"This deck has undergone a massive change over the last month or so. I went from using a strategy built around Butcher of the Horde to a more control build using Monastey Mentor. I found that Butcher of the Horde was too slow, and made the deck clunky. In this deck the main goal is to grind out your opponent by killing their creatures with burn/removal, and beating away at them with multiple spirits from Lingering Souls and Monastery Mentor with the monks it generates. This build is more efficient because instead of wasting your mana on creatures that will draw hate, and be inevitably killed, you can keep up mana to kill their creatures, and kill them with small attacks throughout the match.
+1 if you like the deck, and please, PLEASE leave s comment or two. I want to hear your ideas. :)
The Primer
Overview
No Aristocrats!?
No Aristocrats!?
You may be wondering why I cut Butcher of the Horde, and the entire Aristocrats strategy, from the deck. This was because Butcher of the Horde, my main beater, was inefficient. Butcher is inefficient because of the fact that this deck needs to be able to keep up mana for removal to stop large threats that are not cast during your turn, and Butcher hindered this aspect of the deck. I would need to cast him Turn 4, and therefore use all my manafor that turn. Turn 4 is extremely important in modern, and you cannot waste that crucial turning point in the game by casting a Butcher, perhaps sacking a creature to Butcher and then inevitably have it die to removal. Which brings us to the flaws of the entire Aristocrat strategy. Sacrificing one of your creatures to another creature is like putting all your eggs in one basket. This sets you up for a host of two-for-ones where you opponent lets you sac a creature, and then destroys the remaining creature themselves. Even Falkenrath Aristocrat is vulnerable to this through board wipes and Bile Blight. Not to mention, Falkenrath Aristocrat be targeted with a removal/burn spell in response to you attempting to sacrifice a creature, killing the Aristocrat. And don't forget they can counter your Turn 4 baddie.
To wrap up, the Aristocrats demographic is too vulnerable and inefficient to play effectively in modern. This is because the main win cons have giant targets on their heads, and the aforementioned win cons' abilities set you up for two-for-ones.
Deck Strengths
Deck strengths
This deck is extremely good at dissecting combos and is powerful against eggs-in-one-basket strategy. Because of the large amount of removal and burn in this deck, this deck is effective at stopping several top tier decks, because this deck pings away at your opponent with spirits from Lingering Souls, Dark Confidant, or the monks from Monastery Mentor, while preventing them from stabilizing with Terminate, Crackling Doom, Kolaghan's Command, and the hand disruption you have.
Deck weaknesses
Deck Weaknesses
This deck has issues dealing with Planeswalkers, and aggressive decks. This is because it has almost no options against planeswalkers, and it needs 2-3 turns to be able to start dealing with multiple threats.
Matchups and Sideboarding
Matchups and Sideboarding
R/G Tron: In: Fulminator Mage, Thoughtseize Out: Lightning Bolt This is gonna be a hard one. R/G Tron runs planewalkers, namely Ugin and Karn. These are gonna be huge issues. It IS possible to win however, with some hand disruption, land destruction, and some luck.
U Tron: In: Fulminator Mage, Grand Abolisher,
Thoughseize
Out: Terminate, 1-2 Dark Confidant Again, this is a tough matchup, because they have a large amount of counterspells at their disposal, not to mention a planeswalker as well. Fulminator Mage is your best hope here, and you will need hand disruption as well to try to stop the counterspells/win cons.
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