One thing you're probably struggling with against blue control is card draw. Sign in Blood is fine in any lifegain deck with black, but with only two of them, that's very few cards drawn over the game -- and you might not even see a single one. That being said, if you're not going the extort route, but are still ramping with Crypt Ghast , perhaps Mentor of the Meek is worth a look? If you strictly want to remain within Standard, then that card is probably rotating out too soon for your tastes, but the extra card draw can be a lifesaver. This way, you increase your chances of finding an Archangel or Baron before an opponent puts out AEtherling , or something similarly nasty. If you can put Archangel of Thune on your board and gain life before your opponent's turn, they might think twice about swinging with AEtherling -- at that stage of the game, you may well be threatening lethal.

Very cool deck. +1I'm working on a similar deck build myself called Achangel of PWN. If you have the time it'd be awesome if you could take a look at it and offer any suggestions. Thanks :)

@ Trollhoffer... yeah rotation is big on my mind at the moment so rotating cards im trying to avoid unless i already have them or can trade and the lack of draw tends to be countered by me slowing down the early plays of decks i'm against, hopefully i should drop land every turn until turn 4 or 5 and then use Crypt Ghast to fix the late game mana... it works and is horrible in multiplayer and its fun... thats what counts!

@ Lord_Mandible... thanks for the +1, i'll happily have a look at your deck. Always good to get fresh ideas or pass on knowledge

cptjmaverick even with a SB Pithing Needle has AEtherling give u that much problems? maybe ive just been fortunate in my draws; but he rarely wins. its honestly the mill side of the AEtherling deck that gets me.

AEtherling is just an annoyance... as you said its the fact that most blue control decks dont have field presence meaning cards like high priest become useless and yet they can easily remove large numbers of creatures in one fowl swoop or mill me without me being able to do anything. Tbh ive not lost a whole match to a mill deck yet as they are a little inconsistent but its a tough match up to say the least, just put in elixir and hope it shows up in a timely manner :p

Been looking at some of the theros spoilers and i think i should find room for gift of immortality in this deck... makes removing any of my cards a nightmare for my opponent and thats what we like

You lose a lot of this deck in rotation! Vampire Nighthawk is a big deal!

Have you thought about adapting this to a Dega shell? Foray into red, play Boros Reckoner in the Nighthawk slot? Theros has a lot of red-white support and you already have the crucial Blood Baron of Vizkopa and Archangel of Thune components!

It wasnt a direction i had really considered for the deck but would be interesting to play around with that... your right though a lot rotates out and theres no real suitable replacements in theros so i need to change the direction of the deck slightly... will have to have a play with the cards and see what i want... i could run Boros Reckoner without splashing red as its a split colour card...

You don't really want Boros Reckoner for WWW, it's not a turn 3 play (especially with the loss of the M13 lands) whereas when you can make use of the hybrid mana, it's fast. Also, Aurelia, the Warleader ends your curve and gives you a very solid win condition!

Introducing red gives you a brand new card pool which is especially suited toward your current play speed - Rakdos's Return , Mizzium Mortars , Warleader's Helix , Assemble the Legion , Dreadbore , Anger of the Gods for examples!

@cptjmaverick have you looked at Agent of Fates...very suitable replacement for Vampire Nighthawk but does require a lot of deck changing to accomodate it; but both black and white have terrific cards to do this.....i look forward to changing these decks next weekend and seeing what ideas we can bounce off each other

I did tag that card when they were spoilering everything as a pretty powerful card. The only issue is finding a way to reliably trigger the heroic mechanic and as you said these decks would need a real shift around to get them to utilise the effect to its full potential.

I too look forward to seeing if we can brew some fun new idea, Whip of Erebos may be another interesting play to flash back a High Priest of Penance when the opponent doesnt expect it. Also was thinging Erebos, God of the Dead can allow you to play cards like Alms Beast now... these decks need some major rework though thats for sure

Okay i've done a rough build for theros with this deck, its still certainly a work in progress but i've included Agent of the Fates and Gift of Immortality from the theros block, Agent of the Fates as creature removal and Gift of Immortality to allow me to get more from Agent of the Fates and High Priest of Penance as well as protecting my end game cards. Orzhov Charm is my choice for spot removal due to it not having the restrictions of a lot of other removal in the format, and it protects my creatures by returning them if i need to. This deck needs a lot of play testing and of course could do with your input :)

very nice. im also planning on using both Agent of Fates and Orzhov Charm .Whip of Erebos and Obzedat, Ghost Council have amazing interaction. i will be adding red to the mix as well, probably for Spark jolt for ping High Priest of Penance and trigger Agent of Fates (and scry!) possibly Strionic Resonator but as a 1 of. Gods Willing is great...Hero's Downfall is a given.i will probably sideboard Erebos, God of the Dead ..Read the Bones ...basically im going for heavy removal; cheap self targetting instants; and probably 16 total creatures...im still brewing in my head but ill tinker with it on here and let you check it out for criticism when complete. hope you had a great prerelease weekend (2-2 friday night, 3-1 2HG)

Sounds like a plan with your deck, i would splash red but i dont have the sacred foundrys and thats a must to run the red in the deck consistantly... i'd end up using Dreadbore if I splashed red though as its the best removal there is imo. And yeah pre-release was good, i built what i thought was a weak green white emchantment deck and it ended up winning the tournament, i was undefeated in every match and beat my best friend in the final which i felt a little mean about haha!

Dreadbore is decent, but i think i prefer Hero's Downfall . its instant speed and you dont need red. so if they drop a planeswalker you can deal with it while their trigger lays on the stack. just renders it useless

One card I hated at the prerelease was Ordeal of Heliod . Your entire deck and Blood Baron of Vizkopa , especially, loves the mammaries off this card.

unfortunately u cant equip it to Blood Baron of Vizkopa as the pro-white....but if you can make it stick....devastating

I suggest perhaps Vizkopa Guildmage instead of sanguine bond, with the amount of mana you're getting from Crypt Ghast, you could probably afford to activate her 2nd ability, oh, I dunno, four or five times a turn... I use her and I can confirm, gaining 6 life and your opponent losing 6 is nice and all, but gaining 6 life and your opponent losing 24, or just enough to kill them, is even better.

I did run vizkopa guildmage in the past but it's so prone to being removed i found it was never the card i wanted in a tight spot, still you are right if you can get the trigger going it can be brutal!

If the deck happens to be creature heavy, I'd also recommend using her with Alive / Well , if you get her to stick, that's 4 mana minimum for a lot of pain, but if she is prone to removal, you can just tack 2 more to that, cast her from hand, activate, then play Well.

I've found it's a nice little win-con.

cptjmaverick i see our decks have diversified greatly. how is this brew working out?

also, changes made to the new Theros brew. Fate of the Dead

Tbh i've not had time to playtest this deck, a lot of people at my club have decided to go black control and its making me want to keep this deck back until i can think of something different to do with it. I'll go have a look at your deck now though as i've not seen what new things you've done to it!

I decided to come back and post a deck that I needed some help with because I keep losing to my friends rakdos deck because of how fast it is. I appreciate all the insight you gave me before. I was hoping you can give me insight on my new deck Aggro life gain drain deck. Thanks.