MTG Salvation

So I kinda stumbled into this one.

I made a Teysa Karlov deck that was a back door into playing Teshar, Ancestor's Apostle + Black. The deck was noticeably really cheap CMC wise outside of the couple rocks I am missing (Mana Crypt, Lion's Eye Diamond, Mox Opal, Mox Diamond) so I including all the usual black cards including Ad Nauseam. Teysa seemed like a card that didn't really do anything or was a win-more in the Commander slot so as a whim I decided to try out Kambal, Consul of Allocation in her spot and he worked like a charm. He comes out early and in most games he will do a lot of draining early on which also helps when the deck does eventually go for a big Nauseam.

So I took that list I played and decided to see how much I could flatten the curve and increase the early disruption to see how far it could be pushed. Now I know straight Orhzov is not generally considered a thing at these tables and the easy temptations of Esper, Mardu and Junk are right around the corners (This will probably lead to me making a Vial Smasher the Fierce / Tymna the Weaver someday) but I really like how this deck plays and don't mind if it isn't necessarily the fastest it can be.

I did Vampiric Tutor a Reanimate with Yawgmoth's Will active to recast Ad Nauseam to Reanimate Children of Korlis and have enough life at that point to close the game with an Aetherflux Reservoir


Here is the decklist as it stands right now:



One big thing with the deck is that when you have Yawgmoth's Will active the entire Teshar plan of attack is turned off during your turn.



Thanks for taking a look curious at possible suggestions.

I often play 5C lands for this reason, very fun fine tuning and finding interesting uses for a bunch of different scenarios.

Thinking it over decided to change some cards prior to even playing the deck.



One standout I overlooked was Flash a card with obvious workings with cards like Academy Rector, however the option to just Pay a different 4 mana and have an ambush Swans seems too good to pass up. Only a couple creatures are more mana or completely weird with Flash and one is completely irrelevant Snapcaster Mage.

A lot of the changes were putting in cards that worked better with TYS storm out so spells in the place of permanents some more land bounce and some more land drops, extremely curious to see how it runs.

That is just basically Kambal, Consul of Allocation isn't it

30 was always the number Shadowborn hovered at when I played those anything more felt like the deck had nothing else to do.

Thanks for the post I guess I will take it point by.

Quote from darrenhabib »

Defense of the Heart. Add Forbidden Orchard to up opponents creature counts.

I don't like next upkeep triggers generally, they feel very fragile.

Not sure what Greater Good is in the deck for? If your plan is to use it for Academy Rector or World Shaper, then I'd just play a sacrifice land. Sacrificing Kozilek, Butcher of Truth seems like when you're in the upper echelon of winning anyway.

With only 12 creatures, Survival of the Fittest is going to be pretty dead card most of the time. I know you want to use it for getting Swans of Bryn Argoll and Borborygmos Enraged, but I was playing Survival in a 20 creature deck, and found the creature count too low to be able to use it consistently. Because it's not like you hold onto creatures in your hand either thinking they'll be potential fuel for SoF, you'll play out Birds of Paradise, Lotus Cobra, etc when you get the chance.

These are related, I tend to like having free / close to free sacrifice cards when I need to get Eldrazi triggers if the decks other methods of victory are taken from me or out of reach, there being 34 lands in the deck currently means that even drawing every single land Borb can't kill a table on one go around, now the goal is not to increase the land count to make that more reliable instead I would play ways to recycle the lands I have used. I haven't generally have had a problem with Survival on low creature counts and even if I have drawn a bunch I can discard things without needing to find something. Greater good is also a hold over from when Titania, Protector of Argoth perhaps she should come back in.

Blasphemous Act is a fun one with Swans of Bryn Argoll, and your deck is pretty creatureless so removal is welcome anyway.

I have an idea for a future Repercussion deck in these colors so I will save that for then along probably with the Orchard from above.

At it's core it's a storm deck, but then I feel like some of the cards are a bit lost on potential power.
Frantic Search, Snap, Turnabout, all suggest mana doublers as a benefit.
Maybe Heartbeat of Spring, Mana Flare or you could go for an only you one like Mirari's Wake.
I'd think at least one in the deck would go a long way, especially as you have cards like Explore, Nature's Lore, Growth Spiral, Urban Evolution, that become like "free" spells to cast. You can even combine with Trade Routes/Storm Cauldron to make Exploration and Azusa, Lost but Seeking gain you mana.
Remember you don't play out cards like Heartbeat of Spring, Mana Flare, until you have your combo turn all setup, think of these as more like a sorcery spell you'd play.

So the card that powers all of these is the prime Rector target in Thousand-Year Storm Wake is definitely a card I will try depending on how the deck plays.

Mana I think is your biggest bottleneck in general, I'd try Smothering Tithe and if you do play Heartbeat of Spring/Mana Flare I'd also like to see Time Spiral in the deck.

Tithe is possible as is Time Spiral I like these suggestions

Meloku the Clouded Mirror as an alternative to returning lands to hand. Especially if you keep in Survival of the Fittest and Greater Good as it'll up your creature count.

So I was actually trying to find my Patron of the Moon but I forgot about Meloku this is really good I like a bunch also that probably means Burgeoning finds a home too

As far as cuts, Amulet of Vigor I can see you want to use with Scapeshift, Splendid Reclamation, World Shaper, but from personal experience often it literally does nothing most games.

I have played those games with Vigor too, but I have also played the games where it worked and good god did it work. However having it in a deck that also runs Lotus Cobra might be too greedy.

I think with trying to set your graveyard up with Life from the Loam, Mizzix's Mastery, Intuition, Scapeshift, Splendid Reclamation, World Shaper, that Kozilek, Butcher of Truth doesn't seem to fit. Not sure what you had in mind for the big guy? Maybe you're thinking about burning people out with Borborygmos Enraged and having enough lands, by recycling them with Survival of the Fittest and Kozilek, Butcher of Truth. But as I've already pointed out they are pretty bad cards without a complete combo, and you might as well just use Laboratory Maniac as your win condition.

That is primarily why the big guy is there and I like having at least one main alternative win-con

Electrodominance I think will be an easy cut.

Perhaps I do love this card, especially as an EoT way to blast my own Rector.

I play Pyroblast in all my red decks, so know where you are coming from, but I think it's just better as Dispel when you have access to blue. Then you'll have another blue card to pitch to Force of Will as well.

It is true however I have gotten way more Pyroblast and REB uses these days out of the Commander who is Blue or 1/2 Blue or 1/3 Blue and on and on, or hitting things like Rhystic Study or other dumb blue cards that linger on the board, the fact that it can turn the tide if someone has a counterspell is gravy. (I also really don't like Dispel)

Thanks again a lot to think about.

I don't think the answer to this problem is just another card + Legendary + Boros mana

At least I hope it is not.

My bad in that case I read part of that post in the wrong way then

Quote from ilovesaprolings »

Quote from Taleran »

Yeah it is a thorny topic because I don't disagree with anything you are saying but also I am not going to hold anything against the player in the corner who has that in their deck and it has a chance to completely change the game in their favor.

Quite different saying you play something because you want or you say you play something because it's a good and righteous way to fight an oppressive strategy.
I can bear the land destruction even if i'd rather visit my dentist; i can't bear someone's lies because he want to feel morally superior

I don't appreciate being called a liar out of the blue.

My arguments for the cards that encompass MLD and the use of MLD as a means to combat ramp can be varied and different because those topics are, and this thread has gone all over the place.

The Idea

So I have been wanting to make a deck with Tooth and Nail in it for a bit I have been playing a lot of lower CMC decks and thought it was time for a change and I run in a meta that doesn't have a problem with that card and all the things it can lead to. That being said I have done a lot with this card in the past, your Mike/Trike, Kiki/Zealous, Avenger/Hoof or Regal/Avenger even a Lark/Guide so I was looking for a new pairing to pull out with it and something that has the potential to be more variable and not 100% guarantee a victory on resolution like most of those others do.

I hit upon the combination I wanted to focus on while looking through all the creatures I have access too, the title of this thread gives away half of it and if you know anything about the Swans the other half should be pretty easy to guess.


Tooth and Nail Seismic Swans, lets go.


The Commander

Now using those 2 cards there are not that many Commander options available one all four a bunch of partner pairs and the five color options. I ruled out the partners because I didn't see a use for taking up two slots (this might change more later). Five color might be fun Black bringing stuff like Goryo's Vengeance and other reanimation cards to the table and tutors which is possible the best Commander for it would probably be Ramos but I wanted to stick to four colors and keep the deck more focused that leaves Kynaios and Tiro of Meletis. They also provide value from having lands in hand and ramp towards the biggest spells intending to be cast.

The Deck



Cards for Consideration

So thinking about the Commander after I built the deck there is some merit to making it Kydele, Chosen of Kruphix and Bruse Tarl, Boorish Herder the goal of deck being to draw powers of Kydele while Borb could really benefit from the Lifelink that Bruse hands out (the double strike being Gravy).

The inclusion of Thousand-Year Storm to play with all the land spells also gets me thinking about both Through the Breach and Show and Tell as alternatives to Tooth and Nail



I am going to play the game some before I write anything else about it since I don't tend to keep a lot of decks in one piece these days it all comes down to how they play.

Thanks for taking a look and any and all suggestions are welcome.

Yeah it is a thorny topic because I don't disagree with anything you are saying but also I am not going to hold anything against the player in the corner who has that in their deck and it has a chance to completely change the game in their favor.

I feel like most people will not find it controversial in the method that is used to close out the game quickly (the Krenko deck that has a critical mass of board and cycles a decree of annihilation for example). However I still do not think casting or utilizing those cards in a variety of situations in the game would be considered the wrong play.

That is a card I generally don't like because of how easy it is to put into a lot of decks to just create a win condition where one did not exist before. I genuinely find Scepter Reversal as a much more oppressive thing than Paradox Engine could ever be just for the investment needed and the creation of mana without the needing as much outside spells.

I have also seen it cast just to fuel some big X spells Torment of Hailfire is a common one in this case that doesn't need the biggest X to be severely damaging.

I generally agree that MLD is not the best case scenario for controlling players it is effective in flattening land accumulation.

A control deck is well equipped to deal with an explosion of ramp however depending on what colors you are in that control changes.

If you can't control the spell you control the fuel for it. In the end the spell is controlled.

That would be an entirely new design space I don't think there is an effect in the game that prevents the playing of lands.

So I do love this style of Voltron/Control that wears people down before a Haymaker so I came back to look at this deck and modify it and this came out.



Some notable new inclusions:


Nevinyrral's Disk is a card that should have been in the deck earlier, with any bounce / flicker effect this becomes a really effective way to wipe boards clean.

Pox this shrinks life totals, resources and this deck most of the time has a single creature in play and 1/3 of 1 is still 1 with Pox.

Dark Ritual, there are enough lot of black symbol cards now that this card does a lot of work and can create some extremely explosive early plays.

A lot of the other changes are lowering the curve down and altering the removal / disruption / counters