Merfolk Update

I decided to finally post a decklist of Merfolk in its current state. It's pretty much what I've been talking about all along but with a few cards added in after Alara Reborn's release.

Merlark 2.0

Creatures:

3 x Cursecatcher

4 x Merrow Reejerey
3 x Reveillark
3 x Mirror Entity

4 x Silvergill Adept

2 x Sower of Temptation

3 x Stonybrook Banneret

3 x Meddling Mage
3 x Sygg, River Guide

Other Spells:

3 x Sage's Dousing
3 x Path to Exile

3 x Cryptic Command

Land:

4 x Adarkar Wastes

1 x Faerie Conclave

5 x Island

4 x Mutavault

3 x Mystic Gate

2 x Plains

4 x Wanderwine Hub

Sideboard:

2 x Flashfreeze

2 x Glen Elendra Archmage

2 x Jace Beleren

4 x Burrenton Forge-Tender

2 x Celestial Purge

3 x Wispmare

The main changes to the deck consist of the addition of three Meddling Mage and a little tweaking of the sideboard for the post-regionals meta. Since everybody and their mother seems to be running BW tokens lately I decided to add Wispmare to my sideboard because of the abundance of bitterblossoms and Glorious Anthems in the current meta. I also added a couple Flashfreeze to the side because of the ridiculous Bloodbraid Elf that is going to be making Jund decks much more powerful.

You may be asking yourself why I'm running Mirror Entity instead of Wake Thrasher. The answer is simple: It's BETTER!. Wake Thrasher is able to buff itself without using up any of your resources but the versatility of Mirror Entity is much better for a deck like this. Can a wake thrasher save your entire board from a Volcanic Fallout? Can Wake Thrasher make your entire team Merfolk? Can Wake Thrasher let you pump your entire team at the same time? I didn't think so.. It's true that Wake Thrasher is a good card, I'm just not convinced it's better than Mirror Entity. That's pretty much all I have to say about this deck that hasn't already been said. Let me know what you think!

(Links & pictures provided by Mtgfanatic and Wizards of the Coast Inc. respectively)

If I Was Going To Regionals...

Because I'm going to Disneyland this weekend (WOOT!) I will be unable to attend regionals. This is actually a relief because I'm nowhere close to having a deck tournament ready. If I weren't so lazy maybe I would be more dissapointed :P If I was going to go to regionals on Saturday I would most likely be playing either the Doran Lark deck from earlier this week or a Red/Green Aggro deck I've been working on that utilizes some new Alara Reborn cards such as: Bloodbraid Elf, Jund Hackblade, Violent Outburst, and Colossal Might. It has made the pair of colors much stronger and I filled the deck with cards that would compliment the hasty strategy that these cards encourage. The basic premise of the deck is to hit early and often and for as much damage as you can. It also lets you play multiple spells for a single cost by using cascade. It is a simple deck but it is fun to play because it is so blisteringly fast!

RG Aggro

Creatures:

4x Bloodbraid Elf
4x Jund Hackblade
4x Figure of Destiny
4x Rip-Clan Crasher
4x Hellspark Elemental
4x Boartusk Liege
4x Boggart Ram-Gang

Other Spells:

4x Incinerate
3x Colossal Might
4x Violent Outburst

Lands:

4 Forest
4 Fire-Lit Thicket
9 Mountain
4 Karplusan Forest
2 Treetop Village

Speed and stability are two very different things. The Sideboard that I'm working on is going to help make this decklist more stable against the current Meta. Though if it proves to be too unruly then I will probably go towards a Jund approach rather than just Red/Green. Please let me know what you think!

(Pictures and links provided by Wizards of the Coast Inc.)

Updated "Artifatties" Decklist

Artifatties!

Creatures:
1 x Grim Poppet
1 x Platinum Angel
1 x Scarecrone
1 x Inkwell Leviathan
4 x Master Transmuter
4 x Merfolk Looter
4 x Tidehollow Sculler
1 x Magister Sphinx
1 x Sharuum the Hegemon
4 x Sphinx Summoner


Other Spells:
4 x Mind Stone
3 x Sculpting Steel
4 x Thousand-Year Elixir
3 x Makeshift Mannequin
2 x Tezzeret the Seeker


Land:
3 x Island
2 x Mystic Gate
3 x Reflecting Pool
2 x Sunken Ruins
4 x Arcane Sanctum
4 x Vivid Creek
2 x Vivid Marsh
2 x Vivid Meadow


Added the Makeshift Mannequins back in because they are more consistent than running just scarecrone. 2 more sculping steels got added into the mix because they are extremely versitile cards when paired with the Transmuter. It basically adds three more of each non-land card to the deck. Updated the mana base a little and added Tezzerets to the mix because he strengthens the deck considerably. Still needs some work as far as spot removal and aggro control but its getting there!

(Links and picture provided by MTGfanatic.com)

Artifatties!

As I opened my Conflux booster box I opened several ( 3 in fact) Master Transmuters and thought that her ability would be extremely fun to build around. Shortly after I managed to get distracted by a building my Druids! and Merfolk decks ( see earlier posts) and forgot all about the idea. Sometime later I happened upon an article on the Wizards website talking about a budget version of the deck I had already been thinking about making. I decided it was time to build the deck and after purchasing the cards that make up the main engine of the deck I decided to try and take it a few steps further. I made the mana base smaller and more efficient (though much more expensive) as well as adding more fatties from Conflux and Shards. I then proceeded to troll the Alara Reborn spoiler in search of cards from the upcoming set that would make the deck even more fun when the new set came out. Here is what I have right now:

Creatures:
4 Master Transmuter
4 Merfolk Looter
4 Tidehollow Sculler
3 Plumeveil
4 Sphinx Summoner
1 Sharuum the Hegemon
1 Sen Triplets ( Alara Reborn)
1 Filigree Angel ( Alara Reborn)
1 Ethersworn Adjudicator
1 Platinum Angel
1 Scarecrone
1 Grim Poppet
1 Magister Sphinx
1 Inkwell Leviathan

Other Spells:
4 Thousand-Year Elixir
4 Mindstone
2 Tezzeret the Seeker
1 Sculpting Steel

Lands:
3 Reflecting Pool
2 Vivid Marsh
4 Vivid Creek
2 Vivid Meadow
4 Arcane Sanctum
2 Sunken Ruins
2 Mystic Gate
3 Island

I'm not sure how stable the deck is in its current form and I'm still messing around with the creatures and numbers of cards right now so please feel free to give me suggestions! The way the deck works is by getting your Thousand-Year Elixir and Master Transmuter into play and then use the Sphinx Summoner to tutor up whatever you need for the situation you are currently in. Merfolk Looter is another key utility card because it thins your deck out quickly to get your key cards into play faster.

I decided to take out the Makeshift Mannequins that were originally in the deck in favor or Scarecrone because it has the potential to be better in most match ups (especially against control). Scarecrone is especially good with Sharuum because you can tap four colorless and tap it to return Sharuum and with its ability on the stack tap one colorless and sac it to draw a card returning both it and Sharuum to play and gaining valuable card advantage in the process. Inkwell Leviathan is amazing because once you transmute it into play it is nearly unstoppable (save for a Wrath). Filigree Angel is going to be fun because you can pop it in and out of play with your Transmuter gaining 3x the number of artifacts you control of life each time! Sen triplets is just plain good against control decks because even if they try and bounce or path it you can just use your Transmuter to keep it in play!

The deck stands up pretty well against any spot removal because you can just use your Transmuter to bounce things in and out of play (including itself!) causing your opponent's removal spells to fizzle on resolution because of a lack of valid targets. I'm also thinking of trying to replace something with Glassdust Hulk (Alara Reborn) because it has awesome synergy with Master Transmuter and the rest of this deck. I might end up putting Sen Triplets in the sideboard for control matchups and replacing it with Glassdust Hulk in the main deck. The sideboard isn't complete so any thoughts on that would be appreciated as well! The rest is pretty self explanatory and it is an extremely fun deck to play and tweak! Please let me know if you have any ideas about how to make the deck better or just more efficient!

(Pictures Courtesy of Coolstuff.com, diver.com & trollandtoad.com)

Fixing Merfolk

Originally I built my merfolk deck along the same lines as my druid deck; quick to hit but little defense. When I decided to run this deck at last weeks Friday Night Magic tournament I added in some control and mill cards to give me more options mid and late game. I added 2 Remove Soul, 2 Negate, 2 Coordinated Barrage, 3 Drowner of Secrets. I kept 2 or 3 Judge of Currents in the main deck just in case and he was a welcome sight against several Red/Green Beatdown variants. I also added in 2 Silvergill Dousers to keep cards like Chameleon Colossus at bay until I could manage to overrun them with tokens or mill them out. A couple games I managed to mill my opponents deck down without the addition of Grimoire Thief (which I forgot to add in before leaving my apartment :S). Oblivion Ring seemed to be the card of the night and I spent most of my negates trying to keep my Drowners and Merrow Reejerey in play. All in all my favorite card of the night was Mirrorweave. It saved my hide countless times especially against aggro decks. I would just wait until they swung out with all of their 3/3s and bigger, Mirrorweave one of my tokens and wipe their side of the board by blocking with my tokens. A perfect example of how good this card really is happened during the last match of the night:

I have a ~5 1/1 tokens, a Douser, Drowner, and two Merrow Commerce out and I'm trying to mill my opponent before he has time to beat me down with red/green goblins. I'm staring down the business ends of two Boartusk Lieges and a Boggart Ram-Gang who looked mighty hungry and my Merfolk seemed to be on the menu. A quick check of my hand showed a shiny Mirrorweave and enough mana to play it. I checked my side of the board and then his. I did some mental math estimating I needed to stall him for just one more turn to be able to mill him out. As I figured he turns his board sideways declaring that he was attacking me with everything he had. I quickly tapped four and Mirrorweaved my Douser and tapped 3 of my creatures to reduce their enemy's power to zero. I then waited for him to finish his turn and for my creatures to return to normal. After untapping, tapping to mill, untapping for one of my Commerce, re-tapping to mill, untapping for the other Commerce, re-tapping to mill again I had just enough to mill him out.

To make a long story even longer adding control elements to the deck went a long way towards increasing its effectiveness and resilience. Even though my record wasn't the greatest (2 Wins-2 Losses-1 Tie) I was very pleased with the performance of the deck in it's current form and with my play throughout the night. I will add "before" and "after" decklists when I get home tonight!