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Thread: Brewing up Mairsil, the Pretender Combo-Control

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    Brewing up Mairsil, the Pretender Combo-Control

    Mairsil, the Pretender

    This card is just such a flavor win and looks like a great value engine too. As such, I am thinking of brewing up a deck for him that embraces my favorite meta-achetype, that of Combo-Control. The idea here is not to build him as a straight combo deck, made to win as fast as possible. Instead, the idea is to use him to leverage value, control the board and then win at your leisure or when the right opportunity presents itself.

    Since I want to have as many "control elements" as possible, I want to minimize how many "dead draws" I have, in the form of creatures or artifacts that aren't really useful unless caged with Mairsil. This means I am leaving some potential power on the table, which is fine, this deck isn't going to be played in any real competitive sense. The idea is to play it in Multiplayer really. There are lots of other ways to go with a Mairsil build, but this is the one I want to do, I'm not really concerned with win percentage, I am looking for a distinct and efficient play-pattern.

    First, I think the most key cards are:
    Quicksilver Elemental
    Staff of Domination
    Gilded Lotus
    Hateflayer

    Quicksilver Elemental is largely the cornerstone of abusing Mairsil. In case it is not clear why, granting Mairsil his own abilities gets around the "once per turn" caveat, because they are considered different abilities not those tied to the static one that has the restriction. Once this is done, we can go wild, making infinite mana and going off via the Lotus and the Staff, or just kill everyone and everything via Lotus and 'Flayer.

    Beyond this, there are some other spicy things we can do. Tree of Perdition allows us to let someone's life total to 4, or even lower, via Aetherling (which also allows us to protect Mairsil and to cage more things). There is the further option to use a power/toughtness switching ability after the Tree, but frankly that just seems win-more.

    Other value propositions:
    Skithiryx, the Blight Dragon (Haste, Regeneration, can be a great blocker in a pinch.)
    Avatar of Woe (Creature removal, castable, as opposed to Minion of Leshrac and Shauku, Endbringer, as much as I really would love to have those in a deck.)
    Arcanis the Omnipotent (As it turns out Ancestral Recall is pretty good.)
    Kozilek, the Great Distortion (Not to sure about this one, but more countermagic can be good.)
    Ertia, Wizard Adept (Again, a reusable counterspell.)
    Dralnu, Lich Lord (Flashback can get you what you need, plus value, or help you combo.)
    Sensei's Divining Top (Pretty obvious, plus I sort of "protects" Mairsil in a pinch.)
    Empress Galina (Not too sure about this, but can dominate certain Generals.)

    Eater of the Dead is an interesting one, which (by way of it's Oracle text) is actually some value and disruption.

    Of course there are more creatures one could add, but the question of them being worth it is pretty real. My idea is to have any of them being good/fine being hardcast, in case something terrible happens to Miarsil.

    I'll be updating this when I get a little more time with the Non-creature cards I am looking at.
    "The Ancients teach us that if we can but last, we shall prevail."
    Kaysa, Elder Druid of the Juniper Order

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    Re: Brewing up Mairsil, the Pretender Combo-Control

    Mairsil says hand or graveyard, so how about Necrotic Ooze? You can then use stuff like Forbidden Alchemy and Thought Scour to set him up, while also getting some random value from stuff you don't cage. Ooze also says "all graveyards" which could randomly net you something useful from an opponent. Plus, it's a flavor win since it borrows activated abilities of other things.

    You probably also want a copy of Anger or something in there, especially if you're on the Aetherling blink plan.

    Does Deadeye Navigator make the cut? The activated ability doesn't work with a cage (I don't think?), but just pairing it up the regular way makes a backup Aetherling type effect.

    It's a weird interaction, but Dark Impostor is pretty neat when he's in a cage and you hit someone else's Mairsil. It's probably also fine on its own, even if the ability is a little expensive, and again on theme flavor-wise.

    Another solid one is Withered Wretch.

    I assume you already know about Training Grounds, but I'll mention it anyway.

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    Re: Brewing up Mairsil, the Pretender Combo-Control

    Quote Originally Posted by H View Post
    Quicksilver Elemental is largely the cornerstone of abusing Mairsil. In case it is not clear why, granting Mairsil his own abilities gets around the "once per turn" caveat, because they are considered different abilities not those tied to the static one that has the restriction.
    I have no idea if this should be of concern or not...

    Quicksilver Elemental reads ": Quicksilver Elemental gains all activated abilities of target creature until end of turn."

    So if you exile Quicksilver Elemental with Mairsil, the Pretender, does Mairsil also gain ": Quicksilver Elemental gains all activated abilities of target creature until end of turn."?

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    Re: Brewing up Mairsil, the Pretender Combo-Control

    Quote Originally Posted by Ace/Homebrew View Post
    I have no idea if this should be of concern or not...

    Quicksilver Elemental reads ": Quicksilver Elemental gains all activated abilities of target creature until end of turn."

    So if you exile Quicksilver Elemental with Mairsil, the Pretender, does Mairsil also gain ": Quicksilver Elemental gains all activated abilities of target creature until end of turn."?
    No, when something says it's card name, it refers to itself. So, when Mairsil gets Quicksilver's ability, it says: ": Mairsil gains all activated abilities of target creature until end of turn."

    There is an issue though, because the current Rules Manager has issued a ruling that contradicts Mairsil's wording and the current Comprehensive Rules, so we will have to wait and see how that shakes out.
    "The Ancients teach us that if we can but last, we shall prevail."
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    Re: Brewing up Mairsil, the Pretender Combo-Control

    Quote Originally Posted by H View Post
    There is an issue though, because the current Rules Manager has issued a ruling that contradicts Mairsil's wording and the current Comprehensive Rules, so we will have to wait and see how that shakes out.
    First I'm seeing that...and I'm not sure where the hell it came from. Regardless, I think a solution is to just cast Quicksilver Elemental and use its ability targeting Mairsil rather than putting it in a cage and copying the abilities that way. You should lose the "once per turn" clause for sure that way.

    EDIT: Wait, I'm dumb (apparently), since someone also asked that in the twitter thread and somehow the ruling also applies to the scenario I described.

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    Re: Brewing up Mairsil, the Pretender Combo-Control

    Quote Originally Posted by H View Post
    No, when something says it's card name, it refers to itself.
    Good to hear.

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    Re: Brewing up Mairsil, the Pretender Combo-Control

    Quote Originally Posted by Davran View Post
    First I'm seeing that...and I'm not sure where the hell it came from. Regardless, I think a solution is to just cast Quicksilver Elemental and use its ability targeting Mairsil rather than putting it in a cage and copying the abilities that way. You should lose the "once per turn" clause for sure that way.

    EDIT: Wait, I'm dumb (apparently), since someone also asked that in the twitter thread and somehow the ruling also applies to the scenario I described.
    Yeah, his ruling seems to imply that the "Once per turn" restriction is embedded in the ability, which is not how they actually worded the card.

    They really need to errata it if that's what they meant though.
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    Re: Brewing up Mairsil, the Pretender Combo-Control

    Quote Originally Posted by H View Post
    Yeah, his ruling seems to imply that the "Once per turn" restriction is embedded in the ability, which is not how they actually worded the card.

    They really need to errata it if that's what they meant though.
    If that's what they meant they should have worded it differently for sure - something like "those abilities gain 'use this ability only once per turn'" would have done what he is suggesting happens.

    Regardless, seems like power level errata if that's what they're intending to do.

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    Re: Brewing up Mairsil, the Pretender Combo-Control

    Quote Originally Posted by Davran View Post
    If that's what they meant they should have worded it differently for sure - something like "those abilities gain 'use this ability only once per turn'" would have done what he is suggesting happens.

    Regardless, seems like power level errata if that's what they're intending to do.
    Yeah, I mean, they ended up doing the same thing Marath, Will of the Wild too though.
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    Re: Brewing up Mairsil, the Pretender Combo-Control

    Quote Originally Posted by H View Post
    Yeah, I mean, they ended up doing the same thing Marath, Will of the Wild too though.
    Marath went infinite with itself, though. This guy isn't really on that level. For me, EDH is about finding bulk bin rares like Quicksilver Elemental and actually wanting to cast them to do something cool, not a bunch of power level errata before the card is even released.

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    Re: Brewing up Mairsil, the Pretender Combo-Control

    Quote Originally Posted by Davran View Post
    Marath went infinite with itself, though. This guy isn't really on that level. For me, EDH is about finding bulk bin rares like Quicksilver Elemental and actually wanting to cast them to do something cool, not a bunch of power level errata before the card is even released.
    I agree and it will be sad if they do errata him, but unfortunately neither of us get to make that decision. I think Mairsil is pretty well powered (but not overly so) without errata, but I guess Wizards feels otherwise...
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    Re: Brewing up Mairsil, the Pretender Combo-Control

    Quote Originally Posted by H View Post
    I agree and it will be sad if they do errata him, but unfortunately neither of us get to make that decision. I think Mairsil is pretty well powered (but not overly so) without errata, but I guess Wizards feels otherwise...
    Guess we'll have to wait a couple days for the release notes and see what's up. As of right now, the gatherer rulings don't speak to this at all.

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    Re: Brewing up Mairsil, the Pretender Combo-Control

    Mirror-Mad Phantasm flips your deck when caged. Fun way to activate Mortal Combat. Plus you can be obnoxious and yell "Mairsil Kombat!"
    Last edited by kirkusjones; 08-29-2017 at 03:52 PM.
    Quote Originally Posted by TsumiBand View Post
    It's like arguing your way out of a speeding ticket by saying "it's not like I'm wearing oven mitts, officer."
    Twenty Kavus and a Dream is NOT a Legacy deck.

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