Hey folks!
Here's a deck that I was playing for quite a while (from release of Kaladesh) and got a lot of solid results (X-0, X-1 on FNMs, Showndowns and Game Days). I think this deck is pretty well positioned in present standard meta.
Pros:
3 Kozilek's Return maindeck and ability to fire it from your graveyard instant speed. That means you have pretty good shot with every aggressive deck.
Ability to lock your opponent out of the game and win on turn 4. (I will talk about it later)
Good match-up vs control decks because of high number of recursive threats
Pretty low budget
Cons:
- Inconsistency. Your biggest enemy is yourself. Because of 3-color mana base you will lose games to screw, flood or just drowing wrong part of the deck.
Mana curve:
1 drops: 4x Minister of Inquiries, 4x Insolent Neonate and 3x Lightning Axe - all this cards serve one big role get your Haunted Dead and
Prized Amalgam
into your graveyard.
2 drops: Here you get your back-up graveyard fillers Cathartic Reunion, Collective Brutality and Key to the City. Also all recursive creatures in the deck come into play for 2 mana. If you have nothing better to do you can play Scrapheap Scrounger
3 drops: On turn 3 you want to have Haunted Dead on the board and start emerging
Elder Deep-Fiend
or Distended Mindbender. Sometimes you want to hard-cast
Prized Amalgam
to be able to emerge next turn, but if you are doing that - you are not in a good shape.
Things to remember:
Haunted Dead has CMC of 4 but is coming back from your graveyard for 2. That means you can emerge big eldrazi on turn 3!
If you are discarding
Prized Amalgam
as a price to return Haunted Dead they will return at the beginning of next end step.
Elder Deep-Fiend timing is very important. Most of the times you want to emerge it in your opponent's upkeep to tap their lands and effectively
Time Walk
them. But there are different situations when you want to play it on opponent's end step or beginning of combat to tap their blockers and/or attackers. Also remember that you can fire off Kozilek's Return on istant speed with help of Elder Deep-Fiend
Playing vs control think twice about casting your Cathartic Reunion. If it will get Censor or Negate you will 3-for-1 yourself
This deck usually doesn't need more than 4 land to operate. If things are going well you should consider saving your dead lands in hand for discarding in case you top-deck Cathartic Reunion or get you Haunted Dead back
Despite of what color pie says - most needed color in the deck is black. Also you want to have double blue for
Elder Deep-Fiend
and double black for Distended Mindbender. That means that you need 3 land for double blue, double black and 1 red. For example Spirebluff Canal, Choked Estuary and Swamp will be your perfect mana
Sideboard:
Playing vs control:
In - Negate, Collective Brutality, Fevered Visions, Transgress the Mind. Sometimes you may want planeswalker removal in Never
Out - Lightning Axe and Kozilek's Return then do some trimming
Playing vs Marvel:
In - Negate, Ceremonious Rejection, Transgress the Mind, Distended Mindbender. Depending on how many artifacts is marvel playing you may want By Force as well
Out - 1
Elder Deep-Fiend
, 1-2 Lightning Axe, 1-2 Kozilek's Return, Collective Brutality then trim
Playing vs Aggro:
There is a not bad match-up pre-board so depending on the build you may want to consider cutting Key to the City and Collective Brutality for 2x Never.
If you make it this far - thank you very much fot your attention! Please, if you have things to say, leave a comment below! Draw Well!
