Since the new mechanic afterlife was spoiled I know I wanted to build a deck around it, so began to brew and built a pile that I'm refining since more than a month.
First of all I'm going to post my list and after that I'll give you the explanation for some choices and ask for help about some doubts I have with the current build. Take into account that although the list have some aristocrats in there, this is not a usual aristocrats deck and I don't want to transform it into one of them. I'm not usingblood artist, zulaport cuttrhoat or Judith, scourge divaand don't want to play them here also, so please don't make suggestions about that line or trying to change the direction of the deck. I'm trying to build a deck that makes the removal of the opponent almost useless, swarm the board with difficult to block creatures and win with incremental advantage or alpha-strikes.
With this list I've been capable of win consistently all aggro and tempo decks I've faced and some others too. I've won in my testings: Cremator deck, Caleb shamans, Saffron Wizards, merfolks, naya, monoblack and rakdos,... so happy with it but also have more cards than I wanted to so I also have to cut some of them so I ask for your help here too.
The goal of the deck is making removal from the opponent useless because all creatures provide some benefit when dying in form of replacing itself or being indestructible/ protected so removal becomes worse and worse (even mass removal).
Because almost all creatures are humans, Xathrid Necromancer becomes a powerhouse because you sac a witness with any aristocrat (cartel or pontiff or teysa) and you gain two tokens (a zombie and a human (or spirit)).
Also all the afterlife creatures are expendable but also having some other nice uses (like enforcer which serves as removal). Also because they create a black and white spirit you can sac the spirit to teysa and gain another white spirit for free so you can see how much value you can get wiht this chains.
Because the aristocrats cards shave some built -in protection and because spirits flies, when you cast any pump permanent the game becomes much easier to close. Because of that Honor of the pure HOTP and Marshal are there.
In my testings all cards serves a purpose and they are performing really good but I have to cut 10 cards (at least) from the list so I need your help on this.
Also I think the pumpers can be improved. I'm not very sold in HOTP because don't pump all my creatures (most of them, yes, but necromacers, zombie tokens and enforcers doesn't benefit from it). I've though on intangible virtue but is worse much of the time because only pumps tokens. The marshal does what I want but is a 3 CC card and easily removable (you usually only get a zombie from it) so I need to find a good pumper that is cheap (in CC) and durable. I'm thinking on Sorin, Lord of innistrad because the emblem, but is not cheap (cost 4), so not sure on it.
Also I need to cut cards, but again I'm very happy with most of them so not sure what to cut. The good thing is that once the deck is rolling, is very difficult to stop it. It's also cheap in CC.
Some cards I've tested but didn't worked or underperformed:
The visitation was really slow, and when comes into play you usually have the borard full of tokens but not lot of producers. Same happens with teysa, 4 CC is hard and the effects come too late and not imppressive.
Path is not needed and we don't want to give speed to opponents
Legion's landing usually doesn't flip soon enough to be relevant
Cards That I tested but right now they not work as expected
Champion produces some humans and have an interesting synergy with Xathrid necromancer. Also the deck plays lot of WB creatures, but the problem is that he is easily killable without any benefit and using more monocolored cards make the deck weak (because Teysa need as much WB creatures as you can afford, and you know, teysa, orzhov scion is a powerhouse)
Tithe Taker is monocolored, so has the same problem than above. Because of that I replaced it with imperious oligarch (which doesn't tax but being WB and having vigilance lets you attack and defend on the spot)
Cards I want to test: Blasting Station: Is a removal and a sac outlet, all in one.Also can combo nicely with High priest of penance Gravecrawler: The bad thing is that the deck only has the zombies we can make with necromancer, but combos nicely with station (see above). Also the good thing is that gravecrawler + station + teysa + any other zombie = do as much damage as B you can pay and create as many spirits with flying also. Loyal Cathar: is another expendable creature that provides a zombie if we want to play gravecrawler. Doomed Dissenter: See above
So I really need your help here. Any suggestion or help is really appreciated.
Lot of thanks for answering!!! I really would like this deck could go on!!
Bad moon could be a good option. The problem is that it doesn't pump all the white spirits the deck produce (most of them created with teysa, but also with travler and witness) so this is a bit dissapointing :(. Anyways it pumps main creatures and zombies so I have to test it. Also I'm thinking on including Bloodsoaked champion in the deck because it has synergy with Teysa, Athreos and Necromancer (after attacking we can sac it and create a 2/2 zombie (necromancer), a 1/1 flying spirit (teysa) and even come again from B instead of 1B (Athreos), and we can do it multiple times!!). Also bad moon pumps him so he can be even better. Also if I include champion I would include a single copy of blasting station for more fun!!!
I'm very happy with this list and has lot of synergy and mini-combos between his parts.
I've removed the afterlife creatures because also providing two bodies is something I'm having with my 1CC drops and although black/white creatures are superb, not having anthems (which I also removed because the slow the deck and are not so good) make them less useful. Instead I'm playing hero which give us lot of human tokens that also gave us zombies with necromancer which is bonkers. Also the bloodshoakes give us zombies so there were some games which i finished by beating with an horde of 8-9 angry zombies
Anyways there are some points I would like to improve.
First of all I need a way to deal damage to high priest of penance so I can remove problematic permanents when needed. If opponents attack is a great blocker but I need a way to exploit him. I would need that:
1) would be a permament, preferably a human and preferably multicolored. The options I have right now are murderous redcap and icatian javalineers but both of them are clunky. I would like to stay in colors also. I have blasting station for this right now but not very sold on it yet.
2) I need some replacement to tragic slip. There were some games where I need a cheap removal that exiles also. PTE is an option but I would prefer aa multicolored cheap removal. I'm thinking on unmake but ...
3) I would like to have more WB useful humans but seems that there is no more of them. I'm using pontiff and although it's a great blocker, I would love him being a human
Still testing the deck with some success. I've played recently against other decks (fmn level, not really tier1 decks), but anyways very satisfied although I still think it can be improved a lot (also being possible to cut some cards). I've faced Naya allies (win 2-1), elves (win 2-0), naya zoo (win 2-0), cremator deck (win 2-1) so as I said happy it the performance
Since the new mechanic afterlife was spoiled I know I wanted to build a deck around it, so began to brew and built a pile that I'm refining since more than a month.
First of all I'm going to post my list and after that I'll give you the explanation for some choices and ask for help about some doubts I have with the current build. Take into account that although the list have some aristocrats in there, this is not a usual aristocrats deck and I don't want to transform it into one of them. I'm not using blood artist, zulaport cuttrhoat or Judith, scourge diva and don't want to play them here also, so please don't make suggestions about that line or trying to change the direction of the deck. I'm trying to build a deck that makes the removal of the opponent almost useless, swarm the board with difficult to block creatures and win with incremental advantage or alpha-strikes.
With this list I've been capable of win consistently all aggro and tempo decks I've faced and some others too. I've won in my testings: Cremator deck, Caleb shamans, Saffron Wizards, merfolks, naya, monoblack and rakdos,... so happy with it but also have more cards than I wanted to so I also have to cut some of them so I ask for your help here too.
Without more preambles, my list:
4 Doomed Traveler
4 Pitiless Pontiff
4 Cartel Aristocrat
4 High priest of penance
4 imperious oligarch
4 Orzhov Enforcer
4 Xathrid Necromancer
4 Benalish Marshal
3 Teysa, Orzhov Scion
2 Athreos, God of passage
2 Zealous Persecution
4 Honor of the Pure
1 Urborg, Tomb of yawgmoth's
4 Isolated Chapel
4 Concealed Courtyard
4 Godless Shrine
1 Vault of the Archangel
1 Cavern of Souls
5 Plains
3 Swamp
Now explanations and card choices:
The goal of the deck is making removal from the opponent useless because all creatures provide some benefit when dying in form of replacing itself or being indestructible/ protected so removal becomes worse and worse (even mass removal).
Because almost all creatures are humans, Xathrid Necromancer becomes a powerhouse because you sac a witness with any aristocrat (cartel or pontiff or teysa) and you gain two tokens (a zombie and a human (or spirit)).
Also all the afterlife creatures are expendable but also having some other nice uses (like enforcer which serves as removal). Also because they create a black and white spirit you can sac the spirit to teysa and gain another white spirit for free so you can see how much value you can get wiht this chains.
Because the aristocrats cards shave some built -in protection and because spirits flies, when you cast any pump permanent the game becomes much easier to close. Because of that Honor of the pure HOTP and Marshal are there.
The deck can be split in four parts:
1) The expendables:
2) The Aristocrats (predators)
3) The pumpers
4) Utility/Removal
In my testings all cards serves a purpose and they are performing really good but I have to cut 10 cards (at least) from the list so I need your help on this.
Also I think the pumpers can be improved. I'm not very sold in HOTP because don't pump all my creatures (most of them, yes, but necromacers, zombie tokens and enforcers doesn't benefit from it). I've though on intangible virtue but is worse much of the time because only pumps tokens. The marshal does what I want but is a 3 CC card and easily removable (you usually only get a zombie from it) so I need to find a good pumper that is cheap (in CC) and durable. I'm thinking on Sorin, Lord of innistrad because the emblem, but is not cheap (cost 4), so not sure on it.
Also I need to cut cards, but again I'm very happy with most of them so not sure what to cut. The good thing is that once the deck is rolling, is very difficult to stop it. It's also cheap in CC.
Some cards I've tested but didn't worked or underperformed:
The visitation was really slow, and when comes into play you usually have the borard full of tokens but not lot of producers. Same happens with teysa, 4 CC is hard and the effects come too late and not imppressive.
Path is not needed and we don't want to give speed to opponents
Legion's landing usually doesn't flip soon enough to be relevant
Cards That I tested but right now they not work as expected
Champion produces some humans and have an interesting synergy with Xathrid necromancer. Also the deck plays lot of WB creatures, but the problem is that he is easily killable without any benefit and using more monocolored cards make the deck weak (because Teysa need as much WB creatures as you can afford, and you know, teysa, orzhov scion is a powerhouse)
Tithe Taker is monocolored, so has the same problem than above. Because of that I replaced it with imperious oligarch (which doesn't tax but being WB and having vigilance lets you attack and defend on the spot)
Cards I want to test:
Blasting Station: Is a removal and a sac outlet, all in one.Also can combo nicely with High priest of penance
Gravecrawler: The bad thing is that the deck only has the zombies we can make with necromancer, but combos nicely with station (see above). Also the good thing is that gravecrawler + station + teysa + any other zombie = do as much damage as B you can pay and create as many spirits with flying also.
Loyal Cathar: is another expendable creature that provides a zombie if we want to play gravecrawler.
Doomed Dissenter: See above
So I really need your help here. Any suggestion or help is really appreciated.
Lot of thanks!!
Bad moon could be a good option. The problem is that it doesn't pump all the white spirits the deck produce (most of them created with teysa, but also with travler and witness) so this is a bit dissapointing :(. Anyways it pumps main creatures and zombies so I have to test it. Also I'm thinking on including Bloodsoaked champion in the deck because it has synergy with Teysa, Athreos and Necromancer (after attacking we can sac it and create a 2/2 zombie (necromancer), a 1/1 flying spirit (teysa) and even come again from B instead of 1B (Athreos), and we can do it multiple times!!). Also bad moon pumps him so he can be even better. Also if I include champion I would include a single copy of blasting station for more fun!!!
So I'm going to test the following list:
4 Doomed Traveler
3 Pitiless Pontiff
4 Cartel Aristocrat
4 High priest of penance
4 imperious oligarch
4 Orzhov Enforcer
4 Xathrid Necromancer
3 Teysa, Orzhov Scion
1 Athreos, God of passage
1 Sorin, Lord of Innistrad
2 Zealous Persecution
3 Honor of the Pure
3 Bad Moon
1 Blasting station
1 Urborg, Tomb of yawgmoth's
4 Isolated Chapel
4 Concealed Courtyard
4 Godless Shrine
1 Vault of the Archangel
1 Cavern of Souls
5 Plains
3 Swamp
Still have to cut cards. at least 10 of them, but not sure what to cut to still get balance and power.
Any idea is welcome and lot of thanks for reading and posting!!
Also is competitive enough to compete.
I've changed my list over games to try to find the more suitable form and finally I'm on the following list:
4 Doomed Traveler
3 Hunted Witness
4 Pitiless Pontiff
4 Cartel Aristocrat
4 High priest of penance
4 Hero of precinct one
1 Reassembling skeleton
4 Xathrid Necromancer
3 Teysa, Orzhov Scion
1 Athreos, God of passage
2 Sorin, Lord of Innistrad
4 Zealous Persecution
1 Blasting station
1 Urborg, Tomb of yawgmoth's
4 Isolated Chapel
4 Concealed Courtyard
4 Godless Shrine
1 Vault of the Archangel
2 Cavern of Souls
4 Plains
2 Swamp
I'm very happy with this list and has lot of synergy and mini-combos between his parts.
I've removed the afterlife creatures because also providing two bodies is something I'm having with my 1CC drops and although black/white creatures are superb, not having anthems (which I also removed because the slow the deck and are not so good) make them less useful. Instead I'm playing hero which give us lot of human tokens that also gave us zombies with necromancer which is bonkers. Also the bloodshoakes give us zombies so there were some games which i finished by beating with an horde of 8-9 angry zombies
Anyways there are some points I would like to improve.
First of all I need a way to deal damage to high priest of penance so I can remove problematic permanents when needed. If opponents attack is a great blocker but I need a way to exploit him. I would need that:
1) would be a permament, preferably a human and preferably multicolored. The options I have right now are murderous redcap and icatian javalineers but both of them are clunky. I would like to stay in colors also. I have blasting station for this right now but not very sold on it yet.
2) I need some replacement to tragic slip. There were some games where I need a cheap removal that exiles also. PTE is an option but I would prefer aa multicolored cheap removal. I'm thinking on unmake but ...
3) I would like to have more WB useful humans but seems that there is no more of them. I'm using pontiff and although it's a great blocker, I would love him being a human
Lot of thanks for your help!!!
My actual list is:
4 Doomed Traveler
2 Hunted Witness
4 Pitiless Pontiff
4 Cartel Aristocrat
4 High priest of penance
4 Hero of precinct one
4 Xathrid Necromancer
3 Teysa, Orzhov Scion
1 Athreos, God of passage
2 Sorin, Lord of Innistrad
2 Zealous Persecution
1 Blasting station
2 Grave Pact
1 Urborg, Tomb of yawgmoth's
4 Isolated Chapel
4 Concealed Courtyard
4 Godless Shrine
2 Vault of the Archangel
2 Cavern of Souls
3 Plains
2 Swamp
I'm very happy but would love any feedback. Please comment!!!