Gorgons are awesome! Assassins are awesome! Cards that say "that player loses the game!" are awesome! And all of that can happen with just one card!
Vraska the Unseen is a Gorgon planeswalker. Her ultimate produces assassin tokens. And those assassins, if they deal combat damage, win the game by making the damaged player lose the game!
So this deck is built around the idea of capitalizing on her.
Along with an extremely powerful card called Deadbridge Chant. This card offers huge tempo swing via card advantage and also cheats creatures into play no matter what their casting cost is.
Basically the idea is to run out gorgons to control the board state because of their big beautiful bodies. They have inherent removal from being gorgons. And then you use Vraska the Unseen's assassins or any of your big creatures to destroy your opponent. There is so much creature kill in this deck that an aggro strategy will just wilt in the face of these lovely ladies. The deck also has many cards to make your creatures unblockable as well as some in-hand removal in case your gorgons alone are not enough to clear the way for your attackers.
So if you like the idea of mythological, semi-divine and snake-haired ladies turning people to stone and delivering some beatdown then this deck is for you!
Here is the deck's card breakdown:
The Creatures:
Elvish Mystic and Elves of Deep Shadow: Ramp and mana-fixing on legs. Sadly, they do not like seeing Hythonia in play but will help build board-state in the meantime.
Hythonia the Cruel: She is hugely powerful and if brought in with Deadbridge Chant you can use your mana to activate her Monstrous ability the turn she is put into play. An exclusive Wrath of God on legs that kills anything that is not a gorgon.
Keepsake Gorgon: A weaker, easier to play and targetable "removal on legs" version of Hythonia.
Reaper of the Wilds: This creature just has quality. It's main disadvantage being it's costs. With these offset by the chant and mana elves the Reaper should be a major threat on the table.
Xathrid Gorgon: She actually does turn your enemy's creatures into stone. Amazing pseudo-removal on legs. And even without creatures to target with her ability, another big body resistant to removal in play.
The Other Spells:
Commune with the Gods: This lets you get 5 deep into your library, then put 1 into your hand and the rest into your graveyard. Deadbridge Chant + Commune with the Gods means that you are doubling your draws every turn or can get more free creature plays.
Treasured Find: Instant speed version of your Deadbridge Chant. Just adding more slots to recover from wipes or removal that kills your chants.
Vraska the Unseen: This planeswalker is nothing but gold. Her first two abilities destroy creatures and permanents. Her ultimate can potentially win the game in the following turn. And she's a Gorgon!
Glaring Spotlight: This card's utility is great. It allows your Gorgons to turn creatures into stone even if they have hexproof. And, if needed, can confer hexproof or unblockability to all of your creatures for 1 turn. Can be game-winning and happens at instant speed.
Hot Soup: Makes your game-winning Assassin tokens unblockable.
Grim Contest: More instant speed removal that takes advantage of the fact that your Gorgons all have big beautiful butts and um, deathtouch.
Deadbridge Chant: This card gets 10 deep in your library and can drop creatures on the battlefield without paying their costs. And for the rest of the game it lets you bring back any cards in your graveyard either to your hand or, in the case of creatures, directly onto the battlefield. This can be crippling to your opponent as long as it remains on the field. It turns all of their creature kill into just delays of the inevitable. And it will keep your hand filled with cards when it is not dropping creatures back into play.
Combine Deadbridge Chant together with Vraska the Unseen and you have a powerhouse of a deck that can crush your opponents.
The Sideboard:
Gaze of Granite: Sometimes weenie or combo decks can overrun the field with hordes of tiny creatures that your gorgons may have trouble killing fast enough to win the game. That is where this card comes in. Set to 0 and you wipe the board of token creatures for only 3 mana. Because of the higher cost of your gorgons you can even set a little higher and still sweep the board of whatever the enemy is fielding.
Grim Contest: More copies of this card can be swapped into the deck in case you cannot get rid of creatures via the red zone. With the high toughness of your creatures and their death touch it is almost guaranteed removal of any other creature in play at instant speed.
Pharika's Mender: If, going into game 2, you are sure your opponent is going to bring in a lot of enchantment hate for your bridges then it is a good idea to swap in a few menders. They will bring back your Deadbridge Chants and are not lightweights in the power and toughness department either. And yeah, they are gorgons too!
Return to the Earth: This is a great all around game 2 card to swap in to address nearly any cards your opponents might bring to bear.
Sisters of Stone Death: These ladies are waiting in the sideboard to crush people in multiplayer. Or to get rid of creatures that keep coming back. Or just to improve the power of the deck in multiplayer games. Finally swapping in a couple of these will keep the deck going strong in case of card-naming removal.
Treasured Find: Just in case you need even more recovery from massive hate-filled decks.
And that is it for the sideboard.
So that is it for the deck! Please leave any comments or suggestions here.
