What about Swords to Plowshares instead of Mortify?
Also, I would still run just 1 Angel. Can help in niche situations.
I just thought of it, but Timely Reinforcements could help against those aggro swarms.
Nah, I like Mortify here a little more simply for the utility of it. StP is awesome, but using Mortify allows me to not have allocate a slot for Enchantment removal, whilst still allowing me to have a 1 for 1 Creature removal, if need be.
Options, I like em.
As far as Angel of Despair goes, I generally tend to shy away from 1 of's simply because I value consistency. So it's either use all or none, and as Blut said, if I'm just using it to nuke lands it's kind of counter-productive.
I like rotting rats a lot because he gives you a blocker as well as a discard outlet in the early game (so in some situations, a turn 4/5 bomb is realistic).
I changed the bomb package around a bit, but still kept it relatively budget.
Angel of Despair: Still necessary as a 1 of because it's an incredibly effective universal answer.
Sheoldred: I like her. She's solid. 'Nuff said.
Stormtide Leviathan: You said you've been having some success with him, and that makes sense. He's quite solid in an aggro-heavy meta....he's pretty much a big Moat.
SotSW: Amazingly powerful. Just really good against a green/red deck, and not bad otherwise.
Inkwell Leviathan: Probably the best wincon for the control mirror. Three turn kill on a shrouded, unblockable body seems pretty good to me.
I also went with the refuges for budget, but this deck really needs Drowned Catacombs and Glacial Fortresses, imho.
Rotting Rats are so meh. I get where your coming from with them, but unless I have some fat in my hand, I'm more than likely to grip it than play it.
In my meta there are a lot of mono decks so Persecute really goes the distance and provides immense CA.
After that Compulsive Research, Forbidden Alchemy, and Turn Aside have already been discussed and already have been cut.
Finally I know the deck needs Drowned Catacombs and Glacial Fortress, but until I acquire them, the Refuges will have to do.
Divine Reckoning can save a leviathan. I'd use a couple of them, like a 2/2/2 split ***/DoJ/DR. Flashback is a nice bonus too.
EDIT: Keep Angel of Despair. It is not a Solar Flare without them.
Lol, yeah Divine Reckoning would save a fatty, but it does nothing when I absolutely NEED that single Raging Goblin off the field (Seriously I wasn't joking.)
I think painlands aren't a bad idea, they fuel your early counters to aggressive creatures and taper off once you hit your basics. With that said, you should run more lands that provide U and W as that is nesscesary early game to get compulsive research, FoF, Forbidden Alchemy going and to spot remove creatures
I'd experiment with this, I feel it might help you out. If you can afford fetches, I'd say go for them because they really help you out
Sorry man I have to disagree, the pain lands are just terrible here, I take WAY TOO MUCH damage off of them. I think I'm only ever gonna use them in so combo decks or something. In a long drawn out control game, it's kind of like using your own hand as a silencer for a pistol.
I'd still ditch a Signet for a land, you don't have much to accel into, unless it's crucial to clear the board t3. On that note, the Signet should be should do better than the other two, cuz you only have CC costs (other than Counterspell and ridic. high ones) and your lands are already a tad in favour of :symu:. That's nitpicking tho.
The Signet thing. And when I said 'cut a Wrath', I ment 'cut a white 4cmc nuke all critters spell', with DoJ being the worse - that'd be a DoJ. There's also the fringe bonus of a 3:2 split (***: DoJ) against Cranial Extraction et alii.
I would play different fat (Sphinx over Stormtide, maybe a Iona [if Persecute works, Iona should too] but the meta where I could play this tends to opt for multicolour lists, so pro'ly not), but that's about it.
Oh I knew what you meant, but given the choice between the 2 I cut the wrath because I can use it elsewhere. I have 15 Day of Judgements and only 2 Wrath of Gods. Tis the only reason I cut a DoJ.
Good point, but without more cards that somehow interact/improve the tokens (f.e. Elesh or an equipment), I found it to be a tad lacking against agro that lacks reach, where it helps you to get back to a safe life total, or is really fast, where I'd rather play cheaper removal.
With four Fact or Fiction and four Thirst for Knowledge in there it could be worth trying one or two Deep Analysis, the flashback cost is incredibly cheap and makes it a very efficient draw spell with those two cards.
Really solid looking deck though.
I hope that helps!
That's a very interesting concept. Listen you figure out what to cut, I'll throw'em in, lol.
Of those three, given your other comments, I would go for Duress ( Inquisition of Kozilek depending on yoru meta), unless you opt for switching to TfK, then I'd favour Signet for the artifact count. What I wouldn't do, unless adding artifact fat.
Yeah pretty sure I'm adding Signets and Thirst for Knowledge, as well as switching the basics to Artifact lands. Though I suppose I might be able to dig up a few Inkwell Leviathans at some point...... (Yeah that's right I'm looking at you Rez deck).
A wrath & a counter. You can't cut threats or land and shouldn't cut straight CA. That said, Alchemy is not CA unless you go the full distance, and in here certainly is underperforming 'cuz you have not enough cards that atleast don't mind to hit the yard (8, 5 of which are passive fatties). So it would be my cut for FoF. ("I just have one question, what should I add that will allow me to discard?")
Hmmmmm, I suppose I could cut 1 of each, I'm not in love with the idea, but I'll try anything twice (The Emergency Room doctors around here say it's my most redeeming quality)
I understood from the beginning that Forbidden Alchemy was not CA, I was running it because it seemed like it would be amazing in this deck. After playing it last night, I pretty well agree with you, and it gets deep 6'ed for the much more potent Fact or Fiction.
Flare is a classic control deck. You want to, have to hit your land drops 'til late game. Going below 24 land will do less good than having too much land in your hands.
Yeah I know the drill but it just seems excessive in this deck, with all the card filtering, and with the advent of the Signets, I really feel like if I add 4 Signets I could cut the lands down to 23 and be fine.
I'm not trying to argue your word or go against the "Conventional Standard", just playing through the deck a couple times, it was just too much. when my curve tops out at 4 (Virtually anyway) after I hit 6 lands, they become far less exciting. (4 from a Wrath on my turn, leaving 2 open for a counter or at least a descent bluff)
(considering you just put it together yesterday: Did you shuffle the deck enough?).
Def. Pile Shuffled, then Riffle Shuffled a couple times each. Same process I go through with every new deck I make. Plus a played it a few times and shuffled in between the games.
Manlands also help to improve threat density & against the feeling that your lands are useless. If your landbase can stomache the lack of colour Nephalia Drownyard might also be an option (the other two fitting lands of the cycle need unfortunately creature heavy decks), or with the same restriction in regards to their etbt-ness cycling lands.
You may be on to something, like I said I'll try for some Creeping Tarpits, in the meantime I'll checkout Celestial Colonnade to see how that idea flows.
By today's standards it is sub-par, still it has the unique property of being literally Vindidacte on a stick. If you don't need that, cut it.
It usually comes down and nukes some sort of non-basic. It's nice having 5 in the air, but seriously Stormtide Leviathan is fun, and protects me, so long as I can protect it. Add to that me kicking around the idea of Inkwell Leviathan and it seems like the Angel should kick it to the 'board.
What would your deck look like? Currently you have 'eight', and I'm using quotation marks, 'cuz as I said above, Alchemy is not really a draw spell, unless you also use its flashback or dump something that you can cast from your grave. On its own it's filter like Impulse (not that I recommend to play that here).
Ok when you say "he gets to do something every turn" what do you mean?
What kinda deck is it so we can get the flavour he seeks, also can you provide an approximate deck list (since youve played against it so many times) so we can get the feel of what he's looking for?)
So with what got this started is Jace, Memory Adept the best jace for milling?
Yes it is, it's fairly obvious. Assuming you play Jace Beleren turn 3....... and can protect him, your looking at milling at the earliest Turn 7, all the while helping your Opps. to draw into answers.
By then you could have played Jace, Memory Adept and milled 20 cards, coincidentally the exact amount that Jace Beleren would have milled 2 turns later, if you popped his Ultimate.
If you are having trouble with your mana base, you can use some "cheap" solutions like Tendo Ice Bridge, Gemstone Mine, Vivid Lands, City of Brass as some fill ins until you can iron it out. Or maybe just sprinkle some of those in.
On Vivids and the lot : I might as well take the slow trip for a turn and have a perm. mana fix. (Invasion. Coldsnap, & Refuges)
And with City of Brass, I never liked the fact that I couldn't tap it with colorless.
Alright so lets dig into this. I really think I like the core of this deck.
First I have to ask, why is there Red in here? Seems to me like you can just go straight Black and it wouldn't change a thing but the consistency of the mana base. (and you'd get to use those Rare lands in a much more suited deck.)
Let's look at the Red cards in the deck :
Staggershock - My assumption is it's in here pretty much to enable the Ascension, am I correct? After Ascension is online it can be used to nerf a creature or just throw it at someone's dome.....
Volcanic Fallout - Keeps weenies in check whilst enabling Ascension.
Lastly, maybe you can clarify, does Ascension Trigger separately for EACH opp. that lost 2 or more life during the turn or does it just check to see if an Opp. did?
Why don't you try adding in fatties that you don't mind hardcasting? (I.E. Sun Titan).
As for discard outlets, Compulsive Research seems like the best one for the deck. If you add some artifacts/artifact creatures you can also try Thirst for Knowledge.
Yes Thirst for Knowledge, I want to add Signets any way, to accelerate, fix mana, and not clog my hand with land. On the back end of it, I could replace some of the basic lands with artifact lands, to help it a little more.
But wouldn't running 12 draw spells be a little heavy on this deck?
Let me start off by saying I played a few games with this last night and was so frustrated that I wanted to scream.
My mana base is a wreak. I think it's the first thing that needs work. For now I'm going to replace the Pain Lands, with Citp Tapped lands (yeah I know it's enter the battlefield now, but the terminology pisses me off).
I won about 1/3 of the games I played with it, which is just unacceptable in my eyes.
There was a time when I was so low on life due to the Pain lands (Sits back and waits for Blut to pop up and laugh in my face with an "I keep telling you") and early pressure, I had to Wrath of God a lone Raging Goblin. I was one of the most sad things I've done as a MtG player.
I've hit an all time low, lol
Further more, My hands were a wreak, there are just too many lands in the deck for the draw components, there was a point were I ripped 3 lands off the top of my library off of a Forbidden Alchemy. Trust me that's not doing anyone any good.
Also top decking land after land after land, got redundant and annoying real quick, I hate having to grip a handful of land, it just pisses me off to no end.
Lastly Angel of Despair was almost always under whelming. I want to rip it out, but I hate the prospect of ripping the decks namesake card out.
I experimented with Stormtide Leviathan a little to great success (yeah I know that sounds absurd) so I might just add a few of him and change my counter suite.
Speacking of which as good as Counterspell and Mana Leak are, they are not the best for this deck. I stuggled with the UU cost of Counterspell, and the games go longer than Mana Leak's effectiveness.
I'm going to test Negate and Turn Aside, because those are the only things I was using my counters for, to protect my investments.
On the Counterspell vs. Negate debate does this deck really need another way to deal with creatures? There is no reason why I should ever be countering anything but non-creatures, because I have so many ways to deal with them already, it's just burning a card outta my hand.
I would put in a Sphinx of the steel wind. It's in your colors, is a fantastic target to reanimate, and has will help recover against aggro.
Sphinx of the Steel Wind is amazing, dadly I didn't buy / trade much back during Alara so I don't have a cache of them lying around, and until I can fix the mana base I'm not about to drop the cash on some.
Though if I can get the mana base fleshed out I will def start hunting some down.
This deck wants Fact or Fiction so badly. Do you know how awkward Unburial Rites makes FoF piles?
Fact of Fiction you say? YES! I def am adding that over over Compulsive Reseach, like nowish.
Good call bone_doc. I just have one question, what should I add that will allow me to discard? I mean the idea is to never pay for fat, so what if I draw one in my draw step? kind of hard to rez a creature out of your hand.
Also, as previously mentioned, Fact or Fiction, Gifts Ungiven, Entomb, etc. stuff to just straight derp cards into the grave.
And SotSW is powwwwwwerful.
Gift's Ungiven and Entomb are both amazing cards, but much like Sphinx of the Steel Wind, I have no intention on dropping straight cash into this before I can optimise the mana base. Plus with all the draw -> discard I think Entomb would just waste a spot in the deck, personally.
Knowledge Pool + Teferi, Mage of Zalhfir - Hard locks all your opps, out of the game unless they have an activated ability, or some weird ass morph creature already on the board.
Nah, I like Mortify here a little more simply for the utility of it. StP is awesome, but using Mortify allows me to not have allocate a slot for Enchantment removal, whilst still allowing me to have a 1 for 1 Creature removal, if need be.
Options, I like em.
As far as Angel of Despair goes, I generally tend to shy away from 1 of's simply because I value consistency. So it's either use all or none, and as Blut said, if I'm just using it to nuke lands it's kind of counter-productive.
Rotting Rats are so meh. I get where your coming from with them, but unless I have some fat in my hand, I'm more than likely to grip it than play it.
In my meta there are a lot of mono decks so Persecute really goes the distance and provides immense CA.
After that Compulsive Research, Forbidden Alchemy, and Turn Aside have already been discussed and already have been cut.
Finally I know the deck needs Drowned Catacombs and Glacial Fortress, but until I acquire them, the Refuges will have to do.
Lol, yeah Divine Reckoning would save a fatty, but it does nothing when I absolutely NEED that single Raging Goblin off the field
Sorry man I have to disagree, the pain lands are just terrible here, I take WAY TOO MUCH damage off of them. I think I'm only ever gonna use them in so combo decks or something. In a long drawn out control game, it's kind of like using your own hand as a silencer for a pistol.
Fair enough, as stated before your will be done.
Agreed.
Thanks, and no non-basic hate is a complete and utter dead end. No one runs it so I can get away with it.
Oh I knew what you meant, but given the choice between the 2 I cut the wrath because I can use it elsewhere. I have 15 Day of Judgements and only 2 Wrath of Gods. Tis the only reason I cut a DoJ.
Agreed.
Awez, thanks. and I agree about the Rotting Rats, seriously it would sit in my hand and congest it.
That's a very interesting concept. Listen you figure out what to cut, I'll throw'em in, lol.
(Personal : W00t! 2,000th Post!)
Yeah pretty sure I'm adding Signets and Thirst for Knowledge, as well as switching the basics to Artifact lands. Though I suppose I might be able to dig up a few Inkwell Leviathans at some point...... (Yeah that's right I'm looking at you Rez deck).
Like $30 - $40 a piece.
Hmmmmm, I suppose I could cut 1 of each, I'm not in love with the idea, but I'll try anything twice (The Emergency Room doctors around here say it's my most redeeming quality)
I understood from the beginning that Forbidden Alchemy was not CA, I was running it because it seemed like it would be amazing in this deck. After playing it last night, I pretty well agree with you, and it gets deep 6'ed for the much more potent Fact or Fiction.
Triple :facepalm:, Frick. I've been enlightened, of that you can be assured.
Yeah I know the drill but it just seems excessive in this deck, with all the card filtering, and with the advent of the Signets, I really feel like if I add 4 Signets I could cut the lands down to 23 and be fine.
I'm not trying to argue your word or go against the "Conventional Standard", just playing through the deck a couple times, it was just too much. when my curve tops out at 4 (Virtually anyway) after I hit 6 lands, they become far less exciting. (4 from a Wrath on my turn, leaving 2 open for a counter or at least a descent bluff)
Def. Pile Shuffled, then Riffle Shuffled a couple times each. Same process I go through with every new deck I make. Plus a played it a few times and shuffled in between the games.
Yeah I got enough Refuges, and a playset of Celestial Colonnade, I'll give them a shot and try to get some Creeping Tarpits in the mean time.
You may be on to something, like I said I'll try for some Creeping Tarpits, in the meantime I'll checkout Celestial Colonnade to see how that idea flows.
It usually comes down and nukes some sort of non-basic. It's nice having 5 in the air, but seriously Stormtide Leviathan is fun, and protects me, so long as I can protect it. Add to that me kicking around the idea of Inkwell Leviathan and it seems like the Angel should kick it to the 'board.
Sure I could give it a shot. I suppose your right because it stops non-targeted removal too.....
I'm glad you asked
2 Stormtide Leviathan
2 Sheoldred, Whispering One
2 Dimir Signet
2 Azorius Signet
1 Wrath of God
4 Day of Judgement
2 Persecute
3 Unburial Rites
4 Negate
4 Fact or Fiction
4 Thirst for Knowledge
3 Mortify
4 Celestial Colonnade
3 Jwar Isle Refuge
4 Arcane Sanctum
4 Ancient Den
4 Seat of the Synod
4 Vault of Whispers
Hows that look?
EDIT :
Aye, nor I, but it's what I can best describe it as in this deck because it's not Fat, Accel, Counter, or Removal.
What kinda deck is it so we can get the flavour he seeks, also can you provide an approximate deck list (since youve played against it so many times) so we can get the feel of what he's looking for?)
I was assuming that I was replacing Compulsive Research with Thirst for Knowledge.
4*3 = 12
So is that too much do you think?
Yes it is, it's fairly obvious. Assuming you play Jace Beleren turn 3....... and can protect him, your looking at milling at the earliest Turn 7, all the while helping your Opps. to draw into answers.
By then you could have played Jace, Memory Adept and milled 20 cards, coincidentally the exact amount that Jace Beleren would have milled 2 turns later, if you popped his Ultimate.
So the choice is fairly clear in my eyes.
You've got Crabs? -
Using Hedron Crab is amazing, pairing it with Oboro, Palace in the Sky is sick, but if you want to go over the top, Green is required.
Azuza, Lost but Seeking allows you to play Oboro, Place in the Sky, tap it to bounce it's self and replay it again the same turn.
Oh and don't forget YE' Olde Flash + Protein Hulk = 4 Hedron Crab + 1 Sakura-Tribe Elder + 4 Dryad Arbor = I just milled you on turn 2. (Or turn 1 with a stupid good draw and Gemstone Caverns in your opening hand)
Of course there is also Scapeshift...............
You forgot Midnight Haunting in all it's instant speed goodness.
Knowledge Pool
On Vivids and the lot : I might as well take the slow trip for a turn and have a perm. mana fix. (Invasion. Coldsnap, & Refuges)
And with City of Brass, I never liked the fact that I couldn't tap it with colorless.
That's a big ass IF. I wish I did.
Alright so lets dig into this. I really think I like the core of this deck.
First I have to ask, why is there Red in here? Seems to me like you can just go straight Black and it wouldn't change a thing but the consistency of the mana base. (and you'd get to use those Rare lands in a much more suited deck.)
Let's look at the Red cards in the deck :
Staggershock - My assumption is it's in here pretty much to enable the Ascension, am I correct? After Ascension is online it can be used to nerf a creature or just throw it at someone's dome.....
Volcanic Fallout - Keeps weenies in check whilst enabling Ascension.
Earthquake - I am assuming the same as fallout?
Replacements in Mono Black base :
Evincar's Justice - Same as Fallout but it's slow and counterable, but it comes with buyback
Exsanguinate - It doesn't hit creatures, but it nets you life back.
Syphon Soul / Viscous Hunger / Brush with Death / Bump in the Night / Sign in Blood / Syphon Life - All will meet the requirement of Ascension with little to no commitment on your behalf.
Super Secret Tech :
Maddening Imp seems good , but have you ever considered Angel's Trumpet?
Lastly, maybe you can clarify, does Ascension Trigger separately for EACH opp. that lost 2 or more life during the turn or does it just check to see if an Opp. did?
Yes Thirst for Knowledge, I want to add Signets any way, to accelerate, fix mana, and not clog my hand with land. On the back end of it, I could replace some of the basic lands with artifact lands, to help it a little more.
But wouldn't running 12 draw spells be a little heavy on this deck?
My mana base is a wreak. I think it's the first thing that needs work. For now I'm going to replace the Pain Lands, with Citp Tapped lands (yeah I know it's enter the battlefield now, but the terminology pisses me off).
I won about 1/3 of the games I played with it, which is just unacceptable in my eyes.
There was a time when I was so low on life due to the Pain lands (Sits back and waits for Blut to pop up and laugh in my face with an "I keep telling you") and early pressure, I had to Wrath of God a lone Raging Goblin. I was one of the most sad things I've done as a MtG player.
I've hit an all time low, lol
Further more, My hands were a wreak, there are just too many lands in the deck for the draw components, there was a point were I ripped 3 lands off the top of my library off of a Forbidden Alchemy. Trust me that's not doing anyone any good.
Also top decking land after land after land, got redundant and annoying real quick, I hate having to grip a handful of land, it just pisses me off to no end.
Lastly Angel of Despair was almost always under whelming. I want to rip it out, but I hate the prospect of ripping the decks namesake card out.
I experimented with Stormtide Leviathan a little to great success (yeah I know that sounds absurd) so I might just add a few of him and change my counter suite.
Speacking of which as good as Counterspell and Mana Leak are, they are not the best for this deck. I stuggled with the UU cost of Counterspell, and the games go longer than Mana Leak's effectiveness.
I'm going to test Negate and Turn Aside, because those are the only things I was using my counters for, to protect my investments.
On the Counterspell vs. Negate debate does this deck really need another way to deal with creatures? There is no reason why I should ever be countering anything but non-creatures, because I have so many ways to deal with them already, it's just burning a card outta my hand.
Yes a few more creatures (like 2-3) might just do me good.
Sphinx of the Steel Wind is amazing, dadly I didn't buy / trade much back during Alara so I don't have a cache of them lying around, and until I can fix the mana base I'm not about to drop the cash on some.
Though if I can get the mana base fleshed out I will def start hunting some down.
Thanks for that suggestion.
Fact of Fiction you say? YES! I def am adding that over over Compulsive Reseach, like nowish.
Good call bone_doc. I just have one question, what should I add that will allow me to discard? I mean the idea is to never pay for fat, so what if I draw one in my draw step? kind of hard to rez a creature out of your hand.
Gift's Ungiven and Entomb are both amazing cards, but much like Sphinx of the Steel Wind, I have no intention on dropping straight cash into this before I can optimise the mana base. Plus with all the draw -> discard I think Entomb would just waste a spot in the deck, personally.
Also accomplished with Arcane Labratory, Rule of Law, or Curse of Exhaustion. Though Teferi is probably the best of the lot (for multiplayer)