This is what I like to see in a Bant deck. Most of the decks posted in this thread are Fog decks... I just don't get the appeal. It's got to be the most boring archetype to use/play against, next to mill. You literally don't do anything. No creatures, no interaction with the opponent. You just sit there and do nothing for 20 turns till you can get some kind of Time Warp combo, or whatever strategy those decks use to win. Boner Wand maybe? Idk what others' opinions are, but I think that has got to be one of the most boring ways to play the game.

The only way I could imagine getting any enjoyment out of using a fog deck is by pissing off your opponent because none of his creatures ever get in, and you potentially get rage messages. But even I don't think it would be that fun. What a waste of 30+ minutes.

Glad you like it!
If you want to play Bant and don't like fog decks, there are some nice exalted decks in this topic.
You could also try my bant ramp exalted deck: viewtopic.php?p=243133#p243133. I like big creatures, so I went with this approach

I have a Bant Fog deck, but don't really play it much. It's interesting though in the sense It's a unique archtype and can only be done in these colours. Anything that expands the variety of play styles is good in my book. Most other Bant decks tend to be an existing archetype + another colour, so don't play in that much of a unique manner.

Auunj's is at heart just an Azorius combo deck + Green. Even the marquee mechanic, Exalted, is better in Mono White. You don't really need Rafiq. Bant can add value, but outside of Fog decks, doesn't do a lot to distinguish itself with unique strategies in this game. That's not to say Auunj's deck isn't good - it is good - but just that Bant colours have only added power to it, and not a unique playstyle.

The other good thing about Fog decks are that they're quite good against token and fast aggro decks, so play an important role in evening out the metagame. I don't play to troll people, but I'm quite happy to occasionally frustrate the kind of person who does nothing but spam what they believe to be the most OP deck for easy wins.

Magic has a very simple foundation to winning/losing. Swing for the face with creatures, burn the face with spells and have no more cards to draw. so with 2 of the 3 considered boring I wonder, how long before the singleton method of winning/losing becomes repetitive? this is why I play every strategy and avenue and find none of it boring,That's my opinion on the subject anyway.

1. Swing with creatures
2. Burn with spells
3. Mill

I would say that 90-95% of decks in this format fall under numbers 1 and 2, and since the expansion, I'm having a lot of fun with this game. It hasn't been repetitive for me. I have not run into a mill deck yet, and I've run into a fog deck twice I think. I get that mill isn't really a viable option in this game, but it's not really a viable option in any format, and that's why it's not a very popular archetype. People either think that milling is super fun to do, but realize that it loses to decks that are trying to do numbers 1 and 2... or they just think that it's boring because you don't interact with your opponent, and the majority of the time you're just getting your face stomped in. Fog decks are viable in this format, but hardly anyone plays them. If I could wager a guess it would be because it's no fun to sit and do nothing in a match that's going to last 30 minutes.

This is just my opinion. I'm sure someone will comment and say "Well, so-and-so won this many times with a mill deck in the la-la-land format, so mill is actually really good and these statistics recorded on blah-blah-blah website show that more people like mill decks and fog decks than any other archetype, so I'm right and you're wrong." Go ahead and post these statistics. I understand that there are people who like using these decks. What I don't understand is why. And I never will! The only reason I can think of is because they are like Stevo, and only use decks that no one else uses because reasons. Or because they just want to troll the opponent.

Fog decks fall under category 2, burn with wand.

The only difference is for a fog deck you are stalling the game until your win con combo comes out, as opposed to a deck that relies on drawing any fat creatures to try and win. It's a specific set of conditons you need to create for yourself, and it takes time with a fog deck (or any combo deck)

A bant deck with a few cloudshift, archaeomancers and arbor colossus bores me personally. I've been playing dotp 2015 since its release mid last year, and I need to keep the game fresh by exploring the more unique styles.

Timmy decks have been done to death, the card pool encourages it but it's fun to explore outside of "my creature smash! yay!" etc

+1. Though "Kozilek Smash!!!" is also an occasional and acceptable win-con for Fog decks.

I also agree with the complexity argument. Surprisingly, I haven't yet played against a Fog deck, though I have played a few dozen games with my own, but I imagine it's incredibly boring to play against and seems simplistic from the other side of the table.

However, when playing it, it's actually pretty interesting and complex. As the Fog pool is quite shallow, split between three colours, and all have different levels of utility, you have to make a lot of calculations on how much damage you can afford to sustain (which requires a good knowledge of the metagame in predicting your opponent's deck's contents), when to Fog and when to draw, when to wipe and when to risk your small number of win-cons.

Playing it is pretty fun, and not the same experience as playing against it. And I think both are reasons for it's lack of popularity. Most hate the deck from just playing against it, and those that try it out find they lose pretty badly by making all manner of misplays, so give it up. That leaves only the good players who do well with it, who piss people off even more by winning a good percentage, which creates a shrinking cycle of popularity.

On a side note, a friend of mine won a game that lasted almost 2 hours in Ranked with this recently versus a lifegain deck with Elixirs, Griselbrand and Artifact destruction. Magic hell to some - Magic heaven to others!

Personally, I'd much rather spend two hours and win a titanic battle like that than win 10 games in the same time where all I did was repeatedly play out my hand and press "attack with all" every turn. Again, that's Magic heaven to some, but boring as hell to me.

Come to think of it, I don't think I've ever built and played a fog deck in this game yet. I just assumed it was boring and bad because it took my opponent who was using it 20 turns to lose the game. I suppose I'll go look through the thread for a decent looking one...

Edit: Just suffered a 20 minute loss.

To revive the Bant topic, here's my Bant Weenies which started of Monk's Naya Tokens

The deck is based on white and blue weenies with blue's card draw and a splash of green for Beastmaster Ascension and Sigil Blessing as a finisher.

I'm not sure the green splash is worth it for just four cards, though they are admittedly quite strong. White has Inspired Charge which is more expensive than Sigil Blessing, so really you're just making your mana worse solely for Beastmaster. You could always just play some Negates or Gods Willing to protect your board and just win with evasion.

How is Banisher Priest performing in this list?

This deck is doing pretty well and is fun to play, so I decided I might as well post it here.



The theme of this deck is card advantage. You are supposed to draw cards like crazy using small creatures with EtB draw rather than draw spells. If poor suckers die, they become Seance fodder and draw more cards. Eventually, draw into a bomb and win the game. Occasionally, win with a bunch of 9/9 or so random suckers if you draw into the Behemoth (which works just as fine if it is a Seance token btw -- "So, you've countered my Hoof? Oh look, its spirit is back to haunt you"). Most creatures have Seance synergy. The Quicklings are here to either bounce your card drawers for more draw, or as removal protection for valuable stuff like Mentor of the Meek. It can also save some creature from your own Planar Cleansing. You won't be able to save your Seance from it, though, so plan ahead. It's best to drop Seance next thing after a Cleansing.

This deck is extremely mana hungry. You've probably noticed that it has 25 lands and 4 Cultivates. Every one of them is needed. You will have a lot to do every turn.

The bombs are your choice. I use Souls because they are a mana sink and can block fliers. If you like Pelakkas or Baneslayer better, feel free to swap them in. I don't recommend cutting the Arbor Colossus, though, he's your flier removal that is fetchable with Seance. Didn't go 2x because of the GGG in the cost.

The Masked Admirers came in to replace 2x Reclamation Sage's. You may want to swap them back, depending on the meta. Also, swappable for 2 more Saruli Gatekeepers if there's a lot of RDW around (there isn't lately on Steam). The deck is highly tweakable in general, so go ahead and knock yourself out tweaking it to your liking! I've been constantly tweaking it, and will keep doing it as the metagame changes.

You might ask me: wouldn't this deck be better without blue? I tried it, but something was amiss. I felt it was just not as fun without Blue. Maybe I missed the Switcheroo's? But most likely it was the Quicklings.

Edit: added a video with typical gameplay:

I've been having fun with this deck. Of course the basic mechanism is to stall until cheating fatties in with Jalira, Master Polymorphist. But with the ramp I can also hard cast them. Suggestions to improve consistency are welcome.

How on earth can you possibly win with a fog-deck vs. any deck that has red in it? I've tried Stevo's Fog-deck a few times, but I keep running into Izzet burn that just.. well, burns me to death.

Edit:
Uhhh!! Loooool.. I only now realized that Safe Passage provides damage immunity to non-combat damage aswell.. Duh! Should be easier now

Edit2: Hihi, I must admit.. I really enjoy playing fog.. Makes me feel like a true goddamn troll muaahahaahaha.

Like trolling? "unmemorable"

Ohh yeah the Jeskai deck? Yeah, that is great fun too
I really love the green here though. I'm a huge fan of ramping, and even more so in control as I have so many options open all the time. Tons of mana and tons of draw is just so much freedom

If only I could play magic 2015 on my mac without parallels

Parallels?

A program for mac that emulates windows. I recently got my pc setup so I am back in action with magic 2015 again!
Played a match in unmemorable that lasted about an hour before the guy finally quit. I didn't bother to finish it either once he quit as I could see the possibility of it lasting another hour.

Gonna try out stevo's fogger and compare my results to my old fog build.

Just managed to mill myself with unmemorable vs a 75+ card deck earlier.. I dropped the elixirs for Kozilek and a wand, but of course decided to cast kozilek as exile fodder instead of saving him to discard.

For anyone interested in my Bant Combo deck, here are the latest changes:



I added 2x Species Gorger as another way to draw cards in case I don't draw Mentor of the Meek. Thanks to that I could drop Cultivate as I hardly ever have any many problems. Species Gorger is a 2-of, as I don't want to have 2 in my hand.

I also added 2x Planar Cleansing as I usually have card advantage and sometimes I need to sweep the board.