Delver of Secrets
recently got a new BFF in Tolarian Terror, but there's still some question about which shell is the best for these guys. Now I personally like going all-in on deck concepts, so I thought I'd try going super low-to-the-ground Xerox style with just a ton of cantrips and no creatures other than our wincons. I also didn't want to go the Thought Scour route since we actually don't care about filling our graveyard past 6 spells anyway, so hardcore self-mill seems like extreme overkill.
In terms of cantrips, we're running 20 -- yep, that's right, a full third of the deck is dedicated to one-mana card selection. Even just casting these little guys, we can drop Tolarian Terrors for 1 mana by T4 with countermagic backup! Ponder and Preordain give us the best card selection overall, but let's not discount the instant versatility of Brainstorm, which is also the king of setting up Delver flips. We're so low-to-the-ground that we don't have to worry about being Brainstorm-locked, even without a ton of shuffle effects. Consider is a good compromise between self-mill and raw card selection, as we usually want to mill other cantrips and lands but can keep interaction or creatures as needed. Finally, Serum Visions may be generally worse than Preordain but it actually plays really well with our other cantrips, allowing us to draw a known top card while still getting maximum use out of the Scry. Plus, it sets up Delver flips nearly as well as Brainstorm.
With only 8 cards that can win the game, though, we need to protect them with Counterspell, Spell Pierce, and Foil. Counterspell obviously is the heavy-hitter, but Spell Pierce might actually be better at dealing with what this deck cares about. I've also been trying a few copies of Foil and finding it to be really clutch. Tossing a spare cantrip isn't the end of the world and this deck can actually flood somewhat easily. (Force Spike is also a consideration here; you feel like a galaxy-brained genius when you get them with this, but you really have to prioritize using it at the earliest opportunity.)
For raw card draw, we're running Frantic Inventory. The first copy is the worse card in our deck by a wide margin but all subsequent copies are the best cards, and we can sometimes mill over the first one with Consider or discard it with Foil. I tried doubling up on this effect with Accumulated Knowledge and there's some merit to that, but I prefer the consistency of 20 cantrips vs 16. We're not planning for the game to last forever so just one true card advantage source seems fine.
For on-board interaction, I've gone with the ol' faithful, Snap. Importantly, Snap lets us add to our graveyard spell count for free, making it vital for some of the T2/T3 Terror nut draws this deck can accomplish occasionally. (That said, I'm really interested in trying out You Come to a River. Bouncing a creature is often better than making one dude unblockable but it could really help steal games from opponents who have stabilized, and being able to bounce anything could be really sweet.)
I've whittled down to just 16 Islands in playtesting, and we might even want to go down to 15. We can keep just about any hand with 1 land and aim to get up to 3, with 4 at the most.
The sideboard should be pretty self-explanatory. Fade Away might be a little ambitious but I really love it so it's here for now.
I would love to hear any thoughts or suggestions!
