How good is
Eternal Scourge
?
Can
Eternal Scourge
be abused?
This deck attempts to answer those questions!
I will start by explaining the mana base: Abzan colors, dominantly Orzhov. 4 Shambling Vents, because it fixes the most important colors and provides a powerful man land in this aggressive meta. The rest of the mana fixing is pretty straight forward:
Aether Hub
, and other dual lands for mana fixing.
In the 1-drop slot, we have a questionable card:
Shamble Back
. This is here to exile Eternal Scourge from your graveyard if it gets stuck there. It also gains 2 life and makes a 2/2 zombie, which is a nice defensive advancement for 1 mana.
In the 2-drop slot, we have removal in the form of
Grasp of Darkness
and
Declaration in Stone
. White and black have some of the most effective removal in this format, so we were lucky to end up in those colors. We also have creatures in the form of
Duskwatch Recruiter
and
Scrapheap Scrounger
. The Scrapheap Scourge combo is an obvious inclusion, because it is an effective and beneficial way to get Scourge out of the graveyard. Duskwatch is there because the deck needed some more early game creatures and card advantage, and in its flipped form, it can give you a discount on Scourges and other creatures.
In the 3-drop slot, we have some important cards. We have the namesake card
Eternal Scourge
,
Lost Legacy
,
Always Watching
, and
Bygone Bishop
. Lost Legacy can be very good with Eternal Scourge. You can target yourself with Lost Legacy and exile all of your Eternal Scourges, essentially drawing up to 4 creatures for 3 mana! Unfortunately, since Standard is so aggressive, that interaction is too slow to survive against the top tier decks. That is why we have sideboards. Although, against heavy control decks, this interaction will pretty much guarantee you a win, assuming it resolves. All removal spells become essentially bounce spells, which is fine at the rate that control decks win. Not to mention removal spells don't technically resolve against Eternal Scourge, so even with an artifact, you don't need to worry about
Unlicensed Disintegration
. Always Watching is actually sweeter than it first appears to be. One of the problems with Eternal Scourge is that it is essentially a 3-mana 3/3, which is mediocre compared to the much more efficient creatures in Standard right now. With Always Watching, all of a sudden, your Scourges are running over
Kalitas, Traitor of Ghet
, trading with
Grim Flayer
, and applying significantly more pressure than before, while putting up an effective wall. Not to mention, Always Watching is great with Shambling Vent, and gives creatures an extra crucial toughness to avoid removal. Finally, the last 3-drop: Bygone Bishop. The bishop is sweet because Eternal Scourge is indeed a 3-mana creature, which means while you cast your Scourges from exile, you get a clue with it! This is our main source of card advantage. I know, it's fragile. But, Bygone Bishop is a flyer, which is nice. Also puts up a small defense as well. It doesn't block
Smuggler's Copter
very well though. This card is easily replacable, but I like its synergy which is why it's in the deck.
We have no 4-drops, but our 5-drops are essential. We have
Sigarda, Heron's Grace
, and
Skysovereign, Consul Flagship
. Sigarda's purpose should be pretty obvious. It can exile a card from our own graveyard to make a 1/1 human token. Ideally, we want to be exiling Eternal Scourges from our graveyard. For 2 mana, getting Scourge into exile and making a hexproof token is pretty sweet. Sigarda's stats are also very good. She stonewalls
Archangel Avacyn
,
Grim Flayer
, and
Smuggler's Copter
. Lastly, Sigarda also gives us hexproof, which has proven to be helpful in many situations. She prevents
Emrakul, the Promised End
from taking control of your turn, sacrifice effects like
Blessed Alliance
, burn spells to the face, and even some obscure things like
Combustible Gearhulk
. Skysovereign is also really good, even just in general. The reason it is in here though is because Eternal Scourge is 3 power, which just happens to be enough power to crew the massive vehicle. You start recurring Eternal Scourges, then you will always have a creature to crew Skysovereign.
We only have 1 6-drop in the form of
Descend upon the Sinful
. It never hurts to have a sweeper in your deck as long as you don't 5-for-1 yourself. Descend is a board wipe that exiles all creatures, and makes a 4/4 angel if you have delirium, which is feasible due to Scrapheap Scrounger and the variety of card types. The best part is that you don't mind exiling away your Eternal Scourges, because you can just recast them later.
Finally, our last card:
Abundant Maw
. This deck struggles to put pressure on opponents, and can easily be run over. The maw helps with that a little bit. It drains some life upon casting it, and provides a decently big body in the board. It curves well with Scourge too. Assuming you play a Scourge on turn 3, and the Scourge lives, you can emerge the maw into play on turn 4 off of the Scourge.
The sideboard consists of mainly cards to help the deck survive against some of the strong threats in Standard right now, some hate cards to hate on specific decks, and some specific removal to answer specific threats more efficiently.
That is my opinion of how to abuse Eternal Scourge in Standard. I am open to ideas, I want to make this deck as good as possible. So if you have concerns about this deck, I encourage you to speak up.
