Definitely agree on Flickerwisp, I think it has some downsides compared to the familiar, but overall familiar is considerably worse. Flickerwisp also lets you put acid on Slippery Bogle, which is a corner case, but still definitely something to be considered. Riptide Chimera also seems interesting as a beater.
Another card I forgot to mention before is Zur's Weirding. If you have the acid trip loop (Acid + Curio + Enchantment), you can just attack their mana base and make sure they don't draw any more lands. Combined with the ability to potentially get that life back by repeatedly rebuying Kitchen Finks, and I think it deserves to at least be considered.
Wow. I love this. In case you didn't know, by the way, this deck exists in Pauper and is usually referred to as "Acid Trip."
Cloudstone Curio is something I've tried to make work many times, but I've never found a deck where it feels so at home. I think Kitchen Finks (at least some number of them) should stay in the main. Legion's Landing is something I was doubtful on at first to be honest, but having played with it, I can say that it's absolute gas. Being able to trigger curio off of a one-mana enchantment is great, and allows you to bounce Finks for extra life gain. Getting that engine online has been absolutely fantastic against creature decks in my experience.
Faith's Fetters is something I'm not quite as excited about. Four life is great an all, but personally, I'd rather have Cast Out. Being able to cycle it if its dead is great, and the only thing Fetters stops that Cast Out doesn't are abilities on lands like Pendelhaven or Academy Ruins.
Aether Tradewinds is something else I'd be interested in removing. It has some neat tricks, but at three mana I'm just not sure how I feel about it.
Porphyry Nodes is a tool I'd very much like to fit in to the deck, as it gives you another one-mana way to bounce Reality Acid, and gives you extra removal on the way. Trial of Ambition serves a similar purpose if you're willing to throw black in as well, and with Curio + Trial + Acid, the opponent is going to be dismantled pretty quickly.
I'm very curious how Jace, the Mind Sculptor slots in now that he's unbanned. Especially with Whir being the standard, allowing us to easily hit the double blue necessary.
Very quick rundown: B splash looks the most viable in my opinion. Blue splash is the most interesting. G splash does almost nothing.
I want to talk on the U splash very quickly here. More specifically, the sideboard. I made this one a bit spicier, with a SB package of 3x Artificer's Intuition. Of course I still have some instants, but I thought this would offer a different angle.
This package gives us EE, Cage, needle, and welding jar, along with three copies of a tutor. No idea how that'll play out, but I just thought it seemed like a fun idea.
On Condemn, I think we would want a 1-of path before we run condemns.
-I'm...still not sure. Scepter helps us reach metalcraft, and still has a lot of utility. It can do the good old Silence every turn cheaper than Sunforger/Mistveil, and can also give us Lightning Helix and Galvanic Blast every turn, both of which can be very difficult for opponents to deal with. I think this needs testing for sure. Definitely do want to find room for at least 1 sword though, with Feast//Famine getting my vote.
I originally suggested the removal of scepter, and I think that might need more context. All of my experience with the card comes from using it in Azorious Turbo-Fog with both fog effects and other spells like Negate. The spells were not the same as this deck, but ultimately the goal of both of our decks is to establish a soft lock so our slow win conditions can take over. I ultimately decided to take it out of the deck.
The thing about scepter is that it needs to cast the imprinted spell twice (once to replace the exiled spell and once to make up for Scepter otherwise doing nothing on its own) in order to break even on card advantage. If your opponent has an answer before that, which will be frequent in games 2 and 3, then you lose on both CA and tempo.
That brings me to my second issue with scepter, its unavoidable tempo loss. Your initial cast of the artifact will be spending two mana to do nothing of importance, save maybe turning on metalcraft. If you drop it early, you probably won't get to use it in the same turn. If you drop it late enough to use it right away you've just spent 4 mana to cast a 1-2 CMC instant either as a sorcery or a telegraphed instant. Either way, it's a huge tempo loss that many of modern's faster decks will take advantage of to beat you down.
Alright, that makes sense. I do like the idea of jamming sword, so I'll give this a shot. I'm currently working on 3-color lists for this deck, trying to keep the splash light enough that we don't need a total manabase overhaul. I think it's going well so far. I'll report back when those are all done.
-Sunforger could probably stand to go up one more. These were quick, late-night changes, and I have no doubt they're far from perfect.
-I'm...still not sure. Scepter helps us reach metalcraft, and still has a lot of utility. It can do the good old Silence every turn cheaper than Sunforger/Mistveil, and can also give us Lightning Helix and Galvanic Blast every turn, both of which can be very difficult for opponents to deal with. I think this needs testing for sure. Definitely do want to find room for at least 1 sword though, with Feast//Famine getting my vote.
-I guess I see the point, but I'll still be looking for something better. If all we need is a white permanent, why not Sigarda's Aid? I'm not sold on it either yet, but being able to turn 1 this, turn 2 paladin, turn 3 cast and equip sunforger at instant speed while holding up and instants in our hand does sound appealing. Again though, I'm definitely not sold on it, just throwing stuff against the wall here.
-That was more or less me typing stream of consciousness. Basically, what I meant was "Either cut the opals, or play more artifacts." So I played more artifacts, because like you said, Opal is really good.
-Not gonna lie. Forgot signets were a thing when I was making this last night.
-I'm still gonna give a third color a shot. Will report back here with a preliminary list once I have it.
-Pithing Needle can do a lot of work, but like you say, we'll have to see how we like it.
-I'd say tinkering of the mb suite is definitely in order. There are so many cards out there that could fit into this deck it's ridiculous. This is gonna take a lot of testing I think, and the exact instant package will probably be meta dependant.
-That's fair, yeah. We'll have to see how much we focus on Metalcraft though.
And building as though XLN cards are legal makes sense, although I think Settle is the only thing in XLN that makes the cut. I made the current list without Settle so Cockatrice testing could be done.
EDIT: if you really just want white 1-drop permanents, I think Thraben Inspector and Judge's Familiar fit the bill fairly well here. Inspector is a white permanent, and helps us hit metalcraft, while familiar is a white flier that we can cash in to counter an opponent's spell, or just use to set an opponent back a turn on instant/sorcery plays.
Alright. After a little bit of goldfishing and fiddling with numbers, here's what I have...for the time being. It still feels generally pretty bad (and suffers from drawing the wrong half of the deck), but once it gets going it's really powerful. Despite the flaws, I do believe it is better than the original list. Anyway, here goes nothing.
This list is *completely* untested. I will be testing this some on Trice at least when I get the time. Now, onto the meat...and by meat, I mean stuff that looks weird.
2 Sunforger: Yes, this is the namesake of the deck. Yes, we do want often want to play it as soon as we get the chance. However, I've decided to cut it to two. To compensate, I went up to 4 Steelshaper's Gift. This also lets us do a little bit extra, which I'll talk about later.
2 Talisman of Progress: A little bit of ramp, plus it adds to our metalcraft. What's more, it fixes for W, which is actually really important in this deck.
1 Batterskull: Plan B. What I often found in playing this deck is that I had one or more Sunforgers, but no creatures to wield them. This gives us a tutorable creature thanks to our 4 Gift plan, and an alternate wincon (especially when combined with Inkmoth Nexus). This card is often subpar against things like Death's Shadow, but shines if you can pump it out early against burn.
1 Retaliate: Our stand-in Settle the Wreckage. I think having a tutorable board wipe is quite important in this deck, and Wreckage seems like a nice way to do that. In my opinion, settle will be better once we can play it, since we don't have to take damage first.
20 lands: I often found myself getting mana flooded, with our 21 lands (plus 4 opals, mind you), so I cut one.
1 Inkmoth Nexus: I wanted to make room for Inventors' Fair, and definitely didn't want to cut a colored source to do it. So here we are. I would like a second one, but right now that isn't something I can figure out very well.
1 Inventors' Fair: A very good card in this deck. Gains us life. Tutors up Sunforger. Tutors up Batterskull. Can even tutor up Isochron Scepter and Pithing Needle. All around, great card for any deck running enough artifacts to hit metalcraft.
4 Steelshaper's Gift: This gives us a nice little toolbox. Lets us run essentially 6 copies of Sunforger (up to 8 if we change cards around), and 5 copies of Batterskull. Also good for something I want to change in the future: adding swords. I would like to find room for at least Sword of X and Y in the 75 here, but I'm not sure which one or in what slot yet.
Sideboard:
1 Apostle's Blessing: Hate protection. This shuts down spot removal, can be forged out, and costs 1 mana from hand. This card can protect both our creatures and our artifacts, making it very versatile.
1 Repel the Abominable: Valakut? What's that? This card can shut down a lot of problem decks, like Storm, Scapeshift, and Ad Naus. Seems decent enough I think.
1 Mana Tithe: This card should almost certainly be anything else. But what can I say? I love the blowouts this can cause when your opponent isn't expecting it.
1 Abrade: This should probably just be another Wear // Tear, but I do like the versatility it brings to the table.
2 Return to Dust: Affinity hate of choice. Can tutor it up during our opponent's turn, or tutor it during our turn to hit 2 things. Also splash hates a few other random decks.
There are a lot of improvements that still need to be made to this deck, I think. Namely, the addition of a third color. This will require a pretty heavy rework of the mana base, but a third color would provide us with so much.
Black
Black offers a variety of options, both in the main and sideboard.
This probably isn't a comprehensive list of what each color has to offer, but it does give us a half-decent idea. I like blue and black for potential splashes (we actually get to play with [card]Counterspell[card], at the cost of...uh...RW), while the best thing green offers is Advent for a 2-mana 5/5 (or just a creature if you draw the card). As you may notice, my list is missing any sideboard cards that you couldn't hardcast. I see what you were going for on the Research plan, but since that's gone, I think we need to focus on cards we can cast, since drawing an uncastable card is the same as skipping a draw. Just my two cents.
Gotta say, I really like what you have going on here. As someone else pointed out, R&D doesn't work quite like you want it to. In addition to this, I don't think you want even a single Mox Opal in this deck with the way it's currently constructed, let alone 4 of them. Enabling Metalcraft seems quite difficult in this deck. However, we do want metalcraft for Paladin, meaning that I think rather remove Opal, we need to add some more artifacts. Third order of business: Kitesail Apprentice seems very out of place here. And last but not least, I think you could use a larger toolbox of instants, especially with R&D not working the way you want. So, considering all this, I would consider making (roughly) the following changes (in the main):
Of course, these numbers are almost certainly off, and there are probably of plenty better cards I'm not thinking of. But I feel like this is a good place to start. The needle is a nice catch-all of sorts, Wreckage is a forge-able board wipe, relic is a bit of maindeck grave hate (Very relevant right now, and it cantrips!), and talisman give you just a bit of ramp (while turning on metalcraft).
I definitely want to take this for a spin, and honestly, this looks like it has the potential to be...not the worst deck I've ever seen. I'm excited!
have you thought about using Arbor Elf instead of Heirarch and swapping out finks for Utopia Sprawl? Edit: i didn't see you had Utopia Sprawl in your list until after i posted. isn't there another enchantment that's practically the same, though?
that would be another easy way to manipulate nice amounts of mana out of Magus of the Vineyard. if only there was a way to keep untapping it so you could go infinite on turn two or three...
also, i suggest using a playset of Primeval titan. if you get him to stick on turn three, you can win by pulling an Inkmoth Nexus and a Kessig Wolf Run and attacking for 10+ infect on the next turn as a backup wincon.
Arbor Elf is something that I completely forgot about (guess I need to play more Ponza). I don't really know if there's another enchantment like sprawl, at least, I don't think there's one that gives ramp turn 1 like sprawl does. With regards to Kessig/Inkmoth, that definitely seems like a good wincon. Maybe putting each in as a 1-of would work, and then adjusting the manabase to get red for it. Definitely seems doable.
The basic idea here is to use Magus of the Vineyard as a ramp spell. The issue here, however, is that our little friend is symmetrical. I was looking for ways to "break" this symmetry when I remembered Omnath, Locus of Mana. This allows us to store up mana for future turns, when we can use it either for a huge Omnath, or pump it all into a Chord of Calling.
This is pretty much just an idea right now, and there are some things I'm considering. I would like some help tweaking the deck so we can get it to work. Here are some cards I've been considering:
Walking Ballista: This guy lets up dump mana into damage, letting us win on the spot in some instances.
Hydras: X cost creatures seem to be pretty good in this deck, so I've been considering things like Genesis Hydra.
Khalni Hydra: I've been debating moving him over to the main. I haven't gotten the opportunity to try him out yet, but he seems like he could come down as a turn 3 8/8, which is certainly nothing to sneeze at.
Primal Command: This card gives us a lot of utility, as well as something currently not seen in the deck: removal. This can gain us life against burn, take lands or other important pieces from any deck, and even get rid of something "for good" by mashing the second and third modes together. This can also tutor up a ballista if we need one to finish out a game.
Any help would be appreciated. The deck is a lot of fun, and I'd highly recommend trying it out!
Alright everyone. So after seeing your suggestions and getting some from others outside of MTGS, this is my current list. It's more on the grindy end of tempo, and utilizes the grave a bit more than the old version. I gotta say, this new version definitely feels good. My biggest problem before with Relentless Dead is that I didn't RTFC, and thought that its second ability returned the zombie to the hand, not the battlefield. I feel stupid, but thankfully some people have set me straight. Anyway, here's my current list:
I still have some tweaks I want to make to this list. I'm currently at a staggeringly high 32(!) creatures. I could probably drop this number, and get some number of Zealous Persecution, some number of Fatal Push, and maybe an extra land in place of one of those creatures. The deck feels really solid right now, and those are about the only changes I can think of. Vial gives us lots of nice tricks with Sculler, Cryptbreaker and our lords, and Relentless Dead and Cryptbreaker allow us to grind out card advantage. Thanks for all the positive replies so far!
Hey everyone. After seeing the new additions in AKH, I decided to give zombies a shot. The new white ones in particular interested me. After building my version of the deck and talking with some other people to tweak it, I checked out this thread. To my surprise, almost everyone here seems to be on an aristocrats-style build. Mine, on the other hand, is more tempo-oriented, similar to fish. Here's my list right now:
A quick rundown: This deck is playing more of a tempo game, and doesn't care too much about using graveyard recursion. It helps us recover after a board wipe, but it isn't central to our gameplan. Vial allows us plenty of tricks, and lets us cheat on mana. Binding Mummy acts like Merrow Reejerey, allowing us to tap down opposing blockers when we want to swing, and to stop potential attacks thanks to vial. Servant also gives us some extra reach, and also works fairly well with vial. Colossus has also been great. Colossus gives us extra Mummy and Servant triggers, which can help speed us up. I originally had some number of Thoughtseize and Inquisition of Kozilek in the main, but as soon as someone mentioned that Sculler was a zombie, it seemed obviously better. Mutavault gives us extra attackers and blockers, and is great for getting just a little extra damage in. The sideboard is a variety of things. Brutality because it's really just a solid card. An extra Cryptbreaker, Lili, and some Relentless Dead to help if we need to grind. Relic to help hose graveyard strategies, and stony to deal with artifacts.
I'm excited to hear your thoughts. I think the new white zombies bring a lot of potential to the deck.
Because of this, I would recommend taking out Dosan the Falling Leaf unless you need him in there as counter protection. But the biggest problem with this deck seems to be getting burned out or dying before we can cast the card we need to. So maybe replace with another ramp card.
you know, Mikokoro wouldn't be a bad addition at all. some extra draw early game along with a strong way to suck up some leftover mana on the end of an opponents turn. with Mind Stone i have all the wincon i need for the maniac, but i do agree that some extra draw would be nice.
also, Dosan isn't in there for just counter protection. he's there to stop any crazy sort of shenanigans that could blast through my creature protection and bolt my maniac. he's basically the layer that makes getting to my kill impossible and i like having that security net. there's no need to add more ramp, as well. if anything, i'd say more wincons are in order. but, with Primeval Titan in our corner, pulling out Kessig makes any creature a wincon. you could keep turning arbor elf and lotus cobra into 10/1 tramplers and not even give two farts.
the combo isn't the only way to win with my deck and i love that about it. the opening hand is what tells you if you're going to combo, or going to beat face.
On the same note, Rune-Scarred Demon has been an abject failure in my playtesting, mostly just because he costs 7 mana and the flying body is negated by the fact that we win the next turn, Sidisi, Undead Vizier has performed much better as it is much more possible to cast both her and Primal Surge on the same turn, and she deters attackers quite well. Also keep in mind that she can sacrifice herself to be a 3BB demonic tutor, which isn't that bad.
i've never once had RSD be, "and abject failure." he's regularly cast on turn three when in my opening hand(the same turn Sidisi can be cast), his massive flying body enables kessig to make him very deadly, and it doesn't matter if he dies when you play him. you netted a card from him entering the battlefield, and you empty a spot removal card from their hand if they have one. he's also clutch against Infect due to flying, which really helps me in that matchup.
But besides that, I believe that this deck has a lot of competitive potential and would be curious if anyone would want a primer on this?
PS: Just so everyone knows if they remove your win con from the deck, put permanents into play until there are 10 cards left on top of your library. (It's a may ability you can stop at any point!)
i could easily turn this idea thread into a primer, but i haven't seen enough interest in my deck to do so. i know how a lot of cards that work and don't work in this deck, cards you want to see in opening hands, etc., because i've been working on it for years.
if this deck ever garners more interest, i'll turn it into a primer. but until then, i don't see any point in putting in a lot of work just to see it vanish into all the deck creation primers of years past.
Hey man. I was curious if you could post the list you're using now? Is it the one in the OP, or is that an old list? Thanks!
Another card I forgot to mention before is Zur's Weirding. If you have the acid trip loop (Acid + Curio + Enchantment), you can just attack their mana base and make sure they don't draw any more lands. Combined with the ability to potentially get that life back by repeatedly rebuying Kitchen Finks, and I think it deserves to at least be considered.
Cloudstone Curio is something I've tried to make work many times, but I've never found a deck where it feels so at home. I think Kitchen Finks (at least some number of them) should stay in the main. Legion's Landing is something I was doubtful on at first to be honest, but having played with it, I can say that it's absolute gas. Being able to trigger curio off of a one-mana enchantment is great, and allows you to bounce Finks for extra life gain. Getting that engine online has been absolutely fantastic against creature decks in my experience.
Faith's Fetters is something I'm not quite as excited about. Four life is great an all, but personally, I'd rather have Cast Out. Being able to cycle it if its dead is great, and the only thing Fetters stops that Cast Out doesn't are abilities on lands like Pendelhaven or Academy Ruins.
Aether Tradewinds is something else I'd be interested in removing. It has some neat tricks, but at three mana I'm just not sure how I feel about it.
Porphyry Nodes is a tool I'd very much like to fit in to the deck, as it gives you another one-mana way to bounce Reality Acid, and gives you extra removal on the way. Trial of Ambition serves a similar purpose if you're willing to throw black in as well, and with Curio + Trial + Acid, the opponent is going to be dismantled pretty quickly.
I have to know, with Jace, the Mind Sculptor being unbanned, where do you plan on going from here?
1x Batterskull
1x Blood Crypt
1x Boros Charm
1x Boros Signet
1x Crackling Doom
2x Darksteel Citadel
2x Dispatch
2x Galvanic Blast
1x Godless Shrine
1x Intimidation Bolt
1x Inventors' Fair
3x Kazuul's Toll Collector
1x Kolaghan's Command
3x Lightning Helix
4x Marsh Flats
1x Mistveil Plains
4x Mox Opal
2x Pithing Needle
1x Plains
4x Puresteel Paladin
1x Relic of Progenitus
1x Retaliate
4x Sacred Foundry
1x Silence
4x Steelshaper's Gift
2x Sunforger
1x Swamp
1x Sword of Feast and Famine
1x Talisman of Indulgence
1x Terminate
2x Thraben Inspector
1x Abrade
1x Anguished Unmaking
1x Apostle's Blessing
2x Deflecting Palm
1x Dispatch
2x Galvanic Blast
1x Hallowed Moonlight
1x Mana Tithe
1x Rakdos Charm
1x Repel the Abominable
2x Return to Dust
1x Wear
1x Batterskull
1x Boros Charm
1x Boros Signet
1x Counterflux
2x Darksteel Citadel
2x Dispatch
1x Electrolyze
4x Flooded Strand
2x Galvanic Blast
1x Hallowed Fountain
1x Intimidation Bolt
1x Inventors' Fair
1x Island
3x Kazuul's Toll Collector
4x Lightning Helix
1x Mistveil Plains
4x Mox Opal
2x Pithing Needle
1x Plains
4x Puresteel Paladin
1x Relic of Progenitus
1x Restore the Peace
4x Sacred Foundry
1x Silence
1x Steam Vents
4x Steelshaper's Gift
2x Sunforger
1x Sword of Feast and Famine
1x Talisman of Progress
2x Thraben Inspector
2x Apostle's Blessing
3x Artificer's Intuition
2x Deflecting Palm
1x Dramatic Rescue
1x Engineered Explosives
1x Grafdigger's Cage
1x Pithing Needle
1x Render Silent
2x Wear
1x Welding Jar
4x Arid Mesa
1x Batterskull
1x Boros Signet
2x Darksteel Citadel
2x Dispatch
1x Forest
2x Galvanic Blast
1x Intimidation Bolt
1x Inventors' Fair
3x Kazuul's Toll Collector
4x Lightning Helix
1x Mistveil Plains
4x Mox Opal
1x Naya Charm
2x Pithing Needle
1x Plains
4x Puresteel Paladin
1x Relic of Progenitus
1x Retaliate
4x Sacred Foundry
1x Silence
4x Steelshaper's Gift
1x Stomping Ground
2x Sunforger
1x Sword of Feast and Famine
1x Talisman of Impulse
1x Talisman of Unity
1x Temple Garden
2x Thraben Inspector
4x Windswept Heath
1x Abrade
1x Apostle's Blessing
1x Atarka's Command
2x Deflecting Palm
1x Destructive Revelry
1x Dispatch
2x Galvanic Blast
1x Hallowed Moonlight
1x Mana Tithe
1x Repel the Abominable
2x Return to Dust
1x Wear
Very quick rundown: B splash looks the most viable in my opinion. Blue splash is the most interesting. G splash does almost nothing.
I want to talk on the U splash very quickly here. More specifically, the sideboard. I made this one a bit spicier, with a SB package of 3x Artificer's Intuition. Of course I still have some instants, but I thought this would offer a different angle.
This package gives us EE, Cage, needle, and welding jar, along with three copies of a tutor. No idea how that'll play out, but I just thought it seemed like a fun idea.
On Condemn, I think we would want a 1-of path before we run condemns.
Alright, that makes sense. I do like the idea of jamming sword, so I'll give this a shot. I'm currently working on 3-color lists for this deck, trying to keep the splash light enough that we don't need a total manabase overhaul. I think it's going well so far. I'll report back when those are all done.
-Sunforger could probably stand to go up one more. These were quick, late-night changes, and I have no doubt they're far from perfect.
-I'm...still not sure. Scepter helps us reach metalcraft, and still has a lot of utility. It can do the good old Silence every turn cheaper than Sunforger/Mistveil, and can also give us Lightning Helix and Galvanic Blast every turn, both of which can be very difficult for opponents to deal with. I think this needs testing for sure. Definitely do want to find room for at least 1 sword though, with Feast//Famine getting my vote.
-I guess I see the point, but I'll still be looking for something better. If all we need is a white permanent, why not Sigarda's Aid? I'm not sold on it either yet, but being able to turn 1 this, turn 2 paladin, turn 3 cast and equip sunforger at instant speed while holding up and instants in our hand does sound appealing. Again though, I'm definitely not sold on it, just throwing stuff against the wall here.
-That was more or less me typing stream of consciousness. Basically, what I meant was "Either cut the opals, or play more artifacts." So I played more artifacts, because like you said, Opal is really good.
-Not gonna lie. Forgot signets were a thing when I was making this last night.
-I'm still gonna give a third color a shot. Will report back here with a preliminary list once I have it.
-Pithing Needle can do a lot of work, but like you say, we'll have to see how we like it.
-Oof, I forgot about Mistveil Plains. I guess we have a few options here. We can either play around it, or switch to something else. If we splash black, we can use Nihil Spellbomb. Other options include Tormod's Crypt and Grafdigger's Cage.
-I'd say tinkering of the mb suite is definitely in order. There are so many cards out there that could fit into this deck it's ridiculous. This is gonna take a lot of testing I think, and the exact instant package will probably be meta dependant.
-I also like Intimidation Bolt, but I agree with megatog that Master Warcraft is attractive as well.
-That's fair, yeah. We'll have to see how much we focus on Metalcraft though.
And building as though XLN cards are legal makes sense, although I think Settle is the only thing in XLN that makes the cut. I made the current list without Settle so Cockatrice testing could be done.
EDIT: if you really just want white 1-drop permanents, I think Thraben Inspector and Judge's Familiar fit the bill fairly well here. Inspector is a white permanent, and helps us hit metalcraft, while familiar is a white flier that we can cash in to counter an opponent's spell, or just use to set an opponent back a turn on instant/sorcery plays.
2 Sunforger
4 Mox Opal
2 Isochron Scepter
2 Pithing Needle
2 Relic of Progenitus
2 Talisman of Progress
1 Batterskull
Creatures (7)
4 Puresteel Paladin
3 Kazuul's Toll Collector
Instant (14)
4 Lightning Helix
1 Boros Charm
2 Dispatch
2 Galvanic Blast
2 Blessed Alliance
1 Silence
1 Intimidation Bolt
1 Retaliate
2 Mistveil Plains
4 Arid Mesa
4 Darksteel Citadel
2 Mountain
4 Sacred Foundry
2 Plains
1 Inkmoth Nexus
1 Inventors' Fair
Sorcery (4)
4 Steelshaper's Gift
1 Wear // Tear
1 Dawn Charm
2 Deflecting Palm
1 Hallowed Moonlight
2 Galvanic Blast
1 Dispatch
1 Wild Ricochet
1 Apostle's Blessing
1 Repel the Abominable
1 Mana Tithe
1 Abrade
2 Return to Dust
Some things to note here:
This list is *completely* untested. I will be testing this some on Trice at least when I get the time. Now, onto the meat...and by meat, I mean stuff that looks weird.
2 Sunforger: Yes, this is the namesake of the deck. Yes, we do want often want to play it as soon as we get the chance. However, I've decided to cut it to two. To compensate, I went up to 4 Steelshaper's Gift. This also lets us do a little bit extra, which I'll talk about later.
2 Talisman of Progress: A little bit of ramp, plus it adds to our metalcraft. What's more, it fixes for W, which is actually really important in this deck.
1 Batterskull: Plan B. What I often found in playing this deck is that I had one or more Sunforgers, but no creatures to wield them. This gives us a tutorable creature thanks to our 4 Gift plan, and an alternate wincon (especially when combined with Inkmoth Nexus). This card is often subpar against things like Death's Shadow, but shines if you can pump it out early against burn.
1 Retaliate: Our stand-in Settle the Wreckage. I think having a tutorable board wipe is quite important in this deck, and Wreckage seems like a nice way to do that. In my opinion, settle will be better once we can play it, since we don't have to take damage first.
20 lands: I often found myself getting mana flooded, with our 21 lands (plus 4 opals, mind you), so I cut one.
1 Inkmoth Nexus: I wanted to make room for Inventors' Fair, and definitely didn't want to cut a colored source to do it. So here we are. I would like a second one, but right now that isn't something I can figure out very well.
1 Inventors' Fair: A very good card in this deck. Gains us life. Tutors up Sunforger. Tutors up Batterskull. Can even tutor up Isochron Scepter and Pithing Needle. All around, great card for any deck running enough artifacts to hit metalcraft.
4 Steelshaper's Gift: This gives us a nice little toolbox. Lets us run essentially 6 copies of Sunforger (up to 8 if we change cards around), and 5 copies of Batterskull. Also good for something I want to change in the future: adding swords. I would like to find room for at least Sword of X and Y in the 75 here, but I'm not sure which one or in what slot yet.
Sideboard:
1 Apostle's Blessing: Hate protection. This shuts down spot removal, can be forged out, and costs 1 mana from hand. This card can protect both our creatures and our artifacts, making it very versatile.
1 Repel the Abominable: Valakut? What's that? This card can shut down a lot of problem decks, like Storm, Scapeshift, and Ad Naus. Seems decent enough I think.
1 Mana Tithe: This card should almost certainly be anything else. But what can I say? I love the blowouts this can cause when your opponent isn't expecting it.
1 Abrade: This should probably just be another Wear // Tear, but I do like the versatility it brings to the table.
2 Return to Dust: Affinity hate of choice. Can tutor it up during our opponent's turn, or tutor it during our turn to hit 2 things. Also splash hates a few other random decks.
There are a lot of improvements that still need to be made to this deck, I think. Namely, the addition of a third color. This will require a pretty heavy rework of the mana base, but a third color would provide us with so much.
Black
Black offers a variety of options, both in the main and sideboard.
Fatal Push
Kolaghan's Command
Anguished Unmaking
Terminate
Rakdos Charm
Crackling Doom
Blue
Counterflux
Render Silent
Ojutai's Command
Electrolyze
Restore the Peace
Dramatic Rescue
Whir of Invention
Artificer's Intuition
Green
Destructive Revelry
Advent of the Wurm
This probably isn't a comprehensive list of what each color has to offer, but it does give us a half-decent idea. I like blue and black for potential splashes (we actually get to play with [card]Counterspell[card], at the cost of...uh...RW), while the best thing green offers is Advent for a 2-mana 5/5 (or just a creature if you draw the card). As you may notice, my list is missing any sideboard cards that you couldn't hardcast. I see what you were going for on the Research plan, but since that's gone, I think we need to focus on cards we can cast, since drawing an uncastable card is the same as skipping a draw. Just my two cents.
-4 Kitesail Apprentice
-1 Research // Development
-1 Silence
+2 Pithing Needle
+1 Settle the Wreckage
+2 Relic of Progenitus
+1 Talisman of Progress
Of course, these numbers are almost certainly off, and there are probably of plenty better cards I'm not thinking of. But I feel like this is a good place to start. The needle is a nice catch-all of sorts, Wreckage is a forge-able board wipe, relic is a bit of maindeck grave hate (Very relevant right now, and it cantrips!), and talisman give you just a bit of ramp (while turning on metalcraft).
I definitely want to take this for a spin, and honestly, this looks like it has the potential to be...not the worst deck I've ever seen. I'm excited!
Arbor Elf is something that I completely forgot about (guess I need to play more Ponza). I don't really know if there's another enchantment like sprawl, at least, I don't think there's one that gives ramp turn 1 like sprawl does. With regards to Kessig/Inkmoth, that definitely seems like a good wincon. Maybe putting each in as a 1-of would work, and then adjusting the manabase to get red for it. Definitely seems doable.
4 Courser of Kruphix
4 Kitchen Finks
4 Lotus Cobra
4 Magus of the Vineyard
4 Noble Hierarch
4 Omnath, Locus of Mana
4 Scavenging Ooze
3 Vizier of the Menagerie
2 Primeval Titan
2 Chord of Calling
2 Summoner's Pact
Land (19)
17 Forest
2 Oran-Rief, the Vastwood
Enchantments (4)
4 Utopia Sprawl
3 Fracturing Gust
2 Grafdigger's Cage
2 Mwonvuli Acid-Moss
2 Primal Command
1 Hum of the Radix
1 Khalni Hydra
1 Plow Under
1 Relic of Progenitus
1 Thragtusk
1 Tornado Elemental
The basic idea here is to use Magus of the Vineyard as a ramp spell. The issue here, however, is that our little friend is symmetrical. I was looking for ways to "break" this symmetry when I remembered Omnath, Locus of Mana. This allows us to store up mana for future turns, when we can use it either for a huge Omnath, or pump it all into a Chord of Calling.
This is pretty much just an idea right now, and there are some things I'm considering. I would like some help tweaking the deck so we can get it to work. Here are some cards I've been considering:
Walking Ballista: This guy lets up dump mana into damage, letting us win on the spot in some instances.
Hydras: X cost creatures seem to be pretty good in this deck, so I've been considering things like Genesis Hydra.
Khalni Hydra: I've been debating moving him over to the main. I haven't gotten the opportunity to try him out yet, but he seems like he could come down as a turn 3 8/8, which is certainly nothing to sneeze at.
Primal Command: This card gives us a lot of utility, as well as something currently not seen in the deck: removal. This can gain us life against burn, take lands or other important pieces from any deck, and even get rid of something "for good" by mashing the second and third modes together. This can also tutor up a ballista if we need one to finish out a game.
Any help would be appreciated. The deck is a lot of fun, and I'd highly recommend trying it out!
4 Binding Mummy
4 Cryptbreaker
4 Death Baron
4 Diregraf Colossus
4 Gravecrawler
4 Lord of the Accursed
4 Relentless Dead
4 Tidehollow Sculler
Spells (4)
1 Collective Brutality
3 Path to Exile
4 Aether Vial
Lands (20)
4 Concealed Courtyard
4 Godless Shrine
4 marsh Flats
2 Mutavault
2 Cavern of Souls
2 Swamp
1 Plains
1 Urborg, Tomb of Yawgmoth
4 Thoughtseize
3 Stony Silence
2 Relic of Progenitus
2 Liliana, the Last Hope
2 Leyline of Sanctity
1 Fulminator Mage
1 Collective Brutality
I still have some tweaks I want to make to this list. I'm currently at a staggeringly high 32(!) creatures. I could probably drop this number, and get some number of Zealous Persecution, some number of Fatal Push, and maybe an extra land in place of one of those creatures. The deck feels really solid right now, and those are about the only changes I can think of. Vial gives us lots of nice tricks with Sculler, Cryptbreaker and our lords, and Relentless Dead and Cryptbreaker allow us to grind out card advantage. Thanks for all the positive replies so far!
4 Binding Mummy
4 Death Baron
4 Diregraf Colossus
4 Gravecrawler
4 Lord of the Accursed
4 Tidehollow Sculler
4 Wayward Servant
2 Cryptbreaker
2 Dread Wanderer
Spells (8)
4 Aether Vial
3 Path to Exile
1 Collective Brutality
4 Concealed Courtyard
4 Marsh Flats
3 Godless Shrine
2 Cavern of Souls
2 Mutavault
2 Plains
2 Swamp
1 Urborg, Tomb of Yawgmoth
4 Thoughtseize
3 Stony Silence
2 Relic of Progenitus
2 Relentless Dead
2 Liliana, the Last Hope
1 Cryptbreaker
1 Collective Brutality
A quick rundown: This deck is playing more of a tempo game, and doesn't care too much about using graveyard recursion. It helps us recover after a board wipe, but it isn't central to our gameplan. Vial allows us plenty of tricks, and lets us cheat on mana. Binding Mummy acts like Merrow Reejerey, allowing us to tap down opposing blockers when we want to swing, and to stop potential attacks thanks to vial. Servant also gives us some extra reach, and also works fairly well with vial. Colossus has also been great. Colossus gives us extra Mummy and Servant triggers, which can help speed us up. I originally had some number of Thoughtseize and Inquisition of Kozilek in the main, but as soon as someone mentioned that Sculler was a zombie, it seemed obviously better. Mutavault gives us extra attackers and blockers, and is great for getting just a little extra damage in. The sideboard is a variety of things. Brutality because it's really just a solid card. An extra Cryptbreaker, Lili, and some Relentless Dead to help if we need to grind. Relic to help hose graveyard strategies, and stony to deal with artifacts.
I'm excited to hear your thoughts. I think the new white zombies bring a lot of potential to the deck.
Hey man. I was curious if you could post the list you're using now? Is it the one in the OP, or is that an old list? Thanks!