[Vintage legal] Squirrel Match: Not your ordinary squirrel deck

[hjalte]

On the breaking of Death Match:
Back when I were still opening boosters (Onslaught), I got an unreasenable amount of Death Matches. It seemed like a rather fun casual card, so i started to create a deck around it, and it has been my pet casual deck ever since. After the addition of skullclamp it became a very powerful deck. I really like the direction it has gone in, with a slight comboish feel, but still not unreasonable.

My decklist right now is

//Mana Base - 24
11 Forest
4 Swamp
4 Bayou
1 sol ring
4 Llanowar Elves

//Big guys - 3
3 Gigapede

//Small guys - 12
4 Chatter of the Squirrel
4 Squirrel nest
2 Beacon of creation
2 Words of Wilding

//Central Part - 11
4 Skullclamp
3 Death Match
4 Diabolic edict

//Utils - 5
2 eternal witness
1 Demonic Tutor
1 Vampiric Tutor
1 fastbond

//More or less open - 5
2 Beacon of creation
2 Gleeful Sabotage
1 demonic consultation

I'll discuss each part of the deck:

Mana base
The mana base is fairly standard, though I haven't bought fetches for the deck yet, though I plan to get 4 Verdant catacombs (B/G fetch), when I can afford them. It is only ever nescesary to get a single black mana, but quite crucial to get double green for Squirrel Nest.
The llanowar elves could be Birds, but again, I don't have them yet due to budget constraints. I use mana elves rather than wild growths, so I can draw cards off of them with Skullclamp.

Small Guys
The small guys is an important part of the deck. They fuel Skullclamp, and kill opposing creatures when Death Match hits the board. They also stall, until this is possible. The reason for chatter of the squirrel, instead of, say Nimble Mongoose, is the fact that it creates two tokens.
Beacon of Creation fogs, or works more or less like a sweeper, when Death Match is online.
Words of wilding is great, when skullclamp is going, but not so much otherwise, which is why there's only two of them.

Central part
The central part of the deck is Death Match and Skullclamp. They fulfil the same role: Creating card advantage. Skullclamp is pretty obviously very powerful, but combined with Death Match and Squirrel Nest it becomes savage, creating rediculous amounts of card advantage.
Diabolic edict is included, so I can get rid of problematic creatures, which can't be removed by Death Match, that is Protection from Black and shroud creatures.

Big Guys
Gigapede is a great recurring threat, which can't be killed with my own death match, which can be very important agains some decks.

Utils
Lastly, Eternal witness, demonic and vampiric tutor make it possible to find lost parts, and recover destroyed ones. Fastbond makes it possible to go more or less broken with skullclamp.
Eternal witness has perfect synergy with both skullclamp and death match, hence I use her over regrowth.

Debatable slots
The last 2 beacon. 4 Beacons feels a little clunky in the deck, so it might be swapped with some other stuff, I'm not sure what.
2 naturalize/Krosan Grip/Gleeful sabotage, as it is a casual deck, and therefore no sideboard, I feel it's nescesary to maindeck some enchantment and artifact removal, for problematic things. Gleeful sabotage is great, as it can remove 2 enchantments/artifacts.
Demonic consultation is nice, but the deck performs very well already, and I don't think the extra tutor is needed.


Improvements of the deck
The obvious one is to get 4 Verdant Catacombs, to smooth out the mana base even more, then also add Birds.
I think it would be nice to have 2-4 Gaea's cradle, and 3-4 Crop rotation. It will give the deck a comboish finish, if I crop rotate a Gaea's cradle into a new one, seems nice together with skullclamp. It might make the deck too unfun for everyone else, I'm not sure.
Garruk might be nice, to untap lands with squirrel nest, and to create guys, if it is needed.

The deck is really a blast to play.
Any suggestions or comments would very be welcome.

(I have thought about porting it to legacy, just for fun, but I haven't found anything, which makes up for the loss of Skullclamp. Any suggestions?)

[HdH_Cthulhu]

How could this deck not run 4 earthcraft?

Plz explain!

And 3 swamps should be the new b/g fetch

[hjalte]

Yeah, I have thought about earthcraft. The most important reason is, that it's a casual deck, and it seems pretty non-casual to play such a combo. I haven't tried it though.

The verdant catacombs, yes, That would probably be the change i would make, when I can afford it.

[neckfire]

i still say you should make it with earthcraft. skullclamp is pretty non casual also but i see you playing it too lol

[Miklion]

Now, I've played against and with this deck quite abit over the last few years, well - it's been tampered with over time obv, but you know.

It started out as UG t2 legal squirrel/opposition deck back in odessey/onslaught era. Back then it was good, but the dismissal of blue and introdiction of black for death match for the deck just made things alot more fun/retarded in a casual meta.

The deck, as far as i know, is made to fit multiplayergames, be it Emperor (is that even a thing people know of?), 4player FFA or whatnot. And the death match just add a twist to everyones gameplan, since not only does the squirrels remove creatures, but ever single creature in every deck becomes a removal spell.

The deck is supposed to be an annoyance to other people, rather than just a combodeck, hence earthcraft is not included. We have talked about going rogue, and taking an earthcrafy version of it to a medium sized legacyevent, just to turn heads - we can discuss that later on. But the fact remains that when 4 friends shuffle decks, and play a casual match, seeing someone comboing off on turn 3 just makes the other 3 players rather crossed, and making them find their control decks, and then how fun is that?

I feel i drifted off abit, but what im actually trying to do, is justify skullclamps position in the deck, as an enabler, and not a broken piece of brokenness.
Skullclamp gives the deck the chance to find its pieces, and play the control-role it's supposed to play in the multiplayer-meta.
It works the same way it did for Goblins back in onslaught/mirrodon t2, except it doesn't make people cry nearly as often.
The deck is not fast, by any means, it CAN make ridiculous plays rather fast, and gaining CA in the process, but it doesn't win right here and now, which kinda is the reason it's fun to play, and to play against.