This is a Snapdax, Apex of the Hunt mutate deck I made for a customer on Fiverr. If you would like a deck built around any budget or idea, you can find me on Fiverr under genoslugcs.
Let's go over my card choices and look at what each card's role in the deck is.
Creatures we want to mutate onto:
These are the creatures we want underneath Snapdax so that he gains their abilities.
First up is Adanto Vanguard. The biggest weakness of playing mutate creatures is mutating 2 or 3 creatures together and having the entire pile (a mutate creature counts as only 1 creature) get destroyed by a single removal spell. Being on the wrong side of a 3 for 1 feels bad and is hard to recover from.
With that said, Adanto is an amazing mutate base because he can be made indestructible for no mana. Additionally, he gets +3/+0 when he attacks. Making Snapdax a 6/5 with double strike and protection is exactly what we want to be doing. Furthermore, Adanto is a solid card even without snapdax and this is a great advantage as you won't always draw a mutate creature.
The next creature we want to use as a base is Will-o'-the-Wisp. Similarly, to Adanto his protection is invaluable to the strategy. While granting evasion in the form of flying is a great way to get Snapdax through for damage.
Flensermite is good for a few reasons. First, he will give our mutate creature lifelink; which is great for stabilizing against aggressive decks. Secondly, him granting Snapax infect is very potent. If you were unaware, it only takes 10 infect damage to win. So, you can quickly win games like this if the opponent is unprepared. In addition to being highly aggressive, it also gives the deck an out against decks that gain tons of life.
Then we have Thunderous Orator. He will always grant Snapdax vigilance but the reason I included him is that he lets all our creatures share keyword abilities. For example, if Snapdax, Apex of the Hunt is mutated onto Thunderous Orator and we also have a Flensermite out, Snapdax would have vigilance, lifelink, and double strike. This ability sharing is particularly powerful with the indestructible from Adanto Vanguard. Just remember to activate adanto before combat, as a thunderous orator's ability is an attack trigger. Another huge plus for this ability (and adanto) is it gives the deck solid threats even aside from mutate. There will be games where you won't draw Snapdax at all and being stuck with a board full of creatures like Daggerdrome Imp for example, will lose you games.
Tip: When you have thunderous orator and other creatures in hand without any mutate plans, be sure to play out thunderous orator the turn before the creature with those abilities you want.
Last up is Cubwarden and while it's not the best creature to mutate onto it does have its perks. First, it will always grant Snapdax lifelink. Secondly, it also has mutate, so we will get the tokens whenever cubwarden goes onto a creature and whenever Snapdax goes onto it. Furthermore, everything mentioned above applies to cubwarden as well as Snapdax.
With the mutate bases and creatures out of the way let's move on to some of the tech and removal. Starting with my personal favorite, Killian, Ink Duelist. He is a human so while we can't mutate onto him he gives the deck an invaluable asset. He ramps us into Snapdax. Mutate targets the creature you want to mutate onto. This means that with Killian out we can mutate Snapdax, Apex of the Hunt for 3 mana instead of 5. This makes the deck so much more competitive. Mutating an entire 2 turns early is huge for the deck and will take people off guard. Let me show you a play sequence of how strong this lower curve out can be.
Turn 1: Cast Will-o'-the-Wisp
Turn 2: Cast Killian, Ink Duelist
Turn 3: Cast Snapdax, Apex of the Hunt for its reduced mutate cost, targeting Will-o'-the-Wisp. You can get the mutate trigger that deals 4 damage and gains you 4 life. Then you can attack with both creatures as well. If everything goes unblocked that's 8 damage in combat plus you will have gained 6 life as well. This cost reduction also works for Cubwarden, making it just 2 mana to mutate.
Tip: Remember that you can attack with a mutate creature the turn you can it, as long as the creature you mutated onto doesn't have summoning sickness.
Since we can reduce the cost of spells that target creatures we are also going to use it for some utility spells. My favorite being Silverquill Command. With the cost reduction, we can cast this for just 2 mana. Giving a creature +3/+3 and flying may be the strongest mode and my personal favorite. That can even turn Will-o-the-wisp into a threat. Plus, imagine the damage that's possible with snapdax. With that said, all the modes have their time to shine and the reanimation mode hits all our non-mutate creatures.
Tip: Remember, the spell has to target a creature to get the cost reduction. So, choosing the last 2 modes would not allow you to cast it for 2 mana.
Onto the removal and a few other things. I gave you the removal that has been the most versatile for me personally playing decks of these colors.
I am a huge fan of playing Collective Brutality mainboard. Since you don't know your meta yet I think it is a must. Fatal Push is fine against burn but it is useless against control. Collective brutality is good against almost everything. The -2/-2 can remove tons of early game aggro creatures like, Goblin Guide but it can also get removal or counterspells from opponents' hand. Also, I suspect you will run into a lot of burn and collective brutality is one of my favorite cards against burn. The -2/-2 kills all their creatures, the hand disruption mode hits all their burn and the drain and gain mode can keep you out of bolt range. If you choose the -2/-2 mode you can also cast this for 1 mana with Killian, Ink Duelist out.
Tip: Killian, Ink Duelist and Snapdax, Apex of the Hunt are both legendary so, the "escalate" on collective brutality is a great way to put those extra copies to good use. Extra lands as well
Then we have a 2/2 split between Path to Exile and Prismatic Ending to answer creatures and permanents very cheaply and effectively.
Last but not least we have 2 mainboard copies of Apostle's Blessing. This is for added protection of our creatures as well as using protection to make our creatures unblockable. Once again, the cost of this reduced with Killian, Ink Duelist out. Meaning it can be cast for just the 2 life and catch opponents off guard.
Mana Base:
You may have noticed that we are only running white/black cards and lands. This is because I honestly couldn't find anything in red worth going into another color for. The cool thing about spandax's mutate cost is that we don't need red to mutate him at all. It does mean that the deck can't hard cast him but that doesn't hurt the deck much. I tried a legit 3 color version, and the budget 3 color mana base issues were no were not nearly worth the payoffs in red. 2 colors allow us to play plenty of untapped duals as well as lots of basics to dodge things like Blood Moon.
Sideboard:
Again, I tried to make this as versatile as possible.
Damping Sphere would come in against decks with lands that produce excess mana, like Tron, Lotus Field decks, and Amulet Titan. As well as any deck that casts multiple spells per turn like Prowess, Storm or Affinity.
x3 Tormod's Crypt would come in against any deck that uses its graveyard as a resource. This includes decks like Dredge, Griselbrand, and Living End.
1x copy of Apostle's Blessing is to bring in against decks with heavy removal like Jund or Burn. Or any deck that has sided in removal against you post board.
3x copies of Fracture. This is a cheap catchall spell that can be brought in against any deck playing artifacts or enchantments. This includes decks like Tron, Mill, or 8-Rack. This is also a cheap out to Ensnaring Bridge and can destroy a lot of opposing sideboard cards. It is also something I would bring in against any decks that play Liliana of the Veil or control decks that play Teferi, Time Raveler.
2x copies of Duress are here to bring in against control and combo decks that rely or certain cards. And can even be brought in against things like burn.
3x copies of Lingering Souls to help out value decks that want to win wars of attrition. I bring this in against things like Jund or Midrange decks with lots of counter spells. It is a hard card for opponents come come out on top of in terms of value. This is because if they spend a card to destroy a token, they spent a whole card to answer 1/4 of your card. The same principles apply to it being countered or if someone wipes the board, because of the flashback. Furthermore, the tokens are good mutate bases as well as target to pump with Sivlverquill Command.
