This is a deck I'm working on for the purpose of a special Standard variant tournament: one where you can have only 8 "points" worth of Rare or Mythic cards. M13 Dual Lands count for 1/2 point, and all other rares count for 1 point.
My current idea is to have a deck that can change its roles entirely on the fly - by default, it's a deck that relies heavily on enchantment-based control, taking advantage of the fact that people tend not to run much enchantment removal and finally dropping mostly hexproof creatures that could be enchanted for additional damage. The sideboard would allow it to change to a mostly counter-based control deck, with the same end goal but switching out enchantments (and somewhat weakening the Ethereal Armor play) in favor of instant-based removal.
vs. Exalted | vs. large creatures | vs. Creature Aggro
Fight as-is (maybe Essence scatter situationally)
vs. Populate
(+) Essence Scatter | Negate (depending on populate source)(-) defang
vs. Counter-based | Thragtusk/Resto
(+) Negate(+) Syncopate(+) Essence Scatter(+) Augur of Bolas(-) Defang(-) Pacifism | Oblivion Ring (depending on situation)(-) Invisible Stalker(-) Ethereal Armor
vs. Heavy Burn w/limited aggro
(+) Negate(+) Syncopate(+) Essence Scatter(+) Augur of Bolas(-) Defang(-) Pacifism(-) Lyev Skyknight
vs. Heavy Aggro w/ limited burn
(+) negate(+) syncopate(-) Oblivion Ring(-) Lyev Skyknight
Alternative ideas:
Detention Sphere instead of Lone Revenant for clearing out sets of duplicate creatures. (In practice, I found that I seldom actually got a 2-for-1 or higher with Detention Sphere)
Start as counter deck, and sideboard into enchantment-heavy approach instead of vice-versa (may make more sense given likely opponents)
More card draw/lifegain(?) Maybe even substitute detention spheres for Sphinx's Revelation?
