Angel of Serenity , why ?

@Alpha Authority

It works wonders everytime I summon it, clears a path for my non-fliers to hit in, halts creature devotions, it's just about having that reach and taking the lead in the mid to end-game.

May I ask what are your thoughts on Angel of Serenity ?

AlphaAuthority linked your name wrong lol :L

I'm off to FNM, but I'll comment later :-)

Good luck! Hope you have fun!

Looking forward to hearing your thoughts on Angel of Serenity :)

I do understand your concerns because Stormbreath Dragon and Blood Baron of Vizkopa are pro white, and they will surely appear often in tournaments.

I'll reserve any more thoughts until I get your comment though :) before I ramble on too much lol

@AlphaAuthority

Just making sure you've not forgotten :P

Read my profile info whilst I'm commenting :-)

First of all, having avg. 3,87 cmc with that much mana ramp isn't bad, it's ok. But you might consider having 23 Lands, and cut down the mana ramp. Make room for better 'plays'.

Angel of Serenity and Ashen Rider are both strong and excellent cards, only problem is cmc. And they are ONLY really good, if you can hardcast them. Let's say you whip back, Angel of Serenity , you then Exile 3 permanents, swing for 5 dmg, but then she leaves in form of Exile, and the exiled cards by Serenity will return. How is that good ? It's only a temporally removal. Which makes Ashen Rider better, but not godlike.

If you want more help, credit me in description and I'll make an thoroughly examination of your current build, and help you progress and shape your deck :-)

When you whip Angel of Serenity , this is essentially its effect:

Pay 4 mana, Return up to 3 creatures on the battlefield and/or 3 creature cards in your graveyard to their owner's hand. Your opponent lose 5 life. You gain 5 life.

If that was a sorcery card, it's still a good card to have, it does damage and nets you life gain for 4 mana.

You tend to be guaranteed to hit for 5 since Serenity can clear any flying or reach creatures your opponent have.

As for Ashen Rider ;Pay 4 mana, exile target permanent. Your opponent lose 5 life. You gain 5 life.

It still reads a great card, no?

I have no problem putting your name in the credit after there's significant changes influenced by your input, I've done the same thing in one of my other deck where someone helped me with forming a sideboard

I need to ask you to explain something, before I comment :-)

You said: "Pay 4 mana, Return up to 3 creatures on the battlefield and/or 3 creature cards in your graveyard to their owner's hand. Your opponent lose 5 life. You gain 5 life."

With Angel of Serenity , you can only Exile other creatures, on the field or in the graveyard, doesn't matter. But they will return to place of origin post exile, when she leaves. You said: "Return up to 3 creatures on the battlefield and/or 3 creature cards in your graveyard to their owner's hand", what do you mean, because no cards would go back to their owners hand ?

what he's saying is....

whip back angel...pick 3 creatures in your graveyard.

swing with the angel for 5dmg , gain 5 from lifelink.

exile angel

his leave the battlefield trigger happens.

you return the 3 creatures from your graveyard you selected to your hand.

then you can discard the 3 again to lotleth troll or hard cast them. depending on situation.

Nice deck. I wanted to make one, but lack the extra shocks and some other key pieces.

Super, thanks, he did just make it a bit complicated to understand ;-) ..

Well, I still think that Angel of Serenity is a waste of a 7 drop. She is only good when Hardcasted or Obzedat's Aid is used on her. I could understand if only thing you wanted with her, was to use Obzedat's Aid on her, but then again, running 3 copies of her, that doesn't really make any sense :s .. it's your deck, but I believe that you would be better of with something better.

@AlphaAuthority

The second part of Angel of Serenity 's ability reads "When Angel of Serenity leaves the battlefield, return the exiled cards to their owners' hands."

Once you've exiled your chosen 3 cards, at the end phase, Angel of Serenity would be exiled by the Whip of Erebos ' effect, so its leave the battlefield ability triggers.

The exiled cards would then return to their respective owners' hand. Not their place of origin post exile.

I realized that, I remembered her wrong, my bad. I apologize. But my statement still stands ;-) ..

And on the contrary, I do have her included with whipping back in mind.Hardcasting her or using Obzedat's Aid is simply a bonus really.

I would be interested as to what other cards you would suggest in her stead, I used to run Borborygmos Enraged , Medomai the Ageless , Giant Adephage , as well as Lord of the Void . I love those cards in this deck, don't get me wrong but in my experience of several months running the deck, those cards that needs to deal damage before its effect kicks in are very prone to removal.

A simple Azorius Charm exiles a creature you've whipped by the whip's own effect, when they try to return it to the top of your library.

Which is why control is reanimations biggest threats :-) .. I played with my deck

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this friday and went 3-1.. only problem was control. Everything is prone to removal, and every token is prone to effects like Azorius Charm , no doubt about that. When you get controlled, you either take the loss, as there isn't really much reanimation can do against U/W Azorius control decks, or you make the deck as competitive as possible trying to counter every deck type except control, you then use those 15 slots in sideboard to make this reanimation deck more aggro and much much faster. This deck is to slow, and realize to much on the reanimation part. As you have no spells to deal with Enchantments/Artifacts Pithing Needle would how you lose in a heartbeat against aggro.

rely*

I've had a look, playtested and +1'd your deck already :)I would say that the sideboard looks great, and I may take a leaf out of your book with the Fiendslayer Paladin as I have never thought of that card as a sideboard in this.

I already answered you some time ago in my comment section :-) - take a look.

You rely to much on this one combo, it will bite you in the butt my friend. In reanimation it's important that you stick to more combos, that relate to the one of reanimate. I could be go total nuts in aggro, throw in the whips and bring them back from the dead to avenge whatever and/or whoever put them there. It could also be midrange with Obzedat's Aid , but then you need something to protect you till midrange. Atm you only have Lotleth Troll as the main threat. You need to go with one of either Deathrite Shaman or Sylvan Caryatid , as mix of both slows you down.

In midrange decks, it's important to have a good mana curve, take a look on yours, it's stalling. As midrange, you need to have concentrated power on 2/3 drops, and slowly descend the curve. Try look on my mana curve, and see the difference. As the game goes on, you still have the same chance of getting a 8 drop as a 4 drop :-)

Please elaborate on the part where you said Deathrite Shaman and Sylvan Caryatid slows me down, I wanted to have 6 mana ramp creatures at the 1 or 2 CMC to hit 4 mana on turn 3. Which happens quite often, allowing me to skip 3 CMC altogether.

However, I have now made some changes to the deck based on some of the things you mentioned. You're right that I shouldn't simply rely on the whip or obzedat's aid, as a pithing needle would halt the whip altogether.

I had Putrefy in the original list, but having removals felt like it was stalling my own game plan, so i removed it to the maybe list, but now it's moved up to the sideboard.

I've added Blood Baron of Vizkopa to hard cast against control, and will be looking into Witchstalker and Fiendslayer Paladin

I can't deny that Blood Baron of Vizkopa is a powerful card, but I might have him in my sideboard against control. As he is lacking a breach method, no trample, flying or intimidate nor any ETB effect.

Deathrite Shaman is better in modern with fetch lands, but he would first work as a ramp in T3 anyways, as you need to cast Commune with the Gods before you would have any lands in your graveyard. So he is first efficient in T3, just like Sylvan Caryatid when it comes to ramp. But you might wanna prioritize Sylvan Caryatid over Deathrite Shaman , as she has hexproof and is a better defender against aggro.

Having 6 ramp cards will eventually around mid game give you some dead draws, and therefore slow you down. I see you changed your land total to 23, so 4 Sylvan Caryatid would be better. Deathrite Shaman can be used for dmg as well. But I don't think he would do that much of a difference to be honest. At least he didn't when I playtested him.

I think you limit yourself with only having so few creatures in the deck, that makes a difference. You can't keep whip'ing creatures back, as they end up in exile. And having 4x Whip of Erebos and 4x Commune with the Gods you'll end up having dead draws. Cut it down to 3 Whips. You'll get flooded with the cards you don't necessarily need.

This decks biggest weakness is aggro atm, as you have literally need field control. You will be dead by T4/5 as you can't do anything to halt a White Weenie, Rakdos Aggro, Dimir Aggro, Rush decks, Land destruction decks, Control countering all your mill and whips. Having one or two deck counters wouldn't be bad, but as it is of now, everything else but Midrange will tear you apart.

Prioritising Sylvan Caryatid does make sense in the standard format, my reasoning for keeping it half and half is that Deathrite Shaman also works as a graveyard hate which works against any deck that runs a whip, and he does all the other things that he does too. That been said, his main job will be to ramp, so I will try out having 4 of the Caryatids instead.

To be honest, now that I've included a Deadbridge Chant in the deck, I was considering cutting the whip count down to 3 and having the chant count up to 2, gives variation as to which I'd draw when I play commune with the gods.

Against aggro, at times I'm able to race them to my set up, at which point they just can't race all the bouncing, exiling, and lifelink i'm doing. And yea currently Lotleth is the only thing slowing them, I'll try to play around with Fiendslayer Paladin as I do like the idea of him against R/x aggro.

Against control, it was always about picking when to play what for me. They dig to try and find their win-con, I dig to find mine and as the game goes on, I whip a Serenity back and grab some of my creatures to hard cast back from the graveyard to make them pay out more removals.

Honestly, it has been doing fine, but I'd never say no to improvements :)

Thanks for the discussion!

This discussion has been great to read! I, personally, love Angel of Serenity . And with your ability to Obzedat's Aid or Whip of Erebos her good, when you discard her with your other cards, it makes sense. I see what AlphaAuthority (sorry, new to this forum and not yet used to the linking of names) is saying about cmc and mana ramping, and I don't know where you play your FNM, but this deck does not seem slow and if the late game is in order, a 5/6 triple exile, flying is something of an issue with many decks, even for 7 cmc. My question is your Blood Baron of Vizkopa . I see him as great for resurrecting later in the game, but a 5/5 lifelink without first strike for 5 cmc. Does he make it early on? Do you only plan to fish him out later? I see the apeal of a 10/10 flying, lifelink, protection from detain and black removal, but does he get there or is he stopped early on before he becomes the monster? Might there be another card that would help either with mana ramping or defending until Armada Wurm does it's work?

Just some thoughts from an outsider who has never played a deck like this :)