I'm apprehensive about Spiketail Drakeling as there are many superior 3cc creatures I've cut, but I could see Cursecatcher and Spiketail Hatchling working out. Most importantly, they are effects which encourage people not to spend the mana to trigger them. Which means they provide tempo AND warm bodies.
Speaking of tempo, this is clearly a deck that wants Tangle Wire. It's ridiculous.
The problem with defining [EDH] by what is "fun" is that everyone seems to define fun as what they don't lose to. If you keep losing to easily answered cards, that means you should improve your deck. If you don't want to improve your deck, then you should come to peace with the idea that you are going to lose because you chose to not interact with better strategies.
Hummmm yes I agree that Tangle Wire is fairly nuts in here. Do you try to drop Edric before it or does Tangle Wire take priority? I sort of feel like I should look at Sunder again as well though. Both are amazing tempo cards that we can really abuse.
I'm apprehensive about Spiketail Drakeling as there are many superior 3cc creatures I've cut, but I could see Cursecatcher and Spiketail Hatchling working out. Most importantly, they are effects which encourage people not to spend the mana to trigger them. Which means they provide tempo AND warm bodies.
Speaking of tempo, this is clearly a deck that wants Tangle Wire. It's ridiculous.
Yes indeed, it will be on my list when I make my next update. I put it in Uril too but I haven't draw it yet. I do have high hopes, it's a ridiculous card in cube draft. I wish this deck had more equipment I could tap :P.
EDIT: I added a list on the OP of things I need to add, things I am testing and cards I would be interested in testing at some point. Let me know if I missed anything important.
I generally cast Edric turn 3, Tangle Wire turn 4. If you tangle on turn 3, you'll have to tap so much stuff that you either can't cast Edric or can't attack with him to draw cards anyway. Normally I will tap lands to Wire so I draw more cards, which is kind of the opposite of most Tangle Wire uses. The fact that you only tap 3 non-wire permanents and opponents tap 10 is sufficient even if you don't have a lot of equipment. But if you got an early Greaves, Tangle Wire is a game win.
It can be worth reordering your early plays with draws like this, mind you. Suppose you have Greaves + Wire in your opening hand along with three 1 drops and two lands. You cast a random 1 drop turn 1. On turn 2, you should cast the Greaves rather than both one drops despite the fact that you'll draw one less card. Turn 3 is hasty Edric for 2 cards and Turn 4 you drop Tangle Wire after swinging for 3 (and casting the second one drop). By the time anyone has more than 3 mana, you'll have a phenomenal board position and at least one counter spell in hand.
The problem with defining [EDH] by what is "fun" is that everyone seems to define fun as what they don't lose to. If you keep losing to easily answered cards, that means you should improve your deck. If you don't want to improve your deck, then you should come to peace with the idea that you are going to lose because you chose to not interact with better strategies.
Unified Will If there was ever a deck for this to work in it is this one. I seriously doubt that you are going to need to counter a spell from someone with more creatures in play than you. This is essentially another Arcane Denial for the deck. I feel like it is probably better for the deck than the 3 mana tuck effects and or counterspell due to its UU to cast. Augury Owl evasive 2 mana creature that allows you to scry and essentially pitch what you dont want to draw seems somewhat solid. I am not entirely sure what I would cut for this but I like how I can tuck cards I dont want when he comes in.
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I have officially moved to MTGNexus. I just wanted to let people know as my response time to salvation decks being bumped is very hit or miss.
Since this is the multiplayer forum, I think the decklists here play far too many bad weenie creatures. In multiplayer games, many players spend the first few turns of the game developing their resources by tapping out and ramping. This is a small window of opportunity and my Edric deck focuses on exploiting this opening. I'm always looking to play him on turn 2 with an elf and attacking for 2 cards on turn 3.
Capitalizing on this small opening allows me to maintain a steady advantage throughout the game. Instead of developing my mana, I developed a small army of drawers. The cards build and opponents succumb to the avalanche of card-advantage.
To this end, I believe that there are more than enough top tier creatures to fill these roles that you don't have to play Flying Men and Grayscale Gharial. Because if the game progresses beyond the early stage where you don't have a solid footing, these guys aren't going to be capable of bringing you back.
Edric, the Spymaster
9 forest
9 island
6 fetches (misty, verdant, polluted, flooded, scalding, wooded)
Gaea's cradle
Academy ruins
Blinkmoth Nexus
Wasteland
Strip Mine
Mutavault
Command tower
Reliquary tower
Minamo, school at water's edge
Tropical island
Breeding pool
Dryad arbor
Quirion ranger
Llanowar elves
Fyndhorn elves
Wirewood symbiote
Elvish visionary
Priest of titania
Lotus cobra
Scavenging ooze
Phyrexian revoker
Rofellos, llanowar emissary
Fauna shaman
Coiling oracle
Rootwater thief
Sakura-tribe elder
Erayo, soratami ascendant
Eternal witness
Yavimaya elder
Wood elves
Viridian shaman
Trygon predator
Vendilion clique
Sower of temptation
Venser, shapaer savant
Glen elendra archmage
Wonder
Body double
Vesuvan shapeshifter
Psychosis crawler
Primeval titan
Hornet queen
Kederekt leviathan
Tidespout tyrant
Sol ring
Mana crypt
Umezawa's jitte
Sword of feast and famine
Lightning greaves
Aluren
Cloudstone curio
Earthcraft
Survival of the fittest
Crop rotation
Worldly tutor
Green suns zenith
Force of will
Negate
Mana drain
Commandeer
Forbid
Garruk wiodspeaker
Jace, the mind sculptor
Natural order
Exploration
Natures claim
Opposition
Erratic portal
Treachery
Spitting image
Explosive vegetation
Praetors counsel
Akroma's memorial
Temporal manipulation
Beacon of tomorrows
It's a very complicated deck with a lot of decision trees. But its very rewarding to play with. I'm a simic mage at heart and when I saw Edric, I knew he'd be my next general. Guaranteed more fun than Momir Vig, it play more creatures!
Actually I've had a lot of success with these "bad weenie creatures". It's not a true aggro deck. It's aggro control, and the bad weenies help you draw into counterspells and overruns to win the game. It's much more important to have a 1 mana 1/1 unblockable guy that always draws cards than to have planeswalker that does exactly the same thing for 4x the mana, only without the dealing damage part.
On the subject of counters, I would play both Counterspell before Unified Will, but it might be better than Negate. It's not THAT hard to get UU in this deck. Unified Will seems good when you're winning. And when you're losing, there's very little reason to counter spells-- threat assessment says they probably aren't going to be your problem. So that suggests Unified Will is better than Negate. It can also coutner Elesh Norn, which is huge. However, Negate has the benefit that it can stop a combo from going off even if you're in a bad position.
It might be worth trying to fit all three in. If so, you'd probably want to cut Aether Vial though, as it's generally just a colored sol ring that only casts creatures, and being able to cast non-creature spells seems important.
The problem with defining [EDH] by what is "fun" is that everyone seems to define fun as what they don't lose to. If you keep losing to easily answered cards, that means you should improve your deck. If you don't want to improve your deck, then you should come to peace with the idea that you are going to lose because you chose to not interact with better strategies.
I though I posted a response this morning but I must have forgotten to submit it...
@Unified Will: Good find ISB, I will give this a try on MTGO.
@Augury Owl: Card filtration isn't that important since we are drawing so many cards. It's fine if a lot of them are crappy.
@umtiger: Your deck looks more geared for the midgame while mine is more of an all in approach. There aren't enough 1 mana elves to consistently drop Edric turn 2 and draw 2 cards turn 3. The weenies help with this because you can consistently drop some weenies turn 1 and 2 then Edric turn 3 to draw 2 or more cards. It's a fairly fragile strategy but it has been very powerful so for if nobody has an early answer. I'm with the others, Jace is even more terrible in this deck than he is in other decks.
I updated the OP with some changes, adding in some more fast mana and fixing. My main issues so far has been fixing, which this update will hopefully alleviate, and having enough early dorks (shocking I know!). I'm going to see how it plays out for now but I'll probably be looking to increase the number of 1-2cc dorks in the near future. Merfolk Spy was added to give me another rogue to enable Notorious Throng which is just a ridiculous beating in this deck.
EDIT: Thinking about Unified Will some more and I think we can easily run Mana Leak in this deck. It should almost always be a hard counter.
Ok I have to say first and foremost that I am with you in the fact that I sort of want to load up a few more guys in the 1-2 mana slots. The one mana slot is the most important and if we can drop a few more guys in before Edric then great. Once we get the card draw going we want to drop guys in for cheap and keep the counterspell option up. I think I might even cut some of my 2 drop guys for more one drops. How effective has Lotus Cobra been so far?
I looked through every single one drop creature just to see if we missed anything. Here is the list I came up with:
EVASIVE Grayscaled Gharial islandwalk is a decent evasion. Willow Dryad I am not really sure how we I missed this guy but its another forestwalk guy. (realized you have him on your list but somehow I missed him)
BEATERS Cosi's Trickster I love how this guy has a good chance to get really big really fast. He has no evasion but every fetchland and ramp spell means he gets bigger. Considering he comes down at 1 mana and will likely immediately become bigger I at least find him a bit better than Scute Mob who doesnt start becoming larger till you hit larger mana base. Skyshroud Elite a 2/3 for G with no drawbacks seems great. no evasion though Twinblade Slasher personally I like this guy a bit more than the rootwalla due to the wither which can always be threatening. I guess the rootwalla has the whole madness option but I doubt that would matter until you are drawing crazy amounts of cards. No evasion though and I dont know how often you would want to trade mana for damage in this deck. Basking Rootwalla solid early drop that can turn into a 3/3. The downside being I dont know how often you would want to pay mana for damage in this deck. Joraga Warcaller I dont know if I should call him a utility or beater. I like how later in the game this guy becomes a lot better. If he is in the opening hand we can drop him as a 1/1. At the least he always buffs himself and Edric.
UTILITY Greenseeker cycles cards for land... I dont care for it much myself but I suppose its an option. Martyr of Frost I like how this guy can counter stuff. Still you need to keep cards in hand and mana open for it to be an option. Still... on a 1cc drop it seems like it could be alright. Sakura-Tribe Scout Assuming no elf tribal thing this creature is a bit better than the Skyshroud Ranger. Skyshroud Ranger another land cheater. Stampede Driver this guy lets you toss cards to give mini overruns which is cool. I dont know how effective his ability would ever be but I found it amusing.
All those look like viable options except for maybe Greenseeker since it's only able to get basics and Stampede Driver who's effect is too small and mana hungry. I played against an early Cosi's Trickster yesterday and it go to 4/4 size by turn 4 which isn't too bad at all. Willow Dryad is already on my list and I am running the Ghariel online and he's been unblockable every time I played him so I think he's pretty good. After playing this deck the last couple days I don't think evasion is quite as crucial on a creature as I initially thought. It's certainly great at guaranteeing card drawing but it has been pretty rare that all 3 opponents have dropped blockers in the early turns. Later in the game they might all have blockers but your dorks are pretty easily replace so I've just been swinging in and losing a guy or 2. I'll try out some of these on MTGO and see how they do.
Ok I have to say first and foremost that I am with you in the fact that I sort of want to load up a few more guys in the 1-2 mana slots. The one mana slot is the most important and if we can drop a few more guys in before Edric then great. Once we get the card draw going we want to drop guys in for cheap and keep the counterspell option up. I think I might even cut some of my 2 drop guys for more one drops. How effective has Lotus Cobra been so far?
He's a complete beating if you're playing with 7 fetch lands. Also combos with Exploration, Elvish Pioneer, and Coiling Oracle. In some sense he's the best mana elf because you can both mana and your your attack card. (Though more precisely, Priest of Titania is the best mana elf in this deck.)
Grayscaled Gharial islandwalk is a decent evasion. Willow Dryad I am not really sure how we I missed this guy but its another forestwalk guy.
I considered these but didn't mention them because I was worried there was too much 1 mana evasion. I suppose you really could try a deck that's ALL one mana crap, but... card draw is only as good as the cards you draw, and I'm concerned about diluting the deck with too much crap. We only need to draw 2 extra cards per turn to win the game. But if our card quality gets lower, we might end up in a situation where we need to draw more than that.
There's also the question of whether fliers or landwalkers are better evasive creatures. I'm going with fliers for the most part, as you are pretty much guaranteed to have one player at the table without flying, but it sure sucks if everyone happens not to have a matching land, especially in the early game. Fliers also have the benefit of being easier to split damage between combat phases. If there's only 1 green player, he might feel compelled to blow up your Jukai Messenger since he knows it will only attack him.
I don't think there's room for 1 mana guys that don't provide mana or a utility ability, which means Cosi's Trickster doesn't make the cut. Skyshroud Elite and Twinblade Slasher are both elves, meaning they can get forestwalk from one of the two lords, but I think I'd rather play a straight up forestwalker. I tried Basking Rootwalla and he's not bad but I'd rather have an evasion creature here too.
Joraga Warcaller, on the other hand, is flat out amazing. With cradle it's easy to get 3 to 6 counters on him, making this another Beastmaster's Ascension. In the early game he just beats. And you can bounce him with Wirewood Symbiote if you need to give him more counters. He also stops Elesh Norn from ruining your day. And the deck has more elves than you'd think. My list something like 20 elves.
Greenseeker and Stampede Driver seem terrible because every time you are tapping them, you aren't attacking. If you want to play a spellshaper, at least make it Llanowar Mentor.
Martyr isn't great because it sacrifices itself, and the last thing you want to do is kill your own creatures. Plus you won't have that many blue cards in hand.
Skyshroud Ranger is amazing-- it's better than Llanowar Elves. I missed Sakura-Tribe Scout, but he's going to be almost as good as the ranger. Not an elf but otherwise a champ. Besides, lots of times you want to attack with everyone but your ranger, then use the ranger's ability to get more mana, keep your card count low, and cast more spells.
The problem with defining [EDH] by what is "fun" is that everyone seems to define fun as what they don't lose to. If you keep losing to easily answered cards, that means you should improve your deck. If you don't want to improve your deck, then you should come to peace with the idea that you are going to lose because you chose to not interact with better strategies.
I don't thinking self sacrificing is that big of a drawback on Martyr of Frost. Most of the spells you'd want to counter would have killed the creature anyways and it protects the rest of your team. Not having a tap ability is the reason I'm thinking about it. Right now I still feel like I'm a little short on dorks and counterspells but again the MTGO list I've been playing is about 20 cards off so that might be a factor.
I need help with my decklist.
This is what I want to do with this deck. I wanna use tokens and token generators to attack, combos with rite of replication, use doubling season, combo into infinite mana and utilize the infinite mana.
Though honestly I feel like i just put together a (decent-good) stuff.dec. I have not tested it out yet since i'm still missing 1/4 of the cards.
Why isn't Momir Vig the general for that deck? Seems like a much better fit for a combo blue/green build. Edric is about aggro, which is the opposite of what you described.
The problem with defining [EDH] by what is "fun" is that everyone seems to define fun as what they don't lose to. If you keep losing to easily answered cards, that means you should improve your deck. If you don't want to improve your deck, then you should come to peace with the idea that you are going to lose because you chose to not interact with better strategies.
Why isn't Momir Vig the general for that deck? Seems like a much better fit for a combo blue/green build. Edric is about aggro, which is the opposite of what you described.
Mind over Matter ...Mmmm....I guess it's good...So, if you can win from combat damage, just do the degenerative combo.
Right...because you're in a real good position to tell people MoM is degenerate.:rolleyes: Not sure if you checked my list but now might be a good time to dust off your Pyroclasms.
Right...because you're in a real good position to tell people MoM is degenerate.:rolleyes: Not sure if you checked my list but now might be a good time to dust off your Pyroclasms.
MoM is part of my past. (RIP)...so dont reanimate it!
And I already have tons of expirience dealing with little 1/1 puches.
this deck can be a bit greedy and to be honest crossroads would slow down our start. Best case scenario you probably draw one extra card after dropping it on turn 2 with another one drop.
I wouldnt want to see someone drop an Avenger and swing with their tokens to draw like 20 cards in the same turn.
This deck doesnt like giving opponents advantages as it operates in the very early game and things like this and aluren can be troublesome.
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I have officially moved to MTGNexus. I just wanted to let people know as my response time to salvation decks being bumped is very hit or miss.
So I played some more games with my Edric deck and Spiketail Hatchling is an allstar. He was so good that I'm convinced Cursecatcher will be good too. This is such a tempo deck that it's amazing how often being just 1 mana behind stops people from dropping wrath. Making them wait one turn to wrath is easily 3 to 7 extra cards.
I was also really happy cutting the expensive counters for things that cost only 1 or 2. I never drew Overwhelming Forces but I suspect it would be good. I wonder if Envelop would be good here. Other options include Disrupt, Spell Pierce, and Flusterstorm. Mana Leak would probably counter a lot of things too, but once you're in the 2 mana range, there's a lot of near hard counters you could play. Negate also seems strong, though it didn't make the final cut.
I'm going to try to include Spell Piece, as it seems like the best of the options listed there. There's the big question of how many counters this deck wants. I'm thinking 8 at the very most. You definitely want one in your hand by turn 4 or 5 though. I might just go with 7.
The problem with defining [EDH] by what is "fun" is that everyone seems to define fun as what they don't lose to. If you keep losing to easily answered cards, that means you should improve your deck. If you don't want to improve your deck, then you should come to peace with the idea that you are going to lose because you chose to not interact with better strategies.
I love how this is such a 1v1 deck at heart. It's almost ridiculous the sheer amount of trash creatures and spells (like the counters tedv mentioned) we play in here. This is also very much an all-in version of Edric.
tedv, how do your elves swing in without evasion? I've been trying a bunch of unblockables in my build (Escape Artist and such) and I like them, but elves just seem like vanilla dudes until you drop a lord.
EDIT: I'm currently playing 5 counterspells in my deck, including Forbid and 4 two-mana ones. I might boost it up to 6.
Emmara is like the worst parts of Legends and Homelands got pregnant, aborted the fetus, tossed it in the trashcan, set it on fire and wrapped the corpse in a Dragon's Maze pack wrapper.
Well I've been playing a lot of 4 player games, and usually there's someone who doesn't have blockers. I will commonly zenith for a lord to give the elves forestwalk as well, which provides three outlets. Often people will only have one blocker as well, meaning you can just go all in against them and lose one guy for a net win. Or you can bounce the blocked elf with Wirewood Symbiote.
The more I play though, the more I realize that every creature either needs a solid ability or evasion. I'm going to cut Elvish Visionary for this reason. At least cards like Skyshroud Ranger are good even when they can't get through.
I wouldn't play any 2 man unblockables like Escape Artist until you've filled out all of your one mana unblockables, of which there's something like a dozen.
The problem with defining [EDH] by what is "fun" is that everyone seems to define fun as what they don't lose to. If you keep losing to easily answered cards, that means you should improve your deck. If you don't want to improve your deck, then you should come to peace with the idea that you are going to lose because you chose to not interact with better strategies.
I also got a bunch of games in this weekend with Edric. I will give a quick rundown on some cards that I had either a positive or negative experience with:
Positives: Chrome Mox / Mox Diamond: I ran both of these proxied up in my list. I managed to draw both of them at least once within the first turn or two of the game. These are amazing tempo machines. Speeding up the deck and allowing us to drop more of the small guys. Skullclamp this card is probably our best bet if we loose Edric. Due to this I have added Trinket Mage to my list. I figure if I am doing well and dont need the card draw I will drop the Trinket Mage and go get my Memnite. If things go tits up I go for the clamp and start moving through my deck as fast as I can. Vendilion Clique I managed to get a good quick game where I got rolling and I managed to drop this in a few times to check out the control player's hand which is very nice as it gives us some insight as to how to play as well as strip those pesky wraths. What I really like here is that it has flash so I can keep mana open to fake the counterspell. It flies and punches for 3 which I also feel is effective. Out of my 3 drops I found I usually liked having this one. Tangle Wire I did manage a very tasty early game lock with this the other day and this card hands down won me that game. I pushed Zedru off of casting his commander and pushed him back like 3 turns. I managed to drop and flip Erayo before my opponents recovered and I backed it up with counters as it bought me time to draw into a solid hand.
NEGATIVES: Gilded Drake sadly this card is too responsive for the deck. I need creatures that I can just mindlessly drop in and use to swing with. I found it cloging up my momentum when I was doing good and even when I could steal something with it, it was a bit slow to be effective and left an opponent with a 3/3 flyer which was then difficult to get arround. It has since come out of the deck. Lotus Cobra I can see how it is somewhat useful in the midgame but I dont care much for it in the early game. It usually comes down on turn 2 and it doesnt ramp me forward at all. I might get some extra guys dropping in on turn 3 but that is when Edric should be coming in anyways. I think best case scenario you drop him turn 2 and turn 3 use a fetchland to keep 2 mana open for a counter and drop Edric in. Still I found it very narrow when I wanted him. Coming in on turn 2 didnt feel as good and he wasnt ramping as fast as I needed. Trygon Predator I guess this one is sort of a meta call but we dont really allow much for art / ench abuse and I found this guy to slow me down too much. It is handy to take out mana stones but Sol Ring is almost the only one I encounter and by the time I can take it out it has already done its damage. I felt a quicker evasive creature was just more impressive. Phyrexian Metamorph I guess my problem here is again that it feels a bit slow to drop. It is also a somewhat responsive creature as I dont want to pay 2 life and 3 mana to copy one of my evasive 1 drops. I might cut him due to this as I didn't really ever want it while I was doing well. I guess there is always the whole idea of copying someone else's bomb later in the game but at that point I feel I might just be better off running my own bomb creature. Sunder I ran it just because I had a copy and I was trying to whip the list together quickly. Unfortunately I quickly found out that it is a winmore card in the deck. I dont have much for ways to tutor it up so it is great when I am winning and terrible when I am not. I like it a lot more in Wydwen where I had a lot more tutors and I could go get it when I felt it was appropriate. I lack that in this deck so it ended up being a lot worse. Boreal Druid sadly colorless mana is really tough to use in the deck and as the creature has no evasions I found it sort of a lacking utility guy. This guy would probably be better if I had a higher 2-3cc drop list but I dont focus as heavily on them so I dont know if I really like him in here.
Overall I totally love the deck approach. I agree that it really does feel like a 1 v 1 approach but I just love how different it is. It isnt a guarenteed hit but it does do well enough that I can run away with a game very easily.
I agree with the cursecatcher and spiketail creatures being totally crazy good in here. They give great protection and stall opponents plays. Pushing the wraths back give us a chance to setup and back it with counters. I might even bump my extra turn effects up by one. I have found them to be solid cards in almost every situation and I see very little counter magic from my opposition. I like how even in a bad setup they are still good to draw as they cantrip and give the option for extra attacks and land drops.
Let me know how the spell pierce effects go for you if you try them out.
Also I did get tucked once which was really rough and it ended up killing me but I think I will go ahead with trying Survival of the Fittest in here. I like how I can use it to change out some of the small guys for some wincons or wrath protection further into the game. Also it gives me one more means of digging up Edric.
EDIT: also I got post number 100 congrats on having the place to be thread Donald
Speaking of tempo, this is clearly a deck that wants Tangle Wire. It's ridiculous.
Also I agree that in the least Cursecatcher, and Spiketail Hatchling belong in the deck. I will reserve my thoughts on Spiketail Drakeling for the meantime but who knows.
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[Modern] Allies
Yes indeed, it will be on my list when I make my next update. I put it in Uril too but I haven't draw it yet. I do have high hopes, it's a ridiculous card in cube draft. I wish this deck had more equipment I could tap :P.
EDIT: I added a list on the OP of things I need to add, things I am testing and cards I would be interested in testing at some point. Let me know if I missed anything important.
It can be worth reordering your early plays with draws like this, mind you. Suppose you have Greaves + Wire in your opening hand along with three 1 drops and two lands. You cast a random 1 drop turn 1. On turn 2, you should cast the Greaves rather than both one drops despite the fact that you'll draw one less card. Turn 3 is hasty Edric for 2 cards and Turn 4 you drop Tangle Wire after swinging for 3 (and casting the second one drop). By the time anyone has more than 3 mana, you'll have a phenomenal board position and at least one counter spell in hand.
Unified Will If there was ever a deck for this to work in it is this one. I seriously doubt that you are going to need to counter a spell from someone with more creatures in play than you. This is essentially another Arcane Denial for the deck. I feel like it is probably better for the deck than the 3 mana tuck effects and or counterspell due to its UU to cast.
Augury Owl evasive 2 mana creature that allows you to scry and essentially pitch what you dont want to draw seems somewhat solid. I am not entirely sure what I would cut for this but I like how I can tuck cards I dont want when he comes in.
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[Modern] Allies
Capitalizing on this small opening allows me to maintain a steady advantage throughout the game. Instead of developing my mana, I developed a small army of drawers. The cards build and opponents succumb to the avalanche of card-advantage.
To this end, I believe that there are more than enough top tier creatures to fill these roles that you don't have to play Flying Men and Grayscale Gharial. Because if the game progresses beyond the early stage where you don't have a solid footing, these guys aren't going to be capable of bringing you back.
Edric, the Spymaster
9 forest
9 island
6 fetches (misty, verdant, polluted, flooded, scalding, wooded)
Gaea's cradle
Academy ruins
Blinkmoth Nexus
Wasteland
Strip Mine
Mutavault
Command tower
Reliquary tower
Minamo, school at water's edge
Tropical island
Breeding pool
Dryad arbor
Quirion ranger
Llanowar elves
Fyndhorn elves
Wirewood symbiote
Elvish visionary
Priest of titania
Lotus cobra
Scavenging ooze
Phyrexian revoker
Rofellos, llanowar emissary
Fauna shaman
Coiling oracle
Rootwater thief
Sakura-tribe elder
Erayo, soratami ascendant
Eternal witness
Yavimaya elder
Wood elves
Viridian shaman
Trygon predator
Vendilion clique
Sower of temptation
Venser, shapaer savant
Glen elendra archmage
Wonder
Body double
Vesuvan shapeshifter
Psychosis crawler
Primeval titan
Hornet queen
Kederekt leviathan
Tidespout tyrant
Sol ring
Mana crypt
Umezawa's jitte
Sword of feast and famine
Lightning greaves
Aluren
Cloudstone curio
Earthcraft
Survival of the fittest
Crop rotation
Worldly tutor
Green suns zenith
Force of will
Negate
Mana drain
Commandeer
Forbid
Garruk wiodspeaker
Jace, the mind sculptor
Natural order
Exploration
Natures claim
Opposition
Erratic portal
Treachery
Spitting image
Explosive vegetation
Praetors counsel
Akroma's memorial
Temporal manipulation
Beacon of tomorrows
It's a very complicated deck with a lot of decision trees. But its very rewarding to play with. I'm a simic mage at heart and when I saw Edric, I knew he'd be my next general. Guaranteed more fun than Momir Vig, it play more creatures!
On the subject of counters, I would play both Counterspell before Unified Will, but it might be better than Negate. It's not THAT hard to get UU in this deck. Unified Will seems good when you're winning. And when you're losing, there's very little reason to counter spells-- threat assessment says they probably aren't going to be your problem. So that suggests Unified Will is better than Negate. It can also coutner Elesh Norn, which is huge. However, Negate has the benefit that it can stop a combo from going off even if you're in a bad position.
It might be worth trying to fit all three in. If so, you'd probably want to cut Aether Vial though, as it's generally just a colored sol ring that only casts creatures, and being able to cast non-creature spells seems important.
@Unified Will: Good find ISB, I will give this a try on MTGO.
@Augury Owl: Card filtration isn't that important since we are drawing so many cards. It's fine if a lot of them are crappy.
@umtiger: Your deck looks more geared for the midgame while mine is more of an all in approach. There aren't enough 1 mana elves to consistently drop Edric turn 2 and draw 2 cards turn 3. The weenies help with this because you can consistently drop some weenies turn 1 and 2 then Edric turn 3 to draw 2 or more cards. It's a fairly fragile strategy but it has been very powerful so for if nobody has an early answer. I'm with the others, Jace is even more terrible in this deck than he is in other decks.
I updated the OP with some changes, adding in some more fast mana and fixing. My main issues so far has been fixing, which this update will hopefully alleviate, and having enough early dorks (shocking I know!). I'm going to see how it plays out for now but I'll probably be looking to increase the number of 1-2cc dorks in the near future. Merfolk Spy was added to give me another rogue to enable Notorious Throng which is just a ridiculous beating in this deck.
EDIT: Thinking about Unified Will some more and I think we can easily run Mana Leak in this deck. It should almost always be a hard counter.
I looked through every single one drop creature just to see if we missed anything. Here is the list I came up with:
EVASIVE
Grayscaled Gharial islandwalk is a decent evasion.
Willow Dryad I am not really sure how
weI missed this guy but its another forestwalk guy. (realized you have him on your list but somehow I missed him)BEATERS
Cosi's Trickster I love how this guy has a good chance to get really big really fast. He has no evasion but every fetchland and ramp spell means he gets bigger. Considering he comes down at 1 mana and will likely immediately become bigger I at least find him a bit better than Scute Mob who doesnt start becoming larger till you hit larger mana base.
Skyshroud Elite a 2/3 for G with no drawbacks seems great. no evasion though
Twinblade Slasher personally I like this guy a bit more than the rootwalla due to the wither which can always be threatening. I guess the rootwalla has the whole madness option but I doubt that would matter until you are drawing crazy amounts of cards. No evasion though and I dont know how often you would want to trade mana for damage in this deck.
Basking Rootwalla solid early drop that can turn into a 3/3. The downside being I dont know how often you would want to pay mana for damage in this deck.
Joraga Warcaller I dont know if I should call him a utility or beater. I like how later in the game this guy becomes a lot better. If he is in the opening hand we can drop him as a 1/1. At the least he always buffs himself and Edric.
UTILITY
Greenseeker cycles cards for land... I dont care for it much myself but I suppose its an option.
Martyr of Frost I like how this guy can counter stuff. Still you need to keep cards in hand and mana open for it to be an option. Still... on a 1cc drop it seems like it could be alright.
Sakura-Tribe Scout Assuming no elf tribal thing this creature is a bit better than the Skyshroud Ranger.
Skyshroud Ranger another land cheater.
Stampede Driver this guy lets you toss cards to give mini overruns which is cool. I dont know how effective his ability would ever be but I found it amusing.
EDIT: I think I will try to fit Grayscaled Gharial, Willow Dryad, and Cosi's Trickster into my list for now. I might at some point in time want to test Martyr of Frost but who knows.
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[Modern] Allies
He's a complete beating if you're playing with 7 fetch lands. Also combos with Exploration, Elvish Pioneer, and Coiling Oracle. In some sense he's the best mana elf because you can both mana and your your attack card. (Though more precisely, Priest of Titania is the best mana elf in this deck.)
I considered these but didn't mention them because I was worried there was too much 1 mana evasion. I suppose you really could try a deck that's ALL one mana crap, but... card draw is only as good as the cards you draw, and I'm concerned about diluting the deck with too much crap. We only need to draw 2 extra cards per turn to win the game. But if our card quality gets lower, we might end up in a situation where we need to draw more than that.
There's also the question of whether fliers or landwalkers are better evasive creatures. I'm going with fliers for the most part, as you are pretty much guaranteed to have one player at the table without flying, but it sure sucks if everyone happens not to have a matching land, especially in the early game. Fliers also have the benefit of being easier to split damage between combat phases. If there's only 1 green player, he might feel compelled to blow up your Jukai Messenger since he knows it will only attack him.
I don't think there's room for 1 mana guys that don't provide mana or a utility ability, which means Cosi's Trickster doesn't make the cut. Skyshroud Elite and Twinblade Slasher are both elves, meaning they can get forestwalk from one of the two lords, but I think I'd rather play a straight up forestwalker. I tried Basking Rootwalla and he's not bad but I'd rather have an evasion creature here too.
Joraga Warcaller, on the other hand, is flat out amazing. With cradle it's easy to get 3 to 6 counters on him, making this another Beastmaster's Ascension. In the early game he just beats. And you can bounce him with Wirewood Symbiote if you need to give him more counters. He also stops Elesh Norn from ruining your day. And the deck has more elves than you'd think. My list something like 20 elves.
Greenseeker and Stampede Driver seem terrible because every time you are tapping them, you aren't attacking. If you want to play a spellshaper, at least make it Llanowar Mentor.
Martyr isn't great because it sacrifices itself, and the last thing you want to do is kill your own creatures. Plus you won't have that many blue cards in hand.
Skyshroud Ranger is amazing-- it's better than Llanowar Elves. I missed Sakura-Tribe Scout, but he's going to be almost as good as the ranger. Not an elf but otherwise a champ. Besides, lots of times you want to attack with everyone but your ranger, then use the ranger's ability to get more mana, keep your card count low, and cast more spells.
This is what I want to do with this deck. I wanna use tokens and token generators to attack, combos with rite of replication, use doubling season, combo into infinite mana and utilize the infinite mana.
Though honestly I feel like i just put together a (decent-good) stuff.dec. I have not tested it out yet since i'm still missing 1/4 of the cards.
1 Coiling Oracle
1 Primeval Titan
1 Sakura tribe elder
1 ant queen
1 Eternal Witness
1 Terastadon
1 Acidic Slime
1 Glen Elandra Archmage
1 Mnemonic Wall
1 Gilded Drake
1 Jin-Gitaxias, Core Auger
1 Consecrated Sphinx
1 Fauna Shaman
1 Trygon Predator
1 avenger of zendikar
1 primordial hydra
1 wolfbriar elemental
1 mycoloth
1 oracle of mul daya
1 lorescale coatl
1 primal rage
1 treachery
1 survival of the fittest
INSTANTS (12)
1 blue sun's zenith
1 worldly tutor
1 mystic tutor
1 krosan grip
1 naturalize
1 time stop
1 cryptic command
1 counterspell
1 pact of negation
1 dream fracture
1 negate
1 Voidslime
1 all is dust
1 explore
1 kodama's reach
1 cultivate
1 Bribery
1 time stretch
1 time warp
1 Green Sun's Zenith
1 praetor's counsel
1 tooth and nail
1 rite of replication
1 garruk wildspeaker
1 jace, the mind sculptor
1 Sword of feast and famine
1 thran dynamo
1 lightning greaves
1 sol ring
1 sensei's divining top
1 skull clamp
1 mana reflection
1 doubling season
1 squirrel nest
1 earthcraft
1 spawning pit
1 strip mine
1 wasteland
1 maze of ith
1 command tower
1 tropical island
1 flooded grove
1 misty rainforest
1 breeding pool
1 simic growth chamber
1 scalding tarn
1 verdant catacombs
1 flooded strand
1 polluted delta
1 windswept heath
1 wooded foothills
1 vesuva
1 reliquary tower
1 oran-rief, the vastwood
1 forbidden orchard
1 gaea's cradle
10 forests
9 islands
I was thinking the same thing. Experiment Kraj is also a combo general. You can still run some combos in Edric though. tedv runs Groundskeeper + Mind over Matter + Gaea's Cradle/Priest of Titania/Elvish Archdruid for infinite mana and it is pretty easy to Squirrel Nest + Earthcraft in here along with some other Earthcraft combos. Eternal Witness/Mnemonic Wall + Time Walk effect + Crystal Shard/Erratic Portal is an infinite turn combo. I'd start cutting high end stuff like Jin-Gitaxias and things like Jace that just don't tend to do much.
Mind over Matter ...Mmmm....I guess it's good...So, if you can win from combat damage, just do the degenerative combo.
Right...because you're in a real good position to tell people MoM is degenerate.:rolleyes: Not sure if you checked my list but now might be a good time to dust off your Pyroclasms.
MoM is part of my past. (RIP)...so dont reanimate it!
And I already have tons of expirience dealing with little 1/1 puches.
Also, I might try a deck very similar to this cause it seems 100000% than Seshiro haha
I wouldnt want to see someone drop an Avenger and swing with their tokens to draw like 20 cards in the same turn.
This deck doesnt like giving opponents advantages as it operates in the very early game and things like this and aluren can be troublesome.
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[Modern] Allies
I was also really happy cutting the expensive counters for things that cost only 1 or 2. I never drew Overwhelming Forces but I suspect it would be good. I wonder if Envelop would be good here. Other options include Disrupt, Spell Pierce, and Flusterstorm. Mana Leak would probably counter a lot of things too, but once you're in the 2 mana range, there's a lot of near hard counters you could play. Negate also seems strong, though it didn't make the final cut.
I'm going to try to include Spell Piece, as it seems like the best of the options listed there. There's the big question of how many counters this deck wants. I'm thinking 8 at the very most. You definitely want one in your hand by turn 4 or 5 though. I might just go with 7.
tedv, how do your elves swing in without evasion? I've been trying a bunch of unblockables in my build (Escape Artist and such) and I like them, but elves just seem like vanilla dudes until you drop a lord.
EDIT: I'm currently playing 5 counterspells in my deck, including Forbid and 4 two-mana ones. I might boost it up to 6.
The more I play though, the more I realize that every creature either needs a solid ability or evasion. I'm going to cut Elvish Visionary for this reason. At least cards like Skyshroud Ranger are good even when they can't get through.
I wouldn't play any 2 man unblockables like Escape Artist until you've filled out all of your one mana unblockables, of which there's something like a dozen.
Positives:
Chrome Mox / Mox Diamond: I ran both of these proxied up in my list. I managed to draw both of them at least once within the first turn or two of the game. These are amazing tempo machines. Speeding up the deck and allowing us to drop more of the small guys.
Skullclamp this card is probably our best bet if we loose Edric. Due to this I have added Trinket Mage to my list. I figure if I am doing well and dont need the card draw I will drop the Trinket Mage and go get my Memnite. If things go tits up I go for the clamp and start moving through my deck as fast as I can.
Vendilion Clique I managed to get a good quick game where I got rolling and I managed to drop this in a few times to check out the control player's hand which is very nice as it gives us some insight as to how to play as well as strip those pesky wraths. What I really like here is that it has flash so I can keep mana open to fake the counterspell. It flies and punches for 3 which I also feel is effective. Out of my 3 drops I found I usually liked having this one.
Tangle Wire I did manage a very tasty early game lock with this the other day and this card hands down won me that game. I pushed Zedru off of casting his commander and pushed him back like 3 turns. I managed to drop and flip Erayo before my opponents recovered and I backed it up with counters as it bought me time to draw into a solid hand.
NEGATIVES:
Gilded Drake sadly this card is too responsive for the deck. I need creatures that I can just mindlessly drop in and use to swing with. I found it cloging up my momentum when I was doing good and even when I could steal something with it, it was a bit slow to be effective and left an opponent with a 3/3 flyer which was then difficult to get arround. It has since come out of the deck.
Lotus Cobra I can see how it is somewhat useful in the midgame but I dont care much for it in the early game. It usually comes down on turn 2 and it doesnt ramp me forward at all. I might get some extra guys dropping in on turn 3 but that is when Edric should be coming in anyways. I think best case scenario you drop him turn 2 and turn 3 use a fetchland to keep 2 mana open for a counter and drop Edric in. Still I found it very narrow when I wanted him. Coming in on turn 2 didnt feel as good and he wasnt ramping as fast as I needed.
Trygon Predator I guess this one is sort of a meta call but we dont really allow much for art / ench abuse and I found this guy to slow me down too much. It is handy to take out mana stones but Sol Ring is almost the only one I encounter and by the time I can take it out it has already done its damage. I felt a quicker evasive creature was just more impressive.
Phyrexian Metamorph I guess my problem here is again that it feels a bit slow to drop. It is also a somewhat responsive creature as I dont want to pay 2 life and 3 mana to copy one of my evasive 1 drops. I might cut him due to this as I didn't really ever want it while I was doing well. I guess there is always the whole idea of copying someone else's bomb later in the game but at that point I feel I might just be better off running my own bomb creature.
Sunder I ran it just because I had a copy and I was trying to whip the list together quickly. Unfortunately I quickly found out that it is a winmore card in the deck. I dont have much for ways to tutor it up so it is great when I am winning and terrible when I am not. I like it a lot more in Wydwen where I had a lot more tutors and I could go get it when I felt it was appropriate. I lack that in this deck so it ended up being a lot worse.
Boreal Druid sadly colorless mana is really tough to use in the deck and as the creature has no evasions I found it sort of a lacking utility guy. This guy would probably be better if I had a higher 2-3cc drop list but I dont focus as heavily on them so I dont know if I really like him in here.
Overall I totally love the deck approach. I agree that it really does feel like a 1 v 1 approach but I just love how different it is. It isnt a guarenteed hit but it does do well enough that I can run away with a game very easily.
I agree with the cursecatcher and spiketail creatures being totally crazy good in here. They give great protection and stall opponents plays. Pushing the wraths back give us a chance to setup and back it with counters. I might even bump my extra turn effects up by one. I have found them to be solid cards in almost every situation and I see very little counter magic from my opposition. I like how even in a bad setup they are still good to draw as they cantrip and give the option for extra attacks and land drops.
Let me know how the spell pierce effects go for you if you try them out.
Also I did get tucked once which was really rough and it ended up killing me but I think I will go ahead with trying Survival of the Fittest in here. I like how I can use it to change out some of the small guys for some wincons or wrath protection further into the game. Also it gives me one more means of digging up Edric.
EDIT: also I got post number 100 congrats on having the place to be thread Donald
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[Modern] Allies