Keep in mind that there is a big intervening "if" clause on MMR. That means that if you don't have the biggest creature by the time the beginning of combat happens, it won't even go on the stack. So Xenagod cannot help here.
Secondly, if you have a tie with someone, this card will not work.
I was under the impression that you could resolve Xenagos' trigger first and then resolve MMR?
You would be correct if there was no intervening "if" clause.
"The ability will trigger only if you control each creature on the battlefield with the greatest power as the beginning of combat step begins. If another player controls a creature with the greatest power or tied for the greatest power at that time, the ability won’t trigger at all."
That's what you mean, and that is very disappointing!
Keep in mind that there is a big intervening "if" clause on MMR. That means that if you don't have the biggest creature by the time the beginning of combat happens, it won't even go on the stack. So Xenagod cannot help here.
Secondly, if you have a tie with someone, this card will not work.
I was under the impression that you could resolve Xenagos' trigger first and then resolve MMR?
Have you thought about Fling, I think it could be pretty strong as a finisher at the end of a game or if you deal 20 to somebody and "fling" the body for another 20.
I had thought about Fling as an option, I may end up replacing Grab the Reins with it, mostly because I can't forsee when stealing an opponents creature and saccing it would be more effective than just saccing my own big beater.
I'd actually rather run Might Makes Right over Gruul Sarkhan, mostly because the effect is repeatable and it's a great budget option if all I'm using him for is his -2. Good tech, though.
EDIT: After a little more thought, I've made some changes to the deck with cards that I own before I bring it out for the first run:
- Phytotitan + Hunter's Insight
The giant plant would work best in a sacrificed based deck. I was including it mostly for the interaction with Greater Good, but Hunter's Insight should work fine. While not as reliable as Harmonize, it can draw me more cards and at instant speed.
- Witherscale Wurm + Savage Ventmaw
A small dragon subtheme is growing into the deck which is exciting! Witherscale was just a card I wanted to try out, but Savage Ventmaw has natural evasion and it refunds itself with a haste enabler. Free beats are good.
- Krosan Drover + Life's Legacy
Happened to have a Drover lying around. Life's Legacy is another card draw option that relies on creatures, and it has to die. But it can draw a lot for very little. If you can't tell by now, Harmonize bores me. It's a great card, so if you have one and don't care just include it.
- Unravel the Aether + Deglamer
I have a foil Deglamer, and I can't figure out how to make the AE symbol, swapping just because.
Thank you for putting the card choice explanation in the OP. I completely skipped over Wurmcoil Engine, which is very important as it gains you life to take some of the heat off of you. It also grants 0 devotion, which is just gravy.
I don't understand Shamanic Revelation in this deck. That's more of a token deck type of card.
In its place, I'd recommend Garruk, Primal Hunter (never a dead card, if you have no creatures to use its card draw, it can make some and if you do have a creature out you can be drawing a bunch of cards), Domri Rade (can draw creatures and Doubles as removal) or even just Harmonize (never dead).
Also, anytime I see a Xenagos deck, I look for my new favorite creature: Savage Ventmaw. He's one of many dragons in my build and he likes to spew Mana which is great for all of the extra combat spells I pack.
Revelation is in the deck because, as I've played against a few Xenagod builds before, they gain immediate attention and I figured that a bit of life gain would go a long way, even if it's only 12 life from Xenagod and a few beaters. Maybe it's just me, but I don't even see Revelation as much of a token card either unless you happen to have a way to ensure Ferocious is active, maybe something like Trostani, Selesnya's Voice that wants life gain and fat tokens. I'm always interested in other options, though.
Garruk, Primal Hunter looks great, however I'm worried that the +3 to devotion may be detrimental to Xenagod's health. If it does, I may replace most of the mana creatures with rocks instead. I haven't played the deck in a real game, though, so Garruk could be a possibility.
Domri Rade isn't too expensive, but I like what he does. I had thought about retooling the deck before I bust it out at my LGS this weekend, adding more of a fight theme including a lot of the fight cards in my old Polukranos deck. Gruul has some nice fight options, too. I just don't know if I'll really need spot creature removal if I'm going to be trampling over them anyway.
Savage Ventmaw would be great in the deck, giving Hellkite Charger a bit of fuel while also not going infinite, and also feeds into Savage Beating. I know it goes infinite with Aggravated Assault, but infinite really isn't my thing. Doesn't mean I can't include the dragon though.
If you have a Xenagod thread I'd love to look at the card choices you have to compare!
My first EDH deck was a Wort, Boggart Auntie deck that a friend built and gifted to me because I played Zendikar Goblins in standard during college at the time. I've loved tribal anything since I started playing, so I've been most comfortable with my Korlash, Heir to Blackblade zombie tribal deck that evolved from my longest running old Grimgrin build.
Something that says, At the beginning of your upkeep, choose two players. If a source controlled by one of the chosen players would deal damage to the other chosen player or a permanent that player controls, prevent that damage instead until the beginning of your next upkeep. Sort of the opposite of Bitter Feud, and stapled to a Human Advisor.
For this deck, Decimate is amazing. Finding a creature and land target is a non-issue. Even finding an artifact target is trivial because of how common place mana rocks are.
The enchantment target is the most difficult target, but when there isn't one you can always target your god!
Easy 2 for 1s or 3 for 1s are so good I'd even play Hull Breach.
Also having removal that has the option of targeting lands is very important in a land where cards like Maze of Ith exists.
Lastly, I don't think there is such a thing as too much card draw. I play as much as I can fit. Shamanic Revelation is awkward in xenagod decks because you're not going super wide. But cards you run like Greater Good and Momentous Fall are all-stars. I go so far as to play even the "mediocre" equivalents because I want to refill if no one kills my guy.
Oh, and Green Sun's Zenith is not expensive and will improve every base green deck you will ever make. Card is busted in half. (actually it went up from $5 to 8 now. Still worth getting imo)
EDIT: I forgot. Get a Joraga Treespeaker. I don't call this thing "green sol ring" for nothing.
Thanks for commenting! Having Xenagod as a way out of two modes on Decimate is awesome, did not even think of that. I've been thinking of swapping out Destructive Revelry for Hull Breach since its really an upgrade. I've also thought about adding my foil copy of Spring Cleaning. While I don't have any top-deck manipulation, having a chance to destroy all opposing enchantments seems amusing and there are enough high costed cards in the deck to make it work. Come to think of it, Might Makes Right and Guild Feud seem really fun here.
I'm with you on the draw mentality. Aggro has been my go-to style since I started playing and I'd argue that card draw is more important for that archetype than any other. Shamanic Revelation is in there for both card draw and life gain. I've played against other Xenagod decks before and one of the things I've noticed is that, either for lack of deckbuilding skill or hindsight, most of the versions I've played against can't handle the heat that comes with playing it. Xenagod is by no means a tier 1 general, but not all players see a giant beater as, "Hey there's a giant creature on the field, sweet! He should totally smack that into one of my opponents" and go from calm to panic. It's quite a fun reaction to witness and I've often been a victim myself! While I haven't yet tested this deck, I am hoping that Shamanic Revelation will perform to my expectations. If not, I'll just swap it for Harmonize, or Soul's Majesty even though it requires a target. I like to have a mix of steady and burst draws in most of my decks. As for other draw options, Elemental Bond is definitely going in once I can snag a copy from a friend. I've also thought about Hunter's Insight and to a lesser extent Hunter's Prowess. I've used them both, but I believe being cheaper and faster puts Hunter's Insight leagues ahead of Hunter's Prowess, especially in a deck with trample enablers and some of the beaters already having inherent trample. Thoughts?
I used to play GSZ in all of my green decks, but I quickly realized that if I have a tutor in my deck it's going to be used to pull out a game winner instead of an answer (which, imho, if you're playing anything but combo tutors are more fun to use to find answers to threats rather than threats themseves). A great suggestion don't get me wrong, but I know how I play and the inclusion of a creature tutor in green is a very slippery slope for me and I'll soon include cards like Craterhoof Behemoth/Avenger of Zendikar and go nuts. If I do decide to include Woodland Bellower and Fierce Empath, I'll probably have to restrain myself from abusing them. Again, good suggestion.
Joraga Treespeaker, a green sol ring? Definitely getting a copy in a future card order, thank you.
This should have gone in the first post, but maybe explaining my dilemma will get some gears grinding. I've recently built my first draft (unplayed) Xenagos, God of Revels deck. In my meta, I'm known as the political player. I call things as I see them and try to gain the favor of the majority of the table, never breaking promises even if it causes me to lose that game. Playing politically appeals to me in EDH because it opens up new areas of the game that I can't find in any other format. EDH is sometimes called the dollar rare format, and while that statement isn't true it's not entirely false either. Playing cards that are cheaper price wise has it's advantages, too. Say you've just cast a Doom Blade and your only targets are Urabrask the Hidden and Cyclops of Eternal Fury. The majority of the time, Urabrask is going to eat that Doom Blade. Both cards do similar things, but one is definitely more threatening than the other. TheCommandZone's favorite example of this is Market Festival. In a multiplayer game, chances are pretty low that someone is going to Naturalize that Market Festival when there's so many other potentially scarier targets in someone's hand, deck, or already on the field. You can play weaker cards and still get by, and to me that is just gravy. Circling back around to Xenagod, the reason I want to run him is because I'd like to revisit an old Stonebrow, Krosan Hero beats deck that I made when I was just starting to get into the format. However, playing against Xenagod I know very well that the moment he hits the field, the next creature that player drops is going to be an immediate threat. I can play cards like Archetype of Endurance and Spearbreaker Behemoth to increase the chances that those threats remain threats and so the deck can function as intended. However I've also considered the backlash of those effects. And like CSEARLE_54 previously stated, you need to be prepared for whatever comes next. So, I could run Fog, decent blockers, and life gain effects to offset the forseeable damage that I will take by playing this deck. But I would like to offset that backlash even further by playing cards that aren't necessarily fair, but just more political in terms of removing me from the spotlight.
At first look Decimate might look like you're spreading the hate, but it's highly likely that 3 of the 4 targets will be from the player with the best boardstate. A critter, an enchant/artifact and a land, sometimes all four, and you can choose the targets. It's also nice to get stuff into your gy (Anger/Brawn/Genesis). SO compared to let's say Tribute to the Wild it is a much better card in that regard, but keep in mind that sometimes it might be useless. If it happens to often, you can run Hull Breach instead.
Thank you for bringing up Hull Breach as another example I hadn't thought of. The issue with cards like Decimate that I'm looking to explore isn't with their game mechanics, but with their social ones. Tribute to the Wild is a great political comparison to Hull Breach! Tribute to the Wild effects all of your opponents but does not target. Hull Breach doesn't have to effect all of your opponents, but it does target specific cards on the board. Mechanically, Hull Breach is better than Tribute to the Wild because classically giving your opponents a choice is never as good as making the choice yourself. When considering the political consequences of each card, the answer isn't so clear to me.
Tribute to the Wild gives your opponents a choice, which makes them feel less bad about losing a card because they decide what bites the dust. It also effects all opponents, so one could make the argument (upon resolution) that no one was left out. On the flip side, that can backfire because it did hit all of your opponents at once, making you seem like the enemy. Hull Breach can target a specific or multiple permanents in play, pointing all of the blame directly on you. However taking responsibility for that act could gain you the favor of the other opponents because you just took out a threat that was potentially hurting the whole table. Obviously every scenario will differ so there isn't really a black and white answer that I can think of where one card is a better choice from a political standpoint.
While looking through scoeri's Statistical Average Deck thread for cards for a new deck, I came across Decimate. A 4 for 1 is some serious value. However after going through a few scenarios in my head on how and when to use it against certain cards in my meta, I thought about what would happen if I only targeted one player with it. Then two, and then three and on and so forth. How would that one player feel if I decimated (pun intended) their board? More than likely, I would paint a large target on my head for that player and deal with the consequences later. However, I may gain the unspoken favor of other players by not targeting their cards. On the reverse side, if I spread the hate around I may end up painting multiple targets on my head for all players.
Other cards that I can think of like this are Hex and Aether Gale that specifically target multiple cards. Almost everything you do in the social game portion of EDH has ramifications, you're either building bricks to appear less threatening or deflecting blame onto something or someone else to ultimately stay alive longer and end up winning, whatever winning means to you. Casting Shatter on an opponent's Sol Ring may make the defending player a little more aggressive towards you, but also may make the other players in the group unspoken allies that may leave you alone for a turn or two for dealing with a 'threat'. Casting Shatterstorm, however, deflects all blame away from you as the player because not a single person is targeted and you're also potentially blowing up your own stuff.
Does anyone have their own experiences with Decimate or other cards like it that can shed a little light on the topic? Do you play with cards like this, regardless of the potential ramifications, or do you actively avoid including them in your decks?
Giant Adephage (Not really happy about using this again, but it will stay until I find something better)
Or, instead of giant adephage, Woodland Bellower? Not having evasion really sucks. Being able to get E-wit and Fauna Shaman doesn't! However, not getting Dosan is really big...
Giant Adephage works as a nice engine with either Garruk's Packleader or Elemental Bond if you were to include them. If you're looking for some sac fodder for Evolutionary Leap maybe test out Living Hive? Between Dragon Mage or Knollspine Dragon for some burst card draw, I would personally side with Knollspine. After a huge hit from one of your beaters, it'll come down and draw you a boatload of cards and it doesn't require it's own combat damage. Knollspine also doesn't limit you to drawing 7 cards and also doesn't refill your opponents' hands. However if your meta is tutor heavy, Dragon Mage may be something you want to consider.
Gaea's Revenge could also work in that anti-control element. Without firebreathing or flying though, I do like Akroma Red as a primary option. Revenge was recently reprinted though and could easily be a good budget option!
I've been trying to think of digging options for the deck, but the only things that come to mind are Fierce Empath and Mwonvuli Beast Tracker as cheap toolbox options. Thoughts?
I like the deck. I just purchased some budget beef and used what I currently own to make my own version of Xenagod. Although I haven't played the deck yet, I did not include any extra haste enablers such as the Urabrask the Hidden you have. At least for my deck, I figured if I'm only dropping one creature a turn with a fielded Xenagod, the haste outlet is already there. If you're looking to lower your curve but still want the haste, swap it for Fires of Yavimaya. When you don't need it anymore it effectively boosts for +4/+4 with Xenagod. Moldgraf Monstrosity has built in trample which is nice, but if you're looking to swap it out for some other recursion I would suggest Creeping Renaissance. It doesn't bring it to the field, but it does allow you to get all of your creatures back and the effect isn't random. I feel that ramp such as Cultivate, Kodama's Reach, and Nissa's Pilgrimage are very important to this deck as they allow you access to five mana on turn four.
Elemental Bond also appeals to me, I did not pull one in my prerelease. If you do test it, please give us a report of how well it works! I imagine the comparisons would be against Garruk's Packleader and Soul of the Harvest.
As far as digging for new threats, have you thought about Evolutionary Leap? It replaces your doomed creatures, and also gives you something to do with Arbor Elf and friends late game.
I embrace my condition. Hello, I am Kedvesem, and I have EDHD. But I don't want to change!
I do rip apart decks if I find they don't work, or not the way I want them to, anyway, but I always seem to be finding a new thing I want to do. Just recently, Yasova Dragonclaw, who when she came out was totally overshadowed, for me, by Tasigur (who totally has a deck, and I just *had* to pimp out that one!), inspired me to build a deck to be the thematic opposite of my King Rafiq, Knight-Errant deck (Bant Enchantresses who all fall in love with King Arthur/Rafiq). So now I'm building Morgana Dragonclaw, a deck that convinces your creatures to fight for her instead of you. The challenge for me is building a sacrifice deck without B.
Where was I? Oh, yes. Sliver Queen 5-color Allies? Yes, just last week.
Nath, Elven life-drain? Yes, last month.
Liliana and Jace flip-walkers? Of course! Kytheon has joined the rotation of potential generals for my mono-W equipment deck.
I give up. I embrace my condition.
I also recommend just embracing your urge to create EDH decks to your heart's content, either until the fire dies or you find another way to capitalize on it. If you're playing in paper form, my suggestion to you is (if you haven't already) build yourself an EDH Toolbox with all of the same color/brand sleeves. It will hold all of your favorite pet cards and staples and you won't need to own multiples of more expensive cards. This way you can pretty much build any deck you want on the fly, and you'll only need one deck at any time anwyway. While it can be expensive to keep up with the sleeving of all of the cards you want to play with, I'm suggesting this because it will allow you to build more decks faster with the collection you already own.
Of course, you could just always write down decklists in a spreadsheet, but where's the fun in that?
"The ability will trigger only if you control each creature on the battlefield with the greatest power as the beginning of combat step begins. If another player controls a creature with the greatest power or tied for the greatest power at that time, the ability won’t trigger at all."
That's what you mean, and that is very disappointing!
I was under the impression that you could resolve Xenagos' trigger first and then resolve MMR?
The casting cost is pretty harsh, I'm leaning more towards Nissa's Revelation as it's cheaper and more reliable.
I had thought about Fling as an option, I may end up replacing Grab the Reins with it, mostly because I can't forsee when stealing an opponents creature and saccing it would be more effective than just saccing my own big beater.
I'd actually rather run Might Makes Right over Gruul Sarkhan, mostly because the effect is repeatable and it's a great budget option if all I'm using him for is his -2. Good tech, though.
EDIT: After a little more thought, I've made some changes to the deck with cards that I own before I bring it out for the first run:
- Grab the Reins + Fling
Cheaper CMC for what I want to do. Easy swap.
- Phytotitan + Hunter's Insight
The giant plant would work best in a sacrificed based deck. I was including it mostly for the interaction with Greater Good, but Hunter's Insight should work fine. While not as reliable as Harmonize, it can draw me more cards and at instant speed.
- Witherscale Wurm + Savage Ventmaw
A small dragon subtheme is growing into the deck which is exciting! Witherscale was just a card I wanted to try out, but Savage Ventmaw has natural evasion and it refunds itself with a haste enabler. Free beats are good.
- Krosan Drover + Life's Legacy
Happened to have a Drover lying around. Life's Legacy is another card draw option that relies on creatures, and it has to die. But it can draw a lot for very little. If you can't tell by now, Harmonize bores me. It's a great card, so if you have one and don't care just include it.
- Unravel the Aether + Deglamer
I have a foil Deglamer, and I can't figure out how to make the AE symbol, swapping just because.
Revelation is in the deck because, as I've played against a few Xenagod builds before, they gain immediate attention and I figured that a bit of life gain would go a long way, even if it's only 12 life from Xenagod and a few beaters. Maybe it's just me, but I don't even see Revelation as much of a token card either unless you happen to have a way to ensure Ferocious is active, maybe something like Trostani, Selesnya's Voice that wants life gain and fat tokens. I'm always interested in other options, though.
Garruk, Primal Hunter looks great, however I'm worried that the +3 to devotion may be detrimental to Xenagod's health. If it does, I may replace most of the mana creatures with rocks instead. I haven't played the deck in a real game, though, so Garruk could be a possibility.
Domri Rade isn't too expensive, but I like what he does. I had thought about retooling the deck before I bust it out at my LGS this weekend, adding more of a fight theme including a lot of the fight cards in my old Polukranos deck. Gruul has some nice fight options, too. I just don't know if I'll really need spot creature removal if I'm going to be trampling over them anyway.
Harmonize is an easy include, but I was looking for something more with my card draw. Are there any other options for card draw that also gain life that you know of?
EDIT: Doing a quick gatherer search, Lifeblood Hydra, Nissa's Revelation, Ugin, the Spirit Dragon (not as reliable), and Fruit of the First Tree are some options. Thoughts?
Savage Ventmaw would be great in the deck, giving Hellkite Charger a bit of fuel while also not going infinite, and also feeds into Savage Beating. I know it goes infinite with Aggravated Assault, but infinite really isn't my thing. Doesn't mean I can't include the dragon though.
If you have a Xenagod thread I'd love to look at the card choices you have to compare!
Thanks for commenting! Having Xenagod as a way out of two modes on Decimate is awesome, did not even think of that. I've been thinking of swapping out Destructive Revelry for Hull Breach since its really an upgrade. I've also thought about adding my foil copy of Spring Cleaning. While I don't have any top-deck manipulation, having a chance to destroy all opposing enchantments seems amusing and there are enough high costed cards in the deck to make it work. Come to think of it, Might Makes Right and Guild Feud seem really fun here.
I'm with you on the draw mentality. Aggro has been my go-to style since I started playing and I'd argue that card draw is more important for that archetype than any other. Shamanic Revelation is in there for both card draw and life gain. I've played against other Xenagod decks before and one of the things I've noticed is that, either for lack of deckbuilding skill or hindsight, most of the versions I've played against can't handle the heat that comes with playing it. Xenagod is by no means a tier 1 general, but not all players see a giant beater as, "Hey there's a giant creature on the field, sweet! He should totally smack that into one of my opponents" and go from calm to panic. It's quite a fun reaction to witness and I've often been a victim myself! While I haven't yet tested this deck, I am hoping that Shamanic Revelation will perform to my expectations. If not, I'll just swap it for Harmonize, or Soul's Majesty even though it requires a target. I like to have a mix of steady and burst draws in most of my decks. As for other draw options, Elemental Bond is definitely going in once I can snag a copy from a friend. I've also thought about Hunter's Insight and to a lesser extent Hunter's Prowess. I've used them both, but I believe being cheaper and faster puts Hunter's Insight leagues ahead of Hunter's Prowess, especially in a deck with trample enablers and some of the beaters already having inherent trample. Thoughts?
I used to play GSZ in all of my green decks, but I quickly realized that if I have a tutor in my deck it's going to be used to pull out a game winner instead of an answer (which, imho, if you're playing anything but combo tutors are more fun to use to find answers to threats rather than threats themseves). A great suggestion don't get me wrong, but I know how I play and the inclusion of a creature tutor in green is a very slippery slope for me and I'll soon include cards like Craterhoof Behemoth/Avenger of Zendikar and go nuts. If I do decide to include Woodland Bellower and Fierce Empath, I'll probably have to restrain myself from abusing them. Again, good suggestion.
Joraga Treespeaker, a green sol ring? Definitely getting a copy in a future card order, thank you.
5 Xenagos, God of Revels
Creatures
1 Joraga Treespeaker
2 Vexing Shusher
3 Feldon of the Third Path
3 Fierce Empath
3 Shaman of Forgotten Ways
3 Somberwald Sage
4 Flametongue Kavu
4 Wickerbough Elder
4 Drumhunter
4 Brawn
4 Spellbreaker Behemoth
4 Chameleon Colossus
4 Nylea, God of the Hunt
4 Oracle of Mul Daya
5 Malignus
5 Vorapede
6 Ruric Thar, the Unbowed
6 Inferno Titan
6 Hydra Omnivore
6 Rapacious One
6 Realm Seekers
6 Soul of New Phyrexia
6 Savage Ventmaw
6 Hellkite Charger
6 Hellkite Tyrant
7 Siege Behemoth
7 Giant Adephage
7 Spearbreaker Behemoth
7 Atarka, World Render
8 Archetype of Endurance
8 Woodfall Primus
8 Akroma, Angel of Fury
1 Relic of Progenitus
1 Sol Ring
2 Talisman of Impulse
2 Strionic Resonator
Enchantments
3 Awakening Zone
4 Greater Good
5 Asceticism
Sorceries
2 Explore
2 Life From the Loam
2 Life's Legacy
3 Cultivate
3 Kodama's Reach
4 Bramblecrush
4 Decimate
4 Seize the Day
5 Hunter's Prowess
5 World at war
5 Chandra's Ignition
5 Creeping Renaissance
9 Blasphemous Act
Instants
2 Deglamer
2 Temur Battle Rage
2 Fling
2 Constant Mists
3 Soul's Fire
3 Beast Within
3 Chaos Warp
4 Momentous Fall
4 Grab the Reins
5 Savage Beating
0 Mosswort Bridge
0 Spinerock Knoll
0 Jund Panorama
0 Temple of the False God
0 Kessig Wolf Run
0 Ghost Quarter
0 Command Tower
0 Naya Panorama
0 Wooded Foothills
0 Skarrg, the Rage Pits
0 Rootbound Crag
0 Winding Canyons
0 Yavimaya Hollow
0 Reliquary Tower
0 Temple of Abandon
0 Gruul Turf
9 Mountain
12 Forest
My current version of this deck, feedback is appreciated.
Thank you for bringing up Hull Breach as another example I hadn't thought of. The issue with cards like Decimate that I'm looking to explore isn't with their game mechanics, but with their social ones. Tribute to the Wild is a great political comparison to Hull Breach! Tribute to the Wild effects all of your opponents but does not target. Hull Breach doesn't have to effect all of your opponents, but it does target specific cards on the board. Mechanically, Hull Breach is better than Tribute to the Wild because classically giving your opponents a choice is never as good as making the choice yourself. When considering the political consequences of each card, the answer isn't so clear to me.
Tribute to the Wild gives your opponents a choice, which makes them feel less bad about losing a card because they decide what bites the dust. It also effects all opponents, so one could make the argument (upon resolution) that no one was left out. On the flip side, that can backfire because it did hit all of your opponents at once, making you seem like the enemy. Hull Breach can target a specific or multiple permanents in play, pointing all of the blame directly on you. However taking responsibility for that act could gain you the favor of the other opponents because you just took out a threat that was potentially hurting the whole table. Obviously every scenario will differ so there isn't really a black and white answer that I can think of where one card is a better choice from a political standpoint.
Other cards that I can think of like this are Hex and Aether Gale that specifically target multiple cards. Almost everything you do in the social game portion of EDH has ramifications, you're either building bricks to appear less threatening or deflecting blame onto something or someone else to ultimately stay alive longer and end up winning, whatever winning means to you. Casting Shatter on an opponent's Sol Ring may make the defending player a little more aggressive towards you, but also may make the other players in the group unspoken allies that may leave you alone for a turn or two for dealing with a 'threat'. Casting Shatterstorm, however, deflects all blame away from you as the player because not a single person is targeted and you're also potentially blowing up your own stuff.
Does anyone have their own experiences with Decimate or other cards like it that can shed a little light on the topic? Do you play with cards like this, regardless of the potential ramifications, or do you actively avoid including them in your decks?
Giant Adephage works as a nice engine with either Garruk's Packleader or Elemental Bond if you were to include them. If you're looking for some sac fodder for Evolutionary Leap maybe test out Living Hive? Between Dragon Mage or Knollspine Dragon for some burst card draw, I would personally side with Knollspine. After a huge hit from one of your beaters, it'll come down and draw you a boatload of cards and it doesn't require it's own combat damage. Knollspine also doesn't limit you to drawing 7 cards and also doesn't refill your opponents' hands. However if your meta is tutor heavy, Dragon Mage may be something you want to consider.
Woodland Bellower would also be fun with Fierce Empath!
I've been trying to think of digging options for the deck, but the only things that come to mind are Fierce Empath and Mwonvuli Beast Tracker as cheap toolbox options. Thoughts?
Elemental Bond also appeals to me, I did not pull one in my prerelease. If you do test it, please give us a report of how well it works! I imagine the comparisons would be against Garruk's Packleader and Soul of the Harvest.
As far as digging for new threats, have you thought about Evolutionary Leap? It replaces your doomed creatures, and also gives you something to do with Arbor Elf and friends late game.
What are your thoughts on Chameleon Colossus and Heroes' Bane, or other cards that can boost their own power like Moltensteel Dragon (risky), Hoard-Smelter Dragon, and Hellkite Igniter?
I also recommend just embracing your urge to create EDH decks to your heart's content, either until the fire dies or you find another way to capitalize on it. If you're playing in paper form, my suggestion to you is (if you haven't already) build yourself an EDH Toolbox with all of the same color/brand sleeves. It will hold all of your favorite pet cards and staples and you won't need to own multiples of more expensive cards. This way you can pretty much build any deck you want on the fly, and you'll only need one deck at any time anwyway. While it can be expensive to keep up with the sleeving of all of the cards you want to play with, I'm suggesting this because it will allow you to build more decks faster with the collection you already own.
Of course, you could just always write down decklists in a spreadsheet, but where's the fun in that?