[Deck] Aluren

I am testing out two different variants of the deck. Im testing out a build ramping/thinning with Phyrexian Tower + Veteran Explorer, as well as a build more simply adjusted to accommodate the new recruiter. I really do enjoy the inclusion of white. I also like how tidehollow sculler interactions with aluren + Cavern harpy to clean out someones hand with multiple etb triggers on the stack from bouncing sculler with harpy..same effect with Orzhov Pontiff. Seems good!

Land (20)

1x Bayou

3x Forest
1x Island
3x Misty Rainforest
1x Phyrexian Tower
1x Plains
1x Savannah
2x Swamp
1x Tropical Island
1x Tundra
1x Underground Sea
3x Verdant Catacombs
1x Volrath's Stronghold

Enchantment (5)

4x Aluren
1x Sylvan Library

Creature (22)

1x Arctic Merfolk
2x Baleful Strix
1x Cavern Harpy
4x Deathrite Shaman
1x Eternal Witness
1x Parasitic Strix
1x Reclamation Sage
4x Recruiter of the Guard
3x Shardless Agent
4x Veteran Explorer

Sorcery (6)

3x Cabal Therapy
2x Duress
1x Thoughtseize

Instant (7)

3x Abrupt Decay
4x Brainstorm

Sideboard (15)

1x Baleful Strix
1x Bone Shredder
2x Carpet of Flowers
3x Force of Will
1x Krosan Grip
2x Meddling Mage
1x Null Rod
1x Orzhov Pontiff
1x Scavenging Ooze
1x Tidehollow Sculler
1x Toxic Deluge
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Creature (23)

1x Arctic Merfolk

3x Baleful Strix
2x Birds of Paradise
1x Cavern Harpy
1x Coiling Oracle
4x Deathrite Shaman
1x Eternal Witness
1x Parasitic Strix
1x Reclamation Sage
4x Recruiter of the Guard
3x Shardless Agent
1x Tidehollow Sculler

Enchantment (5)

4x Aluren
1x Sylvan Library

Land (19)

2x Bayou
1x Forest
1x Island
4x Misty Rainforest
1x Plains
1x Savannah
1x Swamp
2x Tropical Island
1x Underground Sea
4x Verdant Catacombs
1x Volrath's Stronghold

Instant (7)

3x Abrupt Decay
4x Brainstorm

Sorcery (6)

3x Cabal Therapy
2x Duress
1x Thoughtseize

Sideboard (15)

1x Bone Shredder
2x Carpet of Flowers
1x Containment Priest
3x Force of Will
1x Krosan Grip
2x Meddling Mage
1x Null Rod
1x Orzhov Pontiff
1x Scavenging Ooze
2x Toxic Deluge

Only playing 3 Therapy in the Vet list seems like a mistake.

Basic plains over Tundra in the second list is a little odd. The only cards that need W are Recruiter and the 1-of Sculler MD and 4 SB cards. Most of your early plays, especially the ones you actually want to make, don't have any generic mana cost. The plains is effectively a colorless land early and you can always hold off fetching it until you actually need it to cast something. I would rather have one less bad early land drop than hedge against hate on my splash color. I feel the same about it in the other list, but it makes more sense when you're running Vets.

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Originally Posted by Weebo

Only playing 3 Therapy in the Vet list seems like a mistake.

Basic plains over Tundra in the second list is a little odd. The only cards that need W are Recruiter and the 1-of Sculler MD and 4 SB cards. Most of your early plays, especially the ones you actually want to make, don't have any generic mana cost. The plains is effectively a colorless land early and you can always hold off fetching it until you actually need it to cast something. I would rather have one less bad early land drop than hedge against hate on my splash color. I feel the same about it in the other list, but it makes more sense when you're running Vets.

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This list was still pretty early in development, and i have since made changes. I agree with your comments completely, with the exception of running 4 Therapy's. I cant see it being a bad idea, but even in the premier deck for Vet+therapy - NicFit, they only run 3 therapy in most cases. I might put 1 SB though.

This is my more updated list for the Veteran Aluren build:

2x Bayou

2x Forest
1x Island
3x Misty Rainforest
1x Phyrexian Tower
1x Plains
1x Savannah
1x Swamp
1x Tropical Island
1x Underground Sea
4x Verdant Catacombs
1x Volrath's Stronghold

Enchantment (5)

4x Aluren
1x Sylvan Library

Creature (23)

1x Arctic Merfolk
3x Baleful Strix
1x Cavern Harpy
1x Coiling Oracle
4x Deathrite Shaman
1x Eternal Witness
1x Parasitic Strix
1x Reclamation Sage
4x Recruiter of the Guard
2x Shardless Agent
4x Veteran Explorer

Sorcery (6)

3x Cabal Therapy
2x Duress
1x Thoughtseize

Instant (7)

3x Abrupt Decay
4x Brainstorm

Sideboard (15)

1x Bone Shredder
2x Carpet of Flowers
1x Containment Priest
3x Force of Will
1x Krosan Grip
2x Meddling Mage
1x Null Rod
1x Orzhov Pontiff
1x Scavenging Ooze
1x Tidehollow Sculler
1x Toxic Deluge

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Originally Posted by wos1337

This list was still pretty early in development, and i have since made changes. I agree with your comments completely, with the exception of running 4 Therapy's. I cant see it being a bad idea, but even in the premier deck for Vet+therapy - NicFit, they only run 3 therapy in most cases. I might put 1 SB though.

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Which nic fit lists are you looking at? I've been playing that deck for years and I don't think I've ever seen a list run anything but the full set of Therapies. Even if a list shows up occasionally, it's certainly not most lists. The interaction between Vet and Therapy is the point of that deck. There are a few other decks that run three on a regular basis, like storm or elves in the SB, but anyone with a playset of Vets doing so seems like a poor choice.

Which discard spells you run is obviously your choice, but I would argue that Therapy is vastly superior to Duress in most situations. You play it as early disruption, then flash it back as part of your combo turn to ensure the coast is clear before going for it. You're guaranteed to have a creature to flash it back, because the first step in the combo is dumping all of your remaining Recruiters onto the table. It has the potential to strip multiple cards, it hits creatures, which is very relevant because Aluren suffers from the same hatebears storm does, you're not losing any information, and you regularly have the opportunity to cast it twice in succession because you're running 20+ creatures. It takes more practice than Duress to play correctly, but that's not really a downside to speak of. That's all ignoring there's a benefit to saccing your creatures. Once you include Vets in the equation, I wouldn't touch another discard spell before you have the full set of Therapy.

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Originally Posted by Weebo

Which nic fit lists are you looking at? I've been playing that deck for years and I don't think I've ever seen a list run anything but the full set of Therapies. Even if a list shows up occasionally, it's certainly not most lists. The interaction between Vet and Therapy is the point of that deck. There are a few other decks that run three on a regular basis, like storm or elves in the SB, but anyone with a playset of Vets doing so seems like a poor choice.

Which discard spells you run is obviously your choice, but I would argue that Therapy is vastly superior to Duress in most situations. You play it as early disruption, then flash it back as part of your combo turn to ensure the coast is clear before going for it. You're guaranteed to have a creature to flash it back, because the first step in the combo is dumping all of your remaining Recruiters onto the table. It has the potential to strip multiple cards, it hits creatures, which is very relevant because Aluren suffers from the same hatebears storm does, you're not losing any information, and you regularly have the opportunity to cast it twice in succession because you're running 20+ creatures. It takes more practice than Duress to play correctly, but that's not really a downside to speak of. That's all ignoring there's a benefit to saccing your creatures. Once you include Vets in the equation, I wouldn't touch another discard spell before you have the full set of Therapy.

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Thank you for your expert insight! I will be sure to adjust the list accordingly. Duress was suggested to me as an effective hand disruption against relevant threats such as FOW, and the like. I can however see how this can also be very narrow.

Provided your experience, and knowledge - do you have any other suggestions to further the decks development? Any ideas on new or difference utility creatures to add?

The other pillar of (most) Nic fit is Pernicious Deed. It controls the board and helps you get rid of Explorer. We could go old school and run Rector (which already synergizes with the new Recruiter) as well.

From my experience, Therapy alone isn't enough for Veteran Explorer. You need something else to sacrifice them or else you overload Therapies by giving them two roles that may not necessarily overlap. I got the best results with Diabolic Intent and Sidisi's Faithful.

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Originally Posted by Nonex

From my experience, Therapy alone isn't enough for Veteran Explorer. You need something else to sacrifice them or else you overload Therapies by giving them two roles that may not necessarily overlap. I got the best results with Diabolic Intent and Sidisi's Faithful.

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I agree - I do run Phyrexian Tower as well. Also, chumping with him to at the very least shuffle my library is great after tucking my alurens after cascading with Shardless Agent.
Pernicious dead. I might look into some exploit creatures so see if there is any synergy there. So far in testing, I havent encountered too many instances where i couldn't get vet in the yard (between 4 Therapy 3 decay 1 orzhov Pontif, Phyrexian Tower, and using as a blocker).

Diabolic Intent could be good!

Expert insight is almost certainly giving me too much credit. I just really like casting Therapy and aluren is good at doing that, so I hate to let the opportunity slide. I would go more heavily in favor of TS or Therapy than Duress, because there are some killer hatebears against the combo plan that see regular play because of storm. You can always get them with Decay, but you might as well have more potential answers in the deck.

I know I've been tempted by Rector in the past, but was unwilling to go to a full 5 colors. If you're already in white, I could see testing Rector. I would be careful about going to heavy on them, especially if you're not running Vets, because 4 mana isn't nothing and you already have 4 Aluren. The most utility creatures I liked most are EWit and Rec Sage. Witness has been excellent for me, mostly in the cotext of combo, and Rec Sage has generally pulled its weight MB. I was running Edric, Spymaster of Trest there for a little while and was never thrilled with him. He wasn't bad, but I never wanted to tutor him out and he's dead during the combo turn. I still like him to slam the door on some matchups, so he goes in and out of the board.

I run pretty light on tutor targets, because I really like having the ability to play bad shardless when the combo isn't coming together. My creature suite outside of the combo is 4x each of DRS, Shardless, and Strix. I'm losing some flexibility in favor of a better midrange game, which has worked out for me. I also get a fair number of games where my opponent doesn't realize I'm on a combo deck until it's too late for them to play appropriately, because the first couple of turns look like shardless. In the even where I get blown out G1, it can affect boarding too.

Fleecemane Lion should be the new dream stalker

I am going to try to go Junk colors with a blue splash. Harpy and strix are only there for the combo at that point. And I do like academy rector as an aluren 5+


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Originally Posted by Ish

Fleecemane Lion should be the new dream stalker

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Pretty sure you mean Whitemane Lion.

Quote:

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Originally Posted by H

Pretty sure you mean Whitemane Lion.

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Doh! Yes... My bad...


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Whitemane Lion can't be bounced by Cavern Harpy, which makes it a poor replacement. Arctic Merfolk is still the better choice and it even offers some improvements over Stalker. Bouncing as a cost makes the combo even more resistant to removal (kind of. It's still only weak with Harpy on the stack, so it only helps in the corner case of only having access to one Recruiter) and potential 2 power can be good for non-combo situations.

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Originally Posted by Ish

Fleecemane Lion should be the new dream stalker

I am going to try to go Junk colors with a blue splash. Harpy and strix are only there for the combo at that point. And I do like academy rector as an aluren 5+


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Thing with Lion though is that you can't gate trigger it with Harpy, so how do you continue the combo when you get the Harpy so you can use the Strix? I think you still need the Arctic Merfolk so that you can still tutor for, and use the combo in a single turn.

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Originally Posted by Fry

Thing with Lion though is that you can't gate trigger it with Harpy, so how do you continue the combo when you get the Harpy so you can use the Strix? I think you still need the Arctic Merfolk so that you can still tutor for, and use the combo in a single turn.

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I don't understand this at all. Why do you need to keep bouncing the lion? Harpy just bounces strix... Return harpy... Repeat

Am I missing something?


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Recruiter tutors for lion, play lion, bounce recruiter.
Play recruiter, tutor for harpy, play harpy. pass turn because you can't continue the chain.
Exchange that with Arctic merfolk and you can bounce that with harpy to bounce recruiter to tutor for strix and win.

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Am I missing something? Why is everyone dead set on Arctic Merfolk over Quickling, which seems to be the better choice to me. Quickling is naturally a 2/2 with evasion (so he can actually, you know, win you games), has natural flash, can let you 1-for-0 abrupt decay / STP by bouncing a dude in response, trades with Delver, etc.

The downsides I can think of are:

1. It's worse on an empty board when you flip him off of a blind shardless agent. However, you can just ship Quickling to the bottom and a 1/1 arctic merfolk is fairly shit on an empty board anyway;
2. You risk getting blown out by a removal spell on a board where you're casting Quickling with just 1 dude on board, and
3. Cast vs EtB trigger is stronger vs counterspell (although this should virtually never be an actual issue with tight play; also, it's not like Dream Stalker was a cast trigger)

These negatives are all fairly inconsequential compared to the positive, so unless I'm missing something, isn't Quickling just better?

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Originally Posted by Dominic Pain

Recruiter tutors for lion, play lion, bounce recruiter.
Play recruiter, tutor for harpy, play harpy. pass turn because you can't continue the chain.
Exchange that with Arctic merfolk and you can bounce that with harpy to bounce recruiter to tutor for strix and win.

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Yes in that chain it doesn't work... Missed playing the whole thing out in my head. My brain is not working


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Originally Posted by Deathrite_Shaman

Am I missing something? Why is everyone dead set on Arctic Merfolk over Quickling, which seems to be the better choice to me. Quickling is naturally a 2/2 with evasion (so he can actually, you know, win you games), has natural flash, can let you 1-for-0 abrupt decay / STP by bouncing a dude in response, trades with Delver, etc.

The downsides I can think of are:

1. It's worse on an empty board when you flip him off of a blind shardless agent. However, you can just ship Quickling to the bottom and a 1/1 arctic merfolk is fairly shit on an empty board anyway;
2. You risk getting blown out by a removal spell on a board where you're casting Quickling with just 1 dude on board, and
3. Cast vs EtB trigger is stronger vs counterspell (although this should virtually never be an actual issue with tight play; also, it's not like Dream Stalker was a cast trigger)

These negatives are all fairly inconsequential compared to the positive, so unless I'm missing something, isn't Quickling just better?

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Cast trigger is an improvement over Dream Stalker (though obviously dream stalker would still be the creature of choice), and is very relevant, as situational as it may be. I think being resilient to counter spells is more useful then swapping blows with a delver. Also, in terms of power - Merfolk can come in as a 2/2 as well which holds some merrit playing the field to win with out combo.
The fact that quickling can blow itself out with the sacrifice requirement makes it less versatile. There are as many, or more negatives stacked against Quickling. Also if you're playing the game where you're competing with delvers hit for hit, you're likely already playing a losing game.

I think the biggest issue is cascading into it. Also as yoshipwnz put it:
"Much like hitting Dream Stalker with a Cascade, you don't get to bounce Shardless Agent. Shardless Agent is still on the stack while the Dream Stalker/Quickling triggers because Cascade goes on top of Shardless Agent on the stack, so you have to bounce Dream Stalker (or a land), in Quickling's case you just lose it. I also think you're missing something with the part of the combo that they interact with. They kill your Dream Stalker effect with Harpy on the stack, so the kicker cost is generally not different from the trigger of Quickling. Now the kicker effect would be significant outside of comboing, since they wouldn't be able to kill the creature in response (potentially losing both creatures), but that should be mitigated due to the flash."

Then if you're running white Deputy of Acquittals is also a valid option. Can still save creatures, the "may" makes it the best one to cascade into.
But I believe the easier casting cost, evasion, and the ability to trade with delver is something great, so I would go Quickling. Trading with delver shouldn't be overlooked, that is a great feature.