Holy ****, having so much fun with this deck. Exactly how I want to play magic.

Yeah, this is my favorite deck by a country mile. I love "Draw, go" control and I have a terribly unhealthy obsession with Grixis, so it was necessary that I build this deck. It's a great meta deck, too, because it has excellent game against the aggro decks.

Glad you're enjoying it.

HAIL GRIXIS.

This feels like much more versatile control than any esper deck one can build in this cardpool, imho. Oh god how I love resounding thunder! And completely fallen in love with traumatic visions.. Help with mana-fixing in early game, and of course counterspell lategame.

Hail Grixis indeed! Wish they had added some good* (edit: ANY*) storm spells in dotp 2015.. Always dreamt of building a Grixis storm deck.. Past in flames, brain freeze, tendrils of agony, reiterate etc.. And love me some snapcaster mage.. Maybe throw in a time warp, great whale and phantasmal image.. But it remains but a dream so far.. Not gonna pay buckets of gold to play Magic online.

I also do enjoy a somewhat limited cardpool.. Makes deckbuilding much more fun imho, by having to consider the meta.

If only they would have given us Cruel Ultimatum. Lord Bolas is displeased with Wizards.

I redownloaded D13 on my laptop recently and played through the campaign. Lord Bolas nailed me with a few of those before I decided to just play BoF and burn his face off.

What a nasty spell, though. It lives up to its name for sure.

I have been trying to put together an Elder Mastery deck for quite some time now and after quite a bit of testing, this is what I have come up with. I will admit that the card is a little overpriced (really wish it cost one less mana), but it is really fun when it works. This deck is not easy to play and requires some really careful decision making and planning. About card selections:

Guttersnipe: The MVP of this deck by a long shot. Once you get Mastery on it it is usually game over. Playing without it out there is still usually really powerful for chipping away at opponent and making them change focus to removal rather than casting powerful creatures, plus it is hilarious making an opponent discard 2 cards on a counter-spells once you do have Master out there. Very thematic to Grixis in my book.

Sparkmage: Can ping opponent to death or deal automatic damage for Mastery. Feel like this card is so underrated. I usually don't cast the little bastard until I have Elder Mastery ready to go but sometimes I make exceptions if I feel like I can counter enough to not lose him automatically.

Shock, Anger of the Gods, Auger Spree: much needed removal for deck. Hopefully counter-spells are enough to keep opponents off the board.

Negate, Nullify, Dissolve, Traumatic Visions: Counter, Counter, Counter... but be careful what you choose to counter too. Traumatic Visions also helps with some mana fixing.

Tribute to Hunger: Because there is usually only singletons out because of all the countering, this card can be really good at times.
Think Twice: Keep the draw engine going and hopefully draw into one of the three Mastery before it is too late.

Inferno Titan: Didn't want to include at first but is just too powerful in any deck that has red in it.

Charmbreaker Devils: Can be really powerful with all the spell casting and obvious semi-tutoring can be really good (and lucky).

The deck runs very much like a lot of the Izzet decks out there but hopefully still does Lord Bolas proud. As always, I really appreciate any feedback on this and hopefully you enjoy as much as I have!

Edit 1: Went w/ Hakeem's suggestions and replaced Tribute to Hunger with another Charbreaker Devils and a full set of Auger Sprees. Also replaced one Negate and Nullify with two Traumatic Visions. Haven't seen much of a difference yet, but am hopeful.

Wow, Elder Mastery doesn't specify combat damage. Guttersnipe and Sparkmage are amazing, nice find. My only concern on the initial view is that you don't have enough creatures, but I absolutely love the concept. I would find room for Traumatic Visions somewhere, perhaps two copies over one each of Nullify and Negate. It's essentially Think Twice copies 5-6 but with huge upside.

I also wonder about the effectiveness of Tribute to Hunger in a counterspell deck in case they resolve some weenies underneath. I'd rather some other removal, I think, like the fourth Spree and maybe one Flesh to Dust or something. Charmbreaker Devils #2 could be good here also because of the counterspell protection.

Overall I love it, though.

I've been staring at Elder Mastery since the DLC dropped, but I just couldn't justify the cost or find a way to make it work.

Color me inspired. I'll be fiddling with this later.

Could it work on Tormented Hero as well?

Hakeem, I had the 4th spree and 2nd devils in before. Think I will switch it back. Good suggestion. Thanks for the feedback. I will be extremely interested to see how this runs for other people. Let me know how it goes!

No, because Tormented Hero isn't the source of the life loss when you trigger Heroic. The wording on Guttersnipe specifies that he does the damage, so Elder Mastery will trigger. It's amazing, I think I'm in love.

When you hit people with a guttersnipe with mastery you can almost see the look of disbelief (at least I like to imagine it)

I got hit with that look when I saw the deck's concept. I'm just glad I didn't have to discard two cards!

So I have also tested electomancers and Stormbreath. What other creatures can we shove in here?

So.. I played 5 matches and was never able to set up the combo. In fact, I was never able to get Elder Mastery on a single creature. I either won handily or ran out of cards.

It really feels like a win more card. By the time turn 6 comes around, my opponent doesn't have many cards to discard, or I'm in the position of not wanting to tap out.

I tried to get it on Creepy Doll so my opponent would have trouble getting rid of it, but the guy I was playing dropped a Dead Weight on my doll However, I still think that could be a good combo.

I think I want to put it in a deck that doesn't mind tapping out.. like a Conflux deck. I also think it would be really good on Two-Headed Cerberus or Wrecking Ogre, for a 4-card discard

Cool idea. It would be a neat combo with Vent Sentinel in a defender deck, which I think mostly wants to be Grixis anyway.

elder mastery looks really awesome. I love it when someone finds that tiny detail that everyone overlooked, great find. this is something I am going to try out. also hakeem I feel like I should be apologizing that it has taken me so long to try out your grixes control creation. love it, lots of fun, great work. still waiting for this game to get boring for me and hasn't happened yet!

great idea DH50!!!

Really cool idea on the Vent Sentinel. I am curious to know how that goes.

Just had two games in a row where I got 2 Elders out. Do feel like it is definitely win more in a lot of cases, but a fun win more at least.

Do you guys think it would work in my current build to put Guard Gomazoa and Vent Sentine? Would help with my lack of creatures. What would we cut though? Maybe get rid of the Charmbreakers all together

when you play grixes control, you play alone.