That's a good reason to have it in there then! but what if you draw him?

Purity is pretty decent at antimill, and you actually have a reasonable chance of playing him if for some reason you need to.

If you draw your singleton out? generally play him, then day / whatever to get it in the graveyard, or worst case put them on a bad clock where (being mill) they have to remove him or die from damage.

Well, 1 card is still pretty hard to save you from a Mill since they mill my deck, that card goes back in, next turn I draw my one card. At best I could play it, judgment, and live another turn maybe :-/

Aeons torn replaces my whole grave back into my deck. No chance at a mill. If I draw him I just play nothing until I can discard it due to 8 cards in hand in a few turns.

I took 6th out of 22 so not too bad overall but I was disappointed because I fully expected to place top 4 (which would have paid out). I lost to a bad matchup and general bad luck in the form of mana flood/screws/bad draws in the later rounds.

I'll post the tourney play by play later.

No fourth mana in a 16 turn game? That is just terrible luck. Have you thought about making this into a green/white at all? Green is also a good life gaining color, and helps with mana ramp, plus having two colors saves you from Iona.

A quick idea I just thought up is a combo with Cradle of vitality. You could use your Martyr of Sands to easily give a creature a ton of +1/+1 counters, then use Momentous Fall to gain life and draw a bunch of cards. Granted you will have to discard most of them, but it a quick way to get all the cards you do need into your hand.

It's a good idea, Usually though if I have cradle and sands + another creature on the field, I'll attack and if they don't block I'll sac sands and it's game. If they do I still sac and kill their creature dead.

Thanks for the advice though, I'll consider green, Momentous Fall has always intrigued me.

Yea, and I was pretty bumbed out about the mana Screw... What are the odds? And if I hit 4 I could have wiped, searched sands and ascendant and beaten him down. I just couldn't deal with 25+ Damage heading my way every turn and him gaining that much life.

cool deck yo. +1 from me for creative weenie lifegaining!

I SAY Honor the Fallen TO GRAVEYARD REMOVE.

Honor the Fallen isn't particularly helpful against Life from the Loam and Crucible of Worlds .

Mana screw of that severe variety is VERY rare. However, if you can find the slots, I might try to put in another land or two, and maybe cut a couple taplands, because the great strength of this deck against anything midrange or later is 8 mana, Proc forecast for Martyr, sac, gain 15 life, say go. Most decks can't keep up at that point. Temple of the False God is pretty darn good - I'm figuring on either 3 or 4 for my build, since it gives you a potential turn 6 cycle-out and just keep gaining life from there.

I don't think I've had a chance to play this in one of the tournaments but it looks pretty awesome. I know I've seen you play it against other people.

Yea, I changed it for more stability mid to late game. Not sure I liked it. Took 4th with it again.

If you ever wanted an alternate win condition, you could put in Sanguine Bond . Matyr of sands with that card alone rapes. You could just put in the black/white fetch lands, and maybe Weathered Wayfarer to grab land if you need it. Otherwise, I really like the deck, and I would highly recommend putting Kami of False Hope in. It's one of my favorite cards, especially in white reclamation decks. Aggro players get very angry ;)

I have Children of Korlis in place of false hope at the moment. I was thinking of the combo with Cradle of Vitality (which is also ridiculous with sands btw) but a lot of the times it just get's burned away.

What do you think about another Cradle of Vitality somewhere? I do like the Sanguine Bond idea though. I wish I had some but even then with BB in it's cost it's hard to run with the land base I have available.

Thanks for the ideas and let me know what you think please.

Actually I would drop the cradle and mainboard the Titan. For 6 mana you could have a creature that gains you life and works perfectly with your deck. Or at least playtest the deck with a titan on the main board. Fieldmist Borderpost... i think you could drop two of those and put survival catch in. I assume the posts are there to work with the crossroads, but why not just gain the life and get card advantage instead? You may even want to consider removing the posts altogether, main boarding three survival catches and putting in an extra plains to balance out at 20 land.

Something else to consider... as much as I love glowdust moth and loyal sentry, why not put in 4 Soul Warden . Combined with ranger of eos/sun titan/ Proclamation of Rebirth you would gain quite a bit of life.

Last but not least, you may also want to look at Felidar Sovereign and Test of Endurance . Fun, alternate win conditions that are totally viable in your deck.

There are more cards to mention but I think I will leave it here... oh and if you wanted to make a second deck with bonds/sands that would probably be a better idea

The Fieldmist Borderpost are in to give me a white card for sands that is also a mana source (again to bring the concentration of white spells up while not truly hurting my mana base.) I can't bounce the crossroads unfortunately because it's not basic.

I had Felidar Sovereign in the deck but traded it because I got offered a ridiculous deal for it. I was also running the titan at one point but Proclamation of Rebirth does it's job well enough for that. Most of the time I'd rather have the cradle because I play a Sands, attack with all my creatures, and when they fail to block one of them I sac the sands and put 15 - 21 +1/+1 counters on the unblocked creature for game. It has won me more games than Sun Titan and [[Felidar Sovereign] put together and it's also only 4 mana and much harder to remove than a creature. Because of the Cradle, Goldenglow Moth is more of a threat than Soul Warden because it has evasion.

Survival Cache is an amazing card in a deck like this. I agree; however, I tried out Skullclamp and the card advantages it grants blow Survival Cache 's performance away in everything but the lifegain. Most of the time I have no problem getting to 30 life. (1 Sand is usually enough.) Early game it turns my 1 toughness guys into card draws which fills up my hand as well as lets me draw a quick Sands which is extremely ridiculous with 8 cards in hand. Late game I equip it to a Serra Ascendant to make it a 7/5 flying lifelink guy that generates card advantage if he dies.

Thoughts now that you know why I'm running what I'm running? I appreciate any idea you can give me as this deck has taken 4th twice now. I'd like to win the next one if possible because it will be the third tourney in a row in which I got 1st over three different formats.

what do you think of Reveillark i use to use proclamation of rebirth in my deck but i found i wasn't using it enough because i also ran Emeria, The Sky Ruin and that was enough to return my creatures late game so i decided to include damage while i wait for my opponent to kill him so i get creatures back that way. another card that combos well with perimeter captain in your side board that i also use in my life gain deck is Wall of Reverence so cheap if your able to pop Ajani Goldmane for his final ability and/or play the actual Serra Avatar and while i wait for him i use a pumped up card:Ajani's Pridemate.

I totally agree with why you run everything now. That makes sense, and I am glad to hear you have tried out many different versions of the deck to find the one that works most efficiently. I totally forgot about skull clamp lol, ya that card is broken. Nice.

I do, however, disagree about goldenglow moth. My problem with it is that it has to be blocked. That can lead to issues with unblockable creatures, or decks that don't use creatures at all. I prefer Soul Warden , especially now that you have explained the way your deck works. Just think, if you cast ranger of eos, you grab yourself two wardens and you already have a warden on the table. You would be gaining 3 life for every creature played, and with proc of rebirth you would gain insane life. Plus, if an opponent IS playing an aggro deck, 4 life from the moth may not make up for the 10+ you can make just by having a warden sit there.

I like the cradle in your deck now, you may even want to bump it up to 2.. oh, and I kind of like the reveillark suggestion, i just don't like his cost. In this case, his proc of rebirth is a better card.

Lastly, I am curious about wasteland. I really do like that card, but what about sideboarding it? Or has it been a huge staple in your deck? If so, why not Strip Mine ? Instead of just non basic land, you can mess up even mono colored decks

Oh sorry, I forgot you actually play this deck in tournaments and strip mine is restricted lol... you could swap in one strip mine, which is still helpful. Anyway, I really like it, I will try and think of other cards... my friend had an awesome life gain deck like yours, but that was before Serra Ascendant came out. Has an particular type of deck given you a lot of trouble?

Strip Mine is amazing but restricted to 1. I actually have the Wasteland s (picked them up from a great trade the other day) and I'll be looking for a Strip Mine . The reason I have them is because land destruction is vital sometimes against some decks and my mana base is solid enough that I can support 4 colorless. Dropping it first turn with a mana heavy hand against someone that kept a shaky land hand is amazing.

I'll playtest the Soul Warden 's and see if I like them but I'm thinking (especially if I do bump the cradle up by 1) that the flying is going to be more relevant most of the time. I'm not really even planning on using the moth to block unless it's just a good move. It will more likely get clamped early and swing with counters late game.

Reveillark would be fun and I have 1 of them but I just don't know what to drop. I'm thinking proclamation is better in this deck as it pulls 3 back early and later pulls 1 guaranteed every turn even through counters or Iona. Any ideas on what to drop for 1?

I use to run Emeria, The Sky Ruin but find that I either have won or lost the game by the time that it's relevant and it also forces me to drop the colorless lands and boarderposts.

Wall of Reverence is just too high in the curve IMO as I'd almost always prefer to drop an eos or cradle at that point.

Sadly enough last time I took it I got beat by a standard mass pollymorph deck. I got a slow start, he got good draws, and Iona hit the field... yea.

The other deck that killed me was a vintage Hypergenesis deck. Again, Iona.

I'm considering what I can do about her. Maybe Brittle Effigy ? Seems pretty bad and I only own 1. Anything else that you can think of because if she hits the field with my mono white... I just lose.

I appreciate your help guys. Please let the ideas flow.

I agree with what you said on all of those, and reveillark may be good in place of one Proc of rebirth. Revillark is nice because it gives you a creature that can do damage and essentially have the proc's ability, so swapping one in might not hurt.

Ah! I remember now! card:Nevinyrral's Disk! That card would kick ass in your deck. You could use it to get rid of anything that is pissing you off, and you could bring back your stuff with reclamation. I like it better than the effigy, but you could play test it first. Honestly though, Iona is a problem for any mono deck, and you can't expect to win against everything ;)

No, but you can sure hope to. LOL.

You found some pretty nice cards for this deck, I like it. The only problem is, I just can't take a vintage deck seriously unless it has the power 9. Have you considered removing Skullclamp ((I know it works really well in this deck, but hear me out)) and playing legacy? It's a much easier format to play, less expensive for sure. You may not need to, it sounds like people don't use power 9 where you play. Or you could just add the power 9, since most vintage tournaments allow up to 10 proxies, some allow up to 15.

I can't use proxies where I play and a few have lotuses and moxes, only 1 uses them.

I am not one of the ones that have any power 9 cards or I'd ditch this deck and play a storm or something like that.

I have nowhere to play legacy or else I would play without the clamps but since I can use them, Why not?

Since you play Vintage, would you mind taking a look at my other prospective deck for me? I'm pretty much a standard player but was able to win the extended last time. I'm really shooting for this one because it would be three 1st place wins across 3 formats.

the deck is called:

Did That Mermaid Really Just Eat My Deck?

Thanks. Any help is appreciated.

I'd replace the Skullclamp with Sylvok Lifestaff

Maddogenes, you wouldn't be saying that if you had been playing standard during Mirrodin block. Skullclamp was busted enough that it earned itself a banning before Fifth Dawn was released. Clamp is incredible at drawing cards out the everything. In (almost) monowhite with small dudes and recursion, it's nothing short of incredible. In this deck it's most likely better than card:Sensei's Divining Top.