Pump deck pumps. Infect deck infects. Behold Phyrexian Perfection. My first project after reaching satisfaction with my signature vampires. I've been spreading Phyrexia's toxic oil ever since, assimilating other PlanesWalkers into Yawgmoth's glory one by one.
For those who are unfamiliar with the mechanic, Infect is pretty simple. My creatures deal damage to creatures in the form of -1/-1 counters, meaning that damage is not only permanent, but it makes things weaker as well. And they deal damage to player as poison counters instead of actual damage. 10 poison is a game over. This deck aims to swing fast and hard by taking a creature with infect, buffing its power, guarding it from removal, and possibly applying evasion or trample.
Generally speaking, earliest win is the occasional one-shot on turn 2. Turn 3 or 4 is more common, as Blighted Agent kills need some set up.
My lineup is pretty straightforward.
Vectors of the Great Poison:
Glistener Elf: A one-drop infect is just awesome. Single-handedly makes turn 2 wins possible. 4 is a must in every infect build that runs green.
Blighted Agent: The reason I run blue. What's better than a one-drop infect creature? How about a two-drop that can't be blocked? Combining this with Vines of Vastwood is nigh impossible to stop.
Inkmoth Nexus: Dodges sorcery speed removal, survives things like Pyroclasm. Flying is icing on this oil-laced cake.
Buffs:
Noble Hierarch: The best card in the deck. She ramps. For all of my colors, no less. She provides an exalted trigger. She comes out turn 1. She does everything infect needs in a support creature.
Pendelhaven: Reusable, cost-efficient, and a good way to get extra counters when I run out of pump spells.
Wild Defiance: In a format where the most common forms of removal are Lightning Bolt and Lightning Helix, this makes my infected creatures that much harder to kill. It also turns my Mutagenic Growths into +5 buffs for no mana, and makes my +4s practically a kill by themselves. 3 mana is a bit much, but is doable thanks to my Hierarchs.
Vines of Vastwood: Essentially hexproof for one mana. For two, it's hexproof with a massive +4/+4 buff. An undeniable staple.
Groundswell: In my personal opinion, the better Might of Old Krosa. Especially if I'm sitting on a fetch.
Might of Old Krosa: I dislike having to cast this at the main phase, but a second set of one-mana +4/+4 buffs is hard to turn down.
Mutagenic Growth: I love this card. I really do. A free buff is too good.
Become Immense: Requires some setup, but this deck is good at building grave. This card can become really gamebreaking in a hurry. This card should be easily castable by turn 3 if you're smart about the order you play your cards in.
Distortion Strike: A reusable, albeit small buff that makes my Glistener Elves into Blighted Agents.
Miscellaneous support:
Apostle's Blessing: Protecting my creatures from removal is important. But it doesn't stop there. I can use the protection to get in an easy hit and push for game.
Spell Pierce: A fantastic one-mana counterspell that hits everything it needs to.
Twisted Image: At worst it lets me draw and sometimes hit a little harder with Pendelhaven. This is mainly here because opposing Spellskite really does hurt me.
Gitaxian Probe: A personal choice. It lets me dig one card deeper while scouting for threats for no mana. Knowing my opponent's hand lets me plan ahead and play around things like removal spells. Using this turn 1, I can typically formulate a game plan on the spot. Promo art because I like my Gitaxian Probes being actual probes.
Dryad Arbor: Another personal call. Baiting an attack with a fetch in play allows me to spawn an instant blocker. A swinging boss is usually a tapped boss. And a tapped boss poses no threat to my elves.
Spellskite: It's a blocker which doesn't die to bolts, it can take one for the team if they drop a killspell as I swing for game, it completely screws over Twin Exarch and opposing infect builds. Having this on board adds an added layer of safety without needing to expend mana or cards in hand.
Strong Considerations:
Food for thought:
My recent findings can be summed up as thus: mother of Yawgmoth, Noble Hierarch is good here. Speed, consistency (I only had 4 fetches to work with, so producing blue is incredible), and power.
Sideboard is standard fare for Infect more or less.
Dispel to hit killspells.
Spell Pierce to hit more killspells.
Dismember to clear the way. I might consider Slaughter Pact as an "all in" card or Hunt the Hunter if I start running the corrupters. This is basically needed to hit Melira.
Twisted Image because this deck hates seeing Spellskite on any field but mine.
Wild Defiance The third one is sided for those decks that only run burns as removal. You really wanna give me more power? Didn't think so.
Viridian Corrupter functions in a similar manner to my Gatekeeper of Malakirs in my vamps. Only he kills artifacts. And affinity is big as ever.
Piracy Charm: Seeing how I'm not running black, I like a bit of discard in blue. Islandwalk is nice on a sideboard card, and it can be a buff for my already pumped creatures or a kill on an opponent's utility critter.
Nature's Claim for the usual suspects. Affinity, Twin, Tron to an extent. And a lot of artifacts are sided.
