Yeah, I agree it's not ideal. But the deck kind of leapfrogged some of the early days bad stuff removal and ended up in a realm where to try to improve you have to take out things that are okay Feel free to try to suggest alternate cuts and you'll see what I mean. In the end, having a dude that can fetch the real Guttersnipe, or Monastery Mentor, or Phalanx Leader, or whatever else you fancy is just better. And there's also no denying that body deployers, even the heroic ones that require targeting, have a better impact on the game than the half-off Guttersnipes. Gumming up the board with five 1/1s will do more for you within game realities than tickling the opposition for five each.
Oh yeah, and Martyrdom + Stuffy Doll is hilarious but unrealistic. It's a pity Martyrdom is worded in a way that makes it stop when the creature craps out, or it'd merit some consideration for repeatedly Pariahing disposable chumps. Still would probably be worse than Intimidation Bolt due to requiring a body factory, even if it were to hypothetically sponge fireballs.
Come to think of it, "responsible" is not really my style. The responsible thing to do would be to run Avenger of Zendikar in my turbo land barf Patron of the Orochi, but I don't. Debt to the Deathless in my crazy mana pool Daxos the Returned, similarly absent. As such, time to throw caution to the wind and live life dangerously in Feather as well.
Wheel of Fortune and Past in Flames are responsible backup cards. Get a nice fat grip and look for outs, recycle a graveyard's worth of stuff (and abuse it with Feather!). Thing is, when things are operational, they do little. I can count the non spot removal instants that ended up in the 'yard against my will across all the test games so far on the fingers of one hand. I cast a few okay wheels, but in each of those cases had the wheel just been a cantrip I'd have ended up fine too. And when I topdeck a wheel on a 15-card hand before my untap, that's not really contributing.
The last post musings got me wanting Sunforger back in here, albeit responsibly used this time around, so in it goes. It helps with the voltron kill plan, as suddenly Feather smacks like an OG elder dragon, and there's the instant get safety net to keep you safe. May need to work some good silver bullets for this going forward. And Reckless Rage, as if the voltron plan is being embraced this helps pick off winged stragglers left up to absorb the swing. So many possibilities, so little space! Stoneforge Mystic returns as well, much to Ebline's chagrin. It's actually got some solid non-Sunforger targets in here, at least in my opinion - Sword of Lotus Flip is a Thran Dynamo sized ramp boost on a land in a deck happy to churn mana, Sword of Playtest Partner Hate is a hefty mana bump upon connecting (and connect it will - thanks, wings!), and Sword of Rampant Growth may be the least immediate but still offers a good trickle of value. Not a bad set of options to have available on tap in a Boros shell, in my opinion. Also adding Mistveil Plains for time-honoured Sunforger shenanigans. It's nice that Kor Cartographer fetches it.
Having gotten a few more solid draw games under my belt, it takes one hell of a mana setup (we're talking Paradox Engine plus a few rocks level of mana here) to reliably avoid discarding. I'm not even talking five bodies with Zada here, two cantrips with a solid mana foundation will do the trick just fine. All the stuff just keeps coming back, bringing new friends with it, and you suddenly have to shed 5+ in the end step, and hiding the cantrips in exile won't help as that's all new cards to consider While hiding some (preferably non-essential) options in exile is a valid line to virtually extend the hand, something will probably have to go down. This adds another layer of nonsense to try to figure out, as if you pitch the wrong thing it can potentially cost you the game. Like yesterday, where I stupidly shipped my enchantment removal, a guy set down Siege Behemoth into Rhythm of the Wild and sidestepped my majestic token army to gib me in one fell swoop. Skill testing! Hopefully this will help me develop as a player and keep track of different scenarios, buffering my hand with various robust answers to them. That, or I'll put in Meteor Golem
Yeah, yeah. Your suggestions have been largely good, the major thing where you missed the mark was taking out Goblin Matron. I've been slowly working my way through your stuff, but I'm running into the problem where I've got trouble finding cuts. By all means feel free to suggest some. I ran the list by Ebline, my long-time git gud dispenser, and he followed through on the Stoneforge Mystic is bad here reaction by proposing I remove all my non-Sunforger equipment. For now I did not take it on board - all three sword things provide mana benefits, and requiring I tickle someone in combat may be suboptimal but at least synergistic with one of the victory avenues. He pointed me to one more cut though, which made immediate sense upon consideration.
The repeatable removal offered by the Conscriptor is cute, hard to set up, and disproportionately pisses people off. Meteor Golem comes in, kabooms a broader audience, and synergises with the few flick spells for repeated value at a similar rate of return to what you could set up wit Conscriptor in purely removal realms. Simple swap, but should probably work out. Ebline also suggested Phyrexian Altar as an include, and it's not a shabby idea at all. I've got four token makers, two ways to tutor them, and a shell pretty good at card acquisition and filtering.
I'm happy to see the rapid evolution of Feather decks. I've had the pleasure to play my version of the deck most of the weekend, and I've adapted the deck accordingly.
My deck for reference. Note that the land base is obviously a placeholder that I've only used to keep track of my land count.
I'm actually excited to see someone else using Meteor Golem. It has been a crucial piece in my Daretti and Zada decks, and I imagine it'll fill a similar role here, especially with blink/copy effects. Your deck list is the most similar to mine that I've seen so far. We agree for the most part across all categories, and even then, the replacements are almost functionally identical cards. I had Akroan Crusader and Vanguard of Brimaz in my first iterations of the deck, but they haven't performed the way I hoped. Monastery Monk and Young Pyromancer have done all the heavy lifting.
I'm not sold on Solemn Simulacrum and Kor Cartographer. Land Tax and Knight of the White Orchid have been over-performing in my deck, and are definitely staying. Like Cartographer, Knight is also able to fetch double lands and Mistveil Plains, but it's only half the cost. My meta is tuned, and I need to keep my CMC down for consistency reasons.
How's Mox Amber working out for you? I like idea of having "free" mana for protection for when you cast Feather, and I like the interaction with Paradox Engine, but I would probably prefer to have Lotus Petal over it for the T2 potential. I ended up cutting Lotus Petal in an earlier iteration though.
I see that Twinflame and Heat Shimmer have already been mentioned, and I would like to highlight their interaction with Dualcaster Mage. Dualcaster is an amazing card here, which acts as protection (can copy counterspells) and Twincast obviously, but also as a win con when paired with Twinflame (infinite tokens with haste). Twinflame and Heat Shimmer are good cards with Feather, and staples in Zada for a reason. They are high value token generators, that win games with Zada or Zada-dragon out.
What I love about this deck is the ability to close games in multiple ways, and the unique Boros play style.
Neat, another person in the thread! I guess this is what it feels like to build a commander people are actually interested in
Yeah, our builds are quite similar. I've found the heroic token dudes to be perfectly fine - who cares who's getting the Heal to the face? At least in my meta, people stopped most efforts to take out Feather as they just know that nothing's happening, so surplus protection spells can double up as heroic trigger fodder as well. Agreed that Young Pyromancer and Monastery Mentor are better. There's no debating this.
Funny, I'm not sold on Knight of the White Orchid. His clause makes him just weird enough to only really work if you're behind. As mentioned in one of the posts here, I had a Depression Automaton game where I dumped my whole plains supply onto the field and got halfway through the mountains before the game ended. Between the flickers, the Sword of Rampant Growth, I'm not guaranteed to be behind enough to milk the Knight. My build's a bit less all-in than yours, running the mana swords of value, and I've never had an issue with these guys being too rich for the deck's blood. I mean, Meteor Golem is a seven drop and here we are patting each other on the back for running it
Y'see, I don't approach Feather as a three drop that I'm trying to rush out turn two. I'm treating Feather as a four drop I aim to cast her and have a mana up, be it for an actual piece of protection or just a bluff. All the diamonds etc. help with that. Mox Amber fits in that very well too. I'd far rather have that than a treasure token shuffled in
Yeah, I agree that Dualcaster Mage and his gg was closet friends are a good include here. I was considering them very early on into the deck's life, but there was only so much space in the 99 and I didn't follow through. I'm gonna keep it in mind going forward, but the cloners would probably be better in a more ETB shell. Hey, I don't get to talk - I now have eight ETB pieces as well
I'm not sure if the multifaceted victories are a boon or a curse, but they feel like a necessity in the deck at this stage of its life.
Yeah, I agree that Dualcaster Mage and his gg was closet friends are a good include here. I was considering them very early on into the deck's life, but there was only so much space in the 99 and I didn't follow through. I'm gonna keep it in mind going forward, but the cloners would probably be better in a more ETB shell. Hey, I don't get to talk - I now have eight ETB pieces as well
I preordered but I haven't done any proxy testing with my own list.
I had Dualcaster Mage in my early list before I did a lot of my cuts. Of the 7 current flicker option spells, 4 of them don't return him until end of turn which makes him VERY hard to use with those four. Of the remaining three flickers, Acrobatic Maneuver is probably the worst of the flickers, to the point that my current plan is to not run it. I find it kind of narrow to say that its good with Cloudshift and Justiciar's Portal and even then he is incredibly situational.
Private Mod Note
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Rollback Post to RevisionRollBack
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.
Ok, noted. If a more ETBtastic build isn't rushing to fit him in, I'll wait and see if an organic opening presents itself to work him in here. For now a different organic opening presented itself.
Let's think about things for a sec - there are all of nine rocks in the list, two of which produce colourless and are of lower utility for casting the instant flurry. Yet Paradox Engine is dumb as balls in here and gets nuked on sight. How many synergy pieces does Phyrexian Altar have? The four token makers, and one could argue that the two Recruiters are quite likely to get a board gummer if the Altar is looming. That's not that dissimilar a support ratio for a pretty strong payoff. True, Pengine can really go off the rails in a manner Phyrexian Altar won't, but the level of synergy and payoff this offers to the shell is still perfectly sufficient to be considered a strong engine piece. Practical demonstration - so far I've gotten one test game in with it, and I got to work Liberating my Depression Automaton again. A few rocks showed up. My mana base was beyond baller, in spite of the fact my adversary was sporting Panharmonicon, Conjurer's Closet and some Wood Elves variant. Unfortunately, not much else was going on. The spell suite featured one cantrip, which kept getting more mana and not much business. Eventually I drew into a Guttersnipe and Young Pyromancer, but by then I was shredded down to about half my life. Pass turn, dude plonks down a Mirror March and a Pelakka Wurm. Ruh roh, this ain't good. If he gets sufficiently lucky, I might just be dead, and even if not he's likely gonna gain a ton of life, making it hard to take him out. He was on 15. I proceeded to rip a heroic string of eight instants, burning Young Pyromancer tokens for fuel at some point, and a little draw luck from the cantrips assisted by Burning Prophet closed things out with the wurm on the stack. Whew! All in all, if I can have 22 mana on the field and still make good use of the Altar, it seems like a good idea Taking out Wear // Tear, seeing how I just added Meteor Golem I've got a bit of other removal in here with more re-use potential. Sure, the 2-for-1 was nice, but Duergar Hedge-Mage is also around for those sort of needs.
Given how this ludicrous mana game played out, I may as well pursue mana generation further. Smothering Tithe is the first on the bench, and will hopefully provide solid gains to work with. I don't expect the banking aspect to come into effect as much here as it does in my Daxos the Returned, but it should still be very good. Given the fact the deck expects to go the distance a bit, with the engine not explosive enough to slurp a pod quickly in a reliable fashion, may as well go for this rather than a Chrome Mox or Springleaf Drum. Taking out Chain Reaction. I just haven't had much incentive to wipe in this list, seeing how I can gum up the field, make my blockers not die, just overall discourage coming at me. Let's see if living life dangerously with a solitary wrath is sufficient.
With Wear // Tear gone, is there even any good/situational Instants to tutor for with Sunforger? It basically becomes a 5+ Mana protection tutor.. Maybe if Teferi's Protection was in the deck, I'd like it more.
I just realized that Burning Prophet is from WAR, no wonder I don't have one.. lol. Is it really that useful? So hard trying to squeeze stuff in.. I may just have to drop Firebrand Archer like you did.. 'xD
I wonder if I should cut Chandra's Ignition too.. Without pumps it's basically 3 dmg to board/opponents (which IS inevitability, as like a Plan E.. lol.) But if we had any other creatures in play that we wanted to keep alive with a protection spell, that becomes 6+ mana to Slagstorm. Though I did think Chain Reaction was cute, what with protection from Red, sad to see you dropped it (you really are a daredevil! :P)
I see we've both watched the same Game Knights episode
If anything, Wear // Tear makes for a crappy Sunforger tutor as you can't fuse it this way. If that's your jam, I'd like to recommend Crush Contraband. There are still various interesting things in there that this gets, you have your standard Swords/Path/Chaos Warp, you have Boros Charm. I do want to add Teferi's Protection, it's somewhere on the waiting list with Intimidation Bolt and some other stuff.
Yes, Burning Prophet is very good. Take everything you do, the flurry of instant nonsense, and add scry 1 to every single one. You churn through the deck at great pace, looking for whatever you need. It really helps smooth the game, and the fact it doesn't hog targeting is fantastic. Oddly enough, I don't even miss the Guttersnipe knockoffs that much - ole pappy Gutter comes out with a humming instant juggling engine online and shreds life totals in a couple turns tops. Having the small ones is not quite as good at closing, and if you set these sort of things down early they tickle the opposition a bit, maybe drawing attention to themselves. They were nice, but I don't feel I'm any worse at closing things out with them gone.
Heh, funny - before editing that previous update post, I had a bit there musing about the merits of repeatable wipes. Chandra's Ignition, specifically, was mentioned as a possible Chain Reaction replacement because of the various swords/pumps scattered in the list. I'm trying to not overdo the permission. In the interest of overall table game enjoyment in my mid-power meta, I've found that it's best to approach interactivity as a continuum with your ability to answer interactivity yourself. Otherwise nobody else gets to do their thing, you do your thing and stop others answering it. Given the vast protection suite here, if I'd repeatedly screw with the opposition permanents in an aggressive way, I'm pretty sure everyone would hate it. Might just be me and my meta.
Fun fact - my average CMC is 2.29, and yet here I am running sixteen ramp pieces. This thing guzzles any amount of mana you can feed it, as evidenced above. What a weird little list this has become.
Hm, that's a good point. He has even more support in here than Phyrexian Altar. However, in a vacuum, Guttersnipe is better. In the situations where Purph will start shredding face harder you probably don't need the help. I'll lump him in with the others.
I understand Torchling does not synergize as well in your deck as in mine probably, but the thought of being able to use cards like Swords to Plowshares repeatedly sounds so tempting.
Thanks, it's nice to know that my blathering text dumps are of use to people every now and then Torchling is similar to Akroan Conscriptor, trading off the Threatens for shielding itself from enemy spot removal. A perfectly okay card to run, but I've moved to Meteor Golem for increased flexibility.
I may have gone a smidge too pedal to the metal over here with testing, having burned out all three of my playtest partners by now. Things are working smooth, you set down Feather, you start churning through the deck with protection backup and assemble something out of whatever comes around. The engine is not explosive enough to take things down quickly, so the mana swords help scale into the mid/late game with an increased resource pool. I looked back at the posts in the thread, the recommendations, the things I'd muse that I should run. A lot of them are safety nets or additional ways to close out. I don't feel I need help with ending the game at this point, the deck's doing fine on that front. And my irrational disdain for safety nets has also been brought up in here already. The three main contenders that remain are Intimidation Bolt, Teferi's Protection and Gamble. The first as the deck's Constant Mists, the second as the ridiculous blanket catch-all that it is, the third as a slightly risky tutor option. None of them feel immediately required in the deck. However, I did figure out a couple swaps to make.
It's not a case of removing bad cards, as the diamonds have been perfectly fine. It's just a case of replacing the current worst rocks with better options. I somehow forgot to just look at the arbitrary quality of these two options and see that the things I'm not running are just plain stronger than what's in here already. Springleaf Drum can come down before Feather, and even if nothing else happens on board before her that's still a faux-Mox Amber once she lands. Chrome Mox can put up with the card disadvantage, given the deck's sturdy draw potential. Both of these work really solid early, and can help speed up the first few turns a bit. Crucially, they're also super good if encountered late. The Drum is mana neutral, the Mox is actually mana positive. By contrast, the diamonds chew up two mana for no immediate gain.
Took a look at all sub-2 CMC rocks, and caught nothing else of note. Mox Diamond and Mox Opal only come online later, not offering reliable assistance in the early game. As such, the two remaining two-drop tap-rocks (Coldsteel Heart, Star Compass) are probably fine for the time being.
Also, figured that this whole Tenth District Legionnaire merits a slot. True, this adds another competing targeting sponge to the list, but the payoff is scry 1. That's a pretty good payoff to staple on top of whatever, as Burning Prophet has taught me. True, this is a bit worse as it eats the target, but still fits perfectly into the deck's game plan. I have no idea how I missed him. Taking out Sword of Rampant Growth, as it's the most incremental and slow in its benefits and I've still got Ebline's voice suggesting sword and Stoneforge cuts in the back of my mind. Ebline tends to be right about things for some reason
Nice list you've got running here, I'm personally going for more of a flicker etb approach with Purphoros/Panharmonicon and a bunch of theft and I'm enjoying it immensely.
You may have already tried these, but I'd suggest cutting Faith's Shield for Bathe in Light. I guess Bathe in Light can be pretty meta dependent, but no one runs white in my play group so I can usually protect most of my creatures instead of just one lone soul without requiring to be at deaths door. I'd also replace Fall of the Hammer with Soul's Fire. The 1 extra mana is worth it to be able to target planeswalkers or just burn face. There is nothing sexier than seeing someone cheat out a monstrous Eldrazi only to have it stolen, rammed into their face, being Souls Fire'd for another 10 odd, then having the Eldrazi Cloudshifted permanently to your side. But as you've mentioned this deck is a thirsty ***** (I'm paraphrasing of course haha), so you may find the 1 extra on both to be a little too expensive.
On an unrelated note, and I know this is sacrilege, but somehow I forgot Paradox Engine was a card. I had included Unwinding Clock in my list but completely brain farted on Paradox's existence. Now I have to find more room for that too haha.
I'm honestly not that big a fan of the Drum, since in my experience I'd rather have Feather untapped as much as possible to serve as an aerial chumpblocker that I can protect/flicker to not die.. (at least it was extremely relevant in my games last night, lol.) And having to pitch a card to Mox early-game, really puts the wind out of your sails, since you need everything at your disposal to get going.. you can't really afford to lose cards UNTIL you've started.
I had a game where someone blew up my Sword of the Animist.. lol. And I even contemplated using Apostle's on it, but I didn't.
The Drum's seriously been perfectly fine in testing. You can keep Feather up, and if you're forced to tap her (there are often other blokes around) you can do so just before it's your turn. And the Mox can come out whenever it's convenient for you. I've had hands where I held it back as it didn't majorly impact the flow of early game plays and it was okay too. I've had hands where I set it down immediately to get out a two drop. Take your list, draw repeated six-card hands, pretend having the Mox/Drum in there, and see how well they play early game. And there's no debate they're superior late.
Spiritualize - admittedly, it's slow at 3 mana, but it cantrips, and it gives lifelink. It can really help you last longer in the lategame. Chandra's Ignition - repeatable boardwipe, and beautiful with the previous card. Arcbond - this card just screams juicy shenanigans to me. Beautiful with the first card, but can also be devastating without. Possible wincon with Zada or Zada dragon. Fatal Frenzy - potential wincon. Take one of your creatures and buff it up, and cast this on it to make sure it packs a punch. If it's not a token use one of your flicker spells so the sac effect is neutralized. Temur Battle Rage - much like the former. We're not in pauper, but it still packs a serious punch. Buffing Feather to 4 power shouldn't be any kind of hassle. Seize the Day - probably winmore but it still easily enables commander damage lethals if you have a bit of buffs to strap on to Feather. Soul's Fire - I feel like 1 more mana makes this much better than Fall of the Hammer. It really helps you deal with PWs, and helps you regularly damage your opponents so you can pressure them. Also benefits from buffs and from lifelink. Samut's Sprint - comparable with Titan's Strength, only I think that Haste is better than an additional +1/0. Ground Rift - very cute. Cast a bunch of buffs then cast this on the buffed creature. The copies that the storm trigger creates can target opponents' creatures freely, while you still get the card back.
Oblation - classic, too good not to run. Getting rid of anything is just something that needs to be done sometimes no matter the price. Blessed Alliance - seems very very flexible. Might not draw cards, but it's a great repeatable defensive card. Dawn Charm - another flexible defensive spell that can be abused. Fury Charm - less flexible but still an abusable spell. Expose Evil - taps a dangrous attacker with psuedo card-draw. Worth a shot. Fell the Mighty - I know so many people mentioned this card, I'm just confused as to why you're not running it. Impact Resonance - Mentioned already, but still worth a mention. Fetchable with Sunforger, imprintable on Isochron, and abusable on its own. Considering all of these, I think it becomes much less conditional. Otherworldly Outburst - wrath insurance. Sometimes you just can't promise a creature will live, and this helps you keep some pretty good board presence.
Descent of the Dragons - incredibly expensive, but repeatedly turning your weenie tokens into dragons can be pretty cool.
Thanks for the suggestions. Most of these are valid includes in Feather decks. However, there's only so much a 99 can hold, and I've found my cast spam route to work well in multiplayer games. As for game ending timings, I've had a turn 4 win in 1v1 and turn seven tablekills in multiplayer. It's not the fastest, but it's not meant to be.
Spiritualize - I don't pump things reliably enough to make good use out of this. I probably wouldn't run this at 2 CMC, let alone its current three. Not an efficient mana allotment. Chandra's Ignition - I find wipes a dish best served unconditional and efficient. Blasphemous Act costs a single red and shreds everything. This costs five, and is conditional on the target's power to get things done. At its worst, this does just about nothing. At its best, this repeatedly shreds the opposition, and people who are already somewhat grumbly because they can't reliably interact with you get even more grumbly because now they can't do anything. Probably correct to include this. Arcbond - Conditional setup (needs a big source of damage to spread around), quite costly at 3 for something this situational. Fatal Frenzy - You're not casting this on Feather in most sensible setups, and everything non-Feather is super tiny. Might work better in a more voltron-focused build with more pump to go around, but even there it still seems questionable. Temur Battle Rage - A solid double strike enabler, plus trample if going ham. Not shabby at all. I find both double strike enablers I'm currently running (Boros Charm, Psychotic Fury) to be more all around useful though. Seize the Day - Once again, should be ok in a more voltron build. It's not something this particular style of Feather feels comfortable devoting four mana and a slot to though, as its fail case is double strike. Soul's Fire - Funny story, I'm currently trialling replacements for Fall of the Hammer. Similar shtick to Chandra's Ignition - varies between doing nothing and people hating you for it. If I'm tempted to get more creature control, I may actually reach out to Luminate Primordial. Samut's Sprint - On the outskirts of the deck, in consideration for inclusion if something underperforms. The +1 power actually does make a difference, making Feather a turn faster clock. The haste will only come online if recasting Feather late and trying to cheese someone. Not irrelevant, but not super important. Ground Rift - Yep, that's cute as hell. You also get Blinding Flare for a more mana sink'y, self-contained package.
Oblation - Yep, that's a solid removal spell. Also hovering on the outskirts of the deck. Blessed Alliance - It may be flexible, but it's very mana intensive. You're essentially spending four mana for a repeatable Celestial Flare. Dawn Charm - The flexibility is nice, its "fail case" of being a two mana regeneration shield is not. Straight indestructibility is much better. The other modes are interesting though. Fury Charm - Crappier than the above. Expose Evil - There's a version of this with actual draw. There's another version of this which makes their stuff not untap. There are plenty of options for this sort of thing if you want to pursue it. It's an interesting class of effect. Fell the Mighty - I actually like this one less than Chandra's Ignition due to its lack of synergy with pump. Once again, probably correct to run this, but I'm quite removal light and prefer it unconditional. Impact Resonance - Better than Arcbond, that's for sure Still a touch too conditional for my liking, but I can imagine decks that run Brute Force and just go ham on the voltron will have an easier time proccing this sensibly. Otherworldly Outburst - Only really acts as insurance with the Zadas. Hard pass.
Descent of the Dragons - The dragons also happen to block Feather pretty well, so it's not something that synergises with what you seem keen on doing.
I managed to track down Dominicus on Cockatrice. The guy's always been direct with list feedback, and has helped me pick up some new directions for builds. Most notably, he set me on the discard path in Daxos the Returned. As such, I shunted the list at him. He suggested taking out the token spam and the flickering, proposing strong goodstuff and hatebears in their place. That is probably the optimal way to build Feather, in the grand scheme of things - you statically disrupt your opponents and protect your hate pieces with the cheap interaction he surprisingly approved of, and grind out value off the commander. However, my meta's not fond of them. Otherwise, I'd already be running them in Daxos. He eventually relented once I pointed out the general defensive merits of a gummed board and the various synergies in the 99, and suggested Purphoros, God of the Forge as a Guttersnipe-like. Would you look at that, another source pushing Purph. He also pointed me to Sphinx-Bone Wand, which got me thinking about what to do with the putative slot. I did not try to talk the flicker over with him, maybe I'd have changed his mind if I showed him this chart!
Work on the primer's kicked off in the shadows, kickstarted by a badass banner courtesy of Greendawg. Writing has been surprisingly stressful so far - Feather's a popular commander, so there's a chance people will actually read this! As such, I'm making sure I don't spew nonsense in my general introduction, and argue my case for protection choices cohesively. Given the cost-efficient, cast-heavy shell without a heavy ETB focus, does the above chart convince you that I'm not a moron for skipping out non-Cloudshift instant flicker in the interest of cost effectiveness? I'd hope so
I'm not a particularly voltron focused build, so power pump is not necessarily super common around these parts. Most of the time, Fall of the Hammer would hit for around Reckless Rage tier damage. Sometimes you'd get some reliable buffage going, and then it could potentially shred boards, but somehow most of the time I'd draw it in those scenarios I still wasn't incentivised to spend two mana to pop a dude when I could just rip two one-drop instants and go on with my game plan instead. There's a nonzero chance it will return at some point. There's nothing wrong with it, it just doesn't fit particularly well with how I've been piloting and shaping the deck right now.
In my most recent turn seven tablekill, one of the enemies got taken out by a few swings of a mega beefy Tenth District Legionnaire. I got a good setup going with token spam and Phyrexian Altar, and by the time of the game ending the dude was over 20 power. As such, just straight damage potential that scales off the deck's flurry of casting is not a bad idea. Dominicus's Sphinx-Bone Wand fits right in here, but for now I went with Scroll of the Masters. The Wand only comes out quite late, whereas the Scroll may be less bomb'y but at least has the decency of costing less than Feather. The decreased mana cost should make this easier to sneak into sequencing - it takes one hell of a board state for sinking seven mana to not count as some form of resource hiccup. In theory, I imagined I'd use the Scroll to make non-monk 1/1s relevant on the offence while Phalanx Leader is somewhere else. In practice, it turned out to be a pretty darn good voltron enabler instead. In its first trial game, I had a measly board with Burning Prophet, and kept spamming Ephemeral Shields trying to scry into something sensible while the Scroll stacked counters. I failed to find anything relevant, but the Scroll got swole enough for me to take out the opposition with two Feather smacks a head. That doesn't sound particularly winmore to me.
Prerequisites:
1. Have both Feather and Zada / Zada dragon on board
2. Have the highest life total.
Combo steps:
1. Cast Ajani's Presence or any instant that grants indestructible to a creature (which is then copied to them all).
2. Cast Arcbond on a creature (again copied to all of them).
3. Have one of the creatures take damage.
What happens now is that the creature that takes damage deals that damage to each other creature and each opponent. Among those creatures is the other creature on your board, with both indestructible and the Arcbond buff. The other creature will then proceed to do the same to each creature apart from itself and to each opponent, including the first creature. Since both creatures have indestructible, this will then repeat indefinitely - except it also deals damage to players, so eventually they will die. The one that had the highest life total when all of this started will be the last one remaining, thus the winner.
You can also give one (or both) of your creatures lifelink, in which case you will never die from this combo. That's why I'd also recommended Spiritualize. However it's also achievable with equipment like Loxodon Warhammer.
NOTE: Protection is much more conditional here than Indestructible is, since it depends on the number of creatures from each color.
URG Riku: - (Deck List) (Retired, but should probably bring it back.. I need a more casual deck)
BGU Muldrotha: - (Deck List)
UB Yuriko: - (Deck List)
UR Zndrsplt/Okaun - (Deck List)
G Seton: - (Deck List)
RGW Uril: - (Deck List)
GU Vannifar: - (Deck List) (My main)
WUBRG Alara: - (Deck List)
UBR Tresserhorn: - (Deck List)
RW Feather: - (Deck List)
Oh yeah, and Martyrdom + Stuffy Doll is hilarious but unrealistic. It's a pity Martyrdom is worded in a way that makes it stop when the creature craps out, or it'd merit some consideration for repeatedly Pariahing disposable chumps. Still would probably be worse than Intimidation Bolt due to requiring a body factory, even if it were to hypothetically sponge fireballs.
1 Past in Flames
1 Plains
1 Wheel of Fortune
1 Mistveil Plains
1 Stoneforge Mystic
1 Sunforger
Wheel of Fortune and Past in Flames are responsible backup cards. Get a nice fat grip and look for outs, recycle a graveyard's worth of stuff (and abuse it with Feather!). Thing is, when things are operational, they do little. I can count the non spot removal instants that ended up in the 'yard against my will across all the test games so far on the fingers of one hand. I cast a few okay wheels, but in each of those cases had the wheel just been a cantrip I'd have ended up fine too. And when I topdeck a wheel on a 15-card hand before my untap, that's not really contributing.
The last post musings got me wanting Sunforger back in here, albeit responsibly used this time around, so in it goes. It helps with the voltron kill plan, as suddenly Feather smacks like an OG elder dragon, and there's the instant get safety net to keep you safe. May need to work some good silver bullets for this going forward. And Reckless Rage, as if the voltron plan is being embraced this helps pick off winged stragglers left up to absorb the swing. So many possibilities, so little space! Stoneforge Mystic returns as well, much to Ebline's chagrin. It's actually got some solid non-Sunforger targets in here, at least in my opinion - Sword of Lotus Flip is a Thran Dynamo sized ramp boost on a land in a deck happy to churn mana, Sword of Playtest Partner Hate is a hefty mana bump upon connecting (and connect it will - thanks, wings!), and Sword of Rampant Growth may be the least immediate but still offers a good trickle of value. Not a bad set of options to have available on tap in a Boros shell, in my opinion. Also adding Mistveil Plains for time-honoured Sunforger shenanigans. It's nice that Kor Cartographer fetches it.
Having gotten a few more solid draw games under my belt, it takes one hell of a mana setup (we're talking Paradox Engine plus a few rocks level of mana here) to reliably avoid discarding. I'm not even talking five bodies with Zada here, two cantrips with a solid mana foundation will do the trick just fine. All the stuff just keeps coming back, bringing new friends with it, and you suddenly have to shed 5+ in the end step, and hiding the cantrips in exile won't help as that's all new cards to consider While hiding some (preferably non-essential) options in exile is a valid line to virtually extend the hand, something will probably have to go down. This adds another layer of nonsense to try to figure out, as if you pitch the wrong thing it can potentially cost you the game. Like yesterday, where I stupidly shipped my enchantment removal, a guy set down Siege Behemoth into Rhythm of the Wild and sidestepped my majestic token army to gib me in one fell swoop. Skill testing! Hopefully this will help me develop as a player and keep track of different scenarios, buffering my hand with various robust answers to them. That, or I'll put in Meteor Golem
Also, intimidation bolt would have stopped that death, which a certain individual suggested earlier in the thread. Ahead of his time some say.
1 Akroan Conscriptor
1 Meteor Golem
The repeatable removal offered by the Conscriptor is cute, hard to set up, and disproportionately pisses people off. Meteor Golem comes in, kabooms a broader audience, and synergises with the few flick spells for repeated value at a similar rate of return to what you could set up wit Conscriptor in purely removal realms. Simple swap, but should probably work out. Ebline also suggested Phyrexian Altar as an include, and it's not a shabby idea at all. I've got four token makers, two ways to tutor them, and a shell pretty good at card acquisition and filtering.
My deck for reference. Note that the land base is obviously a placeholder that I've only used to keep track of my land count.
I'm actually excited to see someone else using Meteor Golem. It has been a crucial piece in my Daretti and Zada decks, and I imagine it'll fill a similar role here, especially with blink/copy effects. Your deck list is the most similar to mine that I've seen so far. We agree for the most part across all categories, and even then, the replacements are almost functionally identical cards. I had Akroan Crusader and Vanguard of Brimaz in my first iterations of the deck, but they haven't performed the way I hoped. Monastery Monk and Young Pyromancer have done all the heavy lifting.
I'm not sold on Solemn Simulacrum and Kor Cartographer. Land Tax and Knight of the White Orchid have been over-performing in my deck, and are definitely staying. Like Cartographer, Knight is also able to fetch double lands and Mistveil Plains, but it's only half the cost. My meta is tuned, and I need to keep my CMC down for consistency reasons.
How's Mox Amber working out for you? I like idea of having "free" mana for protection for when you cast Feather, and I like the interaction with Paradox Engine, but I would probably prefer to have Lotus Petal over it for the T2 potential. I ended up cutting Lotus Petal in an earlier iteration though.
I see that Twinflame and Heat Shimmer have already been mentioned, and I would like to highlight their interaction with Dualcaster Mage. Dualcaster is an amazing card here, which acts as protection (can copy counterspells) and Twincast obviously, but also as a win con when paired with Twinflame (infinite tokens with haste). Twinflame and Heat Shimmer are good cards with Feather, and staples in Zada for a reason. They are high value token generators, that win games with Zada or Zada-dragon out.
What I love about this deck is the ability to close games in multiple ways, and the unique Boros play style.
Yeah, our builds are quite similar. I've found the heroic token dudes to be perfectly fine - who cares who's getting the Heal to the face? At least in my meta, people stopped most efforts to take out Feather as they just know that nothing's happening, so surplus protection spells can double up as heroic trigger fodder as well. Agreed that Young Pyromancer and Monastery Mentor are better. There's no debating this.
Funny, I'm not sold on Knight of the White Orchid. His clause makes him just weird enough to only really work if you're behind. As mentioned in one of the posts here, I had a Depression Automaton game where I dumped my whole plains supply onto the field and got halfway through the mountains before the game ended. Between the flickers, the Sword of Rampant Growth, I'm not guaranteed to be behind enough to milk the Knight. My build's a bit less all-in than yours, running the mana swords of value, and I've never had an issue with these guys being too rich for the deck's blood. I mean, Meteor Golem is a seven drop and here we are patting each other on the back for running it
Y'see, I don't approach Feather as a three drop that I'm trying to rush out turn two. I'm treating Feather as a four drop I aim to cast her and have a mana up, be it for an actual piece of protection or just a bluff. All the diamonds etc. help with that. Mox Amber fits in that very well too. I'd far rather have that than a treasure token shuffled in
Yeah, I agree that Dualcaster Mage and his gg was closet friends are a good include here. I was considering them very early on into the deck's life, but there was only so much space in the 99 and I didn't follow through. I'm gonna keep it in mind going forward, but the cloners would probably be better in a more ETB shell. Hey, I don't get to talk - I now have eight ETB pieces as well
I'm not sure if the multifaceted victories are a boon or a curse, but they feel like a necessity in the deck at this stage of its life.
I preordered but I haven't done any proxy testing with my own list.
I had Dualcaster Mage in my early list before I did a lot of my cuts. Of the 7 current flicker option spells, 4 of them don't return him until end of turn which makes him VERY hard to use with those four. Of the remaining three flickers, Acrobatic Maneuver is probably the worst of the flickers, to the point that my current plan is to not run it. I find it kind of narrow to say that its good with Cloudshift and Justiciar's Portal and even then he is incredibly situational.
Signature by Inkfox Aesthetics by Xen
[Modern] Allies
1 Chain Reaction
1 Wear // Tear
1 Phyrexian Altar
1 Smothering Tithe
Let's think about things for a sec - there are all of nine rocks in the list, two of which produce colourless and are of lower utility for casting the instant flurry. Yet Paradox Engine is dumb as balls in here and gets nuked on sight. How many synergy pieces does Phyrexian Altar have? The four token makers, and one could argue that the two Recruiters are quite likely to get a board gummer if the Altar is looming. That's not that dissimilar a support ratio for a pretty strong payoff. True, Pengine can really go off the rails in a manner Phyrexian Altar won't, but the level of synergy and payoff this offers to the shell is still perfectly sufficient to be considered a strong engine piece. Practical demonstration - so far I've gotten one test game in with it, and I got to work Liberating my Depression Automaton again. A few rocks showed up. My mana base was beyond baller, in spite of the fact my adversary was sporting Panharmonicon, Conjurer's Closet and some Wood Elves variant. Unfortunately, not much else was going on. The spell suite featured one cantrip, which kept getting more mana and not much business. Eventually I drew into a Guttersnipe and Young Pyromancer, but by then I was shredded down to about half my life. Pass turn, dude plonks down a Mirror March and a Pelakka Wurm. Ruh roh, this ain't good. If he gets sufficiently lucky, I might just be dead, and even if not he's likely gonna gain a ton of life, making it hard to take him out. He was on 15. I proceeded to rip a heroic string of eight instants, burning Young Pyromancer tokens for fuel at some point, and a little draw luck from the cantrips assisted by Burning Prophet closed things out with the wurm on the stack. Whew! All in all, if I can have 22 mana on the field and still make good use of the Altar, it seems like a good idea Taking out Wear // Tear, seeing how I just added Meteor Golem I've got a bit of other removal in here with more re-use potential. Sure, the 2-for-1 was nice, but Duergar Hedge-Mage is also around for those sort of needs.
Given how this ludicrous mana game played out, I may as well pursue mana generation further. Smothering Tithe is the first on the bench, and will hopefully provide solid gains to work with. I don't expect the banking aspect to come into effect as much here as it does in my Daxos the Returned, but it should still be very good. Given the fact the deck expects to go the distance a bit, with the engine not explosive enough to slurp a pod quickly in a reliable fashion, may as well go for this rather than a Chrome Mox or Springleaf Drum. Taking out Chain Reaction. I just haven't had much incentive to wipe in this list, seeing how I can gum up the field, make my blockers not die, just overall discourage coming at me. Let's see if living life dangerously with a solitary wrath is sufficient.
I just realized that Burning Prophet is from WAR, no wonder I don't have one.. lol. Is it really that useful? So hard trying to squeeze stuff in.. I may just have to drop Firebrand Archer like you did.. 'xD
I wonder if I should cut Chandra's Ignition too.. Without pumps it's basically 3 dmg to board/opponents (which IS inevitability, as like a Plan E.. lol.) But if we had any other creatures in play that we wanted to keep alive with a protection spell, that becomes 6+ mana to Slagstorm. Though I did think Chain Reaction was cute, what with protection from Red, sad to see you dropped it (you really are a daredevil! :P)
URG Riku: - (Deck List) (Retired, but should probably bring it back.. I need a more casual deck)
BGU Muldrotha: - (Deck List)
UB Yuriko: - (Deck List)
UR Zndrsplt/Okaun - (Deck List)
G Seton: - (Deck List)
RGW Uril: - (Deck List)
GU Vannifar: - (Deck List) (My main)
WUBRG Alara: - (Deck List)
UBR Tresserhorn: - (Deck List)
RW Feather: - (Deck List)
If anything, Wear // Tear makes for a crappy Sunforger tutor as you can't fuse it this way. If that's your jam, I'd like to recommend Crush Contraband. There are still various interesting things in there that this gets, you have your standard Swords/Path/Chaos Warp, you have Boros Charm. I do want to add Teferi's Protection, it's somewhere on the waiting list with Intimidation Bolt and some other stuff.
Yes, Burning Prophet is very good. Take everything you do, the flurry of instant nonsense, and add scry 1 to every single one. You churn through the deck at great pace, looking for whatever you need. It really helps smooth the game, and the fact it doesn't hog targeting is fantastic. Oddly enough, I don't even miss the Guttersnipe knockoffs that much - ole pappy Gutter comes out with a humming instant juggling engine online and shreds life totals in a couple turns tops. Having the small ones is not quite as good at closing, and if you set these sort of things down early they tickle the opposition a bit, maybe drawing attention to themselves. They were nice, but I don't feel I'm any worse at closing things out with them gone.
Heh, funny - before editing that previous update post, I had a bit there musing about the merits of repeatable wipes. Chandra's Ignition, specifically, was mentioned as a possible Chain Reaction replacement because of the various swords/pumps scattered in the list. I'm trying to not overdo the permission. In the interest of overall table game enjoyment in my mid-power meta, I've found that it's best to approach interactivity as a continuum with your ability to answer interactivity yourself. Otherwise nobody else gets to do their thing, you do your thing and stop others answering it. Given the vast protection suite here, if I'd repeatedly screw with the opposition permanents in an aggressive way, I'm pretty sure everyone would hate it. Might just be me and my meta.
Fun fact - my average CMC is 2.29, and yet here I am running sixteen ramp pieces. This thing guzzles any amount of mana you can feed it, as evidenced above. What a weird little list this has become.
Hm, that's a good point. He has even more support in here than Phyrexian Altar. However, in a vacuum, Guttersnipe is better. In the situations where Purph will start shredding face harder you probably don't need the help. I'll lump him in with the others.
Have you considered using Torchling in your deck?
I understand Torchling does not synergize as well in your deck as in mine probably, but the thought of being able to use cards like Swords to Plowshares repeatedly sounds so tempting.
I may have gone a smidge too pedal to the metal over here with testing, having burned out all three of my playtest partners by now. Things are working smooth, you set down Feather, you start churning through the deck with protection backup and assemble something out of whatever comes around. The engine is not explosive enough to take things down quickly, so the mana swords help scale into the mid/late game with an increased resource pool. I looked back at the posts in the thread, the recommendations, the things I'd muse that I should run. A lot of them are safety nets or additional ways to close out. I don't feel I need help with ending the game at this point, the deck's doing fine on that front. And my irrational disdain for safety nets has also been brought up in here already. The three main contenders that remain are Intimidation Bolt, Teferi's Protection and Gamble. The first as the deck's Constant Mists, the second as the ridiculous blanket catch-all that it is, the third as a slightly risky tutor option. None of them feel immediately required in the deck. However, I did figure out a couple swaps to make.
1 Fire Diamond
1 Marble Diamond
1 Sword of the Animist
1 Chrome Mox
1 Springleaf Drum
1 Tenth District Legionnaire
It's not a case of removing bad cards, as the diamonds have been perfectly fine. It's just a case of replacing the current worst rocks with better options. I somehow forgot to just look at the arbitrary quality of these two options and see that the things I'm not running are just plain stronger than what's in here already. Springleaf Drum can come down before Feather, and even if nothing else happens on board before her that's still a faux-Mox Amber once she lands. Chrome Mox can put up with the card disadvantage, given the deck's sturdy draw potential. Both of these work really solid early, and can help speed up the first few turns a bit. Crucially, they're also super good if encountered late. The Drum is mana neutral, the Mox is actually mana positive. By contrast, the diamonds chew up two mana for no immediate gain.
Took a look at all sub-2 CMC rocks, and caught nothing else of note. Mox Diamond and Mox Opal only come online later, not offering reliable assistance in the early game. As such, the two remaining two-drop tap-rocks (Coldsteel Heart, Star Compass) are probably fine for the time being.
Also, figured that this whole Tenth District Legionnaire merits a slot. True, this adds another competing targeting sponge to the list, but the payoff is scry 1. That's a pretty good payoff to staple on top of whatever, as Burning Prophet has taught me. True, this is a bit worse as it eats the target, but still fits perfectly into the deck's game plan. I have no idea how I missed him. Taking out Sword of Rampant Growth, as it's the most incremental and slow in its benefits and I've still got Ebline's voice suggesting sword and Stoneforge cuts in the back of my mind. Ebline tends to be right about things for some reason
I'm smashing a list together abusing ETBs with cards like sunblast angel to scupper incoming attacks.
I've being fiddling about with dual casting and pyromancer's goggles but not sure how much I love them. Work well with cards like fireball and Aurelia's fury but are fairly useless on spells like expedite.
EDH:
[Primer]C Kozilek, Butcher of Truth C
RGNikya of the Old WaysGR
You may have already tried these, but I'd suggest cutting Faith's Shield for Bathe in Light. I guess Bathe in Light can be pretty meta dependent, but no one runs white in my play group so I can usually protect most of my creatures instead of just one lone soul without requiring to be at deaths door. I'd also replace Fall of the Hammer with Soul's Fire. The 1 extra mana is worth it to be able to target planeswalkers or just burn face. There is nothing sexier than seeing someone cheat out a monstrous Eldrazi only to have it stolen, rammed into their face, being Souls Fire'd for another 10 odd, then having the Eldrazi Cloudshifted permanently to your side. But as you've mentioned this deck is a thirsty ***** (I'm paraphrasing of course haha), so you may find the 1 extra on both to be a little too expensive.
On an unrelated note, and I know this is sacrilege, but somehow I forgot Paradox Engine was a card. I had included Unwinding Clock in my list but completely brain farted on Paradox's existence. Now I have to find more room for that too haha.
I had a game where someone blew up my Sword of the Animist.. lol. And I even contemplated using Apostle's on it, but I didn't.
URG Riku: - (Deck List) (Retired, but should probably bring it back.. I need a more casual deck)
BGU Muldrotha: - (Deck List)
UB Yuriko: - (Deck List)
UR Zndrsplt/Okaun - (Deck List)
G Seton: - (Deck List)
RGW Uril: - (Deck List)
GU Vannifar: - (Deck List) (My main)
WUBRG Alara: - (Deck List)
UBR Tresserhorn: - (Deck List)
RW Feather: - (Deck List)
Spiritualize - admittedly, it's slow at 3 mana, but it cantrips, and it gives lifelink. It can really help you last longer in the lategame.
Chandra's Ignition - repeatable boardwipe, and beautiful with the previous card.
Arcbond - this card just screams juicy shenanigans to me. Beautiful with the first card, but can also be devastating without. Possible wincon with Zada or Zada dragon.
Fatal Frenzy - potential wincon. Take one of your creatures and buff it up, and cast this on it to make sure it packs a punch. If it's not a token use one of your flicker spells so the sac effect is neutralized.
Temur Battle Rage - much like the former. We're not in pauper, but it still packs a serious punch. Buffing Feather to 4 power shouldn't be any kind of hassle.
Seize the Day - probably winmore but it still easily enables commander damage lethals if you have a bit of buffs to strap on to Feather.
Soul's Fire - I feel like 1 more mana makes this much better than Fall of the Hammer. It really helps you deal with PWs, and helps you regularly damage your opponents so you can pressure them. Also benefits from buffs and from lifelink.
Samut's Sprint - comparable with Titan's Strength, only I think that Haste is better than an additional +1/0.
Ground Rift - very cute. Cast a bunch of buffs then cast this on the buffed creature. The copies that the storm trigger creates can target opponents' creatures freely, while you still get the card back.
Oblation - classic, too good not to run. Getting rid of anything is just something that needs to be done sometimes no matter the price.
Blessed Alliance - seems very very flexible. Might not draw cards, but it's a great repeatable defensive card.
Dawn Charm - another flexible defensive spell that can be abused.
Fury Charm - less flexible but still an abusable spell.
Expose Evil - taps a dangrous attacker with psuedo card-draw. Worth a shot.
Fell the Mighty - I know so many people mentioned this card, I'm just confused as to why you're not running it.
Impact Resonance - Mentioned already, but still worth a mention. Fetchable with Sunforger, imprintable on Isochron, and abusable on its own. Considering all of these, I think it becomes much less conditional.
Otherworldly Outburst - wrath insurance. Sometimes you just can't promise a creature will live, and this helps you keep some pretty good board presence.
Descent of the Dragons - incredibly expensive, but repeatedly turning your weenie tokens into dragons can be pretty cool.
Spiritualize - I don't pump things reliably enough to make good use out of this. I probably wouldn't run this at 2 CMC, let alone its current three. Not an efficient mana allotment.
Chandra's Ignition - I find wipes a dish best served unconditional and efficient. Blasphemous Act costs a single red and shreds everything. This costs five, and is conditional on the target's power to get things done. At its worst, this does just about nothing. At its best, this repeatedly shreds the opposition, and people who are already somewhat grumbly because they can't reliably interact with you get even more grumbly because now they can't do anything. Probably correct to include this.
Arcbond - Conditional setup (needs a big source of damage to spread around), quite costly at 3 for something this situational.
Fatal Frenzy - You're not casting this on Feather in most sensible setups, and everything non-Feather is super tiny. Might work better in a more voltron-focused build with more pump to go around, but even there it still seems questionable.
Temur Battle Rage - A solid double strike enabler, plus trample if going ham. Not shabby at all. I find both double strike enablers I'm currently running (Boros Charm, Psychotic Fury) to be more all around useful though.
Seize the Day - Once again, should be ok in a more voltron build. It's not something this particular style of Feather feels comfortable devoting four mana and a slot to though, as its fail case is double strike.
Soul's Fire - Funny story, I'm currently trialling replacements for Fall of the Hammer. Similar shtick to Chandra's Ignition - varies between doing nothing and people hating you for it. If I'm tempted to get more creature control, I may actually reach out to Luminate Primordial.
Samut's Sprint - On the outskirts of the deck, in consideration for inclusion if something underperforms. The +1 power actually does make a difference, making Feather a turn faster clock. The haste will only come online if recasting Feather late and trying to cheese someone. Not irrelevant, but not super important.
Ground Rift - Yep, that's cute as hell. You also get Blinding Flare for a more mana sink'y, self-contained package.
Oblation - Yep, that's a solid removal spell. Also hovering on the outskirts of the deck.
Blessed Alliance - It may be flexible, but it's very mana intensive. You're essentially spending four mana for a repeatable Celestial Flare.
Dawn Charm - The flexibility is nice, its "fail case" of being a two mana regeneration shield is not. Straight indestructibility is much better. The other modes are interesting though.
Fury Charm - Crappier than the above.
Expose Evil - There's a version of this with actual draw. There's another version of this which makes their stuff not untap. There are plenty of options for this sort of thing if you want to pursue it. It's an interesting class of effect.
Fell the Mighty - I actually like this one less than Chandra's Ignition due to its lack of synergy with pump. Once again, probably correct to run this, but I'm quite removal light and prefer it unconditional.
Impact Resonance - Better than Arcbond, that's for sure Still a touch too conditional for my liking, but I can imagine decks that run Brute Force and just go ham on the voltron will have an easier time proccing this sensibly.
Otherworldly Outburst - Only really acts as insurance with the Zadas. Hard pass.
Descent of the Dragons - The dragons also happen to block Feather pretty well, so it's not something that synergises with what you seem keen on doing.
Work on the primer's kicked off in the shadows, kickstarted by a badass banner courtesy of Greendawg. Writing has been surprisingly stressful so far - Feather's a popular commander, so there's a chance people will actually read this! As such, I'm making sure I don't spew nonsense in my general introduction, and argue my case for protection choices cohesively. Given the cost-efficient, cast-heavy shell without a heavy ETB focus, does the above chart convince you that I'm not a moron for skipping out non-Cloudshift instant flicker in the interest of cost effectiveness? I'd hope so
1 Fall of the Hammer
1 Scroll of the Masters
I'm not a particularly voltron focused build, so power pump is not necessarily super common around these parts. Most of the time, Fall of the Hammer would hit for around Reckless Rage tier damage. Sometimes you'd get some reliable buffage going, and then it could potentially shred boards, but somehow most of the time I'd draw it in those scenarios I still wasn't incentivised to spend two mana to pop a dude when I could just rip two one-drop instants and go on with my game plan instead. There's a nonzero chance it will return at some point. There's nothing wrong with it, it just doesn't fit particularly well with how I've been piloting and shaping the deck right now.
In my most recent turn seven tablekill, one of the enemies got taken out by a few swings of a mega beefy Tenth District Legionnaire. I got a good setup going with token spam and Phyrexian Altar, and by the time of the game ending the dude was over 20 power. As such, just straight damage potential that scales off the deck's flurry of casting is not a bad idea. Dominicus's Sphinx-Bone Wand fits right in here, but for now I went with Scroll of the Masters. The Wand only comes out quite late, whereas the Scroll may be less bomb'y but at least has the decency of costing less than Feather. The decreased mana cost should make this easier to sneak into sequencing - it takes one hell of a board state for sinking seven mana to not count as some form of resource hiccup. In theory, I imagined I'd use the Scroll to make non-monk 1/1s relevant on the offence while Phalanx Leader is somewhere else. In practice, it turned out to be a pretty darn good voltron enabler instead. In its first trial game, I had a measly board with Burning Prophet, and kept spamming Ephemeral Shields trying to scry into something sensible while the Scroll stacked counters. I failed to find anything relevant, but the Scroll got swole enough for me to take out the opposition with two Feather smacks a head. That doesn't sound particularly winmore to me.
Prerequisites:
1. Have both Feather and Zada / Zada dragon on board
2. Have the highest life total.
Combo steps:
1. Cast Ajani's Presence or any instant that grants indestructible to a creature (which is then copied to them all).
2. Cast Arcbond on a creature (again copied to all of them).
3. Have one of the creatures take damage.
What happens now is that the creature that takes damage deals that damage to each other creature and each opponent. Among those creatures is the other creature on your board, with both indestructible and the Arcbond buff. The other creature will then proceed to do the same to each creature apart from itself and to each opponent, including the first creature. Since both creatures have indestructible, this will then repeat indefinitely - except it also deals damage to players, so eventually they will die. The one that had the highest life total when all of this started will be the last one remaining, thus the winner.
You can also give one (or both) of your creatures lifelink, in which case you will never die from this combo. That's why I'd also recommended Spiritualize. However it's also achievable with equipment like Loxodon Warhammer.
NOTE: Protection is much more conditional here than Indestructible is, since it depends on the number of creatures from each color.