MTG Salvation

I started playing August 1994, in the first week of school, 8th grade, when I bought a friends small collection of about 400 cards. At that time, The Dark was just about to come out, and you could still buy packs of Antiquities and Legends at our game store for a minor markup, and Arabian Nights and Unlimited for a higher markup. Revised boosters were normal priced, and pretty much what I bought with my allowance every Friday. I became full on obsessed with Magic for the next two years, its all I did, really. That Christmas all I wanted was MTG cards. Guess what set came out right before Christmas that year, and what booster box my parents got me? Fallen Empires. Fail.

I quit somewhere around Weatherlight~Tempest due largely to girls, partying, and death metal becoming a large part of my life. I sold all my cards, and bought a 1989 Mustang and a bass guitar with the money. Aside from selling all my duals and power, it was probably a good idea.

I started back up again 14 years later during New Phyrexia after my best friend and his wife had twins, and while visiting them he broke out some magic cards. Due to his new status as a father, he had been restricted to the house a lot, and he and his neighbor started playing again.

I sold my paper collection (again) two years ago due to not having enough time to play at LGS and paper tournaments, and other than cube, I only play on MTGO now.

At 540 and gold heavy (9 per guild) I run:

Azorious Charm - its ok, not super high on it. Worst case it cycles, best case its a big tempo swing.

Arctic Aven - staple.

Drogskol Captain - trying this out, I have enough spirit token makers to put it to good use, and a few other spirits in U and W.

Lyev Skynight - staple.

Messenger Falcons - cantrip flyer, blink target.

Wall of Denial - I have a lot of aggro in every color but U, so a lot of times a U/X control deck really needs something to this effect. I haven't found it too oppressive yet, but keeping an eye on it.

Skymark Roc - Staple. This and the Aven are the reason to go into U/W skies.

Jelenn Sphinx - solid, but not super crazy amazing.

Sky Hussar - useful, have had some hard play decisions whether to hold in hand for the card draw every turn or to cast it. Tokens make the forecast easier.


Considerations: Mistmeadow Witch, Turn to Mist, Momentary Blink....I have a lot of blink/bounce in here as is, most of which is creature based, so not sure how much more I want to push it.

Jotun Owl Keeper actually looks legit too never saw that card before, but I would prob keep it in white if I played around with it. Would fit into Orzhov sac. decks well.

Alright, I am just ruining 2-mans with this deck. I went 7-1 in matches yesterday, Beat Mono B twice, Boros Devotion, Mono U twice, Orzhov White Weenie, and W/U control. Sole loss was to Mono U devotion that hit me with an overloaded rift in each game.

By turn 3 you usually know if you're going to win or not, and the decks average kill turn is 5 (not goldfishing kills, actual game kills). If your opponents stumble early whatsoever, turn 4 is the norm.

I'm busy all week starting today with Xmas, but someone needs to run this in DEs this week.

The deck is a pretty big gamble, flood is a death sentence, and if the game goes longer than turn 6 or 7, you're probably toast, but its remarkably consistent in being able to establish a board turns 1 and 2, drop an anthem turn 3, and follow up with BTE protection while dropping more threats after that.

This deck is also much faster than the other WW/Orzhov weenie decks, and (usually) outraces them easily. 7 Anthem effects, Judges familiar, and Ethereal Armor basically gets it done, but both of you are going to play the BTE game and leave a W open no matter what.

Back to the OPS post, one of the limited cards I hated more than anything was Odric from M13, its not even that unfair of a card, it just seems whenever he hits the table I seem to have zero removal and can't draw an out. The only paper PTQ I ever played was a M13 sealed, and I ran into Odric twice, which basically gutted my record. I also lost the finals of the M13 prerelease while running an insane B/W exalted deck (3 NIGHTHAWKS!!!) to Odric.

Quote from yamateh

There's no such thing as a single format warping card in limited, because you can't control how often they appear. I mean, in constructed something like JTMS invalidated tons of strategies and powerful creatures, but in limited are you really going to completely change the way you build your deck because of the existence of a certain common/uncommon? Sure maybe you'd change 1 or 2 cards, but even then, that's still not format warping.

I think the closest thing we'll ever get to a "format warper" is centaur token in triple rtr.

That's not true, when you have an overpowered card at common or uncommon it can severely warp a format.

I never played the format myself, but I heard Sparksmith was pretty ridiculous in Onslaught draft.

Quote from Impossible

I've found myself splashing white for Scholar of Athreos in my U/B decks more and more. Thus my control decks usually end up more black splashing blue and white than anything. The card is just such a house, and because it's not better in multiples it is pretty easy to wheel at least one.

In response to skycake, I do like to have a single ordeal in my control decks because sometimes T2 Vaporkin T3 Ordeal is enough to get there. It's also fine later after the board is stable to turn any random flyer into a pretty respectable clock.

Agreed, in almost any base B deck, I gladly splash for the scholar. Its huge having a mana sink available like that that can close out games, and a 1/4 body for 3 is very relevant.

Peasant cube version:

W - Swords to Plowshares
U - Control Magic
B - Shriekmaw
R - Lightning Bolt
G - Eternal Witness

I don't play the MTGO cube that often, but when I do I more often than not end up R/G aggro and just bash. It always seems to be open.

Quote from chrisb3

This deck is sick - just destroyed RG with it. I went 17 Plains / 4 Mutavault (now room for Boros Elite #4) and put in 1 ofs Cavalry Pegasus/Frontline Medic/Heliod instead of Banisher Priests.

What are the weaknesses compared with the regular list though?

This deck really only has one mode, that's the weakness. The more answers you side in, or make room for, the more threats you take out and the synergy weakens. Its a gamble. Plain and simple. Its pretty damn consistent though, isn't it? Wipes aren't the end of the world, shrivel SUCKS, admittedly and you need a way to deal with that. We can get them within lethal by the time a verdict hits, and every creature from then on becomes a must answer, you should know how to play into a verdict anyway with this type of deck. Brave The Elements shields from Anger of The Gods.

I might play around with cavalry pegasus too and see how it does here. I'm leery of running less than 22 land though, this deck almost always wants to drop an aura turn 3.

Right now, the standard meta is relatively slow, basically two out of the three top decks have incredible inevitability and CA on their side, and the other is aggro, but has very narrow answers and can be easily outraced. This deck is just balls fast, faster than anything else out there right now, and is fairly well-positioned.

The only change to the MD I would make is -1 Plains +1 mutavault. I would be leery of running more than 2, since hitting WW early is extremely important. I wouldn't mess with it much more than that. Heliod is very tempting to MD with synergy with armor as well, but its a win-more card in this build in the main. I would keep some in the side for control though.

Here's my SB atm, which is primarily for control.



The only cards I ever side out, ever, are Ethereal Armor and Banisher Priests. Thats it. Removing your threat density less than that is a bad idea. Heliod is for control, Celestial flare is for Blood Baron/Stormbreath which are the only two creatures in standard we need an answer for. Daring Skyjek is to swap out Banisher Priests for vs. control, Profit/Loss are for when Mono B sides in shrivel. The other 5 cards are because SBs need 15 cards, haha. I've never used them yet, but they're there just in case.

That completely depends on the matchup and the deck, but in my Boros deck magma Jet + Ash Zealot/Frostburn Weird would make that a keep against a lot of decks.

So, I went all in with this list, and I've caused more rage quits with this list on MTGO over the last two days than with any other standard deck I've ever run.





I know what it looks like on paper. Just put it together (its cheap) and test it before you jump to conclusions though.

My last Theros sealed I ran 2 Griptide and 2 Seagods Revenge, and whenever I needed just the griptide I would have SG in hand, and whenever I really needed the SG I would have griptide. Grrr city.

Thanks for taking this up Hardened!

MTGO Username: NoHeavenNoHell
Constructed Formats Played:dumb enough to consistently run rogue decks in competitive Standard, casual Modern
Timezone: EST (GMT -5)
Availability: mornings before work, occasional evenings and weekends.

Back when I still played paper, we would do 8 man drafts at a friends house every few weekends, and only I and one other player really understood drafting/deckbuilding principles, so either he or I won it every single time, and the other players just got sick of it and we stopped.

We did our best to try and help them build better decks and give them drafting pointers, but most of them would just jam every rare in their deck (Jar of Eyeballs for the win), and didn't really want to take our advice. Some players are stubborn I guess.

Quote from Tackman

Ajani's Chosen + Mana Bloom is what I'm on right now.

Also trying to get Heliod, God of the Sun + Sphere of Safety to work.

I made this one as well. Heliod and Sphere was in there too. Did you start splashing U for DT spheres yet? Once you do, the deck actually becomes somewhat competitive.