precociousapprentice, thanks for the response.

I'm giving Wild Ricochet a try right now. It's performing alright. I enjoy redirecting my opponents' removal spells. However, I'm still not sure it's worth a slot. It's variable. Sometimes useful, sometimes not.

I'm also thinking of giving Sunhome, Fortress of the Legion a try. It's activated ability is expensive but double strike is a powerful ability to give a creature (particularly a deathtouch creature like Marchesa). Similar to Duelist's Heritage it could be used politically. I find I'm not really using Slayers' Stronghold's ability.

Hey precociousapprentice, what are your thoughts on Avacyn, Guardian Angel? I feel like she could be a fun political/pillowfort card.

Love this deck! Great concept, great read, very inspiring. Makes me rethink my reactive dracogenius deck. Thanks!

MegaMatt13, I love the idea of Sunhome, Fortress of the Legion. I have looked at it a bunch of times, and I have no idea why I never chose it. The is a little steep, but it seems like it would fit so well. I think your suggestion of switching it in for Slayers' Stronghold is probably perfect.

UnleashedHavok, Avacyn, Guardian Angel is more expensive than I like to run, but it would probably fit in really well.

sashaza, I think I totally misunderstood you, and now I feel silly. You asked about Gisela, the Broken Blade, and I responded to my feelings regarding Gisela, Blade of Goldnight. Oops. Gisela, the Broken Blade is basically a holdover from when the deck needed flying lifelinkers to pair with Hatred. It was efficient, had flying and lifelink, and was not too expensive for a midrange creature. I have kept it for the same reasons, but at this point, it may not be the best choice available. I have not switched it, mostly because I just kinda like it. To replace it, I would need to find an efficient flyer, with secondary abilities that are more pertinent than lifelink. At this point, I am mostly pretty happy with it.

Beebles, thanks, it has been fun to create, collect, and evolve.

MegaMatt13 I also really like the suggestion of Sunhome, Fortress of the Legion instead of Slayers' Stronghold. Definitely gonna try that as double strike has proven to be a great political tool.

precociousapprentice Thanks for the reply. I think I'm going to try Gisela, the Broken Blade, as well as Gisela, Blade of Goldnight instead of Dictate of the Twin Gods. I prefer the asymmetrical effect and it feels less scary to play.

What are your guy's thoughts on Vedalken Orrery? I can imagine holding rattlesnake permanents in hand as instants could be very powerful..

sashaza, I feel like my Queen Marchesa build does not have enough permanents that would take advantage of Vedalken Orrery. I also like both Gisela's more than Dictate of the Twin Gods.

Hello,

I'm still intrigued by the deck and have come back to it a few times this week to ponder on it. After doing so I have a few questions and thoughts:

• Sphere of Safety seems quite weak/expensive if you run only 8 enchantments. I wonder if you ever considered switching that out. Aurification or Academy Rector come to mind as a viable alternatives.
• Boros Fury-Shield seems to fit the brief. Did you exclude that one? If so, what made you not include it?
• Could you explain the reasons why you are running Lotus Vale, Scorched Ruins and no basics in this deck? The only benefit apart from mana fixing I see is that it helps to mitigate damage from Acidic Soil (not so much Price of Progress as basics would also do that), but that seems like a small gain to me against the risk of losing 3-4 lands to a Strip Mine or perhaps even auto-conceding in the event of a Wave of Vitriol, From the Ashes, Ruination, Blood Moon or Back to Basics. It seems like an unnecessary built-in achilles heel of the deck. Could you share if there is more to that than I can see atm?
• It seems like the reactive strategy you are going for requires a certain ratio of instants/flash cards to work well. Has this been factor in your tweaking and if so, what would be your advised minimum or sweet spot %?
• If you like the broken blade, you might like Baneslayer Angel and/or Exalted Angel for the same reasons. But maybe their too high cmc for your taste.
• Have you ever considered Electropotence or Warstorm Surge as a means to discourage people from steeling monarch? Else you can let your deathtouch token destroy another creature as it enters the battlefield. Probably not good enough to make the cut, but still a fun interaction with deathtouch I wanted to mention.

Cheers

Beebles, thanks for taking a serious look at the deck. I appreciate the feedback, since this is a work in progress, as evidenced by the huge comment thread and the various updates.

Sphere of Safety - Enchantments are one of the things that just seem to stick around more than other permanents. There are only 8, but I end up collecting them, and three of my most tutored for cards are enchantments, so they often come out. There once was a few more enchantments, and I am not sure of my threshold below which I would get rid of it, but you are right, I haven't really considered removing it. I was just recently thinking that I would put more Ghostly Prison type cards in if I could, and Sphere of Safety is just an overcosted and typically weak version of Ghostly Prison. Academy Rector would potentially fit the bill, in that I would be able to search for that Ghostly Prison, but Aurification may be counter to my strategy. Unlike No Mercy, Aurification leaves them with defense, and I dont want other players to have defense, if possible. I have considered Lightmine Field, but that is only worthwhile against swarm attacks. I will keep in mind that replacing Sphere of Safety with Academy Rector may actually work out nicely, and would lower my curve ever so slightly, and would even be another creature for my recently added Worship. I appreciate the suggestion.

Boros Fury-Shield - This was a card that I did consider early, and have not returned to it since, for no really great reason. I excluded it early for a few simple reasons. It is a fog that only affects the damage done by a single attacking or blocking creature. This seriously limits its ability as a fog. Every other fog I added could stop all damage aside from Deflecting Palm, and the ability to redirect any damage source makes it far superior. The ability to redirect damage is essentially shared by every other fog in my list aside from Dawn Charm, and the other modes of Dawn Charm make up for this. It sort of behaves like a highly conditional Backlash or Delirium, and maybe I should think of it that way. In that case, it actually could fill a role in the deck. Thank you for the reminder. I may consider trialling it as another conditional copy of Backlash or Delirium.

Lotus Vale and Scorched Ruins - These cards are there for much more than as a way to mitigate the damage from Price of Progress. They work somewhat subtly in the deck, and the real reason has to do with another synergy that you did not mention as well as a psychological reason. The risk has been mitigated in my meta by an overaggressive (others said abuse) of targeted land destruction by myself. After a fun bout with a Life from the Loam deck that abused Strip Mine and its various friends, when I tried playing Strip Mine in a few other decks, including this one, and there were enough complaints that we agreed that land destruction is not fun, and we basically all agreed to take it out of our decks. No one enjoys non-basic hate or color specific hate, either, so no one plays them. I understand that this is a very specific meta that I play in, but this mitigates the risk, and there is little risk in playing these lands at this point. The value of these cards has to do with keeping my land count low. This helps with Acidic Soil and Price of Progress, but also makes Tithe, Gift of Estates, and Weathered Wayfarer stay active. These three cards draw me a ton of cards, which I can pitch to Key to the City or Solitary Confinement. These three cards are a decent amount of my non-Monarch card draw. Solitary Confinement is my most tutored card, and extra cards in hand are really valuable. Trimming my lands with Lotus Vale and Scorched Ruins, as well as the Ravnica Karoos and Gemstone Mine all lead to lower land counts, and ensures these synergies with both my offense and my card draw, while leaving me with the same potential mana as everyone else at the table. This is where it gets subtle and tricky. When people look around the table for threats, number of permanents plays into threat assessment. Appearing to have fewer lands makes me appear as less of a threat. It is super easy to overlook the fact that I can often get 7+ mana from 4 lands. Scorched Ruins is actually Ramp, and is a little like a Sol Ring in disguise. When people actually count, they are not fooled, but it is surprising how often people just glance at your lands, unless they are looking for responses to their plays. Not playing Blue means I get less scrutiny than some, and this lowers my threat level. Altogether, the cards in the deck have many synergies as well as subtle psychological effects that the whole package together is much more powerful than the basics that could replace them.

As far as reactivity goes, I would break it down into two categories: Instants, and interactive permanents. While instants make up the bulk of the deck, interactive permanents are super interesting. I have 22 instants, 17 of which are tutorable with Sunforger. You dont need that many, even as a Sunforger package. As a toolbox, Sunforger packages are usually 10+ cards. Less than that is probably underpowering it. Aside from that, I have never had a goal in mind for reactivity. I thought about how I could lose, and set about trying to overcome those conditions, hopefully in a way that wins me the game. I also thought about what sorts of game states are common, and went about trying to punish those game states. Finally, I thought about how to create exciting game state swings in ways that would not make me a global target. Some of this lead to some Mardu goodstuff, but many of these cards are somewhat uncommon. What evolved from this thought process is the deck you see. It now has 22 instants, 18 of which are truly interactive and reactive, as well as a couple of interactive lands, a couple of interactive artifacts, a couple of interactive creatures, and an interesting interactive enchantment. In essence, I have no threshold, and would not consider the underlying philosophy of deck construction used for this deck to be particularly interested in thresholds.

I like the idea of Electropotence, and agree that the synergy with Lifelink and Deathtouch would be great, especially for Assassin and Snake tokens. I think that Warstorm Surge, Baneslayer Angel, and Exalted Angel are too mana intensive for my tastes. Thanks for the suggestion of Electropotence, I may trial it, and it may prompt me to add more Deathtouch creatures again. Ogre Slumlord with Electropotence is a wrath and token bomb all at once. Interesting.

Thank you for the suggestions, and the discussion. It always helps. You have given me a few cards to consider, or even just reconsider, as the case many be. These kinds of discussions have been what has lead to this decks long evolution to what it is now, and will continue to evolve it. Thanks.

I just have to ask: How many feature tokens have you pumped into this thing?

precociousapprentice please let me know how the hour of devastation cards go. The ones I am considering are Torment of Hailfire and Hour of Revelation. With the latter one I'm not sure that I want to destroy ALL nonland permanents. Enchantments are very important in the deck. Still... 3 mana for that is very tempting

As a Gahiji player, I love love LOVE the "aikido" angle here. Great stuff! Also enjoy the haymaker finisher like Anathemancer and Price of Progress.

Do Key to the City and Mana Tithe do enough work for you?

Possible suggestions for you (assuming you haven't tried them already): Serene Master and Righteous Aura. I think both of these back up your theme really well, and help you keep Monarch active!

Thanks for the extensive reply! I'm glad there was something there that matches your vision for the deck! I do would like to say a few more things about your mana base:

• Your mana base makes a lot more sense knowing the people in your playgroup agreed not to run any land destruction.
• You explain that cards like Lotus Vale provide a psychological effect in your opponents that leads them to underestimate your board state. I see how this will be a benefit without drawback in your playgroup and how that ties in with appearing weak when you are strong. However, for other meta's I wonder if that effect is worth running with the strip mine risk. Perhaps I would stick to just the Karoos in my playgroup.
• I think you are overestimating the amount of support Land Tax type of effects need. It's only a potential issue if A) you go first (if you go second you can play Tithe eot, or play Gift of Estates before your land drop), B) if the other people in the game don't play green (only one player needs to ramp and you're fine) or C) everyone runs a very low land count (this is edh, there always will be a player who runs at least as many lands as you do). If you ever find yourself in that situation, which will be quite rare from my experience, a karoo land is often all you need.
• More importantly, It just seems ironic to me that a deck that is all about subtlety and punishing people for being greedy, your deck has such a greedy mana base by playing no basics. If you would ever play in another playgroup I think it would fit the philosophy better to run at least some basics to guard yourself against being beaten at your own game. Even in casual groups these type of punish-nonbasic-land-effects are around. Take Wave of Vitriol for example. That's primarily a 7cmc artifact and enchantment board wipe that a lot of landfall decks play to get more triggers and dealing with OP nonbasics in a somewhat friendly way, while incidentally also punishing people who play greedy mana bases (but that's not the reason why that cards is played). So if you ever go to your LGS, consider adding a few basics ;).

Keep up the great work with this deck. I surely took inspiration from it!

GL & HF

Beebles

Beebles, you have gotten me thinking. I have had no problems with anyone I have played, even at my LGS, but it may be a very unique meta, and I will be moving soon, so the new meta is unlikely to be anything like what I have now. I will have to think and review things.

Deepstriker29, I am pretty sure, just from the comment alone, that it is a lot less than you think.

awalloftext, thanks for the kind words. In my meta, both Key to the City and Mana Tithe do a fair bit of work. They are surprisingly good. Both Serene Master and Righteous Aura have been considered in the past. Righteous Aura is a COP, and basically looked down on for that reason. Serene Master is similar to deathtouch, but without the synergies or offensive power, and didn't make it, despite the flavor win.

MegaMatt13, I will, once I have them and am able to trial them.

Thanks everyone for review and discussion. I really appreciate it.

What an awesome decklist and write up!! +1 from me.

Would you please give some input on my queen marchesa deck (Hvis Lyset Tar Oss)? It's a midrange creature focused deck, but any advice is appreciated.

I left a comment. I love thinking about other people's perspectives on EDH and MTG, so these conversations are fun. Thanks for the upvote.

Fun deck list! I like the Aikido idea, had not heard of that archetype before now.

Have you considered Vault of the Archangel? Might be more than you need, but the color combo makes it available and deathtouch/lifelink seem to be your thing.

I HAVE a Marchesa and a majority of these cards, plus I love to pilot fun decks like that in group settings. Doesn't seem like it's geared to one on one, thoughts?

I play it one-on-one sometimes. It is much harder, but not impossible. It demands that you become much more aggressive, but it does work.

I have checked out Vault of the Archangel, but didn't include it because most of my creatures have one or the other. I felt it was not as powerful as it would seem. I never trialled it, though, so it may actually be really good. I appreciate the suggestion, and may check it out sometime.

The vault works better with a number of creatures which doesn't seem to be this deck's primary style. Plus it's 5 mana.

I will probably play this for group play but I have a pretty aggressive meta so might add in some sweepers like Pestilence as a recurring board wipe. We play a lot of planechase so she might be a fun political aspect.

I enjoy the white counter spells they definitely trip people out in these colors.

Pestilence and Pyrohemia have both been considerations. They fit the deck well.

100 Upvotes update added.

Sphere of Safety -> Academy Rector

Ayli, Eternal Pilgrim -> Ogre Slumlord

Did you mean to put Gisela, Blade of Goldnight instead of Gisela, the Broken Blade? I don't see the broken blade being a wincon as you don't run the other creature necessary to flip her.

No, I have the right Gisela. :-) With Gisela, the Broken Blade, the CMC is less for a midrange creature with evasion and lifelink. The flip was never a consideration, it just wasn't worth the slot for what I got. There may be better creatures out there, she was originally in there because I ran Hatred and wanted the evasive lifelink. I have not looked for a replacement yet. Gisela, Blade of Goldnight has a significantly higher CMC, and is a red flag for many people. Too much hate. I may actually go for Rune-Scarred Demon again, but that is also very expensive. We shall see.

I see! The only thing that throws me off is the 3 toughness. I feel like you would get more value out of running Baneslayer Angel or maybe Archangel of Thune. Archangel of Thune would also synergize great if you have an army or setting up for one. I played this deck last night in a 3 player match and it did great btw! I really enjoyed the political role. One of my friends is stubborn and kept focusing me which killed himself with all of the deflection damage. Then I pulled out a win with 5 health left against my other friend who was using a Meren deck. I had Queen Marchesa an unblockable double striker with the Sunforger. This deck was so enjoyable that I wouldn't have cared to come in second. :)

Agreed, it is even fun when you lose!

I wanted to keep the CMC low, so it was a trade off. I find that I rarely win off of it since removing Hatred, so I have been considering replacements. I think I will be considering more rattlesnake cards than wincons, though. That, or a card with another effect that I would like in the deck.

You should try out a Debt of Loyalty