Casual Guilt

[AceOfJacks]

Greetings.  First of all ... I would like to re-introduce myself.  I used to frequent these forums several months ago, but I stopped, and almost quit Magic.  My old account has appently been removed, so I have re-created it.  I am thankful that this site is still up.

I am working on a casual deck.  Unfortunately, I have only played this deck against a lot of creature-based decks, and they seem to give me a lot of trouble.

For that, I am considering putting "Vile Consumption" and "Breathstealer's Crypt" into the deck.  However ... my blue and black deck building skills are virtually untrained, as I do not play black and blue often.

Please help me with this deck if possible.  The only piece of Power I have is Ancestral Recall, and it will go into the deck, but I just do not know what to do in order to make this deck a winner.

Any help is truly appreciated.  Thank you in advance.

This is the deck as is right now (without the Underworld Dreams ... I need to acquire them)

//NAME: Megrim hurts
// black
        4 Megrim
        4 Underworld Dreams
        4 Phyrexian Arena
        4 Dark Ritual
        1 Demonic Tutor
        4 Soul Feast
        2 Seizan, Perverter of Truth
// blue
        4 Stormscape Familiar
        1 Fact or Fiction
// gold / artifact
        4 Urza's Guilt
        1 Mana Vault
        1 Sol Ring
        3 Ivory Tower
        3 Anvil of Bogardan
// land
        4 Polluted Delta
        8 Swamp
        4 Tainted Isle
        4 Underground Sea

Cards thinking of going in:
Ancestral Recall
Lotus Petal
Mox Diamond
Vile Consumption
Breathstealer's Crypt

If I add white:
Confessor
Tainted Field
Scrubland
Vindicate
Death Grasp
Life Burst
Solitary Confinement

[Upinthe]

Breathstealer's Crypt and  particularly Vile Consumption are both terrible. Your opponent will just lose a few points of life and smash your face in. [card]Propaganda[/card] helps and [card]No Mercy[/card] is better for actually killing creatures. [card]Recoil[/card] is another card to consider to buy you time. If you can get them, [card]Undermine[/card]s might be useful to bitch slap somene with also.

[AceOfJacks]

I'm sorry for the delay, but I was unable to log in on my other computer without saving my login settings ... and that computer has other users, so I would rather not save anything on it.

As for your suggestions ... I'm heavily considering white as an option.  Confessor and Solitary Confinement means that I don't need No Mercy OR Progaganda ... and the Stormscape Familiars allow me to cast the Confinement with relative ease.

As for the Undermines ... I am not a heavy fan of countermagic ... because it's just wrong.  Just on principle ... it's wrong.

Recoil was originally in the deck ... but I actually used them as the proxies for the Underworld dreams ....  

After I discuss this deck a little more and find out what my options are .... I'll know whether or not I actually have room for them.

Considerations:

-8 Swamp, +4 Tainted Field, +4 Scrubland
-3 Ivory Tower, +3 Solitary Confinement
-2 Seizan, -1 Stormscape Familiar, +3 Confessor.

Does that look a little better?

[Ephraim]

With black/blue as your colour base, there are plenty of options for staving off creature-based aggro. One of the ones I like the most is Planar Void plus Web of Inertia. Since a lot of decks like to live out of their graveyards, Planar Void is pretty good on its own. The only problem with this strategy is that in the absence of Planar Void, your discard spells actually help to enable your opponents to attack you. That said, you probably would be better off with Propaganda and/or Ghostly Prison.

I'm not really getting what's so good about Solitary Confinement + Confessor. Sure, you gain a little bit of life every turn, but you're still running out of cards. Am I missing a card somewhere that's allowing you to trade that life for more cards? (update: I see. Phyrexian Arena. As long as you're not casting any spells, having Solitary Confinent, Confessor, and Phyrexian Arena in play provide you with a way of sitting tight until somebody can get rid of one or more of the pieces. Beware of Tempest of Light/Cleanfall/Tranquility, etc...)

As for your opinion on Undermine, I appreciate the sentiment. Countermagic is often frowned upon in casual venues. I seldom use it, myself. However, a deck with four counterspells is hardly a "counterspell deck." A deck doesn't have to be pure blue control to make fair use of countermagic. I certainly know how you feel, having faced many cheap, monoblue decks in my time. However, it isn't always appropriate to avoid countermagic altogether, either.

[AceOfJacks]

I like that combo Web + P. Void.  But honestly, the onyl things I can think about removing from the deck are the same cards that I was going to remove ... 2 Seizan, 3 Tower, 1  S. Familiar.

Do you agree with these choices?  Or do you think other cards in the deck need to be changed?

And furthermore ... burn = ow.  Should I just consider sideboard cards against them, or should I try to find a more universal card for the deck that would help me?

[Upinthe]

Why is Soul Feast in the deck? Its expensive and it can't even hit creatures. The 4 life you get from it isn't worth investing in a 5 cc card. My philosophy of burn is that if you don't get at least the same amount of damage for each mana you put in, its not worth it. That'd be the first thing I'd take out...

[AceOfJacks]

Why is Soul Feast in the deck? Its expensive and it can't even hit creatures. The 4 life you get from it isn't worth investing in a 5 cc card. My philosophy of burn is that if you don't get at least the same amount of damage for each mana you put in, its not worth it. That'd be the first thing I'd take out...

Soul Feast will be the only card in the deck that can net me life if I remove the Towers ...

And with Familiars out, it costs less.  The point of it is to allow me to get more life than my opponent, so that the Urza's Guilt kills them and not me.

If I take it out, I have absolutely no way to gain life in the deck at all.
And that's not cool.

[LotusHead]

On a quick review of the decklist, if creature beatdown is what you fear, then obviously Barter in Blood and say, Pestilence is what you need.

You probably only sometimes have a creature out anyways (6 creatures, by my count), so Barter in Blood will keep the opponent in check.

I like the Ivory Towers. I use them in my scrubby Ninja deck against random beatdown myself.

[AceOfJacks]

I'm also considering Steel Wall / Fog Bank.

Seizan is definitely out.  Edicts or Barters are going in.  I'm leaning more towards edict though.

And I still need something for direct damage.

[AceOfJacks]

Updated decklist:

//NAME: Megrim hurts

// black
        3 Nightscape Familiar
        3 Megrim
        3 Underworld Dreams
        4 Phyrexian Arena
        4 Dark Ritual
        1 Demonic Tutor

// blue
        3 Propaganda
        4 Accumulated Knowledge
        3 Stormscape Familiar
        1 Fact or Fiction
        1 Ancestral Recall

// gold / artifact
        4 Urza's Guilt
        1 Sol Ring
        3 Ivory Tower
        3 Anvil of Bogardan

// land
        4 Polluted Delta
        8 Swamp
        4 Tainted Isle
        4 Underground Sea

total 61

still looking at edicts

if i were to have a sideboard, chill would definitely be stapled to it.

[Upinthe]

This looks MUCH better than the original deck list. Props to you.

However, you still might want to see if you can find space for [card]Windfall[/card].

[AceOfJacks]

This looks MUCH better than the original deck list. Props to you.

However, you still might want to see if you can find space for [card]Windfall[/card].

Noted.


Also ... Fact or Fiction, while good, seems slow.  Should I test the deck with Windfall in it's place?

[AceOfJacks]

I'm going to test a new card in the deck.

Moonring Mirror

Moonring Mirror

Artifact
Whenever you draw a card, remove the top card of your library from the game face down.
At the beginning of your upkeep, you may remove your hand from the game face down. If you do, put into your hand all other cards you own removed from the game with Moonring Mirror.


* Note that Moonring Mirror's first ability is not a replacement effect.

* If you choose to use Moonring Mirror's second ability, you return all the cards you own removed by both of its abilities, but not any of the cards you just removed from your hand.

This card is sick with Arena and Ivory Tower.  Example:
At the beginning of my upkeep, I put Tower on the stack, followed my Mirror, followed by all the arenas.  I draw with the Arenas, then remove cards to the Mirror.  If I have like 10 cards under the Mirror, then I can switch the cards, and then gain more life with the Tower.  Next turn more cards go under the mirror, adding to the hand I just put under it this turn, and I can keep getting cards to play every turn.

[AceOfJacks]

Ok I think it's time I update this little thread of mine.

I have added white.  For 5 reasons.  Balance, Ghostly Prison, Ghostly Prison, Ghostly Prison, and ... dum dum dummmmm Ghostly Prison.

Cut all creatures completely.

Added POX.  Fun card.

Added an proxied Ancestral Recall (I own one, just have it in another deck).

New decklist:

//NAME: Megrim hurts
// black
        4 Megrim
        4 Phyrexian Arena
        4 Dark Ritual
        1 Vampiric Tutor
        1 Demonic Tutor
        3 Pox
// blue
        4 Propaganda
        1 Ancestral Recall
        1 Reins of Power
        1 Windfall
// white
        4 Ghostly Prison
        1 Balance
// gold / artifact
        3 Urza's Guilt
        4 Anvil of Bogardan
        3 Ivory Tower
        1 Sol Ring
// land
        2 Swamp
        2 Tainted Field
        4 Tainted Isle
        4 Scrubland
        4 Underground Sea
        4 Polluted Delta

Now that I run a creatureless deck, I can add cards like Balance and Pox to gain some sort of avantage over my opponent.  Having 8 Props as opposed to 4 is helpful against the creature rush as well.

Main problem is against direct damage now.  But 4 Chills and come CoPs on a SB would definitely change that.

Comments?