Yeah, I wish it came with more. I love it when it has the Savage Vigor Head in play so it gets an additional spell on each of its turns. I was sad when I bought mine and I found out there was only one in the deck, if I could I would take out the Strike the Weak Spots in exchange for more Savage Vigor Heads but I am not going to buy more copies of the deck just so I can do that.
I felt the same way, so I threw a bunch of Clones that have been laying in my binder into the Hydra deck as replacements for the StWSs that I also took out. I play them where Hydra only clones its own creatures, with preference to Elite Head given when revealed.
I can't swear to the value, but people were really psyched over the inclusions in Elspeth vs Tezzeret, so much so that it drove prices up at some less reputable LGS.
Definitely. IMO, EvT was seen favourably for the amount of value it provided while still providing a mix of enjoyable cards to use and deconstruct for other decks, if for no other reason that 1x Elspeth, Knight-Errant and 2x Swords to Plowshares alone pretty much broke even, making everything else a very pleasant bonus. Giving a DD with two good PWs that each had a decent mix was a great formula.
It's got Freyalise on the art, and she's hella dead.
So? No reason that it couldn't be a reimagining of the same scene from a different perspective/style. DDs aren't set in a specific time, they just tend to show the stars of the decks in new arts. It's just unlikely that if it came to mass that Deed got new art, that it would be that way and not be something like showing Vraska plotting or a reuse of the Judge art.
It could definitely be a fall set name -- remember that there was once a set called "Invasion"
Nicol Bolas must be involved in the conspiracy in some way.
Depending if they wanted to expand the PW story more, Conspiracy could fit as a set name if the block was more about Bolas/Tezzeret/Whatever schemes being discovered and countered by Jace/Chandra/Gideon/Etc, and didn't take place on a single plane to boot.
If they really wanted to put an air of multiplane conspiracy in things, then it could happen by setting Set 1 on, say, Ravnica (the discovery), Set 2 on Alara (chasing the clues), and Set 3 on Zendikar (the finale). If this did happen, it would be a way for Wizards to be able to revisit planes that they might not want to spend an entire block on but still want to expand on the flavour (Mercadia and Ulgrotha come to mind first).
I really like Ring of Xathrid for generals. Regenerate is underrated, and getting bigger every turn is nothing to scoff at for how price efficient it is. of course, Him sticking around longer means more life, but thats the price of progress.
Ashes to Ashes This card is just bananas in general really. 3mana for a 2-for-1? Sold.
Although it's not an autoinclude, I'm a huge fan of Sangromancer. It's a efficiently costed 3/3 evasive flyer at 4Mana, with a great ability. Creatures die, and 3 life back each time is nice and adds up quickly, especially if a board clear goes off. Discard part is often moot, but sometimes a Anvil of Bogarden comes out and your life starts spiking, or a blue player BSZ's thier deck for 30 and fails to find thier reliquary tower, it's just good.
EDIT: Noticed your comment above so I took out my input on Nightmare Lash.
I like the idea of Sangromancer, and will probably pick one up in the near future. The life gain would be welcome in this deck in particular.
Ashes to Ashes was in a previous build, but I ended up cutting it since I felt that three removal spells that could drain my life were too much. Hellfire's one-sided sweep and Dismember's instant speed and the optionality of making it a life payment ended up being more attractive to me than the still-amazing double exile. Though I could definitely see putting it back in at some point.
I hadn't honestly thought about Ring of Xathrid, due to generally ignoring regeneration for the most part.
Anyway how about Nightmare Lash for some added redundancy alongside Lashwrithe? Lulz if you equip both at the same time
I tried NL in an older build of this, and it always ended up disappointing me in just making something fatter without helping out against the hate it drew. The equip cost also hurts a lot more when your commander is demanding chunks of life to snack on before he goes to work. Lashwrithe stayed more as Korlash #2 than as an equip.
Disciple of Bolas is a good way to cycle your commander through Mikaeus, draw cards and gain life.
Fun stuff. Tried it out.
Did a few other changes. Liliana Vess always seemed more like a win-more when it came up since I was just searching for a back-up condition for an existing state every time it seemed, so I changed to Liliana of the Dark Realms.
Thanks for the suggestions, guys. Happily, outside of the M13 Exalted pieces, I had most things that I needed gathering dust or something similar. Substituted Sign in Blood for now, and added Dimir House Guard as well for more Transmute utility.
Will do some more testing later, but right now this is updated to how it stands.
Perhaps Knight of Infamy? The exalted can speed up the voltron beats by a turn or two.
I agree entirely. The black Exalted cards slipped my mind, but I definitely like it better as a two-drop. I might try Nefarox, Overlord of Grixis as well while I'm at it.
Good ol' Gallowbraid. Playing sui is awesome, but it might help to have some ways to reset the cumulative upkeep aside from not paying it. Erratic Portal comes to mind and certainly has no shortage of other uses in a 4-player comes-into-play happy format. Power Conduit turns age counters into +1/+1 counters. It's a little narrow, but seems good with the Big G, as you call him. Also, Black Knight doesn't seem like it does enough in EDH.
Black Knight's more of a placeholder than anything. I want to keep something small and cheap in the position, but at the same time have been at a loss for something to replace it with.
I forgot Power Conduit existed. I will definitely have to go track one of those down now.
Gallowbraid... A card that is generally forgotten about because:
1) it's from Weatherlight (i.e. old)
2) the upkeep text isn't really inviting
3) it's not really all that amazing
However, when a person steps back, and makes the decision that yes, they want to play a red zone loving deck in mono-black, it's that one other bit of rules text that actually becomes interesting.
Trample.
Commander damage is a wonderful thing, but it needs to get through. A player might not have the advantage of having the right evasion for the moment, but a nice bit of trample can do in a pinch. And that's what Gallowbraid's really about. He's a 5/5 with trample that can beat face, and can screw with your opponents' preconceptions a bit. Because you're mono-black, there's an expectation that you're going to go with graveyard shenanigans rather than asking what black can do for you. And when it comes to using trample in black for a commander you have three options:
As for the cumulative upkeep... I ask a simple question: How long do commanders typically stay around? As I've played this deck, for the most part, Gallowbraid's CU text could've been replaced with "Vanishing 3; When Gallowbraid enters the battlefield, lose 6 life. (...which is still kinda sucky, but meh; sometimes life is a series of compromises.)" Because even if one person's leaving him alone for you to make the choice of CU versus keeping your life, like most creatures, he gets swept up in Wrath of Gods and Blasphemous Acts and other sweepers meant to take out some other opponent's Sen Triplets or an Azusa-fuelled token horde.
Why you should play Gallowbraid:
-You like beating face with equipment
-You like mono-black
-You like playing a little outside of expectations
-You want to savor the expressions of your opponents when they say "What?" in response to who your commander is
Why you shouldn't play Gallowbraid:
-Lifeloss upkeep scares you
-You're looking for a commander who does more than turn sideways
-You've been on and will continue to be on Team Morinfen for life
Carrionette: It's cheap to cast for a vanilla beater if you need to strap a Sword onto something, but people tend to kill it, forget about it, and then do something silly like tap out and let you exile something. It actually plays a lot better than it sounds, thanks to human nature.
Guardian Beast: He's hilarious in a deck that loves its artifact goodness. Also helps against random Shatterstorms, Simples, and other artifact destruction.
Spike Cannibal: If you haven't played this yet, I suggest you try it. At worst, it's a bad body to tie to a Sword. At best, it can defuse Kresh the Bloodbraided, demote The Mimeoplasm down to a basic Clone, negate a Decree of Savagery, and so forth... all at the same time. +1/+1 tokens can be so prevalent across decks...
Extinction: If you haven't tried Extinction either, it can be amazing. Yes, it's technically bad mass removal. Except that it isn't. It's spot removal that doesn't actually target. Sometimes you don't want to destroy a horde of Saprolings, because you need to destroy that pesky hexproof angel that's raining on your parade.
Comments and suggestions are more than welcome, of course.
I felt the same way, so I threw a bunch of Clones that have been laying in my binder into the Hydra deck as replacements for the StWSs that I also took out. I play them where Hydra only clones its own creatures, with preference to Elite Head given when revealed.
Definitely. IMO, EvT was seen favourably for the amount of value it provided while still providing a mix of enjoyable cards to use and deconstruct for other decks, if for no other reason that 1x Elspeth, Knight-Errant and 2x Swords to Plowshares alone pretty much broke even, making everything else a very pleasant bonus. Giving a DD with two good PWs that each had a decent mix was a great formula.
So? No reason that it couldn't be a reimagining of the same scene from a different perspective/style. DDs aren't set in a specific time, they just tend to show the stars of the decks in new arts. It's just unlikely that if it came to mass that Deed got new art, that it would be that way and not be something like showing Vraska plotting or a reuse of the Judge art.
You'd think this, but Nicol Bolas, Planeswalker and Okina, Temple to the Grandfathers, show how font size and width can be massaged as needed.
Depending if they wanted to expand the PW story more, Conspiracy could fit as a set name if the block was more about Bolas/Tezzeret/Whatever schemes being discovered and countered by Jace/Chandra/Gideon/Etc, and didn't take place on a single plane to boot.
If they really wanted to put an air of multiplane conspiracy in things, then it could happen by setting Set 1 on, say, Ravnica (the discovery), Set 2 on Alara (chasing the clues), and Set 3 on Zendikar (the finale). If this did happen, it would be a way for Wizards to be able to revisit planes that they might not want to spend an entire block on but still want to expand on the flavour (Mercadia and Ulgrotha come to mind first).
That's... physically nauseating in terms of ramifications to other players, yet I just can't stop being aroused by the idea.
I'd recommend Sunder too. Making everyone tuck their lands with the Puzzle Box? Hilarious.
I like the idea of Sangromancer, and will probably pick one up in the near future. The life gain would be welcome in this deck in particular.
Ashes to Ashes was in a previous build, but I ended up cutting it since I felt that three removal spells that could drain my life were too much. Hellfire's one-sided sweep and Dismember's instant speed and the optionality of making it a life payment ended up being more attractive to me than the still-amazing double exile. Though I could definitely see putting it back in at some point.
I hadn't honestly thought about Ring of Xathrid, due to generally ignoring regeneration for the most part.
I tried NL in an older build of this, and it always ended up disappointing me in just making something fatter without helping out against the hate it drew. The equip cost also hurts a lot more when your commander is demanding chunks of life to snack on before he goes to work. Lashwrithe stayed more as Korlash #2 than as an equip.
Thanks for the suggestion, though.
Fun stuff. Tried it out.
Did a few other changes. Liliana Vess always seemed more like a win-more when it came up since I was just searching for a back-up condition for an existing state every time it seemed, so I changed to Liliana of the Dark Realms.
Added in Scroll Rack and Sensei's Divining Top.
Will do some more testing later, but right now this is updated to how it stands.
Gallowbraid, http://forums.mtgsalvation.com/showthread.php?t=516184
Thank you for your service.
I agree entirely. The black Exalted cards slipped my mind, but I definitely like it better as a two-drop. I might try Nefarox, Overlord of Grixis as well while I'm at it.
Black Knight's more of a placeholder than anything. I want to keep something small and cheap in the position, but at the same time have been at a loss for something to replace it with.
I forgot Power Conduit existed. I will definitely have to go track one of those down now.
1) it's from Weatherlight (i.e. old)
2) the upkeep text isn't really inviting
3) it's not really all that amazing
However, when a person steps back, and makes the decision that yes, they want to play a red zone loving deck in mono-black, it's that one other bit of rules text that actually becomes interesting.
Trample.
Commander damage is a wonderful thing, but it needs to get through. A player might not have the advantage of having the right evasion for the moment, but a nice bit of trample can do in a pinch. And that's what Gallowbraid's really about. He's a 5/5 with trample that can beat face, and can screw with your opponents' preconceptions a bit. Because you're mono-black, there's an expectation that you're going to go with graveyard shenanigans rather than asking what black can do for you. And when it comes to using trample in black for a commander you have three options:
1) Big G
2) Rarely playing your mega-costed commander
3) Asking for an exemption every game to play this as a commander
As for the cumulative upkeep... I ask a simple question: How long do commanders typically stay around? As I've played this deck, for the most part, Gallowbraid's CU text could've been replaced with "Vanishing 3; When Gallowbraid enters the battlefield, lose 6 life. (...which is still kinda sucky, but meh; sometimes life is a series of compromises.)" Because even if one person's leaving him alone for you to make the choice of CU versus keeping your life, like most creatures, he gets swept up in Wrath of Gods and Blasphemous Acts and other sweepers meant to take out some other opponent's Sen Triplets or an Azusa-fuelled token horde.
Why you should play Gallowbraid:
-You like beating face with equipment
-You like mono-black
-You like playing a little outside of expectations
-You want to savor the expressions of your opponents when they say "What?" in response to who your commander is
Why you shouldn't play Gallowbraid:
-Lifeloss upkeep scares you
-You're looking for a commander who does more than turn sideways
-You've been on and will continue to be on Team Morinfen for life
1 Gallowbraid
Artifacts (23)
1 Batterskull
1 Basilisk Collar
1 Caged Sun
1 Eon Hub
1 Gauntlet of Power
1 Glaring Spotlight
1 Lashwrithe
1 Lightning Greaves
1 Loxodon Warhammer
1 Nevinyrral's Disk
1 Oblivion Stone
1 Relic of Progenitus
1 Scroll Rack
1 Sensei's Divining Top
1 Sol Ring
1 Swiftfoot Boots
1 Sword of Feast and Famine
1 Sword of Fire and Ice
1 Sword of Light and Shadow
1 Sword of War and Peace
1 Thran Dynamo
1 Torpor Orb
1 Wine of Blood and Iron
1 Hex Parasite
1 Solemn Simulacrum
Creatures (16)
1 Dimir House Guard
1 Disciple of Bolas
1 Fleshbag Marauder
1 Guardian Beast
1 Knight of Infamy
1 Kokusho, the Evening Star
1 Korlash, Heir to Blackblade
1 Kozilek, Butcher of Truth
1 Mikaeus, the Unhallowed
1 Nefarox, Overlord of Grixis
1 Nezumi Graverobber
1 Shriekmaw
1 Spike Cannibal
1 Vampire Hexmage
1 Vampire Nighthawk
1 Xiahou Dun, the One-Eyed
Instants (4)
1 Dismember
1 Hatred
1 Vampiric Tutor
1 Withering Boon
Sorceries (11)
1 Beseech the Queen
1 Brainspoil
1 Damnation
1 Demonic Tutor
1 Hellfire
1 Extinction
1 Mutilate
1 Promise of Power
1 Sign in Blood
1 Syphon Mind
1 Yawgmoth's Will
1 Infernal Darkness
1 Phyrexian Arena
Planeswalkers (2)
1 Karn Liberated
1 Liliana of the Dark Realms
Land (39)
1 Bojuka Bog
1 Cabal Coffers
1 Cathedral of War
1 Haunted Fengraf
1 Phyrexian Tower
1 Temple of the False God
1 Thespian's Stage
1 Urborg
1 Urborg, Tomb of Yawgmoth
1 Vesuva
29 Swamp
Guardian Beast: He's hilarious in a deck that loves its artifact goodness. Also helps against random Shatterstorms, Simples, and other artifact destruction.
Spike Cannibal: If you haven't played this yet, I suggest you try it. At worst, it's a bad body to tie to a Sword. At best, it can defuse Kresh the Bloodbraided, demote The Mimeoplasm down to a basic Clone, negate a Decree of Savagery, and so forth... all at the same time. +1/+1 tokens can be so prevalent across decks...
Extinction: If you haven't tried Extinction either, it can be amazing. Yes, it's technically bad mass removal. Except that it isn't. It's spot removal that doesn't actually target. Sometimes you don't want to destroy a horde of Saprolings, because you need to destroy that pesky hexproof angel that's raining on your parade.
Comments and suggestions are more than welcome, of course.
June 15, 2013
+Disciple of Bolas
+Scroll Rack
+Sensei's Divining Top
-Bane of the Living
-Sculpting Steel
-Umezawa's Jitte
+Liliana of the Dark Realms
-Liliana Vess
+Urborg, Tomb of Yawgmoth
-Swamp
June 11, 2013
-Lake of the Dead
+Thespian's Stage
-Khabal Ghoul
-Drana, Kalastria Bloodchief
-Ink-Eyes, Servant of Oni
-Sever the Bloodline
+Dimir House Guard
+Infernal Darkness
+Brainspoil
+Eon Hub
-Black Knight
-Necropolis Regent
+Knight of Infamy
+Nefarox, Overlord of Grixis
-Carionette
+Sign in Blood
-Rogue's Passage
+Cathedral of War