Toshiro Umezawa

[Matt]

So I happened to click on "view seller's other items" and I picked up a set of these guys for 50 cents. Now what do I do with them? Has anyone ever made a T.U. deck before?

Toshiro Umezawa      

Legendary Creature - Human Samurai
2/2
Rules Text (Oracle):    Bushido 1 (When this blocks or becomes blocked, it gets +1/+1 until end of turn.)
Whenever a creature an opponent controls is put into a graveyard from play, you may play target instant card in your graveyard. If that card would be put into a graveyard this turn, remove it from the game instead.

[Ephraim]

Let's break Toshiro Umezawa

I was just pondering the other day what to do with this guy, although I think it may have been you that put the idea into my head.  I think I'm going to do something with Forbidden Orchard.  I may pair it with Tainted AEther although Grave Pact may be better.  I'm not sure yet.  It will probably be a B/W control deck featuring cards like Abeyance, Chastise, Raise the Alarm, and Razor Barrier.  Black's contribution to the selection of instants is a little bit trickier.  It brings a lot of creature-kill to the table.  Cards like Darkblast are good and they do help to fill up the graveyard with instants, but can you really justify playing Darkblast when you could play with Swords to Plowshares instead?  Devour in Shadow might the cut because it actually sends the creature to the graveyard instead of removing it from the game, so it triggers Toshiro Umezawa.  With Grave Pact in the deck, Plunge into Darkness might be a hit.

At this point, I am also struggling with the best options for the deck's finisher.  I think there's a modest control strategy hidden in Toshiro Umezawa, but what's going to be the most reliable way to win?  Angel of Despair always looks like a fine addition to a black/white deck, so it bears mentioning.  Skeletal Vampire gives you creature tokens and a means to sacrifice them, so it pairs nicely with Grave Pact.

This raises another question, of course.  Granted, the white cards I've mentioned are all pretty splashable.  On the other hand, Grave Pact demands a very strong commitment to black.  Is that alone enough to consider using Tainted AEther instead?

[Jacob Orlove]

Funeral Charm could be a nice black instant here.

[ChemEng]

I had a fun deck with it that was based on instants+Toshiro+Forbidden Orchard+Night of Souls Betrayal. When it worked, it was great. When it didnt, you got a quick reminder about playing flashy things over stable ones.

[Ephraim]

Well, I've assembled something and played a few test games with it.  Tainted AEther and Forbidden Orchard definitely weren't working out.  They relied too much on both being in play at the same time, so I've taken out Forbidden Orchard and I am using Grave Pact instead.  Early editions of the deck didn't have enough creatures, especially with the addition of Grave Pact, so if the compliment of instants seems smaller than expected for a Toshiro Umezawa deck, that's why.  I think that the deck is a trifle inconsistent, so I may further cut a few cards to add three copies of Night's Whisper. 

There is probably also call for a couple copies of Disenchant.  The deck hasn't won yet and I attribute some of that to powerful artifacts getting in my way.  Although I like Grave Pact in theory, I think that my other kill spells (especially Plagued Rusalka) are effective enough at killing my opponent's creatures that those two slots could probably be used more constructively.  I could probably use one fewer Abeyance and possibly one fewer Diabolic Edict.  Any instant kill spell is really nice, though, because it goes to the graveyard in time for Toshiro Umezawa to flash it back.  I especially like Funeral Charm for this, though, because I can kill my opponent's creature and even if there isn't another creature to whack, I can flash the Charm back as instant-speed discard.

Proposed changes to the deck listed below:
-2 Grave Pact
-1 Abeyance
-1 Diabolic Edict

+2 Night's Whisper
+2 Disenchant

***

Creatures 13
3 Toshiro Umezawa
3 Riftmarked Knight
4 Plagued Rusalka
2 Plague Sliver
1 Angel of Despair

Spells (23)
2 Grave Pact
4 Diabolic Edict
4 Funeral Charm
4 Abeyance
4 Raise the Alarm
3 Shelter
2 Chastise

Land (24)
4 Tainted Field
12 Swamp
8 Plains

[Anusien]

Forbidden Orchard and Varchild's War-Raiders (doesn't one of the hunted guys put 1/1s into play?) both produce lots of creatures that are easy to kill.  Aether Flash, Leyline of Singularity and Night of Soul's Betrayal all kill tokens.

What I noticed is that mana is likely to be the biggest constraint.  You can't really afford to be spending a lot of mana to kill opposing creatures and then try to turn around and spend mana on your spells to flashback.  My thought was therefore to play Rituals.  The goal is to chain them.  It's obviously the Danger of Cool Things, but if you have Leyline of Singularity out, you want to do something like Cast Dark Ritual, tap Orchard for the second Spirit, killing them both, flashback Dark Ritual and something else, then cast something like a kill spell which gives you access to another.

Intuition for Cabal Ritual or Dark Ritual gives you a lot of gas to work with. 

[Ephraim]

AEther Flash was actually the first thing I thought of when trying to build with Forbidden Orchard.  As you said, though, the deck has a hard time if it doesn't find the synergies.  I'm especially concerned about AEther Flash or Tainted AEther because if Toshiro Umezawa gets destroyed, you can't get another copy into play.  I don't like Night of Soul's Betrayal, just because the deck's actually win condition is a creature (frequently Toshiro Umezawa himself.)  Every point of damage counts because the control structure is fragile enough that you can't maintain it forever.  Leyline of Singularity is a distinct possibility, but it pushes the deck into blue.  Blue has tons of instants, obviously, so that's probably good.  I'd like to see what kind of list you'd play in B/U.  I hadn't really considered blue, for no particular reason (I just hadn't gotten there yet) so I'm not sure what's worthwhile for a deck like this.

On a side note, should I be running Orim's Chant instead of Abeyance?  I like the cantrip, but do I get enough utility out of the card?

[Matt]

Grapeshot could be good. You're naturally going to be casting multiple spells per turn, and one grapeshot can take out multiple creatures (and therefore give you multiple flashbacks, one of which can be the Shot itself, giving even more power).

[Ephraim]

Grapeshot sounded like a really good idea until I looked it up.  It is actually a sorcery.  It's still a good idea, I think, but not quite as good as it first seemed.  Scattershot is an instant, but it only targets creatures.  It's good for clearing the board, then, but not at all good as a win condition.

[Nomad]

This card really calls for some buyback cards to my mind.  Play them foirst time around, then use Toshiro's special flashback once you've got some mana later, and pay the buyback.  Rinse and repeat.  Surely this'll be done multiplayer and you don't actually need an engine to kill creatures?