@yyuyyy But, if Zendikar and M11 is STILL playable until October, than yeah, there are a lot of things that he could do.

I'm thinking that this deck will be competitive and the price will rise once people figure it out.

I would be sure to pack the sideboard with negate/cancels to shut down field wipes as it will be your only real problem me thinks.

I'm thinking a card draw engine of some sort would be nice. I can see you running out of steam pretty quickly.

Culling Dais maybe? Sac a targeted creature before it dies, proliferate the counter for a rainy day? I dono. It has worked for me before.

Man, it's time to change the description from "Fun casual deck" to OMFGWTFSUPREME competitive :)

@gambit yes, there are a lot of things he can do for about 2 months. then he has to restructure his deck

Ponder has been reprinted. Just what the doctor ordered =)

Hit the Lord of the Unreal with Phantasmal Image and your weak lord issues are over with. It's really a very difficult thing to deal with if you can get board position set up, I like it.

Tumble Magnet s. Leafs_suck, I believe you have playtested it for some time. Are they really needed here? I totally support the decision to put in Ponder s, but taking out Negate ... Perhaps it would be better to remove Magnets for them. Or at least a decision about sidebording some of those. Cause I'm not really sure you are vulnerable to creatures, but you are very surely vulnerable to mass removalsdiscards and that kind of stuff.

@animarignus: Dragonmaster Outcast was just an example of creature that don't attack themselves but still make your life worse and worse with each turn.

@CorwinTaking out the negates is a good thing. You need to have a focused deck; you can't be playing huge artifacts and illusions to pressure your opponent and still have enough mana to play counterspells.

@Leafs_suck, I would take out one of the bears and a metamorph and put in another treasure mage and steel hellkite.

I have been on my phone since friday night. I haven't playtested in a while. I will get back to you all in a few hours.

Great deck! +1, and i always use this deck in Dotp 2012 and its a beast!

There is a GA deck on DotP?

Jace is an illusion deck yea. Don't think it uses GA though.

Man, everytime I play this deck I always seem to get some outrageous things on the board by turn 4. This deck has really good synergy and works together really well. I am pumped to make this deck.

Is engine really important in the mainboard without anything to proliferate?

Thanks a lot! When M12 comes out I'm definitely making this deck !! XD

may i ask what does ponder do?

I agree with the engine removal. You no longer have the magnets and that's mostly what it was there for. You have solid board presence.

Mono blue beats XD That's hilarious.

Soooo why not reconstruct in in 2 months lol. Your DCI records will be losses and not get into whatever you get.

@Justin2543 Perhaps, Perhaps. But, due to Grand Architect s after turn 4 we likely will have some untapped mana and also some beatdown creatures on the BF, which could also have hexproof. And Negate are to avoid a serious turn 5 and after threats. And magnets are turn 3-4 arts that in most cases would tap 3-4 cmc creatures. IMO Negate is more valuable, but only playtests can find it out.

@Gambit Man, this deck is a big beatdown even without those Zend-insertions, and could win many of my meta. (The only thing I'm not sure of is Valakut)

Contagion Engine is a one sided board wipe. In one turn everything my opponent has on the field will be -3/-3, if there is ever a stall in board position, that would take care of it. It only takes up 1 slot in the deck, which isn't a big deal.

@samuel1997xd Ponder lets you scry basically. You can organize your top 3 cards to get whatever you want when you want. If it is nothing good, shuffle your library and draw a card, which odds are, wouldn't be one of those 3 cards. It's very useful in case you're looking for something.

Might as well throw in (sideboard) Spreading Seas to deal with Valakut, since they'll both be going out of Standard at the same time.

Already in. I don't mind throwing cards into sideboard to deal with current meta threats xD.

@Corwin The untapped mana on turn 5 is only a maybe, especially because getting Grand Architect is far from guaranteed. Furthermore, the Grand Architect doesn't help with the casting of any of the Illusions because they aren't artifacts until they hit the field.

The way to have a really consistent deck is to have deck-thinners. That's what all of the Zendikar fetch lands did: in addition to mana fixing they thinned out the deck to its key components. I would suggest taking out the counterspells for Gitaxian Probe .

However, if the counterspells have to stay, then I would also suggest Stoic Rebuttal as a replacement to Negate , or at least to the Cancels in the sideboard. Stoic Rebuttal is always a better card than Cancel and when you have metalcraft, it has more versatility than Negate , which is limited to noncreatures. Frankly though, I'm holding out for a reprint of good ol' Counterspell .

A new M12 card that was just announced is Adaptive Automaton. He'll work great with illusions.

Adaptive Automaton - 3

Artifact Creature - Construct

As ~ enters the battlefield, choose a creature type.

~ is the chosen type in addition to its other types.

Other creatures you control of the chosen type get +1/+1.

2/2

Is the deck named "grand illusion" because of the combination of Grand Architect and illusions, or because it's a clever use of the name of a styx album?