I'm not a huge fan of the Whip of Erebos or the Grim Haruspex. I don't know what I'd replace them with, they just don't feel like they match the deck. Congrats, though. This deck looks fun.

Maybe try to find room for a copy of Sidisi, Undead Vizier? She can trade out a manifested land for a clutch removal spell.

So the Haruspex is for value, I think. He attacks in suicidally with manifests from Whisperwood Elemental or Mastery of the Unseen. If any die, he draws a card. Keeps up the pressure. This also explains the needed mana boost from Sylvan Caryatid.

Not bad.

@JakeHarlow yeah that's exactly it. If he ever gets manifested then it's cheap at just a to flip him. This is huge because it makes playing multiple things or activating multiple abilities in a turn much more possible. Against control, you can get to a point where you force a board wipe because they can't 1 for 1 your 2/2's all day. Having him on board when it happens typically replaces your hand so you can keep the pressure on and don't give them a chance to get set up.

@NobodyPicksBulbasaur Whip of Erebos is a hold over from the original deck. This started as my Abzan deck but I've been a big fan of Mastery of the Unseen so I started siding it in against control (uncounterable 2/2's seems good). Then I saw the G/W devotion deck that popped up and knew there was a better way to build the deck. Then I started getting really excited when I saw things like Den Protector and Hidden Dragonslayer so I started converting the deck over from an aggressive midrange deck to this. The whip may be expendable. Originally it was just a better option than Sorin because it stayed on the board longer and gave me extra value from things like Siege Rhino when I brought them back. I left it in because it has tremendous upside by getting extra use out of creatures in the yard. Whipping back a whisperwood leaves behind a 2/2 with upside. Getting back a rhino is a potential 14 point life swing. Anafenza leaves a counter on my other creatures when I bring her back. However, I'll have to test it out and see what I colud replace it with. I just know from experience playing the whip in my abzan decks that it provides a tremendous amount of extra value and is always something my opponent hates to see hit the board.

I don't see how the Whip is super bad here. It's another layer of resilience for the deck. The theme seems to be all about layered pressure either from the yard or library (to say nothing of casting threats from the hand). On top of this, there is the life gain that the Whip brings. Card advantage and life advantage are two huge factors of winning games, especially in this midrange-dominated metagame. The manifest capability here produces strong matchups against most of today's popular control lists. I'm really not surprised that this did so well. If it catches on, I imagine enchantment hate will start to get leaned on.

I still imagine the devotion matchup is a doozy. This deck doesn't really run the hurry-up when it comes to early offense, which is one of the only reliable methods of beating devotion. When it gets all its stompies on board, a crowd of 2/2s isn't going to be able to halt the carnage too well. Still I imagine the matchup to be a long and tedious one, given all the life gain on either side. Wingmate Roc or a big airborne dude might be a good way to break the stalemate for that match.

Did you play against anyone running Atarka's Command, abenz419?

@JakeHarlow Actually no I didn't which I was kinds surprised about considered as much as I heard people talk about it leading up to release. The thing this deck has that the / devotion version doesn't have is a way to push damage through. Going Abzan lets me mainboard my removal and that is huge in the sense that I don't have to rely totally on inevitability to win. The deck plays out a lot like Abzan midrange untill I hit 6 mana and a Mastery of the Unseen or a Whisperwood Elemental.

I didn't see the / version this week but I have played it before. Obviously the deck was slightly different because this was before DTK, but the concept was the same. An aggressive abzan deck that had tons of late game value from Whisperwood and Mastery. It was as you suspected a grindy matchup. The thing that made that matchup so difficult was awkward draws. We ended up drawing as we didn't finish game 3 before time, but whenever I got behind it was because I didn't have an immediate answer for their Whisperwood. That usually let them get their devotion going helped them create that stall the deck is known for. I would grind and get back into the game and that's when another Whisperwood would hit the board. I feel like this updated list is much more efficient and consistent than before so while it may not be the easiest match up I don't think the worst either.

I hear you. I don't think it would be a terrible matchup, just a very long grindy one, as you've reported. That's why I think Wingmate could be a decent option to keep the pressure on, especially with Whip. It isn't a huge surprise that the tie was forced. I think early and persistent removal is your best bet to quash the devotion, which obviously leads to board-flooding and life gain.

I think the list looks really good, though. Haruspex + manifest is such a good pressure/tempo combo. I never thought of it before I saw this list, actually. :)

pretty cool +1 from me

@JakeHarlow and Hans49163 Thanks guy's I appreciate it. For some reason I'm just really excited about this deck. Even last night at FNM when I wasn't drawing optimally I felt like I always had something to do. So never having to take a turn off really helped a lot and made every game fun for me to play. As far as Grim Haruspex goes, it's been mixed results but in an odd way I think that actually shows how good the card is. There have been games where a single Haruspex has drawn me multiple cards and that card advantage has helped put me over the top. There are also games where it dies as soon as it hits the board because they target it as soon they can to prevent any card advantage from taking over. So while it's probably drawn me a card in less than 50% of the games I've played one, I think the fact that they're actively targeting it knowing I have other threats like Anafenza, Rhino, and Whisperwood says a lot about how strong it can be. Funny thing about the Haruspex as well, people seem to be under the impression that morph and manifest creatures are tokens (i think because of the reminder cards). So when I do get to draw cards off face down cards dying people are confused at first. That's when the one's who didn't already know, realize how good it can be and start to immediately take it out as soon as they see it.

More like abenz mastery.

Nice Hidden Dragonslayer, people need to show him more respect.

Thanks Rhadamanthus. I love the deck. I thought Mastery of the Unseen was just a really cool card but was only using it out of the sideboard against control decks. (uncounterable 2/2's seemed good to me lol). Then the / deck got big and I liked it but didn't like it because it was just long boring inevitability. So I took the raw power of my Abzan aggro deck and combined it with the value and inevitability of the G/W deck and haven't looked back. I feel like being able to interact with opposing threats by going Abzan is just way better than what the / deck does. It's essentially a mono- ramp deck that splashes , but instead of ramping into large creatures it just pumps out a bunch of small ones and uses life gain to create some kind of inevitability. Whereas this plays out like a typical Abzan midrange deck that can generate more value through creatures and card advantage than most decks can handle in a single game.

Hidden Dragonslayer is pretty good and was something I was excited about leading up to it's release because I knew it'd give this deck a way to interact with my opponents board. Which is important because of the potential to manifest removal. Definitely been a big help!

Another card that I was excited about before DTK was released is Den Protector. I was playing a version of this deck before DTK so I may have been a little bias because I was taking advantage of manifest. But I thought people would overlook Den Protector because it's a morph creature and after playing with it the first week it was legal, it had far exceeded even my extremely high hopes. I don't think people will overlook her anymore though based on how much it felt like I saw her on the pro tour.

I've also considered adding Deathmist Raptor when it was spoiled but wasn't able to get any right away and now I'm not really sure I want to pay the current price for them. Plus I'm not really sure where I could fit it in. It would probably have to take Anafenza's spot, but she's just so good. Exiling creatures is relevant more often than you expect and being able to buff the other creatures has always been a huge bonus for me as long as I've been playing her. Plus as a 4/4 for 3 mana she's just pure value and just as easy to flip over as any of the morph creatures when she's manifested for big combat swings.

It's a fun deck and I'd recommend it to anyone. Against a like Rakdos dragon control deck I was able to play the same Whisperwood Elemental 3 different times because his 1 for 1 removal couldn't keep up and then I got manifest triggers from Sacing the whisperwood to a boardwipe which gave me a Den Protector to flip up and get it back, with another Den Protector in hand. It was great. Like I said, the deck is nothing but pure value lol.

I ran a similar deck like this before but felt it was inefficient in my meta lgs. So I switched out black for red. Because flying creatures, primarily dragons and the queen of bees are this decks biggest Downfall. I won my game day with my naya Mastery build. Glad to see Mastery decks wrecking face.

@UpperDeckerTaco I'll admit that flying creatures aren't fun to see on the board but they haven't been as big of a problem as you'd expcet. With Hidden Dragonslayer, Hero's Downfall, Ultimate Price, and Utter End all in the deck I tend to have a way to answer any problems. Plus Den Protector allows me to get back removal from my graveyard when needed. Hornet Queen is pretty much the same situation. Yea it's a hassle but I can just send 2/2's at them all day long. They outrace the insects if thats what they try to do, especially since odds are there is a Mastery in play so I can offset damage with lifegain. If they hold them back as defense, like I said I just keep sending 2/2's at them. They will eventually die if they don't block and when they do block the insects are just removed out of the way. Also, an morphing a Den Protector means it becomes a 3/2 and swings right over the top of the tokens. Hornet Queen may slow me down but my deck has to completely stall out for it to kill me. But yes definitely glad to see Mastery decks showing their true worth lol!

All I'm saying is I attempted a very similar version of Abzan Mastery and it wasn't flexible enough to defeat those flying Dragon or bees decks. Yeah the removal was better in Abzan mastery, but I found it to be almost unnecessary when I went with Naya and just played a much faster Mastery deck.

You should add Foul-Tongue Invocation and/ or Merciless Executioner for those pesky dragons that need to be dealt with in a sacrificial manner.

I have considered both of those. I'm really leaning toward adding in Foul-Tongue Invocation especially if I'm going to be bringing it out of the sideboard in matchups that I bring the dragons in as well. I wasn't sure how often I'd want to bring in another 3 mana removal spell but with Thunderbreak Regent becoming so popular It may be worth having even if I almost never reveal or control a dragon when I cast it.

Merciless Executioner I'm a little more suspect of. It's ability only triggers when he enters, which doesn't trigger if he's manifested and flipped. I'm willing to sacrifice a little with Siege Rhino because I still do cast them from hand most of the time (being a 4 of) and when I don't cast them a 4/5 trampler is good on it's own. I don't think that sacrifice is as worth it with the executioner because it would be coming out of the sideboard for specific matchups and I can't afford to have it only be effective half the time. One of the best cards in this matchup is Mastery of the Unseen because it hits the board before they're set up, creates uncounterable creatures, and the life gain from flipping creatures offsets damage dealt by targeting his dragons and combat damage. So I tend to go a little more all in on a Mastery of the Unseen when I see one in this matchup than I do in some others.