RowanKeltizar wrote: ↑3 years ago
Do you feel it's more important to run the recursion and etb effects and skip
Torpor Orb and
Grafdigger's Cage ? I notice that's one thing you changed with your decklist.
In terms of removal and card advantage I sort of decided to steer the deck toward the stax effects instead. I had a lot of these suggestions in here already but I found them to be pretty inconsistent and not really that synergistic with Atraxa herself. Generally, I would like to lean more on Atraxa's inherent strengths including her proliferate effect and less artifact "goodstuff"
I took out cards like
Sharuum the Hegemon and
Silas Renn, Seeker Adept just because I never wanted to be in the situation of having
Grafdigger's Cage in play and these in my hand. I feel that Cage does more for me overall because it completely shuts down a lot of decks. I've really struggled to be relevant with this deck in my playgroup.
I also took out most of the ETBs including
Noxious Gearhulk and
Verdurous Gearhulk because I'm running
Torpor Orb .
I had the capsules in here originally because they work pretty well with the artifact recursion, but took those out when the recursion came out.
I definitely want to steer away from some of the higher cmc spells like
Magister Sphinx I just think in a stax list where I am running things like Winter Orb, Tangle Wire, etc... that will be problematic.
Sculpting Steel is already in the deck currently.
Armix, Filigree Thrasher is actually already in the list, I just forgot to add him to the OP. Good card!
I think I am leaning more toward a voltron strategy with Atraxa where I suit her up with equipment and protect her with the stax cards. There are a lot of equipment that give +1/+1 counters over time.
Fractal Harness I think could be an example of the direction I am trying to go. It just sits on the field and makes Atraxa more and more of a threat very quickly.
Having played Stax and played against it frequently, I can tell you that the worst weakness of any Stax strategy is not having a continual supply of cards or ways to leverage your advantages. The reason I added in more Card Advantage effects to that list is because you want to get as many
layers of Stax as possible. The more layers you have, the tighter the prison becomes and the more time you'll get to swing with Atraxa. So while I appreciate your purity of intent with going all-in on Stax, I recommend that you do not neglect the Card Advantage/Draw element to your deck.
Sure, the card advantage pieces don't have synergy with Atraxa;
neither do the Stax pieces (except Tangle Wire). Stax buys you time and proactively shuts off certain strategies or card interactions, which indirectly limits your opponent's Card Advantage capabilities. In that window where your opponents are trying to break out of your first layer of Stax, you NEED to be digging into either more Stax pieces so you can layer the prison OR you need to be using that time to increase your Card or Board advantage.
I personally wouldn't choose to exclude certain cards from your list simply because they have non-synergies with Stax pieces ie: cutting the Gearhulks because you're running
Torpor Orb or cutting any recursion elements because you're playing
Grafdigger's Cage. You only have a few tutor effects in the deck, so the chances that you'll naturally draw into these kinds of situations and have that non-beneficial interaction will be slim (unless you tutor for the Orb EVERY game). Yeah, it feels bad when it happens but that's the compromise you make by staying Artifact-only imo.
I say this next part kindly. Your deck, as a whole, is going to always be less consistent or powerful relative to the other decks you're playing against because of your determination to stay completely Artifact-based. I respect it, but I wouldn't worry too much about your deck being optimized or competing at a high level because you're purposefully cutting off the best advantages your colors offer. This isn't a condemnation of your deck's intent but more of an honest realization that if you want the deck to compete more effectively you're either going to need to tweak the deck or relax your standards so you can include some tutor effects at the minimum. It sounds like there are certain Stax pieces that are consistently back-breaking for your opponents, so why not find those particular cards every game? This means you want more tutors in the deck, but you're limited in tutors because of your Artifact restriction.
I can see why you would want to cut Sharuum and Silas Renn, based on your reasoning. The recursion in the deck is meant to be sand-bagged so that you can recur the Stax pieces that die. Cutting any recursion leaves your Stax plan as a one-dimensional strategy that your opponents can disrupt once they start banding together and targeting your Stax pieces (which WILL happen). Recursion is how you build resiliency for the archenemy strategy Stax is, and I think you'd be remiss in not including at least a few elements of recursion.
Yeah, I can see that cutting the high CMC cards as beneficial.
Going with a Voltron strategy in concert with Stax is a solid strategy and is the same exact strategy I employ with my own Kaalia list. The core concept of Kaalia Stax is to build your Prison and in the window of opportunity those Stax pieces create I deploy Kaalia and use her trigger to bypass the Stax and kill all the people. I've personally found that recursion for the Stax pieces isn't as necessary because Kaalia and her Horde can end the game so quickly. Atraxa simply can't, so you need more Card Advantage and recursion to make sure your deck stays relevant and powerful for as long as possible and fully exploit the window of opportunity Stax creates.
RowanKeltizar wrote: ↑3 years ago
Btw, perhaps
Iron Maiden could replace
Black Vise in here as a hand hate card. It's a black vise for the whole table!
Also what are your thoughts on
Blinkmoth Urn ?
Also... just remembered that
Metalworker actually isn't banned in this format. Should probably be in here.
If you want to ping people to death with
Iron Maiden, I say go for it! You need ways to convert your Stax advantage into a win and the Maiden definitely does that by attacking people's life totals directly.
Yeah,
Metalworker would be great in here!
Blinkmoth Urn can also be a powerful accelerant for the deck. My concern is, given your desire to keep the deck Artifact only and Stax/Voltron oriented, that you'll have the Urn, dump your hand with its mana, and then have nothing to do with the mana it will produce as you stay in top-deck mode.
As I mentioned above, a Stax deck needs some way to break the parity of its own Stax pieces so that it can leverage the time those Stax pieces create. Yisan can tutor creatures directly to play, generating Card Advantage that way. Brago flickers Card Advantage permanents, digging deeper into its deck that way. Grand Arbiter can play more Card Advantage effects BECAUSE its Commander is a Stax piece. Kaalia outrageously cheats mana costs for powerful cards with powerful effects regardless of what Stax pieces are in play. Atraxa doesn't create Card Advantage on her own, so that means you need to supplement your deck strategy in the 99 to support your core strategy since your Commander doesn't.
Welp, now that I feel like I've beaten that topic to death (I spared the horse!), I hope you found this useful!