Hakeem, I've played your Abzan build and it's really magnificent! It is really resilient, but I lost vs a mono blue mill deck! Kozilek, Butcher of Truth saved me from loosing to the mill, but 2 Phantasmal Dragon just did the work. Even though I had 2 Angelic Accord on board, I couldn't get any creatures on board because they got countered I wished I had Seance in the deck, and it really could make the deck more resilient.

My question is: what would you replace, to get the Seance?

I had Seance in the deck originally, but cut it because it just didn't do enough work without Angelic Accord in play. If you want to sneak in a singleton then I'd suggest taking Monk's advice to cut one copy of Saruli Gatekeepers.

My take. Mainly posting so i can link to it in the 10 games thread, but if anyone has comments, I'd be happy to read them.

There are a few reasons:

1) The deck is already heavy at the top, so replacing a four-drop with another doesn't hurt the curve.
2) Five toughness is HUGE so it's kind of like a Guard Gomazoa sans flying.
3) The combo with Obelisk is utterly ridiculous. Ten life per turn is basically insurmountable.

But it just seems really not needed to me and having the 2 saruli's still grants you the early life gain and more angel possibilities. Now that the obelisks are here I really think that seance is REALLY not needed in this pile anymore. (Even though it did fine without it, it could be really nice to get angels on the opponents turn.)

I think you missed the part where I said that Trilands were the reason to cut the Gatekeepers; in order to make the mana better for Obelisk I will lose a lot of gates and then Gatekeepers are just vanilla.

I haven't used Seance in this deck for a very long time, either.

I gotcha on the gatekeepers now.. understood, with that in mind I am totally following you now, goodbye saruli.

Seance was a GREAT card here even though you refused to play it. ( I think mainly because of stevo )

I did play a singleton initially and it was great with Angelic Accord in play, but it was strictly average otherwise. I just thought Treasured Find was better in more spots.

Exiling a Rune-Scarred Demon felt filthy, though, I do miss that.

I have a question. What did you replace 3 of the selesyna gates with? Jungle Shrine or Seaside? Did you think the 3 damage or the draw, discard effect would be better here? I am leaning toward the seaside personally.

I haven't rebuilt the deck, I'm just theory-crafting. I think the blue mode is better than the red one in a deck like this. The draw power isn't quite there and topdecking Cultivate or land in the lategame is terrible. Being able to discard the land and go a card deeper would have more value here, I think.

My thoughts exactly.

Hakeem, I tried adding the obelisk in the deck and changed the manabase around a bit to support its use. So far, 5-1, with the loss to a pair of fiends on turn 4...pretty sure I wouldn't have won that game anyways. I feel it hurts the early game a bit but improves the long game options.

Here's my theoretical retake on the Abzan deck:



I've gotten away from Wall of Omens (because I hate it) and gone to Elvish Visionary instead. I've also added back a singleton Séance because this deck is a bit light on midgame plays so it gives me the ability to chump block a bit more freely and then exile something on my opponent's turn to chump again. The deck is more control now than midrange so Séance is a bit better at generating additional value.

I've parted ways with Saruli Gatekeepers, which may actually spell the death knell for the deck because they were pretty important at stabilizing the board against aggro. For now I've added two Obelisk of Alara, four trilands instead of Selesnya Guildgates so I can access more modes of the Obelisk, and Rhox Faithmenders as excellent blockers and to combo with the Obelisk's white mode.

I've cut down to two copies of Angelic Accord because it's more of a combo piece now than it was before I cut the Gatekeepers.

I've also decided to cut ties with Griselbrand because it's much less likely that I just drop him and draw seven because of those Gatekeeper triggers that I don't have anymore. His absence does make the rest of the mana better, so there is a minor upside there.

The curve is a bit high but I'm a bit stuck as to how to rectify it. Thoughts?

I have been thinking that I like the deck the way it was better to be honest. It worked phenomenally. Had a better staying power early AND its late game was GREAT. Plus grisel is my favorite creature in the game..

And I think it could kill faster too. (though I would get the seance in there instead of one of the saruli)

You may be right. I'm going to play it this way just because, but I don't feel that great about it.

This is the version I am currently testing right now. I am inclined to agree with 2bestest, the original is astounding and has over an 80% win ratio for me and this seems like mid-game it can slow down a bit. I played an unusual game yesterday where I only found the Obelisk for lifegain and my opponent was running all 3 Reclamation Sage.

Some notes I have so far...as stated above, seeing more artifact/enchantment removal. That makes the Obelisk weaker overall. Missing the lifegain the Gatekeepers gave you and the body, but the Rhox Faithmender have been a very, very welcome addition...I'd love to find a way to fit them into the original version.

As far as your curve being high, Hakeem, I dont' think you really can fix it and keep it good at all points of the game. You've got a nice even split between early plays and late game-winning bombs. Why do you hate Wall of Omens so much?

The Boros Heroic deck got completely pulverize by Hakeem's Azban deck last night, it was awful. The guy was down to 2 cards in his library when I had to kill Kozy and then he got his whole deck back, planar cleansed, dropped a Pelakka and that was that. UGH

Imo Hakeem's 1st take on the Abzan deck + 1 Seance instead of 1 Saruli Gatekeepers was the best deck till the exp hit and now it's still top. It might still be best, but I can't judge the new Jund and Naya decks

He likes visionary more because it has the possibility of deterring attacks. They both have advantages and disadvantages.

I still feel that the old deck is the way to go with this deck. I kinda feel like adding the obelisk is trying to do too many things at once. I also feel Rhox is overkill and totally not needed here. The lifegain is to trigger angels and get you to the later game where the deck shines. Rhox doesn't generate angels upon entering and doesn't make other cards in the pile push into generating angels either. For this reason I would opt against him when running the original build. I say the build should stay the way it was, only I would totally support putting seance in as I have stated before.

I'm actually mucking around with a version that has cut all the Cultivates in favor of all the two-drops and both copies of Seance. I'm still on the Faithmender/Accord/Obelisk plan but I think it's incorrect. The Obelisk/Accord combo is absolutely insane but it just feels like overkill.