I like 5-Color decks, but I'm terrible at building them. As I was paging through my cards I noticed both Dreamscape Artist and Greenseeker - it seemed like blue as well as green could support a 5 color manabase.
Then I realized there are quite a few cards in Time Spiral Block that care about prismatic manabases (Tribal Flames, Tromp the Domains), and even more that can support them (Prismatic Lens, Stormscape Familiar, Celestial Dawn, Search for Tomorrow, Terramorphic Expanse).
So I pretty much rounded all these up and then capped them off with the splashiest rares I own, cards like: Intet/Teneb, Lightning Angel, etc. These aren't the best or most impressive cards, I know, but my collection isn't so stellar, and so I'm just making do with what I've got.
I guess my question would be - how does one go about, generally, constructing a rainbow deck? My understanding is that, should you be able to best your own mana issues, you should have no trouble beating your opponent, as your cards will be much more powerful than his. Can anyone offer a guideline as to how many of these powerful cards to put it, and how many manafixers? How about card draw - does this need a lot of it?
The best suggestion I can offer is that you go with a Five-Color Green strategy. The reason is that there are already several Land Destruction decks that are very good at what they do, and now some of the more midrange decks pack four Mwonvuli Acid-Moss because some of the competitive decks with more than one color can sometimes have only one of a given basic land, or they might have an Urza's Factory (either way, it's totally worth it).
The FCG strategy would allow you to accelerate and patch any mana problems you might have. Not to mention, Wall of Roots is the nuts right now.
Also, I'd point at that whatever route you take, Stormscape Familiar doesn't help support a multicolor strategy. Sure, it's better in a multicolor deck, but it doesn't actually do any color-fixing for you.
I'd like to chime in on green being the prime colour for a 5-colour build. As for what the best cards would be, I'm not entire sure.
One way to go would possibly be the dragon route, and the other would be some kind of Tromp build. Due to the prominence of Damnation in the current metagame I'm no fan of the latter version. Tromp can be cast relatively early, but it's prone to counters as well as instant removal. Still, the effect is powerful enough that there might be a place for it.
Another option is to simply play one or two main colours and splash for whatever off-colour options suit you best. I'll start with what I consider the best mana fixers in the format.
So, I'm in green and I'll be able to cast cards in almost any colour given that they don't have more than 1 mana in that colour. Also, it'll be hard to splash cards that have three colours or more, where green isn't one of them.
Another thing is that Gemstone Mine isn't as solid for the long game as one would like. It means that you want a relatively cheap deck where you don't have to tap Gemstone for mana each turn, or you'll skip the Gemstones and rather go for Prismatic Lens. A much better choice for the late game.
So, do I think this deck is solid enough? And is it really 5cGreen? Yes, and yes, and potentially no, and no. Oops.
First of all, it's a fast brun deck more than anything, but it has solid card advantage in it's battlemages and the synergies are all over the place. The best burn spells in the format (damage wise) are Psionic Blast and Tribal Flames, so I'm all for testing them both. Groundbreaker can definently be considered burn himself, and so can Timbermare. They tend to go more or less straight to the dome.
The usual Scryb-Force-combo is here, and Scryb "Rambo" Ranger is not without use with Ana Battlemage or Gemhide Sliver either.
One bonus with this deck is Psionic Blast and it's ability to kill Soltari Priest. Even with a Griffin Guide on it (and then whatever else can deal with the token if you can't shoot the priest in response).
Summary:
I think I'll actually try a version of this today and see how it fares. Perhaps it's strong enough to compete.
Private Mod Note
():
Rollback Post to RevisionRollBack
To post a comment, please login or register a new account.
Then I realized there are quite a few cards in Time Spiral Block that care about prismatic manabases (Tribal Flames, Tromp the Domains), and even more that can support them (Prismatic Lens, Stormscape Familiar, Celestial Dawn, Search for Tomorrow, Terramorphic Expanse).
So I pretty much rounded all these up and then capped them off with the splashiest rares I own, cards like: Intet/Teneb, Lightning Angel, etc. These aren't the best or most impressive cards, I know, but my collection isn't so stellar, and so I'm just making do with what I've got.
I guess my question would be - how does one go about, generally, constructing a rainbow deck? My understanding is that, should you be able to best your own mana issues, you should have no trouble beating your opponent, as your cards will be much more powerful than his. Can anyone offer a guideline as to how many of these powerful cards to put it, and how many manafixers? How about card draw - does this need a lot of it?
Anyway, any thoughts/suggestions welcome.
The FCG strategy would allow you to accelerate and patch any mana problems you might have. Not to mention, Wall of Roots is the nuts right now.
One way to go would possibly be the dragon route, and the other would be some kind of Tromp build. Due to the prominence of Damnation in the current metagame I'm no fan of the latter version. Tromp can be cast relatively early, but it's prone to counters as well as instant removal. Still, the effect is powerful enough that there might be a place for it.
Another option is to simply play one or two main colours and splash for whatever off-colour options suit you best. I'll start with what I consider the best mana fixers in the format.
So, I'm in green and I'll be able to cast cards in almost any colour given that they don't have more than 1 mana in that colour. Also, it'll be hard to splash cards that have three colours or more, where green isn't one of them.
Another thing is that Gemstone Mine isn't as solid for the long game as one would like. It means that you want a relatively cheap deck where you don't have to tap Gemstone for mana each turn, or you'll skip the Gemstones and rather go for Prismatic Lens. A much better choice for the late game.
Here's a possible decklist:
9 Forest
3 Gemstone Mine
2 Mountain
2 Island
1 Plains
1 Swamp
1 Pendelhaven
4 Gemhide Sliver
4 Scryb Ranger
4 Thornscape Battlemage
3 Ana Battlemage
4 Tribal Flames
4 Psionic Blast
4 Groundbreaker
4 Spectral Force
3 Timbermare
So, do I think this deck is solid enough? And is it really 5cGreen? Yes, and yes, and potentially no, and no. Oops.
First of all, it's a fast brun deck more than anything, but it has solid card advantage in it's battlemages and the synergies are all over the place. The best burn spells in the format (damage wise) are Psionic Blast and Tribal Flames, so I'm all for testing them both. Groundbreaker can definently be considered burn himself, and so can Timbermare. They tend to go more or less straight to the dome.
The usual Scryb-Force-combo is here, and Scryb "Rambo" Ranger is not without use with Ana Battlemage or Gemhide Sliver either.
One bonus with this deck is Psionic Blast and it's ability to kill Soltari Priest. Even with a Griffin Guide on it (and then whatever else can deal with the token if you can't shoot the priest in response).
Summary:
I think I'll actually try a version of this today and see how it fares. Perhaps it's strong enough to compete.