@KingCobra
Whereas I agree that blightsteel is only an infect card, it still has trample, meaning that the remaining damage will be dealt in the form of poison counters, while at the same time, anything blocking blightsteel will most likely be rendered useless, as it will be dealt damage in the form of -1/-1 counters. If I'm looking to kill with trample, then darksteel is the way to go, but if I'm looking to make my opponent powerless, then blightsteel is the way to go. It all depends on what I'm in the mood for.:D
@Stairc
I agree that emperion doesn't really scream "I win", but the fact doesn't change that my life total won't go down as long as he's on the field, which means that I can tap all of my creatures and make them attack while not worrying about taking the hit afterwards and losing the game because of it. Whereas it doesn't fit with sphinx of the steel wind since my deck let's me cheat cards, depending on the strategy, I can either go lifelink, or prervent all combat damage. It depends on what the situation is. What I like about this is that it gives me options. Either go sphinx or emperion, but not both (I suppose that I could go both to deal some damage to my opponent though). It's big, it's bad, and it won't leave. Emperion isn't there to be a finisher, but rather a stepping stone to my victory.
Thanks for the tip about howling mine, I'll take it out of the deck. Any other suggestions on how to make it better? I'll post an update tomorrow woth what's been changed so that everybody can see.;)
@Stairc and KingCobra
Thank's for tip about alluring siren. I guess it really is pointless in this deck, considering the cards I already have and the strategy I'm running.;)
@BlackVise
Wow, I can't believe that you went through the trouble of making a deck to help! I've seen some cards in it that might be worth adding, but I think I'll keep the creatures that I already have. Only having 4 riptide and 1 blightsteel seem a bit risky for me, but the way you incoprorated control into this so easily makes me all giddy. I can't wait to see how my control/combo deck will turn out once it's done.:D
@everybody
I'm still open to suggestions to make this deck as strong as possible. If you don't think that a card fits, please tell me so that I can understand for future reference. If you think that there's a card that should be added, please tell me. I'll be posting an updated version of my deck tomorrow so that everybody can see what I've got so far and what's been changed.
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@Stairc
I agree that emperion doesn't really scream "I win", but the fact doesn't change that my life total won't go down as long as he's on the field, which means that I can tap all of my creatures and make them attack while not worrying about taking the hit afterwards and losing the game because of it. Whereas it doesn't fit with sphinx of the steel wind since my deck let's me cheat cards, depending on the strategy, I can either go lifelink, or prervent all combat damage. It depends on what the situation is. What I like about this is that it gives me options. Either go sphinx or emperion, but not both (I suppose that I could go both to deal some damage to my opponent though). It's big, it's bad, and it won't leave. Emperion isn't there to be a finisher, but rather a stepping stone to my victory.
Thanks for the tip about howling mine, I'll take it out of the deck. Any other suggestions on how to make it better? I'll post an update tomorrow woth what's been changed so that everybody can see.;)
@Stairc and KingCobra
Thank's for tip about alluring siren. I guess it really is pointless in this deck, considering the cards I already have and the strategy I'm running.;)
Don't worry, I wasn't arguing against the Emperion, far from it, just analyzing the cards you have that can function as actual win conditions. You can run bug guys that aren't win conditions too, if they help you in some huge way. Cards like the Emperion are definitely nice to have around.
There's a lot we can do to up the power level of this deck. Don't worry.
Fun Fact: I kind of want to see you go all out with Eldrazi, Eye of Ugin and similar fun... But that probably wouldn't be budget.
I agree, going eldrazi could be sooo much fun, but I don't have enough money to be able to put together a real eldrazi deck with what I've got, so it won't be happening. The only possible way for this to work is if somebody bought the cards for me, but life doesn't work that way, so I'll stick with what I can afford. I looked up some eldrazi cards, and pathrazer of ulamog isn't expensive, and having it that betrays would be alot of fun if I get it out. Maybe it would be worth putting one in my deck...
I wasn't trying to argue against Emperion,, just point out why I put him there. He is nice to have around, and I thought he could offer quite a bit of protection while he's there, since he's quite hard to kill.
Anyways, yesterday I said that I would put an updated version of my deck on the thread, so here it is:
So this time I've added it that betrays, sphinx of the steel wind and inkwell leviathan for for creatures. I'm still debating whether or not I should replace It that betrays by a pathrazer of ulamog, but It seems like so much fun if I play it! Sphinx was added for life gain, and inkwell for defense.
In terms of spells, not much has changed. I've decided to keep the polymorphs, and mass polymorphs, since I'm looking for a combo/control deck, but I've added mana leak, echoing truth and rune snag for some protection, leaving me with a grand total of 16 protection spells rather than 8. It's not much, but it's a start. I'm still not sure if blightsteel should become a darksteel.
I don't think I'll re-explain the strategy behind this deck, since it hasn't changed much, but if you want me to go in detail, post a comment asking, and I'll do just that.
Right now the deck is at 72 cards if I counted correctly, which isn't too bad. I'm not looking for a perfect 60 card deck, so I'm okay with slightly more than that than 60 cards. The only thing that's left is to make this deck much, much better. I want it to be as strong as possible. That being said, if you guys have any suggestions on how to make my current/modified version of the deck better, let me know. I'd like to know why you want to make these changes so that I learn from my mistakes. If you feel that the proportions should be changed, let me know.
I hope this helps figure out where to start from when it comes to makeing it better, rather than having to refer to previous posts again and again.
@KingCobra
Whereas I agree that blightsteel is only an infect card, it still has trample, meaning that the remaining damage will be dealt in the form of poison counters, while at the same time, anything blocking blightsteel will most likely be rendered useless, as it will be dealt damage in the form of -1/-1 counters. If I'm looking to kill with trample, then darksteel is the way to go, but if I'm looking to make my opponent powerless, then blightsteel is the way to go. It all depends on what I'm in the mood for.:D
Well think about this situation. Your opponent has 4 life and you have both blightsteel and darksteel in your hand. Lets say that your opponent has a 5/5 out. Which card would be more useful for you to play?
If you play blightsteel and attack next turn, they can block with the 5/5 and only 6 damage will get through. Your opponent will have 6 poison counters but wont be dead.
If you play darksteel and attack next turn, they can block with the 5/5, but the 6 normal damage that gets through will be enough to kill your opponent since they are already so low on life.
Remember that creatures with infect will only give out poison counters to opponents, not normal damage. Me and some of my roommates learned the hard way that mixing infect and non infect creatures doesnt work that well when we did a SoM/DKA draft. Trying to win by two strategies in the same deck generally just ends up with half your cards being useless in a game.
The -1/-1 counters that blightsteel gives out wont be that big of a deal. Most creatures that block an 11/11 will be dead anyway. It will kill a indestructible creature or regenerator that darksteel might not be able to, but that wont make too much of a difference in the game. You generally want to destroy your opponent as fast as possible with this creature, since its one of your win-conditions. If you really want to make your opponent feel powerless, annihilator and eldrazi are definately the way to go.
Infect is better on low cost small creatures. Blightsteel can destroy a wall of denial in one hit even without infect, but a flensermite could slowly take the wall down after a couple turns while a normal 1/1 cant.
I see what you mean. If it wasn's for my budget then I would buy both. Maybe darksteel would be better for this deck after all. When you look at it, it' s a hard decision to make. I guess I'll mull it over and see what I should do about. Does anybody else think that darksteel would be better for this deck? While I'm at it, what should ponder and preordain be possibly replaced by? It seems that there are much better cards out there for draw. My only worry is whether or not they'll fit within my budget since I'm starting to get some more expensive cards. Any other suggestions on how to make my deck better?
I agree, going eldrazi could be sooo much fun, but I don't have enough money to be able to put together a real eldrazi deck with what I've got, so it won't be happening. The only possible way for this to work is if somebody bought the cards for me, but life doesn't work that way, so I'll stick with what I can afford. I looked up some eldrazi cards, and pathrazer of ulamog isn't expensive, and having it that betrays would be alot of fun if I get it out. Maybe it would be worth putting one in my deck...
I wasn't trying to argue against Emperion,, just point out why I put him there. He is nice to have around, and I thought he could offer quite a bit of protection while he's there, since he's quite hard to kill.
Anyways, yesterday I said that I would put an updated version of my deck on the thread, so here it is:
So this time I've added it that betrays, sphinx of the steel wind and inkwell leviathan for for creatures. I'm still debating whether or not I should replace It that betrays by a pathrazer of ulamog, but It seems like so much fun if I play it! Sphinx was added for life gain, and inkwell for defense.
In terms of spells, not much has changed. I've decided to keep the polymorphs, and mass polymorphs, since I'm looking for a combo/control deck, but I've added mana leak, echoing truth and rune snag for some protection, leaving me with a grand total of 16 protection spells rather than 8. It's not much, but it's a start. I'm still not sure if blightsteel should become a darksteel.
I don't think I'll re-explain the strategy behind this deck, since it hasn't changed much, but if you want me to go in detail, post a comment asking, and I'll do just that.
Right now the deck is at 72 cards if I counted correctly, which isn't too bad. I'm not looking for a perfect 60 card deck, so I'm okay with slightly more than that than 60 cards. The only thing that's left is to make this deck much, much better. I want it to be as strong as possible. That being said, if you guys have any suggestions on how to make my current/modified version of the deck better, let me know. I'd like to know why you want to make these changes so that I learn from my mistakes. If you feel that the proportions should be changed, let me know.
I hope this helps figure out where to start from when it comes to makeing it better, rather than having to refer to previous posts again and again.
So, planning to use Polymorph, destroy you're creature and dramatically flip over cards until you hit...
Since it's a national holiday where I live, I took some time and looked up a mono blue control primer, and got some ideas from it. If you want to look it up, then just simply look up the primers in this section and you'll find it. It's near the top.
So I was wondering, would it be worth while putting in fact or fiction if I can afford it? What about Jace's ingenuity if I can't afford fiction? I also found a cool card called wash out, but I'm not sure if it'll be useful in this deck. It could be, but I'd like your opinions on it. So, what do you think? Should I add these cards into the deck? I also thought about getting brainstorm, but since my budget is only 30$, I fear that I might surpass it at the rate I'm going, so it's either going to be brainstorm or Fiction in the deck. I suppose 2 of each or 1 and 2 would work, so what you guys suggest?
So, planning to use Polymorph, destroy you're creature and dramatically flip over cards until you hit...
...
A Treasure Mage.
That's the problem with Polymorph in this deck.
No, I think that hitting a treasure mage could be a good thing, since it'll let me put a colossus or emperion into my hand, which can then be cheated out with plasm. It all depends on what's happening at the time I play polymorph. But I see where you're coming from, since putting a treasure mage on the field isn't very threatening and could make me lose the game if I played it at a crucial moment hoping to get my finisher out. But still, it might be worth the risk. If it's not, how do you suggest I get rid of that risk?
*EDIT*
Ignore what I wrote above, it was poorly phrased. Stairc, you're absolutely right. Hitting a treasure mage when using polymorph would be a huge problem, and I see why. If I use polymorph hoping to get a finisher out, then I get a treasure mage, it'll have been a waste of polymorph and another creature. But since no deck is perfect, I'll have to chance the odds that I'll get him (being only 15 %, as I included three in my updated deck, and since no one has given me any feedback on it yet, that's what I'm basing it off of), hoping that I'll already have one in my hand, or that one was polymorphed. Worst case scenario, I put a treasure mage on the field at the crucial moment that I needed a finisher, put colossus or emperion in my hand, and hope I have plasm out on the field or in my hand and that I don't die this turn. That's not only the worst case scenario, but that's exactly what'll happen each time I get him through polymorph. It's a huge dissapointment waiting to happen, but I don't know what else to do about it, so I guess it'll just have to stay that until I find a better way to deal with the problem. Any other problems you (or anybody else) noticed?
Just be careful that you dont let emperion die if you get him out. If theres a high risk of him dying if he attacks, its probably worth holding him back. As long as hes around your opponent can attack as much as they want and it wont matter.
Wash out could be a nice addition to this deck, especially if you play it to clear your opponents side before attacking with a finisher. Just be careful though. Theres many circumstances where it could affect your creatures too, or only take out half your opponents creatures if they're running multiple colors. Sleep might be a better option. If they dont play a good defender on their next turn, theyll be completely open to attack for two turns in a row.
If you want to keep the polymorph strategy, I might just get rid of treasure mage altogether. By the time you get aetherplasm out, I would be very surprised if you didnt have at least one large finisher in your hand. If youre that worried about drawing into your large creatures, just replace treasure mage with more large creatures. That will save you the three mana delay of having to play treasure mage to get that creature.
Riptide shapeshifter costs a lot of mana, but its very good if you can pull it off. Just be sure that you remember the exact creature types of every creature you might consider pulling out. The last thing you want to do is not know what to name during the middle of a game. If you have routine problems pulling out the leviathan that you dont want, it might be worth switching one of them out for a different large creature type.
Just be careful that you dont let emperion die if you get him out. If theres a high risk of him dying if he attacks, its probably worth holding him back. As long as hes around your opponent can attack as much as they want and it wont matter.
Wash out could be a nice addition to this deck, especially if you play it to clear your opponents side before attacking with a finisher. Just be careful though. Theres many circumstances where it could affect your creatures too, or only take out half your opponents creatures if they're running multiple colors. Sleep might be a better option. If they dont play a good defender on their next turn, theyll be completely open to attack for two turns in a row.
If you want to keep the polymorph strategy, I might just get rid of treasure mage altogether. By the time you get aetherplasm out, I would be very surprised if you didnt have at least one large finisher in your hand. If youre that worried about drawing into your large creatures, just replace treasure mage with more large creatures. That will save you the three mana delay of having to play treasure mage to get that creature.
Riptide shapeshifter costs a lot of mana, but its very good if you can pull it off. Just be sure that you remember the exact creature types of every creature you might consider pulling out. The last thing you want to do is not know what to name during the middle of a game. If you have routine problems pulling out the leviathan that you dont want, it might be worth switching one of them out for a different large creature type.
I figured as much with emperion. I was only planning on letting him attack if I thought it was safe. No point in him dying and me losing my protection. I think I'll be keeping the polymorph strayegy, but this has two main problems. The first being that if I remove treasure mage, my lowest costing creature will be a 4cmc, and with only 4 of him in the deck, what are the odds I get him in my hand at the beginning when I need him? The second problem is that the only creatures that I'd be able to polymorph would be plasm and shapeshifter. That's not alot, and again, what are the odds I get them? High enough, but low enough for me to be worried. With these problems, mass polymorph is also out, since I need multiple creatures to kill, and I don't want to kill my strong creatures. I'm all for adding more big guys, but I still need something cheap, preferably with a good ability for this deck, to play at the beginning. Again, right now, the problem I have is not having creatures to play. I literally need aetherplasm and riptide shapeshifter in order to play the game, unless I get lucky and pull off a quicksilver amulet. The only thing saving me at the beginning are my counter spells. If I get propaganda at the beginning, I'll count myself lucky, since my opponent won't be able to attack me with all he's got.
It'S not that I'm worried about not having finishers in my hand, like you mentioned, but whether or not I'll have plasm to go along with it.
On another note, I agree that Wash out could be very risky in this deck, which is why if I include them, it'll be either only 1 or 2, or in my side board (which is non-existant at the moment), and I think that sleep might be a better option. As for the leviathans, I have a 50/50 chance of getting something to let me defend while I get stronger things out on the field, or a 50/50 chance of getting something kick ass really good. As for naming creature types, I'm not worried in the least, since I already know them by heart (I have a amazing memory when it comes to things that interest me).
After much humming and hawing, I've decided to use darksteel colossus rather than blightsteel colossus in this deck, as they both have trample, but the one with infect won't be dealing actual damage to my opponent, and it might take a few turns to finish off my opponent. The only thing I'm still worried about, is that if I use blighsteel with sleep, then it's an instant win for me. If sleep is used with darksteel, it's either and instant win, or the annoying alomost win where your opponent can mess up your strategy if he gets the right cards at the right moment.
In case I don't get plasm, I would need something for draw. I was thinking about maybe replacing preordain and ponder by either a few brainstorm or fact or fiction. Which one do you guys suggest? Do you guys suggest other cards to use? Are my current spells okay as they are? What about the proportions? Just look at my updated deck for referrence and add in 4 sleep. I'm also wondering if my creature:spell ratio isn't favouring my spells too much...
I still think that clutch of the undercity could be useful, but I'm not sure where to get the black mana for him, and I think it would be problematic since I'm looking at an almost all blue deck. What do you think? Do you know any other mono-blue cards along those lines?
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If you run few shuffle effects, I'd recommend Preordain over Brainstorm. It's cheaper and, without shuffle effects to toss the cards you don't want off the top of your deck, easily as good.
4) Take out the Deep-Sea Krakens, a big unblockable creature's cool and all but you've got other big creatures with evasion anyway.
You could also add some mana acceleration like Jeweled Amulet, Lotus Petal, Chrome Mox, and Mind Stone to allow you to cast spells during your turn and keep mana untapped for counters during your opponent's turn.
Definitely run 4 rune snags or none at all. Mana Leak is a good option too.
I might consider keeping the deep-sea kraken. The high CMC wont matter if youre cheating it into play and the suspend ability is a nice backup plan if you dont draw into any aetherplasms.
I like the polymorph strategy but I wish there were more blue token makers out there to support it. I couldnt find anything along the lines of lingering souls or rally the townsfolk.
With four Ponder plus Riptide Shapeshifters there would be enough shuffle effects to make Brainstorm worthwhile, but it really does depend on the rest of the deck as you said.
I'd hesitate to call the Shapeshifter a reliable shuffle effect. If you activate it's ability you should be about win anyway and shouldn't need a Brainstorm after the fact. If the deck doesn't win 90% of the time after activating a Shapeshifter, that's a problem.
Brainstorm's an amazing card (and better than ever now with the new Miracles) but I wouldn't recommend dropping around $8 for a full playset when you could spend a fraction of the cost for Preordains... Which I actually like better for the deck anyway. He's on a budget after all.
I see... but I'm still a bit confused when it comes to certain cards, so please bear with me.
First of all, should I have mana leak or rune snag in this deck? Or should I put both? If I do put both, I know I need 4 rune snag to get the most of it, but what about mana leak? If you had to pick between 2, 3, or 4 mana leaks in the deck, how many would you put in?
One of my concerns with this deck is that I won't have any small creatures to polymorph. It's obvious that I don't want to polymorph any of my finishers, so that leaves plasm and shapeshifter, and shapeshifter's out of the question, due to his ability., so tha leaves plasm. When I see my plasm on the field, I figure one of two things will happen: my opponent will attack me, letting me use plasm's ability to put out afinisher, or my opponent won't attack me right away, giving me a turn or two to get some better cards in my hand. So do I really want to polymorph plasm? No on most accounts, as I can get another plasm, yes if my opponent plays a flying deck and I need a finisher to be able to do something and I don't have shapeshifter in my hand. So really, I would need to find something small and weak to polymorph, lest I just take them out all together. What do you guys think? Is polymorph really needed in this deck, or is it just a waste of space? As much as I like the polymorph strategy, like KingCobra said, there's not much to back it up when it comes to this deck.
I think I'll keep deep-sea kraken for when things go bad since I can always suspend it and play it later. Would that be wise, or am I better off replacing it with something else? Obviously, tresure mage is pretty pointless in this deck, so he's gone. I've decided to add sleep, since it's a really good card with this deck, but I'm still hesitating about wash out.
Preordain seems to be useful, so I think I'll keep those, but how many? Should I keep brainstorm since they cost 1$ right now (even then, it seems a bit costly), or should I replace it with anouther draw card since it's a bit explensive. Since I only have one card for draw, what else do suggest? Is ponder a good choice for the deck I'm running, or would something else be better?
One last thing, do I have enough creatures in this deck, or am I better off with more spells?
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One of my concerns with this deck is that I won't have any small creatures to polymorph.
One last thing, do I have enough creatures in this deck, or am I better off with more spells?
I'm studying right now, so I can't give a comprehensive answer, but I'd like to address this point.
Polymorph isn't good here. It's only good in decks that use non-creatures to make creature tokens for you to sacrifice. Khlani Garden, Raise the Alarm - you need a deck filled with these cards to guarantee to hit a big bad after you morph. The more little guys you put in the deck, the worse off you are with using Polymorph. And the fact it already has a lot of chances to fizzle off your shapeshifters and plasms is an indication it isn't right for the deck.
You raise some good points, but then also consider that Brainstorm allows you to put a big creature from your hand back into your library so it can be cheated into play with Riptide Shapeshifter.
I caught this synergy too, but when I thought about it - the game should end with a Riptide Shapeshifter activation - and you're very unlikely to have all your game-ending creatures in your hand. Having a card you can't play in your hand is harmful, but once you can shapeshift a powerhouse game-ending bomb into play, which the desck should be designed to assure your victory, it won't matter anymore. So, I think this is a really minor synergy. It's nifty, but by the time you can find and activate a shapeshifter it'll hardly matter to cheat out what might be in your hand instead of some other game-ender that's chilling in your library.
And compared to Preordain, which can set up the combo more effectively in the first place (and again is much more budget)... I think Preordain is still the more effective choice in this particular deck. At least, as it now stands. Brainstorm lives off things like fetchlands and similar easy shuffle effects.
Also, I agree with Stairc that Polymorph isn't very good in this deck, it isn't reliable enough without changing the entire deck.
Yes, I noticed that polymorph no longer fits with this deck, so I think I'll remove it and mass polymorph sinc it's now become a waste of space and money as far as I'm concerned. In other decks it might be useful... but not in this one.
You might also want to consider removing Sleep - what does it do that Propaganda doesn't already do?
I already thought about removing sleep from the deck, but then it dawned on me: even if I manage to play propaganda, it doesn't prevent my opponent from blocking, whereas sleep does. If I play a well timed sleep, then that's game right then and there. We can also look at it another way: proaganda cuts my opponent's attacking capabilities, and sleep cut's my opponent's defensive capabilities. A pretty good combo that could really hurt if played right. What do you think? Would you like to be unable to attack and block at the same time knowing I have an 11/11 creature and other goodies on the field waiting to kill you and you can't do a thing about it? For now, I think I'll keep it since I think it could make for a good control/combo to finish the game.
And compared to Preordain, which can set up the combo more effectively in the first place (and again is much more budget)... I think Preordain is still the more effective choice in this particular deck. At least, as it now stands. Brainstorm lives off things like fetchlands and similar easy shuffle effects.
I see what you're getting at, and it seems to me that although shuffling your deck when you're in a bind is a good thing, it may be counter productive here. Maybe I'll include 2 brainstorm and 2 ponder for draw, and keep preordain at 3 or 4.
Any other suggestions? Do you guys want me to post another updated version of the deck so you can see what's been changed rather than look for it in old posts?
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I see what you're getting at, and it seems to me that although shuffling your deck when you're in a bind is a good thing, it may be counter productive here. Maybe I'll include 2 brainstorm and 2 ponder for draw, and keep preordain at 3 or 4.
Any other suggestions? Do you guys want me to post another updated version of the deck so you can see what's been changed rather than look for it in old posts?
Run whatever you like more, but I think that for this deck - Ponder and Preordain will both be superior to Brainstorm. Ponder might be about on par with Brainstorm here, but I don't think the brainstorm is worth the extra money at all. Whatever you like of course.
Here's the long awaited updated deck! It's still not complete yet, but it's getting there. So far, it's 70 cards, and I'm okay with not having a perfect 60 card deck. I can never seem to make one anyways. They all end up 65-70 cards or so. Anyways, here it is.:D
So, for anybody who doesn't wish to take the time to read the whole thread to get the gist what this deck is about, it's very simple: it's a control/combo mono blue deck that uses aetherplasm and riptide shapeshifter to cheat out finishers. The finishers will then use their various abilities and strength to win me the game. For protection, I threw in sleep and propaganda. For draw, because the odds that I get plasm and shapeshifter when I need them are slim, I have ponder and preordain. For extra backup, I have a quicksilver amulet to let me drop my finishers for 4 mana. To control my opponent's creatures, I have control magic and to control the board early and late game, I have mana leak and rune snag, followed by echoing truth for bounce. I don't think I'll explain all the creatures, since all you need to do is click on them and you'll understand why they're there.
For those of you who have been following the thread, you'll notice that I nixed the polymoprhs and mass polymorphs, since they've become useless. I've also taken out dissipate, as I have mana leak and rune snag for counter. I've decided not to include wash out. As useful as it could be, it's risky if I need to call on blue, so I replaced it with sleep. I think I'm going to try out sleep and see what it gives, since it's gotten me curious as to what it'll do when paired with propaganda. I know that it looks better on paper, but this one seems to good to pass up. And worst case scenario, I'll just take it out since I've got 70 cards in this deck.
I've also decided against brainstorm because it's, for lack of better words, on par with ponder here. Also, it costs more than poder, and since I'm on a budget, why take the more expensive card that does the same thing as the less expensive one?
I've also decided to keep deep-sea kraken just in case the cards don't fall my way. It's always nice to be able to suspend it for almost nothing, and put on the field to wreak havoc a few turns later. I've also decided to change blightsteel colossus for darksteel colossus, not just because of the cost, but because the infect aspect of blighsteel would be pointless in this deck, and quite frankly, an 11/11 with just trample is already alot.
And I'm glad that my deck's inspired you to make something similar blackvise. Who would've thought that the simple question at the beginning would turn into this? I'm really happy with all the help everyone's given me so far, and I hope you'll all stay by me until the end to see the true finished version of this thing.:D
As I mentioned, this deck is still in the finishing stages and isn't complete yet, so I'm open to all suggestions to make it better. That being said, I hope this helps!;)
If you are going more than 60 cards you need to fix your land %. This type of deck COULD support more than 60 cards (toolbox decks can do it well), but I'd recommend cuts.
I'd drop the rune snags and mana leaks, your deck taps out, it doesn't wait. IT KILLS!
Also I'd suggest some early ramp, you have no 2 or 3 drops. Those could be your early drops...
I'd just run Counterspell in their spots though.
Or signets. Def signets.
In my experience of playing blue (which is a lot :tongue:) effects like that look a lot better on paper than they do in practise; most of your big creatures have some form of evasion (flying, unblockable, trample etc), so even if they are blocked you're going to be doing damage with most attacks anyway. Sleep might allow you to win one turn earlier in some situations, but more of the time it's likely to just be sat in your hand not being of any use. Still, it's always good to try cards out.
I've had decent luck playing sleep. Its a good defensive card because it can shut down all of your opponents creatures from attacking for two turns, and its a good offensive card because it essentially makes all of your creatures unblockable. Propaganda is nice, but it has a completely different use than sleep.
I'd drop the rune snags and mana leaks, your deck taps out, it doesn't wait. IT KILLS!
Also I'd suggest some early ramp, you have no 2 or 3 drops. Those could be your early drops...
I'd just run Counterspell in their spots though.
Or signets. Def signets.
I knwo that my deck deosn't wait, but as you mentioned, I have no 2 or 3 drops for the beginning of the game, and couldn't find any that suited this deck. Do you (or anybodyelse) have any idesÉ And even then, would they be of actual use in this deck? I mean, the point is to cheat out big guys, but it would suck if I had small guys in my hand and eating away at my deck space. Normally I would've included counterspell in this deck, but it's way out of budget, which is 30$ (mentioned on the first post of the first page). So I decided to run cheaper counter spells that have the same effect. I think that in order to keep the same amount of mana, I would need to cut the deck by 5 cards. By the way, I'm new to magic, so can you explain what a signet is?
But when you're running Propaganda that negates Sleep's defensive use and when all your big creatures have some form of evasion that pretty much negates its offensive use too. I just don't see how tapping their creatures down is that useful all your creatures will either fly over them, trample through them or just can't be blocked by them. For the offensive side of things Sun Quan, Lord of Wu would probably be far more effective and is not too expensive if you look around.
I see. My only concern is that he's a bit costly (both mana and money), so I would have to include just one in my deck. When I'm cheating out my finishers, would playing him instead really be a good idea? As for sleep and propaganda, if I had to keep one, which one do you suggest and why?
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But when you're running Propaganda that negates Sleep's defensive use and when all your big creatures have some form of evasion that pretty much negates its offensive use too. I just don't see how tapping their creatures down is that useful all your creatures will either fly over them, trample through them or just can't be blocked by them. For the offensive side of things Sun Quan, Lord of Wu would probably be far more effective and is not too expensive if you look around.
Yeah I guess I see what you mean. The only thing I like better about sleep is that it will tap out all of your opponents creatures no matter how much mana they have. Propoganda isnt as good against that rely on one finisher to win the game, such as this deck we're discussing right now. There are lots of circumstances where that extra two mana wont matter for your opponent.
Deepchannel Mentor is an alternative to Sun Quan, but I dont think its really that necessary for this deck. Whispersilk Cloak might be a better option if you really want the unblockability, because itll give you the shroud too.
If you're really worried about being blocked and don't want to run Sun Quan then Distortion Strike is probably a far better option than Sleep as it costs a lot less to play, meaning you can keep mana untapped for counter spells.
Actually, to be honest, I was getting confused with the mana cost of sleep. In my mind, I thought that it cost 2 mana (I don't know why) which would make it so perfect for this deck: cheap, efficient and works well with my cards. I like distortion strike though, since not only does it make my creatures unblockable, but I can cast it again the following turn for nothing.
Propoganda isnt as good against that rely on one finisher to win the game, such as this deck we're discussing right now. There are lots of circumstances where that extra two mana wont matter for your opponent.
I see what you mean. Even if my oppononent has the same strategy as I do, he still needs cards and time to get there, and propaganda will just stall him, which is all the better for me since I'm hoping to have several finishers out by late game (if the game ever lasts that long:tongue:), not just one. One would imply mid-game with this deck.
Whispersilk Cloak might be a better option if you really want the unblockability, because itll give you the shroud too.
I like the idea of whispersilk cloak. It makes my finishers impervious to cards like doom blade, which was another one of my worries in this deck.
As it is, I get the feeling that I'm starting to get too many cards in this deck for the amount of mana that I'm running. The only problem with adding more mana is that it lowers my chances of getting the cards I need to cheat out fnishers. I'd like to replace sleep with distortion strike and whispersilver cloak, but how many of each do you guys suggest? Anyother cuts that you guys think that I should make?
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Alright, I've done studying for the day, so I've got the time to post up another updated version of the deck see where we're at. Right, I've made enough cuts (which I'll explain later) and have managed to bring it down to 65 cards, which is pretty good for now.
So here it is:
Truthfully, I'd like to add in a title (haven't decided on it yet), but I don't know how to add one in the deck tags. I've seen other people do it, so would somebody mind explaining to me how it works?
Now, on to the cuts:
-I took out sleep, since after much debating I realized it's a bit costly and I'd like to keep the mana available for counters. Propaganda also does the job and it's less costly card than sleep.
-I cut out a single mana leak: I've got 4 rune snags, which cost the same, and become more efficient the more I've played.
- I took out 1 deepsea kraken, Inkwell leviathan and stromtide leviathan respectively, since I only need one of each, or at that's what I think. Maybe I should add another kraken or stormtide just in case...
- I took out 1 preordain, six draw is plenty.
- I took out one quicksilver amulet since I have plasm and shapeshofter. The only thing I'm debating is whether or not I should have taken out 1 plasm or shapeshifter instead. What do you guys think?
Now it's time for the additions:
-I added in 2 distortion strike: it can make my finishers unblockable, costs 1 mana, and can be re-cast the following turn for free
-I added in 2 Whisperslik cloak, since it can make my finishers unblockable and give them shroud, which protects them from cards like doom blade.
What I kept:
After reading the comments, I decided to keep It that betrays. Just think about it: even if it's eldrazi, if I get this out on the field, not only is it an 11/11, but it has annihilator 2, and all creatures my opponent sacrifices return on my side of the field for the rest of the game (or until they die). I'll control every creature my opponenent puts down, since he'll have to kill them anyways.
So, lets break down the deck:
- 10 cheat cards
- 7 finishers
- 6 draw
- 7 counter
- 2 control
- 2 bounce
- 4 unblockable
- 3 propaganda (not quite sure what category this fits in)
- 24 land
So what do you guys think of the updated deck? I want your opinions on the cuts that I made as well as what I added in. Anything else I should add or remove?
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Whereas I agree that blightsteel is only an infect card, it still has trample, meaning that the remaining damage will be dealt in the form of poison counters, while at the same time, anything blocking blightsteel will most likely be rendered useless, as it will be dealt damage in the form of -1/-1 counters. If I'm looking to kill with trample, then darksteel is the way to go, but if I'm looking to make my opponent powerless, then blightsteel is the way to go. It all depends on what I'm in the mood for.:D
@Stairc
I agree that emperion doesn't really scream "I win", but the fact doesn't change that my life total won't go down as long as he's on the field, which means that I can tap all of my creatures and make them attack while not worrying about taking the hit afterwards and losing the game because of it. Whereas it doesn't fit with sphinx of the steel wind since my deck let's me cheat cards, depending on the strategy, I can either go lifelink, or prervent all combat damage. It depends on what the situation is. What I like about this is that it gives me options. Either go sphinx or emperion, but not both (I suppose that I could go both to deal some damage to my opponent though). It's big, it's bad, and it won't leave. Emperion isn't there to be a finisher, but rather a stepping stone to my victory.
Thanks for the tip about howling mine, I'll take it out of the deck. Any other suggestions on how to make it better? I'll post an update tomorrow woth what's been changed so that everybody can see.;)
@Stairc and KingCobra
Thank's for tip about alluring siren. I guess it really is pointless in this deck, considering the cards I already have and the strategy I'm running.;)
@BlackVise
Wow, I can't believe that you went through the trouble of making a deck to help! I've seen some cards in it that might be worth adding, but I think I'll keep the creatures that I already have. Only having 4 riptide and 1 blightsteel seem a bit risky for me, but the way you incoprorated control into this so easily makes me all giddy. I can't wait to see how my control/combo deck will turn out once it's done.:D
@everybody
I'm still open to suggestions to make this deck as strong as possible. If you don't think that a card fits, please tell me so that I can understand for future reference. If you think that there's a card that should be added, please tell me. I'll be posting an updated version of my deck tomorrow so that everybody can see what I've got so far and what's been changed.
I seek both.
Don't worry, I wasn't arguing against the Emperion, far from it, just analyzing the cards you have that can function as actual win conditions. You can run bug guys that aren't win conditions too, if they help you in some huge way. Cards like the Emperion are definitely nice to have around.
There's a lot we can do to up the power level of this deck. Don't worry.
Fun Fact: I kind of want to see you go all out with Eldrazi, Eye of Ugin and similar fun... But that probably wouldn't be budget.
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I wasn't trying to argue against Emperion,, just point out why I put him there. He is nice to have around, and I thought he could offer quite a bit of protection while he's there, since he's quite hard to kill.
Anyways, yesterday I said that I would put an updated version of my deck on the thread, so here it is:
4 Aetherplasm
3 Treasure Mage
2 Deep-Sea kraken
3 Riptide shapeshifter
2 Stormtide leviathan
1 Blightsteel colossus
1 Platinum emperion
2 Inkwell leviathan
1 Sphinx of the steel wind
1 It that betrays
3 Propaganda
3 Quicksilver amulet
3 Polymorph
2 Mass polymorph
2 Control magic
2 Ponder
2 Preordain
2 Rune snag
2 Echoing truth
4 Mana leak
3 Dissipate
24 island
So this time I've added it that betrays, sphinx of the steel wind and inkwell leviathan for for creatures. I'm still debating whether or not I should replace It that betrays by a pathrazer of ulamog, but It seems like so much fun if I play it! Sphinx was added for life gain, and inkwell for defense.
In terms of spells, not much has changed. I've decided to keep the polymorphs, and mass polymorphs, since I'm looking for a combo/control deck, but I've added mana leak, echoing truth and rune snag for some protection, leaving me with a grand total of 16 protection spells rather than 8. It's not much, but it's a start. I'm still not sure if blightsteel should become a darksteel.
I don't think I'll re-explain the strategy behind this deck, since it hasn't changed much, but if you want me to go in detail, post a comment asking, and I'll do just that.
Right now the deck is at 72 cards if I counted correctly, which isn't too bad. I'm not looking for a perfect 60 card deck, so I'm okay with slightly more than that than 60 cards. The only thing that's left is to make this deck much, much better. I want it to be as strong as possible. That being said, if you guys have any suggestions on how to make my current/modified version of the deck better, let me know. I'd like to know why you want to make these changes so that I learn from my mistakes. If you feel that the proportions should be changed, let me know.
I hope this helps figure out where to start from when it comes to makeing it better, rather than having to refer to previous posts again and again.
I seek both.
Well think about this situation. Your opponent has 4 life and you have both blightsteel and darksteel in your hand. Lets say that your opponent has a 5/5 out. Which card would be more useful for you to play?
If you play blightsteel and attack next turn, they can block with the 5/5 and only 6 damage will get through. Your opponent will have 6 poison counters but wont be dead.
If you play darksteel and attack next turn, they can block with the 5/5, but the 6 normal damage that gets through will be enough to kill your opponent since they are already so low on life.
Remember that creatures with infect will only give out poison counters to opponents, not normal damage. Me and some of my roommates learned the hard way that mixing infect and non infect creatures doesnt work that well when we did a SoM/DKA draft. Trying to win by two strategies in the same deck generally just ends up with half your cards being useless in a game.
The -1/-1 counters that blightsteel gives out wont be that big of a deal. Most creatures that block an 11/11 will be dead anyway. It will kill a indestructible creature or regenerator that darksteel might not be able to, but that wont make too much of a difference in the game. You generally want to destroy your opponent as fast as possible with this creature, since its one of your win-conditions. If you really want to make your opponent feel powerless, annihilator and eldrazi are definately the way to go.
Infect is better on low cost small creatures. Blightsteel can destroy a wall of denial in one hit even without infect, but a flensermite could slowly take the wall down after a couple turns while a normal 1/1 cant.
I seek both.
So, planning to use Polymorph, destroy you're creature and dramatically flip over cards until you hit...
...
A Treasure Mage.
That's the problem with Polymorph in this deck.
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So I was wondering, would it be worth while putting in fact or fiction if I can afford it? What about Jace's ingenuity if I can't afford fiction? I also found a cool card called wash out, but I'm not sure if it'll be useful in this deck. It could be, but I'd like your opinions on it. So, what do you think? Should I add these cards into the deck? I also thought about getting brainstorm, but since my budget is only 30$, I fear that I might surpass it at the rate I'm going, so it's either going to be brainstorm or Fiction in the deck. I suppose 2 of each or 1 and 2 would work, so what you guys suggest?
No, I think that hitting a treasure mage could be a good thing, since it'll let me put a colossus or emperion into my hand, which can then be cheated out with plasm. It all depends on what's happening at the time I play polymorph. But I see where you're coming from, since putting a treasure mage on the field isn't very threatening and could make me lose the game if I played it at a crucial moment hoping to get my finisher out. But still, it might be worth the risk. If it's not, how do you suggest I get rid of that risk?
*EDIT*
Ignore what I wrote above, it was poorly phrased. Stairc, you're absolutely right. Hitting a treasure mage when using polymorph would be a huge problem, and I see why. If I use polymorph hoping to get a finisher out, then I get a treasure mage, it'll have been a waste of polymorph and another creature. But since no deck is perfect, I'll have to chance the odds that I'll get him (being only 15 %, as I included three in my updated deck, and since no one has given me any feedback on it yet, that's what I'm basing it off of), hoping that I'll already have one in my hand, or that one was polymorphed. Worst case scenario, I put a treasure mage on the field at the crucial moment that I needed a finisher, put colossus or emperion in my hand, and hope I have plasm out on the field or in my hand and that I don't die this turn. That's not only the worst case scenario, but that's exactly what'll happen each time I get him through polymorph. It's a huge dissapointment waiting to happen, but I don't know what else to do about it, so I guess it'll just have to stay that until I find a better way to deal with the problem. Any other problems you (or anybody else) noticed?
I seek both.
Just be careful that you dont let emperion die if you get him out. If theres a high risk of him dying if he attacks, its probably worth holding him back. As long as hes around your opponent can attack as much as they want and it wont matter.
Wash out could be a nice addition to this deck, especially if you play it to clear your opponents side before attacking with a finisher. Just be careful though. Theres many circumstances where it could affect your creatures too, or only take out half your opponents creatures if they're running multiple colors. Sleep might be a better option. If they dont play a good defender on their next turn, theyll be completely open to attack for two turns in a row.
If you want to keep the polymorph strategy, I might just get rid of treasure mage altogether. By the time you get aetherplasm out, I would be very surprised if you didnt have at least one large finisher in your hand. If youre that worried about drawing into your large creatures, just replace treasure mage with more large creatures. That will save you the three mana delay of having to play treasure mage to get that creature.
Riptide shapeshifter costs a lot of mana, but its very good if you can pull it off. Just be sure that you remember the exact creature types of every creature you might consider pulling out. The last thing you want to do is not know what to name during the middle of a game. If you have routine problems pulling out the leviathan that you dont want, it might be worth switching one of them out for a different large creature type.
I figured as much with emperion. I was only planning on letting him attack if I thought it was safe. No point in him dying and me losing my protection. I think I'll be keeping the polymorph strayegy, but this has two main problems. The first being that if I remove treasure mage, my lowest costing creature will be a 4cmc, and with only 4 of him in the deck, what are the odds I get him in my hand at the beginning when I need him? The second problem is that the only creatures that I'd be able to polymorph would be plasm and shapeshifter. That's not alot, and again, what are the odds I get them? High enough, but low enough for me to be worried. With these problems, mass polymorph is also out, since I need multiple creatures to kill, and I don't want to kill my strong creatures. I'm all for adding more big guys, but I still need something cheap, preferably with a good ability for this deck, to play at the beginning. Again, right now, the problem I have is not having creatures to play. I literally need aetherplasm and riptide shapeshifter in order to play the game, unless I get lucky and pull off a quicksilver amulet. The only thing saving me at the beginning are my counter spells. If I get propaganda at the beginning, I'll count myself lucky, since my opponent won't be able to attack me with all he's got.
It'S not that I'm worried about not having finishers in my hand, like you mentioned, but whether or not I'll have plasm to go along with it.
On another note, I agree that Wash out could be very risky in this deck, which is why if I include them, it'll be either only 1 or 2, or in my side board (which is non-existant at the moment), and I think that sleep might be a better option. As for the leviathans, I have a 50/50 chance of getting something to let me defend while I get stronger things out on the field, or a 50/50 chance of getting something
kick assreally good. As for naming creature types, I'm not worried in the least, since I already know them by heart (I have a amazing memory when it comes to things that interest me).After much humming and hawing, I've decided to use darksteel colossus rather than blightsteel colossus in this deck, as they both have trample, but the one with infect won't be dealing actual damage to my opponent, and it might take a few turns to finish off my opponent. The only thing I'm still worried about, is that if I use blighsteel with sleep, then it's an instant win for me. If sleep is used with darksteel, it's either and instant win, or the annoying alomost win where your opponent can mess up your strategy if he gets the right cards at the right moment.
In case I don't get plasm, I would need something for draw. I was thinking about maybe replacing preordain and ponder by either a few brainstorm or fact or fiction. Which one do you guys suggest? Do you guys suggest other cards to use? Are my current spells okay as they are? What about the proportions? Just look at my updated deck for referrence and add in 4 sleep. I'm also wondering if my creature:spell ratio isn't favouring my spells too much...
I still think that clutch of the undercity could be useful, but I'm not sure where to get the black mana for him, and I think it would be problematic since I'm looking at an almost all blue deck. What do you think? Do you know any other mono-blue cards along those lines?
I seek both.
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Definitely run 4 rune snags or none at all. Mana Leak is a good option too.
I might consider keeping the deep-sea kraken. The high CMC wont matter if youre cheating it into play and the suspend ability is a nice backup plan if you dont draw into any aetherplasms.
I like the polymorph strategy but I wish there were more blue token makers out there to support it. I couldnt find anything along the lines of lingering souls or rally the townsfolk.
I'd hesitate to call the Shapeshifter a reliable shuffle effect. If you activate it's ability you should be about win anyway and shouldn't need a Brainstorm after the fact. If the deck doesn't win 90% of the time after activating a Shapeshifter, that's a problem.
Brainstorm's an amazing card (and better than ever now with the new Miracles) but I wouldn't recommend dropping around $8 for a full playset when you could spend a fraction of the cost for Preordains... Which I actually like better for the deck anyway. He's on a budget after all.
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First of all, should I have mana leak or rune snag in this deck? Or should I put both? If I do put both, I know I need 4 rune snag to get the most of it, but what about mana leak? If you had to pick between 2, 3, or 4 mana leaks in the deck, how many would you put in?
One of my concerns with this deck is that I won't have any small creatures to polymorph. It's obvious that I don't want to polymorph any of my finishers, so that leaves plasm and shapeshifter, and shapeshifter's out of the question, due to his ability., so tha leaves plasm. When I see my plasm on the field, I figure one of two things will happen: my opponent will attack me, letting me use plasm's ability to put out afinisher, or my opponent won't attack me right away, giving me a turn or two to get some better cards in my hand. So do I really want to polymorph plasm? No on most accounts, as I can get another plasm, yes if my opponent plays a flying deck and I need a finisher to be able to do something and I don't have shapeshifter in my hand. So really, I would need to find something small and weak to polymorph, lest I just take them out all together. What do you guys think? Is polymorph really needed in this deck, or is it just a waste of space? As much as I like the polymorph strategy, like KingCobra said, there's not much to back it up when it comes to this deck.
I think I'll keep deep-sea kraken for when things go bad since I can always suspend it and play it later. Would that be wise, or am I better off replacing it with something else? Obviously, tresure mage is pretty pointless in this deck, so he's gone. I've decided to add sleep, since it's a really good card with this deck, but I'm still hesitating about wash out.
Preordain seems to be useful, so I think I'll keep those, but how many? Should I keep brainstorm since they cost 1$ right now (even then, it seems a bit costly), or should I replace it with anouther draw card since it's a bit explensive. Since I only have one card for draw, what else do suggest? Is ponder a good choice for the deck I'm running, or would something else be better?
One last thing, do I have enough creatures in this deck, or am I better off with more spells?
I seek both.
I'm studying right now, so I can't give a comprehensive answer, but I'd like to address this point.
Polymorph isn't good here. It's only good in decks that use non-creatures to make creature tokens for you to sacrifice. Khlani Garden, Raise the Alarm - you need a deck filled with these cards to guarantee to hit a big bad after you morph. The more little guys you put in the deck, the worse off you are with using Polymorph. And the fact it already has a lot of chances to fizzle off your shapeshifters and plasms is an indication it isn't right for the deck.
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I caught this synergy too, but when I thought about it - the game should end with a Riptide Shapeshifter activation - and you're very unlikely to have all your game-ending creatures in your hand. Having a card you can't play in your hand is harmful, but once you can shapeshift a powerhouse game-ending bomb into play, which the desck should be designed to assure your victory, it won't matter anymore. So, I think this is a really minor synergy. It's nifty, but by the time you can find and activate a shapeshifter it'll hardly matter to cheat out what might be in your hand instead of some other game-ender that's chilling in your library.
And compared to Preordain, which can set up the combo more effectively in the first place (and again is much more budget)... I think Preordain is still the more effective choice in this particular deck. At least, as it now stands. Brainstorm lives off things like fetchlands and similar easy shuffle effects.
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Yes, I noticed that polymorph no longer fits with this deck, so I think I'll remove it and mass polymorph sinc it's now become a waste of space and money as far as I'm concerned. In other decks it might be useful... but not in this one.
I think I'll do just that and have four of each, since it'll be easier for me to control the board early on this way.
I already thought about removing sleep from the deck, but then it dawned on me: even if I manage to play propaganda, it doesn't prevent my opponent from blocking, whereas sleep does. If I play a well timed sleep, then that's game right then and there. We can also look at it another way: proaganda cuts my opponent's attacking capabilities, and sleep cut's my opponent's defensive capabilities. A pretty good combo that could really hurt if played right. What do you think? Would you like to be unable to attack and block at the same time knowing I have an 11/11 creature and other goodies on the field waiting to kill you and you can't do a thing about it? For now, I think I'll keep it since I think it could make for a good control/combo to finish the game.
I see what you're getting at, and it seems to me that although shuffling your deck when you're in a bind is a good thing, it may be counter productive here. Maybe I'll include 2 brainstorm and 2 ponder for draw, and keep preordain at 3 or 4.
Any other suggestions? Do you guys want me to post another updated version of the deck so you can see what's been changed rather than look for it in old posts?
I seek both.
Run whatever you like more, but I think that for this deck - Ponder and Preordain will both be superior to Brainstorm. Ponder might be about on par with Brainstorm here, but I don't think the brainstorm is worth the extra money at all. Whatever you like of course.
Sure, I'd be happy to see the updated deck.
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4 Aetherplasm
4 Riptide Shapeshifter
2 Deep-sea Kraken
2 Stormtide Leviathan
2 Inkwell Leviathan
1 Darksteel Colossus
1 Platinum Emperion
1 Sphinx of the Steel Wind
1 It That Betrays
3 Propaganda
2 Sleep
3 Quicksilver amulet
2 Control Magic
3 Ponder
4 Preordain
4 Rune Snag
2 Echoing Truth
4 Mana Leak
24 Island
So, for anybody who doesn't wish to take the time to read the whole thread to get the gist what this deck is about, it's very simple: it's a control/combo mono blue deck that uses aetherplasm and riptide shapeshifter to cheat out finishers. The finishers will then use their various abilities and strength to win me the game. For protection, I threw in sleep and propaganda. For draw, because the odds that I get plasm and shapeshifter when I need them are slim, I have ponder and preordain. For extra backup, I have a quicksilver amulet to let me drop my finishers for 4 mana. To control my opponent's creatures, I have control magic and to control the board early and late game, I have mana leak and rune snag, followed by echoing truth for bounce. I don't think I'll explain all the creatures, since all you need to do is click on them and you'll understand why they're there.
For those of you who have been following the thread, you'll notice that I nixed the polymoprhs and mass polymorphs, since they've become useless. I've also taken out dissipate, as I have mana leak and rune snag for counter. I've decided not to include wash out. As useful as it could be, it's risky if I need to call on blue, so I replaced it with sleep. I think I'm going to try out sleep and see what it gives, since it's gotten me curious as to what it'll do when paired with propaganda. I know that it looks better on paper, but this one seems to good to pass up. And worst case scenario, I'll just take it out since I've got 70 cards in this deck.
I've also decided against brainstorm because it's, for lack of better words, on par with ponder here. Also, it costs more than poder, and since I'm on a budget, why take the more expensive card that does the same thing as the less expensive one?
I've also decided to keep deep-sea kraken just in case the cards don't fall my way. It's always nice to be able to suspend it for almost nothing, and put on the field to wreak havoc a few turns later. I've also decided to change blightsteel colossus for darksteel colossus, not just because of the cost, but because the infect aspect of blighsteel would be pointless in this deck, and quite frankly, an 11/11 with just trample is already alot.
And I'm glad that my deck's inspired you to make something similar blackvise. Who would've thought that the simple question at the beginning would turn into this? I'm really happy with all the help everyone's given me so far, and I hope you'll all stay by me until the end to see the true finished version of this thing.:D
As I mentioned, this deck is still in the finishing stages and isn't complete yet, so I'm open to all suggestions to make it better. That being said, I hope this helps!;)
I seek both.
I'd drop the rune snags and mana leaks, your deck taps out, it doesn't wait. IT KILLS!
Also I'd suggest some early ramp, you have no 2 or 3 drops. Those could be your early drops...
I'd just run Counterspell in their spots though.
Or signets. Def signets.
So Pro I have an alpha Volcanic Island
I've had decent luck playing sleep. Its a good defensive card because it can shut down all of your opponents creatures from attacking for two turns, and its a good offensive card because it essentially makes all of your creatures unblockable. Propaganda is nice, but it has a completely different use than sleep.
I knwo that my deck deosn't wait, but as you mentioned, I have no 2 or 3 drops for the beginning of the game, and couldn't find any that suited this deck. Do you (or anybodyelse) have any idesÉ And even then, would they be of actual use in this deck? I mean, the point is to cheat out big guys, but it would suck if I had small guys in my hand and eating away at my deck space. Normally I would've included counterspell in this deck, but it's way out of budget, which is 30$ (mentioned on the first post of the first page). So I decided to run cheaper counter spells that have the same effect. I think that in order to keep the same amount of mana, I would need to cut the deck by 5 cards. By the way, I'm new to magic, so can you explain what a signet is?
I see. My only concern is that he's a bit costly (both mana and money), so I would have to include just one in my deck. When I'm cheating out my finishers, would playing him instead really be a good idea? As for sleep and propaganda, if I had to keep one, which one do you suggest and why?
I seek both.
Yeah I guess I see what you mean. The only thing I like better about sleep is that it will tap out all of your opponents creatures no matter how much mana they have. Propoganda isnt as good against that rely on one finisher to win the game, such as this deck we're discussing right now. There are lots of circumstances where that extra two mana wont matter for your opponent.
Deepchannel Mentor is an alternative to Sun Quan, but I dont think its really that necessary for this deck. Whispersilk Cloak might be a better option if you really want the unblockability, because itll give you the shroud too.
Actually, to be honest, I was getting confused with the mana cost of sleep. In my mind, I thought that it cost 2 mana (I don't know why) which would make it so perfect for this deck: cheap, efficient and works well with my cards. I like distortion strike though, since not only does it make my creatures unblockable, but I can cast it again the following turn for nothing.
I see what you mean. Even if my oppononent has the same strategy as I do, he still needs cards and time to get there, and propaganda will just stall him, which is all the better for me since I'm hoping to have several finishers out by late game (if the game ever lasts that long:tongue:), not just one. One would imply mid-game with this deck.
I like the idea of whispersilk cloak. It makes my finishers impervious to cards like doom blade, which was another one of my worries in this deck.
As it is, I get the feeling that I'm starting to get too many cards in this deck for the amount of mana that I'm running. The only problem with adding more mana is that it lowers my chances of getting the cards I need to cheat out fnishers. I'd like to replace sleep with distortion strike and whispersilver cloak, but how many of each do you guys suggest? Anyother cuts that you guys think that I should make?
I seek both.
I seek both.
So here it is:
4 Aetherplasm
4 Riptide Shapeshifter
1 Deep-sea Kraken
1 Stormtide Leviathan
1 Inkwell Leviathan
1 Darksteel Colossus
1 Platinum Emperion
1 Sphinx of the Steel Wind
1 It That Betrays
3 Propaganda
2 Quicksilver amulet
2 Control Magic
3 Ponder
3 Preordain
4 Rune Snag
2 Echoing Truth
3 Mana Leak
2 Distortion Strike
2 Whispersilk cloak
24 Island
Truthfully, I'd like to add in a title (haven't decided on it yet), but I don't know how to add one in the deck tags. I've seen other people do it, so would somebody mind explaining to me how it works?
Now, on to the cuts:
-I took out sleep, since after much debating I realized it's a bit costly and I'd like to keep the mana available for counters. Propaganda also does the job and it's less costly card than sleep.
-I cut out a single mana leak: I've got 4 rune snags, which cost the same, and become more efficient the more I've played.
- I took out 1 deepsea kraken, Inkwell leviathan and stromtide leviathan respectively, since I only need one of each, or at that's what I think. Maybe I should add another kraken or stormtide just in case...
- I took out 1 preordain, six draw is plenty.
- I took out one quicksilver amulet since I have plasm and shapeshofter. The only thing I'm debating is whether or not I should have taken out 1 plasm or shapeshifter instead. What do you guys think?
Now it's time for the additions:
-I added in 2 distortion strike: it can make my finishers unblockable, costs 1 mana, and can be re-cast the following turn for free
-I added in 2 Whisperslik cloak, since it can make my finishers unblockable and give them shroud, which protects them from cards like doom blade.
What I kept:
After reading the comments, I decided to keep It that betrays. Just think about it: even if it's eldrazi, if I get this out on the field, not only is it an 11/11, but it has annihilator 2, and all creatures my opponent sacrifices return on my side of the field for the rest of the game (or until they die). I'll control every creature my opponenent puts down, since he'll have to kill them anyways.
So, lets break down the deck:
- 10 cheat cards
- 7 finishers
- 6 draw
- 7 counter
- 2 control
- 2 bounce
- 4 unblockable
- 3 propaganda (not quite sure what category this fits in)
- 24 land
So what do you guys think of the updated deck? I want your opinions on the cuts that I made as well as what I added in. Anything else I should add or remove?
I seek both.