I've kind of made a decision to avoid token creatures in this build and so Avenger no longer suits the limitations I've set myself (some may argue including Clues with Tireless Tracker may already void this, I guess).
Animist's Awakening doesn't do enough when you compare it to Boundless Realms, Collective Voyage and the all star Genesis Wave. The major difficulty would be choosing which card to cut for it if I decided to try it.
Living Plane is on the wish list, but I'm not really in a position to pick up cards at the moment and again I'd have trouble choosing something to cut for the redundant effect.
Jolrael makes lands into 3/3 creatures so they don't immediately die to Elesh Norn, which is why I haven't included her. Sometime last year I was playing around with the idea of building a mono-green Jolrael deck, but then I decided to sell most of my cards and move country, so that's on the back burner. She is an awesome legendary creature.
I'm slowly upgrading the OP here, with a vague idea of making it into a primer since I'm winding down on my Animar deck, but Selesnya is well represented in the list of current primers, so I'm in no rush.
Not sure this is the correct choice of cut or even if Epiphany will be good, but it does play into the decks graveyard themes and I got one at the SOI prerelease and want to test it out.
The medallions are decent mana rocks if you're shutting down activated abilities, but not really very exciting. Tireless Tracker is an amazing source of card advantage given the landfall triggers this deck generates and the Clues have good synergy with Martyr's Bond. There is a bit of anti-synergy with Stony Silence, but I think it's still worth it as unchallenged Tireless Tracker will draw a lot of cards and become a huge threat at the same time.
Always Watching has great art, which really made me want to use it in a deck. This deck is creature heavy and doesn't use any token creatures, so it should be good on board much of the time. Vigilance is a great ability in multiplayer and it affects my land creatures, letting me attack and then still play spells in second main phase. If feel the Glorious Anthem affect makes it playable (to contrast I don't believe Serra's Blessing is playable in the deck).
As I've mentioned Animar is in storage so I'm not able to play the deck for a few months, but these are the cards from SOI that caught my eye:
Sin Prodder - I think this card is a trap. An opponent could and likely would deny you land draws for the rest of the game if that's what you're revealing. This isn't necessarily bad, provided you didn't drop Sin Prodder too early, but if you need those lands it does more harm than good. Likewise if a combo piece is revealed, an opponent would take damage instead of letting you win the game. No doubt Sin Prodder lets you see more cards and may at times do a Phyrexian Arena impression, but I don't like giving my opponents control over what goes into my hand, even if they do take a bit of damage while doing it. Ultimately in blue and green there are far better draw options that we don't really need to consider this little devil.
Cryptolith Rite - A fair impression of Earthcraft, although requiring creatures to have haste or survive a turn is a significant disadvantage over Earthcraft itself. Still I'd recommend it if Earthcraft is not an option.
Obsessive Skinner - Another trap. While an extra +1/+1 counter on each opponents upkeep seems good, this deck will struggle to activate Delirium with it's very low number of enchantment, sorcery and instant cards. It's not worth trying to accommodate delirium in this deck.
Tireless Tracker - A creature that generates incidental card draw is good. While I'm not a fan of the activation cost to draw cards, this Scout can offer some decent board wipe protection by generating a bunch of Clues as we go about our normal business. If everything goes bad, at least we can spend a turn refilling our hand later on. I think I'll value this creature in my Torsten Von Ursus ramp deck more, but he's worth considering at least as a creature that sort of 'slow cantrips.' It may be worth considering the othergreen and blue creatures that investigate, in the same light.
Traverse the Ulvenwald - It's a trap! Most of the time we won't be able to activate delirium to get the awesome tutor effect.
Ulvenwald Hydra - It can find Gaea's Cradle, so it probably deserves a spot in the deck. Of course it's nearly impossible to fit anything else in the 6 cmc spot, so I don't know how we'll fit it in. Let me know what you cut to get it in there! Cloudstone Curio shenanigans with this guy can get every land out of the deck, which incidentally also makes it huge.
Altered Ego - A clone with multiple upsides and considerable synergy with Animar. Not sure I'd be in a rush to find a spot for it in the deck, but if you're still running Clone, please replace it with Altered Ego.
Sage of Ancient Lore // Werewolf of Ancient Hunger - Most importantly it draws a card when it enters the battlefield and unlike other Elvish Visionary look-a-likes, it has the potential to be a decent size. If it ever flips (unlikely in multiplayer and especially Animar which loves to chain multiple spells together) it will likely be an enormous trampling beat stick.
Game Trail - I think this is probably worse than Copperline Gorge in terms of the likelihood of coming into play untapped. Probably pass on this, but maybe it gets better if you play the karoo bounce lands along with all the 'Forest Mountain' duel lands? It will likely be a decent budget choice if you need it.
That's actually an opinion. A fact (keeping to the chess theme) would be that Legends had a chess theme in development; only Jacques le Vert, Arcades Sabboth, and Whirling Dervish kept to that theme.
Fun fact: technically right is the best kind of right.
In my opinion Grixis is best for a single chess based deck, but for a pair of decks mono white vs. mono black would be cooler. Jhovall Queen is the only white queen available for such a theme build.
For Animar I'm not that impressed with Arlinn. In general I have a low opinion of Planeswalkers in this deck and Arlinn isn't offering any particular synergy with the deck.
The ultimate requires her out for 5 turns to activate; +1 three times, 0 once to transform, -6 ultimate. In that time all you get is a 2/2 wolf and some combat buffs, which doesn't seem worth the effort. In a deck with doubling season it might be worth attempting to ultimate, but even then you still need to transform her first. It would be quite irritating having to constantly pull her out of a sleeve to flip her every turn too.
She is designed well and might make a splash in standard; I imagine it will always be about generating wolves and lightning bolting to get value from her. Maybe if her +1 face up ability gave trample (or other evasion) and haste I could consider it as a way to push through Commander damage, but now we're entering hypothetical territory, so I'll just say no to Arlinn.
Creature power (or how quickly the game can end)?
Evasiveness (Flying, Intimidate, Shadow, Trample, etc.)?
Survivability (Hexproof, shroud, self-recursion, regen, etc.)?
Examples: Phyrexian Juggernaut will end the game quickly, if it can get through, but is weak to multiple types of removal and must attack. Archangel adds evasion. It will take a few more hits to kill, but she flies past most chump blockers and also acts defensively at the same time (useful in Multiplayer). Skeletal Wurm adds regeneration which makes it a bit more survivable, but is again able to be chump blocked forever.
All of this of course assumes mana cost is not an issue. If you're using equipment at all something like Invisible Stalker is probably going to provide far better inevitability than a big creature that can be blocked.
If mana cost is no issue, the uncommon Eldrazi are probably your best finishers as they attack your opponents resources at the same time as being a fast clock to finish the game: Artisan of Kozilek, Bane of Bala Ged, Pathrazer of Ulamog.
Repopulate only shuffles creatures into the deck from the graveyard, not the whole graveyard. While this will deal with most reanimation targets, it doesn't help out against reanimation of other permanents types (artifacts probably the next most dangerous).
It was tough to decide, but I think my favourite card has to be Recurring Nightmare. I love graveyard recursion and reusable engines, and the Nightmare has to be one of the best ever engines for generating incremental advantage or just pulling a big monster from beyound the grave to harass my opponents. The art is at it's Lovecraftian best, all teeth and writhing tentacles, and it is so aptly named as it creates a nightmare for my opponents that goes on and on and on...
A couple of cards I want to find for the deck:
Gilded Drake
Thalakos Deceiver
I think in general I need to lower my curve a bit. Perhaps I need another sweeper as well? Massacre Wurm?
I've kind of made a decision to avoid token creatures in this build and so Avenger no longer suits the limitations I've set myself (some may argue including Clues with Tireless Tracker may already void this, I guess).
Animist's Awakening doesn't do enough when you compare it to Boundless Realms, Collective Voyage and the all star Genesis Wave. The major difficulty would be choosing which card to cut for it if I decided to try it.
Living Plane is on the wish list, but I'm not really in a position to pick up cards at the moment and again I'd have trouble choosing something to cut for the redundant effect.
Jolrael makes lands into 3/3 creatures so they don't immediately die to Elesh Norn, which is why I haven't included her. Sometime last year I was playing around with the idea of building a mono-green Jolrael deck, but then I decided to sell most of my cards and move country, so that's on the back burner. She is an awesome legendary creature.
I'm slowly upgrading the OP here, with a vague idea of making it into a primer since I'm winding down on my Animar deck, but Selesnya is well represented in the list of current primers, so I'm in no rush.
Out
- Tolarian Winds
In
+ Epiphany at the Drownyard
Not sure this is the correct choice of cut or even if Epiphany will be good, but it does play into the decks graveyard themes and I got one at the SOI prerelease and want to test it out.
Out:
- Pearl Medallion
- Emerald Medallion
In:
+ Tireless Tracker
+ Always Watching
The medallions are decent mana rocks if you're shutting down activated abilities, but not really very exciting. Tireless Tracker is an amazing source of card advantage given the landfall triggers this deck generates and the Clues have good synergy with Martyr's Bond. There is a bit of anti-synergy with Stony Silence, but I think it's still worth it as unchallenged Tireless Tracker will draw a lot of cards and become a huge threat at the same time.
Always Watching has great art, which really made me want to use it in a deck. This deck is creature heavy and doesn't use any token creatures, so it should be good on board much of the time. Vigilance is a great ability in multiplayer and it affects my land creatures, letting me attack and then still play spells in second main phase. If feel the Glorious Anthem affect makes it playable (to contrast I don't believe Serra's Blessing is playable in the deck).
Sin Prodder - I think this card is a trap. An opponent could and likely would deny you land draws for the rest of the game if that's what you're revealing. This isn't necessarily bad, provided you didn't drop Sin Prodder too early, but if you need those lands it does more harm than good. Likewise if a combo piece is revealed, an opponent would take damage instead of letting you win the game. No doubt Sin Prodder lets you see more cards and may at times do a Phyrexian Arena impression, but I don't like giving my opponents control over what goes into my hand, even if they do take a bit of damage while doing it. Ultimately in blue and green there are far better draw options that we don't really need to consider this little devil.
Cryptolith Rite - A fair impression of Earthcraft, although requiring creatures to have haste or survive a turn is a significant disadvantage over Earthcraft itself. Still I'd recommend it if Earthcraft is not an option.
Obsessive Skinner - Another trap. While an extra +1/+1 counter on each opponents upkeep seems good, this deck will struggle to activate Delirium with it's very low number of enchantment, sorcery and instant cards. It's not worth trying to accommodate delirium in this deck.
Tireless Tracker - A creature that generates incidental card draw is good. While I'm not a fan of the activation cost to draw cards, this Scout can offer some decent board wipe protection by generating a bunch of Clues as we go about our normal business. If everything goes bad, at least we can spend a turn refilling our hand later on. I think I'll value this creature in my Torsten Von Ursus ramp deck more, but he's worth considering at least as a creature that sort of 'slow cantrips.' It may be worth considering the other green and blue creatures that investigate, in the same light.
Traverse the Ulvenwald - It's a trap! Most of the time we won't be able to activate delirium to get the awesome tutor effect.
Ulvenwald Hydra - It can find Gaea's Cradle, so it probably deserves a spot in the deck. Of course it's nearly impossible to fit anything else in the 6 cmc spot, so I don't know how we'll fit it in. Let me know what you cut to get it in there! Cloudstone Curio shenanigans with this guy can get every land out of the deck, which incidentally also makes it huge.
Altered Ego - A clone with multiple upsides and considerable synergy with Animar. Not sure I'd be in a rush to find a spot for it in the deck, but if you're still running Clone, please replace it with Altered Ego.
Sage of Ancient Lore // Werewolf of Ancient Hunger - Most importantly it draws a card when it enters the battlefield and unlike other Elvish Visionary look-a-likes, it has the potential to be a decent size. If it ever flips (unlikely in multiplayer and especially Animar which loves to chain multiple spells together) it will likely be an enormous trampling beat stick.
Game Trail - I think this is probably worse than Copperline Gorge in terms of the likelihood of coming into play untapped. Probably pass on this, but maybe it gets better if you play the karoo bounce lands along with all the 'Forest Mountain' duel lands? It will likely be a decent budget choice if you need it.
Enjoy!
In my opinion Grixis is best for a single chess based deck, but for a pair of decks mono white vs. mono black would be cooler. Jhovall Queen is the only white queen available for such a theme build.
Fun fact: Grixis is best positioned for a chess themed deck with Sol'kanar or Sedris as king and Garza Zol for queen.
The ultimate requires her out for 5 turns to activate; +1 three times, 0 once to transform, -6 ultimate. In that time all you get is a 2/2 wolf and some combat buffs, which doesn't seem worth the effort. In a deck with doubling season it might be worth attempting to ultimate, but even then you still need to transform her first. It would be quite irritating having to constantly pull her out of a sleeve to flip her every turn too.
She is designed well and might make a splash in standard; I imagine it will always be about generating wolves and lightning bolting to get value from her. Maybe if her +1 face up ability gave trample (or other evasion) and haste I could consider it as a way to push through Commander damage, but now we're entering hypothetical territory, so I'll just say no to Arlinn.
Creature power (or how quickly the game can end)?
Evasiveness (Flying, Intimidate, Shadow, Trample, etc.)?
Survivability (Hexproof, shroud, self-recursion, regen, etc.)?
Examples:
Phyrexian Juggernaut will end the game quickly, if it can get through, but is weak to multiple types of removal and must attack.
Archangel adds evasion. It will take a few more hits to kill, but she flies past most chump blockers and also acts defensively at the same time (useful in Multiplayer).
Skeletal Wurm adds regeneration which makes it a bit more survivable, but is again able to be chump blocked forever.
All of this of course assumes mana cost is not an issue. If you're using equipment at all something like Invisible Stalker is probably going to provide far better inevitability than a big creature that can be blocked.
If mana cost is no issue, the uncommon Eldrazi are probably your best finishers as they attack your opponents resources at the same time as being a fast clock to finish the game: Artisan of Kozilek, Bane of Bala Ged, Pathrazer of Ulamog.