Purpose
Do you ever ask yourself "Am I saving too much money?" or "Is my wallet too fat?" perhaps "M14 standard was really fun... right?"?
Well, if you answered yes to any of those questions, a Sliver deck running all of the best little fuckers, a viable mana base, and various other expensive ass cards is right for you!
What's the main idea?
Phase 1: RAMP & COLOR FIX
Phase 2: ???
Phase 3: Infinite
After messing around with this deck for over a year, my most consistent wins usually involve me playing Morophon, the Boundless, and Sliver Overlord, it's a good idea to have extra mana by the turn both of those big bois are out but sometimes you just gotta put your balls on the table.
(Due to placing thine testicles upon said table it is not uncommon to get the shit targeted out of you, but that's why we run various forms of protection, and interaction)
If you have extra mana per chance you can tutor as many of the 5 color Slivers as you can, ideally playing The First Sliver FIRST for free of of Morophon, the Boundless, then you get to cascade into as many Slivers as fate will allow, once Morophon, the Boundless and Sliver Overlord are on the field, if you have a mana Sliver ( Gemhide Sliver, Manaweft Sliver, or Cryptolith Rite ) and a haste Sliver ( Cloudshredder Sliver or Heart Sliver ) you can do this much more efficiently, typically outright winning the game; espically with Training Grounds or Mana Echoes out.
Settup (Ramp & Color Fixing)
To talk about the setup a bit more having a mana Sliver (Manaweft Sliver, Gemhide Sliver, or Cryptolith Rite) is essential. Not only will it allow you to not only fix your mana easily, but it will allow you to afford the more costly cards in your deck by paying for them with your Slivers, Chromatic Lantern also helps out with the color fixing aspect.
Being able to tutor from Sliver Overlord, Worldly Tutor, Enlightened Tutor, Vampiric Tutor, or Demonic Tutor are what keeps the deck list tight, at its heart, this deck is a tool box, and there are only so many tools that we truly need to make an impact; so making sure you are equipped to react with the right spells goes a long way.
I also run ramp spells like Three Visits (thank god for reprints), Nature's Lore, Skyshroud Claim, Smothering Tithe, The Great Henge (which costs only two mana when Sliver Overlord, Sliver Legion, Sliver Queen, or The First Sliver are out), and 'rocks' like Mana Crypt, Sol Ring, Arcane Signet, and Chromatic Lantern which can't help cast the Sliver lords, but CAN help cast Morophon, the Boundless or pay for Sliver Overlord's tutor.
Combos Time
95% of this decks combos revolve around Sliver Queen, along with most combinations of the following cards, Sliver Queen goes nuts;
Cloudshredder Sliver / Heart Sliver, Manaweft Sliver / Gemhide Sliver,Training Grounds, Mana Echoes, Intruder Alarm, Basal Sliver, and Lavabelly Sliver.
To expand on that,
Training Grounds reduces the cost to make Sliver Queen's 1/1 Sliver to , and by sacrificing a Sliver with Basal Sliver you get mana back, this goes infinite for creating 1/1 Slivers. (Training Grounds also reduces our Sliver Overlord tutor cost to )
OR
If you have Mana Echoes in play, and at least one Sliver out on the field, playing Sliver Queen gives you , which you can turn right around and use to pay for Sliver Queen's ability, which makes Mana Echoes give you ...
TLDR; you get to exponentially ramp allowing you to create infinite Slivers with colorless mana this leads to 'infinite' by creating 1/1 Slivers, in addition to whatever other shenanigans you may be holding.
OR
If you have Intruder Alarm out on the field with Sliver Queen, in addition to a "mana" Sliver, and a "haste" Sliver; this goes allows you to infinitely produce 1/1 slivers AND colored mana, by tapping all of your Slivers for whatever color you want before activating Sliver Queen, you can then activate her and as the 1/1 Sliver hits Intruder Alarm makes the field untap, and then you can all your Slivers for mana again, and then pay for the Queen again, blah blah blah yada yada yada; if you have draw you can play your entire deck in one turn if you REALLY wanted to, but most people just scoop by the second time you do this.
While you can take any of these infinite 1/1 sliver production combos from our Sliver Queen and just go straight to the face on your opponents;
If you have a Lavabelly Sliver out, all the Slivers you are making slowly ping all of your opponents to death while inflating your own life total, one trigger at a time. :')
The most efficient way to do this is obviously with Sliver Queen, Lavabelly Sliver, and Basal Sliver.
As mentioned in the main idea of the deck, my favorite combo to have is playing Morophon, the Boundless, then casting Sliver Overlord for free, if I have extra mana I can tutor for The First Sliver
(if you don't have one in your hand already in which case you play The First Sliver first)
The first time you cascade off of The First Sliver, if you hit another Sliver, it doesn't have cascade because The First Sliver is not yet on the field, BUT once I get my cascades going, I tutor for the rest of the Sliver lords like Sliver Hivelord, Sliver Legion, and Sliver Queen to get that sweet sweet cascade triggers, while also playing them for FREE, as well as any Sliver that have no colorless mana in its cost (hint hint Cloudshredder Sliver for combat damage, or Hibernation Sliver for lots of cascades; this is how I win most of my games)
A decent combo in this deck involves having Sliver Overlord out with a mana Sliver, a haste Sliver and Intruder Alarm. If you tap all of your Slivers, (floating at least 4) you can search your library for a 1 cost Sliver, then rinse and repeat this process getting a bigger sliver each time, and filling up your board to a game winning state. (same thing with Intruder Alarm and a mana/haste Sliver works with Sliver Queen
One fun "combo" I have found during games where I'm not being targeted heavily, involves me stockpiling Slivers into my hand through draw or tutor effects, then discarding Slivers on my end step (prioritizing the expensive ones & combo enablers) and on my next turn playing Patriarch's Bidding to get everything back to the field for only which can likely just win a game depending on what is in the graveyard.
Typically I have only used Hibernation Sliver defensively, but I recently discovered that if you ALSO have Morophon, the Boundless, and The First Sliver out at the same time; you can just keep castingThe First Sliver over and over again by putting it back into your hand for 2 life. While this may not outright win you the game, it can allow you to outvalue all of your opponents
If you ever feel like being scum of the earth you can use Amoeboid Changeling to turn opponents creatures(commanders) into a Sliver, and then using Sliver Overlord to then steal that card and keep it under your control forever for only , (or with Training Grounds out).
One combo I would like to add to this deck (because it would be funny) is Blasphemous Act and Spiteful Sliver, if everyone has 40 life 12 Slivers taking 13 damage kills everyone, if everyone has 39 life, you can do it with 9 Slivers. This combo only gets funnier if you have Sliver Hivelord out.
Value & Combat
Sliver Overlord too expensive? Good thing we have Homing Sliver which only serves one purpose, and is honestly on the chopping block for expansion to other cool stuff.
Anywho, not enough cards in hand? Good thing we have Rhystic Study, Mystic Remora, Sylvan Library, Sensei's Divining Top, and Scroll Rack. While using top/library/rack you may find that you are having trouble drawing into cards you haven't seen already and are "locked out" of your deck, good thing we run all 10 fetches and plenty of tutors to shuffle that library up!
As far as combat goes, do I even need to talk about how Slivers have the ability to obtain all the key words you'll ever need...?
Probably; so to name a few...
Flying / First Strike / Double Strike / Vigilance / Deathtouch / Unblockable / Shroud / Indestructible / Flash / Trample / Haste / Regenerate / Life Link / cost reduction / Pay 2 life return to hand / +X/+0 / and lets not forget the classic +X/+X
This deck also has numerous ways to get Slivers back from the graveyard or to keep them from dying with Hibernation Sliver, Sedge Sliver, Sliver Hivelord, Crystalline Sliver, and Patriarch's Bidding as I previously mentioned.
No longer included is Spirit of Resistance, while I love the card in the sense that if you have Sliver Overlord your opponents can't deal damage to you, a more ideal play is to win before you have to worry about taking damage like that.
Protection & Removal
For protection we run ~6 counter spells and some other things to help out during tricky interactions or in response to being targeted. To name them off we have Swan Song, Counterspell, Delay, Dovin's Veto, Mana Drain, and Voidslime,
Some non counterspell protection would be cards like Heroic Intervention, and Teferi's Protection.
One weird card I'm just going to talk about here even though its not really protection is Hall of Heliod's Generosity it helps keep your combo piece enchantments out of your graveyard which I think is pretty nifty.
For removal we have a handful of options of some pretty good stuff, namely Path to Exile, Swords to Plowshares, Assassin's Trophy, Anguished Unmaking, Cyclonic Rift, and Kindred Dominance which can help you deal with the tables threats, or to just help you stay in the game.
Land base
While upgrading a budgeted mana base over time I have been able to vastly improve the speed and reliability at which I can get Sliver Overlord out,
note Back in the day when this list was cheaper the mana base consisted of 5 basics(which it still does), all 5 vivid lands, all 5 BFZ duals, and all 10 of the original tri lands, and some other cards I have now cut; While the deck "functions" with a cheaper mana base, the more fetches, and the less "enters tapped" lands you run the better, I use to run the mirage fetches which are a GREAT budget option, but there's only 5 of them, so I've always had the the Khans fetches in here (which are still pretty cheap), but having all 10 actual fetches really helps you fix your mana for whatever situation you're in; but running Chromatic Lantern really does help at any budget level.
As mentioned above this deck runs 1 of every basic, which lets us grab from any cards that make you search for a basic like Settle the Wreckage or Path to Exile, or in case you don't want to pay two life to shock in a land, or if you don't want to grab a triome that will enter tapped (triomes are fucking awesome btw; hypothetically if you don't need 1 extra mana for the rest of your turn, you can just grab a triome, you won't be able to do anything less, and your color fixing just got that much cleaner)
If you have any suggestions/questions/comments/concerns feel free to let me know!
I love to hear/receive feedback and making my deck better!
Also, big shoutout to Mortlocke for his help with this deck, and for his deck The Queen's Egg which I used as a baseline for inspiration when deciding cards to add and cut