MTG Salvation

I like the changes so far. Had a couple of interesting games on Friday:

• Narset, Enlightened Master went crazy early and finished their turn with a Karn Liberated at 14. On my turn, used Catch to restart the game. Narset proceeded to lose the following game quickly.
• Finally had the chance to use the Precursor Golem combo after getting Traumatized and still having the pieces in my hand and library and drawing a ton of cards to get to it.

A cool potential add, while not turning any permanent into a creature/golem, Shields of Velis Vel (along with Blades and Wings of Velis Vel) could possibly do some cool things.

Altar of the Brood will mill with the Sakashima loop. Eldrazi would mess the loop up without Rest in Peace though. Good source of incidental mill otherwise.

For the other discard outlet, Nahiri’s Wrath would probably be my go-to. Possibly add Urborg, Tomb of Yawgmoth and Kormus Bell for the feel bad jank to avoid interaction. Those don’t add value elsewhere unless you want to run something like Karma to support it as well.

Oh, I'm jealous! I've stolen planewalkers prepped to ult before, but I've never ulted a Karn. That's sweet!

I've thought about the Velis Vel cards. Blades of Velis Vel would be the likely pick as it plays with Precursor Golem in 2 ways (making things golems but also I can pick one golem target and make my golems all bigger) but also make creatures bigger for Warstorm Surge, and Vanish Into Memory. I was thinking of them recently too because having a tribal spell for Aminatou's Augury would be neat.

Incidental mill doesn't do much for me. Something old and weird like Kyren Negotiations would be better at just ending the game, but ideally I'd like a card that does more than just end the game. I was looking at Soulherder from MH1 as something that both acts as a 4th card and potentially gives me incremental value with my etb creatures, but in testing it was a dead card as often as most combo pieces are while also not ending the game in the combo it was chosen for. The most fun I've had with things that trigger off of infinite Sakashima Sphere have been the constellation spells, Skybind and Forgeborn Oreads. The red one pings everyone to death in the combo, but also can situationally ping away creatures and plaenswalkers over the course of the game or draw cards with Swans. Also, kinda interesting with Mirrorweave is a plus. "whenever an enchantment enters the battlefield under your control, destroy target creature for each 2 creatures you control." Skybind doesn't even approach being good as that fourth combo piece, it exiles any number of permanents until end of turn, but it's just a fun card to begin with. I'm fairly hopeful they'll revisit constellation at some point and maybe throw more options my way.

Masterful Replication - golem galore, i guess.

I am not sure if this deck can support the CMC of this thing or has a want for it but it is the first thread I thought of when seeing it

Quote from rogerandover »

Masterful Replication - golem galore, i guess.

Meh. I like that it's an instant, but 6 mana is a lot for either one Precursor Golem etb or Mirrorweave for artifacts. If it could do both, if it could target or effect other people's artifacts, if it laste longer than end of turn, if it cost less than six... there's a lot of ways to make me like this card, but I don't really like it as is.

Quote from Taleran »

I am not sure if this deck can support the CMC of this thing or has a want for it but it is the first thread I thought of when seeing it

When has cmc ever stopped me? I unapologetically play 7 and 8 drops! A flickerable Confiscate that might Mirrorweaveably draw cards is interesting at the very least, but all things considered, the card that looks most fun to me is the Jeskai Ascendancy bird you put in your signature. That has me pondering all sorts of things.

I put the changes from post #462 into the front post, and did a little bit of cleaning there. I'm comfortable enough with those changes to post them up. I have more radical ideas in the works, but considering the likelihood of site migration soon, I'm not looking to cut any of the sacred cows here.

I playtested like a half dozen cards from Modern Horizons. Despite all the jokes of it being edh horizons, it turns out it wasn't that edh exciting for me. Things like Urza and the splice spells are just huge mana sinks that this deck can't manage and are very lackluster if you don't spend into them (except for maybe Mirrorweaving Urza's construct, but even that is suspect if other people have lots of creatures). Of the bloaty mana-sinks, the one that actually performed best, believe it or not, was Throes of Chaos. I've paid close attention to both cascade spells and retrace spells for this deck over the years because they are ways to abuse cast triggers effectively, but none have ever stuck. This card has both keywords, so I was obligated to try it even if my hopes were low. All of Zedruu's interesting things are at 4+ mana, than Throes only grabs 3 or less. But having actually tried, that's sort of perfect, it's like turboing out early game build up. Of the 28 hits, 9 draw cards or set up zedruu to draw cards, 6 make mana, 9 interact with opponents. And in my games playing with it, it was good after something like Nevinyrral's Disk to rebuild the whole early game. And it was outstanding with Eye of the Storm, both occasions I got it into Eye, I proceeded to cast every spell that cost 3 or less from the deck (and won one of the games!). That's the only recent card I would consider wedging in here.

And a couple minor tweaks that have been in the back of my mind for a while: Ephemeral Shields is unnecessary to combo kill with Arcbond, Precursor Golem, a clone, Jeskai Charm, and Arcbond can hit everyone for 44+ without being infinite, and that's just fine. The only reason I haven't cut it yet is because being able to convoke away the mana cost of an instant for Eye of the Storm has been clutch a few times. But there are other free spells out there that would be more versatile, and good Clones that would preserve the combo potential. So those are some possible direct swaps. And then Rest in Peace is kind of iconic, but I've gotten very good at doing Mirror of Fate without it, and there are so many alternative cards that can exile a card out of my graveyard at instant speed that are more proactive than the blanket answer.I don't really need to use the most textbook example of Mirror of Fate looping when there are weirder options.

Edit: While I don't care about the instant that makes golems in M20, I do care about the golems. I've been using Theros enchantment golems as my golem tokens because the mismatched type line bothers me less than New Phyrexia pointy golem art, but the new ones look great and I intend to collect like 10 of them.

Quote from tstorm823 »

Lastly, some things that I wish I had in this deck, but mostly just don't exist the way I want them to.

4) An interesting fog effect at 1 or 2 mana. There are interesting 4 mana fogs, but then you're paying full price for the extra turn you bought.

Hey there tstorm823,

I am a really long-time "lurker" of your thread, and finally, I can maybe contribute !

For your interesting fog effect that you were looking for, I think that Dawn Charm could pretty fit the bill, no ?
Fog, regen Zedruu and the unusual counterspell that could come in handy sometimes ?

Thank you very much for your awesome decklist and description that ia a real pleasure to read.

Why do you not like the original Scars of Mirrodin Golem?

Quote from Pakito »

Hey there tstorm823,

I am a really long-time "lurker" of your thread, and finally, I can maybe contribute !

For your interesting fog effect that you were looking for, I think that Dawn Charm could pretty fit the bill, no ?
Fog, regen Zedruu and the unusual counterspell that could come in handy sometimes ?

Thank you very much for your awesome decklist and description that ia a real pleasure to read.

Thank you for the kind words. As a fan of fogs over the years, I honestly think Dawn Charm was in Zedruu at some point a long time ago. It does have fun modes, the regenerate clause could replace the Ephemeral Shields protection I've deemed replaceable, and counter a spell that targets me is so narrow as to be exciting on the rare occasion it's relevant. But like, that's just how charms work, they sucker you in with options. When I'm imagining interesting Fogs, I'm imagining things like Blaze of Glory. Not really a fog exactly, but it mostly blanks a combat in a cool way that can be exploited by the right deck. Just not really this deck. Or Comeuppance is one of my favorite cards, and not just for the name, but sitting around with 4 mana open hoping for people to attack me isn't great strategy here. Reins of Power is another weird card, you can cast during combat to remove everything from combat, but it also can serve as a win condition sometimes. But again, 4 mana instants are good like that. But like, imagine something goofy like "RW instant, Prevent all combat damage, add R for each attacking creature. Or like, imagine a card that gave you the Swans of Bryn Argoll ability for a turn. That could cost less than 4 and be both wonderful and hilarious.I'm probably hoping for too much, but I'm greedy like that.

Quote from KissMyAssassin »

Why do you not like the original Scars of Mirrodin Golem?

Cause all the golem tokens from that block are really angry and metallic (the 9/9's not terrible), and that's not my image of golems. To me, golems are earthy, like rocks or ceramics, and they're not emotional actors. Like, check out Chippy's art from Precursor Golem, they're big stone-faced Karn-looking things, bouldering along. Not shrieking death robots.

Do you at least have a pile of Precursors to use as your Precursor tokens? I don't mind the SoM tokens since they are metallic and look fresh from the forge (like from Golem Foundry). Cardamajigs also often has great tokens, especially for stuff like Hippos.

I actually do have a playset of Precursor Golems now that you mention it. If I wanted to go off brand for my tokens, I think the winning move is to get a bunch of Golem pokemon cards.

Quote from tstorm823 »

I actually do have a playset of Precursor Golems now that you mention it. If I wanted to go off brand for my tokens, I think the winning move is to get a bunch of Golem pokemon cards.

Here's the OG version.

Oh man, they're less than $1 too.

Can you think of any fun stuff to use with the newly unbanned Painter’s Servant? It doesn’t seem to do much with the current build, but possibly opens up new avenues?

Quote from rmelzer1986 »

Can you think of any fun stuff to use with the newly unbanned Painter’s Servant? It doesn’t seem to do much with the current build, but possibly opens up new avenues?

Painter's Servant is super neat, I fully intend to play it somewhere in one of my decks, but probably not here. It does, I believe, literally nothing at the moment.

If you were so inclined to make Painter's Servant a Zedruu card, I'd like to see 5 or 6 colors matter cards worth playing on their own. Dream Halls for sure would be fun. Off the top of my head, color lords would work and are already acceptable just as Mirrorweave targets, so something like Grand Architect. The cards from Ravnica with radiance might have something. Tibor and Lumia could be worthwhile (too bad Swans has flying). I hate to ever consider Grand Arbiter Augustin IV, but 1-2 mana discount on every spell could be nutty. Circles of Protection are neat sometimes. I'm sure there are gems waiting to be found.

I've begun migrating this thread over to MTGNexus, making it more detailed and prettier than ever. I've got a text document saved with notes of suggestions made in this thread so I can eventually port over a lot of that discussion value.

I have every intention of continuing to check up over here if anyone comments on this thread, but if the future is anything like today as far as salvation working, that may not always be an option.

Long time lurker, wanted to contribute my own riff off your beautiful, beautiful deck.

I dropped red and incorporated a lot of your combos and inspiration into a Hanna, Ship's Navigator deck. I was part of a "competitive" EDH scene way back in 2010-2011, and I ran Hanna as my general, so this list is an homage to that original list.

https://archidekt.com/decks/187578#Hanna's_Moonage_Daydream

I have your Mirror of Fate lines and the Eye of the Storm lines, and I am experimenting with Azor's Gateway as well.

The big tech I'm excited for is the new C19 card, Sudden Substitution. In my opinion, this card is absolutely insane. The floor is swapping a Preordain for your opponent's best creature, and the ceiling is literally defeating someone by "donating" an Intervention Pact or Enduring Ideal. I also threw in enough "copy target spell" effects to use Enduring Ideal as a win-con. If I copy it once, I can tutor out a hard lock (Solemnity + Decree of Silence) and some pillow-fort, and then win the game with Dovescape later on.

Anyways, I appreciate your seemingly bottomless knowledge of corner-case rules knowledge and fringe interactions. It's become a beloved deck in my meta, because the games always end up weird.

Thank you!

Sudden Substitution is getting a chance in here. As far as corner cases and fringe interactions, I think this card is more complex than some entire decks I've played. I haven't had enough experience with it yet to gauge the power in my deck, but the intrigue level is off the charts. Being able to trade like a Howling Mine on the stack with a creature in play seems pretty alright. And even better than trading a preordain, I can trade things like Firestorm or Nahiri's Wrath with no targets, or Pentad Prism cast with colorless mana. Or Chrome Mox lets them ramp, but they have to put the card in, and I get split second Naturalize-proof Control Magic.

Split second is already a weird mechanic that have some fringe benefit with Eye of the Storm or Knowledge Pool. Just being able to say "no, I get to use these, stay out for a second is sweet. Then with Thousand-Year Storm out, you can do some creative stacking of triggers to effectively give the spells in the Eye split second (you have to cast the split second spell out of eye last, but then all the spells trigger TYS anyway and you get all the storm copies with split second still on the stack, and then use the copies of Sudden Substitution on the originals cast out of Eye of the Storm and take control of a bunch of creatures. Then if you're like 6 levels deep on shenanigans, you can do things like cast a spell with Sudden Substitution already in Knowledge Pool, then respond to your own spell with another, cast Sudden Substitution out of the pool to steal a creature and give them the first spell, then resolve the original Knowledge Pool trigger to exile the spell anyway.

Precursor Golem is kind of interesting with it. It doesn't trigger the golem, but I can trade 1/3 of my Precursor for a noncreature spell, or trade like 1/3 of an Arcbond for their creature. And while I'm not playing any cards that lose the game at the moment, I can do really fringe things like kill every creature except an Inferno Titan, pump it to 100 power, and then donate a Vanish Into Memory to someone.

But even more thought provoking than all of those interactions with other cards in the deck is the fact that you don't have to control either target. You can use this spell to donate people each other's creatures, or use it as a political redirect on targeted removal. Without playing anything yourself, Sudden Substitution can be killer disruption just by rearranging people's pieces. Things like taking the commander from the player with no other creatures and swapping it for another player's Earthcraft on the stack. With split second. This card is going to be really hard to play optimally, but it's gonna make some sweet blowouts sometimes.

Congrats on the deckbuild! Zedruu was my first commander, and it has had quite a few iterations throughout the years. I was wondering if you've tried homeward path in your deck. It works well with Starke of Rath and a couple of other creatures that exchange as a result of an activated ability. Also, since you are drawing so many cards, Wild Research might be useful to make sure you can draw what you need. My version of the deck is more of a exchange / control version, but I like some of your ideas.

A while back you posted a Mathas, Fiend Seeker deck that I thought was pretty cool. Did you ever update that?

Sorry I missed these two comments for so long. I've been checking in occasionally on mtgsalvation, but apparently I'm no longer notified of posts in this thread.

Quote from Arctanis8 »

Congrats on the deckbuild! Zedruu was my first commander, and it has had quite a few iterations throughout the years. I was wondering if you've tried homeward path in your deck. It works well with Starke of Rath and a couple of other creatures that exchange as a result of an activated ability. Also, since you are drawing so many cards, Wild Research might be useful to make sure you can draw what you need. My version of the deck is more of a exchange / control version, but I like some of your ideas.

I have not considered Homeward Path, as I prefer not to be donating creatures in the first place due to fragility. But I have been with Sudden Substitution, so maybe it's worth a test run. I don't see myself moving towards much more theft than that though.

Quote from Bashrag »

A while back you posted a Mathas, Fiend Seeker deck that I thought was pretty cool. Did you ever update that?

I update that as more cards to give people tokens come out, but I'm not gonna pretend I put a lot of thought into that process. Flipping through it just now, it looks like the recently printed changes are Generous Gift, Massacre Girl, and Chandra, Awakened Inferno, and I picked up a Dousing Dagger that I just didn't own before.

I built Zedruu awhile back as a pure chaos deck. Didn't go over well, everyone hated playing against that. Got the need to play a chaos deck out of my system, though. Since then, I completely rebuilt it as a much more traditional donation deck. It's fun for both me and my opponents, but not very strong. It's a good deck for political multiplayer games, but it just can't keep up with certain strategies sometimes. That's okay though, having fun is more important than winning.

Some pet cards I recommend that I run in my version:
Nevermore - This card can get you a lot of hate if you name a commander, which sometimes is just a necessary evil to keep things under control, but I usually find it a godsend for preventing things like Bane of Progress in particular from being cast.
Frenzied Fugue - It's a cute card that doesn't bother my opponents, but it's quite strong.
Fractured Identity - There are so many crazy plays this can lead to. Super fun.
Show and Tell - A pet card with high risk but high fun factor.
Divergent Transformations - My Zedruu strategy involves helping my opponents while keeping myself safe in my pillowfort. This gets rid of problem creatures that might attack me at instant speed while replacing the reduced boardstate so I can still try to steal the entire board later with cards like Mob Rule or Insurrection.