Theorycrafting! (Because I like competitive metagames too much)

[metroid composite]

Thinking on it, I really do want Vault of the Archangel, just to have something permanent that grants deathtouch.  Ready//Willing is fine and all, but "surprise combat trick: some of your stuff dies one time" is kinda what the card already did....  In fact, if I want to get use out of the pinging, I need to cast it before blockers are even declared.  Whereas with Vault, it's repeated creature kill.

Alright, so now that we know M14 isn't providing deathtouch...

Cautery Sliver/Acidic Sliver: out, probably
Hunter Sliver: think this is in; can use the "combat damage destroys" sliver
Quilled Sliver: Still maybe.  ...they'll see the deathtouch land on the table and know not to attack or block
Root Sliver: Sure, in.
Regenerating slivers like Sedge and Clot: maybe
Toxin Sliver: in
Chameleon Colossus: Kinda want this in just because every once in a while this deck seems like it will make a bunch of tokens that can all tap for mana.

And...thinking I want some kind of less expensive evasion to tutor for, just in case I want to be like "surprise you can't block my commander".  One mana is sadly out.  At two mana there's Winged Sliver and Two Headed Sliver.  Thinking Winged.  Among other things, if the one flying card in the deck gets exiled or something, I don't just lose to flyers.

So...that's five cards I've shifted to in status.  Ready//Willing is a sixth.  That leaves about 4ish slots I think.  I'm fine with filling that with muscle/megagigantic and calling it a day.  Or maybe swap one of those muscles out for two-headed or quilled just for variety.

[SnowFire]

Going back to the extremely-large-but-not-infinite combo shenanigans, M14 offers Path of Bravery to add an extra layer at the end, I think. 
http://gatherer.wizards.com/Pages/Card/Details.aspx?multiverseid=370798

I don't think this is actually better than just using more critters that can't target themselves for the chain, though.  Maybe worth a footnote or something?

[metroid composite]

Going back to the extremely-large-but-not-infinite combo shenanigans, M14 offers Path of Bravery to add an extra layer at the end, I think. 
http://gatherer.wizards.com/Pages/Card/Details.aspx?multiverseid=370798

I don't think this is actually better than just using more critters that can't target themselves for the chain, though.  Maybe worth a footnote or something?

At this point, we're more limited by the 60 card restriction.

Path of Bravery...you get to put X of them into play before you attack thanks to doubling season, and then you attack and get X triggers.  But these triggers don't scale between each one (without Boon Reflection) so it's 1 layer for 1 card.  1 layer for 1 card is not actually worth a deck slot.

The one that caught everybody's eye, of course, is Stronic Resonator, but last I checked nobody could think of a good way to use it without it going infinite:

http://gatherer.wizards.com/Pages/Card/Details.aspx?multiverseid=370670

[metroid composite]

Starjeweled

So...a measure that people use in the community of how much energy you're producing is Energy per Minute, which is really just manually take the game time, and divide your energy at the end.  Shorthanded as EPM.  But because this is all done manually, and because there tends to be variation from game to game, I'm starting to think that there may be misreporting going on.

Historically, the thinking went as follows:

Bots: 4k-5k EPM

Best human players out there: 3k-3.5k EPM

Good human players 2.5k EPM



The recent evidence I've looked at seems to contradict that.  At least for an average non-lucky game, that lasts for a few minutes so that random variance doesn't do weird things, and where spells are being used.

So...going back in time to take a look at plex in a longish game:

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=I3MTb9fSWeE

11:49 game length, 30480 energy.  Total EPM: 2580.


So like bots.  Dr Ribosome is the most famous one, and certainly has a famous youtube video with ridiculously high energy, but also some videos with less impressive energy:

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Owc2W2DZaH0

8490 energy, 2:42 game length.  Total EPM: 3145.
(Also: celebrity appearance by Grrr in this video)
Granted, this is not the best version of the bot; the best version plays like a chess engine and thinks several moves ahead.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=7_hDoXoPrl4

2:27 game length.  10380 energy.  Total EPM: 4237


So...the finals of the recent tournament; Kira vs Jeremy.  Funnily enough, none of the players that have historically been classified as nigh unbeatable (Luke, Crush, Xat, Plex in his prime)

http://www.seroskal.com/tourny-may.html

5:26 game length.  Both had around 15800 energy.  Total EPM: 2900



Which is really interesting; it implies to me that instead of "starjeweled used to have an elite who could reach 3k every game" that starjeweled players as a group have actually been getting better over time, even when some of the individual stronger players have ducked out.

Just to be sure I checked an old replay I had stored on my computer of plex.  This was from around...oh, Sept 2011 or so.

4:34 game length.  11130 energy.  Total EPM: 2440

You know, when plex came back briefly, I concluded he was rusty.  But upon further reflection, actually no, he hadn't dipped significantly.



So basically:
Bots are slower than most people seem to think they are.
The community now seems to be more talented than it used to be, even if most of the former "top players" have left.

[DjinnAndTonic]

Can we request a metroid in depth look at meta gaming? Cause I've been getting hyped about Smash Bros again and I like some of the things about its meta game, but Smash Bros fans are terrible. I'd prefer to listen to a more focused metroid examination of it. Of course if you're busy, I understand, just putting it out there that there's some interest in it.

[Captain K.]

Did you watch EVO Djinn?  They brought back Melee as a main event.  While a Fox won the whole thing, second was Ice Climbers (due almost entirely to their infinite), and third was a Jigglypuff.  The former best player in the world also had an excellent Peach in the top 8.

[metroid composite]

It should be noted that I don't acutally understand Melee on a numerical level like some people do, so I'm the wrong person to do a metagame analysis.

I can tell you that Armada (the peach player) was completely dominant, literally hadn't been in a loser's bracket in two years.  He then "retired" at the end of 2012, but still showed up to EVO despite being in not particularly great shape.  Before Armada's dominance, Jigglypuff was absolutely oppressive, and some people argued ruining the tournament scene.  (Jigglypuff vs Jigglypuff made for pretty much the worst grand finals ever to watch).

Lower tier characters have been rising in prominence, for the following reason: smash has a mechanic called DI (directional influence) where the direction you hold on the control stick influences your position in the air.  If you know all your opponent's character's combos, with good DI and perfect timing, you won't get comboed.  Now, a lot of the low tier characters are low tier because they don't have many combos, but now that so many players are becoming fantastic at DI, high tier characters don't really combo.  So, for instance, major matches (like winners finals) have been stuff like...

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ltK9sfN2xUE
Mewtwo vs Peach

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=0osuNxURlzE
Ness vs Young Link
(Armada couldn't beat Hungrybox's Jigglypuff, so he started counterpicking Young Link, and then Hungrybox counterpicked his counterpick with Ness).

And of course, there are pretty good players who are arguably top 10 in the world and main unusual characters (Shroomed with Dr Mario, Axe with Pikachu, Wobbles and Chu Dat with Ice Climbers).

This is on top of the usual Fox/Falco/Marth/Shiek/Jigglypuff/Peach you tend to see in top 8.  I guess Captain Falcon has dropped off a little in top 8 results (well...Hax sometimes makes top 8 with CF).

[metroid composite]

So like...starcraft 2.

As a review, when you 6-pool rush your opponent, generally you get to make drones back up to 7, and then save up to make six lings when the pool finishes, and then you're at 10/10 supply, and need to either make an overlord, or do an extractor trick for an extra set of lings.

Tonight, I accidentally did a 7 pool, and had it work out very nicely for me--something like 5 seconds slower than the 6 pool, had 8 drones and an overlord, and made 6 lings.  This is a pretty monumental step up--one more drone, AND an overlord to allow for nonstop ling production.  This was a little surprising--was one extra drone really mining 100 extra minerals?  Now, i had also been stacking my drones, so I wondered also if that could be it.

And the answer is...spawning pool takes 65 seconds to make; drones generally collect 40-45 resources per minute.  So...yes, at a glance I think mineral stacking does actually enable a build here that otherwise wouldn't really work.

[metroid composite]

Ok, decided to do some formal testing to see exactly how much you get from the 7 pool compared to the 6 pool.

6 pool:

41 s Pool
1:46 lings

44 s pool
1:49 lings

40 s pool
1:46 lings

40 s pool
1:46 lings

40 s pool
1:46 lings


7 Pool

51 s Pool
1:56 lings

49 s pool
1:54 s lings
(5th/6th ling at 1:57 due to supply block)


47 s pool
1:53 lings
(5th/6th ling at 1:59 due to supply block)

48 S pool
1:53 lings
(supply blocked, though)

49 s pool
1:54 lings
(5th/6th lings at 1:57 due to supply block)

49 s pool
1:55 lings
(5th/6th ling at 1:59 due to supply block)

50 s pool
1:55 lings
(5th/6th ling at 1:58)

48 s pool
1:53 lings
(5th/6th ling at 1:56 from supply block)



So...looks like on average it's about 8 seconds slower, with +1 drone, and +1 overlord.  (Provided drone stacking is perfect).  Zerglings 5 and 6 seem to be about 10 seconds slower.

[metroid composite]

So...picked up one of the pre-con commander decks.  (power hungry in this link).  Been making modifications to it.

First cards cut:

Hooded Horror: 4/4 can't be blocked for 5.  powerful, but not really in the theme of the deck
Wight of Precinct Six: Potentially huge for 2 mana--gets pumped by all opponents graveyards.  Again, not really in-theme, though.
Walker of the Grove: In theme but dull.  You can sacrifice your 8 mana 7/7 for one creature...yeahhhh
Hunted Troll: interesting in multiplayer, 8/4 regenerator for 4, and the downside isn't necessarily a downside because you might be teaming up with someone against a bigger threat.  Again with the not really in-theme though.
Terra Ravager: +x/+0 where x is the number of lands defending player controls.  That hurts.  Again, not especially in-theme
Widespread Panic: Punishes people who do a lot of library searching.  I don't really feel I need to punish that, since nobody's abusing tutors too hard.
Vile Requiem: One of the last of the first batch to be cut; I was hesitant to cut removal, but it's underwhelming; 6 mana, and needs to exist in play for two turns to get more than one creature.
Spoils of Victory: the mana fixing this deck came with is pretty awful--that's most of what I swapped out.
Restore: Kind-of interesting mana fixing potentially, in that it can steal fetchlands from other players.  The first few times I ran the deck I just wanted to reliably get to 6 mana for Prossh, though.
Obelisk of Jund: cut for signets
Dirge of the Dead: Yeah, ok, this is a very out of theme card.  The commander in this deck has evasion.
Curse of Chaos: The other two curses fit the theme (more tokens, and +1/+1 counters on everything?) but this one, while good, was harder to justify.
Carnage Altar: The deck needs sac outlets, but this is pretty mediocre.  Jaemdae Tome is 4 mana to draw a card.  3 mana and sac a creature?  Ehh.
Rupture Spire: Lands that enter tapped are already problematic, what with karoos and stuff.  Lands that enter tapped and require you to have another land?  Nahh.
2xMountain: I added the two missing red karoos.

Added common mana:
Rakdos Signet
Gruul Turf
Cultivate
Rakdos Canarium
Kodama's Reach
Gruul Signet
Golgari Signet
Awakening Zone (ok, this is rare, and kind-of borders the common mana fixing to splashy effect)

Added splashy stuff:
Blood Artist (drain 1 every time a creature dies? lol ok)
Craterhoof Behemoth (So...with just prossh it's 74 damage with trample?  ok)
Skullclamp (Lots of 0/1 tokens you say?)
Black Market (Lots of creatures being sacced you say?)
Rapacious One (You know, I added this, and realized later I could have added like...Grave Titan instead.  I think I'm keeping this, though; it's not like any other EDH deck is going to make use of Rapacious One like this deck does).
Tombstone Stairwell (Zombies for everybody!  Does silly things with all the death triggers floating around this deck.)
Gaea's Cradle (so...your commander costs 6 mana and makes 7 creatures you say?)
Grave Pact (Did you say you were going to sac a lot of creatures?)


After piloting the deck a bunch, I've come to the following conclusions.

It draws a lot of hate, but it can take it.  I've certainly piloted decks which kind of just cried if they lost, say, doubling season.  One thing I do like is that...yes, it's powerful, but people generally get a few turns warning to blow up some of the more ridiculous stuff.  Except for Craterhoof Behemoth; that can just come out of nowhere.  Might be too good.

The deck would not take much tweaking to knock players out in one turn fairly consistently--like...a piece of equipment that gave double-strike, for instance, would consistently deal 22+ commander damage in one swing.  I'd like to avoid this.

I'm reasonably happy with the mana now; tend to get to 6-8 mana in reasonable time.

There aren't enough sac outlets.  Prossh really wants sac outlets so that you can recast him and get more kobolds.

There is an infinite combo purely within the precon cards (tooth and claw, primal vigor, just about anything that triggers from death).  This hasn't come up yet, though, so I'm not too worried.

Paying 3 mana to make a creature is pretty overpriced based on the opinion of this deck.  (You can usually mint about 1 mana  to 1 creature off of prossh).  This really lowers the value of cards like Jade Mage and Endless Cockroaches.  That said, Kher Keep has been a fantastic card, but I guess being a land helps with that.

Tombstone Stairwell...the creature count in this deck is actually pretty low so there often aren't many in the graveyard.  It's a hillarious card, though, don't want to cut it, so probably just be careful not to cut any more creatures.

Curse of Shallow graves is pretty underwhelming.  One free token a turn for 3 mana is good, and there's a few cards like that, but you have to attack one player to get it, and unlike most other token generation, it comes into play tapped, and it works for other players too (for all that this can be an upside if people ignore you--the temptation of a tapped 2/2 usually isn't as important as more important game state stuff).  There's some cards I'm not comfortable cutting as I haven't really given them a fair shot, but yeah, this one might be on the chopping block.


Also note: I'm avoiding including cards just because they're good unless they are very on-theme.  I.e. I haven't added derranged hermit or avenger of zendikar yet, for example.



So...round 2...

Remove: Jade Mage, Endless Cockroaches, Curse of Shallow Graves (it's too often better to spend mana on the commander than these) and Craterhoof Behemoth (too gamebreaking)

Add:
Puphoros, God of the Forge/Shared Animosity.  I'd like some kind of overrun effect, even though I'm cutting Craterhoof.  I'd like to see these, as I've never seen them before; most token decks are like...green white black or green white.
Korozda Guildmage: Spending 4 mana to get 5 1/1s off of saccing prosh (which you may have wanted to do anyway) is...solid mana use.  Worth paying.  Could also play Feed the Pack, but only saccing at end of turn is inconvenient; means you can't sac and immediately recast.  The least flashy of the four additions, but it's also a 2-drop creature to replace one of the 2-drop creatures.
Mycoloth: absolutely silly; devouring prossh and his kobolds means an 18/18 that puts 14 1/1s into play every turn.  Also a way to sac things, technically.
Greater Good: excellent sac outlet, especially for a creature that will often have 11 power.  Surprised I didn't think of it until my coworker mentioned it.

[SnowFire]

You might want to try Homura, Human Ascendant.  He's pretty hilarious with both tokens and Greater Good.

Flip side, I think Skullclamp is on the game-breaking side of things.  It's obviously fantastic but I'd cut that before Craterhoof if you're concerned about "playing fair."

[metroid composite]

Homura?  I don't actually have that much red mana, so it would primarily be a global +2/+2.  Given my relatively low red mana I'll often be able to firebreath as much on Purphoros, God of the Forge.  (And from what little I've tested with Greater Good, draw 11 cards discard 3 is enough.  In fact it usually leaves me with a degree of decision paralysis with what to discard).

Flip side, I think Skullclamp is on the game-breaking side of things.  It's obviously fantastic but I'd cut that before Craterhoof if you're concerned about "playing fair."

I think you're underestimating Craterhoof.

Play Prossh, 7 creatures in play.   Play hoof, you have 8 creaures, +8/+8, attack for 74.  That's generally two people dead.  Now, if you have two more creatures from somewhere, everything gets +10/+10 and you get to attack for 110.  That's generally three people dead.  Game over.


Skullclamp has been solid, but not even the best performer, or necessarily the best card drawing.  By far the best card has been Black Market.  Well...either that or Grave Pact.  (Greater Good might actually be the best card drawing in the deck right now.  Fecundity is also very good, for all that it's symmetrical, so realistically it's not as good.  Foster is also pretty scary, but limited by mana the same way skullclamp is).

Skullclamp doesn't really turn on until after Prossh usually.  And even then, I need to invest mana into it at sorcery speed, and it means sacrificing some damage output/blockers.  I've drawn it in several games against my coworkers, usually draws 2-4 cards and then gets blown up.  Don't think I've won any of the games where I drew it (actually, the deck has only won once).


But yeah, fundamentally I think mana is just more dangerous for this deck than cards.  Like...a card that I'm not including because it breaks things in half is Food Chain (literally lets me cast and recast prossh an infinite number of times for unlimited kobolds).  Phyrexian Altar is also infinite.  I'm similarly avoiding Mana Echoes and Ashnod's Altar.  They're not infinite because they make colourless but like...Black Market is already dominant, and those seem better because they don't require you to accumulate counters first.  Gaea's Cradle is also really good in the deck of course (like...I don't complain at all when Cradle has land destruction thrown at it) for all that Cradle is not as broken as you might think in the deck since it tends to sac the kobold tokens, not accumulate them, and also doesn't always have creatures before turn 6.

But yeah, anyhow, so far skullclamp has seemed within reasonable power levels in lunch games.  I mean, it deservedly draws out removal, don't get me wrong but....


Other cards I have been tossing around...

Phyrexian plaguelord
Greater Gargadon
Lands (high market, miren)

Sac outlets.  In fact, really good sac outlets.  I shied away from these a little bit because I'm not aiming to make an impossible to deal with deck (like...Greater Gargadon has no way of turning off the sac outlet).  Phyrexian Plaguelord would be fine, but the precon comes with Fell Shepherd, which is very similar.  Worse, of course, but I'm not looking to jack up the power of the deck.

Dragon broodmother

Another sac outlet, another source of tokens, and just a ridiculously overpowered card in multiplayer formats where it makes 4+ tokens per turn because it triggers every upkeep.  Actually, I'm not sure why I don't have this one in.  The logic in my head was that "Ideally I want to attack with prossh, sac it after combat, and then re-cast it, and Broodmother doesn't allow that.  Also, Mycoloth is even more ridiculous."  And these are true, but I think something that does all three of makes tokens and allows me to sac, AND that is a good method to turn 0/1 kobolds into damage (6 kobolds make a 13/13 dragon token).  Yeah...I probably should find room for it. >_>

Feed the Pack

I ended up choosing Korozda Guildmage over it, for some of the similar logic to the above (lets me recast prossh the same turn).  Also, it's a creature and thus fuels Tombstone Stairwell (which is often a pretty weak card in the deck, but it's funny so I want to support it).  I feel kinda bad, though, as it's a totally forgotten card that would be great in the deck; oh well.

Avenger of zendikar, deranged hermit

They're really, really good.  But that's about it--no special interactions with the rest of the deck other than making tokens.  I'm aiming to have the cards I add be for a specific purpose because they have unusually good synergy.

Sarkhan the mad

It's a sac outlet for Prossh, and lets me fling extra damage at people's faces.  Not super excited about it, though.

Trading Post

Another sac outlet that didn't have me super excited (although it does make tokens!)  I guess the artifacts in my graveyard is the sticking point here.

Champion of Lambholt

This on the other hand, does work very well in the deck.  I guess it just doesn't have me super excited (it's...basically big and vanilla, and makes my opponents unable to block.  Doesn't sound like the funnest way to win, and most of the time it'll just draw out removal before it does much anyway).

Masked Admirers, Solumn Simulacrum, Yavimaya Elder

Generically good cards that like being sacced.  They do feel like power level upgrades without having particularly special interactions, though.

Hellion Eruption

Ok, I do want to make room for this one.  Another sac outlet, and makes good use of 0/1 tokens.  Didn't make the last cut because I was looking for repeatable sac outlets, and wasn't so keen on the fact that everything had to be sacced since some of my engine pieces are creatures.  But it's funny, I should find room for it for that reason alone, maybe even swap it in for a more powerful card like Inferno Titan.

Ogre Battledriver

Another cute pump spell; allows attacking for 22 after dropping Prossh.  I guess it didn't make my last cut because it's not quite as silly as Shared Animosity.

Instigator Gang

An interesting pump spell.  Again, not quite as silly as shared animosity, so it's not too high on this list.

Junkyo Bell

Another sac outlet.  Normally a terrible card this actually is pretty solid in prossh.  Although...I wish it was "sac after combat" not "sac at end of turn".

Varolz, the Scar-striped

Generically good sac outlet, but doesn't have any particularly interesting interactions with this deck.

Slate of Ancestry

Obviously great interactions with this deck.  I've played it when borrowing other EDH decks and it's OP as fuck.  Better in decks where there isn't a lot of other card draw and you end up with an empty hand, though, which isn't so much the case for Prossh.  (It happens often enough that Fecundity puts like...20 cards in my hand, and I need to figure out what to do with them).  Bottom line is that I'm having trouble getitng excited about yet more card draw that would require me to do yet more thinking about how to discard down to 7 cards.

[metroid composite]

So...I'm looking at adding two 6 cost things (and my general is 6 cost, so this is already iffy).  What do I cut?

Options I see in the 5-6 mana range:

Sek'Kuar Deathkeeper

This card is pretty awful in the deck.  Lots of tokens die.  Not that many non-tokens die.  That said, it does cost 5.

Blood Rites

I am adding two sac outlets; maybe that makes it ok to finally cut one sac outlet.

Inferno Titan

Great card, but just not in-theme.  If I had even one way to give it deathtouch, then maybe.  But it's not that interesting in the deck.  Probably the highest power in this list, but I don't mind lowering power level a bit.

Rough // Tumble

You know, I initially thought sweepers would be amazing in this deck, because you're saccing all your stuff anyway, and that's....not really the case.  BUT sometimes they can pull you out of a nasty situation.

That said, this one is pretty painful.  The ground one will generally only kill my tokens.  The air one often enough only kills my air units.  Of course, the flip side of this is that if/when Prossh does get stolen, killing it with this is one of the few ways I have to get it back.  I dunno, cutting sweepers seems iffy; maybe I should swap it out with a different sweeper though.  Not sure what; Kagemaro, first to suffer?

Capricious Efreet

It is kinda neat in this deck, since there will usually be at least two things you want to blow up of your opponents, and usually at least one thing you wouldn't mind losing.




Current substitutions: removed Inferno Titan and Blood Rites (For Hellion Eruption and Dragon Broodmother).  I feel a bit odd about this, since Inferno Titan is one of the reasons I picked up the deck (I've never owned a titan before).  But no question it's not really in theme, and doesn't really have any synergies.  I'm sure eventually I'll find a home for it.



EDIT:

thinking about possible substitutions for a better sweeper.  There's at least three cards in this deck I can think of that look for creatures or dig creatures out of the graveyard, so I was looking for what my options were (other than Kagemaro, First to Suffer).  Happened across Hythonia the Cruel--oh hey, I actually own one of those--got it in the one Theros draft I did.  It's another 6 drop, which is x_x but I don't have to proxy it.

[metroid composite]

Ok, couple more changes

Essence of the Wild

This has a funny interaction with prossh, since his tokens are created on casting not on entering the battlefield, which means you still get them.

Spawning Pit

Wanted to break up the infinite combo.

[metroid composite]

Starcraft 2: so...attempting to fend off void rays as zerg: spore crawlers are extremely dubious as choices.

Comparing a spore crawler to a hydralisk:

Spores have 17 DPS
Hydras have 14.5 DPS

Spores have 400 HP and 1 armor, compared to Hydras with 80 HP, but...Void Ray damage almost triples against armored targets when they align.  So...factoring that out, it's more like 160 HP to 80 HP.

As you might expect, anywhere hydras are good, queens are better.  With an effective HP of 210.  Their DPS is quite a bit lower (9), but on the other hand, they have transfuse.

So...I guess the moral is that spores aren't completely awful--they are marginally more cost efficient than a hydra still.  But that I shouldn't do what I did last night and believe myself safe when I have six spores against four void rays.

[metroid composite]

MtG

So...I am making an important sub-out for Prossh:

Gaea's Cradle is out.  By far the most complained about card, and at first I argued it was ok (since I'd had a few games where it tapped for nothing) but I had a few games in a row where a Cradle topdeck resulted in me just winning the game, and it's been warping the meta, with everyone adding land destruction (and then sometimes hitting each other when I don't have cradle) and...yeah.

Replace with Xenagos, The Reveler.  Xenagos if left unchecked is probably more scary, since previously I would be limited on black and red mana, but with Xenagos I would only be limited on black mana.  However, it doesn't have the "black lotus" effect that cradle had, where I topdeck it, and suddenly tap for 7.  And it's much more killable.

Also adding Phyrexian Tower as a token really cool land.  I had previously avoided putting sac effects on lands, because I wanted to avoid making one of those decks with no answers whatsoever.  But winning the game in one turn seems like it's the much larger balance issue than the deck having resilience.  Also, I haven't really seen it in decklists (online or controlled by my coworkers) whereas High Market is everywhere in EDH, and I think Tower is actually quite a bit better than high market.



In the mean time, I got a second precon for christmas (Marath) so a few cards left Prossh because Marath wanted them (Silklash Spider, Terramorphic Expanse, and...I had already cut it from Prossh, but Inferno Titan finally found a home).





Marath

ok, onto the main event.

My first thought with this commander was to run it with nothing but land.  Or...nothing but ramp and land.  Then I thought about what might make it better, and came up with deathtouch.  Every ping destroys your creature .  Ok, so all five deathtouch cards in green/white/red went in

Basilisk Collar
Bow of Nylea
Gorgon Flail
Nightshade Peddler
Quietus Spike

As well as Sword of Kaldra (yep, doesn't say combat damage XD) and Neko-Te.

I could have added a bunch of "search your library for equipment" cards, but mmm...I'm following my friend's policy of not including tutors in EDH decks so that games don't always feel the same.  Instead I added...

Sun Titan (most of these cost 3; good odds I can grab one)

And just for the hell of it, Grafted Exoskeleton (infect.  Better used against players.  In fact, it might be kind-of mean.  We'll see).


So...what else should go into the deck?  My next thought was "I finally can find a home for the Inferno Titan I took out of the other deck", and then just turned this into a bunch of pingers that happen to be silly with deathtouch.

Quick note: pingers I'm NOT adding.

Goblin Sharpshooter (so...with deathtouch, anything that doesn't have hexproof instantly dies?  Ew.  Also, I'd be stealing it from Prossh where it is actually fun).
Balefire Dragon (Yeah...I kind-of hate playing against this card, and it doesn't need my help.  Jerk).

So...after much culling the list became...

Inferno Titan
Barbie Enraged (I still had in my head that this would be a mostly lands and ramp deck, and this gets me land)
Fire Ants (yeah, you know, I don't want this to turn into a "everyone starts sideboarding in tons of hexproof" so...I focused on cards that ignore hexproof.
Ronin Cliffrider[url=http://see above
[url=http://gatherer.wizards.com/Pages/Card/Details.aspx?multiverseid=6117]Scalding Salamander] see above
[url=http://gatherer.wizards.com/Pages/Card/Details.aspx?multiverseid=6117]Scalding Salamander see above
Scattershot Archer (see above)
Silklash Spider (see above)
Scourge of Kher Ridges (see above)
Magmatic Force Well I'm including Inferno Titan, which will generally ping 3 things a turn, when this will usually ping 4, so...as far as targeters go it's not bad.  Also, silly if it gets infect.


So....next up, this is a commander that uses +1/+1 counters; and obviously there's stuff that interacts with that like doubling season.  Maybe I should throw in some of those interactions?

Pre-emptively cut:

Forgotten Ancient it's good.  I was just trying to cut down on the number of cards I proxied, because the number was getting quite high, and it excited me less than the other +1/+1 counter interactions.
All Doubling Season variants.  Already have one in Prossh, and it's the crappy global one, and every time I play it I seem to end up with a pretty gamebreaking board state.  Pretty sure Marath benefits from it way more than Prossh.
Gavony Township.  Just kind of generically good--not something that's splashy and easy to deal with.  Also, pushes the deck more towards being a token deck than a pinging deck, which is not my intent.
Mayael Aria Something tells me a 20 power creature wouldn't be that hard to get.

Included:

Archangel of Thune So....like...what's really funny is if you give Marath lifelink and then start pinging stuff.  Pay 1 mana, take a counter off of Marath, put a +1/+1 counter on every creature, lololol.  Some assembly required; I intentionally left in most of the lifegain cards from the precon for the silly interactions here, though.
Kinda like the above, except no assembly required whatsoever.  Might be too good?
[url=http://gatherer.wizards.com/Pages/Card/Details.aspx?multiverseid=370766]Kalonian Hydra.  Has a gigantic target painted on its head, but it's quite funny; also not too hard to deal with.


Additionally, Persist is something else that combines quite well with +1/+1 counters.

Preemptively Cut:

Kitchen Finks.  Kind of just generically good.  But also not that exciting without sac outlets.  (And this deck doesn't have sac outlets.  It can ping its own creatures, but that generally requires, say, 2 mana, and there's actually better lifegain sources for that--more on that later

Included:
Kithkin Spellduster: The deck is pretty good at destroying creatures, so I had my eye out for destroying any non-creature stuff, and this fits the bill.
Woodfall Primus: Same here.  I don't feel great about including this one, since it's one of those stupidly good EDH cards that serious players use to blow up lands, and I'm channeling my inner hipster right now, but like...it fills a niche.
Twilight Shepherd: This, on the other hand, I'm looking forward to trying out.  Saves equipment if someone plays a big destroy-everything sweeper.




Landfall:

Was originally going to be a big theme, because it was going to be an almost all land deck.  Not so much in the end.  I still kept all four landfall cards in the precon, though.  Would have added [http://gatherer.wizards.com/Pages/Card/Details.aspx?multiverseid=197160]Admonition Angel[/url] if I was taking this theme seriously, but as-is I'm trying to keep the number of cards I proxy down, and really taking landfall seriously would involve adding more fetchlands and...nahh.


Damage triggers:

All these mass pingers let me ping my own creatures too.  Had two cards lined up for this...
Vigor
Sprouting Phytohydra

Ended up preemptively cutting phytohydra.  It's only really funny with Fire Ants (a lot of the other mass pingers only hit enemy creatures or deal 2 damage).  And...they all have defender, which like...this deck honestly doesn't have a problem producing blockers, it's one of the commander's abilities... >_>


Miscellaneous:
Aura Shards: love the card, great with the commander.
Trostani, Selesnya's Voice So........mostly I wanted some kind of populate, because technically Marath doesn't have to make 1/1 tokens, he can make like...7/7 tokens.  And Trostani is funny with Archangel of Thrune (better in this deck than Kitchen Finks at gaining life too).




So...my original plan was to have like...20 ramp cards, but I decided that might be really powerful (and also more cards than I wanted to proxy right now.  So...kept as much of the precon as I could (mostly utility cards like hull breach).  And...paired it down to just six added ramp cards...

Rampant Growth (had one; not the best card, but whatever, put it in.  2CMC ramp cards are valuable in this deck, because I can play them before I drop Marath).
Mirari's Wake: I was originally going to have a lot of land doubling cards, but if I'm going to include just one, this is the ridiculously obvious choice.
Boundless Realms: (I still have four landfall cards in the deck just from the precon, so...this is still potentially quite funny).
Khalni Heart Expedition: 2CMC ramp spell, also moar landfall!!1  And something Sun Titan can get back.
Gyre Sage: so...the commander can make this tap for a lot of mana.  Also 2CMC ramp spell.
Yavimaya Elder: I totally only included this over arguably more synergistic cards because it does really funny things with Sun Titan.  That'll happen once every like...20 games, but still >_>.  Whatever, not like the card is bad....

[metroid composite]

Hm, apparently this has become a topic I post in to do EDH stuff >_>  (I really should say something about Hearthstone at some point, but for now EDH).


So...someone jokingly said "see you cats later" and I was like "oh, cats huh?  So...I should make a cat deck? "  And since I'm proxying anyway, it doesn't really hurt to throw together a silly deck I might only use a few times.

Raksha Golden Cub, let's go.

First thing I noticed: in mono-white there just aren't that many good cats.  Getting to, say, 40 different cats...it can be done, but it gets pretty ugly.  The solution was to make a second theme; it wasn't just a cat deck, it was also an equipment deck--which fits pretty naturally.  Equipment is needed to turn on  Raksha anyway, and a number of cats have special interactions with equipment.

Second thing I noticed: this was looking a little like my coworker's Jor-Kadeen equipment deck (which also plays a bunch of equipment and then ends up pumping a bunch of small creatures when it is turned on).  How am I going to make this deck feel different from his deck?  The solution I came up with was to focus on commander damage--here's the trick:

Equip Raksha with, say, three swords, and he gets +2/+2 and double strike from the cat pump, and +6/+6 from the swords, which overall is 11/12 double strike--22 commander damage (fatal).  Jor-Kadeen in the same scenario is 14/10, not killing in one swing.

So...the trick is going to be looking for equipment that gives:

1. Evasion
2. Gets Raksha to exactly +6 power

Straight off the bat, I will be running all five swords, just for the evasion, but also because they are good.

http://gatherer.wizards.com/Pages/Card/Details.aspx?multiverseid=209280
http://gatherer.wizards.com/Pages/Card/Details.aspx?multiverseid=214070
http://gatherer.wizards.com/Pages/Card/Details.aspx?multiverseid=370471
http://gatherer.wizards.com/Pages/Card/Details.aspx?multiverseid=370455
http://gatherer.wizards.com/Pages/Card/Details.aspx?multiverseid=214368

Which pushes me towards pump values of +2 or +4 (to make it easier to add up to a total of +6).  For this reason, I'm not really interested in Honor of the pure (+1/+1?  Lame), but I am interested in Light From Within (gives +2/+2).

Next up, equipment that can easily give +6 on its own is an obvious include so...

Sigil of Distinction
Strata Scythe
Hedron Matrix
Argentum Armor

But notably, I'm NOT including +5 options like Sword of Kaldra, and Inquisitor's Flail

I'm also looking for consistency, so Pennon Blade, and Bonehoard?  Empyral Plate? Cutting those.

Also an obvious evasion include:

Whispersilk Cloak

The other evasion options are mostly much less exciting.  Nonbasic landwalk with no hexproof for about the same cost as Whispersilk Cloak; yeah, whatever.  Fleetfeather Sandals are interesting to me due to the haste, although there is already an obvious haste include.

Lightning Greaves

There are some nice tramples however--but notably if trample is your only form of evasion, suddenly the exact mathematics of dealing 22 commander damage no longer works.  Sword of Vengeance is quite good in a vacuum, although...on Raksha, the vigilance and the first strike don't do anything, so it's only for +2/+0, trample, and haste, which is less exciting.  O-Naginata is pretty efficient...although unexciting; it probably makes the deck better because of the low cost, but better is not always the point of EDH.  The trample I do know I want is:

Loxodon Warhammer

Notably, when you have both lifelink and doublestrike, you can often lose the second strike's worth of lifegain...but not if you have trample as well.  The synergy is just very nice.

Rounding off with some +4 and +2 cards that just happen to be very nice...

+4
Batterskull
Angelic Destiny (technically not equipment, but it's evasion and +4, so with just about any equip on top of it, it's enough)
Umezawa's Jitte (I actually own one of these)

+2
Konda's Banner (obvious include.  Lots of cat legends).

And...originally I had Champion's Helm here too, but...not super excited about this one; it could be bonesplitter instead, or something that gives evasion.  Low equip costs are valuable, especially with so much equipment.  I dunno, though, the more I look at this the less I like it; it's just a +2 with no evasion.  Hexproof, too, but I already have two ways to give that, and swords that grant protection.  Think I want a second haste instead.  And...I'm thinking Fleetfeather Sandals over Sword of Vengeance--cheaper equip.  Flying over allows for the precision 22 commander damage plan better than trample.  Does a better job of bypassing a Darksteel Colossus, which you can't just get past with proteciton from a colour.

Fleetfeather Sandals

Last but not least, It's an equipment deck, it has a tutor package for equipment.  Might as well throw in some removal equipment.

Manriki-Gusari (extremely relevant in the local playgroup.  There's at least two equipment focused decks; three counting the Marath deck I made).
Heartseeker (bonus: it happens to give +2 attack)

19 Equipment.



CATS

Ok, well cats are divided into a couple of categories.

Stupidly good or just very interesting cards (ofc they go in):

Leonin Shikari
Brimaz
Kemba
Leonin Abunas
Set's Tiger
Taj-Nar Swordsmith
Felidar Sovreign (Arguably too good in a format where your life total starts at 40, but screw it, it's a cat deck; wouldn't include him otherwise)
Jareth
Spirit of the Hearth
Mirror Entity
White Sun's Zenith
Ajani, Caller of the Pride (pretty bad, actually, but the ultimate is hillarious with 40 life so...)

And past that, what I'm looking for is cats that carry equipment well.  Evasion, double strike, lifelink, vigilance--these are the primary categories I'm looking for.

Not really feeling the 1-drops.  Savannah lion is a good card, but it doesn't do anything special with equipment.  1/1 lifelink for 1 is kind-of tempting, but it's awful without equipment.  So...starting at 2...

Ajani's Pridemate (Plenty of lifegain in the deck; could get big)
Ajani's Sunstriker (Lifelink)

Hmm...Leonin Arbiter is a good card, but doesn't do anything special with equipment.

Leonin Skyhunter (flying)
Lost Leonin (infect)
Sunspear Shikari (lifelink)
Jamuraan Lion (Forces damage through; fits the theme of the deck super well, actually)
Skyhunter Prowler (flying and vigilance?  Sign me up!)
Skyhunter Skirmisher (flying and doublestrike?  Cool!)


For cards I'm not running...Not super keen on all the cats that must be equipped to do stuff; I'm obviously running one, but not lots; equipment needs to go to Kemba.  Leonin Squire is really interesting; too bad I'm not really running 1 CMC artifacts.  Leonin Battlemage is cool because it pumps and thus helps the theme that way.  Actually sure...I orignally had Whitemane Lion but it maybe saves a creature; not sure how good this will be if the creature is heavily equipped, and since equip is sorcery speed, I don't think this deck wants to leave mana open very often.  The return isn't even that useful since I have like...maybe two enters the battlefield triggers.

Leonin Battlemage

And then there's like Jhovall Queen (ehh, I have bigger things to do at 6 mana), and Kemba's Legion (it's like Jhovall Queen, but more expensive for less toughness!)

21 cats (plus Raksha for 22)



And then some just generally good cards.

Interacting with equipment:

Stonehewer Giant
Stoneforge Mystic
Puresteel Paladin
Mirran Crusader (not a cat, but I can't imagine a scenario where I'll be too sad about this; even if Raksha is equipped, I'd probably still play a 1/1 cat with protection from two colours, so...yeah).
Prototype Portal (yes, having four sword of fire and ices on the battlefield sounds hillarious).

Not running: Steelshaper Apprentice, Steelshaper's Gift.  Obviously I am breaking my normal "no tutors" rule in this deck (because it's a joke deck; I'm also doing things I try to avoid in other decks like kill in one swing).  But...I still don't want to run tons of them.  And these two are less exciting.  Also not running Sun Titan.  Have it in another deck where it rescues equipment, so...yeah, variety.

Anthem effects:

Elesh Norn, Grand Cenobite (Would I run this if it said "cats you control get +2/+2?  Hell yes I would).

Not running Light from Within.  Initially I was planning on it, since it's another +2 for Raksha, but in the event of getting, say, 40 2/2 cat tokens, it pumps none of them, which would be such a letdown when it happens.  Also not running Door of Destinies.  I'm just looking at it, and on paper it looks dull.  Like...it'd either be "omg, your cats have +9/+9, game over ".  Or it would be a completely useless card; topdeck it late in the game, and then never draw another cat, which isn't that unlikely since they're only 20% of the deck.

Removal:

Return to Dust
Austere Command
Mass Calcify
Oblivion Ring  (yeah, not even going to bother linking these)
Dispatch
Dispense Justice

And I'm thinking about Condemn, but it's kind-of mean due to killing generals.  I want to restrict the meanness/stupidness of this deck to cats and equipment.  EDIT: and prototype portal >_>

Ramp/card draw (the deck needs a lot of mana--7 to cast the general; lots of equip costs)

Sol Ring
Thran Dynamo
Land Tax
Weathered Wayfarer
Mox Opal (Totally wouldn't bother with this, except I actually own one)
Dreamstone Hedron (Wasn't going to run this, since it doesn't help run out the general, but then I thought about how silly it is with Prototype Portal)
Mind's Eye (monowhite just doesn't have much card draw--my coworker warned me about this when I said I was thinking about making a cat deck.  So...straight up ridiculous card draw, sure).

Not running Gift of Estates, Knight of the White Orchid, Solemn Simulacrum.  Mostly I need a lot of bang out of the ramp because so much of the deck is cats and swords.  So...I'm looking for +3 mana generally.  Kind-of tempted to sub in Gift of Estates for something; I just worry about the scenario where I have both land tax and gift, and then gift becomes useless.  Although...I guess if I have Land Tax and it's triggering, then I'm home-free, so...replace Gilded Lotus with Gift of Estaates then?

Gift of Estates

Support cards: 20

That leaves...39 lands (but there's a mox, so effectively 40).  Land choices...

Emeria, the Sky Ruin
Mutavault
Cavern of Souls

Are the cat bonus and/or "here's your bonus for running monocolour" lands.  So those.  I could do more here (Scrying sheets and snow-covered plains!)  But fuck it, I have regular plains, I don't have those fancy snow-covered plains.  (Actually, I'm not sure my coworkers really play enough counterspells to make me really want to proxy Cavern of Souls when I can use a non-proxied plains instead).

EDIT: for land, ended up not printing Cavern of Souls (would have required an extra page of printing)

Ended up printing:

Emeria, the Sky Ruin
Mutavault
Temple of the False God
Rogue's Passage
Daru Encampment

That's 5, so...34 plains.


EDIT: after initial testing (just goldfishes)...turning on metalcraft is not automatic.  Deck could really use an Ancient Den (partially for thematic reasons--Raksha's home, but partially so that it can be searched up with Weathered Wayfarer).

Not getting equipment and thus not being able to turn on Kemba or Raksha is a thing that has happened.  I figured with 18 equipment, 3 more ways to search it up, this would be a nonissue.  Guess it's about as likely as missing one colour in a two-colour deck, which happens.




EDIT

So apparently I forgot Leonin Relic-Warder somehow.  That goes in.

I'm also looking at Umbral Mantle, which does two things.  First, with Stonehewer Giant it fetches multiple equipment in one turn.  Second, it's a 0 cost equip, which matters for Raksha--that moment when I hit 7, play Raksha and...nothing happens because I can't equip is a bit of a letdown.  But with this, immediate +2/+2 and double-strike for the other cats.

Cutting for these...probably Leonin Battlemage (yeah, ok it fits the theme, but in practice every time I've had it in my hand, I don't play it because turn 4/5/6 are spent equipping swords, turning on metalcraft.  Just a bad place on the curve.

And...maybe swap a 2 drop for the 2 drop.  Leonin Skyhunter, perhaps, because I have three other flying, and all of them have a second ability? (doublestrike, vigilance, and making me untargetable).  I could see an argument for Sunspear Shikari, but it sounds like my friend has one of those he'll give me, and I'll take a real card over a proxy.  Ajani's Pridemate is probably the actual worst card in this slot, but it will occasionally get enormous, so I'm tempted to leave it in.


If I am adding Umbral Mantle, it's handy to have ways to get Raksha tapped (stupid vigilance...).  Honor-Worn Shaku is a thought as a mana rock; two of my legends have vigilance.  Paradise Mantle might be a better choice, though, just because being an equipment matters in this deck, especially being an equipment with low mana cost.

[metroid composite]

Hearthstone

So...I was somewhat inspired by Day 9 doing this video:

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=9jR8FLwLMV0

And apparently Kripp has done something similar, but more serious:

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=vTuThI6vXa0


The idea of these decks is to fill your opponent's hand up to 10, and then bounce stuff which causes the card to be destroyed.  ...And they're terrible against aggro.

But I was thinking recently not about bounce shenanigans, but about a different card: Divine Favor.  Draw Cards until you have an equal number of cards in hand to your opponent.  This is a card that isn't considered that spectacular, but which I find myself getting blown out by a lot.  (But isn't that great when I play it, since my curve tends to be like...Harvest Golem, Chillwind Yetti, Azure Drake, Argent Commander).  Now, combining Divine Favor with an aggressive deck is something that is done.  But combining it with an aggressive deck that uses some of the above shenanigans to fill the opponent's hand?  That sounds new.  Namely:

2x Coldlight Oracle
1x King Mukla

(And probably not running Lorewalker Cho--not aggressive enough).

Obviously some kind of aggressive deck with a lot of low cost stuff seems ideal.  Since Coldlight Oracle is already in the deck, this pushes me in the direction of Murlocs.

15x other Murlocs

Obviously there's also

2x Divine Favour

And fill the rest out with aggressive cards:

2x Blessing of Might
2x Abusive Seargeant
2x Argent Protector
2x Ironbeak Owl
2x Knife Juggler

Or maybe drop one of these for a Truesilver Champion or a Leeroy Jenkins or whatever.  (Yeah, Truesilver is probably better than Blessing of Might).

Granted, I'm not likely to actually put this deck together.  I'm very unlikely to craft King Mukla.  But it's a fun idea.

[metroid composite]

So...messing around with priest.  I have two inspirations right now.  One is an interesting deck I saw on Reddit:

http://www.reddit.com/r/hearthstone/comments/1yujlg/just_hit_legendary_with_an_unusual_priest/

Which basically runs a bunch of goodstuff, and doesn't run many spells at all.  The reason I like this is that the priest hero power is very very good, but when I run all the "mandatory" priest spells, sometimes I find myself with a hand full of spells and that's really terrible.  I don't really think I have the cards to put together this exact decklist though, so...dunno.


The other is starting from a free deck that apparently went almost undefeated up to decenly high rank, with the plan of playing Northshire Cleric on the same turn as an AoE healing spell (either Holy Nova or Darkscale Healer) to get crazy card draw.

http://www.hearthhead.com/deck=25/doctor-draw-(basic-only,-by-top-50-in-north-america-for-constructed-pre-wipe)

Which...I like the idea, but I want to modify the deck and play more ways to get damaged; wild pyromancer, Injured blademaster.

EDIT: so the problem with wild pyromancer is that sometimes I don't want to play my spells, even simple stuff like Power Word Shield.  I still think it's great in a darkscale healer deck.

EDIT2: in fact, I'm really not sure how I feel about wild pyromancer; the idea of the deck is to take control of the board (at which point healing becomes an insane hero power), and Wild Pyromancer is not that great when you have control of the board.  On the flip side, it can be pretty good at gaining control of the board.

[metroid composite]

Mmm...so tried some more with the normal suite of priest cards (shadow word pain, shadow word death, 1x shadow madness since I have it, wild pyromancer and darkscale healer) and...really embarassing performances in general; like...losing record at rank 20.  dropped most of the spells other than the ones kept in the low spell deck (power word shield, holy smite, holy nova, mind control), and dropped 2x pyromancer as well (kept 1x Darkscale Healer because I do think the mass heal potential is cool).  Instantly won two in a row rather comfortably.


In other metagame news, this deck (the one he's facing) is pretty hillarious:

http://www.twitch.tv/tidesoftime/b/507380781?t=30h12m35s

Plays Druid.

Turn 1: Innervate, Alarm-o-bot
Turn 2: Coin, Alarm-o-bot
Turn 3: Alarm-o-bot

Seems to be a somewhat serious deck, actually.  The idea is that Alarm-o-bot generally just dies, because it can be attacked by creatures.  And it's not really worth setting up taunts to protect it, because by that point it doesn't save you that much mana anyway.  On turn 1, however, there's not that much some decks can do.

Overall I think it has some serious weaknesses.  Against aggro it's likely to only bring down one creature before they can kill it.  (or none if you're going second, and they had any turn 1 play followed up by a charge).  A number of removal spells just kill it--frostbolt, wrath, lightning bolt, Fiery War Axe, coin Eviscerate, shadow word: pain, earthshock, soulfire.

That said, it's still interesting.  A few notes:

Obviously you want expensive creatures with this thing, but you don't need to have a horrible curve.  you CAN use spells (and probably want to; certainly Wrath is what you want to cast if they play a 3/2).

[metroid composite]

So...I showed my friend the large finite combo deck, and he's telling me now that I should try and make an EDH deck that makes token copies of doubling season.

So...a few notes:

1. I'll be running more than 3 land, obviously.
2. I'll not be going for the turn 1 kill; so no Show and Tell into Omniscience; just cast things normally.
3. I don't really need layers; put a token copy of doubling season into play 3 times -> 2059 5/5 creatures in play; that's fine.
4. I do need redundancy, though.  Search effects, multiple effects that do the same thing.
5. I need to be really careful that my cards don't just kill my opponents through other means.  Ex: the following card would be great if it copied doubling season: http://gatherer.wizards.com/Pages/Card/Details.aspx?multiverseid=369001, but it could also copy someone else's darksteel colossus much more easily.

So anyway...commander I think I need to take a 5 colour commander?  Green is non-negotiable I think.  Playing without white would suck--Enduring Ideal is one of the best ways to ensure I actually follow through on the plan.  Opalescence is one of the only cards that lets me put things like Followed Footsteps and Splinter Twin onto Doubling Season (because Opalescence says "non-aura" whereas something like march of the machines does not).  Also, populate is a great mechanic when I'm trying to make a deck that doesn't steal opponent's stuff.

So...ok, green white.  This is great, green white has potential commanders that make copies of tokens like Trostani and Rhys the Redeemed.  Why not go with green white?  Well...because the colour combo has a very hard time getting the first token to use populate on.  You basically need Opalessence, and then also one of Minion Reflector, Dual Nature, or Mimic Vat (and Mimic Vat is iffy because it can steal opponent's stuff).  Technically Enduring Ideal can still work here, but leans heavily on Dual Nature, and Dual Nature has all sorts of ways to ruin the fun.

Fortunately, red and blue have several ways to make a token copy of creatures already in play, which matters because it doesn't have to enter the battlefield as a creature, which is quite a bit harder to pull off.

Caclking Counterpart (blue) - only your creatures; perfect
Dance of Many (blue) - can copy opponent's stuff--probably avoid.  Although...the fact that this makes tokens and is searchable through Enduring Ideal makes it tempting.
Fated Infatuation (blue) - only copy your creatures; perfect
Fellhide Spiritbinder (red) - can copy opponent's stuff temporarily.  Populated tokens do not have haste or "exile me at end of turn".
Followed Footsteps (blue) - can copy opponent's stuff, but gives them warning; I dunno, might want to make an exception for this one.
Heat Shimmer (red) - can copy oppoent's stuff.  Populated tokens have haste and get exiled at the end of turn.  hmm.
Infinite Reflection (blue) - is interesting, as long as you can get token versions of everything you need like opalescence.  I think it might be a bit unweildy, though.
Kiki-Jiki (red) - can only copy your stuff.  Populated tokens have haste but do not get exiled.
Progenitor Mimic (blue) - can copy opponent's stuff.  Probably not, although the repeated copy is tempting.  Notably, still works even if it stops being a creature.
Riku of Two Reflections (blue red) - is great, but requires Opalescence in play or similar.
Rite of Replication (blue) - can copy opponent's stuff.  Probably not.
Spitting Image (blue) - can copy opponent's stuff.  probably not--although the repeated copy is tempting.
Splinter Twin (red) - can only copy your stuff.  Populated tokens have haste but do not get exiled.  The one downside of this is that if you make Doubling Season temporarily a creature, Splinter Twin will fall off when it stops being a creature.
Stolen Identity (blue) - can copy opponent's stuff.  Probably not, although repeated copy is tempting.
Tempt with Reflections (blue) - Who else wants some Doubling Seasons?   This actually works brilliantly, since they come in as three different timed events, so can each increase the haul of the previous one (including the opponents if you use Primal Vigor)


Ok, so going with only blue gives
1. Cackling Counterpart
2. Fated Infatuation
3. Tempt With Reflections
4. Probably a few things that can copy opponent's stuff like Followed Footsteps, maybe Dance of Many.

Going with only red gives
1. Kiki-Jiki
2. Splinter Twin
3/4. Maybe something that can copy opponent's stuff would be ok, just because it's temporary

Hm, well, green/white/red or green/white/blue look possible.  More likely green/white/blue.  Is there a general that even does anything with this colour combo?

Derevi Empyral Tactician can untap stuff.  This would be a lot cooler if kiki-jiki or splinter twin could be in the deck; I guess there's still going to be some support cards like Trostani and Liquimetal coating that tap.  More to the point, untapping lands is pretty cool.

Angus Mackenzie can fog forever, which I guess gives time to set up.  Sounds obnoxious though.

Ragnar can protect combo pieces.

Roon of the Hidden Realm combos...very badly with Dual Nature, and decently with Minion Reflector.  Although...honestly Minion Reflector isn't spectacular here, since it is worded such that the tokens die, and any copies of the tokens also die.



Hmm...none of these really combo much at all.  I doubt I'm going to want to leave 3 mana open to be defensive.  Derevi seems like the best of these; Llanowar Elf general, gogo, and occasionally combo-relevant.  Toss in some lands that tap for 2.

[metroid composite]

So...the rest of the deck.

A lot of the key cards in the deck are enchantments.  Enchantment synergies

Zur the Enchanter - (can't, requires black)
Verduan Enchantress
Treasury Thrull - (can't, requires black)
Silent Sentinel
Mesa Enchantress
Meletis Astronomer - (probably not--not enough ways to trigger heroic)
Femeref Enchantress
Enchantress' Presence
Argothian Enchantress

6 cards.  Probably want all of these.

Auramancer/Monk Idealist - maybe
Hana, Ship's Navigator -- definitely-there will be a decent number of artifacts, too, and untaps are handy.
Dowsing Shaman - Worse Hana, maybe
Open the Vaults - yes
Replenish - yes

at least 3 cards

Academy Rector - yes
Enduring Ideal - yes
Enlightened Tutor - yes
Idyllic Tutor - yes
Lost Auramancers - maybe
Plea for Guidance - actually...probably
Sterling Grove - yes
Wild Research - (sadly red)

At least 5, maybe 6-7.


So...there aren't that many ways to turn enchantments into creatures (only one) but there's a number of ways to turn anything into an artifact, and then turn artifacts into creatures.

Argent Mutation - hm maybe
Karn Silver Golem - obv
Karn's Touch - hmm...doesn't draw like Argent mutation
Liquimetal Coating - sure
Memnarch - too much potential to be mean, probably
Sydri, Galvanic Genius - (black)
Tezzeret, Agent of Bolas - (black)
Titania's Song - probably--either sac the Titania, or don't have a global make everything artifacts effect, and copies will not be artifacts
Toymaker - Ugh, paying cards, I dunno.
Transmogrifying Licid - probably not--it has enchant creature instead of enchant permanent.  Unless there's a global effect that makes artifacts into creatures this doesn't do much.
Xenic Poltergeist = (black--but notably keeps it a creature until your next turn, so lasts long enough for Followed Footsteps)
Animate Artifact - decent, although most of the ways to make things into artifacts are temporary, so it will fall off
Mycosynth Lattice - good
March of the Machines - good --although one note is that Mycosynth Lattice + march makes everyone lose all their lands, which is meaner than I want to go with this deck.

Ok, how many of each enabler do I have...

To make enchantments into artifacts I have Liquimetal Coating, Argent Mutation, Mycosynth Lattice, and Memnarch.  If I am going to run a "make enchantments into artifacts theme" I think I probably need all four, although ugh, really don't want to run Memnarch...actually I guess Memnarch might be ok because it's legendary, so I can't just make five token memnarchs and start attacking with them.  The stealing is problematic, though, for sure.  Oh, noteworthy, though, we can run Treasure Mage which helps finding the Mycosynth Lattice

To make artifacts into creatures...March of the Machines, Karn, I guess Titania's Song although it's really screwy with mycosynth lattice, and then oddly we're really wanting black here.  Animate Artifact is an enchantment so interacts with that whole theme.  And then sure, Karn's Touch.


Enchanted Evening is intriguing, but I don't think it really does much.  Enchantments need to be creatures, but Artifacts don't really, so I can't imagine I'd be too sad with Opalescence out.


I actually am intrigued by the idea of Mirror Gallery.  The card I'd really like to use it with is Kiki-Jiki, which sadly can't go in the 3 colour version, but it's rarely a dead card since it can be used with the general, and scales rather ridiculously if I'm sticking with Derevi (two Derevi = four untaps per attack; three Derevi = nine untaps per attack).



Some pump is a decent idea, to save lands from the march of the machines + mycosynth lattice.

Angelic Shield has combo potential...but potentially more combo potential than I want?  Hmm...pretty sure there's ways it could go infinite by bouncing itself, but it would take a lot of cards.

Collective Blessing is probably overkill.

Gaea's Blessing/Glorious Anthem are fine.

Leyline of Vitality is great.

Mirari's Wake...oh well yes, that looks good in this deck due to Derevi untapping lands.

Spear of Heliod gives the deck some decent defence.  Definitely picking this over glorious anthem given the choice.

Spidersilk Armor...not that exciting.

I think the ones to take are...Angelic Shield if I'm not too bothered about the fact that it probably goes infinite with the right card combo (maybe I should cut Ashnod's Altar?  Without that, I don't think it can go infinite).  The bounce is a fairly relevant defensive play.  Maybe Leyline of Vitality--I won't have many creatures at all if I'm not winning; mostly a cushon if I do suddenly get 2000 token copies of doubling season.  Mirari's Wake is good regardless of my creature situation, of course.  Spear of Heliod is also ok even without many creatures online.

Artifact searching, let's see.

Fabricate is ok.
Treasure Mage can be copied, but it only has one target anyway, so Fabricate may be better.  Can search Karn or Mycosynth Lattice; that's probably better.
Tezzeret the Seeker can't search up mycosynth Lattice, but the ult does offer an alternative way to make artifacts into creatures.  Don't like it too much, though; there won't be much to untap, and a lot of the other stuff you'd want to search for costs 3-5, so searching for two things is unlikely.  Also, if you do ult with Mycosynth Lattice out, probably you just attack with a bunch of 5/5 lands and win, which defeats the purpose.

What else...transmute cards exist; I think transmuting for 4 would be really good in this deck.  Opalescence, March of the Machines, and one of the Doubling Season variants are all 4 cmc.  So...let's see...the transmutes at CMC 4 are...black/blue, and mono black.    Why are there so many random black cards I'm finding I want??

Ok, let's see...what other random searches are there.

Supply/Demand exists, but doesn't search for a whole lot of key components.

Gifts Ungiven is.......banned in commander!  okie dokie then

Long Term Plans might be ok here.  Well...I dunno, it's pretty terrible as a card.

Mormor Smig Simic Visionary might be ok here, since some parts of the combo are creatures, and it can trigger off of the commander.  I guess run Treasure Mage if I'm going this route.

Sovreigns of Lost Alara...Well it can search up Followed Footsteps....

Wargate: OMFG yes, forgot about this card.

[metroid composite]

The rest of the cards...mana and card draw are just always a good idea.  Sticking with enchantments because there's the enchantressess to trigger from the enchantments...

Mystic Remora
Mind Unbound (maybe; don't like that it costs 6--I'd rather have cards on turn 6 and be playing combo)
Sylvan Library
Archmage Ascension (might be ok; decent amount of card draw in the deck)
Attunement (This...actually looks interesting; digs a lot)
Bident of Thrassa (with the commander it's decent; can usually connect)
Compulsion (I believe it was banned in some format somewhere, so it must be at least somewhat decent)
Ephara (not really a lot of creatures to turn it on)
Hatching Plans (hmm...I don't have a lot of ways to kill...frankly anything in this deck at the moment, so...)
Lor Ruin Expedition (draw 2 cards for 2 mana?  Could be ok)
Rhystic Study
Sisay's Ingenuity (well it does cost 1...).
Spreading Seas (Was a constructed card!  There's some nasty utility lands to kill too, like Kor Haven...yeah, I think this goes in...)
Trade Routes (hmm...might be better than compulsion in this deck).

Ramping...there's two reasons why this deck wants to use enchant lands.  One, because Derevi untaps them.  Two, because they are enchantments.

Abundant Growth: hmm...doesn't really do anything, but does cycle.
Annex: ...........>_>
Dawn's Reflection: hmm...4 mana to ramp by 2?  Yeah, that still sounds pretty solid if it doesn't get blown up.
Fertile Ground: sure
Overgrowth: Definitely
Trace of Abundance would be great; stupid red
Underworld Connections would be great; stupid black
Urban Burgeoning...hmm...not really that many instants in this deck
Utopia Sprawl: yep, it's good.
Wild Growth: yep, also good
Wellspring: Well......it's a less mean Annex.  A lot of the time there'll be a karoo to steal, and when there is it's a good ramp spell.
Mana Reflection: I'm not sure if I can count this as ramp given that it costs 6, but I'm certainly down for running it.

So....at least five ramp cards there.  Probably want a few more.  And if I am going to run both March of the Machines and Mycosynth Lattice, then I probably want some mana sources that still work if I kill all my lands.

Sol Ring (goes in every commander deck)
Nobe Hierarch (running bant colours, you say?)
Chromatic Lantern (Partially just for the time-saving convenience when figuring out coloured mana)
Gilded Lotus (fantastic untap target)
Coalition Relic (fine untap target when there's a bunch of spare untaps that I have no idea what to do with because they happen during combat)



So...ok, typical commander deck: 39-40 lands, 10ish ramp spells sounds ok.

[metroid composite]

Alright, so what's the actual deck, then, and how tight is the space/how much more space needs to be filled?

Doubling Season
Primal Vigor
Parallel Lives
Opalescence

4

Verduan Enchantress
Silent Sentinel
Mesa Enchantress
Femeref Enchantress
Enchantress' Presence
Argothian Enchantress

6
(10 total)

Cackling Counterpart
[strike]Dance of Many (As much as I want to avoid copying opponent's stuff, the tutorability and fact that it makes a token to populate is really good)[/strike]
Dual Nature
Fated Infatuation
Followed Footsteps (Again, as much as I'd like to avoid copying opponent's stuff, the original stated goal of the deck was "get followed footsteps onto doubling season)
Mimic Vat (Probably; does steal opponent's stuff sometimes, though.  But, the tokens it creates can be populated)
Minion Reflector
Mirrorworks
Tempt with Reflections

9
(19 total)

Druid's Deliverance
Growing Ranks
Rootborn Defences
Sundering Growth
Trostani, Selesnya's Voice
Trostani's Judgment
Wayfaring Temple

7
(26 total)

Hana, Ship's Navigator
Dowsing Shaman
Open the Vaults
Replenish
Academy Rector
Enduring Ideal
Enlightened Tutor
Idyllic Tutor
Plea for Guidance
Sterling Grove

10 cards
(36 total)

Liquimetal Coating
Argent Mutation
Mycosinth Lattice
March of the Machines
Karn
Titania's Song
Animate Artifact
Karn's Touch
Fabricate

9 total
(44 cards)

Wargate

1 total
(45 cards)

Angelic Shield
Spear of Heliod
Mirari's Wake

3 total
(48 cards)

Sylvan Library
Mystic Remora
Rhystic Study
Spreading Seas

3 total
(52 cards)

Hmm...looks like I'm one over-budget here.  Well...I do think the issue of lands becoming artifact creatures and dying is a problem, but I'd have to replace a number of deck slots to deal with that.  So...that's probably staying in the deck.  On the other hand, Karn's Touch is just worse than the rest in its category, so that's an easy cut.  And...Titania's Song is...hard to use, since two of the things that make enchantments into artifacts are themselves artifacts and thus get disabled.  Cut those two.

And then just 11 ramp cards, 39 lands.  So like...

Dawn's Reflection
Fertile Ground
Overgrowth
Utopia Sprawl
Wild Growth
Mana Reflection
Sol Ring
Noble Hierarch
Chromatic Lantern
Gilded Lotus
Coalition Relic

Lands
3x Karoos
Some duals and fetches
Command Tower
Reliquary Tower
Serra's Sanctum
some basic lands

Oh, hm, you know what, Eternal Witness is probably too good to not run in this deck.  There will always be tutors and fetchlands in the graveyard, and maybe some spells that make token copies of stuff, and it can have token copies of it made and then populated.  Hmm...cut Dance of Many?  It is the one remaining card that easily copies opponent's stuff; Mimic Vat and Followed Footsteps can too, but they give warning, and neither are particularly good at copying enemy generals (which has been the main point of contention in my playgroup lately).  Although...eternal witness definitely goes infinite with some combination of stuff (enough doubling seasons + enough token copy cards in your graveyard + mana rock creature tokens that get haste through minion reflector or something).  Actually, Angelic Shield with minion reflector and enough doubling seasons and a mana rock can also go infinite.  So...ok no, don't add Eternal Witness, keep Dance of Many...wait, hold on, is Dance of Many itself a problem card?  What if the token is a copy of dance of many?  You can make unlimited Dance of Many this way, which...isn't immediately a problem since you can't pay the upkeep on all of them, but if they have haste then that's a problem.  If there's a doubling season in play, then that's a problem, because each copy makes two dance of many--one of them can put a token copy of doubling season into play.  Then you don't need to pay a lot of upkeeps.

Ok, so not adding Eternal Witness, but unexpectedly cutting two cards.  I guess titania's Song and Karn's Touch go back in....

[metroid composite]

Hearthstone.

So...Laggy asked me what deck I would build if I could put up to 30 of any card in a deck--no deck limit.  And the goal is to kill the opponent quickly.

As an absolute baseline:

Warlock Decklist:
30x soulfire

Kills on turn 3 if you go second.  Kills on turn 4 if you go first.  Any serious competition must be able to beat one of these benchmarks, or match them without lifetapping, because this deck is 100% consistent.


So anyway, my first thought was "I want to run at least 6 murloc warleaders".  So...like

Turn 1: Innervate, Murloc Tidecaller x3
Turn 2: coin, Murloc Warleader (attack for 15; more than lethal on board)

This looks pretty good.  But you can't do this if you go first--no coin, and not enough cards to do innervate warleader on turn 2.  So...what are the options that actually kill on turn 3?

T1: Innervate, Tidecaller, Murloc Tidehunter
T2: Innervate, Murloc Warleader, attack for 13, 16 power on board--shapeshift will kill next turn if nothing dies

T1: Innervate, Murloc Tidecaller x3
T2: Murloc Tidehunter, attack for 12
T3: Murloc Warleader, attack for 28

T1: Innervate, Murloc Tidecaller x3
T2: Grimscale Oracle, attack for 12
T3: Warleader, attack for 23

T1: Innervate, Tidecaller x3
T2: Bluegill Warrior, attack for 11
T3: Warleader, attack for 22

I still am not in love with these, because they require topdecking the right card twice in a row (whereas when playing with coin you can just have everything you need in your opening hand, so you can mulligan for it).  That said, impressed by Tidehunter here, so what about like...

T1: Innervate, Tidecaller, Tidehunter
T2: Tidehunter, attack for 8
T3: Warleader, attack for 22

Ok, that's better, and lets you have a spare card in hand at all points (so you can mulligan to get a warleader, for instance).  I don't like the increase in 1 toughness creatures, though.  This is similarly good going second, except you get to cast Warleader on turn 2 and attack for 13 T2.



So like....

6 Innervates
7 Murloc Warleaders
8 Murloc Tidehunters
9 Murloc Tidecallers

Something like that?


This deck does have a funny weakness, though, in that Murloc Warleader buffs all murlocs including enemy murlocs, so it might actually lose to a standard Murloc deck.  To make it more resiliant to that, Old Murk-eye is an option, since he just gets extra power based on the number of murlocs, so in a murloc mirror can be like...a 10/4 charge for 4.



Hmm...wonder what the non-murloc options are.  Coin Scrubs, shadow step x4 leads to...attacking for 12 on turn 2.  Drop Raid Leader on turn 3 and win I guess.  But I'm not sure what the scrubs deck does if it doesn't have coin.


Innervating out a bunch of 1 drops seems like the highest damage you can get out of Innervate.  And in a druid deck this can curve into Savage Roar.  So...that's an option, and will generally be better than raid leader.


Of course, another question is whether these are meant to beat up normal decks, or meant to play against each other, because in the latter case thins get different.  The all soulfire deck lifetapping 3 times before it kills you is now very relevant--that's 6 life lost!  Also, hunter becomes pretty cool, because there's this card called Explosive Trap, and this card called Unleash the Hounds.  (Although it gets rolled by the Soulfire deck).