Greven, Predator Captain - No Pain No Gain

[darrenhabib]

Hi darrenhabib,

Great little primer you have here. I have been using it as a reference for a battlecruiser Greven deck that I have put together for my meta. What do you think of the new 2021 Unleash Fury as an Instant add. Can be used to pump Greven or pump a sac creature for more card draw with only 2 mana.

Cheers,

Discombobulated

Hey. I've never been a fan of the double strike cards like Temur Battle Rage and Psychotic Fury that seem quite popular with Greven builds, but Unleash Fury definitely has a more appealing dynamic as you can use it to pump your sacrifice creatures alternatively and it also leads into better advantages that specifically use power like Essence Harvest.
I think I like it more in a build that uses slightly smaller creatures, like 3drinks list (posted within this thread) which uses creatures like Bloodghast, Squee, the Immortal, Bloodsoaked Champion for recursion.
The reason being that I feel like it can be overkill doubling say a 6 power creature to draw 12 cards, as you have to spend 1r precombat, which isn't nothing for this deck.
But if you are looking to use smallball creatures then doubling their power can be more helpful.

Any other cards you run in your deck that I don't? Always interested to see what peeps are playing.

[Ardeyn]

I started building this Commander recently - not in small part inspired by your great write-up.
One card that absolutely should be in here is Unexpected Fangs - instant speed, permanent(!) lifelink just checks all the boxes I believe.

Ardeyn

[Discombobulated]

Hey. I've never been a fan of the double strike cards like Temur Battle Rage and Psychotic Fury that seem quite popular with Greven builds, but Unleash Fury definitely has a more appealing dynamic as you can use it to pump your sacrifice creatures alternatively and it also leads into better advantages that specifically use power like Essence Harvest.
I think I like it more in a build that uses slightly smaller creatures, like 3drinks list (posted within this thread) which uses creatures like Bloodghast, Squee, the Immortal, Bloodsoaked Champion for recursion.
The reason being that I feel like it can be overkill doubling say a 6 power creature to draw 12 cards, as you have to spend 1r precombat, which isn't nothing for this deck.
But if you are looking to use smallball creatures then doubling their power can be more helpful.

Any other cards you run in your deck that I don't? Always interested to see what peeps are playing.

Yes, I get your point as to the mana and the overkill. I run some different cards but understand that this build is meta specific and with some agreed upon restrictions for more "Battlecruiser" style play. No high efficiency mana rocks like Mana Crypt and no Necropotence. We also limit tutors so I have room for more "filler" cards.

• K'rrik, Son of Yawgmoth - still not convinced this is worth the add but it checks a lot of the boxes

• Bedevil

• Vorrac Battlehorns

• Boon of Erebos

• Mayhem Devil

• Torpor Orb - My meta loves ETB's

• Dockside Extortionist - Just goes in pretty much all my red decks

• Anger

• Chandra's Ignition

• Unspeakable Symbol

• Tentative Connection - Just too much fun to use someone else's big hitter for the 1 mana

• Curse of Fool's Wisdom - still messing around with this one. Mostly for the discard madness cost and targeting myself

Cheers!

[darrenhabib]

I started building this Commander recently - not in small part inspired by your great write-up.
One card that absolutely should be in here is Unexpected Fangs - instant speed, permanent(!) lifelink just checks all the boxes I believe.

Ardeyn

Oh yeah that's just a straight upgrade to the 2 mana instant lifelinks. I'll play this over Grotesque Mutation.

[darrenhabib]

I run some different cards but understand that this build is meta specific and with some agreed upon restrictions for more "Battlecruiser" style play. No high efficiency mana rocks like Mana Crypt and no Necropotence. We also limit tutors so I have room for more "filler" cards.

• K'rrik, Son of Yawgmoth - still not convinced this is worth the add but it checks a lot of the boxes

• Bedevil

• Vorrac Battlehorns

• Boon of Erebos

• Mayhem Devil

• Torpor Orb - My meta loves ETB's

• Dockside Extortionist - Just goes in pretty much all my red decks

• Anger

• Chandra's Ignition

• Unspeakable Symbol

• Tentative Connection - Just too much fun to use someone else's big hitter for the 1 mana

• Curse of Fool's Wisdom - still messing around with this one. Mostly for the discard madness cost and targeting myself

Cheers!

Dockside Extortionist is a must. Silly me.

I want to try Boon of Erebos as well.

Add

• Unexpected Fangs
• Boon of Erebos
• Dockside Extortionist

Remove

• Grotesque Mutation
• Vampiric Link
• Netherborn Altar

[Flipthecoin]

Is it just me or wouldn't the new Demonic Embrace be amazing for this deck? Gives Greven even more evasion, makes him significantly bigger with +3/+1 ( not mentioning the life loss of 3 if you play it from the graveyard which makes it a +6/+1), so he then can hit like an absolute train.

The +3/+1 also meshes well and goes along nicely with the theme of " make creatures top heavy and light on the back for some value when needed" which is amazing early if you toss it on an insignificant creature that you want to sack regardless but don't necessarily want to hurt yourself just yet.

I know its 3 mana, it's not the cheapest to cast but I feel like the fact that you get to replay it again and again even late game from the yard makes it more than worth it for this card to have a slot in this deck.

I know I'll be personaly adding it to my Greven deck haha

Cheers !

[Flipthecoin]

And it fits with Greven throwing fools off the Predator ship too haha,
They get sacrificed and they need to go through their demonic embrace for the cause! Lol
Sorry for the thread spam, just thought about the card being nice flavor wise too and wanted to share.

[darrenhabib]

And it fits with Greven throwing fools off the Predator ship too haha,
They get sacrificed and they need to go through their demonic embrace for the cause! Lol
Sorry for the thread spam, just thought about the card being nice flavor wise too and wanted to share.

I will say that it is full of flavor. But I'm personally not sold on the overall interaction being quite good enough.

We already have similar card in Sleeper's Guile and I have looked at Aphotic Wisps as a possibility in the past as well.
I'm just not personally heavy on the evasion part. As you can see I prioritize the card draw first and foremost and spending 1bb precombat is going to be difficult most games in my opinion.
Plus Auras are notorious for getting 2-for-1 and even though you can cast it from graveyard you do need to discard a card so it does cost a resource.
The stats bonus isn't a big deal either in the overall way that you can get Grevan's power high either.

Maybe in a more reanimation style build where the discard is way more important. So a deck that runs Animate Dead, Dance of the Dead, Necromancy.

[Artemis132]

So how would you rank Undying Evil , Boon of Erebos and Supernatural Stamina as protection spells for Greven?

And do you think the total number of lifelink-granting cards is high enough to cut a permanent lifelink card in Vampiric Link ? I mean I can understand that you prefer instant speed to draw into of sacrificing, but its also quite efficient for just 1 mana and the possible double lifegain is nice!

How did Abrade work out? Have you ever thought about Keldon Vandals ?

[darrenhabib]

So how would you rank Undying Evil, Boon of Erebos and Supernatural Stamina as protection spells for Greven?

And do you think the total number of lifelink-granting cards is high enough to cut a permanent lifelink card in Vampiric Link ? I mean I can understand that you prefer instant speed to draw into of sacrificing, but its also quite efficient for just 1 mana and the possible double lifegain is nice!

How did Abrade work out? Have you ever thought about Keldon Vandals ?

Obviously the Undying Evil and Supernatural Stamina are better than Boon of Erebos as Boon doesn't save you from Damnation, Wrath of God, Toxic Deluge type effects. Technically Supernatural Stamina is the best as it avoids the -1/-1 counter of Undying Evil and my guess is coming into play tapped or untapped is not the most important.
So yeah I should definitely play Supernatural Stamina over Boon of Erebos.

I do think there are enough lifelink cards at instant speed that you can look to cut Vampiric Link as it is can come a bit late to the party if you draw it in your attack sequence. Sure its can be ongoing unlike the others, but often its that case of you might have a way to deal lethal damage and really you want to draw into that instant speed lifelink so that you can tie it all together by taking the lifeloss without putting yourself at deaths door.

Abrade I feel is just a necessary card in more competitive games where you need a little interaction. I'm talking about when a Stax card hits the table.
Yeah there is so much scope for meta plays with creatures like Keldon Vandals.

Also I want to try out Gadrak, the Crown-Scourge as another efficient creature to sacrifice and the treasures could come in handy if I was to keep it around and sac other creatures each turn. Worth a go anyway. Gosh cutting cards is hard, but Ball Lightning is 3 red which does come up sometimes as hard to cast.

I'm cutting Living Death as well as the creatures are not the most versatile as continuous onboard presences (think Lightning Skelemental, Rotting Regisaur, Phyrexian Soulgorger), so getting back a bunch all at once isn't always the best.
Plus I don't actually have targeted graveyard removal if opponents have built up their own graveyards, which has made it sticky to want to cast it as removal.

Add

• Supernatural Stamina
• Keldon Vandals
• Gadrak, the Crown-Scourge
• Graven Cairns

Remove

• Boon of Erebos
• Ball Lightning
• Living Death
• Tomb of Urami

[TheAmericanSpirit]

Howdy, what are your thoughts on Tentative Connection? For one mana, Greven gets to eat take out instead of having to microwave his 6/1 lean cuisine at home. It can also give Greven itself haste in a dire moment.

[darrenhabib]

Howdy, what are your thoughts on Tentative Connection? For one mana, Greven gets to eat take out instead of having to microwave his 6/1 lean cuisine at home. It can also give Greven itself haste in a dire moment.

Actually I've been playing with a few major configuration differences over the last week just so that I feel like I've really explored potentials.

I decided to try and go with more of a reanimation build. with the idea that instead of trying to protect Grevan on the board so much with cards like Lightning Greaves, Swiftfoot Boots, Kaya's Ghostform. Supernatural Stamina that you just expect him to go to the graveyard and then use the enchantments like Animate Dead, Dance of the Dead, Necromancy instead to get him back into play. This way you can also use the reanimate spells on creatures that have gone to your graveyard for access and mana efficiency.

Further to this I've really been trying different creatures for the overall theme. I've been playing more utility creatures, rather than focusing on super mana efficient to power ratios. I've been trying more versatile value creatures that provide value more often on their own, which means that you have more plays without Greven potentially. But you are still fine with sacrificing them to Greven for the draw. But you are likely to be 3 or 4 cards less on those draw. I figure that often I am discarding cards at end of turn so a few cards less is still a winning plan.
I won't post the changes I've been trying specifically yet, as I'll want to explain it in more detail. But anyway I thought I'd mention it because as part of the changes I don't have the Lightning Greaves and Swiftfoot Boots anymore and this means that the only haste enabler in the deck is Hall of the Bandit Lord. I did play a game where I would have wanted to have haste enabler during a single turn. So I had a tutor but realized I didn't actually anything as Hall of the Bandit Lord comes into play tapped meaning you have to wait a turn.
I didn't even think about the haste enabling with Tentative Connection so I could see it being useful as a sliver bullet for that situation as well as a way to kill a threat on the opponents board.

[rogerandover]

Obviously the Undying Evil and Supernatural Stamina are better than Boon of Erebos as Boon doesn't save you from Damnation, Wrath of God, Toxic Deluge type effects. Technically Supernatural Stamina is the best as it avoids the -1/-1 counter of Undying Evil and my guess is coming into play tapped or untapped is not the most important.
So yeah I should definitely play Supernatural Stamina over Boon of Erebos.

Unless I overlooked something with counters, I just want to point out, that Undying Evil puts a +1/+1 counter on said creature, not a -1/-1.

[TheAmericanSpirit]

@darrenhabib It's really not bad for a common. Alternatively, Act of Aggression kills a tidy amount of birds with a stone.

Edit: the act is also an instant, if that's ever relevant in your games.
Edit 2: I do look forward to your report on the recent changes too. I love a good Darren essay, they're such good bathroom reading. I've got your underworld breach thread favorited on my phone's browser.

[Ardeyn]

So, I got to play my adaptation of Greven this past week and I thought I'd share some of my experiences:
The first game was just absurd. I played against Alela, Artful Provocateur and Lazav, Dimir Mastermind and got out a Turn 1 Greven courtesy of Mana Crypt, Dark Ritual and Shadowblood Ridge. Second turn I lost the Crypt flip, played a land, Hex Parasite and Unexpected Fangs to kill the Alela player and gain a bunch of life back. Lazav scooped subsequently.
I really like the Ridge and its counterparts for filtering colorless mana. Any reason you don't run it in your list, darrenhabib?
The second game against the same opponents I lost to an unfortunate Chaos Warp which revealed a Blightsteel Colossus that I had neither an answer nor blockers for. *sigh* Well, sometimes random stuff just backfires, I guess. Still, it was a good game going back and forth between the three of us, with Vindictive Lich being my MVP.
The third game was against Bruse Tarl, Boorish Herder & Akiri, Line-Slinger and a rather tame version of Kinnan, Bonder Prodigy. I managed to take out Bruse & Akiri with a Tainted Strike after removing one blocker with Dismember while keeping Kinnan in check with my Corpse Danceing Flametongue Kavu.
All in all, the deck was a total blast to play and I'm looking forward to some more games.

Do you have an update on your list, darrenhabib? I'm curious to see where you are at now, since you said you'd move from protection to Reanimation more.

Thanks for the great resource you provide here.

Ardeyn

[darrenhabib]

Do you have an update on your list, darrenhabib? I'm curious to see where you are at now, since you said you'd move from protection to Reanimation more.

Hey, yes I wanted to update the original post to reflect more of a slightly different approach as had a lot of old card references so just needed to take a bit of time on that first before posting.

Basically I've reduced the number of high power creatures to more low-mid range utility creatures. The reason is that it was the case that more often than not you are just discarding due to hand size not being able to cast cards post combat, and well I didn't even have a much of a reanimation theme either to really make use of that.
So you'll find 2-4 mana creatures that can give you additional draw or resilience (or whatever) outside of Greven.

I've also moved away from trying to protect Greven so much and just relent that if removed then hopefully use reanimation cards like Animate Dead, Dance of the Dead, Necromancy to bring him back.
So rather than protection like Kaya's Ghostform, the reanimate cards are used instead. They obviously are not as good against exile effects like Swords to Plowshares and the like, but they serve a duel purpose of using them on your other creatures for mana efficient ways to get creatures into play as well.
I also removed the protection equipment for the reason of just favoring reanimating Greven instead. It's quite a big shift in approach, but one that I think I'm enjoying a bit more success with.

So yeah as you can see I have some additional draw creatures in Dark Confidant, Mindblade Render, Azra Oddsmaker. They have been great.
Treasure Nabber causing havok and generating mana potentially.
Rekindling Phoenix has been brought back into the fold for its reusability.
Doom Whisperer large chunga, nuff said.

Gamble is a little better with (potentially) discarding a creature to bring back with reanimation. Playing this instead of Imperial Seal really so that this build might be a little bit more accessible to players. This might seem a little bit of a token effort given the deck does require Mana Vault, Grim Monolith, Mana Crypt, etc to fire on all cylinders, but hey at least shaving off some hundreds of dollars for not much of a change is good.

I've been really enjoying Tentative Connection recommended not that long ago. It has done some good work for sure. It does make me think about other steal effects. Kari Zev's Expertise is definitely on my radar now.

Fury of the Horde has been great in the past, but now that I'm not drawing as many cards and the red card count is down it's much harder to get online. So that is one downside of removing the big draw creatures is that Fury is no longer as good.

Add

• Animate Dead
• Dance of the Dead
• Necromancy
• Living Death
• Dark Confidant
• Mindblade Render
• Azra Oddsmaker
• Anger
• Treasure Nabber
• Rekindling Phoenix
• Doom Whisperer
• Tentative Connection
• Gamble
• Cabal Ritual
• Castle Locthwain

Remove

• Lightning Skelemental
• Mijae Djinn
• Keldon Vandals
• Slumbering Dragon
• Malignus
• Lightning Greaves
• Swiftfoot Boots
• Unexpected Fangs
• Kaya's Ghostform
• Supernatural Stamina
• Fury of the Horde
• Phyrexian Reclamation
• Imperial Seal
• Abrade
• Wasteland

[rofldiekatz]

Hey darrenhabib,
awesome Primer!
How did the testing with steal effects go for you? What's your opinion on Grab the Reins and Act of Aggression ?
Grab the Reins has the option to Fling while Act of Aggression allows for some extra life loss if needed. Both are Instants.
Keep up the great work!

[darrenhabib]

Hey darrenhabib,
awesome Primer!
How did the testing with steal effects go for you? What's your opinion on Grab the Reins and Act of Aggression ?
Grab the Reins has the option to Fling while Act of Aggression allows for some extra life loss if needed. Both are Instants.
Keep up the great work!

Thanks. The Tentative Connection has been really good, allowing for some basically game winning tempo swings. If I was to play another one it would be Act of Aggression mainly because of its instant speed. I could see even drawing into it with Greven ability to then take an opponent off a second blocker as a play assuming you can attack for lethal.
The only reason I haven't played it yet (Act of Aggression) over say a creature is that the creature count ratio is very tight when it comes to having that first sacrifice, and I'm worried that I'll tempo myself out of consistent targets.
If the only option available to you is Act of Aggression and the best stats wise opponents creature is a 2/2 for example, then you'll fail to draw into more creature sacrificing potentially.

[darrenhabib]

Greven got some easy to slot in and amazing cards from Zendikar Rising.

Of the cards that are either spells or lands, Agadeem's Awakening and Shatterskull Smashing are easy to include as both secondary spells that can provide use throughout games, that simply replace other lands.
Shatterskull Smashing killing off a blocker or two to push through lethal.
Agadeem's Awakening can be used later on in the game to bring back a number of creatures. The deck has a nice range between 2-6 cmc, so you could easily cast it for say 5bbb and bring 4 creatures back from the graveyard. You also can lose life with them as lands. Perfect.

Feed the Swarm is a much welcome card to Rakdos color-pie in giving more ways to get rid of enchantments. It also can kill a creature and the loss in life..hey no pain, no gain.

Now I've removed cards that return Greven to play after removal in the past with Kaya's Ghostform, Supernatural Stamina, Boon of Erebos, Butcher's Glee, Undying Evil.
It wasn't because they were not good cards, it's just that I shifted to reanimation cards like Animate Dead as ways to get back Greven (and others) instead of instant speed recursion.
We have a new one in Malakir Rebirth but this time it can also be a tapped land. Tapped lands are not exactly where you want to be with Greven, but being such a versatile cards I feel like makes this card worth it. Do I replace a land or a spell? The land count currently of 35 is to make sure you have early land drops, as later on in the game you draw so many cards that land drops are not an issue. So I feel like replacing a land will be fine for how the deck works in general.

Moraug, Fury of Akoum has the potential to be a powerhouse in this deck. Any additional attacks can lead to knocking off another opponent easily.
6 mana is obviously a lot and then you really don't want it to be a creature you sacrifice for the draw however. But we do have reanimation spells like Reanimate to cheat a creature like this into play as well as Sneak Attack. So I definitely want to at least give Moraug a whirl in this deck.

Kargan Intimidator can give Greven trample, can make a creature unable to block and can also give it 4 power for sacrifice card draw. Between the unable to block and trample, it basically means that opponents will struggle to defend against your attacks.
It also adds a bit to the Mindblade Render and Azra Oddsmaker.

Other cards that interested me for Greven are Kazuul's Fury as another tapped land that can be a Fling as well. However I don't like the concept of sacrificing Greven for any reason, and I don't want another tapped land.
Song-Mad Treachery is another spell/land card that has some synergy with Greven if you steal a creature and sacrifice. Same as above don't want another tapped land unfortunately.

If there were more instants and sorcery in the deck then Magmatic Channeler would be great as it could have 4 power for 2 mana, and it also has card advantage ability which exactly what this deck loves. There are 22 instant and sorcery in the deck so perhaps it's close as you can discard a lot of them at end of turn to fill your graveyard.

Add

• Feed the Swarm
• Kargan Intimidator
• Moraug, Fury of Akoum
• Malakir Rebirth
• Agadeem's Awakening
• Shatterskull Smashing

Remove

• Lupine Prototype
• Phyrexian Soulgorger
• Cabal Pit
• Canyon Slough
• Mountain
• Mountain

[rofldiekatz]

Hey, I found Filth to be a little inconsistent. Have you considerer Outmaneuver or Trailblazer's Boots instead of it?

[darrenhabib]

Hey, I found Filth to be a little inconsistent. Have you considerer Outmaneuver or Trailblazer's Boots instead of it?

I haven't looked at once off unblockable effects at all for the deck, so Outmaneuver is new to me.
I really think you want continuous effects where possible however.

Vorrac Battlehorns is technically cheaper than Trailblazer's Boots and the rare case where opponent has all basics.

I'm of the mind with the deck that I want to play creatures where possible for roles, as they line up better with sacrifice to Greven, reanimation cards (Reanimate, Living Death, etc), Sneak Attack and a few other creature matters cards.
So Sonorous Howlbonder or Archetype of Aggression are viable creature options for "evasion".

I used to play Whispersilk Cloak as an unblockable equipment but shied away from it and Lightning Greaves as I couldn't target lifelink cards once equipped.
I also used to play Loxodon Warhammer but just found it too expensive to play and then equip.

There are definitely inconsistencies with Filth being effective all games, but I find that because it costs you nothing to discard it due to hand size its upside to play is worth it across games.
One thing I should do is since I've added Animate Dead, Dance of the Dead, Necromancy I really should be playing Faithless Looting, and this will help with putting Anger and/or Filth into the graveyard early.

Add

• Faithless Looting

Remove

• Cabal Ritual

[LexanduR_]

I learnt quite a few things in this thread, and I wanted to share a couple of my thoughts with you.

Isn't Relic Golem better than something like Gadrak, the Crown-Scourge or Phyrexian Soulgorger? the 8 cards is a bit troublesome in the early stages of the game, but the activate ability is relevant when people try to use the 1 mana tutors or we could just mill ourselves if we run the reanimation package. Unlike the Soulgorger, it can sit there until we attack with Greven.

I run Goblin Engineer in most of my heavy artifact/mana rock decks, and it seams bonkers in this kind of decks. You could fetch equipments or the op mana rocks.
Or we could even fetch the artifact creatures and reuse them over and over again.
Chrome Mox becomes relevant even more with this goblin.
I could also tutor up for something like a Noxious Gearhulk, then we reanimate it the hard way.

I also use a heavier mana rocks list, since Greven always gets removed/counter the first 2 times I get it into play. So, I play Manifold Key but I haven't tested it yet, unlike the Engineer that I was quite happy with my testing.

[darrenhabib]

Isn't Relic Golem better than something like Gadrak, the Crown-Scourge or Phyrexian Soulgorger? the 8 cards is a bit troublesome in the early stages of the game, but the activate ability is relevant when people try to use the 1 mana tutors or we could just mill ourselves if we run the reanimation package. Unlike the Soulgorger, it can sit there until we attack with Greven.

I have removed Phyrexian Soulgorger and Lupine Prototype recently if you check out the post maybe a couple above these ones.
Probably still have a lingering reference in the primer, it's hard to maintain I've kind of over extended myself on online threads.

I hadn't registered Relic Golem at all during my reviews of Zendikar Rising and certainly is a top tier as far as cost-to-power ratio. The mill with reanimation is synergy as well.
I do think Gadrak, the Crown-Scourge is great. Any treasures can help towards goals.

I run Goblin Engineer in most of my heavy artifact/mana rock decks, and it seams bonkers in this kind of decks. You could fetch equipments or the op mana rocks.
Or we could even fetch the artifact creatures and reuse them over and over again.
Chrome Mox becomes relevant even more with this goblin.
I could also tutor up for something like a Noxious Gearhulk, then we reanimate it the hard way.

I also use a heavier mana rocks list, since Greven always gets removed/counter the first 2 times I get it into play. So, I play Manifold Key but I haven't tested it yet, unlike the Engineer that I was quite happy with my testing.

I am a fan of Goblin Engineer in quite a few decks. Yeah I'd need to put in at least Relic Golem as a further target for it.
I'll try Goblin Engineer and Relic Golem but have no idea what I'd replace at the moment.

Not sure what you mean by tutor up Noxious Gearhulk as its 6 cmc?

What other mana rocks do you run?

[LexanduR_]

Goblin Engineer tutors up for any artifact, but it can only reanimate 3cmc ones.

I'm running Mind Stone, Coalition Relic, Commander's Sphere, Hedron Archive and Thran Dynamo. But I don't own a Mox Diamond nor Grim Monolith yet, so I guess I could replace the dynamo and hedron for them as soon as they get reprinted or I get a good trade for them. [I know they are in the reserved list, but nothing is set in stone]

When I try the reanimate cards or the theft effects, they always felt not good enough or I would get too many of them with no targets. So, I'm trying more looting effects to sculpt my hand better, this also could happen with anything (lands, removal, too many lifeloss cards). Like Tormenting Voice and Thrill of Possibility.

But that is how I'm trying to adapt to my meta, perhaps I could build it with less rocks and let Greven go to the yard and reanimate it. I'm always scared to let him go and get my reanimates countered [I know, countering them would show a sign of terrible misplay, but you can't underestimate the bad plays/spite moves from your group! ]

I love the idea of using the spells/land cards from Zendikar, they are quite decent in most Greven's builds.

[LexanduR_]

Do we care about hosing other peoples searches?
The Wheel of Misfortune looks ok? I don't know what to think of it