Do you mind explaining your reasoning for the recent change?

IN: Memory Jar, Lotus Petal, Mind Over Matter, Kindred Discovery, Arcane Denial, Stifle, Snapback

OUT: Izzet Boilerworks, Neheb, the Eternal, Tolarian Winds, Arjun, the Shifting Flame, Enter the Infinite, Molten Disaster, Pull from Tomorrow

I felt that these cards were good, or were you giving them up in place of more protection?

MordMetal: I'm pretty sure that those cards are too expensive in terms of CMC, and he was actually winning by turn four, so he needed that change.

Daedalus19876 correct me, if I'm wrong.

Planning to make a locus god deck too, this list looks cool but is 32 lands too little since usually in commander the standard is like 36+ or something? Or do you hardly notice with the wheel effects.

MSL2395: Yeah, your experiences sound much like mine. The deck is definitely reliant on the commander here, which unfortunately is an inherent weakness.

I tried to mitigate this weakness by frequently casting The Locust God on my combo turn (with Dream Halls or otherwise), or having a lot of counterspells. The "return to hand" clause is really helpful to mitigate this (since most removal merely kills it), but it's still worth mentioning.

Elesh Norn, Grand Cenobite really hurts against this deck, though I've won despite it by wheeling with Purphoros, God of the Forge on the field. Snapback is very helpful here, as are Mystic Confluence, Chaos Warp, and counterspells.

I'd also consider Goblin Bombardment, thanks! It was in an early draft, but got cut for some reason. Thanks for your comments, and I'm so happy you've enjoyed the deck!

rkjunior: I prefer repeatable or mass card draw for this deck, so that I can net many cards from each card I cast. Still, Mind's Eye might fit...

MordMetal: Yep, MSL2395 is correct. I'm consistently winning T4-5, and sometimes even as early as T2-3. The cards I cut are great cards, but are simply too much mana to be relevant in many cases.

For commander decks, I often use the rule of 39 lands, minus two for each mana rock you run. I'm running 12 mana rocks, and enough wheels to find lands and rocks when I need them. I've not had much of a problem personally, but if you can't afford Mana Crypt/Mox Opal/etc, I wouldn't go below perhaps 35 land.

(For comparison, cEDH decks usually run 29-32 land and work very, very well.)

I hope that helps! :)

If you don't mind me asking how would you go about winning that early? I looked over the deck and even play tested a bunch but I can't seem to do much until I have my commander out and then proceed to pop off but T1 - T4 seems a bit fast and I am confused on how this deck does that.

MordMetal: Strong ramp is usually the solution TBH (or Paradox Engine/Dream Halls, for "easy mode").

With fast ramp, you can play powerful draw spells early, draw more ramp, cast Locust God T3-4 easily, then combo the following turn (often with counter protection).

I don't have this available off the top of my head, but I can record my next few games and get back to you if you want.

Hey, I'm just putting it here that I had a question for you, but it wasn't technically about this deck at all, so would you rather I try and post something a comment to you directly or just not really bother you? If the latter is true I can understand and I'll not do anything.

TheRedGoat: What's your question? :)

Daedalus19876: If it is not too much trouble, just really like your deck and getting to understand it more is always great. :)

You don't need my advice here my friend. This s**t's scary.

You seem to be relying on drawing cards something like Notion Thief, Spirit of the Labyrinth, Chains of Mephistopheles and others can hate you out pretty hard.

How about a different kind of combo?

Sword of Feast and Famine and Aggravated Assault/Hellkite Charger will give you infinite attack phases with your locust swarm.

Another potential combo piece is Mind Over Matter which combos with everything if you put your mind it it! :D

HezTheGod: While I acknowledge that those cards do hit me pretty hard, the draw combos are very central to this list, and I'm not willing to add a somewhat subpar method of victory to the list in case I run into those cards. To do so would completely cripple my deck :(

I do run countermagic, bounce, and burn to deal with that sort of thing, though.

And Mind Over Matter is already in here, though I've been considering cutting it actually. Stay tuned!

Thanks for your comment!

I like the flavour you've included in the description!

I looked through all the comments currently visible to see if anyone had suggested this yet: Obstinate Familiar. I use it in my Arjun deck as a safeguard against decking myself. It might not be what you're looking for given it's limitations as a creature, but it works for me.

Daedalus19876 Any chance you can update the list for changes? I think you mentioned Mind Over Matter was in the list but it's showing on the maybeboard at this point. Don't want to run that with Arcanis as a win-con with Lab-Man?

rkjunior: Actually, the list is updated currently. I used to run Mind Over Matter, but I don't anymore :(

I'd love to find a slot for it in the future (hence its position on the maybeboard), but it simply didn't do enough for its high mana cost and ridiculous blue devotion (plus, the combo with Niv-Mizzet, the Firemind was too conditional to realistically work). And if I have enough cards in hand for Mind Over Matter to REALLY combo off, I am winning already.

This list online currently reflects my IRL decklist, except for the Timetwister and Mana Drain - those are currently proxied but should be unproxied in the near future.

(What DOES need to be updated is the description. It's misleading, because it's based on previous versions of the deck.)

Sounds good. What are your primary targets with this iteration for Dream Halls? Also, to try Mind's Eye, I cut Mystic Remora (for now) to see how it plays. Any thought on Jace Beleren for another low curve draw option?

I'm currently running Firestorm in my own Locust God deck. Whenever you are in an infinite draw combo and you're about to deck yourself, you can cast this and discard your hand (probably with Kozilek, Butcher of Truth). You will definitely have enough legal targets (because tokens) and you can just burn your opponents faces for 70 damage. As long as your opponents don't have hexproof, this is a very strong wincondition.Turbulent Dreams can work similarly (just bouncing all of your opponents permanents), and can even work very well in conjunction with Firestorm because you can use it to bounce permanents that give hexproof. This however does require Quicken for when you go off with Kindred Discovery .

Another wincondition (less combo-ish, so I'm not sure if it will fit) is Tears of Rage. You will often be finding yourself attacking with 10+ flyers, so they will deal a ton of damage with this card.

As for combo protection; Force of Will and Pact of Negation are very good, but I'm not sure about the Mana Drain (especially as you mentioned you were building on a budget). Instead of that, you can run cards like Commandeer, Foil or Disrupting Shoal. You have enough cards in hand anyway ;)

Lastly: what about Gush? You don't seem to be so fond of lands anyway.

Hope these suggestions were useful.

rkjunior: Dream Halls lets me chain wheels, mostly. Cast half my hand by discarding the other half, cast a wheel, repeat until I get to a combo. It's also one of the best ways to cast my commander without paying that obnoxious 6 mana.

And Jace Beleren's just too...low-impact for this deck. An extra card per turn is nice, but I don't want to give cards to opponents when possible, and his -1 has limited utility.

HauntinYou: Thanks for the comment, man!

Firestorm is a very good idea to terminate the combo; I'm not sure why I excluded it. I must find a slot, thank you!!

I've considered effects like Tears of Rage, and it's a great budget replacement for Shared Animosity. For the moment, though, I'm not sure I have space for it :(

I am...no longer on a budget for this deck, lol (evidenced by my inclusion of freaking Timetwister haha). Mana Drain, while good disruption if needed, is actually here as a ramp card more than a counterspell. If I can counter a 3-drop on T2, I can cast The Locust God T3!

Is it worth running all on color fetches to help tho the deck for wheels even if there's only a couple dual land targets?

thoughts on the new Chart A Course ?2 mana draw 2s are a rarity

What about Blasting Station

Daedalus19876-

What would be a good cut to incorporate Firestorm? I'm running a slightly different list based upon card availability (no Mana Drain) and running Mind's Desire over Mystic Remora

Sorry, Mind's Eye not Mind's Desire.. Wish you could edit comments.

Time to answer a significant backlog!

rkjunior: Um, probably. But I don't own the fetches, and I don't think the need is extremely pressing (especially since I don't own a Volcanic Island).

bmorri9: I really want to run Chart A Course, but I don't know where to find a slot...Still, I very much like the card. I'll try to figure out where to stick it.

rkjunior: Nah, it's just a much worse version of Goblin Bombardment here. And honestly, I might cut Mind's Eye for it: it's just too slow and mana-hungry of a draw source for this deck.

(Incidentally, if you upgrade your account, you can edit your comments haha.)

Really nice deck, I got so inspired that I brewed up a list using this as a baseline :)

I do have to ask, why are you not running Sensei's Divining Top and the traditional blue cantrips Ponder and Preordain? They would increase the consistency of the deck nicely and also synergize with the commander itself.