Help building deck, from the basic idea
Deck Help forum
Posted on June 23, 2012, 8:41 p.m. by Sudain
Okay, so I can use some help reworking some of my existing decks into more refined forms. So instead of just tossing cards together at first I thought I'd toss the idea to you guys first, and then make sure I'm on the right track as far as the 3 main archetypes (agro, control, combo).
Note: I've linked to the current decks I'm trying to rebuild. I can link to the existing attempts if that would help.
-=- Deck 1 -=-The idea was to sit back and chuck lightning bolt and fire and brimstone and just generally rain death upon everyone with spells(mono red). Since this is low on creatures, it wouldn't be an effective 'agro' deck as it wouldn't have many cards that stick around to do repeated damage like kiln fiend; correct? This would be better suited to a 'control' deck where all the damage is used to kill creatures off, and if no creatures are around killing off the player; correct?red dd
-=- Deck 2 -=-The idea was get out big, big nasty ugly creatures like Prince of Thralls , Progenitus , etc... and just smack people HARD. This would fit better under control? Since alot of the beautiful creatuers I was looking at were multi color I've tried to stick to multicolor and Alara but I havn't been able to make it work. I also tried to use cacscade to speed it up but I don't think it works this way.Big Critters
-=- Angels and Demons -=-So iconic and cool. Havn't found a way to do it as angels cost a bundle. Any advice on where to go here?Angels
-=- Bolas -=-I love the idea of bolas so I want to build a deck based upon him. Since his plansewalker is costly, he should go in a grixis control, correct?bolas-control
pheonix_222 says... #3
Chances are someone has already optimized all of these deck themes through months of playtesting. Just do a quick search for 'mono-red burn' or 'grixis control'. There are already likely very good decks built for you to check out.
June 23, 2012 9:57 p.m.
I think you are right, that might yeild some pre-built decks that already do what I want. But I'm also hoping to become a better deck builder by understanding the fundamental approach they take. This is inspired by the featured article "do you know what your deck does?" And honestly... I don't. So I'm hoping to restart from the core idea and build it again, with the major archetype in mind.
That's why I'm asking for help confirming the major archtypes. Grixis and angels I should probably look at pre-built decks your right. But for the red burn and creatures I do want to understand from the ground up.
Thank you for the suggestion! :)
June 23, 2012 10:05 p.m.
DawnsRayofLight says... #5
I do think grixis control will have a place in the meta again, perhaps grixis planeswalkers.
something like this:
1x Nicol Bolas, Planeswalker 2x Liliana of the Veil 2x Tamiyo, the Moon Sage maybe 2x Tibalt, the Fiend-Blooded and Chandra, the Firebrand (with chandra I'd recommend Volt Charge and card:Tezzeret's Gambit)
some field wipes like:
3x Bonfire of the Damned (with Noxious Revival 2x card:Black Sun's Zenith3x Whipflare 2x Slagstorm
Spot removal:
2x Go for the Throat 3x Galvanic Blast 2x Tribute to Hunger
Draw:
4x Ponder 3x Forbidden Alchemy
Win Cons
1x Consecrated Sphinx 1x Inferno Titan 1x Wurmcoil Engine 1x Grave Titan 2x Batterskull
Control
4x Mana Leak 4x Snapcaster Mage
Some Ideas I suppose, I have two grixis lists that are a bit outdated I can link up if you want, one is classic grixis and the other a 4 colored reanimator.At the very least they should provide an example of the lay out.
RDW is a bit weak right now, I have not seen one that impressed me even with Thunderous Wrath and Vexing Devil . If you want a big critters deck, solar flare, pod, and wolf run will cover it, I can give examples of each as well. All of these are standard. Angels and demons sounds fun, just not entirely viable in a competitive environment.
June 23, 2012 10:59 p.m.
Thank you for the response. I noticed you have a lot of plainswalkers - several of which are varied so you can have multiple out, up to 5 I think.
10 field wipes(affecting all targets) 8/10 are damaged related, 2/10 are -counters related, spell counts split evenly among 4 different spells. Is that so when you do get one of these you can cast it a wipe different ways(say protection from black or protection from red)?
7 spot removal - split among different methods of removal. Is that to get around different creature immunities?
7 draw cards. Is the ratio for the draw supposed to match the spot removal or is that just coincidence?
Win conditions - just large critters to slap people about with. I'm guessing that's the normal win condition type for control decks?
Control - I don't understand why this is named or it's purpose. Is this to limit the ability for people to play cards that are advantageous to them? Such as instants and sorcery(we already have 17 cards to kill creatures). Wouldn't discard work just as well for this purpose?
Was the thought process building this list something akin to: "I want to win with planswalkers so I'll pack in a some. Now I need time to let them live and do their work: so I need to kill tons of small critters and tokens, so add some board wipes. Now I'm still vulnerable to large critters so add some spot removal(which should also nicely take care of combo critters). Now I need some cards to help draw/fetch the right cards so I'll add some in so I can have the right spell in hand at the right time(or find it). Add in some control so I can proactively stop their stuff versus react."? I'm not sure if I'm on the right track but based upon the order that's my guess.
Having a good list to start off is great, thank you. As a programmer and engineer I always interested in deconstructing things so I can rebuild them. :)
Yes, I'm not sure if RDW has a place right now. That's why I'm wondering if the red deck I'm thinking of wouldn't be just better implemented as a control deck. Though I have to admit I am throughly interested in figuring out how to abuse worldfire. :)
Are solar flare, pod, and wolf run decks aggro? IIRC pod decks revolve around the birthing pod artifact, ETB and LTB triggers. Wolf run decks are just decks getting trample from the land. I may have to include that land, it looks amazing.. :)
Yea, I tinkered with an Angel/Demon deck but didn't invest much time into it. Angels are expensive on mana.
June 24, 2012 3:05 a.m.
DawnsRayofLight says... #7
Pod in general is usually a more midrange list, however, certain naya variants are very aggro. Wolf run is a ramp deck that goes T1: land T2: Sphere of the Suns /Rampant Growth T3: Solemn Simulacrum T4: Titan, again s bit midrange. Solar flare is a black white blue reanimator control that dumps big guys like Elesh Norn, Grand Cenobite into the grave and reanimates them turn 4-6. It relies a lot on the Sun Titan -Phantasmal Image combo (bring back image with titan, copy titan,repeat).
The cards listed above are a suggestion for numbers and examples of cards to put in. Discard would not be a half bad idea to add in, but some counterspells might prove beneficial. The main idea of a grixis control list is to keep the board as clear as possible via kill spells/board wipes and counter spells, and landing something devastating to finish them off. The planeswalkers are added control, you should be fine with the 1 bolas, 2 tamiyo, and 2 liliana; a Karn Liberated might not be half bad either. The board wipes vary because of the mana cost, Whipflare as a 2 cmc sweeper with only 1 color needed to cast. Slagstorm as a turn 3-4 range, and BSZ as a more late range definitive killer. Bonfire of the Damned is always to your benefit to cast and handy as well. The kill spells need to be varied for specific targets. The Galvanic Blast as a 1 mana shoot your flipped delver, inkmoth, etc., while Go for the Throat can handle most other creatures. Tribute to Hunger is blacks way of keeping its head over the aggro lists because of the life gain and it gets hexproof and regen guys (assuming the opponent so chooses to sac said creature). 6-7 draw spells are recommended: Think Twice , Forbidden Alchemy , Thought Scour , Ponder , Gitaxian Probe , and Amass the Components are usually used.
Essentially you need to keep your opponent from playing magic as much as possible. here would be a sample game:
T1: land, Duress , Ponder , or Galvanic Blast their guy
T2: Whipflare /Go for the Throat /Mana Leak
T3: Slagstorm /Forbidden Alchemy /Liliana of the Veil
T4: Some combination of the above cards
T5: Batterskull / Tamiyo
T6: Big guy
T7: control/ karn
T8: bolas-win
Of course control matches are usually slower, but that would be an ideal chain of events.
later today, if you would like, I can make lists on here of each of the above decks to give you an idea or two (solar flare, wolf run, pod, grixis control). Hope this helps.
Sudain says... #2
Apparently my deck names aren't creative enough - the ones linked above are not my decks.
Deck 1 deck:sudred
Deck 2 deck:sudbigcritters
Deck 3 deck:sudangels
Deck 4 Sud.Bolas
June 23, 2012 8:45 p.m.