Explore the Unseen (B/U/G Pack Rat/Pain Seer)

Standard BG (Golgari) BUG (Sultai) Discard Midrange Theme/Gimmick

arimondry

Creature (18)

• 3x Deathrite Shaman
• 2x Desecration Demon
• 3x Kiora's Follower
• 4x Pack Rat
• 3x Pain Seer
• 3x Scavenging Ooze

Planeswalker (4)

• 2x Kiora, the Crashing Wave
• 2x Vraska the Unseen

Land (21)

• 2x Breeding Pool
• 4x Forest
• 1x Golgari Guildgate
• 4x Overgrown Tomb
• 4x Swamp
• 2x Temple of Deceit
• 2x Temple of Mystery
• 2x Watery Grave

Artifact (3)

• 3x Springleaf Drum

Instant (10)

• 3x Abrupt Decay
• 2x Golgari Charm
• 3x Grisly Salvage
• 2x Hero's Downfall

Sorcery (4)

• 4x Thoughtseize

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Sideboard

Creature (4)

• 2x Erebos, God of the Dead
• 2x Lifebane Zombie

Artifact (2)

• 2x Glaring Spotlight

Instant (9)

• 2x Bile Blight
• 3x Far / Away
• 2x Golgari Charm
• 2x Hero's Downfall

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My attempt at making Pain Seer playable. Instead of building the deck around him from scratch, I figured I'd ease him into a list that already operates rather smoothly.

This is a deviation on my Golgari Dump Truck Aggro deck, adjusting for Born of the Gods and the fabulous cards that are Pain Seer and Kiora's Follower. Ultimately, the goal of the deck is to discard to Pack Rat, and create an army of largish, hard-to-answer creatures and swing for win. It features utility creatures in the form of Scavenging Ooze and Deathrite Shaman. Additionally, the deck runs Kiora, the Crashing Wave as a really gross mana-ramp effect (2 Explore in standard, on one card? I'm down). The main sources of color-fixing/mana ramp in this deck are going to come from Springleaf Drum and Deathrite Shaman, which is made infinitely more useful by the ability to untap with Kiora's Follower, another gem for utility. Essentially, this deck is supposed to pilot with 2-3 lands on board, using the drum, shaman and follower to discard your hand for Pack Rat copies. Pain Seer, while not the sole focus of the deck, is made useful as a target for the drum and the follower, triggering his ability to replenish your rapidly-depleting hand. Additionally, if you draw more than what you want of him, he gets chucked to the Rats! Grisly Salvage is a phenomenal spell for this deck, helping to fetch that first Pack Rat, and adding 4 more cards to the graveyard as targets for Deathrite Shaman and Scavenging Ooze: this card is essentially raw fuel. Additionally in the deck are Abrupt Decay, IMO one of the best removal spells in the game and its counterpart Hero's Downfall. Thoughtseize runs as a cantrip to help deal with answers in an opponent's hand, and Desecration Demon because he is made easily a LOT more powerful by being untapped from Kiora's Follower. Lastly, I am running 2 Vraska the Unseen because she is incredible.

TL;DR Version: This deck uses synergy from a number of different cards in B/U/G color identities to create powerful board presence, a sustainable draw engine, and huge amounts of utility.

Let me know what you guys think, any help is appreciated!

Kiora's Follower + Pain Seer + Springleaf Drum

Top Ranked	Achieved #20 position overall 10 years ago
Date added	10 years
Last updated	10 years
Key combos	Kiora's Follower + Pain Seer + Springleaf Drum
Legality	This deck is not Standard legal.
Rarity (main - side)	8 - 2 Mythic Rares 30 - 4 Rares 10 - 9 Uncommons 4 - 0 Commons
Cards	60
Avg. CMC	2.15
Tokens	Assassin 1/1 B w/ Player Killer, Copy Clone, Emblem Kiora, the Crashing Wave, Kraken 9/9 U
Folders	Must Try Decks Made By Others, Deck I'd Like to Playtest, Examples, decks I like, infinite combo, Interesting stuff, Hiropain, Inspiration, standard worthy decks, standard