MTG Salvation

Cataclysm is good anti-planeswalker tech, although it is kind of mass land destruction too if that's frowned upon in your group.

Song of the Dryads and Oblivion Ring are good single-card answers. Throw in a Vesuva with SotD for fun

Vindicate or Anguished Unmaking of course are good answers for anything.

Phyrexian Revoker or Pithing Needle are cheap answers to planeswalkers also.

Hex Parasite is kind of similar to the hexmage.

I'm currently building my abzan boonweaver list, but I'm not sure if I'll run Karador or Tymna + Sidar. Do you have your list somewhere online @gma? OP hasn't been updated for ages...

Any thoughts on Prowling Serpopard? I'm going to test it since it can't be countered itself.

Never been particularly concerned about my creatures getting countered, so not even slightly on my radar.

My current list is here: http://tappedout.net/mtg-decks/karador-ghost-chief-what-is-dead-may-never-die/

Shred Memory has been an all-star lately. It's either Survival of the Fittest #2 or it totally blanks other GY combos. Very underrated in some metas.

How has Renegade Rallier been for you? Also is Arbor Elf worth it if I don't have any ABUR duals? I have all 9 fetches and other lands but no duals.

Rallier has actually been great for me as a mini-Sun Titan and combo piece. I play in a slightly less competitive meta, so its added utility of grabbing back a fetch and ramping me (or getting back a clutch hate bear) has been consistently pretty good. Arbor Elf got cut form my deck as the least consistent of my available mana dorks.

So... Protean Hulk?

What would hulk even do in this sort of list? Rallier + Saffi + Viscera Seer?

Quote from akroma44 »

What would hulk even do in this sort of list? Rallier + Saffi + Viscera Seer?

Devoted Druid + Quillspike/Vizier of Remedies+Walking Ballista aka all bad cards

Protean Hulk is almost strictly better than Boonweaver Giant. It can do all the same loops with more flexibility. You don't even need a free sac outlet to get started! You can just sac it to whatever effect, get Karmic Guide and Viscera Seer, and go from there. The only thing it can't do is search up creatures with CMC greater than six.

Quote from akroma44 »

What would hulk even do in this sort of list? Rallier + Saffi + Viscera Seer?

hulk w/ sac outlet on board:

sac hulk, get karmic guide + cutthroat
karmic guide brings back hulk, sac hulk for reveillark + whatever
sac guide, sac cutthroat, sac reveillark, bring back guide and cutthroat reanimating reveillark, repeat?

Oh man this is insane. Hulk seems to be completely better than Boon! By now the list has no creatures with CMC 7 or greater (except Boon). If we replace Hulk for Boon we get the same combo except we don't have to worry about the small frame of priority when Pattern in on the stack and the target gets killed.

We could potentially remove Pattern to free up a slot, though I think it works as a second win con.

Super good man, super good.

Do you ever miss Saffi Eriksdotter or Sun Titan? Sun Titan costs 6 so I can definitely see cutting him but Saffi is nice at 2 mana. After looking at bringing in Protean Hulk I decided on Saffi Eriksdotter over Fiend Hunter for the lower cmc and being able to work with Reveillark and Karmic Guide.

Any thoughts on Zulaport Cutthroat as redundancy or replacement for Blood Artist a way around hexproof/shroud?

I updated my list replacing Boonweaver Giant with Protean Hulk and added in Summoner's Pact and Natural Order.

If a card is in your Reveillark-Hulk combo deck because it wins you the game when you combo out, it's a bad card. You get Guide=>Lark=>Saffi+stuff and you can just shred their hands with Tidehollow Sculler, have arbitrary amounts of: Hulk triggers, life, reanimates, Regrowths. You likely also have access to disenchants/acidicslimes, edicts, draw, and either infinite green mana or infinite mana of any color and thus repeat application of any spell in your deck. Maybe arbitrary amounts of targeted damage and definitely power on a creature attacking at an empty board the next turn as well. If you cannot win the game from that kind of position I question wtf you're doing or what kind of eldritch sorcery the opponent is employing that he can't be made helpless.

Just pick cards that have a use outside of the combo. You can cobble together all manner of insane Goldberg machines with these kinds of decks, and those solve just about anything just in an unnecessarily complicated way.

Personally, I'm going to keep Boonweaver in my list instead of replacing it with hulk, with the rationale that Hulk grabbing Grand Abolisher + Academy Rector lets you beat grave hate that comes in the form of Relic, Scooze, Tormod's Crypt etc. I'm also in agreement that a card that only facilitates a win is useless, but I'm keeping in Zulaport Cutthroat due to the fact that having access to a win condition out of incidental combos such as Saffi + Loyal Retainers, Fiend Hunter/Saffi + Sun Titan, etc. is fairly valuable.

That said, I think I'm going to be moving away from Karador to a UG/BW Partner list for Hulk combo, as blue has a bunch of useful tools if you're focused entirely on the combo. Karador probably still grinds better though, so I'd say it comes down to what you're playing against on a regular basis.

It was unbanned a few weeks ago and Leovold, Emissary of Trest was banned.

The rules and bannings of EDH are run independently from Wizards.
The official site is the "Official Commander Rules" website
http://mtgcommander.net/rules.php

Once in a blue moon Wizards updates their lists of banned cards based on the list found in this website.

I currently do not have my list online but here's a link a gma's list (which I hope he doesn't mind me sharing... lmk).
https://deckbox.org/sets/1525046
The list does have Entomb and Survival. Birthing Pod was a cut a while ago due to being slower, narrower, and more revealing than other tutors. Its still a good card so by all means try it

Quote from VenocStorm »

Personally, I'm going to keep Boonweaver in my list instead of replacing it with hulk, with the rationale that Hulk grabbing Grand Abolisher + Academy Rector lets you beat grave hate that comes in the form of Relic, Scooze, Tormod's Crypt etc. I'm also in agreement that a card that only facilitates a win is useless, but I'm keeping in Zulaport Cutthroat due to the fact that having access to a win condition out of incidental combos such as Saffi + Loyal Retainers, Fiend Hunter/Saffi + Sun Titan, etc. is fairly valuable.

That said, I think I'm going to be moving away from Karador to a UG/BW Partner list for Hulk combo, as blue has a bunch of useful tools if you're focused entirely on the combo. Karador probably still grinds better though, so I'd say it comes down to what you're playing against on a regular basis.

Yeah the Partner commanders seem like a decent idea. Some have nicely grindy abilities and better casting costs, too, and I find myself missing Phyrexian Metamorph from playing Pattern-Rector in German Highlander. That card is a house.

Has anyone even looked at Gate to the Afterlife?
I know we have Haruspex and a few other draw engines, but this one does something that as far as I recall others can't: Ditch things into the graveyard for easier access. There have been a few times where I had infinite draw, but couldn't do anything with it cuz everything was in my hand.
It's obviously not a replacement for Haruspex since it's not a creature, but it definitely deserves a fair run, don't you guys agree?

Quote from seriph0 »

Has anyone even looked at Gate to the Afterlife?
I know we have Haruspex and a few other draw engines, but this one does something that as far as I recall others can't: Ditch things into the graveyard for easier access. There have been a few times where I had infinite draw, but couldn't do anything with it cuz everything was in my hand.
It's obviously not a replacement for Haruspex since it's not a creature, but it definitely deserves a fair run, don't you guys agree?

You usually solve that by passing, discarding down to 7 and going off again on their upkeep.

Only problem is that they get to untap and possibly have an answer for you.

I absolutely love this deck list and how you've explained it. Recently I've been looking into playing more combo/control because my play group is starting the arms race again, while I can hold my own fairly well, I don't want to be left in the dust by everyone. This list seems to be what I have been looking for. Do you have any tips for possibly making this a little more budget friendly? I know EDH can be a very expensive format but I honestly am not 100% comfortable with the price of Scrubland and Savannah currently. Are there any other cards that you would recommend running that would still be a bit competitive but not break the bank?

Landwise, you can run more basics or more of other duos. I would suggest the battle lands since they are tutorable, or the cycle lands. There are definitely budget alternatives for lands except for Gaea's Cradle, that card is insane and does amazing 90% of the time.

The deck works by using hate bears to slow the game and tutors to get what you need. Tutors are usually expensive so I would suggest getting other hate bears to give yourself more time to get the cards you need or more draw to get more chances to draw what you need.

I would say if you have a low budget at least get academy rector and survival of the fittest. Those are decently priced among the expensive cards and are very powerful. They are truly irreplaceable

Living plane can be replaced by Nature's Revolt.

The list already uses the fastest, cheapest (mana) cards. I would suggest taking the expensive cards you dont want to buy and searching for their key words in other cards. You will find alternatives that cost 1 or 2 more mana or have a weird restriction.

The good thing about this deck is that the actually combo pieces are dirt cheap, so you can play the deck in a slightly less powerful version for a lot less money

Thanks for advice! I'll have to keep those in mind. The biggest issue I'm currently running into is the arms race in my play group. I'm currently competing with my husband's Tasigur deck, a control/stax player, a couple newcomers who I'm not sure on what to expect. I am pulling cards from other decks I have and completely cannibalizing the lands from my old bant deck. I got really lucky with my husband who has been playing for so long that I have access to a lot of great cards, like Gaea's Cradle, and sometimes uses my decks as an excuse to upgrade his cards.

I've been seeing leonin relic-warder and tainted pact in the newer lists of cobblepott and others. Can someone explain to me why these are all the sudden included over some of the older options? Also has anyone been using heliods pilgrim, I've been finding him very useful to tutor up pattern and the re-animation auras.