tutors but you can't run them as tutors because you look at so few cards. Additionally adding in the whole Forbidden Alchemy, Impulse, Flash of Insight, Lim-Dul's Vault, Ponder, Preordain, Brainstorm package cuts into the toolbox cards so you end up with more ways to dig but not as much to dig for. This deck doesn't really run key cards that I want to make sure I see every game.
Random sidenote: Flash of Insight was actually pretty awesome when I ran Cunning Wish (mostly to get back Mystical Teachings, no wishboard) because I used it to rfg a card then grab it with Cunning Wish. And yes I'm bitter WOTC changed the wishes and stopped me from using my savage tech.
I will just recoup what I edited in the last post as well:
(you caught the edit)What do you think of Tribute to Hunger??? I love that it gives us another source of lifegain. I was also sort of considering Suffer the Past and possibly Skeletal Scrying
Forbidden Alchemy also seems sort of promising as it has built in flashback which we can do and it is instant speed.
EDIT: Jace's Ingenuity how do you feel that this would differ if we changed it to Opportunity or brought it down to Thirst for Knowledge? I guess I am just a bit currious as to why this card was chosen specifically.
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[Modern] Allies
The BB isn't that big of a deal but it's enough of an annoyance that I'm going to stick with Go for the Throat. I'm tutoring up Islands a lot with my fetches for Vedalken Shackles (and usually Strata Scythe) so I don't always have a lot of swamps in play. So for me I don't run into enough artifact creatures that I need to kill to make that switch but they're very close and it may be the right call for your meta.
Jace's Ingenuity - This used to be Opportunity but I didn't really need to draw 4 cards with it since my card advantage is already pretty good so I went with the slightly cheaper Jace's Ingenuity which seems to draw just the right amount of cards and I've been pretty happy with it. That said Blue Sun's Zenith has been awesome and it is sort of reusable, especially if I draw a tutor with it, so I was thinking Jace's Ingenuity might be the cut to try out Darksteel Sentinel. They are functionally very different but the mana cost is similar and I don't have a like for like card I can cut for the Sentinel.
I should also mention Meditate as another card drawing option since it is quite common for me to do literally nothing other than play a land during my turn/opponents turn and I have all my mana untapped so this could be a cheap option. You miss your land drop but get 3 draw steps worth of cards.
EDIT: Also I haven't tried out Thirst for Knowledge but it seems good. I don't want to cut anything for it however.
lol, looks like the Riku player got a little greedy with his ramp.
This deck is a toolbox deck so each match up could require a different hand so it is hard to say that any one particular thing is appropriate for an opening hand. Generally speaking though the equipment does the same thing in every match. The control aspects of this deck change though based on the opponents for every game. A counterspell like Hinder might be amazing if you are facing a commander like Uril but it might suck against other decks who rely on their commanders far less. It is hard to pin down a specific good hand. Defensive cards are good though vs a lot of decks though.
EDIT: Ignore the fact that Donald does not run Hinder for the above example lol. You get what I was trying to say regardless.
Also Donald have you experimented with Darksteel Sentinel yet or did you change your mind on it?
Signature by Inkfox Aesthetics by Xen
[Modern] Allies
I'm excited to try out the Sentinal though he hasn't seen play yet. Since I don't have a version of this deck on MTGO I have to test with my regular playgroup and we won't be getting together for several weeks. Everyone is pretty spread out so we usually only get together once every 6 weeks or so for a 3-4 day long Commander/Cube weekend. That and even if I did have an MTGO list I'm probably going to play an absurd amount of Innistrad limited so I wouldn't be able to test anyways :P.