The Community Deck Build Project v7.0

[3drinks]

Oh man, Mangara would be super sweet lines like activate Mangara and respond with Ephmerate --> Yannik to blink out Mangara. Or uhh, just any sac outlet. I think that's got a lot more mileage than a durdly five mv 2/2 tbh.

I think 3c can support a land based LD package, provided we don't go negative in lands. Demolition Field and Field of Ruin would fit the bill here.

Slime is actually deadlocked at 2-2 while leaning nay, but Toc hasn't committed to a vote. Plowshares of course is confirmed to the surprise of absolutely no one. That brings us to 3/14 interaction slotswith @RxPhantom and @Henlock on the clock.

[Henlock]

let"s bring Mangara of Corondor to the table.

[cheonice]

@cheonice are you interested in joining the activity? I will add you into the lineup if so.

That would be great! It was a stressful week, but I'm all in now

I feel like before playing slime, we should be on Knight of Autumn and/or Harmonic Sliver right? I just can't imagine being okay with paying five on my main phase to one for one something, and with that I think this needs a nay. Sorry slime 😕

Knight of Autumn sounds great, I really like the flexibility. Even the counters can do something for us.

[RxPhantom]

Yay to Mangara. Seems cool. I'll nominate Fiend Hunter because I'm sure we'll be able to abuse its blinking loophole.

[toctheyounger]

Yeah Mangara is a machine gun with the right tech. Yeah from me. I'm in for Fiend Hunter too.

[aliciaofthevast]

Mangara over the slime nomination? I'm with that, and the fiend hunter too since that's a combo piece, potentially!

[3drinks]

Mangara has been confirmed, and I'll toss the third yay to confirm fiend hunter too. That brings the removal slots up to 5/14 filled.

I need either @toctheyounger or @cheonice to offer the third yay/nay on acidic slime based on the conversations here so I can remove or add it once and for all.

For today, we'll put myself and newcomer cheonice on the clock. Since you're new, I recommend you read over the first page to know how the activity is done.

For my pick I'm gonna nominate Faceless Butcher to go alongside Fiend Hunter.

[cheonice]

Nay to Acidic Slime. While I played the crap out of it back in the day, this has aged terribly. At five mana it's overcosted.

I'll nominate Knight of Autumn instead. She's a Naturalize on a stick and might do some work for us with her other moves. The counters come in handy for some shenanigans. If we have a small blink theme, we can reset her or draw cards with her and even the lifegain might add up fast.

[3drinks]

Hmm. I think we need more discussion on the Knight of Autumn & Faceless Butcher reqs before the next nominations.

[aliciaofthevast]

Hmm. I mentioned knight of autumn before so obviously I like it. It doesn't split counters like Rishkar does but it's really well costed I think to do the thing it needs to do. I think it's an easy yay!

Faceless Butcher is tricky though. Four is not good for this effect even though it's a combo with the commander but I don't think being a combo is enough to justify it? This feels similar to the same apprehension we had towards acidic slime and that didn't end well for the slime...so I think I need to nay this!

[Dunharrow]

I would Yay slime because I think this deck wants reveillark and I think it makes it worthwhile
That being said, I think some of the other cards mentioned need to be included too.

Yay Swords

Yay faceless butcher and yay Knight of autumn. I like that Knight has potential for infinite lifegain in some situations.

[aliciaofthevast]

Yay, dunharrow is back!

[3drinks]

In honor of @Dunharrow being back, today we'll put them on the clock alongside @aliciaofthevast as we hit 6/14 interaction slots.

I would yay Knight of Autumn which makes three yays to bring it into the deck.

Faceless Butcher yay - 1 nay - 1

[Dunharrow]

Anguished Unmaking for me. Too good to pass up.

I was thinking about Retribution of the Ancients but I am not sure how viable it will be in our deck until we start looking at synergy pieces that give extra counters.

[aliciaofthevast]

We have a lot of three mana interaction, I think that's too heavy and we need to go lighter. For that reason I want to nay Anguished Unmaking.

I'm gonna put Path to Exile on deck! And I cannot believe how cheap that card has gotten, I remember when it was an $8 uncommon from Conflux......

[toctheyounger]

I'm gonna nay Unmaking. Wild, I know, but my experience with it is such that it's never, ever the card I want to cast. 3 mana is just too much even if the effect is excellent.

Path is an obvious yea.

I was thinking about Retribution of the Ancients but I am not sure how viable it will be in our deck until we start looking at synergy pieces that give extra counters.

Yeah, I was thinking on this too...@3drinks perhaps for the next build we could look at covering synergy pieces earlier in the piece? We usually start by speculating where we wanna go, we cover off interaction and stuff and it's all pretty stock standard, as good as some of these pieces are. Maybe that'd look a little different and we'd see a few more individualised options come through if we've got a deck's uniqueness fleshed out earlier in the process. Not saying that we're doing it wrong, just perhaps we could experiment next time around and see if we got some more inventive options in the build by covering different areas from the jump.

[3drinks]

I was thinking about Retribution of the Ancients but I am not sure how viable it will be in our deck until we start looking at synergy pieces that give extra counters.

Yeah, I was thinking on this too...@3drinks perhaps for the next build we could look at covering synergy pieces earlier in the piece? We usually start by speculating where we wanna go, we cover off interaction and stuff and it's all pretty stock standard, as good as some of these pieces are. Maybe that'd look a little different and we'd see a few more individualised options come through if we've got a deck's uniqueness fleshed out earlier in the process. Not saying that we're doing it wrong, just perhaps we could experiment next time around and see if we got some more inventive options in the build by covering different areas from the jump.

Re: Retribution of the Ancients. Doesn't this have anti synergy? Since we want counters on cards to draw cards on LTB, this would create friction against that no?

I have reservations towards the synergy stuff as first picks, namely that we risk going backwards with tons of synergy pieces but we forgot swords to plowshares, and similar, y'know? Presently if we can get the mechanical slots out of the way first, we ensure we always have a potent deck not lacking in ability. Now, if you can answer the question of how mitigate that without losing deck functionality, I am all ears. Any way to improve the activity is always going to be better than doing the same thing.

[toctheyounger]

I have reservations towards the synergy stuff as first picks, namely that we risk going backwards with tons of synergy pieces but we forgot swords to plowshares, and similar, y'know? Presently if we can get the mechanical slots out of the way first, we ensure we always have a potent deck not lacking in ability. Now, if you can answer the question of how mitigate that without losing deck functionality, I am all ears. Any way to improve the activity is always going to be better than doing the same thing.

Yeah I think both sides are valid; I'm all ears too, I don't have any outright suggestions that cover both sides of this. Perhaps we could bank a card each at the start of the build to come back to later? I don't know if that's really much different from the current though.

[Henlock]

I actually like the idea of Retribution of the Ancients, it gives us something else to do with our counters resources. Nikara cares about one counter, so any extra ones are not really adding to its effect.

I am yaying Butcher with the understanding we"re to exploit its wording.

I am also yaying path. If there"s a deck that can use it in own creatures, it is this one.

[RxPhantom]

I like Retribution too. We might as well use the counters for something.

Yay to Path. Yay to Anguished Unmaking, too. It's unreal to me that anyone would think it's overcosted. That does not compute for me.

Like @Henlock, I'm only yaying Faceless Butcher with the understanding that we'll be abusing the %$#% out of it.

[Dunharrow]

Yeah... not sure how anyone is saying Anguished Unmaking is overcosted. I get that Knight of Autumn has synergy but it is obviously a worse card.
Really surprising me all the reactions. Best 3 mana removal spells is too expensive, but 3 mana disenchant is an automatic yeah.

Re Retribution of the Ancients - it could be anti-synergistic, as 3Drinks says... but that's just it. Hard to say until we actually flesh out the deck. I guess it is not worth nominating in the interaction section and worth waiting until the meat+potatoes are added to the deck.

[3drinks]

Yay to Path. Yay to Anguished Unmaking, too. It's unreal to me that anyone would think it's overcosted. That does not compute for me.

I believe it's because three to remove one card isn't good enough. At least Beast Within|tsr/Generous Gift|h1r can hit anything unrestricted for the same cost. Vindicate|brc is the same cost (albeit slower, sure) with no drawback and also can hit anything. To say nothing of the myriad of cheaper alternatives, such as debatably the oft-overlooked Angelic Ascension. I'd imagine that puts Anguished Unmaking closer to the bottom of the list. All this for a $9 card when other (arguably) better or more efficient alternatives exist for less dollars.

So I guess the question is what are you most anticipating hitting with this, that you need this to hit because others won't hit it?

[toctheyounger]

I believe it's because three to remove one card isn't good enough

Pretty much yeah. Anytime I'm casting this, I'm almost certainly taking a turn off my own plan to do it. And the what if we have big mana thing is like if we have big mana we probably don't care as much anyway. Granted this gets pretty crushing with Eternal Witness to repeatedly cast it, but that doesn't change that it's 3 mana which is a lot to trade for holding that up or putting my plans on hold. Idk, maybe I'm overthinking it.

Fwiw I didn't yea Knight of Autumn. I'd much, much rather see Aura Shards in the deck than either. I'm happy with both, but Shards is a nom you can definitely expect from me moving forward.

[3drinks]

I'd have much more quickly yay'd shards, easy. Card is critically unfair and should be banned so I can stop losing to it

[RxPhantom]

Getting rid of any non-land permanent at instant speed is a great deal for three mana. Versatility ain't free.