You are right, I'm not in a position to proxy. The Elvish Spirit Guides sound a bit random, were they really working for you? Another problem would be to find slots for them.

I need Witness for the Triskelion kill, don't I? This wouldn't make it an option for me because Witness isn't good in unpowered decks as we discussed above. Memnarch sounds good though. I think I'll ad one to the SB or maybe even try it in the maindeck.

Edit: So far I removed 1 Tropical Island and 2 Bayous for another two basic Islands and one Swamp. This leaves me with three Tropical Islands as permanent green mana sources, I hope this won't cause any problems in casting the Xantid Swarms.

I was thinking about Intuition of course, but it seemed to be to slow for an almost unpowered version of this deck. Let's assume that normally I don't have any artifact mana acceleration. I would have to play 3 mana-producing lands to play Intuition which means that I could play it in the forth turn considering the fact that I'd probably play Bazaar first turn. The Intuition won't end the game of course, so it would take at least another turn to finish the opponent. I also experienced that I often have only two mana-producing lands and a Bazaar, so maybe three mana isn't really good for a card that doesn't end the game in this unpowered version.

I don't really want to remove that Xantid Swarms because somehow I don't feel that I would stand a chance against a control deck or Fish without them. They are a must counter / must removal target for many decks and improve so many matchups that I don't think it would be good to remove them.

I thought about cutting one or two Tropicals and one Bayou for 2 more Islands and one Swamp. I'm not sure if only 2 permanent green mana sources are enough to support three or four Swarms. What do you think about the overall mana base? I don't have many mana problems so far although the manabase is quite narrow.

You are right when you say that Dance isn't good when you are reanimating creatures. Maybe I should go up to four Animate Dead and one Dance? But here again I have to say that Meddling Mage is played often and in most cases they name Animate Dead with it, so maybe four of them aren't that good. I could also go up to three Necromancies and one Dance but I feel that the Necromancies are a bit slow. On the other hand, they have the advantage of being an instant which makes them good to play around hate cards or to play them in the oppents turn so that the Sliver Queen kill can come immediately without waiting another round.

As I've been owning 4 Bazaars of Baghdad for years, I decided to play Dragon after Madness had become boring. Black and blue should be obvious as colours, I also added green for Xantid Swarms and possible sideboard choices. As you will see, the deck isn't full powered, in fact I only have access to two power cards; a Black Lotus and a Mox Jet. I'll just start with posting the decklist and go on with explaining card choices in the maindeck and sideboard.


3 Duress
3 Compulsion
4 Force of Will
3 Lim Dul's Vault
2 Dance of the Dead
2 Necromancy
3 Animate Dead
1 Entomb
1 Demonic Tutor
2 Stifle

4 Worldgorger Dragon
3 Squee, Goblin Nabob
3 Xantid Swarm
1 Ambassador Laquatus
1 Sliver Queen

1 Mox Jet
1 Black Lotus
1 Lotus Petal
1 Sol Ring
4 Polluted Delta
4 Underground Sea
4 Bazaar of Baghdad
3 Tropical Island
3 Island
2 Swamp


My metagame is a mixture between all types of decks with aggro probably being the most popular archetype. There are many Fish-Decks, Food Chain Goblins, Oath and some Bird Shit. Apart from these decks, control decks like MonoU or Control Slaver are played as well as combo decks like TPS or Salvager.

I decided to play three different animator spells because many decks in my metagame run Meddling Mages. My lack of Moxen and thus of speed is the main reason why I chose to play three Animate Dead over the more expensive Necromancy.

The Stifles are cards I'm not sure about. Usually they are useful against almost every deck, but there are of course cases in which you can't use Stifle but it's at least pitchable to FoW. I thought about Deep Analysis, maybe they would be better in this slot but somehow they seem a bit slow to me. What do you think?

The Sliver Queen is in the deck because it can go for the combo kill if Ambassador doesn't work, it can be a beatstick and it can be pitched to FoW. I don't play Witness in the maindeck because I would have to add some crappy draw spell for the kill as I don't have Ancestral Recall. Caller of the Claw isn't really needed either because there are almost no decks playing Root Maze in my metagame.

I'm not sure about the mana base. So far it works quite good, do you think four Tropical Islands are needed? The two Bayous aren't that necessary either, maybe I should remove one for another basic Island?

Now let's have a look at the sideboard which has not really been tested that much so far:

4 Chain Of Vapor
3 Sundering Titan
3 Hydroblast
1 Stifle
1 Xantid Swarm
1 Caller of the Claw
1 Eternal Witness
1 Inspiration

I chose to play Chain over Echoing Truth because the one mana difference in casting cost can be decisive. Sundering Titan should be clear, it's just plan B against some decks. I included Hydroblast because sometimes I lose randomly against Food Chain.
The Eternal Witness is now in the sideboard along with it's best friend the crappy draw spell, in this case Inspiration. That's not really good I know and somehow wastes a slot but Witness is the best kill option against some decks and especially against Oath.

So what do you think of the deck, my maindeck and sideboard choices and the questionable cards?

Thanks in advance.