You always cast creatures on time, and you always have mana for countermagic--what's not to love? This is a Green-Blue deck that never casts spells on its own turn.
N.B. I talk like I know what I'm talking about, but I'm just a limited player. I draft every friday and do pretty well but I'm not experienced in Standard at all.
Rattlechains is certainly Jacob Marley. Who is Ebenezer Scrooge? Prophet of Distortion, who draws many cards? Overwhelming Denial, who cannot be argued with? The exploitative Silumgar Sorcerer? Or Pack Guardian, who shows up with a turkey in the end? These are the real mysteries of Shadows over Innistrad.
This is just a deck in progress, but testing has shown it to be rather strong against control decks. Earlier, fluffier versions of the deck (lower density of creatures and counters) did very poorly in the few aggro matchups I tested, but I think having many Horribly Awry and Clash of Wills will improve my aggro matchup.
This deck is basically a one-for-one substitution of the Theros-standard flash deck, which had cards like Shambleshark
+
Skylasher
, Briarpack Alpha
+
Horizon Chimera
, a couple Opportunity, and plenty of counterspells of its own. The recipe is the same: flash creatures with a wide range of mana costs, and spells that counter spells.
About a potential White splash
I considered splashing White into this for Stasis Snare and maybe Archangel Avacyn, but they both cost double White and I don't want to pay money for multiple Avacyn. Realistically the only White card I want to play in this deck is Ojutai's Command. And Pack Guardian and Bounding Krasis are already so good.
I'm not sure how I feel about Prophet of Distortion. It's an amazing turn 1 play, and with the tempo of the deck it will basically always get 3 or 4 damage in in that case, but I haven't played any games yet where I needed to draw those cards. Maybe I'll change my mind about it once I topdeck it. It seems like a fine topdeck, better than a land at least.
Every turn, you should either cast a creature spell or cast a counterspell. These are the only two things in the deck. Instead of Anticipate, why not just play a good creature or good counter? Or both (Silumgar Sorcerer)? I tried this deck with Anticipate, but it was far too slow.
Dragonlord's Prerogative, on the other hand, is important in a deck like this to help make sure it doesn't run out of gas, even in the absence of Horizon Chimeras of old. Sometimes drawing three creatures and a land is just better than casting a creature.
About the number of lands
The Theros deck had 25 lands, which is a lot, but it was justified by 4x Mutavault. This deck has Lumbering Falls, which is a lot worse than Mutavault, and takes more mana. Mostly I just play this as a Woodland Stream, but having the extra creature is helpful if my opponent is trying to stabilize but taps out one turn. (I will counter whatever they tapped out for.)
Also, discarding lands to Pack Guardian's trigger is super powerful. I'm looking for a couple Drownyard Temple to replace Shivan Reef.
