My side board looks like this

2x Azorius Charm

2x Silence

3x Render Silent

3x Swan Song

3x Celestial Flare

2x Banisher Priest

But im considering Pay No Heed over celestial flare.

Haha, I have most of this stuff laying around and in my deck, and this wrecks my UW Heroic. And our sideboards are awesomely similar [:

+1,000,000 from me, this is probably my favorite archetype from Theros.

I used this deck and it worked great. Took out the Hidden Strings since cipher doesn't trigger heroic.Put in two Fabled Hero 's in the main deck, as well as two Silence 's. Won on turn four with a Favored Hoplite and 2 Ethereal Armor 's. An awesome deck model all around, it's usually too fast to counter.

JakeSaysAhoy I'm not sure what you are talking about on Hidden Strings . The first time you cast a spell you can trigger 2 separate heroic creatures and then cipher it onto one of them. Ciphering it on to the creature doesn't trigger heroic but when that creature attacks you can cast as copy of that spell (for free) and trigger 2 separate heroics again (or untap 2 lands).

It's an incredibly versatile tool for triggering heroic. Remember that heroic triggers when you target, not when the spell resolves, and since Hidden Strings reads "may tap or untap" you needn't do any more than cast it and target to trigger heroic.

@JakeSaysAhoy I don't even need to answer cause Scopes got my back jack.

Do you think that Strionic Resonator would be a good card for this deck???

Got rest of cards. Deck works amazingly against my other decks. Its a draw between my mono black though. I always have doom blades lol. But I love it!

I built this and keep trying playtest hands, since I have nobody to play with until Friday, and I kept getting mana problems. Gonna try one more Plains over an Island to be able to cast Favored Hoplite and Phalanx Leader more often. Not a big change, but hopefully it'll make a difference.

And @I_H8_U_M8 Have you tried Bioshift at all? I'm thinking about mainboarding that, Silence , and Fabled Hero .

MaliciousMac Bioshift is actually a fantastic idea, you can save the counters off of a creature that is about to be removed and put them on another.

Scopes Yep! It can also be a one-drop combat trick. If Fabled Hero was here, you can swing in with him with no counters, and if they declare no blocks; use Bioshift on Phalanx Leader and Fabled Hero , set off two heroic triggers, move over the one counter from Phalanx, and Fabled Hero is a 5/5 double striker.

It can also be a target for Elite Arcanist .

Im not sure about this Bioshift idea. It sounds cool but im just not sold. What would you cut for it? Hidden Strings and Triton Tactics are too good to lose. Aqueous Form and Ethereal Armor give to much damage to be replaced by something that isnt equally amaising.

I'm really not sure what to cut. Maybe like, one Aqueous Form and one Gods Willing for two Bioshift ?

Since most of your creatures will be usually be unblockable anyway, Triton Tactics is the obvious cut choice to slot in Bioshift . Alternately you could drop Bident of Thassa , Spear of Heliod and 1x Triton Tactics and slot in 3x Bioshift .

If you wanted to take it a step further you could drop Elite Arcanist and Artisan of Forms completely and add 4x Hopeful Eidolon to make up for the lost enchantments and also use the bestow later in the game to turn a Fabled Hero into a lifelink monstrosity.

I love the idea of Bioshift in this deck actually. I'd consider cutting the Bident of Thassa and Spear of Heliod and send 2 Gods Willing to the side board. Not because any of those are less good, but adding 4 more 1 mana dual-heroic triggers feels like it would add a lot of consistent synergy and further drop the already sick mana curve.

I updated my version of this deck to include Bioshift if you want to run it through some playtesting - Hoplite's Fortune

@MaliciousMac Bioshift is a great 1 drop to target two creatures, will definatly mainboard that. Give me a little to decide what to drop. I'll update in a day or two. It would be a small chance but I'd wanna test it for a little.

@Scopes Triton Tactics is not the first card to ditch, just because I'm unblockable doesn't mean I can't untap my creature to block one of my opponents creatures that are swinging. too good of a card.

I_H8_U_M8 does Daxos of Meletis usually pull cards successfully? I am just wondering if fabled hero isnt often times the better play. Since you have actually played this in a tournament setting i was wondering what cards if any where valuable to your win with him.

@I_H8_U_M8 You said Judge's Familiar was easily killed by burn, but why don't you just sac it in response? :P

Seriously, wouldn't Judge's Familiar be a better counterspell?

And I agree with Felixlives, wouldn't Fabled Hero be more effective than Daxos of Meletis ? (*mockingly * He's human too!)

I dont think Judge's Familiar is a better counter granted if they use a burn spell to pop it and you sac it in response you could counter the burn spell but it effectivly killed the bird and it is not a surprize counter against something that is legitimatly targeting one of your threats. The best you are gonna get out of the familiar is prolonging a board wipe for a turn except supreme verdict cannot be countered

I_H8_U_M8 I getcha, just don't want you to end up to spell (or U) heavy. You could drop an Aqueous Form and a Triton Tactics and add 2x Bioshift , there are lots of options.

Scopes & I_H8_U_M8 good call. I guess I'll put those back in. Didn't realize the heroic potential, thanks for the tip! I've beat mono-clue devotion decks quite a few times with this, it's a sweet deck.

@[user:I_H8_U_M8] You could take out a Gods Willing or Aqueous Form , or the Artisans? I don't know how helpful they are, as I haven't played anyone with this deck yet.

Since I've already Fucked up my color wheel lol, I was wondering if I should play Nivmagus Elemental mainboard. I would be replacing Battlewise Hoplite with it.Reason behind my thinking is that If I were to cast a spell, say Triton Tactics and an opponent were to in response Shock my creature, I could then in response exile the spell and put 2 counters on Nivmagus Elemental and save the spell from having no benifit. Its a 1 drop instead of 2 so it can be played sooner however the down side is that it doesn't have heroic and its not human.

Also It would drop my Average CMC down to 1.5 so I could remove 2 land. (I technically have more land then I need.) and in a game where I start with 3 land in hand, I can sometimes get flooded.

I am still having a hard time understanding how the infinite combo works with Elite Arcanist ,Triton Tactics , and lets say, Phalanx Leader ? Can you go more in depth for me?

Its not infinite its repeatable. Triton Tactics on Elite Arcanist and a Phalanx Leader on the board. Tap one mana use Elite Arcanist ability to cast Triton Tactics target himself and Phalanx Leader with it untapping them both and giving them both a +1/+1 counter. Tap another mana use arcanist ability targeting himself and phalanx leader again giving them both another counter etc etc etc till you have no more mana.Its not infinite but very repeatable and quite benificial if you did something crazy like that precombat and say you had Aqueous Form already on your phalanx leader you could get through for stupid damage. Remember to leave up a mana and arcanist to cast during opponents attack phase.