As of right now I'd suggest lowering your number of tutors/digging cards and instead have some better beaters/wincons in the deck. My list involves dredgers like Tasigur and Gurmag Angler as well as some self mill (think esper delve) but you also get to play the best card ever... Postmortem Lunge.
Happy brewing and I'll start contributing soon!
postmortem Lunge is definitely something I didn't even think about, and sounds really good! I'll have to test to see how the creature density feels, but you may be right on that as well
@Zerodawn, added a list to the first post that is a rough take on the version you mentioned, but Impact Tremors could easily become Altar of the Brood come testing time! It's definitely gonna be fun to test these bad boys out this weekend
I haven't played Elves much, but would Greenwarden of Murasa be played at all? I could see it work in removal heavy metas, since you can effectively get 2 triggers off of it... but would Eternal Witness just be better?
I think the card is definitely worth a test, but if burn is already a weak matchup (to my knowledge), do we really want to tap out and bolt ourselves in essence?
That was an incredibly amateur mistake because you were in a rush to post a list before someone else did... Let me guess, you wandered through the infinite combo thread yesterday and suddenly had the original idea to make a deck about Renewall+Hangarback/Endless One? lol...
Since you... beat me to the punch I guess I'll share what I had in mind for this combo. Just be aware this is going to be a long tough road to refine as Enduring Renewall does cost 2WW and you need 2 other cards to combo off and the whole combo is easily disruptable. And you are playing a 3 card combo where neither piece will do anything for themselves in a format with much faster combos. I also didn't a primer list because I didn't find anything better than Enduring Renewall to power the engine.
The first thing you need to do is lower costs for the combo while also protecting it. Its not bad the 2 combo creatures you are using cost 2 mana, but its bad that they are creatures as its so easy to disrupt. Altar of the Brood is an artifact and costs 1. Impact Tremors is an enchantment and costs 1R. Not being a creature helps protect the combo in a format packed with removal. However, I'm more interested in Molten Nursery as the second wincon with Altar of the Brood, simply because if you make the deck WGR you can play Ancient Stirrings, which then could be able to get any piece of the combo except for Enduring Renewall while also being able to get lands to ramp up into Renewall or other artifacts you end up playing for protection/Disruption.
Faithless digs for pieces & lands while filtering unneeded extra copies.
Wild Cantor can be played turn 1 and used to power out Renewall.
That is a good core to start up testing, just needs a disruption package good enough to stall into playing Renewall. I guess you could try playing Altar & Blood Artist just to remove R and play on B for some discard as disruption, but Artist cannot be grabbed by Stirrings. Collected Company and the other cards you were contemplating are useless if you do not get Renewall on the field first, while Stirrings gets cards into your hand.
Good luck developing this, it would be sweet if it could be done.
Nope not quite, someone in the Heartless Summoning thread mentioned Enduring Renewal and made me think about it. Didn't really care about someone beating me to it, as nobody has even really brought it up. Just a simple error on my part.
As for the card base, that may eventually be the way to go, but I think collected company is too good to overlook at just hitting your combo pieces and slamming them down.
Ancient Stirrings would definitely be a card to look at with Molten Nursery and Altar, but cards like Kholagan's Command are so popular in the main board right now that it could just as easily be removed, and even more difficult to get back without 8 spells that can fetch it. Having said that, I think a list that played those is completely viable in their own right, and I'll test them as well.
I do think I'm onto something here though, same with my Aristocrats build that I also have a primer for. Thanks for your thoughts though man! They def help
i think another path could be to cut blood artist and cutthroat for another ETB effect like purphoros... you could get a more solid combo and avoid playing cards that are useless outside the combo
promising idea anyway
Not sure how to feel about that, as the plan is to have one of the cards on the battlefield for when you cast your Enduring Renewal, you're then able to go off that turn.
This was incredibly amateur of me, but there actually is room for 4 more cards. What should they be? Disruption? 4 more creatures in the form of Wild Cantor or Voice of Resurgence?
(Forgive the crappy Banner, not very good at graphic design lol)
The Centerpiece
Enduring Renewal:Part B of our combo (Winding around to Part A shortly) The card that makes the deck win, you're able to get any creatures that die from the battlefield back into our hands at no cost. Endless One and Hangarback Walker are its' best friends
Card "Draw" and Utility
Commune With Nature: So this card is really strong because you are able to dig really deep to find a missing combo piece, and having 8 of each effect in the deck makes it hard to miss Commune With the Gods: Basically the same exact thing as above except at the added mana cost for the ability to snag enchantments. In other words, perfect for this strategy. Collected Company: Again, the redundancy of this effect is incredibly important for the deck, although this card can actually put the creatures on the BATTLEFIELD instead of in the hand. Perfect for grabbing the missing piece to the puzzle for this deck. Idyllic Tutor: Another way to actually grab Enduring Renewal, so 1 or 2 is usually a good idea. Reviving Melody: Nice card for the board that helps you greatly versus other Thoughtseize or Duress effects. Getting back enchantments is huge on this but not big enough to be in the main Riftsweeper: Damn you, Surgical Extraction! Gives us the ability to pull something that may have been exiled back into our library, which should be surprisingly easy to get to with our "Commune" and tutor effects in the deck. Horizon Canopy: Counts as a dual land and a card draw effect, so I think this is really important to have. Haunted Fengraf: When one of your creatures gets countered, this gives you the opportunity to get them back at a low cost. Very effective to get your free creatures back when you need to go off. Mikokoro, Center of the Sea: Just another way to have a constant source of draw. This will let you filter through your deck possibly at 7 cards a turn with your draw and a "Commune" spell. Tolaria West: If you decide to add blue for whatever reason, it's ability to grab Part 3 of the combo is paramount Ghost Quarter: Pretty good way to get Tron off of your case while you search for the pieces
Disruption
Thoughtseize: Pretty much the only discard spell you should be running in the MB at least, it catches anything that you might not be able to deal with Game 1 Duress: Great combo hate against other decks, can also get rid of countermagic from the opponent. Despise: Most likely shouldn't be run unless you're in a creature or superfriend dominated meta Appetite For Brains: If Tron, Midrange, or Recursion tactics are heavy, play this bad boy Destructive Revelry: Great Versus Blood Moon, and many combo decks. Only needing a forest + any other land lets you still do work and have an answer to Hurkyl's Recall: Basically, it's a "Buy me a turn or 2" card against Affinity. 99% of the time all you need is one more turn, so it's perfect here. Creeping Corrosion: A sweeper versus artifacts, wild cantor gets you there faster
The Creatures
Blood Artist: Part A of the creature package. Drains whenever a creature dies, this is the effect that kills your opponent. Zulaport Cutthroat: Again, Part A of our combo. A minorly weaker effect since it only hits our creatures deaths (won't come up in this deck often at all) with an added power. Endless One: Part C of our combo, you get to play this for 0 over and over again because Enduring Renewal says we can. This is how you machine gun your opponents to death Hangarback Walker Yet again, Part C of our combo. Very little if any difference in these two cards for the deck, however this can be played as a blocker that makes a backup chumper in certain situations. Wild Cantor: The 3rd Part C of the combo, it's able to ramp you into a faster Enduring Renewal while also giving you more targets for your spells and added redundancy
No no I meant the ability of Emeria Shepherd! Haha. Playing a fetch nets you returning a card. Saccing it for a plains nets you a sun titan effect! My bad for not explaining more hahaha
The reason I steered clear from Ruination Guide is because I'm just not sure that having, for all intents and purposes, is better than a removal spell (Wasteland Strangler) , A trampler (Vile Aggregate) , or someone who has pseudo-haste and can act as a late game burn spell (Dominator Drone). Having said that, I haven't had the chance to playtest at all yet really so I guess I'll try a few out in some games as well and update the list accordingly
So how does Emeria Shepherd look in this deck? It is probably good, right? With fetches you can eternal witness something AND sun Titan something to the field
Abbot is the man, and I am really drawn to this deck. I usually play Aristocrats in modern, but I'm always a huge fan of proactive/reactive decks that slowly grind out victories. My one question is, would this deck be even better using a higher number of charms, commands, and split cards? A deck like this, it looks like it thrives off of utility at any given time, and is just raw power. Izzet, Dimir, and Rakdos Charm (Rakdos in the board maybe) all are incredible in multiple situations, so having Abbot triggers, Snapcaster flashbacks, and reactions to your opponents spells seems like the utility would be too much to handle for most other decks. Thoughts on this?
Having said that, I think the lists everyone else have posted look really solid. Just trying to stir the pot!
postmortem Lunge is definitely something I didn't even think about, and sounds really good! I'll have to test to see how the creature density feels, but you may be right on that as well
Nope not quite, someone in the Heartless Summoning thread mentioned Enduring Renewal and made me think about it. Didn't really care about someone beating me to it, as nobody has even really brought it up. Just a simple error on my part.
As for the card base, that may eventually be the way to go, but I think collected company is too good to overlook at just hitting your combo pieces and slamming them down.
Ancient Stirrings would definitely be a card to look at with Molten Nursery and Altar, but cards like Kholagan's Command are so popular in the main board right now that it could just as easily be removed, and even more difficult to get back without 8 spells that can fetch it. Having said that, I think a list that played those is completely viable in their own right, and I'll test them as well.
I do think I'm onto something here though, same with my Aristocrats build that I also have a primer for. Thanks for your thoughts though man! They def help
Not sure how to feel about that, as the plan is to have one of the cards on the battlefield for when you cast your Enduring Renewal, you're then able to go off that turn.
The best play you can do is most likely:
T1 cast Wild Cantor
T2 cast Blood Artist/Zulaport Cutthroat
T3 Sac Wild Cantor for a white mana, cast Enduring Renewal, cast Endless One/Hangarback Walker to win
Going off turn 4 gives you the ability to have disruption or dig available to you as well, which makes the deck really hard to stop
2 Endless One
4 Salvage Drone
4 Sludge Crawler
2 Mist Intruder
4 Fathom Feeder
4 Forerunner of Slaughter
2 Dominator Drone
4 Wasteland Strangler
4 Vile Aggregate
3 Dust Stalker
3 Wild Slash
Artifacts
4 Ghostfire Blade
Lands
2 Tomb of the Spirit Dragon
4 Polluted Delta
4 Bloodstained Mire
3 Swamp
5 Island
3 mountain
(Forgive the crappy Banner, not very good at graphic design lol)
The Centerpiece
Card "Draw" and Utility
Commune With the Gods: Basically the same exact thing as above except at the added mana cost for the ability to snag enchantments. In other words, perfect for this strategy.
Collected Company: Again, the redundancy of this effect is incredibly important for the deck, although this card can actually put the creatures on the BATTLEFIELD instead of in the hand. Perfect for grabbing the missing piece to the puzzle for this deck.
Idyllic Tutor: Another way to actually grab Enduring Renewal, so 1 or 2 is usually a good idea.
Reviving Melody: Nice card for the board that helps you greatly versus other Thoughtseize or Duress effects. Getting back enchantments is huge on this but not big enough to be in the main
Riftsweeper: Damn you, Surgical Extraction! Gives us the ability to pull something that may have been exiled back into our library, which should be surprisingly easy to get to with our "Commune" and tutor effects in the deck.
Horizon Canopy: Counts as a dual land and a card draw effect, so I think this is really important to have.
Haunted Fengraf: When one of your creatures gets countered, this gives you the opportunity to get them back at a low cost. Very effective to get your free creatures back when you need to go off.
Mikokoro, Center of the Sea: Just another way to have a constant source of draw. This will let you filter through your deck possibly at 7 cards a turn with your draw and a "Commune" spell.
Tolaria West: If you decide to add blue for whatever reason, it's ability to grab Part 3 of the combo is paramount
Ghost Quarter: Pretty good way to get Tron off of your case while you search for the pieces
Disruption
Duress: Great combo hate against other decks, can also get rid of countermagic from the opponent.
Despise: Most likely shouldn't be run unless you're in a creature or superfriend dominated meta
Appetite For Brains: If Tron, Midrange, or Recursion tactics are heavy, play this bad boy
Destructive Revelry: Great Versus Blood Moon, and many combo decks. Only needing a forest + any other land lets you still do work and have an answer to
Hurkyl's Recall: Basically, it's a "Buy me a turn or 2" card against Affinity. 99% of the time all you need is one more turn, so it's perfect here.
Creeping Corrosion: A sweeper versus artifacts, wild cantor gets you there faster
The Creatures
Zulaport Cutthroat: Again, Part A of our combo. A minorly weaker effect since it only hits our creatures deaths (won't come up in this deck often at all) with an added power.
Endless One: Part C of our combo, you get to play this for 0 over and over again because Enduring Renewal says we can. This is how you machine gun your opponents to death
Hangarback Walker Yet again, Part C of our combo. Very little if any difference in these two cards for the deck, however this can be played as a blocker that makes a backup chumper in certain situations.
Wild Cantor: The 3rd Part C of the combo, it's able to ramp you into a faster Enduring Renewal while also giving you more targets for your spells and added redundancy
Alternative Package
Ancient Stirrings: Going this route, this is basically a Commune with Nature for any card in the deck, sans Enduring Renewal
Molten Nursery: This is Part A of our combo in enchantment form. Ancient Stirrings can find this card as well!
Impact Tremors: comes down faster than Molten Nursery, but at the cost of not being able to be found with Ancient Stirrings. Part A of the combo
Altar of the Brood: Another card that may be found by Ancient stirrings, acting as an alternative to the Part A damage plan of the combo. 1 CMC is really nice
The Lists
4 Enduring renewal
Creatures
4 Blood Artist
4 Zulaport Cutthroat
4 Endless One
4 Hangarback Walker
4 Wild Cantor
Sorceries
4 Commune With the Gods
4 Commune with Nature
3 Thoughtseize
1 Idyllic Tutor
Instants
4 Collected Company
4 Horizon Canopy
2 Temple Garden
2 Godless Shrine
1 Overgrown Tomb
2 Windswept Heath
1 Marsh Flats
1 Verdant Catacombs
2 Plains
1 Swamp
1 Forest
2 Mikokoro, Center of the Sea
1 Haunted Fengraf
1 Thoughtseize
2 Duress
2 Ghost Quarter
2 Creeping Corrosion
4 Reviving Melody
2 Riftsweeper
2 Destructive Revelry
4 Enduring renewal
4 Molten Nursery
4 Impact Tremors
Creatures
4 Endless One
4 Hangarback Walker
4 Wild Cantor
Sorceries
4 Commune With the Gods
4 Commune with Nature
4 Ancient Stirrings
3 Thoughtseize
1 Idyllic Tutor
Lands
4 Horizon Canopy
2 Temple Garden
2 Godless Shrine
1 Stomping Ground
1 Overgrown Tomb
2 Windswept Heath
1 Marsh Flats
1 Verdant Catacombs
2 Plains
1 Swamp
1 Forest
1 Mikokoro, Center of the Sea
1 Haunted Fengraf
1 Thoughtseize
2 Duress
2 Ghost Quarter
2 Creeping Corrosion
4 Reviving Melody
2 Riftsweeper
2 Destructive Revelry
Having said that, I think the lists everyone else have posted look really solid. Just trying to stir the pot!