[Deck] Spirit Truck

[Cire]

Recently i have been playing the spirit stompy decks that have been appearing in extended with the game plan to play a tallowisp, a tough spirit like chameleon or phantom centaur and equip it with either armadillo cloak or griffin guide and beat for the win, unfortunately when i was testing to see if this deck could be moved to legacy i found the big spirits too slow to race combo, or even aggro deck. That is when i started experimenting with other spirits and arua's and saw potential in threads of disloyalty. Instead of a stompy deck i focused on a more control oriented build and settled on a UWb list. I called it spirit truck because its similar to the old dump truck decks that were around. Anyway heres the list

-Spirits
4 Tallowisp - A good card advantage engine, keep looking for threads and getting opponents goyfs and bobs and other good cards, and against larger threats get isolation to shut them down, when you dont need to take care of threats just pump you creatures.
4 Dimir Cutpurse - +2 CA whenever he connects, griffin guide also helps him get through
3 Kami of Ancient law - Takes care of any annoying enchantment that might give you trouble (counterbalance)
3 Spectral lynx - blocks goyf all day long, and with a swamp out it helps against other aggro decks like goblins

-Other creatures
4 Meddling mage - Good against combo and everything else
3 Dark Confidant - card draw, and since we have a relatively low curve its not that painful

-Auras
3 Threads of disloyalty - With all the spirits in your deck youll be drawing this alot, and winning alot.
2 Griffin guide - average pump and gives evasion, plus if they take your creature down you'll still have a threat out
1 Temporal isolation - flash is good and it takes care of alot of threats, only problem is they can attack and before damage is put on the stack grip it to deal unblocked damage.

-Other
4 Counterbalance - Really good card, you have 22 - 2 mana cards and even gip has a hard time getting through because you have - 9 -3 mana cards
4 Brainstorm - good draw + fetchs
3 Top - just good

-Lands
6 Island
4 U/B fetchland
3 U/W fetch land
3 U/W dual
2 Plains
2 Swamp
2 U/B Dual

-sideboard
4 Orim's Chant
2 Kira Great glass spinner
2 Kataki war's wage
7 undecided...


The deck is has a good game against combo with meddling mage and counterbalance, even better post board you move is chants, and maybe even duress/stiffle effects.

Against aggro you will be taking damage before you get your spirits into play and then start stealing creatures, you'll have to slow them down with meddling mage, counterbalance, lynx. really fast aggro like goblins will give you trouble itll all be about getting those threads in early to stop the flood.

Aggro control like thresh should also be a good matchup, you have enough control spells to go 1 for 1 with their counters, and then since you have more Card advantage you should steal their goyfs and start winning. Plus lynx is really good here vs mongoose and goyf. By the way your biggest concern in this matchup is the mongoose, you can't steal it or do anything really, just try to get a creature equipped with the guide and then either block the mongoose or try to race it.

This deck is still a work in progress and i am still developing the sideboard, as soon as i am able to get play test results in i will. If anyone has comments or suggestion they would be appreciated

[Wobbles The Goose]

wow, Spectral Lynx is a spirit cat now. Who knew?

[Willoe]

Won't Kami of the False Hope do?

What about Azorius Herald?

Hmm, maybe not Kami, but I think that Herald has some potential. The drawback can easily be negated. Also with Griffin Guide, he beats for 4 a turn.

EDIT: Mind Harness can also be good to grab a goyf.

And make sure that your deck doesn't become infected with "danger-of-cool-stuff" syndrome. Try to make sure that your tutor targets can be used even if Tallowisp's not in play.

Good luck! And nice find with that Lynx.

[Waikiki]

This is a really interesting concept. Could you describe how the deck plays.

What are the early game objectives etc.

[Cire]

willoe - yeah i'm trying to make all the targets useful and not run just cool things. Kami of false hope isn't that good since its just a 1/1 and it's abilaty is only good if i'm losing, and it doesn't stop me from losing. Herald looks good but the problem is that i need U and W for it too work and i don't know what ill take out for it.

Waikiki- This deck is a control deck, it's too slow to be aggro control and it's kill conditions are too small to compete as Goyf's peers. Early game is entirely Dependant on what deck your playing against, basically play your draw engines, and then either stop (mage, lynx) or steal (tallowisp) your opponents threats. when you have enough board position and CA you then start taking swings at your opponent, but as i stress don't throw all your creature out right away because your vulnerable to swords to plowshare. Against controll decks though you have a surprisingly high number of must counters like mage, confidant, cutpurse, and even tallowisp since they all give you CA

[alebronwebb]

A very interesting deck, to say the least. I really like it, of cource I loved Spirit Stompy in Extended so maybe I am biased towards Tallowisp.
How about Dimir Infiltrator as an additional Spirit/Tutor/Evasive creature, unblockable with Guide just seems good. And he can tutor any creature in the deck, he could be too mana intensive though.

[Giles]

I know that is is not a Tallowisp.dec but why not Yavimaya's Embrace, Mythic Proportions or Epic Proportions as a 1 of?

[Cire]

alebronwebb - I considered the infiltrator, but its just too slow for what it does, the deck has plenty of draw and tutoring, it doesn't need a 3 mana sorcery speed tutor.

Giles - those cards would mean i would need to splash green (and they're slow and expensive), which would upset my mana base additionally i wouldn't be able to justify running green with out 4 goyfs. But i understand your concern that the deck needs more 'power' (by which i mean goldfish). I am thinking of making room for jitte's or SOFI/LS or another aura buff. Maybe even Mirror entity to be an extra spirit and to help my goldfish

As of now in testing i can say that ***** is a good match up as well as faerie/dragon stompy, but i find the Landstill match incredibly hard and the goblin match up needs help as well. For these matches i think im putting propaganda/ghostly prison into the sb...

[Zilla]

Can you make use of Vedalken Shackles in the SB as an additional out against aggro? Your manabase would seem able to support it, and it seems to bolster the theme of the deck along with the Tallowisp/Threads combo. Taking another page out of Extended's book, you might consider Miren, the Moaning Well as an addition to that anti-aggro strategy.

[Giles]

Giles - those cards would mean i would need to splash green (and they're slow and expensive), which would upset my mana base additionally i wouldn't be able to justify running green with out 4 goyfs. But i understand your concern that the deck needs more 'power' (by which i mean goldfish). I am thinking of making room for jitte's or SOFI/LS or another aura buff. Maybe even Mirror entity to be an extra spirit and to help my goldfish


I am not saying that you need to run green at all. I am saying since you are running tallowisp a large "OMFG" aura might be good as a one of.

If you are not understanding think it as this... it like running a off-color creature in a reanimator deck.

[Cire]

Giles - i think you may need to reread Tallowisp, it put the aura into your hand not into play.

GodzillA - Shackles would fit right into the deck but there aren't any cards that i can see that i would take out from the deck to fit in the Shackles. I might put them in the sideboard to help even more against landstill and goblins

[LordEvilTeaCup]

I was working on a deck pretty similar. I would suggest trying out a singleton Sleeper's Robe in this deck. Its pretty sick when you put it on your Dimir Cutpurse...

[Maveric78f]

good spirit :
- Blinking Spirit
- Dimir Infiltrator
- Guardian of the Guildpact
- Horobi, Death's Wail (combo!)
- Nikko-Onna (maybe better than kami of ancient law)

Reminds me when I was looking for "good" merfolks...

[Illissius]

another page out of Extended's book, you might consider Miren, the Moaning Well as an addition to that anti-aggro strategy.

In Legacy you might want High Market or Phyrexian Tower instead.

[xsockmonkeyx]

With Blinking Spirit, you could bounce it repeatedly to grab extra enchantments. It's also annoying as hell. (I still wish it had flying though :/)

[Cire]

I was actually thinking of running as few Non-basics as possible to hopefully be able to run back to basics.

Here is my current Sideboard

3 Orim's Chant - Good against combo
3 Stifle - more combo hate
3 Kataki war's wage - good Against Stax decks
2 Back to basics - Good against landstill and decks with bad mana bases, although i think i need to slightly reduce the amount of non basic lands i run (excluding fetch since B2B doesn't really effect them)
2 Windborn muse - A spirit and its a propaganda effect, i love playing it against goblins to slow them down & get threads to slow them down even more. also good against landstill slowing down there man lands
2 Shackles - More creature stealing, good against landstill, i steal their lands TEOT (i assuming that as soon as the lands become lands i lose controll over them, but even then i still prevent them from attacking me)

just to say which cards are being tested right now

Mirror Entity - another spirit, and improves my goldfish, but the deck is still slow so i don't know if it's worth it
Nameless inversion - A spirit spell so works with tallowisp, and searching up aruas instant speed is pretty good although +3/-3 doesn't really kill the creatures I'm most afraid of.
Sleeper's Robe - not really that good, i have plenty of draw and tutoring and it doesn't add to the goldfish that much.
SOFI - More draw although i have plenty, but makes my creatures into threats, and i like that
SOLS - Maybe even better than SOFI since i have plenty of draw and this card allows me to by pass my most feared hate (swords) and it gains me life which is much needed in the aggro matchup
Jitte - Probably better than the 2 swords, it really is a beast of a card... i might actually need to make a permanent space in the deck for this card.
Guardian of the Guildpact - basically it has protection everything, but i can't equip auras to it, and 2/3 for 4 is really to slow.

anymore card suggestion, help with mana base or any comments would be appreciated.

[Drac]

When you take over a manland with shackles, u can keep it even after it stops being a creature.

In my oppinion Windborn Muse is a bad card in Legacy. Its not at all usefull vs goblins since if they are racing you they can just kill it. Ghostly Prison/Propaganda cannot be killed by Goblins and that does actually slow them down.

I really like this deck idea and i am also testing it. I run 2 MD jitte and they are awesome.

Here are some cards that i have also tested.

Tradewind Rider: He is too expensive and it requires you to have too much creatures on the board. He is not good enough

Kira Glassspinder: Although his ability is very good. It also means that you cannot equip your own creatures with Aura's anymore. I still consider him good enough.

I also added 2 maindeck Controll Magic and cut back to 2 Threads of Loyalty.
I like them very much in Matchups like FS/DS/TerraNova/RGLoam

Anyways thanks alot for posting this very innovative deck. I hope we can get it working.


Edit: btw This deck needs FoW

[Cire]

Drac thanks for the comments hopefully i'll be able to take this deck to tournaments and move this into established decks, but before that:

I agree with your analysis's of Windborn Muse goblins just kills way to much with weirding and the like.

Jitte really does deserve a spot in the deck..i am wondering what spots you made room for it?

I already cut 1 threads for 1 controll magic, and it has proved useful so far. I am unsure though that i would put more into the deck.

On Kira, i found it really bad, not equiping auras or equipment, and only having a 2/2 body.

Okay, here is going to be the big controversy; as of now i dont think this deck needs force of will. The deck runs plenty of combo hate, plus theres not alot of room to fit in force of will. Force of will provides -CA and this deck is all about getting CA. Plus the deck as of now runs 19 blue cards, with 18 being needed to run force, what cards would you cut to keep at least 14 (+the 4 force) blue cards in to run force? And one more argument against force of will: all the decks that force of will would be good against out side combo decks would be aggro control decks which you have a good game against or control decks which beat you in terms of counters anyway. I might change my opinion in further testing but as of right now i just don't see the spots open to fit force in.

[Drac]

After a few more games i must agree on Kira, although sometimes he really wins games. he also can be a pain in the behind.

I think however Force is definitly needed cause you will always face decks that have cards that you MUST counter. for instance try having a Seismic Assault on table with active LftL.

I am also sceptic about howmuch the Griffon guides contribute. Although it is very fun to get it out of your deck with Tallowisp. I dont think the card is strong enough. When the creature he is on gets a Sword, he doesnt even make a token(swords is by far the most played Legacy Removal).

I suggest running engineered plague in Side. Not only is he killer in the Gobbo machup. also elves have seen more play recently. Also good vs empty the warrens and Alluren(cavern harpy,beast)

[Pinder]

Have you given any thought to Weight of Conscience? If you have Tallowisp, and you play a Spirit, you automatically have 2 creatures that share a creature type, essentially giving you 2 mana tutorable removal. And if you don't want to remove it right now, you can at least stop a threat from attacking. Sounds pretty good to me.

Also, it might be worth noting that Tallowisp triggers off Arcane spells, too. I don't know if there are really any ones worth playing, but here's (http://magiccards.info/query/1606511.html) a list of them.

[Cire]

Drac i understand your concerns about griffin guide, but you simply don't play it or search for it against decks that play swords, the problem being though what other aura does what griffin does which is to increase goldfish and to give evasion?

And i agree loam is kind of hard to play against without force of will, but you could always Mage the Seismic Assault and CB can take care of loam...

Pinder: yeah lol there are no arcane spells that even look playable in this deck, or really any deck in legacy. Nice find with Weight of Conscience, it looks like it can be a replacement for temporal isolation since it takes care creatures such as illusionist in breakfast which temporal isolation couldn't do. i guess only testing will show if it's more useful than lets say flash...

Here is the current list with room made for Jitte, and some cuts made to fit in force.

4 Tallowisp
3 Meddling mage
3 Dimir Cutpurse
3 Kami of Ancient law
3 Spectral lynx
2 Dark Confidant

4 Force of will
4 Brainstorm
3 Counterbalance
3 Top
2 Jitte
2 Threads of disloyalty
1 Control Magic
1 Griffin guide
1 Weight of Conscience

6 Island
4 U/B fetchland
4 U/W fetch land
2 U/W dual
2 Plains
2 Swamp
1 U/B Dual

I am unsure about the cuts i made (specifically the lowered Dark confidant count and the CB's) but force contrary to what i originally believed is pretty good in this deck. Jitte is as amazing as i previously thought .

[Drac]

I just noticed this but... you do not run swords?

you should 100% run 4x swords. here is my most recent list.


4 Tallowisp(S)
4 Dark Confidant
4 Spectral Lynx(S)
4 Dimir Cutpurse(S)

4 Brainstorm
4 Force of Will
4 Swords to Plowshares
3 Counterbalance
3 Sensei's Divining Top
2 Threads of Disloyalty
2 Control Magic
2 Umezawa's Jitte

and 20 Lands, abit tired so im not gonna post :P havnt tested manabase to fullest extent anyway.

you can go -1 Cutpurse and -1 Control Magic. to make it look abit more like your list.

Hope this helps abit

[Cire]

a couple of questions on your list Drac

1) Did you miss meddling mage at all?
2) is 12 spirits enough?
3) do you miss at all a pump aura or a pacifist type aura?
4) is 20 lands enough, it looks a little low to me

[Isamaru]

I almost prefer Kami of Ancient Law to Dimir Cutpurse, in the most recent list.

But you should also consider Azorius Herald, Dimir Infiltrator (I know he's my pet card, but don't underestimate him), possibly Ghost-Lit Stalker (though 5 mana is extremely expensive), possibly Kataki SB, and maybe Kira.

[Cire]

this needs to be addressed, a member of Mtgsally pointed to me to a couple rulings on tallowisp searching out threads.

Apparently the 'combo' won't be able to work

http://forums.mtgsalvation.com/showthread.php?t=36919&highlight=threads+of+disloyalty
http://forums.mtgsalvation.com/showthread.php?t=41499&highlight=threads+of+disloyalty

I don't know if this deck can survive this ruling, we won't be able to even search out mind harness or the like, if someone can confirm this ruling or offer another way around it.....

im sad now :frown: :cry:

[alebronwebb]

That sucks, I was really liking this deck too. Damn you Oracle, ruining our fun. I honestly think that this ruling kind of kills this deck, the control element is what made it promising. And going the aggro route is just not good in Legacy, what with the horrible two for ones.

I hope the ruling is wrong, but it is all over Salvation, so I'm not really counting on it. A shame too.

[Cire]

i am wondering if replacing all the threads with control magic (1 colorless mana more) /Binding Grasp (upkeep cost and 3U instead of 1UU) /Treachery (2 colorless mana more but untaps your lands)would kill this deck... it might cost more mana but it won't be situational anymore.. also finding treachery stealing a creature untaping lands, playing shackles ans stealing another creature would be sweet.. but i am wondering that 1 mana difference between control magic and threads would make this deck go from potential to just a suck ass deck.


edit- sorry this was a freak out to the rulling

[Drac]

I dont think you should run mothdust changeling.. he is just plain awefull. i think the best thing to do is cut our losses and run control magic instead of threads.
also with 3 tops and 4 brainstorms and 4 confidants i think the deck can run on 20 lands. 12 spirits is indeed enough. i havnt missed the pump or pacifism aura's yet. and maybe you are right about the dimir cutpurse. perhaps we need to go splitsies on those and kami. also since mirrir entity should be a tutorable 1 off we cannot play him since we cannot tutor for him.

[pcccp]

I would love to see if someone can put Academy Researchers and Mythic Proportions in it. 10/10 trample seems really good for me.

[Drac]

You have to be carefull not to go wild with idea's and run bad cards that can be situationally good. the current idea is that it plays like a card advantage control agro deck. all the cards in the deck are good without each other. your opponent will have to kill your confidant and your tallowisp to make sure he doesnt get out advantaged.

[Maveric78f]

I think that the incapability to search for threads is the best thing that could happen to this deck. Because control magic is 1 billion times better now in the meta, even if it costs 1 more.

[Drac]

In my Testing i found the following matchups to be good

UG Treshhold
UGw Treshhold
UGr Treshhold - this is alot harder then the other matchups since they have good mana denial, but in my testing it it still favorable.
Goblins- Abit harder then Treshhold but still good.
Dragon stompy
Faerie stompy- harder then dragon stompy because they have good evasion but you should still be able to crack em with control magic.
Angel Stompy
Death and Taxes
Mono Black Agro
Eva Green

Some harder matchups(im not sure how bad these matchups are, atleast they aint in your favor.)

TerraNova
RG(b) TerraNova
TES
Alluren
Food Chain evoke
Loam Pox
Landstill tested vs UW, Cunning 3 Collor(my own build)


Overal i would say this deck would have a good time vs anything that wins in the traditional way of creature to the face. Harder vs combo but you still have Counterbalance+FoW and side ofc. Some weaknesses of the deck include Deed and graveyard recurring removal. Also combo is a biatch.

[Cire]

Drac im not as optimistic as you are in testing although i now agree that we can get over losing threads control magic is still pretty slow..

in testing i found MBA, goblins and UGr threshold to be unfavorable, mostly due to the fact that they can race us pretty easily and we have to wait till turn 4 to start stealing creatures.. Mabey we should start thinking of Propaganda/Ghostly prison effects main?

[Hightower]

I think this shows how much effect one of Nightmare/Adam's articles can have on developing decks and ideas. Of course he didn't create the extended Spirit deck, but I for one didn't know about the hot Tallowisp - needless to say I don't follow Extended at all, so it was a very inspiring read.

(sorry for off-topic, keep being creative)

[Cire]

Hightower thanks for the complement, but until recently i didn't even see the nightmare article you were talking about. He proposed a comboish build using green which is much different from this deck.

Oh and i think i found a solution to Goblins and MBA, Daybreak Coronet. yes i know the card is a potential 3 for 1 thats why its only a singelton in the SB. You don't bring up against decks that run swords but against everything else its pretty good.

Here is my current list with sb, its a mix of Dracs list but a modified creature base.

4 Tallowisp
4 Dark Confidant
3 Dimir Cutpurse
3 Kami of ancient law
2 Spectral Lynx

(i am unsure about the 3/3/2 split between Cutpurse, Kami and lynx, i guess its about the meta game. the more threshold the more lynx and the more counterbalance the more kami and the more control and combo the more cutpurse.... but as of now this 3/3/2 divide is working okay for me)

4 Brainstorm
4 Force of Will
4 Swords to Plowshares
3 Counterbalance
3 Sensei's Divining Top
3 Control Magic
2 Umezawa's Jitte
1 Griffin Guide

(i still like the occasional griffin guide to pump my creature for more defensive/racing and evasion + if you can't steal a creature and then play coronet, you can use griffin guide and then coronet)

5 Island
4 U/B fetchland
4 U/W fetch land
2 U/W dual
2 Plains
2 Swamp
1 U/B Dual

(20 lands are okay, if i had room for 1 more island i would of put it in though)

SB

3 Orim's Chant
3 Stifle
2 Kataki war's wage
2 Back to basics
2 Propaganda
2 Shackles
1 Daybreak coronet

(Pretty much my old sb but muse is now propaganda which is cheaper, harder to remove and blue, and Coronet which is pretty good against aggro decks and slow combo decks)

[Akasha]

Question, is Balance really needed md? I know it is good, but somehow I would rather put it in the sb. Many decks come prepared for it, so it might be better there.

And how about this one:
http://www.wizards.com/magic/images/mtgcom/fcpics/making/mr325_v7qljy7p.jpg

CC might be a bit high. It makes every critter 1/1, but doesn't take away abilitys. So how does this work with goyf? And also Curiosity might be a card to be considered with the Godhead because she is still flying.

[Cire]

I really like godhead, I think it can really help the deck against aggro...another cool thing is that it combos with tallowisp to search out a screams from within for a one sided 3 mana wrath...

The godhead though has a pretty prohibitive mana cost, so only more testing would show if it has a place in the deck..so far i'm just using my above list and its been going great, the sb is still questionable though.

[Maëlig]

This deck reminds me in some ways of the one developed (correct me if I'm wrong) by Nightmare for the CaNG contest, based on Zur the enchanter.
He can share at least part of his toolbox with tallowisp, and add another way to trigger the mechanic the deck is based on (without which the deck seems quite weak, that's its principal weakness imho). Or is it too far-stretched?

[Drac]

Im thinking its not at all comparable to Zur.dec because this is a treshhold like shell that has the abilit to fetch enchant creatures. while Zur gets enchantments. this is a huge difference. Global enchantments are much more powerfull. if Tallowhisp would be able to fetch oblivion ring/counterbalance this would be really nice

Adding Zur to the deck would mean the toolbox would have to go a totally different way. and the treshhhold like shell would have to be removed. I think they should not belong in the same deck.

Godhead seems very fun. but 5 mana im not sure. maybe he could be played

[Cire]

Okay tested godhead, it's pretty bad. We have no accel so it comes in turn 5, and turns their horde into 1/1's and then they kill it, its as simple as that.

I also tested the U/B spirit on the spoiler also to slow although unblockable is some good.

And additionally i tested swans. And its pretty awesome, okay we can't do retarded stuff with chains or even use it as a draw engine, but with them wating their STP's on dark confidant & Tallowisp they often can't kill swans which is 5 turn clock by itself + the other spirits and Jitte. Maybe even take out the jitte for SOFI to interact with the swans

maybe this change in the lists

-3 Dimir Cutpurse
+3 Swans
-2 Jitte
+2 SOFI

overall a slower setup but its more control oriented with an importal creature and a draw engine (if i can fit SOFI and jitte i would) . On the cutpurse i just have to say i found him lacking, he's more of a win more than anything else, he only connects when the opponent doesn't have a board or a kill spell, which usually means he's in a bad place already...

Other than that i can't see how to improve this deck, the new spirits (save swan) are all way to expensive and not that great and the new aura's are all aggro oriented instead of control. If anyone has any great idea on how to improve this deck that would be sweet...

P.S. As soon as i get around to it ill post up my matchup results (without swans)

[Akasha]

What about :
Curse of Chains
1{wu}
Enchantment - Aura Common
Enchant creature
At the beginning of each upkeep, tap enchanted creature.

it's a cheap enchantment that keeps almost every critter at bay. And it is cheap!

[Zach Tartell]

I don't understand how you would abuse Swan in this deck. Is giving your opponent a new hand really worth having a blocker for Tarmogoyf/Goblin Piledriver/Tombstalker every turn?

[Cire]

Lonelybaritone: its not the fact that you'll be blocking with the swan, but the fact that you'll have a 4 power unkill-able clock on your hands. You play the swan then steal your opponents creature (sure he'll probably draw cards attacking into the swan), but you have answers to anything he or she might draw. STP is really the only thing widely played that'll kill the swan (and weirding but same thing applies) and in between control magic, tallowisp, and confidant STP doesn't hit the swan that often, i don't know anyone who would save STP a confidant to STP the swan (yet). The basic thing is you have alot of answers to creatures, enchantments, spells and the swan actually gives you a valid clock, thats hard to kill, and the opponent drawing some cards doesn't offset that benefit. Shit some times i feal like throwing in a worship as well. I think everyone needs to look at other ways the swan can be good outside of the chain combo.

[Media314r8]

I apologize, I've just skimmed the thread, but in Re to aggro plans outracing you and not wanting to run do-nothing enchants like ghostly or prop, perhaps you might consider THIS (http://www.cardkingdom.com/images/10thEdition/WindbornMuse.jpg) spirit as a way to stave off aggro and EtW tokens while fueling your engine. She beats for 2 in the air and doesn't afraid of anything.

[Cire]

the muse was tested in the board (not the main deck) but from the testing I've done with her i always prefer Propaganda type enchantments over her, thats why have them in the board instead.

Also about the swans i currently replaced griffin guide with pariah (also im testing guilty conscience since that acts as removal and as a really good draw engine, while the pariah acts as a lock), since thats a pretty cool interaction that so far won me some games... although at the moment I'm trying to find room for MD extirpate to be able to get rid of multiple weirdings and STPs

Akasha: Thats a cool find there it might replace 1 control magic.

Edit:

ahh forgot to put in my result of testing of Pre-Swan

First bad news:

Loam Decks rape us. End of story. Now of course you can win the occasional game due to play skill or a play mistake on their end, But barring broken/bad hand starts pre and post board they win. Also TES and Fetchland tendrils are hard matches, much better post board so expect to play 3 games against them since 1st game is usually theirs.

Some Average matchups:

Landstill/ MUC/ Rock: basically other control decks are pretty 50/50 it all coms down to the card advantage you have vs they have. You have a better game against the rock than the other two, but again these aren't byes.

Goblins/ UGR threshold: against goblins we have a disadvantage pre-board and a slight advantage post board, so overall its pretty even matchup. UGR is a tough match all around, but its not bad nor good for you, it just punishes you heavily for the wrong plays.

Good Matchups:

UGB/UGW threshold: really good matchups, not byes but overall you should win.

Stax variants: idk maybe i played against bad players but i found this matchup again to be very good. (Suntower though is much much tougher with the aether flash)

--------

okay those are my results, hopefully my slight changes of jitte/SOFI swan/pariah/conscience ect will improve all the above (hopefully the goblins/UGR and Loam) again though im trying to find room for extirpate

[Akasha]

New card that might be possible for this deck as a one-of:

Prison Sentence* 1ww
Enchantment - Aura Uncommon
Enchanted creature cannot attack or block. Its activated abilities cannot be played.
If a creature comes into play under an opponent's control you may attach Prison Sentence onto that creature.

The double white might be hard to get by, for the rest it shuts down every critter.

[Cire]

Hey i was thinking to dust this deck off with the eventual printing of

Evershrike :3::wb::wb:
Creature- Elemental spirit
flying
Evershrike gets +2/+2 for each Aura attatched to it
X:wb::wb:: Return Evershrike from your graveyard to play. You may put an Aura card with converted mana cost x or less from your hand into play attatched to it. If you don't, remove Evershrike from the game.
2/2

seems kind of perfect for this deck..its a spirit, gets stronger for each aura attached, aura are easy to get in this deck, and it comes back turn after turn

Here was the most recent list.

4 Tallowisp
4 Dark Confidant
3 Dimir Cutpurse
3 Kami of ancient law
2 Spectral Lynx

4 Brainstorm
4 Force of Will
4 Swords to Plowshares
3 Counterbalance
3 Sensei's Divining Top
3 Control Magic
2 Umezawa's Jitte
1 Griffin Guide

5 Island
4 U/B fetchland
4 U/W fetch land
2 U/W dual
2 Plains
2 Swamp
1 U/B Dual

in order to fit in evershriek we'll have to take on a slightly diffrent dirrection since we don't run that many aura's that we can use on our own creatures. Also im thinking of splashing green (gigapead) for this play

Gift's ungiven for

Edge of divinity/ Rancor
Unstable Mutation/Spirit loop
Evershriek
Gigapede

which allows me to either get a 7/7 out for 3 mana turn 5 (or a 6/4 trample or 4/4 spirit link that can keep coming back), which leaves me room to play my other creatures and aura's..and playing gift's ungiven would give this deck more options and plays and draw/tutoring power, although the gifts may be to expensive.

anyway i just thought that evershriek could be an intresting addition to this deck, maybe push it to being playable, or is this deck doomed to stay on the back pages of New and Developmental Decks.

[Waikiki]

I'd go for intuition then. cost 1 less.

[Cire]

I'd go for intuition then. cost 1 less.

How would you make an intuition stack that can get Evershriek out? I can't think of any...

[Nihil Credo]

How would you make an intuition stack that can get Evershriek out? I can't think of any...
Uhm, a 2/1 split of Evershriek and whatever aura you want to resurrect him with?

[Cire]

...so they'll just give me one of the shrieks and then what? you can only bring him back if the aura is in your hand...and all of the "return to hand" auras only work when they're sent to the graveyard from play... the best that that'll stack give me would be to just end up with an evershriek in my hand...might as well search out 3 shrieks instead.

[Kadaj]

The issue then becomes Intuition is both easier to cast and more flexible than Gifts Ungiven. You could potentially fit an AK or DA set into this if you wanted to make Intuition stronger, whereas Gifts is pretty locked into what it can accomplish. It is tougher to make a pile that automatically gives you the combo in hand when you have none of the pieces with Intuition (it may actually be impossible, hard to say), but Intuition is stronger than Gifts in general.

It's an interesting deck that actually seems like it's getting a few stronger cards in newer sets, so it may be worth it to experiment with it a bit.

[Nihil Credo]

...so they'll just give me one of the shrieks and then what?Uhm, you play it? That's what you'd be supposed to do when you draw it anyway.

[Cire]

<this part of the post was dumb, useless since Illissius is right, with a gifts pile they can just give me a Shriek and Gigapede and thats the end of that>

Also as an answer to Kadaj, again, i understand that intuition is much more flexible than Gifts but i don't think this deck has enough space in it to abuse that flexiblity. that would have to be changed radically just to include intuition and cheap aura's let alone intuition.

If you do think intution would make this deck better than the possible inclusion of gifts how would the list look like?

[Illissius]

Can't they just give you Gigapede and Evershriek out of the Gifts pile?

[Cire]

Shit your right, i geuss both piles don't work....:frown:

Would their be a better pile or should i come up with another better way of getting Evershriek in the yard and aura's in my hand?

[Kadaj]

You could run a discard outlet, something like Cabal Therapy or Careful Study perhaps. Obviously hitting yourself with Threapy isn't exactly amazing, nor is Careful Study particularly strong. I'm more just brainstorming ideas, as I do think the Evershrike idea has potential merit. Undead Gladiator maybe? It's a method of card quality with a body attached, and it would let you get Evershrike or something like Cabal Therapy into your yard if you so desired. Or it could just get rid of excess lands.

Now that I think about it, I think Undead Gladiator may end up a solid option for that. Any thoughts?

[Cire]

Gladiator doesn't sound half bad as a way to get Evershriek in the yard. If you get him early enough just cycle it, later in the game discard it to get the shreik into your yard and cycle it again, and if your out of options just get it back and beat face.... it can kill a mongoose and then comback...

How bout also Zombie infestation as a way to get the shriek into the yard...
-----

I understand the inital apeal of the deck way the controlling aspect with the control magics but that version of the deck was never that good compared to the rest of the feild, i think we should take a more aggresive role, when trying out Evershriek.. that is not to say that we can't run aura's like temporal isolation, ect.

Here's an initial undeveloped untested evershriek list, if it sucks (which it probably does) remember its just to get a feel on how evershriek plays out.

4 Tallowisp
4 Dark Confidant
4 Undead Gladiator
3 Evershriek
3 Kami of ancient law
2 Oona's Prowler
2 Spectral Lynx
-22

4 Zombie Infestation
4 Swords to Plowshares
2 Chrome Mox
2 Mox Diamond
2 Edge of Divinity
2 Temporal Isolation
1 Spirit Loop
1 Griffin Guide
-18

5 Plains
5 Swamps
4 W/B Dual
3 Blood Stainded Mire
3 Flooded Strand
-20

- yeah in the inital list i took out blue, hopefully ill be able to put it back in but for now i just want to see how evershriek plays.

[Waikiki]

you play 4 tallowisps. I suggested intuition since I didn't think getting an enchant creature in hand wouldn't be that hard.

[BlindMage]

I think that with the advent of Evershrike (that's shrike - a kind of bird, not shriek - a loud scream or yell) that a more aggro kind of aggro-control is the way to go with this deck. I think that it would be possible to play a mix of creatures and auras that would allow you to race aggro, have inevitability vs control, and allow some busted early turns. Shrike+Spirit Loop+High Market/Phyrexian Tower = GG against Landstill or similar control decks. You can bring back a 4/4 flying lifelink as much as you want (without playing any spells) and can sac it as part of an activation cost in response to swords. It's like Eternal Dragon and Exalted Angel had a superbaby. Now that I think about it, that would win games against more than just Landstill, if it came online quickly enough.

Basically, there's a couple ways I can see going with this:

- Running it with deadguy disruption suite (therapy, sinkhole, hymn, vindicate).
- Running it on an Angel Stompy Model. Obviously it would wouldn't have quite the "holy crap" speed of AS, but it's aggro-control where AS was aggro.

I think I like the second way better. I like Phyrexian Tower as part of a way to power out the occasional stupid fast Evershrike, as well as part of the later game recurring Shrike. I'll try to work up a decklist draft later when I have time.

P.S. I know it's not a spirit, but Kitchen Finks + Griffin Guide seems hawt.
P.P.S. http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Shrike

EDIT: I'd also really like to work in Auratog and Replenish. It may be that there simply isn't room, but "returns to your hand" auras are also good with Auratog, and a Replenish could steal a game if you had Auratog in play and even 3 enchantments, especially if one of them is Temporal Isolation (you can put it on the 'tog, swing, and sac it after blocks). If you can connect with a 'tog/replenish play, each enchantment you have in play is 4 damage. So even if you only have 3, that's a 13 damage swing. If you had two more enchantments in the yard to start with, it's 17. The potential for that seems worth at least working on a way to include.

[Clark Kant]

Why not play a singleton Control Magic and/or a singleton Temporal Isolation.

It would be solid to be able to tutor out an answer against Tombstalker or some other beefy threat that Threads of Disloyalty can't steal.

There are a lot of good enchant creatures out there to give you outs against lots of different situations, as well as creatures that interact very well with them. They may be more worthwhile than stuff like meddling mage.

I definately think Evershrike belongs in the list in the opening post more than Meddling Mage.

[Roman Candle]

It would be solid to be able to tutor out an answer against Tombstalker or some other beefy threat that Threads of Disloyalty can't steal.

Considering that Threads can't be fetched by Tallowisp, you might wanna up the Isolations/Control Magics.

[Clark Kant]

Considering that Threads can't be fetched by Tallowisp...

Why can't Threads be tutored up when you have Tallowisp in play?

Tallowisp's text says...

Whenever you play a Spirit or Arcane spell, you may search your library for an enchant creature card, reveal it, and put it into your hand. If you do so, shuffle your library.

Threads of Disloyalty IS an Enchant Creature card.

[Roman Candle]

Why can't Threads be tutored up when you have Tallowisp in play?

Tallowisp's text says...

Whenever you play a Spirit or Arcane spell, you may search your library for an enchant creature card, reveal it, and put it into your hand. If you do so, shuffle your library.

Threads of Disloyalty IS an Enchant Creature card.

Nope, its an "Enchant Creature with converted mana cost 2 or less" card. This was covered earlier in the thread.

[Clark Kant]

That's what I hate about erratas. I have a playset of Threads and they literally says "Enchant Creature" in the card type. It's going to confuse the hell out of a lot of people.

Anyways, congrats on hitting a 100 posts.

[Kevdog]

Instead of cutting the blue, you could cut the black instead and run U/W/g.
Green gives you access to Moldervine Cloak, Keen Sense, and Armadillo Cloak.
3x Dimir Cutpurse-> 3x Augury Adept
2x Spectral Lynx + 4x Dark Confidant-> 3x Intuition, 1x Evershrike, 1x Moldervine Cloak, 1x Gigapede.
You could then intuition for Evershrike, Moldervine Cloak, Gigapede.
If intuition resolves, you get a counterspell/counterbalace/discard immune 7/7 flier for 3WW + Dredge 2 that can be recurred.

[Cire]

Well, i never advocated cutting blue, it was simply done in order to test the potential and play style of a potential Evershirk style of this deck. Although green does sound tempting it would force us into running Goyf and then we wouldn't be able to justify why were not simply playing Ugw threshold instead. Also why are you suggesting we cut 5! spirits? the deck won't work anymore....

After testing Evershirk i found it to be in one word: good. it's better than exalted angle when you have spirit loop and it's a better win con with other Aura's. I also put in 1 phyrexian tower thanks to BlindMage's suggestion and it had helped me so much in avoided STP that im looking for more good sac outlets. IF i can't find other sac outlets how bout chalice of the void in the deck, you run a minimum amount of 1cc cards and even at 2cc your win con is still playable. <another stupid thing i said, god im an idiot- thanks for pointing out this mistake Akasha>

On the BW list itself, yes it was done just to test how evershrike plays out instead of developing a fully built deck. Blue must absolutly be in the deck! I don't know about CB+Top but force of will and brainstorm are absolutly needed.

On intuition stacks, im looking for good stacks that don't involve green, as much as gigapede, Eternal Witness, life from the loam help these stacks i would want to avoid going into green as i believe it would lead this deck into becoming a worse threshold, ect.

oh one stack i came up with

Dredge land + Cycling Land + Raven Crime = a discard effect whenever you want
-------
so far im using that BW list as a base and im trying to fit blue back in starting with

4 Brainstorm
4 Force of Will
3 Intuition

since FoW needs at least 17 blue cards im trying to figure out what the other 6 ones could be that still leave room in the deck for Evershirke

[Akasha]

Return Evershrike from your graveyard to play. You may put an Aura card with converted mana cost X or less from your hand into play attached to it. If you don't, remove Evershrike from the game.

So sorry, but if you don't have creature enchantment in your hand, he gets removed from the game. Looks like we can use wisp to get it, but how to dump shrike into the grave? Careful Study?

[Cire]

Shit Read that line over....seems like i force myself to ignore the fine print on alot of these cards :rolleyes:. still having an aura in hand is easy in this deck