I actually would have rather Molten Tail be a 6 drop...you could bet your happy ass I'd pop one in here.

But being 4 and somewhat unstable early game makes me sad. GA makes him much better

Play, pay for regen, attack, block, or use 4 damage ability.....dies at beginning of next turn, since it has regen it stays. Pay 2 more, than 4 (which is very easy with GA around) Hit again, and since it doesn't tap you can cast it multiple times.

hmmm I like it except for the lack of treasure mage synergy.

In my version you can bet your happy ass I'm running 4 preordains, 3 augury owls and 4 ponders.

I like phantasmal dragon, but Augury is so clutch with scry 3.

I actually would have rather Molten Tail be a 6 drop...you could bet your happy ass I'd pop one in here.

But being 4 and somewhat unstable early game makes me sad. GA makes him much better

Play, pay for regen, attack, block, or use 4 damage ability.....dies at beginning of next turn, since it has regen it stays. Pay 2 more, than 4 (which is very easy with GA around) Hit again, and since it doesn't tap you can cast it multiple times.

hmmm I like it except for the lack of treasure mage synergy.

In my version you can bet your happy ass I'm running 4 preordains, 3 augury owls and 4 ponders.

I like phantasmal dragon, but Augury is so clutch with scry 3.

You can't regenerate Molten-Tail Masticore in lieu of discarding a card during your upkeep. It is sacrificed.

He's even better with a Grafted Exoskeleton equipped.

Wow I have no idea how THAT happened.

tried an earlier build of this deck yesterday. went 3-2 and hit 8th place. i could have gone 4-1 but got mana screwed in games 2 and 3. but every other game was great. only issue i had was against this green elf ramp deck. by turn 3 he had too much for me to even get in to attack.

Glad to hear this deck has potential, thanks!

hey no problem. got a few compliments on it. said it has a lot of synergy. i haven't tried it with the card:Jace's Archivist yet but that's only cause i have 2 of them. might try the revamped version of it. i just don't have the masticore's so i might put in 2 mana leaks instead. seems my group it'd be better.

BTW, this is the deck I ran yesterday. Sort of a different take on yours.

Grand Illusion Dreamer

seems kinda weird but maybe swiftfoot boots to protect your lords/things that are not illusions

I guess it's about time i put some cents here in this deck, can't stay away from something with this many votes ;)

Before i commented on Xenograft i wanted to be sure that no one had done it before me so i ctrl+f'd, only to find people are shouting it all over the place :P

Still, my 2 cents.

I dislike it.

The thing is; it doesn't really do anything until your lord is on the table, which is too little for 5 mana. Even then, Day of Judgment s are back in decks now that caw blade is on the decline and aggro and midrange are back to threaten your life. I would like to compare it to Asceticism . That does basically the same, but you can ALSO regenerate your creatures, and still no one uses it. I haven't tested it a lot myself, but i think i can see why, and in your case unless i'm missing something, it's strictly worse than asceticism, which is already bad.

Oh and i forgot: It's even worse because if you already have the lord out, 80% of your creatures are already hexproof. It just doesn't do anything. Again, unless i'm missing something.

Caged Sun (even as a 1 of)

I dislike it.

It does virtually the same as Adaptive Automaton (which you say you don't like), with some ramp added, but it has double the cost... I guess this is sorta personal though because i really don't like that sun :P

Gitaxian Probe

I dislike it.

The card is amazing in decks that try to combo, to see if the coast is clear (exarch twin, forgemaster, etc.). But in your deck, regardless of what they have, you will roll out your illusions. Even if they have targeted stuff, because you will get hit by it sooner or later. You have no counterspells and if you did, they wouldn't help because when they cast it the illusion already dies. You have no hand-manipulation and you have no way to protect your illusions except by the lord, which will be on the field anyways. I'm not saying perfect information and drawing a card for 2 life is bad, i'm just saying that it doesn't really fit your deck and that i believe there's other, better stuff for you to include.

So basically, that's 5 cards out of your deck (if i could have my way of course ;))

I would replace them with some spot "removal" in 2x Dismember and 3x Into the Roil . I think this will improve your Splinter Twin matchup greatly and basically give you some answers to random stuff like planeswalkers and tempered steel.

Also i prefer Preordain over Ponder if not combo-ing with anything, but it shouldn't matter much. (except that of course preordain will rotate this september)

One more thing; Nice find in card:Jace's Archivist for refilling your hand.

+1 :)

@ jessetaverne I appreciate the comment.

I see your point in the Xenograft experiment. Without a lord this card is kinda useless and with a lord it's almost pointless. For 5 mana I could have something better, so I will take your advice and take them out when I look into it more.

As for Caged Sun , I like it for it's mana ramp. If I am going through hands with card:Jace's Archivist, I can afford to play 2 or 3 illusions with the extra mana, while my opponent might only play one card. Activate the archivist again and I gain card advantage. Plus the +1/+1 boost is nice and only having 1 of in the deck makes me feel it doens't limit me in any way.

I have the Gitaxian Probe in for the 2 life - draw a card thing. Also it can be used to look at an opponent's hand to see if i need to activate archivist not to benifet me but to get away from an opponent's next play or know the coast is clear for my own stuff.

I have Ponder in the deck because I want to play with it more since I'll have to use it after rotation.

Thank you kind sir, I'll have to find a replacement for Xenograft at least.

Big fan of these decks.. i'm doing something somewhat similar, but i went for a black splash for a couple of solid removal spells! you can check it out here.. maybe snag some ideas! :)

Architect's Illusions

I would say that with card:Jace's Archivist you would want to play with Visions of Beyond rather than ponder, better card advantage. Preordain lets you control what you'll get with the archivist's ability as to where ponder only lets you know what is coming... it could work either way, but i feel like Draw 3 is better than Look at 3. Granted you need 20 in a graveyard, but that wouldnt be to hard with the archivist. just some food for thought

"T1: Island, Phantasmal Bear

T2: Island, Lord of the Unreal

T3: Island, Grand Architect, tap him and blue creatures, Wurmcoil Engine

T4: Island, Phantasmal Image my Wurmcoil Engine"

I've seen this somewhere else. I build a deck of this sort, and it wasn't from looking at this. Maybe the Lord of the Unreal 's Gatherer page? I cannot remember. But I HAVE seen this somewhere else.

Scary, I was working on a deck almost exactly like this about a week before I saw your deck. I guess great minds do think alike! +1 to you for all the testing you've done. Have you thought about running Time Reversal in place of card:Jace's Archivist? I know, I never thought I'd find a use for that terrible card either but my experience with it in this deck is that it basically says "Shuffle your graveyard into your library, then draw seven cards." It's technically only one more mana than the Archivist but it's a guaranteed 7 cards versus maybe 3-4 and it's also great anti-mill. I found myself emptying my hand by turn 5 or 6 most games so it ended up working out.

@Sila

My Gatherer name is deco_y. If thats who made the comment thats me. It was LotU's page.

anyone tested this yet in real play?

I've got all the pieces for mine and I'm going to give it a spin (along with my white deck) this week at FNM

@iConcede...did you, um...just say Time Reversal is terrible...?? 8-\

time reversal is jank as hell. I showed this to my friend and he didn't like the deck at all.

He said why try to make a white deck out of blue...I politely let him know that the minute they printed lord of the unreal and low cost powerful creatures MTG was pushing for an aggressive blue for this block.

You can still counter and do lovely "blue" things if you wish. Or you can make a solid, quick to grow blue deck.

He is a classic blue player, so it will be fun crushing him with a similar stylized deck.

Anxious to see how people deal with this, in my area, Black sun is the only wipe people play with.

I've built and played both this specific deck as well as my version. If I may provide constructive critisism, card:Jace's Archivist really helps either very little or it benifits your opponent just as much as you with the drawback that you're not assured of more than 4 cards. I have to agree with iConcede, in game situations it would be easier to cast Time Reversal than to cast card:Jace's Archivist AND activate its ability.

Secondly, Caged Sun nice card, good for the mana ramp but, when tutoring up with Treasure Mage I rarely go for the Caged Sun above Wurmcoil Engine . In this regard I added 4 Adaptive Automaton inplace of the archivists and the Caged Sun . Not only are they cheaper, costing 3, you choose illusion, thereby benefiting both your current illusions on the board, but themselves get the +1 from the Lord of the Unreal

Mindslaver , always a good bet to delay/ suicide board your opponent, a definite win imo.

Final thoughts, the more i play the deck the more I feel as if Contagion Engine should be a sideboard card, currently its still in my mainboard but im contemplating alternatives.

to go with what chesire_cat said, i feel the Adaptive Automaton is good with any of the big creatures. have a Wurmcoil Engine out? name Adaptive Automaton wurm and then turn it blue. wow it's just huge.

Precisely my point! The Adaptive Automaton is extremely versatile card that reaaly ramps an aggro onslaught.

Went up against our local standard circle top dog who's playing a R/B Aggro Vamp deck. With the Adaptive Automaton i managed to "out-aggro" him 5-0, 3 of which he chose to sideboard.

I played my deck last night, my thoughts:

Caged sun doesn't fit, it will be removed.

Jace's Archivist I never wanted to cast when I drew it. It will be removed.

Phyrexian Metamorph is a champ in this deck. These will probably replace the Archivists.

Contagion Engine is a beast. It's a board wipe machine. Ask the guy I pkayed, wiped 6 creatures in a single turn. KILLS aggro.

Beyond that I'll be tweaking this again soon so stay tuned.