I am considering switching out Everflowing Chalice for 2 more Darksteel Citadel s. Even though the Everflowing Chalice is strong ramp, it still takes a whole turn in most cases to utilize to its maximum potential.

Thoughts?

Also debating Turn Aside vs. Pact of Negation . Anyone care to weigh in on this one?

Maybe I'm missing something obvious here, but how are you able to get Lotus Bloom on the field each time you sacrifice it? Salvagers brings it to your hand at which point you have to exile it with 3 time counters. So how are pulling off the infinite combo in one turn?

Please correct me if I'm wrong but I was under the impression that it's a 0 mana cost artifact to play from the hand which you can choose to suspend instead (not sure why you would choose to, other than for hand space if you are starting to overdraw).

My apologies. I misinterpreted this card as essentially a modern legal Black Lotus , which it is not. That being said, this deck idea still works with Black Lotus but it would be reduced to a casual level deck. I may have to simply incorporate a new infinite mana combo to fill the hole revealed in my plan.

Yeah, I wish lol that would be absolutely ridiculous. It actually technically does not have a normal casting cost, effectively forcing you to pay it's alternate casting cost (suspend 0). If it had a 0 casting cost like Pact of Negation , as well as the suspend alternate cost, then it would work.

I'll just end up replacing Lotus Bloom and Leonin Squire with Grand Architect and Pili-Pala , as well as some other minor changes to better suit this new adjustment. The deck still works. Thank god magic has no short of infinite mana combos.

Infinite Mana Combos:Auriok Salvagers + Pyrite Spellbomb = infinite damageAuriok Salvagers + Sunbeam Spellbomb = infinite lifeAether Spellbomb + Auriok Salvagers = infinite board removalAuriok Salvagers + Necrogen Spellbomb = your opponent discards his handAuriok Salvagers + Lifespark Spellbomb = the siege of Isengard

I don't see how they are infinite combos if there is no mana generated for you to do this more than once-twice a turn. its more like an interaction. your mana base is also WAY to slow to keep pace with other modern decks.

uiuiho12 these combos don't generate infinite mana. They are combos used once you have infinite mana, which is generated through Grand Architect + Pili-Pala .
Beyond that I'm not sure what the complaint is. 20 lands is standard for the current meta, and I am only one land shy of that standard.

While this deck doesn't ramp in any sense of the word, that lack of ramp is made irrelevant by the fact that it consistently achieves the infinite mana combo by turn 4-6. And that is far more powerful than any ramp.

19 lands means your cmc should cap out at like 3 max. especially since you don't have things like Brainstorm or Ponder in modern. that being said your mana on it's own is slow with 8/19 come into play tapped.

Remand is also better than Perplex because the later the game goes on the more likely your opponent has no cards in hand. Remand will always counter a spell and always let you draw a card regardless of how late in the game it is.

most decks that want to hit 4 cmc spells by turn 4 run around 23-24 lands while decks that want to hit more consective land-drops will run between 25-27. since your deck uses mana like a control deck, having consistent land drops is a good thing.

Cathedral Membrane < Wall of Omens . the draw card is more important than the deal 6 damage. Path to Exile should be in this deck as it is one of the best removal cards in modern and you need removal.

replace Sage of Epityr with Serum Visions , you draw a card that turn which means you don't lose card advantage while setting up the next 2 draws with the option to put them on the bottom. a 1/1 with no effects or interaction is not going to have an effect on the game.

I like the Wall of Omens change, although I'm iffy about swapping out Perplex because it can be used flexibly either as a counter or to fetch Grand Architect . Switching out Sage of Epityr is something I would rather not do as it is a highly effective chump blocker, which allows you to stall out the game for your infinite mana combo. I'm not saying I simply won't make these changes, but rather that I am skeptical. I've also never seen a need for much removal such as Path of Exile, because the point of this deck isn't to control the board. It's just supposed to survive until it's combo time, and you can kill your opponent in such a manner that cannot be countered.

Additionally, I don't think it matters that so few lands are in the deck when a good 1/6th of the deck can be used to scry 3 or 4 upon being played. So far, in my various tastings, it can get 5 lands out on turn 5 no problem.

Assuming I make the switch from Sage of Epityr to Serum Visions , what would you recommend I replace Judge's Familiar with, if anything?
I think I will keep Perplex as its effective doubling of the number of Grand Architect s in this deck is just too strong to ignore.
I'm liking the Wall of Omens change a lot actually.
I'm still not seeing any need for Path to Exile . Chump walling my opponent until combo time is still proving to be extremely effective, and Engineered Explosives handles most situations where chump walling won't work... so I'm rather unconvinced about adding Path to Exile .

Considering switching out Remand for Stymied Hopes and Wall of Omens for Isochron Scepter . This shifts the deck far more heavily towards control, but leaves me weaker to aggro. Thoughts?

Isochron Scepter really isn't worth it considering this deck only have a few cards that can even go on the thing to begin with, it will almost ALWAYS be a dead card, which is really bad. And plus Aggro is a big problem against combo decks so keeping the Wall of Omens is probably best at the moment (or any other anti-aggro card). As far as switching the Remand s to Stymied Hopes I would say no but its really personal preference. I know the card you Remand can come back pretty easy but think of how strong the card is if they tapped out to cast their card (its essentially a Time Walk then) plus drawing cards is a combo deck's best friend, that being said the scry from Stymied Hopes isn't bad either but none the less, I like Remand better personally.

asram9 makes a lot of sense actually. Thank you. I would agree with keeping Remand over Stymied Hopes in almost every situation except to combo with the scepter. In that case the hard counter is more valuable. But you make a good case for not adding the scepter, and thus I agree with keeping Remand as well.

I meant to ask, are you not running fetch lands because of budget reasons or because this deck was made before Khans of Tarkir came out? (or is there some other reason?) Because Flooded Strand s can grab your Hallowed Fountain s and your Watery Grave s. I'm guessing most modern players (based on what i've seen) would say to run 4 Flooded Strand s and 1-2 Polluted Delta s to grab the shock lands and thin out the deck.

You pegged me with the lack of funds. The only real reason I still have Tolaria West in here instead of fetch lands is that Tolaria is affordable, and still can act as a cheese version of fetch lands.