Out of curiosity, has anyone tried out Jet Medallion or Nightscape Familiar in their Marchesa lists? I've noticed in my games that my primary issue is being choked on mana and simply not being able to do enough things per turn. I've already put in Jet Medallion and I'll be adding Nightscape Familiar soon as well, since both cheapen about half my spells for the colors concerned, so I figure they're worth trying.
Most non-green decks struggle to keep up with the ramp that green decks have access to, so my logic is that making spells cheaper is as close a substitute as Grixis is likely to get outside of Rituals or cards like Treasonous Ogre. The other advantage is both those cards facilitate a turn 3 Marchesa and help generate early momentum, which is something I often struggle with and it means opponents have sufficient time to get answers to keep Marchesa off the table. Setting up early advantage seems like the best way to transition from aggro to mid-range IMO, the achilles for my deck seems to be stumbling early and never managing to catch up.
Edit: Bloodghast hasn't been amazing yet so far, the double black is a bit of a nuisance early in the game and later on other things are more important so it just rots in hand, unfortunately.
Just a random thought I've had lately is about the viability of Bloodghast. Generally Marchesa decks run a lot of sacrifice outlets or synergies that consistently need fuel, like Skullclamp, Falkenrath Aristocrat, Viscera Seer, etc. I've noticed in the last few games I've played with the deck that I often want to sacrifice an arbitrary creature to achieve some effect but I don't want to use a creature with a +1/+1 counter that will be vulnerable until my next turn.
I'm going to give Bloodghast a shot and see how it functions for a while.
Living Death seems like it's something that only bails you out against inexperienced players, IMO. Most players that have played against a Marchesa list before sen to reach for the GY hate extremely quickly. All the times I've had LD in hand I've wished it was something else, and the times I could cast it I never ended up getting anything significant back because the games tend not to last long enough.
Could be limited experience on my part but I've recently felt LD should be something that cements a decent position instead of a card that tries to recover on the back foot.
I just saw Tempest Caller as well, it does seem like a very interesting card. The Wizard subtype does work quite nicely with Metallic Mimic/Sage of Fables to recur the Caller and repeatedly use its ability.
As a general statement, attacking their mana isn't how one beats the likes of Tron. I think the long and the short of trying different configurations of Kiki Chord to try and find an optimal build is just that the deck is very poorly positioned right now and in pretty much all competitive MTG formats being as stream-lined and linear as possible is where the good decks are, Kiki-Chord by virtue of being a toolbox deck simply doesn't achieve that.
A little disappointing that she won't be foil, but it's acceptable considering how many other goodies are being provided. If Vindictive Lich and even Portal Mage are anything to go by it seems clear that Marchesa, TBR decks are about to get a few impressive cards - maybe even enough to push certain builds in the direction of Wizard tribal if there are enough ETB Wizards like the Lich. Whatever new Wizards get released also in turn make Mimic and Sage of Fables that much more synergistic for us, too.
I'm intrigued to see if there are enough powerful ETB Wizards to go full on Urza's Incubator/Mana Echoes/Cover of Darkness Wizard tribal with Marchesa.
I completely to agree, the way spoilers have been handled lately pretty much just encourages circular frustration and little in terms of enthusiasm. Then everything is dumped in a short space of time and the hype will evaporate almost immediately after the power levels of the decks are assessed.
Depending on how the colors work out for the remaining decks (assuming Rakdos/Mardu Vampires and Dimir/Grixis wizards) it makes the decision to only have four decks very strange.
It is strange
I'm going with grixis for wizards because of Jeleva, Nephalia's Scourge and Nekusar, the Mindrazer
Can be reprinted in That. And there's a lot of good wizards in BR catergory plus what's wizard tribal without good old niv-Mizzet color combination UR
If we get grixis we would have access to these multi-color wizards.
Grixis is all that makes sense if they actually want to provide something new. Straight up Dimir doesn't seem all that exciting. At the risk of sounding like a jerk, I feel like 3 color is the perfect balance for having access to different resources but still having a good mana base, so personally I'd hope Grixis Wizards and Mardu Vampires happen rather than Dimir/Rakdos of either. And like your list shows, there would be a bunch of great stuff to combine.
Most non-green decks struggle to keep up with the ramp that green decks have access to, so my logic is that making spells cheaper is as close a substitute as Grixis is likely to get outside of Rituals or cards like Treasonous Ogre. The other advantage is both those cards facilitate a turn 3 Marchesa and help generate early momentum, which is something I often struggle with and it means opponents have sufficient time to get answers to keep Marchesa off the table. Setting up early advantage seems like the best way to transition from aggro to mid-range IMO, the achilles for my deck seems to be stumbling early and never managing to catch up.
Edit: Bloodghast hasn't been amazing yet so far, the double black is a bit of a nuisance early in the game and later on other things are more important so it just rots in hand, unfortunately.
I'm going to give Bloodghast a shot and see how it functions for a while.
Could be limited experience on my part but I've recently felt LD should be something that cements a decent position instead of a card that tries to recover on the back foot.
I'm intrigued to see if there are enough powerful ETB Wizards to go full on Urza's Incubator/Mana Echoes/Cover of Darkness Wizard tribal with Marchesa.
Grixis is all that makes sense if they actually want to provide something new. Straight up Dimir doesn't seem all that exciting. At the risk of sounding like a jerk, I feel like 3 color is the perfect balance for having access to different resources but still having a good mana base, so personally I'd hope Grixis Wizards and Mardu Vampires happen rather than Dimir/Rakdos of either. And like your list shows, there would be a bunch of great stuff to combine.
This should probably be a stickied post at the top of every page.