Couchdad gains life, I gain advantage

Deck philosphy

When I started playing magic I thought that life gain was a useful mechanic. I quickly realised that it wasn't beyond a certain point. This deck aims to make great use of life gain by either drawing me cards or by outright winning me the game.

How I do this

This deck has several ways of winning. The most likely way to win is with Exquisite Blood+Sanguine Bond,Vizkopa Guildmage or Defiant Bloodlord. Exquisite Blood also allows me to effectively machine gun down my opponents with Aetherflux Reservoir, but it's a little more risky if they can blow up Exquisite. If all else fails and I have Urborg, Tomb of Yawgmoth and Crypt Ghast (or the Cabal Coffers that I'll eventually invest in) on board than I can potentially drop a huge drain from Debt to the Deathless.

If I have complete control over the board and more than 40 life Felidar Sovereign or Test of Endurance can give me essentially a free win as early as turn 7 or 5 respectively (If I don't hit any of my rocks or other ramp) and if all else fails I can swing in with an army of horses from Crested Sunmare or a massive Serra Avatar in the later game.

How I get to my endgame

This deck loves to draw cards and control the board. Obviously once Couchdad hits the board I'm drawing an extra card at the start of my turn for an extra mana, while pinging everyone else at the table.Drogskol Reaver turns all the life gain in the deck into a massive draw engine, while the classic pair Rhystic Study and Phyrexian Arena are proven card draw.

As the game progresses I'm able to search for my final combo pieces with my tutor's, but in the meantime, I try to set up a pillow fort using Propaganda and Ghostly Prison that's useful when online, but not crucial to the game plan.

Where it feels a bit weak right now

Playing it so far (the deck is missing a couple of pieces at the moment) the deck feels a little slow to start and way too reactive. I think I've solved the speed problem by adding in slightly more rocks to get the bigger stuff out sooner and lower cmc draw to dig through the deck faster. As for the slowness, my other EDH deck is a Mayael deck (not up to date but close enough) so that feeling might just be that Couchdad's control style is just taking some getting used to. In case it isn't then any suggestions for some more proactive cards would be awesome

Suggestions

Updates Add

Comments

99% Casual

Competitive

Date added 6 years
Last updated 6 years
Legality

This deck is Commander / EDH legal.

Rarity (main - side)

17 - 0 Mythic Rares

40 - 0 Rares

24 - 0 Uncommons

4 - 0 Commons

Cards 100
Avg. CMC 3.57
Tokens Bird 2/2 U, Horse 5/5 W, Warrior 1/1 W
Votes
Ignored suggestions
Shared with
Views