Zedd's M:tG decks - The Johnny is strong with this one!

[Zeddicuus]

I haven't seen anyone post about the Ravnica Guild Kits yet, so I thought I would.

For Christmas I received two different Guild Kits: Izzet (Niv Mizzet original for my Zndersplt/Okaun Commander, yay!) and Boros (New art for Aurelia for my Angel collection! My wife knows me too well!)

So far I only played the Izzet deck, and to be honest I was impressed with how well it worked for a precon deck. These guild kits are designed pretty good to show off what that guild is all about. Izzet, of course, is about card draw, instants & sorceries. I never really cared for Izzet when they first came out as I tend to play a lot of multiplayer, but I found this deck to be pretty fun!.

As for the other goodies in the box, the dice are always nice, the pins are actually a pretty good quality, the stickers are actually pretty nice and decorate my PC tower nicely. The deck boxes look a bit nifty, but odds are I'll only use them as box filler to keep decks upright since I use metal lunch kits to carry up to 10 decks at a time.

I haven't had a chance to try Boros yet, but given how well the Izzet one played I'm pretty sure I'll enjoy this one as well. I've already seen several cards in the guild kit I want to add to my R/W deck at a later time. For now, though, I'll leave the guild kits intact to play against others!

Anyone else get these and try them out yet?

[Zeddicuus]

Well, given the next set of Guild Kits are coming out in a month, I've taken a peek at the Orzhov one. To be honest, I really like what I saw and I am pretty excited for them to be released!

In the meantime, I've theory crafted up a deck to mess around with Orzhov and the concept of creating spirit tokens to do your bidding, which is drain your opponents until they have nothing left!

Lands: 20

7x Plains
7x Swamp
6x B/W Lands

Creatures: 24

4x Carrion Feeder B CMC 1 (Would replace if I find something better)
4x Viscera Seer B CMC 1
4x Blood Artist B CMC 2
4x Zulaport Cutthroat B CMC 2
4x Painter's Servant Art CMC 2
4x Teysa, Orzhov Scion BW CMC 3



Artifacts: 8

4x Sol Ring CMC 1
4x Orzhov Signet CMC 2

Instants/ Sorceries: 8

Haven't decided on which of these yet.

Altar's Reap CMC 2
Costly Plunder CMC 2
Night's Whisper CMC 2
Skull Tap CMC 2
Read the Bones CMC 3

Deck: 60

The idea is to try to get the major combo out of the deck: Blood Artis/Zulaport Cutthroat, Painter's Servan, Teysa Orzhov Scion & Carrion Feeder/Viscera Seer..

It would work roughly as follows:

Turn 1: Play Swamp. Tap Swamp to play Sol Ring. Tap Sol Ring to play Orzhov Signet.
Turn 2: Play Plains. Tap Sol Ring to play Orzhov Signet. Tap Swamp & Plains so you have WWBB 1. Play Painter Servant - calling Black, Blood Artist/Cutthroat & Viscera Seer/Carrion Feeder..
Turn 3: Tap a Plains & Swamp & Sol Ring/Orzhov Signet. Cast Teysa, Orvhov Scion some other creature - Doesn't matter which one. Sac rando creature to Carrion Feeder/ Viscera Seer to trigger Blood Artist/Cutthroat & Teysa's black ability to creat a B/W token. Rinse and repeat until all opponents are dead.

The deck is basically a one trick pony. The only threatening combo is from the above statement, but it's harmless looking enough most players can be caught off guard by dropping the main components once the opponent is tapped out.

I'm considering other options for the deck. Maybe some global/target creature kill as an attempt to keep control of the board until I can drop the combo. I definitely want some kind of card draw, but offhand I can't think of any recurring draw in W/B.

If anyone has suggestions for this deck, I'd really appreciate it!

[LiaThistle]

There's not a lot of recurring drawing in W/B, and even less if you're trying to stick to Modern or later. The first ones that come to mind are Phyrexian Arena and Land Tax, and I'm not sure that either of those fit what you're looking for. Your Night's Whispers thoughts are a good choice, and I personally didn't have any issues with Sign in Blood, but meh, to each their own.

There's also the other one-use options of cards like Street Wraith and Twisted Abomination, which can provide backup "brute" plans if you can't get your combo sorted.

If there's enough spirit cards in the deck (not that I recognized, but you'd know), you could always use Angel of Flight Alabaster to mimic a draw by recurring a dead spirit every turn.

These ideas brought to you courtesy my own favorite B/W decks, Tombstone Teysa and B/W Spirits.

[Zeddicuus]

Unfortunately I'm all too aware of the lack of recurring card draw in W/B. Did some checking just to be sure something didn't slip under the radar though. Out of the ones I listed I was planning to go Night's Whisper since it'w 1B while Sign in Blood is BB. I debated putting my only Land Tax in this deck to help weed out lands so I can get more useful draws, but I don't think one will make much of a difference, heheh.

Alabaster Flight would not work in this deck, as the creatures listed are not spirits. The deck relies more on abusing the creation of spirit tokens and making them black so that Teysa's ability continually triggers. I did find Darkest Hour as a nice cheap alternative to the Painter's Servant though.

As to sticking to Modern, that's never been a concern for me. The group I play in has always been casual and anything goes. That can open up a few more options. Given the group is a casual one, I've been second guessing myself on this deck. Will it be fun to play against a deck that can end a multiplayer game by turn 3-5 fairly consistently? Will it be fun with only the 1 strategy in the deck? I become less sure the more I read over the list. Might be fun to shut down the player that believes his Eldrazi deck is unbeatable though, hahaha.

Looking at your lists, some of that would work in the deck, such as Bitter Blossom, Shriekmaw, Martyr of Bones/Sands. Some nice stuff in those lists that could be quite useful. I appreciate bringing those up, they will be quite helpful!

[LiaThistle]

Fun ways to handle Eldrazi (and other large monsters):

Delirium
Meekstone + Kismet (actually, any "Creatures/Cards come into play tapped" card)
Fling effects + any repeatable creature theft (Seasinger, for example). Also works with Goblin Bombardment or Mortar Pod to make things more insulting.
Humility

Though I know they've created smaller Eldrazi since, but it's still fun to punish the heavy hitters for being heavy hitters.

However, to answer some of your questions, no, single strategy decks aren't really a lot of long term fun. It's fun to see them trigger once or twice, but after that...I think they lose their luster quickly. On the other hand, I am always a fan of beating "unbeatable" decks. I'm vicious like that.

[Zeddicuus]

Hahaha yeah I like taking on 'unbeatable' decks, because effectively I have nothing to lose according to them. They already believe I'm going to lose no matter what I do, so I can't exactly lose face, right? hahaha.

I keep a couple high speed decks around just for this purpose. B/R burn/creature kill deck that uses other cards to strip options out of their library. Thoughtseize & Surgical Extraction on Turn 1 takes a lot of wind out of a braggart's sails pretty fast, hahahaha.

[LiaThistle]

Yeah, I remember a tournament game where I had turn 1 Thoughtseize, turn 2 Duress and Thoughtseize #2, and his lowest CMC after that was 3. Though he'd never boasted of having an "unbeatable" deck, it was still an opening he just never recovered from.

The one "unbeatable" deck I remember facing against was a rainbow sliver deck in a multiplayer game. I was the last player standing of that multiplayer game, though, to be fair, I was playing a deck that abused the slower multiplayer game to create a game state where it could survive nearly indefinitely against almost anything that was out at the time. Counterspells would have been the end of it, but few people play those in multiplayer. wink

[Zeddicuus]

OOoh sliver decks! I love playing against sliver decks. I hate using them, but I enjoy playing against them! We used to have a player that only used sliver decks. This would get a bit boring as it was the same deck over and over, even though he had several. He would always go back to Slivers every other game.

as to the deck I posted, I adjusted it for an alternative style deck that uses the first strategy, but incorporates a plan B that could work on its own or blend in plan A and do some hopefully fun things.

Lands: 22

8x Plains
8x Swamp
6x B/W Lands

Creatures: 22

4x Essence Warden W CMC 1 Common
4x Carrion Feeder B CMC 1 Common
4x Viscera Seer B CMC 1 Common
3x Blood Artist B CMC 2 Uncommon
1x Zulaport Cutthroat B CMC 2 Uncommon
2x Teysa, Orzhov Scion BW CMC 3 Rare
2x Teysa Karlov BW CMC 4 Rare
2x Vizkopa Guildmage BW CMC 3 Uncommon

Enchantments: 4

4x Darkest Hour B CMC 1 Rare

Artifacts: 8

4x Sol Ring CMC 1 Rare
4x Orzhov Signet CMC 2 Common

Instants/ Sorceries: 4

2x Plague of Vermin CMC 7
2xNight's Whisper CMC 2

Deck: 60

Plan A is the same. Plan be is to try to ramp up to sac'ing black creaturesto create tokens with both Teysas out. I could choose to swarm opponents or wear them down with the death triggers on the Cutthroats/Blood Artists or blend both together as the situation permits. Might be more fun to play as there is more to the deck, but I'll lose consistency with either strategy. Not that would bother me much, one of my other token decks does well with 1x/2x of most cards in the deck for versatility and variety sake.

How do you think this would play out? I could try to add 4x Painter's Servant for redundancy on the "All creatures are Black" effect going on. If I can't get card draw easily into the deck, I'll just put the same ability with different names in the deck.

[Zeddicuus]

Alrighty, built the W/B deck similar to the one listed above. Some differences as I didn't have all the cards yet (marker on lands = awesome proxies) and wanted to try some minor tweaks. Used it a few times, got the combo to go wombo a few times which was funny, but still testing to see if I want to finish acquiring everything for it. Will post about it later as I will be using it tonight.

Here is another deck concept I'm working on.

Deck Name: "They call me MISTER PIG"

Creatures

Coalhauler Swine(Pumba)
Stuffy Doll
Boros Reckoner
Spitemare
TrueFire Captain
Silverclad Ferocidons
Mogg Maniac
Volcano Hellion
Firemane Avenger


Indestructible
Shield of Kaldra
Darksteel Plate
Indestructibility
Gift of Immortality
Nahiri's Machinations
Boros Charm

Damage redirect
Pariah
Pariah Shield
Gideon's Sacrifice
Martyrdom

Damage Prevention
CoP: Red
Prismatic Strands

Damage Dealers
Pyrohemia
Guilty Conscience
Arcbond
Big Burn Spells

Coalhauler Swine & CoP:R & Gideon's Sacrifice & burn all creatures = End Game

The concept is to get a creature out , slap its arse and send it to Rampage Town, just like Pumbaa in the original "The Lion King" hence the name of the deck.

Picked several other creatures that do similar as well as various Indestructible effects/spells and damage redirecting so I can stop the infinite loop should Pariah Shield/Darksteel plate/ Pumbaa go off.

Will get a more focused spell list once I find time to sit down and start gathering the pieces, though I'll probably have to dismantle a couple decks to get some of these pieces. Need some new stuff anyways hahaha.

[LiaThistle]

Swans of Bryn Argoll?

[Zeddicuus]

That's a real good one to include, given the strategy! You can almost never have too much card draw!

I'll have to root through my binders to add that!

Last night I managed to get a hold of some of the missing components for this deck. I'm hoping to get more time this weekend to weed through my collection and start piecing most of it together.

[Zeddicuus]

Alrighty, going through the list and seeing what I have. Things I don't have I am looking for suitable replacements.

So far, in place of Indestructibility and Gift of Immortality, I found instants that give Indestructible. Boros Charm is a prime example.

I only have 1 Pariah Shield and 0 Pariah (BOOO!), so again I'm using instants like Arcbond and Gideon's Sacrifice as replacements.

Contemplating throwing in some Guttersnipes, just because of the amount of instants involved.

I feel this deck might be more of fa jump scare when I'm using instants like this at least, which could be amusing. I plan to go through some of my other stuff a bit more fully over the weekend, see if I can assemble a full prototype, as well as find my damn swans. This deck is so perfect for them.

Unfortunately I don't have everything I initially listed, but I'll just have to make due.

[Zeddicuus]

Throne of Eldraine just released, and with it some new deck brewing!

Here is what I designed so far. Working on acquiring the cards, but in Arena it has proven to be a very interesting deck!

Mono Black - Food is not always good for you!

Land (24)
24x Swamp

Creature (27)

4x Ayara, First of Locthwain
4x Bloodthirsty Aerialist
4x Cauldron Familiar
4x Murderous Rider
4x Syr Konrad, the Grim
3x Tempting Witch
4x Vindictive Vampire

Artifact (4)
4x Witch's Oven

Instant & Sorcery (5)
2x Bake into a Pie
3x Foreboding Fruit

The Strategy:

The main strategy is to get creatures in to play to trigger Ayara, and/or get a Cauldron Familiar going with Witch's Ovens to help be chump blocks and trigger multiple life drain with Ayara, First of Locthwain , Syr Konrad, the Grim or Vindictive Vampire . The life gain from these should bolster the Bloodthirsty Aerialist with +1/+1 counters aplenty to get some big hits.

Syr Konrad, the Grim 's secondary ability actually works pretty good in this deck once you start getting the kitty kombo going on. Foreboding Fruit serves double duty: It's either netting you precious card draw or draining 2 life from a tapped out opponent to try to finish the game. Tempting Witch pops out some food to get your Cauldron Familiar back if you need it, or can make secondary use of your food in draining life from an opponent with any extra food you don't immediately need.

If you want to make this deck more budget friendly than it already is, just replace the Murderous Rider s with Murder . The only real difference is you can get a body if you're in a tight spot, allowing a nice and tidy 2-for-1 with that 3 CMC card slot should Lady Luck be spitting in your Food.

It's mostly a gimmick/theme deck I built around the Food aspect in Throne of Eldraine while messing around on Arena, but it has turned out to be pretty fun and pretty versatile thus far!

Of course, card suggestions are always welcome! I am trying to keep this standard if possible just to see how well I can create this deck!

[Zeddicuus]

Alrighty, so I used the above Black food deck multiple times on Arena, and tweaked once I got a feel for the cards. It's fairly different now, I'll post the deck below:

Land (23)
2x Castle Locthwain
19x Swamp
2x Witch's Cottage

Creature (2 cool
3x Ayara, First of Locthwain
3x Bloodthirsty Aerialist
4x Cauldron Familiar
2x Cavalier of Night
3x Midnight Reaper
4x Murderous Rider
3x Order of Midnight
3x Syr Konrad, the Grim
3x Vindictive Vampire

Artifact (4)
4x Witch's Oven

Instant & Sorceries (5)
2x Murder
3x Foreboding Fruit



It's been a lot of fun to use. But now is the time to tweak it up and make it so much better!

Total changes as are thus:

+2 Cavalier of Night
+3 Midnight Reaper
+2 Castle Locthwain
+2 Witch's Cottage
+3 Order of Midnight
+2 Murder

-1 Bloodthirsty Aerialist
-1 Syr Konrad, the Grim
-1 Ayara, First of Locthwain
-3 Tempting Witch
-1 Vindictive Vampire
-5 Swamp
-2 Bake into a Pie

The changes should allow for that all important card draw from when the kitties die, a way to revive important creatures, and a means to use my creatures as a sacrifice to destroy other creatures. Mana costs shift very little, but I'm getting more for my mana.

Again, any comments or suggestions are always appreciated!

[Zeddicuus]

Commander deck involving Ebondeath, Dracolich.

https://tappedout.net/mtg-decks/ebondeath-the-everliving/

For those that do not like clicking links, I'll list it below:

1 Abhorrent Overlord
1 Altar of the Brood
1 Ancient Tomb
1 Arcane Signet
1 Ashnod's Altar
1 Ayara, First of Locthwain
1 Balthor the Defiled
1 Bastion of Remembrance
1 Blasting Station
1 Blood Artist
1 Bolas's Citadel
1 Bond of Agony
1 Boneyard Scourge
1 Bontu's Monument
1 Bubbling Muck
1 Cabal Stronghold
1 Corpse Harvester
1 Damnation
1 Deadly Dispute
1 Desecrated Tomb
1 Drag to the Underworld
1 Ebondeath, Dracolich
1 Endrek Sahr, Master Breeder
1 Environmental Sciences
1 Erebos, God of the Dead
1 Expedition Map
1 Exsanguinate
1 Feed the Swarm
1 Gate to the Afterlife
1 Ghoulish Procession
1 Gild
1 Grave Pact
1 Grave Titan
1 Gravecrawler
1 Gray Merchant of Asphodel
1 Greed
1 Grim Haruspex
1 Hero's Downfall
1 Jet Medallion
1 Journeyer's Kite
1 Kokusho, the Evening Star
1 Life's Finale
1 Malevolent Awakening
1 Minions' Murmurs
1 Nether Traitor
1 Nykthos, Shrine to Nyx
1 Phyrexian Altar
1 Phyrexian Arena
1 Pitiless Plunderer
1 Plague of Vermin
1 Plumb the Forbidden
1 Poison the Cup
1 Reassembling Skeleton
1 Rise of the Dark Realms
1 Sedgemoor Witch
1 Shizo, Death's Storehouse
1 Sifter of Skulls
1 Skirge Familiar
1 Skullclamp
1 Sol Ring
1 Spark Harvest
30 Swamp
1 Syr Konrad, the Grim
1 Thawing Glaciers
1 Torment of Hailfire
1 Tormod, the Desecrator
1 Tragic Slip
1 Village Rites
1 Vito, Thorn of the Dusk Rose
1 Wayfarer's Bauble
1 Zulaport Cutthroat

This deck makes excessive use of having creatures that can be revived either by their own ability, or by the use of another card. Examples of these are Reassembling Skeletons, Gravecrawler, Nether Traitor, Ebondeath.

Many cards make use of Enters the Battlefield or Dies triggered abilities to take advantage of these creatures. These can be found in nearly every category.

More details on how parts of the deck are as follows

"The Undeath" combo

Having Phyrexian Altar, One of the #Tokens permanents that create creature tokens (preferably more than one!) and a single #Enabler can effectively give you a controlled infinite recursion. Cast the Enabler, then sacrifice it for mana. Tormod and the Desecrated Crypt will make 2 zombie tokens. Sacrifice the whole batch to the Phyrexian Altar to acquire that much Black mana, plus creatures died that turn for those that care about that such as the #Loss of Life group, some in #Card Draw, as well as a couple in the #Enabler group. Rinse and repeat. If done right, you might even get infinite mana. If you have a way to get lots of black mana (Like Sacrifice or Bubbling Muck), you can use Ashnod's Altar instead of Phyrexian Alter. Not infinite, but it can turn into a lot.

Loss of Life Win

Use "The Undeath" to keep spinning the #Enablers in and out of your graveyard, triggers Enters the Battlefield and Dies/Leaves the Battlefield triggers to drain life from all opponents. Slow but steady can indeed win the race.

Big Mana Win

Use "The Undeath" to basically go infinite on mana and drop a huge Torrent of Hailfire or Exsanguinate. Bonds of Agony if you want to make sure everyone feels treated equally, just be sure to gain life before doing so!

Another Big Win is building up some Life and using Plague of Vermin to create a huge number of rat tokens. Sure, your opponents get rats, but if you have any of the Dies triggers from #Loss of Life on the battlefield, you can sac all those rats through an altar to drain them all of life.

Drain'em All and Let Erebos Sort them out

"The Undeath" makes heavy use of Altar of the Brood's ETB effects. Take advantage of that.