This set seems to be the best boon to meren in a while. We get a great removal, upgraded fleshbag and lots of fun cards for casual meren like underrealm lich and doom whisperer!
Overall a great golgari set! What is everyone's favorite new card for meren?
I like this card a lot. Im a huge fan of spending life for resources, hello Necropotence! but I'm not sure about this card in a tuned meren deck. In a casual build it seems just fine, actually its fantastic in a casual meta. My concern is that the 5cmc spot should be doing something extremely powerful in a tuned deck. Is filling the GY that powerful? The answer is 'it depends.' If you have a lot of life to dump into this card, if you get a good reanimation target plus a reliable way to reanimate it (meren on board with a healthy amount of exp. Counters Would work).
I might be undervaluing this but I feel like it's great for casual and not quite good enough for 75%/competitive meta (but I think it's close so I might be wrong). I just don't know what I'd take out at that spot.
The deck looks like a token/aristocrat theme. You have a lot of token generators. That's a solid plan. You could use a few more sac outlets in my opinion.
Altar of dementia
Ashnods altar
Spawning pit
These are great free sac outlets.
Poison tip archer would be a good fit in this style deck too.
Since you want to sac tokens I'm not sure kessig cage runners is the type of card you want. Also i dont think stitchers companion does enough.
I'm also a fan of putting in as many mana dorks as possible. A turn 3 meren is way better than a turn 4 meren.
My first impression is that I think it's a fine tutor for more more casual builds. It might be worth testing. With my build in particular my top black are Necropotence, mindslicer, Gray Merchant of asphodel, mikaeus. thats a minimum of 3 creatures I'd need in the bin. Plus it gets significantly worse against grave hate like RIP.
As I think about it more i suppose it does work good with buried alive/entomb cards and most reanimate spells.
I'm not 100% sold on it but as I'm writing this post I'm convincing myself it's better than I initially thought.
Have you tried Krav yet? What do you think? Is it worth 5cmc?
I have played 1 game testing Bramble sovereign so far. It was decent but I was playing from behind most of the game and couldn't pull ahead. Being able to copy fleshbag was nice though. I think I'll find a permanent spot for him.
Like others have mentioned I'm finding Grim Haurespaux underwhelming. I think I'll swap it out.
I haven't tried it out at all. It seems "meh" to me. I feel like those kinds of effects aren't terribly strong, especially on a sorcery speed sac outlet. I'd much rather just use Gray Merchant of asphodel (especially since it can actually kill people). This can never kill people
I'd like to try a new 4 drop creature in my Meren deck. I currently have Magus of the abyss. It's not doing too much for me. I'm considering two creatures. Necrotic ooze or kalitas, traitor of Ghet. I don't currently run phyrexian devourer so necrotic ooze would only be for value. My deck runs a lot of self damage (pain lands, necropotence, razaketh, etc..) so incidental life gain is useful from Kalitas plus the incidental grave hate. The problem is that my deck is not very combat focused. I don't usually attack all that often so I'm not sure how useful it'll be. What are peoples experiences with it. Necrotic ooze just has so much value that maybe it's worth it just for that. It can be a backup razaketh, fauna shaman, ramp, not to mention whatever my opponents have...
So far there hasn't been anything that I've thought is a shoe in for Meren. The set looks sweet from a nostalgic point of view and the Art of the cards is spot on for my taste but so far no good Meren tech IMO.
Any other news on Meren? I'm still enjoying the deck a lot. I find it tough to play because Meren gets hated out pretty early. I find myself having to slow play a lot!
another challenge I find is that if I cannot get a value engine going early I risk running out of steam. It's a fun.
growing rites of itlimoc - powerful if it can flip, but super underwhelming if you cant. Is the lack of consistency worth it? Not sure... vraska, relic seeker - I think her abilities are a bit weak for a 6 cmc planeswalker
I'm a tinkerer, and sometimes to a fault so I'm always looking at trying out new cards and getting opinions on cards. I was thinking of adding in another free sac outlet cause and I was thinking of using this one.spawning pit. I think being able to sac a creature and defer the benefits of it until i need it later is a useful utility. Often times I'll sac a creature to ashnods alter and not have anything to do with the mana so it just goes to waste. This offers a chance to sac a creature for future benefit. Also having random 2/2's might be surprisingly useful.
Overall a great golgari set! What is everyone's favorite new card for meren?
I might be undervaluing this but I feel like it's great for casual and not quite good enough for 75%/competitive meta (but I think it's close so I might be wrong). I just don't know what I'd take out at that spot.
Altar of dementia
Ashnods altar
Spawning pit
These are great free sac outlets.
Poison tip archer would be a good fit in this style deck too.
Since you want to sac tokens I'm not sure kessig cage runners is the type of card you want. Also i dont think stitchers companion does enough.
I'm also a fan of putting in as many mana dorks as possible. A turn 3 meren is way better than a turn 4 meren.
As I think about it more i suppose it does work good with buried alive/entomb cards and most reanimate spells.
I'm not 100% sold on it but as I'm writing this post I'm convincing myself it's better than I initially thought.
Amy opinions on underrealm lich in a 75 - 80% tuned list? I like it a lot in casual builds but I'm not sure if it makes the cut in a tuned list
Have you tried Krav yet? What do you think? Is it worth 5cmc?
I have played 1 game testing Bramble sovereign so far. It was decent but I was playing from behind most of the game and couldn't pull ahead. Being able to copy fleshbag was nice though. I think I'll find a permanent spot for him.
Like others have mentioned I'm finding Grim Haurespaux underwhelming. I think I'll swap it out.
I'm going to try bramble sovereign.
I'd like to try a new 4 drop creature in my Meren deck. I currently have Magus of the abyss. It's not doing too much for me. I'm considering two creatures. Necrotic ooze or kalitas, traitor of Ghet. I don't currently run phyrexian devourer so necrotic ooze would only be for value. My deck runs a lot of self damage (pain lands, necropotence, razaketh, etc..) so incidental life gain is useful from Kalitas plus the incidental grave hate. The problem is that my deck is not very combat focused. I don't usually attack all that often so I'm not sure how useful it'll be. What are peoples experiences with it. Necrotic ooze just has so much value that maybe it's worth it just for that. It can be a backup razaketh, fauna shaman, ramp, not to mention whatever my opponents have...
I'd love to hear some feedback from people.
Here is my list for reference: http://tappedout.net/mtg-decks/meren-semi-competitive-1/
another challenge I find is that if I cannot get a value engine going early I risk running out of steam. It's a fun.
growing rites of itlimoc - powerful if it can flip, but super underwhelming if you cant. Is the lack of consistency worth it? Not sure...
vraska, relic seeker - I think her abilities are a bit weak for a 6 cmc planeswalker
anything else??
does anyone have experience with this sac outlet?