This is my competitive multiplayer Sharuum deck. It is combo-focused and tries to play as fast and consistent as possible. This deck is designed to win at 4-man tables at GP/Pro Tour side-events with prize on the line. It isn't suitable for most kitchen tables.
Any of these combos can be tutored for and protected by the other cards in the deck. They can also come out very fast. Turn two wins are possible. Turns three or four wins are very doable, though still somewhat rare. Turn six is a very common time to combo off with protection. In most multiplayer games people are still tapping out at that point, and will usually not see you as threat #1 due to the small board presence this deck maintains.
General:
1 Sharuum the Hegemon - Obvious.
Combo Pieces:
1 Sculpting Steel - Sharuum + Steel creates an infinite loop
1 Bitter Ordeal - Bitter Ordeal exiles libraries (and is effectively uncounterable) when it follows a Sharuum/Steel loop.
1 Disciple of the Vault - Another way to win off the loop. 1 Glassdust Hulk - Another way to win, but it only kills one player. I am considering its removal.
1 Lotus Bloom - If you terminate the Sharuum/Steel loop with this card, you can use it to cast Bitter Ordeal. This speeds up the combo quite a bit.
1 Thopter Foundry
1 Sword of the Meek - Thopter Foundry + Sword of the Meek allows you to pay 1 to gain 1 life and make a 1/1 thopter.
1 Time Sieve - This card combined with Foundry/Sword allows 5: Gain 5 life and take an extra turn.
1 Thopter Assembly - Combined with Time Sieve this card also permits infinite turns.
Tutors/Card Advantage/Card Filtering:
1 Scroll Rack - An excellent way to improve your hand's card quality. Pairs well with this deck's 9 fetch lands.
1 Necrologia - Probably the single strongest draw spell in EDH. A cornerstone of this deck is to trade your excessive 40 life for various advantages, and this card does this well.
1 Ad Nauseam - Another good draw spell in a deck like this with a relatively low average cmc. (1.54 is the average cmc among the 99 cards in the main deck, lands inclusive. This means that you'll take a little more damage from Ad Nauseam, on average, but Ad Nauseam has the advantage that you don't have to pay the life as a cost, can cast it any time (like during an opponent's end step, and can choose how far you want to go based on the cards you draw.)
1 Brainstorm - Similar to Scroll Rack, it's a fast way to get some new cards in hand. Also good with fetches.
1 Muddle the Mixture - Does double duty by both protecting the combo and serving as a potent tutor. You can get any piece of the Thopter/Sword/Sieve combo. You can also get demonic tutor.
1 Sensei's Divining Top - More great card filtering. Good in any deck, especially this one, which has about a million and a half ways to tutor for it.
1 Transmute Artifact - What a great card. Whether you're fetching Sculpting Steel, Time Sieve, Pithing Needle, or Sen Triplets, you're sure to find a multitude of good targets. Reshape is an acceptable substitute if you can't find this one, but I like being able to put the artifact in the graveyard if necessary.
1 Demonic Tutor - If you don't know why this is here you should quit magic.
1 Thirst for Knowledge - Very efficient instant-speed draw. Nice for dumping sculpting steel or other artifact targets in the yard.
1 Tezzeret the Seeker - When this guy resolves, you almost can't lose. His -X is amazing. Even if you don't want to get Sculpting Steel or another combo piece, try going -0. Seat of the Synod, Lotus Bloom , and Mana Crypt are all sweet targets if you need a little mana injection. 1 Tezzeret, Agent of Bolas - Not tested much yet, but his +1 seems exceptionally good, especially in longer games versus control.
1 Liliana Vess - She's a little pricey mana-wise for my taste and I'm looking for a good substitute. As you might imagine she is used almost exclusively for her -2. Occasionally +1 against an opponent with a small hand will serve as a form of protection.
1 Ponder - Just a good card to lay down turn 1 and instantly sculpt your draws. Not a bad way to keep the gas going later as well. I'm considering also adding Preordain and/or Impulse.
1 Trinket Mage - By my count he has 11 targets. That means one in nine cards in the deck can be fetched by him. Seems good.
1 Intuition - Truly a cornerstone of the strategy. No single card is better at setting up the various combos in the deck. Common packages include: Sculpting Steel + Lotus Bloom + Glassdust Hulk; Time Sieve + Foundry + Sword; Time Sieve + Thopter Assembly + Argivian Restoration. Has myriad other uses depending on situation.
1 Mystical Tutor - A powerful way to get cards like bitter ordeal, intuition, ad nauseam, and pact of negation.
1 Tainted Pact - Nearly an instant-speed demonic tutor. Be smart about how you use it, though.
1 Artificer's Intuition - What a beautiful toolbox. In this deck it's practically survival of the fittest. My favorite thing to do is discard sculpting steel, fetch lotus bloom, discard it and get sensei's top. Play the top. Now you have a shuffle engine in Artificer's Intuition, and the ability to look at the top cards. Very potent.
1 Fabricate - I wish it were a little less costly, mana-wise. Still it's a solid card and I think it's a necessary evil.
1 Lim-Dul's Vault - So amazing. Stack your deck for a small life payment.
1 Vampiric Tutor - Obviously exceptional.
1 Necropotence - Like Necrologia and Ad Nauseam, this card allows you unreal amounts of card advantage. Resolving it almost always secures the win.
1 Memory Jar - A repeatable (with Sharuum) way to see more cards. Will usually allow you to play the good cards while stacking your graveyard.
1 Enlightened Tutor - Lots of targets. Early game, don't be afraid to grab cards like Mana Crypt or Sol Ring to speed yourself up. 1 Riddlesmith - He's experimental, and I'm on the fence. Sometimes he's great, sometimes he's meh.
1 Fact or Fiction - Another great draw spell that lets you get good cards in hand and in the grave. 1 Thoughtcast - Another experiment. I think this might just be better as preordain or something else.
Combo Protection:
1 Pact of Negation - Powerful protection for the combo.
1 Remand - Another card that's good for protection. Also worth playing early game to slow your opponent. It will depend on the match and your hand. 1 Silence - Likewise, great combo protection.
1 Sen Triplets - Lots of ways to get these girls out fast. They both act as a perpetual Silence, as well as giving you some free cards (at least lands if nothing else) out of an opponent's hand.
1 Pithing Needle - Shuts down many problems like Relic of Progenitus. Also finds uses in other contexts, like turning off a Jace.
1 Hana's Custody - Basically tells nonblue decks that they cannot disrupt the combo. Note that Sculpting Steel, Thopter Foundry, and Time Sieve all lack the word "target." 1 Misdirection - Solid, free combo protection. I think Force of Will would be better here.
Random Utility:
1 Reanimate - This is a cool little card. One use is to get Sen Triplets in the grave fast then pull it out. It also allows us to recover quickly if the combo is what I call "soft disrupted," in other words if Sharuum is destroyed with her ability on the stack. In that case, if I have reanimate in hand and B open, I can immediately restart the combo. Third, reanimate sometimes gets juicy targets out of opponent's graveyards.
1 Executioner's Capsule (Could easily be Brittle Effigy, kind of a metagame call) - We need some easily tutorable creature kill to deal with the Quasali Pridemages of the world. I like Capsule because it's cheaper to activate and can be brought back from the grave in a pinch. Effigy is also good, though. 1 Argivian Restoration - Just another good way to re-use crucial artifacts when Sharuum herself is impractical. I really wish this cost a little less mana. 1 Oblation - Just a good problem-solver. Vindicate might be better. 1 Master Transmuter - Just good in a lot of contexts. Makes things cheaper and helps protect the combo. Also good for re-setting pithing needle.
1 Dispeller's Capsule - Another great problem-solver. Force them to blow that Relic of Progenitus. Bye-bye Aura of Silence.
1 Swords to Plowshares - More solid creature-kill. Good for slowing aggro and exiling Nezumi Graverobbers.
1 Damnation - Helps slow fast aggro decks. Usually a "one-sided" wrath since this deck plays so few creatures.
Non-Land Mana: - All of these produce mana and help accelerate the deck.
Lands: - I cannot see how any of these require explanation.
New Cards:
Phyrexian Metamorph - I can't see how this could possibly require explanation. This is the strongest card printed for a Sharuum combo deck since Shards of Alara (where they printed Sharuum). Dire Undercurrents- A better combo piece than Glassdust Hulk, but it still could be replaced with something more streamlined mana-wise if such a card is ever printed. Dark Confidant - Experiment. A faster phyrexian arena that will hopefully help those slower hands get moving. Mana Drain - Accel + Combo protection, the two mainstays of this deck in one. Vindicate - Just a general problem solver card. Command Tower - Obvious. Yawgmoth's Will - Powerful recursion that will help me recover from Disk effects, one of my biggest weaknesses. Also good to follow up an Intuition. Salvage Scout - Scout + Thopter Assembly + Time Sieve is a strong Intution package. It is also just a good, cheap recursion card. Might be better as Argivian Find or similar.
+ Gitaxian Probe - I get to run a 98 card deck and peek at my opponent's disruption? Cool.
+ Cepahlid Coliseum - A great way to see some extra cards and possibly put important ones in the bin. 1 life for the mana is negligible in a 40-life format.
+ Abeyance - Just better than Silence, and able to "cycle" when I don't need it.
+ Thoughtseize - Aim it at the guy who keeps never tapping out. May get cut, but it's solid protection.
+ Impulse - Another Ponder/Brainstorm effect. One extra mana is worth it to dig deeper than preordain.
As always, you are encouraged to constructively criticize the deck. I'm always looking for ways to improve. If you decide to test the deck, be aware that it has a rather steep learning curve because of the huge number of tutor choices presented each game. If you're a decent player you shouldn't have much trouble picking it up, but definitely give it a few games of practice before judging its power-level.
Also, feel free to ask any questions you might have, and feel free to request anything else you'd like to see. I was thinking about adding a section with some turn-by-turn game breakdowns so you can see how the deck is played (the way I pilot the deck is really, really dependent on my opponents' strategies).
I've seen quite a few Sharuum the Hegemon EDH builds, and almost all of them feature the very powerful Sharuum / Sculpting Steel combo. However, no decklists I've seen have this combo as the focus of the deck. Most run reanimator shenanigans and include the combo as an afterthought. I absolutely love it, so I bult my deck to win this way, and this way only.
For those of you who may not be familiar with it, this combo consists of creating an unending graveyard to battlefield loop with Sculpting Steel copying Sharuum accompanied by some kind of win condition, in most decks Disciple of the Vault. Associated rules are explained in more detail here.
My deck does include Disciple, but prefers to use the more counterspell-and-killspell-resistant Extractor Demon to mill or my favorite combo piece, a real gem, bitter ordeal. Ordeal is basically uncounterable (except with time stop) can be fetched with CMC-3 transmute cards (which also fetch sclupting steel) and allows you to "combo off" without a win condition on the board. Sometimes this is so confusing/intriguing to my opponent that they'll let me do the loop a bazillion times when they could have stopped it, thinking they'll just counter what I do next or assuming that I'm screwing around.
Bottom line: this deck is really fun to play, but it's not really intended to be fun to play against. A turn three win is possible with a great hand and I almost always win by turn six unless I'm facing control. I have a bunch of fun, casual EDH decks, but this one's intended to be fast, competetive, and brutal. I'm posting this to get more ideas to make it faster and more resilient. Thanks in advance for the help. Without further ado:
If I'm playing against an aggro deck that isn't likely to counter or kill what I play, I usually drop lands and mana artifacts as fast as possible, then tutor or transmute for Sculpting Steel and Bitter Ordeal. For added speed and security, I may get Artificer's Intuition which allows me to discard Sculpting Steel, pull up Lotus Bloom, discard that as well, and end with something like Sol Ring or Sensei's Divining Top. If I have even six mana to resolve Sharuum the next turn, her ability will pull sculpting steel from the grave and allow me to loop 100 million times. I terminate the loop with lotus bloom, then sac it for black and play bitter ordeal, exiling the the libraries of everyone at the table.
Against control I play a similar strategy, but usually get some combination of Teferi, Sen Triplets, Silence, or Pact of Negation first.
I like your idea a lot. Sharuum has been my primary decklist for a long time, at least a year now. I've always included the Sculpting Steel combo, though I don't focus on it to the extent that you do. I've actually been moving away from the combo recently, because it's been weakened with the loss of Gifts Ungiven, and because I find that I can usually win games more easily without going off somehow. I usually have the choice of finding a combo piece, which will let me win if I'm not disrupted, or just finding some kind of strong lock piece, which matters less if it's disrupted and tends to ensure that I win the game (Mindslaver, Memory Jar, Salvaging Station, etc.).
That said, I've never considered Extractor Demon or Bitter Ordeal before. Both are interesting, though they have the issue that they're not artifacts. They're definitely better than Disciple of the Vault though, which I currently do run (I didn't for a long time). The combo is still definitely worth considering. You might consider Arcbound Crusher as a win-condition. It has the disadvantage of being vulnerable to removal (not too big a deal, because so is the combo), but the huge advantage of being an artifact, and thus very easy to recur or tutor. It's better than Disciple of the Vault most of the time for me.
I can appreciate a heavy focus on the combo, but I do think you've taken it overboard by having no backup plan at all. You're hardly running any of the cards that make a Sharuum deck tick. I don't have access to my list right now, but there are lots of cards like Memory Jar, Mindslaver, Sundering Titan, or Magister Sphinx that are just amazing in this kind of deck. You truly don't need to devote your entire deck to finding the combo. The combo only requires 2-3 cards, and you'll be running a bunch of tutors anyways. Instead of running even more tutors, you could run the cards to be a powerful control deck, or to get other "combos" with Sharuum like Mindslaver.
In exchange for losing all these other options, along with the resiliency to removal you gain from having more than 85% of your spells be artifacts, you're speeding up the turn at which you can consistently get your combo by maybe 2-3 turns. Is this worth it? There are very few decks that you need to go off that fast against to win, and I think the artifact-heavy version of Sharuum should be a lot more resilient to disruption.
I'll post my current list in a few days (I don't have access to it right now), but my main point is that there's no need to devote your entire deck to the combo. You can find it almost as consistently with only 2-3 cards that you wouldn't run otherwise. Sharuum, especially with friends like Momentary Blink and Voyager Staff, is an extremely resilient engine that can be abused to win games--in only using her as a combo piece, you miss out on a lot of her potential to just make your deck unstoppable.
I will be adding Extractor Demon though--his problem of not being an artifact is somewhat mitigated by the fact that he can reanimate himself. Thanks for that idea.
Like I said, I'll post my list when I can, and that should give you some ideas. When I do, I'll give you some more direct commentary on the card choices in your deck as well--even at a glance, I can see a bunch of cards, many of which I've tested myself, that I don't feel have a place in any Sharuum deck.
Isn't the Sharuum loop with Scuplting Steel and Desiple of the Vault redundant becuase the generals are not subject to the Legend rule therefore it can't cuase an infinite loop?
Isn't the Sharuum loop with Scuplting Steel and Desiple of the Vault redundant becuase the generals are not subject to the Legend rule therefore it can't cuase an infinite loop?
If you'd read the link provided, you'd have had your question answered.
The combo doesn't work in the same way it does in non-EDH formats, but it still works. The key point is that a permanent dies to the legend rule as a state-based effect, and that state-based effects occur before triggered abilities go on the stack, before any player gets priority.
So, what happens is Sculpting Steel comes in copying Sharuum, and the Sculpting Steel goes to the graveyard as a state-based effect. Sharuum, being a general, does not die. Only after the Sculpting Steel hits the graveyard does its Sharuum-copy triggered ability resolve, and so the Sculpting Steel in the graveyard is a legal target for this ability. Sharuum never leaves play, but the Sculpting Steel, as a Sharuum copy, does go in and out of play an arbitrary number of times.
It's weird and unintuitive, because there are very few situations in Magic where the precise definition of a state-based effect is actually relevant, but it does work.
I can appreciate a heavy focus on the combo, but I do think you've taken it overboard by having no backup plan at all. You're hardly running any of the cards that make a Sharuum deck tick. I don't have access to my list right now, but there are lots of cards like Memory Jar, Mindslaver, Sundering Titan, or Magister Sphinx that are just amazing in this kind of deck. You truly don't need to devote your entire deck to finding the combo. The combo only requires 2-3 cards, and you'll be running a bunch of tutors anyways. Instead of running even more tutors, you could run the cards to be a powerful control deck, or to get other "combos" with Sharuum like Mindslaver.
I think you should try and find room for these 4 cards for sure as a back up. Also should add Vampiric Tutor & Enlightened Tutor in there somewhere.
I just skimmed through the thread, and I don't know if anyone mentioned it, but I'm going to ask it anyways. Where's Condemn? Especially since you've got Tunnel Vision... creature attacks (and even more fun with General) and you put it on the bottom. Next turn... Tunnel Vision for that card... and even if you don't have the Tunnel Vision in your hand, it's fun putting an attacking general on the bottom...
I'm glad to see so many great comments, but I feel like I need to respond to some of them because they're the exact same things I think I'd say if I saw this thread but had never played the deck.
First an update. I bit the bullet yesterday and decided to buy intuition (which replaced beseech the queen), and I was right about the power level of that card in this deck. Unbelievable. There's no "right choice" for your opponent between extractor demon, sculpting steel, and lotus bloom.
Ok, so let me give you a brief history: I've had this Sharuum deck, in one form or another for about a year now. It started out as a "regular" Sharuum deck, and spent much of it's life that way until last December or so when I started to gradually change it to its current form. I'd say it's looked mostly like it does now as of May or so. Before that time, this deck included all the staples: memnarch, sundering titan, magister sphinx, sphinx summoner, buried alive, etc.; and didn't include some of the more combo-centric cards like silence, the cmc-3 transmute cards, etc. This build was definitely strong and fun but as I moved to a more combo-oriented build I found that the deck not only got faster, but (believe it or not) more resistant to disruption.
Why is this? Good question. Let's break it down:
1) There's a ton of creature kill, artifact kill, and counterspells in EDH. What there's not as much of is graveyard and hand disruption. This is not so say it doesn't exist, but it's less prevalent. A sort of "creatureless" deck has the advantage that a bunch of great cards become dead: condemn or any "great blockers" they might have (haven't declared an attacker with this deck in at least 3 months.); Wrath of God, Damnation, Hallowed Burial, etc (usually have no creatures on the board untill the turn I win. This has the added advantage that when I play damnation it's usually one-sided); Bribery and knowledge exploitation (best bribery targets are Teferi and Triplets. Compare that to Magister and Memnarch).
2) As I discussed in my original post, most people don't understand this combo very well the first time, particularly when I use Bitter Ordeal as the win-con. I can often sneak in wins I don't really deserve against very top-tier decks with excellent pilots if they don't understand what I'm doing.
3) A big focus on tutor effects allows me to pull out answers to the problems I do encounter very, very quickly. I can transmute for mortify, hannah's custody, hinder, not to mention trinket mage and many others. This deck laughs at relic of progenitus and similar effects as I'm usually one turn or less from a pithing needle and a couple of turns from pull from eternity with almost any given hand.
As to some of the specific suggestions:
Arcbound Crusher - I never seem to have any shortage of win conditions in this deck, and this seems much more vulnerable than the others. For one thing it doesn't allow me to kill everyone at the table the turn I combo off (which my other win-cons do) but even in a duel it can be pathed, condemned, fogged, bounced, and more. Crusher's only advantage is that Sharuum can ressurect him, but I would prefer to win the first time over having a win con that can come back but makes me keep comboing off. Not worth the slot, but I appreciate the suggestion.
Voyager Staff - I have enough of this effect between momentary blink and master transmuter. 9+ times out of 10 the first time I play Sharuum is the only time I need her triggered ability to go off that game (well, besides the 100 bazillion times that follow, but you know what I mean)
Condemn - Ok, I have a confession. I was actually hoping someone would make a comment like; "The combo isn't your only win con, you have tunnel vision! Why don't you run more cards to take advantage of it?"
I'm going to let you in on a secret. Tunnel vision isn't a win con.
"What? Really?"
Yeah, really. It's a tutor. Try mocking up this deck in MWS. Cast tunnel vision on yourself naming bitter ordeal. If you mill a sculpting steel in the process, you can usually win next turn. If you mill a sculpting steel and a lotus bloom, you are virtually guaranteed to win next turn. Tunnel Vision is one of the best cards in this deck and can turn a horrible hand and board position into a win within one turn if you get even a little lucky.
To address the issue of condemn directly, the only reason I even bother with kill spells is that they can stop creatures that might disrupt my combo in some way, or that might be part of some critical win strategy for my opponent. I've many times even considered cutting path to exile because I can't transmute for it or recurr it, but I like the security of knowing I can kill a darksteel colossus if I have to.
Vampiric and Enlightened Tutors - Great suggestions. They've been on my wishlist for a while and next time I have some money to throw around, I'll probably buy them, particularly Vampiric.
Thanks for all the suggestion, please keep them coming. I can understand how it might be difficult to really understand the ins-and-outs of how this deck plays if you've never used it. If there's any interest I can play a game against one of my brother's or my neighbor's decks and post a "journal" of what happens so you can get a better idea of how a typical game goes for this deck.
After a few testing, How do you play with necropotence exactly? Necrologia is nicer that it doesn't exile anything from your hand and i've seen its versatility on earlier turn.
and if you like draw so much, i think skullclamp is a good consideration
then, how do we handle bojuka bog on earlier turns? it's hard to dodge that, especially when everything's kinda on your graveyard to combo off
Pretty sweet list just a few comments and such. I really really really want to like the thopter sword sieve combo, but every time i try it it always seems to be 1 card too many. I would like to hear your opinion on it since you seem to have a lot of experience with the deck. One combo i found i like a lot is mind over matter with temple bell and an eldrazi legend in the deck...both pieces are good on their own and it is super easy to assemble, although i could see it being maybe a turn or two too slow for your build, just thought id share.
Also how is Riddlesmith treating you, he seems kinda meh at first glance but i guess i can see him being decent. Same with Vedalken Engineer, he seems fragile but maybe you are using him for pure speed...
Finally why no grim monolith/mana vault, the mana they provide is huge, and if you want to add in a voltaic key it gets nuts fast...
Oh almost forgot, hows necropotence on the mana base, i have a similar base with a little less color fixing in the artifact department...do you find you can get necropotence of early? Or do you tend to save it for a little later when/if you run out of gas at which point mana cost prolly wouldnt be a problem?
Sorry, but what makes glassdust hulk better than arcbound crusher?
The only thing I see is cycling, but is that really so huge?
In exchange it costs 1 mana less and gets a permanent power boost.
I guess I just don't see them as superb wincons in general, since neither can kill all opponents in 1 turn.
As I'm playing a very similar sharuum, Ad Nauseum.
What is the right... extent? to use it to? Do you keep going till you hit sculpting steel or are nearly out of life?
And why the snow lands?
Also, personal tutor could search out bitter ordeal/much of the other stuff very easily, is it in consideration? And Insidious Dreams?
I really love dreams as it allows for dumping of, artifacts in order to set up for the next few turns.
*NOTE: Would JTMS be an acceptable sub for Tez, Agent of Bolas? I pulled jace, do not want to spend the cash for tez. Jace searches out 2 less from the top/doesn't put chaff on the bottom so IDK... is tez's ultimate/-1 ever used by you?*
Sorry, but what makes glassdust hulk better than arcbound crusher?
The only thing I see is cycling, but is that really so huge?
In exchange it costs 1 mana less and gets a permanent power boost.
I guess I just don't see them as superb wincons in general, since neither can kill all opponents in 1 turn.
It's because when you loop Sculpting Steel and Sharuum in/out of play x times, Glassdust not only gets the +1s for each time, he also becomes unblockable til eot for an auto kill (barring removal). Arcbound can still be chumped.
It's because when you loop Sculpting Steel and Sharuum in/out of play x times, Glassdust not only gets the +1s for each time, he also becomes unblockable til eot for an auto kill (barring removal). Arcbound can still be chumped.
Actually, Arcbound Crusher has trample, so it's really hard to chump block. Glassdust Hulk is played because it cycles, so it's never a dead card in your hand. With Sharuum as the general, the graveyard is almost as accessible as the hand, so Glassdust Hulk can easily be reanimated when you're going for the win. In contrast, Arcbound Crusher has to be hardcast or discarded first, which is significantly tougher.
Actually, Arcbound Crusher has trample, so it's really hard to chump block. Glassdust Hulk is played because it cycles, so it's never a dead card in your hand. With Sharuum as the general, the graveyard is almost as accessible as the hand, so Glassdust Hulk can easily be reanimated when you're going for the win. In contrast, Arcbound Crusher has to be hardcast or discarded first, which is significantly tougher.
Yeah, as you say, arcbound is the same as hulk when it comes to attacking, no one in my group plays creatures that get around trample, or first strikers/deathtouchers, so its pretty safe.
I guess I've been underestimating the cycling ability, I've actually not drawn the hulk ever, which is weird actually >_>
@OP. Why was tunnel vision cut?
I assume extractor demon is out due to eldrazi.
Also, leyline + helm combo as an alternate/1v1 condition, feasible or no?
And... they just keep coming, sorry:
Grave hate is prevalent in my group since I and the other best deck (hoard of notions with random infinites like kiki jiki/eternal witness) rely on the grave heavily. As a result, bokuja bog is in 4 out of 6 decks in the group (the other 2 are uril and wort) as well as relics and tormod crypts in 2 decks (wort/uril) so would stifle and trickbind be prudent to toss in as combo protection?
Hopefully I can unravel things a little. I appreciate all the interest in the deck, and I'll try to be as responsive as possible. Please bear in mind that some of these answers will vary depending on your opponents decks and board states. I'm trying to give you what I'd call "generally true" answers, but this deck is not well suited to being auto-piloted, so use common sense.
- How do you play with Necropotence exactly?
With Necropotence I like to pay enough life to have my hand total about 10 cards at the end of turn (if I can afford to do so). This way you only exile a few cards (probably lands) and keep a slew of high-quality cards.
Don't expect 'potence to draw you your combo. If it does, great, but what it really does well is set you up with more mana+tutors+protection. From there, you can quickly play your way to the combo. This is also true of Necrologia and Ad Nauseam. Don't expect them to grab your combo every time. What they do is set you up nicely to win within a couple of turns.
-If you like draw so much, i think skullclamp is a good consideration
I do like draw, but clamp is only good with thopter foundry. I have no other meaningful targets. Skullclamp would, in my view, require too great an overhaul of the deck.
I will admit that graveyard hate is the biggest weakness of the deck. Still, it is not gamebreaking. Bojuka Bog, in particular, can be played around since this deck need never put combo pieces into the yard until the turn we combo off. Playing this way slows down the deck a little, but you can always just cast Sharuum, then cast Steel, then loop and Bitter Ordeal (or Disciple, etc).
The other way to handle Bojuka Bog is to switch combos. Try not to let combo pieces from multiple combos coexist in the graveyard if there's any chance of seeing graveyard hate.
- I really really really want to like the thopter sword sieve combo, but every time i try it it always seems to be 1 card too many.
This is a fair concern. I don't use this combo every game, but in the right situations it's great. For example:
1. Against Voltron/Aggro strats, even just thopter+sword lets you survive much longer. This two-card combo also fuels necropotence due to the lifegain.
2. This combo is quite easy to set up when you have either Tezz the Seeker or Intuition. In particular, I like to intuition for something like Thop. Foundry + Sword + Sculpting Steel, then tutor for Time Sieve separately (don't do this if you anticipate gy hate). This is very fast and puts you in a good position to combo off multiple ways.
I decided to do a few test hands to see how fast I can goldfish into this three-card combo. Obviously this isn't representative of real play, but it might be helpful. I apologize for spelling/grammar errors, I did this quickly:
Turn 1 play Urborg + sol ring.
Turn 2 Draw Azorious Signet. Play it off Sol ring. Play Snow-covered swamp. Play thirst. Draw Sen triplets, vault of whispers, Dispeller's capsule. Discard vault.
Turn 3 Draw Sensei's Top. Drop ancient den. Drop top and look at top cards off sol ring. They're all trash. Cast Tainted pact. Exile the top 3, hit thopter foundry, take it.
Turn 4 Draw Dimir signet. Drop it off ring. Cast foundry. Top. Put a fetch on top.
Turn 5 draw the fetch. Play it, crack it. Top. Put artificer's intuition on top. Drop sen triplets.
Turn 6 draw artificer's int. Play it. Discard dispeller's capsule to fetch lotus bloom. top. It's trash. Toss lotus bloom for mana crypt. top. Sword of the meek on top.
Turn 7 draw sword. Toss it for mox opal. top. Fabricate on top. Swap the top. Fabricate for time sieve. I have 4 mana after casting seive. I make 4 thopters, and sac those + an artifact land. After which I go infinite.
This game was slow and would probably have gone poorly in a real match. Still, turn 7 combo off a pretty bad hand and really crappy breaks off the shuffles isn't shabby. Also bear in mind I'm restricting myself only to the thopter combo. This game also illustrates the usefulness of tainted pact. Just get those crappy top few cards to go away. You don't necessarily need to know what you're "tutoring" for. Let's try one more.
Turn 3. Lose the flip and take 4 damage on my upkeep; 22. Tarn, crack, fetch hallowed fountain untapped; 19. Drop Tezz. -2 fetch Thopter foundry.
Turn 4. Lose 1 life from vault. draw a land. Transmute artifact on vault and pay 1 grabbing sword of the meek. Tezz -2 for Time Sieve and we're infinite folks. (sac 4 thopters + sword of the meek).
With a great hand like that the combo is effortless. I didn't even need necropotence. Also note that I never drew Intuition, which would have sped things up significantly.
-mind over matter with temple bell and an eldrazi legend
This seems like a cool combo, but the pieces just seem to do too little by themselves in this deck.
Both cards are experimental and I haven't decided if they'll stay. Riddlesmith can allow you to rip through your deck very fast, but he doesn't provide any actual card advantage, which I'm not a huge fan of.
I think vedalken engineer is a decent mana rock, but he'd probably be better as a grim monolith. I'll make a note of that.
-Why no monolith/manavault
I am running Mana Vault. Grim Monolith would be good. I need to grab one. Voltaic key seems like it might be dead just a little too often, but please do test it and let me know if it seems to be working.
-Oh almost forgot, hows necropotence on the mana base?
I usually find it fairly easy to cast. Even when it's a little challenging, its power level is just so damn high in this deck that I can't justify not running it.
- Arcbound Crusher v. Glassdust Hulk v. Extractor Demon
I think this is a valid debate, except that I hate crusher. He's just too clunky, having neither cycling nor the ability to kill the whole table. I like hulk because he cycles so effortlessly. I like demon because he can kill a table. The eldrazi thing is actually not the main reason I cut demon, since if you stack the triggers right you can still mill an eldrazi player down to his or her last two cards (one of which is the eldrazi). Just keep repeating the mill/shuffle/mill/shuffle until statistics allows you to mill all but the last two (or one of there's an odd number of cards in that deck), then terminate the loop. Demon was cut because I found him awkward to combo off with. He usually requires you to have about 9 mana, since you need three to unearth + 6 for Sharrum (assuming steel is in the yard). Bitter ordeal gets around this problem through lotus petal. Demon can't. Still there's an argument that he's better than hulk. Let me know what you think after testing. Maybe I shouldn't run any of these...
-Ad Nauseum. What is the right... extent? to use it to?
This is kind of a cop-out answer, but you use it until you're done using it. You saw me get 5 cards with it in one of those goldfish games above. Sometimes you get 20. The answer will depend on a lot of factors, like:
1. How many cards can you afford to discard? Will your opponent likely hit you with gy hate?
2. How much life do you have?
3. How much life are you about to lose due to your opponent's board?
4. Are you playing against a control deck (where you want lots of cards) or are you not expecting much disruption (where you might not need so many)
5. Probably most importantly, did you draw cards that will give you a path to winning? Or are you not there yet?
As a rough guide, I'd say you usually draw between 4 and 25 cards with Ad Nauseam. Not super helpful, I know. But it's the truth.
- Snow Lands?
Tainted Pact needs this deck to be pure singleton. I like running a solid number of basics, though tundra and scrubland could probably replace the snows without much trouble.
-Personal Tutor and Insidious Dreams:
I have tested Insidious Dreams, and found it's combination of high mana cost and card disadvantage to be too much. There are only a handful of cards in this deck you actually want in the grave, and putting a bunch of cards on top of the deck is often too slow. It's not a terrible card, it jsut wasn't quite good enough.
Personal Tutor is not my favorite. I've run both Merchant Scroll and Mystical Teachings, both of which I thought were just ok. Teachings has the advantage of being a good intuition target, and scroll can grab counterspells and other useful protection, in addition to draw like fact or fiction. In the end, both were too weak imho.
- Subs for new Tez
Tez, Agent of Bolas is fairly untested as of right now, and though I think he'll be good, I don't see him as critical to this deck's functioning. I think JtMS would be ok, but I think even something like Dark Confidant or Phyrexian Arena might be even better because they can come out so fast. I encourage you to test out a few different options here.
- Why no Tunnel Vision
I see that card as an expensive bomb, and I felt like Necrologia and friends filled that spot better. Tunnel Vision is still strong, however, so in a less permission-control-heavy meta it might still be worth playing.
- Leyline + Helm
I want this deck to work in multiplayer foremost. Also, I don't really see the need for more combos, especially ones that aren't very synergistic with the rest of the deck. Still, test it and let me know.
- Grave Hate
See my bojuka comment above. My answer to grave hate (which hasn't been very prevalent at competitive events in my experience) is to use pithing needle and smart play. Still, Stifle or Trickbind are worthy meta calls. I also encourage you to think about Pull from Eternity and Leyline of Sanctity as other ways of dealing with gy hate. Pull can be tutored for after the fact (which is nice) and Leyline also stops Jester's Caps.
Whew. Hope that helped. Keep the comments and questions coming (even debate, if you like), and I'll try to answer as promptly as possible.
After your post im definitely going to add necropotence to my list. Im still a little unconvinced of the thopter foundrey combo, maybe when i get an intuition i will test it out again.
As for voltaic key i am never sad to see it, if you have it and a mana rock (besides signets/talisman) it is just absurd. I have been playing the deck since sharrum came out so i have a pretty good feel for it, key has been in the deck since i got mana vault, sol ring, and grim monolith for the deck (bout a year ago), so id say i have a decent amount of testing with it.
As far as the mom bell combo, it is perhaps a bit slower but both pieces are good on there own. Personally i think temple bell is pretty powerful (many will disagree) but always having access to one more card is sweet, especially when you tutor something to the top of your deck, and since we combo most games, unless the opponents draw gy hate or counters we are in good shape. Mind over matter is pretty bomby in my experience, it works well with mana rocks, taps down threats, gives you a discard outlet, can be used to untap lands in a pinch if you are a few mana short, the list goes on.... I will admit an eldrazi legend isnt the best card synergy wise for the deck, but i use kozilek...10 mana isnt very hard to get with this deck and drawing 4 cards and getting an awesome threat is well awesome...i can understand why you wouldnt want to use it but i thought i would at least defend it :)...i would cut the glassdust combo and something else for it personally since it can take down a whole table, but it depends on how useful you view temple bell and mom versus being able to cycle hulk. I used to play hulk but i found killing only one player to suck and he dies to removal pretty easily (although you do pack a decent amount of protection...idk if taking out one player is worth using the protection and using the sculpting steel combo...)
3. Glassdust Hulk
NEVER LIKE HIM. Why him? Cycling ability is not that nice too. Can only kill an opponent. But he can wipe the table given the infinite combo. But usually, killing by thopters alone is enough
4. Tezzeret, Agent of Bolas
I kinda have mixed feeling about the guy. Sometimes he gives me good stuff, sometimes he doesn't. Sometimes, i don't really wanna put all of the cards at the bottom, cause i find two or three utility cards that i want. I don't know, can't decide
Well, about the primary combo, i really found it hard to find bitter ordeal. Not that hard, but not as easy as sculpting steel, lotus bloom, etc etc, (artifact combos). I suggest you add more transmute cards such as perplex and dimir machinations to smoothen the combos.
How about replacing hulk with dire undercurrents?
When you go infinite with sharuum, you draw into all the counters in your deck, then mill everyone else (just to be safe if anyone is untapped). It's less deadly than other enchants too so it can usually live for a turn or two after being played before they hate it out.
Is there a reason Demonic Consultation isn't in this deck? Seems like it would be pretty amazing, especially in EDH where the chance of hitting whatever i-win card you need in the first six is smaller than normal. An instant speed tutor that costs B and wins you the game on the spot tons of times is probably pretty good, even if it has a ~8% chance to wreck you.
I dunno though, might not be worth the risk if you don't find yourself in a lot of win-or-die situations.
Is there a reason Demonic Consultation isn't in this deck? Seems like it would be pretty amazing, especially in EDH where the chance of hitting whatever i-win card you need in the first six is smaller than normal. An instant speed tutor that costs B and wins you the game on the spot tons of times is probably pretty good, even if it has a ~8% chance to wreck you.
I dunno though, might not be worth the risk if you don't find yourself in a lot of win-or-die situations.
I think you make a compelling point. I will test this card.
i made a few tweaks to this deck, tested it out and won a competition of 4 player EDH, where they practically ganged up on me and manage to win with 3 life left. awesome.
Entomb is great, probably yawgmoth will is kinda "meehh" but that is just out of 1 play-testing and straight to competition.
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1 Sharuum the Hegemon
Combo Pieces(10):
1 Sculpting Steel
1 Phyrexian Metamorph
1 Phantasmal Image
1 Copy Artifact
1 Bitter Ordeal
1 Disciple of the Vault
1 Lotus Bloom
1 Thopter Foundry
1 Sword of the Meek
1 Time Sieve
1 Thopter Assembly
Tutors/Card Advantage/Card Filtering(30):
1 Necrologia
1 Ad Nauseam
1 Brainstorm
1 Ponder
1 Preordain
1 Impulse
1 Serum Visions
1 Imperial Seal
1 Gitaxian Probe
1 Intuition
1 Muddle the Mixture
1 Sensei's Divining Top
1 Transmute Artifact
1 Demonic Tutor
1 Grim Tutor
1 Vampiric Tutor
1 Tezzeret the Seeker
1 Mystical Tutor
1 Tainted Pact
1 Artificer's Intuition
1 Lim-Dul's Vault
1 Necropotence
1 Memory Jar
1 Enlightened Tutor
1 Dark Confidant
1 Fact or Fiction
1 Yawgmoth's Will
1 Snapcaster Mage
1 Frantic Search
1 Pact of Negation
1 Remand
1 Pithing Needle
1 Mana Drain
1 Force of Will
1 Swan Song
Assorted Utility(5):
1 Vindicate
1 Cyclonic Rift
1 Toxic Deluge
1 Crucible of Worlds
1 Nihil Spellbomb
Non-Land Mana(14):
1 Dark Ritual
1 Orzhov Signet
1 Azorious Signet
1 Dimir Signet
1 Talisman of Dominance
1 Talisman of Progress
1 Mox Opal
1 Mox Diamond
1 Chrome Mox
1 Lotus Petal
1 Mana Vault
1 Grim Monolith
1 Sol Ring
1 Mana Crypt
Lands(33):
1 Island
1 Swamp
1 Mishra's Workshop
1 City of Traitors
1 Ancient Tomb
1 Command Tower
1 Mana Confluence
1 Glimmervoid
1 City of Brass
1 Ancient Den
1 Seat of the Synod
1 Vault of Whispers
1 Cephalid Coliseum
1 Flooded Strand
1 Scalding Tarn
1 Verdant Catacombs
1 Polluted Delta
1 Arid Mesa
1 Windswept Heath
1 Marsh Flats
1 Misty Rainforest
1 Bloodstained Mire
1 Underground Sea
1 Tundra
1 Scrubland
1 Hallowed Fountain
1 Godless Shrine
1 Watery Grave
1 Academy Ruins
1 Buried Ruin
1 Urborg, Tomb of Yawgmoth
1 Reflecting Pool
1 Cavern of Souls
This deck revolves around three combos.
1. Sharuum + Sculpting Steel + (Disciple of the Vault or Bitter Ordeal or Glassdust Hulk)
Allows an infinite loop through the graveyard. The most mana-intensive combo, but it can be challenging to disrupt.
2. Thopter Foundry + Sword of the Meek + Time Sieve = infinite turns
3. Time Sieve + Thopter Assembly = Infinite turns.
Any of these combos can be tutored for and protected by the other cards in the deck. They can also come out very fast. Turn two wins are possible. Turns three or four wins are very doable, though still somewhat rare. Turn six is a very common time to combo off with protection. In most multiplayer games people are still tapping out at that point, and will usually not see you as threat #1 due to the small board presence this deck maintains.
General:
1 Sharuum the Hegemon - Obvious.
Combo Pieces:
1 Sculpting Steel - Sharuum + Steel creates an infinite loop
1 Bitter Ordeal - Bitter Ordeal exiles libraries (and is effectively uncounterable) when it follows a Sharuum/Steel loop.
1 Disciple of the Vault - Another way to win off the loop.
1 Glassdust Hulk - Another way to win, but it only kills one player. I am considering its removal.1 Lotus Bloom - If you terminate the Sharuum/Steel loop with this card, you can use it to cast Bitter Ordeal. This speeds up the combo quite a bit.
1 Thopter Foundry
1 Sword of the Meek - Thopter Foundry + Sword of the Meek allows you to pay 1 to gain 1 life and make a 1/1 thopter.
1 Time Sieve - This card combined with Foundry/Sword allows 5: Gain 5 life and take an extra turn.
1 Thopter Assembly - Combined with Time Sieve this card also permits infinite turns.
Tutors/Card Advantage/Card Filtering:
1 Scroll Rack - An excellent way to improve your hand's card quality. Pairs well with this deck's 9 fetch lands.
1 Necrologia - Probably the single strongest draw spell in EDH. A cornerstone of this deck is to trade your excessive 40 life for various advantages, and this card does this well.
1 Ad Nauseam - Another good draw spell in a deck like this with a relatively low average cmc. (1.54 is the average cmc among the 99 cards in the main deck, lands inclusive. This means that you'll take a little more damage from Ad Nauseam, on average, but Ad Nauseam has the advantage that you don't have to pay the life as a cost, can cast it any time (like during an opponent's end step, and can choose how far you want to go based on the cards you draw.)
1 Brainstorm - Similar to Scroll Rack, it's a fast way to get some new cards in hand. Also good with fetches.
1 Muddle the Mixture - Does double duty by both protecting the combo and serving as a potent tutor. You can get any piece of the Thopter/Sword/Sieve combo. You can also get demonic tutor.
1 Sensei's Divining Top - More great card filtering. Good in any deck, especially this one, which has about a million and a half ways to tutor for it.
1 Transmute Artifact - What a great card. Whether you're fetching Sculpting Steel, Time Sieve, Pithing Needle, or Sen Triplets, you're sure to find a multitude of good targets. Reshape is an acceptable substitute if you can't find this one, but I like being able to put the artifact in the graveyard if necessary.
1 Demonic Tutor - If you don't know why this is here you should quit magic.
1 Thirst for Knowledge - Very efficient instant-speed draw. Nice for dumping sculpting steel or other artifact targets in the yard.
1 Tezzeret the Seeker - When this guy resolves, you almost can't lose. His -X is amazing. Even if you don't want to get Sculpting Steel or another combo piece, try going -0. Seat of the Synod, Lotus Bloom , and Mana Crypt are all sweet targets if you need a little mana injection.
1 Tezzeret, Agent of Bolas - Not tested much yet, but his +1 seems exceptionally good, especially in longer games versus control.1 Liliana Vess - She's a little pricey mana-wise for my taste and I'm looking for a good substitute. As you might imagine she is used almost exclusively for her -2. Occasionally +1 against an opponent with a small hand will serve as a form of protection.
1 Ponder - Just a good card to lay down turn 1 and instantly sculpt your draws. Not a bad way to keep the gas going later as well. I'm considering also adding Preordain and/or Impulse.
1 Trinket Mage - By my count he has 11 targets. That means one in nine cards in the deck can be fetched by him. Seems good.
1 Tainted Pact - Nearly an instant-speed demonic tutor. Be smart about how you use it, though.
1 Artificer's Intuition - What a beautiful toolbox. In this deck it's practically survival of the fittest. My favorite thing to do is discard sculpting steel, fetch lotus bloom, discard it and get sensei's top. Play the top. Now you have a shuffle engine in Artificer's Intuition, and the ability to look at the top cards. Very potent.
1 Fabricate - I wish it were a little less costly, mana-wise. Still it's a solid card and I think it's a necessary evil.
1 Lim-Dul's Vault - So amazing. Stack your deck for a small life payment.
1 Vampiric Tutor - Obviously exceptional.
1 Necropotence - Like Necrologia and Ad Nauseam, this card allows you unreal amounts of card advantage. Resolving it almost always secures the win.
1 Memory Jar - A repeatable (with Sharuum) way to see more cards. Will usually allow you to play the good cards while stacking your graveyard.
1 Enlightened Tutor - Lots of targets. Early game, don't be afraid to grab cards like Mana Crypt or Sol Ring to speed yourself up.
1 Riddlesmith - He's experimental, and I'm on the fence. Sometimes he's great, sometimes he's meh.1 Fact or Fiction - Another great draw spell that lets you get good cards in hand and in the grave.
1 Thoughtcast - Another experiment. I think this might just be better as preordain or something else.Combo Protection:
1 Pact of Negation - Powerful protection for the combo.
1 Remand - Another card that's good for protection. Also worth playing early game to slow your opponent. It will depend on the match and your hand.
1 Silence - Likewise, great combo protection.1 Sen Triplets - Lots of ways to get these girls out fast. They both act as a perpetual Silence, as well as giving you some free cards (at least lands if nothing else) out of an opponent's hand.
1 Pithing Needle - Shuts down many problems like Relic of Progenitus. Also finds uses in other contexts, like turning off a Jace.
1 Hana's Custody - Basically tells nonblue decks that they cannot disrupt the combo. Note that Sculpting Steel, Thopter Foundry, and Time Sieve all lack the word "target."
1 Misdirection - Solid, free combo protection. I think Force of Will would be better here.Random Utility:
1 Reanimate - This is a cool little card. One use is to get Sen Triplets in the grave fast then pull it out. It also allows us to recover quickly if the combo is what I call "soft disrupted," in other words if Sharuum is destroyed with her ability on the stack. In that case, if I have reanimate in hand and B open, I can immediately restart the combo. Third, reanimate sometimes gets juicy targets out of opponent's graveyards.
1 Executioner's Capsule (Could easily be Brittle Effigy, kind of a metagame call) - We need some easily tutorable creature kill to deal with the Quasali Pridemages of the world. I like Capsule because it's cheaper to activate and can be brought back from the grave in a pinch. Effigy is also good, though.
1 Argivian Restoration - Just another good way to re-use crucial artifacts when Sharuum herself is impractical. I really wish this cost a little less mana.1 Oblation - Just a good problem-solver. Vindicate might be better.1 Master Transmuter - Just good in a lot of contexts. Makes things cheaper and helps protect the combo. Also good for re-setting pithing needle.1 Dispeller's Capsule - Another great problem-solver. Force them to blow that Relic of Progenitus. Bye-bye Aura of Silence.
1 Swords to Plowshares - More solid creature-kill. Good for slowing aggro and exiling Nezumi Graverobbers.
1 Damnation - Helps slow fast aggro decks. Usually a "one-sided" wrath since this deck plays so few creatures.
Non-Land Mana: - All of these produce mana and help accelerate the deck.
Lands: - I cannot see how any of these require explanation.
New Cards:
Phyrexian Metamorph - I can't see how this could possibly require explanation. This is the strongest card printed for a Sharuum combo deck since Shards of Alara (where they printed Sharuum).
Dire Undercurrents- A better combo piece than Glassdust Hulk, but it still could be replaced with something more streamlined mana-wise if such a card is ever printed.
Dark Confidant - Experiment. A faster phyrexian arena that will hopefully help those slower hands get moving.
Mana Drain - Accel + Combo protection, the two mainstays of this deck in one.
Vindicate - Just a general problem solver card.
Command Tower - Obvious.
Yawgmoth's Will - Powerful recursion that will help me recover from Disk effects, one of my biggest weaknesses. Also good to follow up an Intuition.
Salvage Scout - Scout + Thopter Assembly + Time Sieve is a strong Intution package. It is also just a good, cheap recursion card. Might be better as Argivian Find or similar.
+ Gitaxian Probe - I get to run a 98 card deck and peek at my opponent's disruption? Cool.
+ Cepahlid Coliseum - A great way to see some extra cards and possibly put important ones in the bin. 1 life for the mana is negligible in a 40-life format.
+ Abeyance - Just better than Silence, and able to "cycle" when I don't need it.
+ Thoughtseize - Aim it at the guy who keeps never tapping out. May get cut, but it's solid protection.
+ Impulse - Another Ponder/Brainstorm effect. One extra mana is worth it to dig deeper than preordain.
As always, you are encouraged to constructively criticize the deck. I'm always looking for ways to improve. If you decide to test the deck, be aware that it has a rather steep learning curve because of the huge number of tutor choices presented each game. If you're a decent player you shouldn't have much trouble picking it up, but definitely give it a few games of practice before judging its power-level.
Also, feel free to ask any questions you might have, and feel free to request anything else you'd like to see. I was thinking about adding a section with some turn-by-turn game breakdowns so you can see how the deck is played (the way I pilot the deck is really, really dependent on my opponents' strategies).
For those of you who may not be familiar with it, this combo consists of creating an unending graveyard to battlefield loop with Sculpting Steel copying Sharuum accompanied by some kind of win condition, in most decks Disciple of the Vault. Associated rules are explained in more detail here.
My deck does include Disciple, but prefers to use the more counterspell-and-killspell-resistant Extractor Demon to mill or my favorite combo piece, a real gem, bitter ordeal. Ordeal is basically uncounterable (except with time stop) can be fetched with CMC-3 transmute cards (which also fetch sclupting steel) and allows you to "combo off" without a win condition on the board. Sometimes this is so confusing/intriguing to my opponent that they'll let me do the loop a bazillion times when they could have stopped it, thinking they'll just counter what I do next or assuming that I'm screwing around.
Bottom line: this deck is really fun to play, but it's not really intended to be fun to play against. A turn three win is possible with a great hand and I almost always win by turn six unless I'm facing control. I have a bunch of fun, casual EDH decks, but this one's intended to be fast, competetive, and brutal. I'm posting this to get more ideas to make it faster and more resilient. Thanks in advance for the help. Without further ado:
1 Disciple of the Vault
1 Extractor Demon
1 Teferi, Mage of Zhalfir
1 Sen Triplets
1 Platinum Angel
1 Vedalken Engineer
1 Trinket Mage
1 Master Transmuter
1 Drift of Phantasms
1 Tezzeret the Seeker
1 Liliana Vess
1 Sculpting Steel
1 Pithing Needle
1 Sensei's Divining Top
1 Planar Portal
1 Time Sieve
1 Dispeller's Capsule
1 Executioner's Capsule
1 Scourglass
1 Lotus Bloom
1 Lotus Petal
1 Mox Diamond
1 Sol Ring
1 Mana Vault
1 Orzhov Signet
1 Dimir Signet
1 Azorious Signet
1 Coalition Relic
1 Talisman of Dominance
1 Talisman of Progress
1 Fieldmist Borderpost
1 Mistvein Borderpost
1 Dimir Machinations
1 Demonic Tutor
1 Diabolic Tutor
1 Demonic Collusion
1 Ponder
1 Reanimate
1 Exhume
1 Damnation
1 Fabricate
1 Reshape
1 Tunnel Vision
1 Intuition
1 Mystical Tutor
1 Fact or Fiction
1 Thirst for Knowledge
1 Perplex
1 Muddle the Mixture
1 Pact of Negation
1 Hinder
1 Silence
1 Path to Exile
1 Mortify
1 Pull from Eternity
1 Ad Nauseam
1 Momentary Blink
1 Mystical Teachings
1 Esper Charm
1 Hannah's Custody
1 Artificer's Intuition
1 Tolaria West
1 Academy Ruins
1 Darksteel Citadel
1 Seat of the Synod
1 Ancient Den
1 Vault of Whispers
1 Dromar's Cavern
1 Ancient Tomb
1 Glimmervoid
1 Hallowed Fountain
1 Glacial Fortress
1 River of Tears
1 Sunken Ruins
1 Mystic Gate
1 Fetid Heath
1 Adarkar Wastes
1 Underground River
1 Caves of Koilos
1 Vivid Meadow
1 Vivid Creek
1 Vivid Marsh
1 Flagstones of Trokair
1 Reflecting Pool
5 Island
5 Swamp
3 Plains
Against control I play a similar strategy, but usually get some combination of Teferi, Sen Triplets, Silence, or Pact of Negation first.
I realize some of the obvious improvements I could make like getting a hold of Tolarian Academy and the on-color "old dual lands." Even better than Gifts Ungiven was, I think, because I could fetch Sculpting Steel, Lotus Bloom, and Extractor Demon
Other than some of these straightforward changes I'd love to hear any ideas ya'll might have. Hope you like it!
Edit: Swapped Beseech the Queen out for Intuition
That said, I've never considered Extractor Demon or Bitter Ordeal before. Both are interesting, though they have the issue that they're not artifacts. They're definitely better than Disciple of the Vault though, which I currently do run (I didn't for a long time). The combo is still definitely worth considering. You might consider Arcbound Crusher as a win-condition. It has the disadvantage of being vulnerable to removal (not too big a deal, because so is the combo), but the huge advantage of being an artifact, and thus very easy to recur or tutor. It's better than Disciple of the Vault most of the time for me.
I can appreciate a heavy focus on the combo, but I do think you've taken it overboard by having no backup plan at all. You're hardly running any of the cards that make a Sharuum deck tick. I don't have access to my list right now, but there are lots of cards like Memory Jar, Mindslaver, Sundering Titan, or Magister Sphinx that are just amazing in this kind of deck. You truly don't need to devote your entire deck to finding the combo. The combo only requires 2-3 cards, and you'll be running a bunch of tutors anyways. Instead of running even more tutors, you could run the cards to be a powerful control deck, or to get other "combos" with Sharuum like Mindslaver.
In exchange for losing all these other options, along with the resiliency to removal you gain from having more than 85% of your spells be artifacts, you're speeding up the turn at which you can consistently get your combo by maybe 2-3 turns. Is this worth it? There are very few decks that you need to go off that fast against to win, and I think the artifact-heavy version of Sharuum should be a lot more resilient to disruption.
I'll post my current list in a few days (I don't have access to it right now), but my main point is that there's no need to devote your entire deck to the combo. You can find it almost as consistently with only 2-3 cards that you wouldn't run otherwise. Sharuum, especially with friends like Momentary Blink and Voyager Staff, is an extremely resilient engine that can be abused to win games--in only using her as a combo piece, you miss out on a lot of her potential to just make your deck unstoppable.
I will be adding Extractor Demon though--his problem of not being an artifact is somewhat mitigated by the fact that he can reanimate himself. Thanks for that idea.
Like I said, I'll post my list when I can, and that should give you some ideas. When I do, I'll give you some more direct commentary on the card choices in your deck as well--even at a glance, I can see a bunch of cards, many of which I've tested myself, that I don't feel have a place in any Sharuum deck.
If you'd read the link provided, you'd have had your question answered.
The combo doesn't work in the same way it does in non-EDH formats, but it still works. The key point is that a permanent dies to the legend rule as a state-based effect, and that state-based effects occur before triggered abilities go on the stack, before any player gets priority.
So, what happens is Sculpting Steel comes in copying Sharuum, and the Sculpting Steel goes to the graveyard as a state-based effect. Sharuum, being a general, does not die. Only after the Sculpting Steel hits the graveyard does its Sharuum-copy triggered ability resolve, and so the Sculpting Steel in the graveyard is a legal target for this ability. Sharuum never leaves play, but the Sculpting Steel, as a Sharuum copy, does go in and out of play an arbitrary number of times.
It's weird and unintuitive, because there are very few situations in Magic where the precise definition of a state-based effect is actually relevant, but it does work.
I think you should try and find room for these 4 cards for sure as a back up. Also should add Vampiric Tutor & Enlightened Tutor in there somewhere.
First an update. I bit the bullet yesterday and decided to buy intuition (which replaced beseech the queen), and I was right about the power level of that card in this deck. Unbelievable. There's no "right choice" for your opponent between extractor demon, sculpting steel, and lotus bloom.
Ok, so let me give you a brief history: I've had this Sharuum deck, in one form or another for about a year now. It started out as a "regular" Sharuum deck, and spent much of it's life that way until last December or so when I started to gradually change it to its current form. I'd say it's looked mostly like it does now as of May or so. Before that time, this deck included all the staples: memnarch, sundering titan, magister sphinx, sphinx summoner, buried alive, etc.; and didn't include some of the more combo-centric cards like silence, the cmc-3 transmute cards, etc. This build was definitely strong and fun but as I moved to a more combo-oriented build I found that the deck not only got faster, but (believe it or not) more resistant to disruption.
Why is this? Good question. Let's break it down:
1) There's a ton of creature kill, artifact kill, and counterspells in EDH. What there's not as much of is graveyard and hand disruption. This is not so say it doesn't exist, but it's less prevalent. A sort of "creatureless" deck has the advantage that a bunch of great cards become dead: condemn or any "great blockers" they might have (haven't declared an attacker with this deck in at least 3 months.); Wrath of God, Damnation, Hallowed Burial, etc (usually have no creatures on the board untill the turn I win. This has the added advantage that when I play damnation it's usually one-sided); Bribery and knowledge exploitation (best bribery targets are Teferi and Triplets. Compare that to Magister and Memnarch).
2) As I discussed in my original post, most people don't understand this combo very well the first time, particularly when I use Bitter Ordeal as the win-con. I can often sneak in wins I don't really deserve against very top-tier decks with excellent pilots if they don't understand what I'm doing.
3) A big focus on tutor effects allows me to pull out answers to the problems I do encounter very, very quickly. I can transmute for mortify, hannah's custody, hinder, not to mention trinket mage and many others. This deck laughs at relic of progenitus and similar effects as I'm usually one turn or less from a pithing needle and a couple of turns from pull from eternity with almost any given hand.
As to some of the specific suggestions:
Arcbound Crusher - I never seem to have any shortage of win conditions in this deck, and this seems much more vulnerable than the others. For one thing it doesn't allow me to kill everyone at the table the turn I combo off (which my other win-cons do) but even in a duel it can be pathed, condemned, fogged, bounced, and more. Crusher's only advantage is that Sharuum can ressurect him, but I would prefer to win the first time over having a win con that can come back but makes me keep comboing off. Not worth the slot, but I appreciate the suggestion.
Voyager Staff - I have enough of this effect between momentary blink and master transmuter. 9+ times out of 10 the first time I play Sharuum is the only time I need her triggered ability to go off that game (well, besides the 100 bazillion times that follow, but you know what I mean)
Condemn - Ok, I have a confession. I was actually hoping someone would make a comment like; "The combo isn't your only win con, you have tunnel vision! Why don't you run more cards to take advantage of it?"
I'm going to let you in on a secret. Tunnel vision isn't a win con.
"What? Really?"
Yeah, really. It's a tutor. Try mocking up this deck in MWS. Cast tunnel vision on yourself naming bitter ordeal. If you mill a sculpting steel in the process, you can usually win next turn. If you mill a sculpting steel and a lotus bloom, you are virtually guaranteed to win next turn. Tunnel Vision is one of the best cards in this deck and can turn a horrible hand and board position into a win within one turn if you get even a little lucky.
To address the issue of condemn directly, the only reason I even bother with kill spells is that they can stop creatures that might disrupt my combo in some way, or that might be part of some critical win strategy for my opponent. I've many times even considered cutting path to exile because I can't transmute for it or recurr it, but I like the security of knowing I can kill a darksteel colossus if I have to.
Vampiric and Enlightened Tutors - Great suggestions. They've been on my wishlist for a while and next time I have some money to throw around, I'll probably buy them, particularly Vampiric.
Thanks for all the suggestion, please keep them coming. I can understand how it might be difficult to really understand the ins-and-outs of how this deck plays if you've never used it. If there's any interest I can play a game against one of my brother's or my neighbor's decks and post a "journal" of what happens so you can get a better idea of how a typical game goes for this deck.
Thanks again!
and if you like draw so much, i think skullclamp is a good consideration
then, how do we handle bojuka bog on earlier turns? it's hard to dodge that, especially when everything's kinda on your graveyard to combo off
Also how is Riddlesmith treating you, he seems kinda meh at first glance but i guess i can see him being decent. Same with Vedalken Engineer, he seems fragile but maybe you are using him for pure speed...
Finally why no grim monolith/mana vault, the mana they provide is huge, and if you want to add in a voltaic key it gets nuts fast...
Oh almost forgot, hows necropotence on the mana base, i have a similar base with a little less color fixing in the artifact department...do you find you can get necropotence of early? Or do you tend to save it for a little later when/if you run out of gas at which point mana cost prolly wouldnt be a problem?
Sharuum the Hegemon
Mayael the Anima
Wort, Boggart Auntie
Sliver Overlord
Drana Kalastria Bloodchief
99 mountain Ashling
The only thing I see is cycling, but is that really so huge?
In exchange it costs 1 mana less and gets a permanent power boost.
I guess I just don't see them as superb wincons in general, since neither can kill all opponents in 1 turn.
As I'm playing a very similar sharuum, Ad Nauseum.
What is the right... extent? to use it to? Do you keep going till you hit sculpting steel or are nearly out of life?
And why the snow lands?
Also, personal tutor could search out bitter ordeal/much of the other stuff very easily, is it in consideration? And Insidious Dreams?
I really love dreams as it allows for dumping of, artifacts in order to set up for the next few turns.
*NOTE: Would JTMS be an acceptable sub for Tez, Agent of Bolas? I pulled jace, do not want to spend the cash for tez. Jace searches out 2 less from the top/doesn't put chaff on the bottom so IDK... is tez's ultimate/-1 ever used by you?*
UWBSharuum the HegemonBWU
UAzami, Lady of ScrollsU
UGMomir Vig, Simic VisionaryGU
GAzusa, Lost but SeekingG
GUEdric, Spymaster of TrestGU
It's because when you loop Sculpting Steel and Sharuum in/out of play x times, Glassdust not only gets the +1s for each time, he also becomes unblockable til eot for an auto kill (barring removal). Arcbound can still be chumped.
Banner by Nakamura, Thanks!
EDH Math
EDH Decks:
Ghost Council: The Magic Mafia of Orzhova
BB Drana: Down with the Sickness
Rasputin: Reality is Broken
Vish Kal Bleeder: Bloody Kisses
Teysa, Orzhov Dominatrix
Stonebrow: Breaking Things
BWR Kaalia Punisher: Heaven's on Fire
Grimgrin: Dead Reckoning
Actually, Arcbound Crusher has trample, so it's really hard to chump block. Glassdust Hulk is played because it cycles, so it's never a dead card in your hand. With Sharuum as the general, the graveyard is almost as accessible as the hand, so Glassdust Hulk can easily be reanimated when you're going for the win. In contrast, Arcbound Crusher has to be hardcast or discarded first, which is significantly tougher.
I completely missed trample..... lol, yeah, a 500/500 trampler is pretty hard to chump block
Banner by Nakamura, Thanks!
EDH Math
EDH Decks:
Ghost Council: The Magic Mafia of Orzhova
BB Drana: Down with the Sickness
Rasputin: Reality is Broken
Vish Kal Bleeder: Bloody Kisses
Teysa, Orzhov Dominatrix
Stonebrow: Breaking Things
BWR Kaalia Punisher: Heaven's on Fire
Grimgrin: Dead Reckoning
Yeah, as you say, arcbound is the same as hulk when it comes to attacking, no one in my group plays creatures that get around trample, or first strikers/deathtouchers, so its pretty safe.
I guess I've been underestimating the cycling ability, I've actually not drawn the hulk ever, which is weird actually >_>
@OP. Why was tunnel vision cut?
I assume extractor demon is out due to eldrazi.
Also, leyline + helm combo as an alternate/1v1 condition, feasible or no?
And... they just keep coming, sorry:
Grave hate is prevalent in my group since I and the other best deck (hoard of notions with random infinites like kiki jiki/eternal witness) rely on the grave heavily. As a result, bokuja bog is in 4 out of 6 decks in the group (the other 2 are uril and wort) as well as relics and tormod crypts in 2 decks (wort/uril) so would stifle and trickbind be prudent to toss in as combo protection?
UWBSharuum the HegemonBWU
UAzami, Lady of ScrollsU
UGMomir Vig, Simic VisionaryGU
GAzusa, Lost but SeekingG
GUEdric, Spymaster of TrestGU
one can't just give it a shot to pilot this deck
it's a riddle indeed
Hopefully I can unravel things a little. I appreciate all the interest in the deck, and I'll try to be as responsive as possible. Please bear in mind that some of these answers will vary depending on your opponents decks and board states. I'm trying to give you what I'd call "generally true" answers, but this deck is not well suited to being auto-piloted, so use common sense.
- How do you play with Necropotence exactly?
With Necropotence I like to pay enough life to have my hand total about 10 cards at the end of turn (if I can afford to do so). This way you only exile a few cards (probably lands) and keep a slew of high-quality cards.
Don't expect 'potence to draw you your combo. If it does, great, but what it really does well is set you up with more mana+tutors+protection. From there, you can quickly play your way to the combo. This is also true of Necrologia and Ad Nauseam. Don't expect them to grab your combo every time. What they do is set you up nicely to win within a couple of turns.
-If you like draw so much, i think skullclamp is a good consideration
I do like draw, but clamp is only good with thopter foundry. I have no other meaningful targets. Skullclamp would, in my view, require too great an overhaul of the deck.
-How do we handle bojuka bog on earlier turns?
I will admit that graveyard hate is the biggest weakness of the deck. Still, it is not gamebreaking. Bojuka Bog, in particular, can be played around since this deck need never put combo pieces into the yard until the turn we combo off. Playing this way slows down the deck a little, but you can always just cast Sharuum, then cast Steel, then loop and Bitter Ordeal (or Disciple, etc).
The other way to handle Bojuka Bog is to switch combos. Try not to let combo pieces from multiple combos coexist in the graveyard if there's any chance of seeing graveyard hate.
- I really really really want to like the thopter sword sieve combo, but every time i try it it always seems to be 1 card too many.
This is a fair concern. I don't use this combo every game, but in the right situations it's great. For example:
1. Against Voltron/Aggro strats, even just thopter+sword lets you survive much longer. This two-card combo also fuels necropotence due to the lifegain.
2. This combo is quite easy to set up when you have either Tezz the Seeker or Intuition. In particular, I like to intuition for something like Thop. Foundry + Sword + Sculpting Steel, then tutor for Time Sieve separately (don't do this if you anticipate gy hate). This is very fast and puts you in a good position to combo off multiple ways.
I decided to do a few test hands to see how fast I can goldfish into this three-card combo. Obviously this isn't representative of real play, but it might be helpful. I apologize for spelling/grammar errors, I did this quickly:
Hand 1:
After mull to 6 I open with:
1 Snow-Covered Swamp
1 Ancient Den
1 Thirst for Knowledge
1 Tainted Pact
1 Sol Ring
Turn 1 play Urborg + sol ring.
Turn 2 Draw Azorious Signet. Play it off Sol ring. Play Snow-covered swamp. Play thirst. Draw Sen triplets, vault of whispers, Dispeller's capsule. Discard vault.
Turn 3 Draw Sensei's Top. Drop ancient den. Drop top and look at top cards off sol ring. They're all trash. Cast Tainted pact. Exile the top 3, hit thopter foundry, take it.
Turn 4 Draw Dimir signet. Drop it off ring. Cast foundry. Top. Put a fetch on top.
Turn 5 draw the fetch. Play it, crack it. Top. Put artificer's intuition on top. Drop sen triplets.
Turn 6 draw artificer's int. Play it. Discard dispeller's capsule to fetch lotus bloom. top. It's trash. Toss lotus bloom for mana crypt. top. Sword of the meek on top.
Turn 7 draw sword. Toss it for mox opal. top. Fabricate on top. Swap the top. Fabricate for time sieve. I have 4 mana after casting seive. I make 4 thopters, and sac those + an artifact land. After which I go infinite.
This game was slow and would probably have gone poorly in a real match. Still, turn 7 combo off a pretty bad hand and really crappy breaks off the shuffles isn't shabby. Also bear in mind I'm restricting myself only to the thopter combo. This game also illustrates the usefulness of tainted pact. Just get those crappy top few cards to go away. You don't necessarily need to know what you're "tutoring" for. Let's try one more.
Hand 2:
After mull to 6 I open with:
1 Flooded Strand
1 Mana Vault
1 Orzhov Signet
1 Vampiric Tutor
1 Ad Nauseam
Turn 1: Glimmervoid into Mana vault into Orzhov Signet. Tap signet plus extra 1 from vault to cast vampiric tutor for mana crypt.
Turn 2 draw crypt. Take 1 from vault; 39. Drop fetch and get underground sea; 38. Drop Crypt. Ad Nauseam. 12 damage for 26 life total and:
1 Azorious Signet
1 Scalding Tarn
1 Transmute Artifact
1 Necropotence
Turn 3. Lose the flip and take 4 damage on my upkeep; 22. Tarn, crack, fetch hallowed fountain untapped; 19. Drop Tezz. -2 fetch Thopter foundry.
Turn 4. Lose 1 life from vault. draw a land. Transmute artifact on vault and pay 1 grabbing sword of the meek. Tezz -2 for Time Sieve and we're infinite folks. (sac 4 thopters + sword of the meek).
With a great hand like that the combo is effortless. I didn't even need necropotence. Also note that I never drew Intuition, which would have sped things up significantly.
-mind over matter with temple bell and an eldrazi legend
This seems like a cool combo, but the pieces just seem to do too little by themselves in this deck.
-Riddlesmith, Vedalken Engineer
Both cards are experimental and I haven't decided if they'll stay. Riddlesmith can allow you to rip through your deck very fast, but he doesn't provide any actual card advantage, which I'm not a huge fan of.
I think vedalken engineer is a decent mana rock, but he'd probably be better as a grim monolith. I'll make a note of that.
-Why no monolith/manavault
I am running Mana Vault. Grim Monolith would be good. I need to grab one. Voltaic key seems like it might be dead just a little too often, but please do test it and let me know if it seems to be working.
-Oh almost forgot, hows necropotence on the mana base?
I usually find it fairly easy to cast. Even when it's a little challenging, its power level is just so damn high in this deck that I can't justify not running it.
- Arcbound Crusher v. Glassdust Hulk v. Extractor Demon
I think this is a valid debate, except that I hate crusher. He's just too clunky, having neither cycling nor the ability to kill the whole table. I like hulk because he cycles so effortlessly. I like demon because he can kill a table. The eldrazi thing is actually not the main reason I cut demon, since if you stack the triggers right you can still mill an eldrazi player down to his or her last two cards (one of which is the eldrazi). Just keep repeating the mill/shuffle/mill/shuffle until statistics allows you to mill all but the last two (or one of there's an odd number of cards in that deck), then terminate the loop. Demon was cut because I found him awkward to combo off with. He usually requires you to have about 9 mana, since you need three to unearth + 6 for Sharrum (assuming steel is in the yard). Bitter ordeal gets around this problem through lotus petal. Demon can't. Still there's an argument that he's better than hulk. Let me know what you think after testing. Maybe I shouldn't run any of these...
-Ad Nauseum. What is the right... extent? to use it to?
This is kind of a cop-out answer, but you use it until you're done using it. You saw me get 5 cards with it in one of those goldfish games above. Sometimes you get 20. The answer will depend on a lot of factors, like:
1. How many cards can you afford to discard? Will your opponent likely hit you with gy hate?
2. How much life do you have?
3. How much life are you about to lose due to your opponent's board?
4. Are you playing against a control deck (where you want lots of cards) or are you not expecting much disruption (where you might not need so many)
5. Probably most importantly, did you draw cards that will give you a path to winning? Or are you not there yet?
As a rough guide, I'd say you usually draw between 4 and 25 cards with Ad Nauseam. Not super helpful, I know. But it's the truth.
- Snow Lands?
Tainted Pact needs this deck to be pure singleton. I like running a solid number of basics, though tundra and scrubland could probably replace the snows without much trouble.
-Personal Tutor and Insidious Dreams:
I have tested Insidious Dreams, and found it's combination of high mana cost and card disadvantage to be too much. There are only a handful of cards in this deck you actually want in the grave, and putting a bunch of cards on top of the deck is often too slow. It's not a terrible card, it jsut wasn't quite good enough.
Personal Tutor is not my favorite. I've run both Merchant Scroll and Mystical Teachings, both of which I thought were just ok. Teachings has the advantage of being a good intuition target, and scroll can grab counterspells and other useful protection, in addition to draw like fact or fiction. In the end, both were too weak imho.
- Subs for new Tez
Tez, Agent of Bolas is fairly untested as of right now, and though I think he'll be good, I don't see him as critical to this deck's functioning. I think JtMS would be ok, but I think even something like Dark Confidant or Phyrexian Arena might be even better because they can come out so fast. I encourage you to test out a few different options here.
- Why no Tunnel Vision
I see that card as an expensive bomb, and I felt like Necrologia and friends filled that spot better. Tunnel Vision is still strong, however, so in a less permission-control-heavy meta it might still be worth playing.
- Leyline + Helm
I want this deck to work in multiplayer foremost. Also, I don't really see the need for more combos, especially ones that aren't very synergistic with the rest of the deck. Still, test it and let me know.
- Grave Hate
See my bojuka comment above. My answer to grave hate (which hasn't been very prevalent at competitive events in my experience) is to use pithing needle and smart play. Still, Stifle or Trickbind are worthy meta calls. I also encourage you to think about Pull from Eternity and Leyline of Sanctity as other ways of dealing with gy hate. Pull can be tutored for after the fact (which is nice) and Leyline also stops Jester's Caps.
Whew. Hope that helped. Keep the comments and questions coming (even debate, if you like), and I'll try to answer as promptly as possible.
Best,
bitterroot
As for voltaic key i am never sad to see it, if you have it and a mana rock (besides signets/talisman) it is just absurd. I have been playing the deck since sharrum came out so i have a pretty good feel for it, key has been in the deck since i got mana vault, sol ring, and grim monolith for the deck (bout a year ago), so id say i have a decent amount of testing with it.
As far as the mom bell combo, it is perhaps a bit slower but both pieces are good on there own. Personally i think temple bell is pretty powerful (many will disagree) but always having access to one more card is sweet, especially when you tutor something to the top of your deck, and since we combo most games, unless the opponents draw gy hate or counters we are in good shape. Mind over matter is pretty bomby in my experience, it works well with mana rocks, taps down threats, gives you a discard outlet, can be used to untap lands in a pinch if you are a few mana short, the list goes on.... I will admit an eldrazi legend isnt the best card synergy wise for the deck, but i use kozilek...10 mana isnt very hard to get with this deck and drawing 4 cards and getting an awesome threat is well awesome...i can understand why you wouldnt want to use it but i thought i would at least defend it :)...i would cut the glassdust combo and something else for it personally since it can take down a whole table, but it depends on how useful you view temple bell and mom versus being able to cycle hulk. I used to play hulk but i found killing only one player to suck and he dies to removal pretty easily (although you do pack a decent amount of protection...idk if taking out one player is worth using the protection and using the sculpting steel combo...)
Just my thoughts
Sharuum the Hegemon
Mayael the Anima
Wort, Boggart Auntie
Sliver Overlord
Drana Kalastria Bloodchief
99 mountain Ashling
1. Riddlesmith
never happy seeing i draw the guy. Doesn't really give much anyway. Sometimes there are no artifact in hand and he just sits there...
2. Thopter Foundry and Sword of the Meek + Time Sieve is awesome and helps you recover from damage from necrologia and necropotence. Thopter assembly is good too, but without lifegain
3. Glassdust Hulk
NEVER LIKE HIM. Why him? Cycling ability is not that nice too. Can only kill an opponent. But he can wipe the table given the infinite combo. But usually, killing by thopters alone is enough
4. Tezzeret, Agent of Bolas
I kinda have mixed feeling about the guy. Sometimes he gives me good stuff, sometimes he doesn't. Sometimes, i don't really wanna put all of the cards at the bottom, cause i find two or three utility cards that i want. I don't know, can't decide
Well, about the primary combo, i really found it hard to find bitter ordeal. Not that hard, but not as easy as sculpting steel, lotus bloom, etc etc, (artifact combos). I suggest you add more transmute cards such as perplex and dimir machinations to smoothen the combos.
and yes necrologia/tainted pact/necropotence is deadly enough that most of the time it can win you a game.
that's it for my playtesting
When you go infinite with sharuum, you draw into all the counters in your deck, then mill everyone else (just to be safe if anyone is untapped). It's less deadly than other enchants too so it can usually live for a turn or two after being played before they hate it out.
UWBSharuum the HegemonBWU
UAzami, Lady of ScrollsU
UGMomir Vig, Simic VisionaryGU
GAzusa, Lost but SeekingG
GUEdric, Spymaster of TrestGU
I dunno though, might not be worth the risk if you don't find yourself in a lot of win-or-die situations.
I think you make a compelling point. I will test this card.
Entomb is great, probably yawgmoth will is kinda "meehh" but that is just out of 1 play-testing and straight to competition.