I've been running black on MTGO (no Ixalan cards until monday, sadly) and it's felt very strong so far. The extra removal and graveyard hate is really good.
Consign/Oblivion is surprisingly good right now. It just helps so much early on with the bounce, it kills tokens and Eternalize/Embalm creatures, and the second half is overpriced, but it's useful a lot more than I thought it would be, although a lot of the time people will just dump whatever creature removal they've been holding if they're heavy in it, but it's not like I ever cast it unless I have nothing better to do. Farm/Market is also very good, both halves. vs. other controlish decks if you can get it in your yard it filters out stuff, and vs. aggro its a bad immolating glare that turns into card selection.
I think Approach is the best deck going into Ixalan, so the deck is built kind of with that matchup in mind. I'm not in love with Authority in the sideboard. Given the nature of Ixalan, I think aggro is going to slow down a bit, and the deck already handles it pretty well. Wait and see how the meta develops I guess. Insidious Will is another card that's surprisingly good a lot of the time. I love it as a one-of, might be worth taking up to 2.
Oh, and the mix of 2x Scarab Feast, 1x Razaketh's Rite, and 1x Forsake the Worldly is realy just 4x Opt in disguise. I think they're better than Opt though, because they're all basically "bad Opt" with a huge, but rare, upside. I think the versatility and power are more important than the raw dig power. YMMV.
You're right about the Kamigawa lands and running less than 4x Lingering Souls. 25 lands might also be too much. I've run Intangible Virtue in token decks before, and I have mixed feelings on its effectiveness. When it works, it's really, really good. But it doesn't always work. And it's a big fat nothing if you're not ahead when you cast it. So yeah, I've got mixed feelings about it.
I've always liked Vastwood Seer, but you're right, she might not be the best fit for this deck, but her 4/4 token is pretty hefty, and the card draw is strong. Playing a version of this deck last night, I liked the card draw and the hefty blocker quite a bit. The removal and discard package needs tweaking, it doesn't feel like it's quite there yet. Some number of Paths should be included.
Thanks for the feedback, you had some really good points.
EDIT: maybe Pride Sovereign should be in here? Flip Gideon can untap him every turn if needed.
I've been messing around with GW Tokens for awhile, but I always missed what you got from Black. The GW Tokens lists from Standard kind of made me rethink how you could build token decks around creatures and token generators and global pump. So looking at the new 'Walker rules I'm getting ready to try this out:
Clearly, it's not "there" yet, and I don't know if it counts as a tokens deck or just a very different kind of junk deck. It's got a lot of pro-active plays on turns 1 and 2, and can really grind people out in the long game while the tokens, discard, and removal slow the game down early on.
Anyone have any thoughts or suggestions on this? Telling me to take it to a different thread works too, because this really pushes the bounds of this one.
Thanks.
I was looking for ways to abuse Ramunap Excavator and the Deserts in the new set to make a land-based control deck. This is where I'm at so far, I can't say how competitive it is yet, but fun is very much an accurate description.
This deck is basically attempting to run a mix of the best cycling cards and effects to filter draws early and win late. The manabase is supported by ramp and color fixing via Corrupted Grafstone and Channeler Initiate. The various cyclers help smooth out draws.
Still a very early work in progress, and the mana probably needs some tweaking, but this type of deck has a lot of draw, a lot of removal, and quite a bit of lifegain as well.
I think you guys should really look at running Regal Caracal in this deck as a high-end card. It's 3 bodies, two of which have lifelink, and it stacks with itself incredibly well - 2 of them on the battlefield is 20 points of lifelink power.
Sram's Expertise really is a must include in any token deck. It's just SO much velocity. Dropping a Sram's and a Nissa or Virtue, or a Beck//Call or something is just such a ridiculous play. Lately I've been thinking the Sorins should be switched over to Solemn Visitors, and the SoLS should be changed to Sword of Feast and Famine, or maybe just a second Fire and Ice, but the deck overall is just really, really strong. Hour of Reckoning is amazing. Convoke makes it easy to cast (it's zero mana off of a resolved Sram's+B//C). The sideboard is for combo and control decks with either mass removal or lots of nonland permanents that present a problem.
On Beck//Call - the card is surprisingly easy to get value out of. Beck + Lingering Souls flashback is four mana for two tokens and two cards. If you have a walker out, that goes up to 3 cards. Birds and Cobras are also easy ways to push up your number of cards drawn. Call is also a great, great choice to put under windbrisk heights. With the presence of the Cobras and Birds, 6 or 8 mana also isn't that hard to get to. With a great hand this deck can easily swing for 30+ damage on turn 4, while cards like the Swords and Jaces and BC's and 'Walkers really give you a nice long game too.
Bant Eldrazi is basically unwinnable though, so it's not like the deck is perfect or anything. Hour of Reckoning is pretty much your only hope there.
I don't know about you, but I'm not a big fan of being four color, especially seeing that you run a full playset of Gavony Township, which is a great card, but looking at your mana requirement, I'd feel like you don't have a lot of space for colorless mana in the deck.
Really like the Sram's Expertise + Beck/Call Combo you got there. Do you get to cast both half this way?
Yes. It's 4 mana for seven tokens and 4 cards. Crazy good value. You can only cast one half of the card off of Windbrisk Heights though.
The decklist I posted is what I'm using now, and like I said above, it's far from optimal. The mana especially is a huge mess. I'm pretty sure I want to be running at least two Hierarch's in addition to the birds. And it's really three color. Hardcasting either or both halves of Beck//Call does happen, but it's pretty rare. That's also one of the reasons I'm down on Procession in this deck. The mana just doesn't really support it, and if you're cheating it out, Beck//Call beats it handily.
So I've been messing around with this deck, but I think I've gone in a pretty different direction than a lot of you. This is my list, the best opening I've had so far led to me attacking for 24 damage on turn 4.
There is a lot of stuff that needs re-working in the list, as it's very much in progress. I think I need to go up to 4 Nissa's, and switch to the other Sorin, or maybe Elspeth or Gideon. Spectral Procession, Smuggler's Copter, and Eternal Witness all probably need to go, and I'm becoming less and less of a fan of Intangible Virtue. Lost Legacy with Birds is awesome, I'd like to add either some Elves of Deep Shadow or Noble Hierarch's to up the consistency of T1 mana dude.
I know some of those suggestions might strike you guys as odd, but the combination of Sram's and Call and Souls obsoletes Procession. It's too much work to get WWW, and at WW2, it's just way worse than Sram's, clogs up the 4 spot, and is redundant. Call casts better off of Windbrisk as well, and at 3 mana, Souls is just a better card. Kambal is amazing. If you haven't tried him, you absolutely should. This guy is severely underrated right now. Dominates the mirror and control decks. Thalis and Alive//Well are bad choices for this deck I've found.
I'm wide open to suggestions and criticisms. The lack of removal so far has only been a problem vs. Merfolk, and there only due to the unblockability provided by Spreading Seas and various Lords. Everyone else you just outcreature with giant tokens. It's important to note that casting "Beck" on it's own is often a pretty good play. If you have even just a BoP or a walker out, it cycles for two mana, if you have more options, you can get 2 or 3 cards out of it pretty easily in this deck. It also works off of your opponents' creatures, which doesn't come up often, but is worth keeping in mind.
EDIT: oh, and the sequence that led to a 24 damage attack on t4 was: T1: BoP. T2: Lingering Souls. T3: Sram's Expertise casting Beck//Call. T4: Nissa, Voice of Zendikar and Lingering Virtue. (It would have been for more but I chump blocked a few things/ate removal with some tokens.
Sram's is really, really good. An earlier build I used had a couple Eternal Witnesses in it, and that was just a brutal, brutal play. One reason for no turn one play is kind of accidental, I used to have some Duress' and Consulate Dreadnoughts in there, and the Dreadnoughts got cut because they were really situational (but very strong in those situations), and the Duress' got moved to the board. It's also kind of on purpose so that I can play a tapped land on T1 without losing a ton of life. I run the Sorin that gives emblems, not the one that gives you tons of life.
Night's Whisper is good, but I have been looking for something better. Tamiyo, Field Researcher would be amazing, but she's not the right colors. I'll probably try Mask of Memory at some point.
So I've been messing around lately on MTGO with an Azban Tokens list, I'm doing a lot of things differently deck wise, but it seems to be working out ok so far. Here's the list:
It's still very much a work in progress, obviously, and I've been experimenting with Wooded Bastion as a way to help out with the inherent conflict in the Nissa/Spectral mana costs. I'd also like to experiment with Warping Wail maindeck, but it would require re-tuning the mana base a bit.
Basically I got rid of the removal package, because more and bigger tokens is a better way to invalidate their board position than diluting our game plan is. And I ditched the discard suite maindeck because the clock just isn't fast enough to really take advantage of it. Discard doesn't stop people, it just slows them down, and the tokens plan isn't really fast enough to benefit that much from that. Duress out of the board is great for forcing through spells though.
This is based off the GW list that got top 16 at a recent GP. I dropped the accelerating creatures form it and added a little more black plus some Aether Revolt upgrades, and vehicles. I really like how the vehicles give your tokens "haste" and provide a little bit of card filtering.
Anyone have any thought son this? Or tried something similar?
1x Duress
1x Razaketh's Rite
2x Never // Return
4x Fumigate
3x Approach of the Second Sun
Instants - 24
2x Fatal Push
2x Scarab Feast
3x Censor
2x Consign // Oblivion
1x Forsake the Worldly
2x Farm // Market
4x Supreme Will
4x Glimmer of Genius
1x Insidious Will
2x Commit // Memory
1x Pull from Tomorrow
3x Scavenger Grounds
2x Ipnu Rivulet
1x Ifnir Deadlands
2x Irrigated Farmlands
2x Concealed Courtyard
2x Fetid Pools
2x Evolving Wilds
4x Aether Hub
2x Island
3x Plains
2x Swamp
3x Negate
3x Lost Legacy
2x Duress
2x Gideon of the Trials
1x Forsake the Wordly
4x Authority of the Consuls
Consign/Oblivion is surprisingly good right now. It just helps so much early on with the bounce, it kills tokens and Eternalize/Embalm creatures, and the second half is overpriced, but it's useful a lot more than I thought it would be, although a lot of the time people will just dump whatever creature removal they've been holding if they're heavy in it, but it's not like I ever cast it unless I have nothing better to do. Farm/Market is also very good, both halves. vs. other controlish decks if you can get it in your yard it filters out stuff, and vs. aggro its a bad immolating glare that turns into card selection.
I think Approach is the best deck going into Ixalan, so the deck is built kind of with that matchup in mind. I'm not in love with Authority in the sideboard. Given the nature of Ixalan, I think aggro is going to slow down a bit, and the deck already handles it pretty well. Wait and see how the meta develops I guess. Insidious Will is another card that's surprisingly good a lot of the time. I love it as a one-of, might be worth taking up to 2.
Oh, and the mix of 2x Scarab Feast, 1x Razaketh's Rite, and 1x Forsake the Worldly is realy just 4x Opt in disguise. I think they're better than Opt though, because they're all basically "bad Opt" with a huge, but rare, upside. I think the versatility and power are more important than the raw dig power. YMMV.
You're right about the Kamigawa lands and running less than 4x Lingering Souls. 25 lands might also be too much. I've run Intangible Virtue in token decks before, and I have mixed feelings on its effectiveness. When it works, it's really, really good. But it doesn't always work. And it's a big fat nothing if you're not ahead when you cast it. So yeah, I've got mixed feelings about it.
I've always liked Vastwood Seer, but you're right, she might not be the best fit for this deck, but her 4/4 token is pretty hefty, and the card draw is strong. Playing a version of this deck last night, I liked the card draw and the hefty blocker quite a bit. The removal and discard package needs tweaking, it doesn't feel like it's quite there yet. Some number of Paths should be included.
Thanks for the feedback, you had some really good points.
EDIT: maybe Pride Sovereign should be in here? Flip Gideon can untap him every turn if needed.
3x Kytheon, Hero of Akros
3x Nissa, Vastwood Seer
1x Brimaz, King of Oreskos
Vehicles - 2
2x Heart of Kiran
Planeswalkers - 10
3x Nissa, Voice of Zendikar
2x Gideon, Ally of Zendikar
2x Sorin, Lord of Innistrad
2x Sorin, Solemn Visitor
1x Ajani, Mentor of Heroes
Spells - 14
3x Legion's Landing
3x Fatal Push
3x Thoughtseize
3x Inquisition of Kozilek
2x Lingering Souls
2x Abrupt Decay
3x Gavony Township
1x Vault of the Archangel
4x Windswept Heath
1x Temple Garden
1x Godless Shrine
1x Overgrown Tomb
4x Forest
2x Plains
1x Swamp
3x Concealed Courtyard
1x Blooming Marsh
1x Okina, Temple to the Grandfathers
1x Shizo, Death's Storehouse
1x Eiganjo Castle
2x Relic of Progenitus
3x Maelstrom Pulse
3x Aven Mindcensor
2x Obsinate Baloth
3x Stony Silence
3x Duress
Clearly, it's not "there" yet, and I don't know if it counts as a tokens deck or just a very different kind of junk deck. It's got a lot of pro-active plays on turns 1 and 2, and can really grind people out in the long game while the tokens, discard, and removal slow the game down early on.
Anyone have any thoughts or suggestions on this? Telling me to take it to a different thread works too, because this really pushes the bounds of this one.
Thanks.
4x Channeler Initiate
4x Primal Druid
4x Ramunap Excavator
4x Ramunap Hydra
3x Mina and Denn, Wildborn
3x The Gitrog Monster
3x Ulvenwald Hydra
Enchantments - 4
4x Oath of Nissa
Sorceries - 6
4x Hour of Promise
2x Hour of Devastation
Lands - 25
1x Blighted Fen
1x Canyon Slough
1x Cradle of the Accursed
3x Desert of the Fervent
4x Desert of the Indomitable
1x Dunes of the Dead
1x Grasping Dunes
1x Ifnir Deadlands
1x Ramunap Ruins
4x Sheltered Thicket
1x Sunscorched Desert
3x Forest
2x Mountain
1x Swamp
4x Abrade
3x Radiant Flames
3x Transgress the Mind
3x Warping Wail
2x Skysovereign, Consul Flagship
Totally open to any suggestions people have. Thanks.
Nettle Sentinel just doesn't seem that great if you're not trying to Glimpse off, while Deep Shadow is color fixing and guaranteed to produce mana.
4x Channeler Initiate
4x Curator of Mysteries
4x Archfiend of Ifnir
Instants
4x Forsake the Worldly
4x Censor
4x Dissenter's Deliverance
Enchantments
4x Drake Haven
4x Cast Out
4x Corrupted Grafstone
Lands
4x Irrigated Farmland
3x Fetid Pool
3x Scattered Groves
4x Evolving Wilds
3x Plains
3x Island
2x Forest
2x Swamp
4x Manglehorn
4x Never/Return
4x Scarab Feast
3x Negate
Still a very early work in progress, and the mana probably needs some tweaking, but this type of deck has a lot of draw, a lot of removal, and quite a bit of lifegain as well.
We've got Cast Out so far just in this set.
4x Birds of Paradise
4x Lotus Cobra
2x Jace, Vryn's Prodigy
Planeswalkers
4x Nissa, Voice of Zendikar
3x Sorin, Lord of Innistrad
Sorcerys
2x Hour of Reckoning
4x Lingering Souls
4x Sram's Expertise
4x Beck//Call
Artifacts
1x Sword of Fire and Ice
1x Sword of Light and Shadow
2x Intangible Virtue
Lands
4x Gavony Township
3x Windbrisk Heights
4x Windswept Heath
2x Flooded Strand
4x Forest
1x Plains
2x Temple Garden
2x Overgrown Tomb
1x Godless Shrine
1x Hallowed Fountain
1x Breeding Pool
4x Kambal, Consul of Allocation
4x Lost Legacy
2x Hour of Reckoning
2x Ratchet Bomb
1x Maelstrom Pulse
2x Abrupt Decay
Sram's Expertise really is a must include in any token deck. It's just SO much velocity. Dropping a Sram's and a Nissa or Virtue, or a Beck//Call or something is just such a ridiculous play. Lately I've been thinking the Sorins should be switched over to Solemn Visitors, and the SoLS should be changed to Sword of Feast and Famine, or maybe just a second Fire and Ice, but the deck overall is just really, really strong. Hour of Reckoning is amazing. Convoke makes it easy to cast (it's zero mana off of a resolved Sram's+B//C). The sideboard is for combo and control decks with either mass removal or lots of nonland permanents that present a problem.
On Beck//Call - the card is surprisingly easy to get value out of. Beck + Lingering Souls flashback is four mana for two tokens and two cards. If you have a walker out, that goes up to 3 cards. Birds and Cobras are also easy ways to push up your number of cards drawn. Call is also a great, great choice to put under windbrisk heights. With the presence of the Cobras and Birds, 6 or 8 mana also isn't that hard to get to. With a great hand this deck can easily swing for 30+ damage on turn 4, while cards like the Swords and Jaces and BC's and 'Walkers really give you a nice long game too.
Bant Eldrazi is basically unwinnable though, so it's not like the deck is perfect or anything. Hour of Reckoning is pretty much your only hope there.
Yes. It's 4 mana for seven tokens and 4 cards. Crazy good value. You can only cast one half of the card off of Windbrisk Heights though.
The decklist I posted is what I'm using now, and like I said above, it's far from optimal. The mana especially is a huge mess. I'm pretty sure I want to be running at least two Hierarch's in addition to the birds. And it's really three color. Hardcasting either or both halves of Beck//Call does happen, but it's pretty rare. That's also one of the reasons I'm down on Procession in this deck. The mana just doesn't really support it, and if you're cheating it out, Beck//Call beats it handily.
4x Birds of Paradise
2x Eternal Witness
2x Monastery Mentor
Enchantments
4x Intangible Virtue
Vehicles
4x Smuggler's Copter
Planeswalkers
2x Nissa, Voice of Zendikar
3x Sorin, Lord of Innistrad
Sorceries
4x Lingering Souls
4x Sram's Expertise
3x Spectral Procession
4x Beck//Call
3x Windswept Heath
1x Flooded Strand
2x Overgrown Tomb
1x Temple Garden
1x Breeding Pool
1x Hallowed Fountain
1x Godless Shrine
3x Windbrisk Heights
3x Forest
2x Plains
2x Swamp
4x Gavony Township
4x Kambal, Consul of Allocation
3x Alive//Well
4x Thalia, Guardian of Thraben
4x Lost Legacy
There is a lot of stuff that needs re-working in the list, as it's very much in progress. I think I need to go up to 4 Nissa's, and switch to the other Sorin, or maybe Elspeth or Gideon. Spectral Procession, Smuggler's Copter, and Eternal Witness all probably need to go, and I'm becoming less and less of a fan of Intangible Virtue. Lost Legacy with Birds is awesome, I'd like to add either some Elves of Deep Shadow or Noble Hierarch's to up the consistency of T1 mana dude.
I know some of those suggestions might strike you guys as odd, but the combination of Sram's and Call and Souls obsoletes Procession. It's too much work to get WWW, and at WW2, it's just way worse than Sram's, clogs up the 4 spot, and is redundant. Call casts better off of Windbrisk as well, and at 3 mana, Souls is just a better card. Kambal is amazing. If you haven't tried him, you absolutely should. This guy is severely underrated right now. Dominates the mirror and control decks. Thalis and Alive//Well are bad choices for this deck I've found.
I'm wide open to suggestions and criticisms. The lack of removal so far has only been a problem vs. Merfolk, and there only due to the unblockability provided by Spreading Seas and various Lords. Everyone else you just outcreature with giant tokens. It's important to note that casting "Beck" on it's own is often a pretty good play. If you have even just a BoP or a walker out, it cycles for two mana, if you have more options, you can get 2 or 3 cards out of it pretty easily in this deck. It also works off of your opponents' creatures, which doesn't come up often, but is worth keeping in mind.
EDIT: oh, and the sequence that led to a 24 damage attack on t4 was: T1: BoP. T2: Lingering Souls. T3: Sram's Expertise casting Beck//Call. T4: Nissa, Voice of Zendikar and Lingering Virtue. (It would have been for more but I chump blocked a few things/ate removal with some tokens.
Night's Whisper is good, but I have been looking for something better. Tamiyo, Field Researcher would be amazing, but she's not the right colors. I'll probably try Mask of Memory at some point.
So I've been messing around lately on MTGO with an Azban Tokens list, I'm doing a lot of things differently deck wise, but it seems to be working out ok so far. Here's the list:
4x Smuggler's Copter
Sorceries - 16
4x Night's Whisper
4x Lingering Souls
4x Spectral Procession
4x Sram's Expertise
Planeswalkers - 9
4x Nissa, Voice of Zendikar
3x Sorin, Lord of Innistrad
2x Gideon, Ally of Zendikar
Enchantments - 4
4x Intangible Virtue
Instants - 2
2x Secure the Wastes
4x Windswept Heath
4x Marsh Flats
4x Gavony Township
3x Windbrisk Heights
2x Plains
2x Forest
1x Swamp
2x Godless Shrine
2x Temple Garden
1x Overgrown Tomb
4x Duress
3x Baneslayer Angel
4x Abrupt Decay
4x Blessed Alliance
It's still very much a work in progress, obviously, and I've been experimenting with Wooded Bastion as a way to help out with the inherent conflict in the Nissa/Spectral mana costs. I'd also like to experiment with Warping Wail maindeck, but it would require re-tuning the mana base a bit.
Basically I got rid of the removal package, because more and bigger tokens is a better way to invalidate their board position than diluting our game plan is. And I ditched the discard suite maindeck because the clock just isn't fast enough to really take advantage of it. Discard doesn't stop people, it just slows them down, and the tokens plan isn't really fast enough to benefit that much from that. Duress out of the board is great for forcing through spells though.
This is based off the GW list that got top 16 at a recent GP. I dropped the accelerating creatures form it and added a little more black plus some Aether Revolt upgrades, and vehicles. I really like how the vehicles give your tokens "haste" and provide a little bit of card filtering.
Anyone have any thought son this? Or tried something similar?
Stoneforge Mystic
Land Tax
Green Sun's Zenith
Tangle Wire
Exploration
Will Not be reprinted:
Omnicience
Preordain
Infernal Tutor
Containment Priest
Trickbind