An experimental deck I call Tabula Rasa, built around several cards that reset the board:

1 x Kytheon, Hero of Akros
2 x Topplegeist
4 x Faerie Miscreant
1 x Clutch of Currents
2 x Hanweir Militia Captain
2 x Dauntless River Marshal
1 x Jace, Vryn's Prodigy
2 x Metropolis Sprite
2 x Bygone Bishop
2 x Stitched Mangler
2 x Scrapskin Drake
2 x Reflector Mage
1 x Archangel Avacyn

1 x Gideon, Ally of Zendikar

2 x Displacement Wave
1 x Call the Gatewatch
3 x Roil Spout
2 x Planar Outburst
2 x Tragic Arrogance
1 x Crush of Tentacles

10 x Plains
10 x Island
2 x Prairie Stream
2 x Glacial Fortress

Working reasonably well up to now, but could probably use some improvements. Ideas?

I'd have to question why are you mixing weenies with board-wipes. With all your win-cons being so small and aggro-dependant, you're probably hurting yourself as much or even more than you are your opponent with the board-wipes.

Mixing aggro creatures with hard control cards like Outburst, Arrogance or Crush of Tentacles doesn't seem like too synergistic a deck to me, but what do I know.

Yeah the Board Wipes and Control + aggro doesn't mix too well here. What are you trying to achieve with the build? Early or late game?

I guess that is my problem, I was trying to achieve both. Fast aggro, reset, and back to fast aggro mode. The Awaken cards provide some larger creatures which are conveniently immune to most of the board wipes.

If I want to keep the board wipe theme, what creatures should I use in your opinion?

The problem with that idea is that aggro creatures lose in value the longer the match goes on, so re-setting the board means you lose most of your momentum while you give your opponent time to regain theirs.

If you want to keep the board wipes, you should go hard control. Lots of removal and counterspells, and late game powerhouse cards such as Eldrazi.

If you want to keep the aggro shell, you can go for a more tempo-build with fliers.

Played a few more games this morning with Flash/Fliers, tweaked a little bit.....

http://forum.nogoblinsallowed.com/viewtopic.php?f=52&t=10292&p=437434#p437434

Expose Evil and Bygone Bishop have both been great, so I swapped out Dauntless River Marshall for Erdwal Illuminators. More fliers, a nice butt, and a good ability. Warping Wail and Grip of the Roil were cards I wanted to try but they weren't good enough. I added scatter to the Winds because I really only had Wail in there as a hedge against sweepers.

Eldrazi Displacer blinking Whirler Rogue a couple of times to feed Westvale Abbey is pretty sweet.

Still working on the mana obviously. Warped Landscape is on my radar, we'll see what happens.

Only tested it twice against the AI and I like it a lot. Mana could do with a little tweaking but I didn't run into any real problems. Something fun happened where the AI used that new blue mind control card and they took my Whirler Rogue. On my turn I used Eldrazi Displacer effect to get it back and get more tokens

With the new cards I was finally able to build a flash/control deck.

Creatures (20)
1x Kytheon, Hero of Akros
3x Topplegeist
4x Faerie Miscreant
2x Rattlechains
2x Dimensional Infiltrator
2x Bygone Bishop
3x Thunderclap Wyvern
2x Hixus, Prison Warden
1x Archangel Avacyn

Instants & Sorceries (12)
3x Horribly Awry
3x Celestial Flare
2x Scatter to the Winds
3x Broken Concentration
2x Confirm Suspicion

Enchantments (3)
3x Suppression Bonds

Land (24)
8x Plains
12x Island
2x Prairie Stream
2x Glacial Fortress

Keep your opponent at arms length with counters and emergency removal. Then use their end step to flash in your creatures and get ahead in the race.

I use Bygone Bishop and Confirm Suspicion to add some card draw on things I need anyway: counterspells and flyers.

The 1-drops are either to be played on your first turn, to put the pressure on before counter shields go online, or on later turns when you don't need the mana.

I've tested this list a little, works pretty well. I suggest trying Pious Evangel in there, when I subbed him in he was useful every time and even won me one game single-handedly. Another card worth trying might be Invocation of Saint Traft Edit: Tried it, sometimes useful, sometimes dead, on the fence about it.

Yeah, that could be pretty good in there. I'm still trying to decide the best tools for the deck, it feels very powerful, but I haven't had a chance to test it against the meta. I'm working on as many deck concepts as possible - I might be playing in 2 tournaments shortly.

I've tried Pious Evangel and to me it seems like it would fit better in a WB or Crats version of the deck rather than a WU version. You don't really have anything in WU to take advantage of the lifegain or sacrifice effects, except to flip your 1-of Avacyn.

I like the deck concept, DJ, though I worry that Goma Fada + Displacer comes in too late to be effective sweeper protection. It looks pretty aggressive; I was thinking of trying WG for an aggro humans deck, but WU looks powerful as well.


I went a bit more midrange for my UW tempo deck:

5 x Plains
5 x Island
2 x Prairie Stream
2 x Glacial Fortress
3 x Meandering River
4 x Crumbling Vestige
2 x Westvale Abbey
2 x Foundry of the Consuls

3 x Essence Flux - Removal defense, combo with several ETB creatures

2 x Hanweir Militia Captain - Early attacker/blocker, Combo with Whirler, Skyspawner, Abbey
2 x Dimensional Infiltrator - Early flier with modest upside
2 x Dauntless River Marshal - Early attacker/blocker, utility ability later on
1 x Jace, Vryn's Prodigy - Looting, recursion
3 x Disperse - Bounce, removal defense, combo with several ETB creatures
2 x Declaration in Stone - Spot removal

2 x Eldrazi Displacer - Removal defense, combo with several ETB creatures
4 x Eldrazi Skyspawner - Ramp, combo enabler, flier, source of colourless
3 x Reflector Mage - Bounce
2 x Make A Stand - Sweeper protection, finisher

3 x Whirler Rogue - Sweep recovery, combo with Hanweir, Reality Smasher, Abbey
2 x Thought-Knot Seer - Sweep/removal/threat protection
1 x Gideon, Ally of Zendikar - General goodstuff

1 x Archangel Avacyn - Sweep protection, finisher
2 x Reality Smasher - Combo with Whirler, Skyspawner
1 x Jace, Unraveler of Secrets - Draw, bounce

Yes, it has 61 cards because I wanted an extra mana. Anyone who doesn't like that can figure out which card to cut themselves.

There are several other cards that are arguably a good fit:
- I tried Roil Spout in place of Disperse (combo with Dimensional Infiltrator) but didn't like the extra mana cost and lack of utility on my own creatures; Clutch of Currents would be better but is still only sorcery speed. On the other hand, Just the Wind could be a possibility; I have only Jace for looting so madness doesn't come up much, but if man-lands are more of issue than enchantments or the like, then Just the Wind can hit them where Disperse can't.
- Make A Stand is a general purpose card that is good at several things but not exceptional at any of them. Scatter to the Winds would be a better anti-sweeper spell. Thalia's Lieutenant (abuse ETB effects) or Always Watching would be a better general purpose pump. The versatility is useful if you don't know exactly what you'll need, but I consider this slot to be tunable if I am anticipating a particular kind of threat.

Yeah, that's cool. So when I built it - and posted it just so the idea would be out there - I was undecided whether it was aggro, midrange, or aggro control. I am now fairly certain this is an aggro control deck, and that's going to shape the choices a lot. For example, goma fada is out, Will breaker is out, irregulars are possibly out - but not sure as they are an excellent aggro control finisher. I would strongly consider adding some hard counters - or at least spell shrivels/make a stands (2/2?). Finally, I'd be looking for a replacement for lanterns scouts - and I'd strongly consider finding a spot for a BIG draw spell - like Pore over the Pages.

Some thoughts, I'm completely against running Reality Smasher in a deck like this, but it's not because I've tested it. It's too expensive, and on t5 most of my current decks wouldn't even be worried about a 5/5 trampler. Also, you can't fit enough colorless sources into the deck, without screwing up your ability to play the rest of your cards - but with no <>X lands. (More about my deck than yours, to be clear).

I think I prefer the spirit fliers decks to the humans concept, but I'm not sure. Humans can get very BIG, and that makes it interesting, especially since humans know how to make things unblockable. :-)

I think that I agree that if I want an aggro/control deck (rather than a mid-range list like the one I posted above) then I would probably look more closely at spirit fliers than at humans. I haven't seen a take on that archetype that I (a) have tried out and (b) really love, but I think such a deck might well exist. For BIG humans I am guessing that I want to go green -- still need to look into that more closely, however.

Here's a starting point: viewtopic.php?p=436565#p436565
It's good. You just have to determine the cuts, and add a bit more for control elements.

Hakeem posted one too.

Big humans is good in UW or WG. But I think UW is actually better, I just haven't got it 100% finished yet - because I'm trying tons of new things and optimizing nothing, lol. (That's said, the 2 drop spot in WG is fantastic. You can put tons of pressure with just 2 drops, leaving the deck open for all kinds of shenaningan switch later cards. My only concern in those colors is removal/board control.)

In the future just link Hakeems version

My take on UW Spirits based on BounceBurnBuff deck, i've been having some really great results with it.

Creatures (19)
3 x Topplegeist
2 x Dimensional Infiltrator
2 x Rattlechains
2 x Bygone Bishop
3 x Blessed Spirits
3 x Reflector Mage
3 x Spectral Shepherd
1 x Archangel Avacyn

Spells (17)
3 x Essence Flux
2 x Declaration in Stone
3 x Claustrophobia
2 x Make a Stand
3 x Spell Shrivel
2 x Always Watching
2 x Invocation of Saint Traft


Lands (24)
2 x Glacial Fortress
2 x Prairie Stream
4 x Evolving Wilds
8 x Plains
8 x Island


Claustrophobia could be Tightening Coils still testing,
Evolving Wilds instead of Meandering River to help activate Topplegeist Delirium, which is awesome.
Archangel Avacyn never got her in 10+ games, don't really know if has a place in the deck, but i think it does.

I didn't like it that much. You link it.

He's still stuck on the eldrazi hype. I'm not buying into it. We didn't get Hedron Crawler, the eldrazi decks just aren't going to be that good (read consistent). We also don't have the colorless tri lands. Meh... I'm over it before it even begins.

I didn't like either version !



...I like u tho

So, from testing on my Azorius Hard Control list, Confirm Suspicions is proving to be surprisingly better than I expected for such an expensive counterspell. The three clues are fantastic in the late game if you're hurting for hand, and a hard counter is still a hard counter.

Yep, Suspicions is fantastic.