Just a place to put these deck lists, where I can update them without needing to make a new post.
Current Decks
I hadn't been playing as much lately and then the Standard rotation happened and all my decks needed changes to remain legal. Aww, Rats! and Eva Marie seemed salvageable, the others not so much, so I made a couple of new ones to replace them.
Aww, rats! |
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Lands |
Creatures |
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4 x Jagged Barrens Spells2 x Corrupted Conviction |
4 x Harried Spearguard |
2023-11-16: I noticed that there's a bunch of rat-focused stuff around now, so it seemed like an easy option. And it seems to work pretty well so far. I'm sure there's plenty of room for improvement, but I'm not losing every game any more.
I should probably have put a couple more Haunted Ridges in there instead of the Bloodfell Caves, but I decided to hold back the rare wildcards in case I want them for something else since I was already spending so many. And I'm not very happy with Tramway Station, but I don't know what I'd replace it with.
Song of Totentanz, Lord Skitter and Twisted Sewer-Witch are the core of the deck. The most likely options for improvement, I think, would be to remove the Ratcatcher Trainees or Voracious Vermins and maybe add a couple more Redcap Gutter-Dwellers or Tattered Ratters, but I'm really not sure.
Update (2023-12-13): As predicted, Tramway Stations are gone. Two more each of Bloodfell Caves and Haunted Ridge. I also took out two of the Rat Outs in favour of a couple of Corrupted Convictions. Rat Out is nice when you draw it early and have something to kill with it but I was finding it a wasted slot more often than I liked, and I wanted a bit more card-draw.
Update (2024-04-22): I love The End. That card that's pissing you off? Gone. Out of the game. All copies. It's only slightly marred by the fact that it doesn't take out copies in play and gets stymied by transformed cards. But fuck transforming cards anyway. Terrible idea. Anyway, that and Molten Collapse are now there in place of the 4 Hero's Downfalls. I also took out Ratcatcher Trainee as it was pretty underwhelming and Voracious Vermin because it almost always died before it could do much, and added Blightbelly Rat instead, as I win a not-insignificant number of games via poison.
Update (2024-08-30): I replaced the Bloodfell Caveses and Haunted Ridges and with Jagged Barrenses and Raucous Theaters, which I should already have done before Haunted Ridge falling out of Standard forced my hand. They're just better options. It feels so lame to burn a wildcard on a land though. The Blightbelly Rats are out and Persistent Marshstalkers are in; a new card that just happens to be a better fit. The Blightbellies were basically just removal bait most of the time but the Marshstalkers provide a bit more value. And that's it. That's all the changes I had to make. Still seems to work ok, but I haven't played a lot (as yet).
Eva Marie |
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Lands & Spells |
Creatures |
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24 x Mountain 2 x Highway Robbery |
2 x Discerning Peddler |
2023-05-01: This is the third deck I've put four Shivan Devestators in, because they're obviously really good; but I've found that often means that they get killed immediately rather than doing what they're supposed to, which is single-handedly win the game. They're definitely staying in there, but I'm more likely now to use them whenever I draw them for however much mana I've got rather than saving them till I can bring them out at 8/8 or whatever.
The real centrepiece of this deck is Urabrask's Forge. It's exactly the kind of card I like: devastating if you don't have a way to deal with it, but not remotely unfair. It's not hard to stop. Anything that can remove artifacts will do the job, as will any creature with First Strike held back as a defender. But having four of them in the deck means there's a good chance I'll draw one earlier and a decent chance I'll even get a second one out. And it's so satisfying to send them smashing through the enemy's defences, turn after turn.
One card that surprised me was Rabbit Battery. I put it in as a one-cost creature that's "good enough", but I've found it's actually much better than I gave it credit for. That ability to become equipment means that you can essentially make a big tough creature and then not lose all of its power when it dies. Plus, if your opponent plays some spell that destroys all your creatures, the Batteries only turn back into rabbits after it resolves so you don't lose them along with everything else.
The Heelslashers and Skalds, on the other hand, I'm not entirely sold on. They're good, but I feel like there are better options for those slots; I just don't know what they are. Twinshot Snipers maybe?
Update (2023-07-12): I originally had four Obliterating Bolts and four Strangles in here, but took them out in favour of two of each of Volcanic Spite, Rebel Salvo, Abrade and Volt Charge. Is this better? I don't know. The Volt Charges are supposed to power the Forge up a little bit, and Abrade can smash artifacts, so that's nice. Rebel Salvo comes in handy sometimes because of the extra damage, but it honestly doesn't come up that often. Volcanic Spite is the most obvious one to replace because I rarely feel like the card cycling results in me being any better off. Probably should replace them with two more Volt Charges.
Update (2023-07-14): Yeah, I got rid of Volcanic Spite and Abrade. Volt Charge, I now realise, also works fantastically with Electrostatic Infantry (two counters per Infantry per Charge), and I don't know why I thought the extra two damage of Rebel Salvo wasn't worth having. Plus it has that nice cost reduction if I've got any Rabbits in play.
Update (2024-04-22): Just a small change here; Thrill of Possibility is out, Highway Robbery and Discerning Peddler are in. Highway Robbery is basically just a better version of Thrill so that's a no-brainer, but I'm not 100% sure about the peddler. I probably really want a couple more Highway Robberies instead.
Update (2024-08-30): Added four Thunder Salvos, but I'm not happy with them. They do the job, but I rarely get the extra benefit from them so they feel like a bit of a waste. Circuit Mender is out of Standard so that's gone, as is Rabbit Battery. Fearless Skald and Redcap Heelslasher are still available but I almost never found them useful so I took the opportunity to remove them. Monastery Swiftspear is fun because it makes my opponent think I'm going to cast a bunch of spells and prowess them to death, but actually it's just a convenient first turn creature so I actually like seeing them waste removal on it. The last addition is Scytheclaw Raptor, which is just there because I love to hurt people who cast spells on my turn. Fuck you, it's my turn.
Life's Good
Lands |
Creatures |
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4 x Blossoming Sands |
4 x Ankle Biter 4 x Armored Scrapgorger 4 x Boon-Bringer Valkyrie 4 x Burrowguard Mentor 4 x Essence Channeler 2 x Gruff Triplets 2 x Queen Allenal of Ruadach 4 x Resplendent Angel 4 x Ruin-Lurker Bat 4 x Voracious Varmint |
2024-08-30: This is basically the replacement for my angel deck, which suffered catastrophic losses in the rotation. Giada's gone, Liesa's gone, Inspiring Overseer's gone, Spirited Companion's gone. It's fucked. So I looked at what was left and thought that Boon-Bringer Valkyrie and Resplendent Angel still make a nice little combo, and Essence Channeler works well with life gain as well, so bring in the Ruin-Lurker Bat to help out with a little bit more life gain.
Then there's the other half of the deck. Life gain's nice but I was thinking about mana acceleration to get the angels going quicker. So I threw the Scrapgorgers in there, and the Ankle Biters as a replacement for Bilious Skulldweller. It was about this time that I realised I was all creatures so far, and thought "why not keep going?"
Voracious Varmint is essential for enchantment removal because enchantments are all over the place right now and need to be dealt with. Since it was going to be a whole lot of creatures, Burrowguard Mentor and Queen Allenal made sense. And the Gruff Triplets? I just like them.
The problem is that there's too much going on and it doesn't all pull in the same direction. I need to figure out what I want this deck to be doing and focus on that.
None for You
Lands & Spells |
Creatures |
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Lands 7 x Plains Spells 2 x Cut Down |
4 x Boon-Bringer Valkyrie |
2024-08-30: Shortly before the rotation I tried out a little bit of Standard Brawl; my deck was unsalvageable and probably not worth posting, but it did form the basis for this one. The basic idea is: I get cards and I take away your things. You play something, I smash it. I play something, I get more cards to play. Is it good? No. Does it annoy people? Yes. So I call that a win.
2024-09-11: Took out the Phyrexian Arenas and Scrapwork Ragers because I think I've got plenty of card drawing without them, and what I was lacking was some heavy hitters, so I put four Boon-Bringer Valkyries in instead.
April 2024
I stopped playing for a while because I got really into Baldur's Gate 3 and didn't have time to play anything else, and by the time I came back two more sets were out and my old decks seemed to have been completely eclipsed. I was getting absolutely destroyed in every single game. So I decided it was time for a fresh approach.
England | |
Lands | Creatures |
4 x Escape Tunnel Spells2 x The End | 2 x Drana and Linvala |
2024-04-22: I'd just been thinking about making a vampire deck for a while so I finally did. It's ok. It's fun. There's not really a stand-out great card that I love in here, although Gift of Fangs is pretty neat for its versatility; got to be careful not to cast it on the wrong thing though, because it's not quite as simple as heads I win, tails you lose. Preacher of the Schism is pretty good, and I tend to get out to a nice early head start. It plays sort of half way between Eva Marie and Triumph of Light.
Triumph of Light
Lands | Creatures |
7 x Plains Spells2 x Lord Skitter's Blessing | 4 x Bilious Skulldweller |
2023-11-21: This is very similar to It Don't Matter (below), and although the non-creature spell section has been revised quite a bit it does play pretty much the same. That said, there's enough different here that I thought it deserved a new name and to stand on its own. It's not as good as It Don't Matter was at the height of its power, but it's not bad. I'm winning some games. The Miner's Guidewing and Resplendent Angel are new; the former is... fine. The latter is really quite good. For 3 mana it's decent on its own, but get it out with a Boon-Bringer Valkyrie and you're doing damage, gaining life, and getting a free 4/4 flyer every turn. It's nice.
One the spell side I got rid of the Diabolic Intents because they were honestly never much good, and replaced them with Lord Skitter's Blessing, which is basically a cheaper, but slightly more fragile Phyrexian Arena because I always want to be drawing more cards, obviously. Hero's Downfall is gone, replaced with Stroke of Midnight and The End. Stroke of Midnight is slightly easier to cast (only one coloured mana) with a very small drawback, and The End is extremely satisfying when you target the right thing and get to completely ruin your opponent's plans.
Finally there's Virtue of Loyalty, which is extremely good when it works out, but I feel like it tends to only work out when I'm already winning, in which case it's not really doing much. There may be a better option for that slot; perhaps even putting back the two Spirited Companions I took out, for the sake of a bit more card draw.
August 2023
Like the Wolf | |
Lands & Spells | Creatures |
4 x The Autonomous Furnace 4 x Howling Moon | 4 x Armored Scrapgorger |
2023-07-12: This is my latest attempt at a red/green deck. I'm a lot happier with it than the previous ones but I'm still not 100% behind it. Racers' Ring is an obvious weak point, but I'm not sure what to replace it with. Maybe Jetmir's Garden or Ziatora's Proving Ground.
Fang of Shigeki is basically just there in case my opponent plays something like Phyrexian Obliterator that I want to be able to kill without dealing any more damage than necessary to, since red and green lack straight-up all-purpose kill spells. Nine times out of ten when playing my mono-red deck, if I see a Phyrexian Obliterator I just concede on the spot as I have literally no way to deal with it.
I really like Tribute to the World Tree and Halana and Alena, especially together (since the former provides a permanent boost to the latter's ongoing effect) and I really want to, at least once, play Snarling Wolf on turn one, Packsong Pup on turn two, Tribute to the World Tree one turn three, and Halana and Alena, Partners on turn four, because that's basically a perfect sequence of moves.
Update (2023-08-07): Took out a Pack's Betrayal and Prizefight to add 2 more Howling Moon's (for a total of four), added Copperline Gorge and Autonomous Furnace's in place of the Rugged Highlands and Racers' Ring. Put in 4 Armored Scrapgorgers in place of the Gala Greeters. I think this makes it a bit more consistent. I still don't like the Furnaces and I'm not happy with the overall performance, but it seems to do a bit better now. The mana availability in the first few turns is certainly a lot more consistent.
It Don't Matter |
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Lands & Spells |
Creatures |
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7 x Plains 4 x Seal from Existence |
4 x Bilious Skulldweller |
2023-05-01: This was originally basically a poison deck with some angels in it and has gradually shifted into a very angel-focused deck with some other stuff in there for card drawing and removal. All that really remains of the original focus is the Bilious Skulldwellers, which are used now for their Deathtouch rather than their Toxic. I used to attack with them, to force my opponent to pick between taking a poison counter or losing a creature, but now they're almost entirely defensive (although obviously I'll still use them to attack if I have the opportunity).
The most recent change is bringing the number of Giadas up from two to four as I realised that you can cast a second Giada with one in play and the first Giada's ability will trigger, making the second one bigger before forcing you to pick which to keep. That and they kept getting killed too quickly, so I don't often find myself with a useless one stuck in my hand anyway.
I would previously have said that Liesa was the real star of this deck, and she is really cool, but after the last few tweaks I'm pretty happy with everything I've got in there and I'm not waiting for any one thing to come out to ensure victory. Aside from Drana and Linvala. They're decent, but I don't really seem to get many opportunities to use their ability-stealing ability and otherwise they're pretty unremarkable. Vigilance is nice, but it's not First Strike or Lifelink, is it?
Update (2023-07-12): I originally had Borrowed Time instead of Seal from Existence: it's basically the same thing. I also had Infernal Grasp instead of Hero's Downfall: I don't care about the loss of life, but the ability to kill Planeswalkers makes the slightly higher cost absolutely worth it.
Early Attempts
Capitalism | |
Lands & Spells | Creatures |
9 x Forest 4 x Thrill of Possibility | 2 x Adaptive Sporesinger |
2023-07-12: This was a second attempt to make at a red/green deck but it just didn't come together at all. Even after a few modifications it was still bad so I gave up on it. But I did end up sort of combining it with Hungry for Like the Wolf.
Brone! | ||
Creatures |
Spells |
Lands |
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4 x Bilious Skulldweller |
1 x Black Sun's Twilight |
1 The Autonomous Furnace |
2023-05-01: This was the first deck I made when I got back into Magic: the Gathering, and I tweaked it a little bit but you can see that it's very rough. I can't tell you why I was saving all my Wildcards, but I was, so I've only got one of some cards in there because that's all I had at the time, and there's not really an obvious focus or game-plan in evidence. It works, to a degree, but it's a mess. I really like those Morbid Opportunists though. Good card. And obviously I felt that four Shivan Devestators was an investment worth making.
Plus One |
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Lands & Spells |
Creatures |
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4 x Evolving Wilds 2 x Borrowed Time |
4 x Angelic Quartermaster |
2023-05-01: This was my second deck, created because I noticed a lot of +1/+1 counters getting passed around and thought "I can probably do something with that." Again, you can see that I hadn't bothered using many Wildcards, and there's a fair few "good enough" choices there, as well as some stuff that doesn't really fit but I thought seemed cool. Why Evolving Wilds in a monocolour deck? Because I figured it'd let me put in more land to make sure I had enough early on while removing two for the price of one so as to not draw too many later. Does it work? Sure. Is it worth the slowdown? No idea. It wasn't significant enough to be notiacable to me.
This deck was sort of a forerunner to It Don't Matter, as it was noticing that I had a few angels in here and that they seemed to be pretty good that inspired me to make the newer deck. I really liked Angelic Quartermaster, and I had it in It Don't Matter until I swapped it out for the Boon-Bringer Valkyries because they're just better.
Hungry |
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Lands & Spells |
Creatures |
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10 x Forest 2 x Howling Moon |
4 x Contortionist Troupe |
2023-05-01: My third deck was built almost entirely around one card: Packsong Pup. People were playing it against me and I wanted its power for myself. Then I found Contortionist Troupe and Halana and Alena and saw there was a bit of synergy there. The Shivan Devestators got thrown in because why not? And stuff like Iron Apprentice and And Howling Moon works well with the rest of it. It's not super focused and I'm sure I could improve it now if I wanted to, but it was pretty much the first solid deck I made since I got back into the game. Even spending Wildcards to grab the extra copies I needed.
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