my oath deck: reckless oath

[kibbe]

OK just to state again i am just getting back into magic, so this deck is very rough with just goldfishing to test it out. that being said it has some real potentail in it i think. one of my biggest probelms with oath decks is that with as powerful as oath is for the most part your opponent still  gets a clock (all be it a short one) to try to figure out a way out or a win. i always wanted to try to win after the first oath activation. basically if my oath activates i want to win on the spot. so how? my choice is certainly different than most oath decks but mine can win somewhat easily on turn 2(turn 1 with the perfect hand) which is something almost no other oath decks can say. so here goes

reckless oath

6 moxen, lotus
2 lotus petal, sol ring
3 forbidden orchard (see reasoning below)
3 city of brass (maybe something else?)
3 tropical islands
2 volcanic is
2 islands
2 fetch

3 fire/ice

4 force of will
2 chalice of the void
2 mana leak
1 misdirection

1 ancient grudge
1 naturalize
1 wipe away

2 scroll rack
4 impulse
3 thirst for knowledge
1 ancestral recall
1 brain storm
1 crop rotation
1 living wish

1 time walk

4 oath of druids
1 Serra avatar
2 reckless charge

sb
1 forbidden orchard
1 strip mine
1-2 decent win condition creatures

the main idea is to oath, hit avatar, and in the process dump a reckless charge in the yard cast the charge on the avatar(now hasted, trampling and buffed slightly) and swing for the win. not bad eh? yes there is no blessing and no reclimation so it is a bit of balls to the balls but hey why not? if i'm gonna win its worth the risk i think. reckless actually works really well cause it will trample right over any orchard tokens that might want to get in the way. originally i ran 3 but as the deck changed i went to only 2. if i can find room i will put the 3rd one back in but the is not much room for stuff as of right now, but its pretty effective right now with only one creature to hit. with the addition of fire and ice i don't have to swing for lethal. as long as i can get them close i can just finish the job with burn

OK so why only 3 orchards? well i run crop rotation and living wish both of which can get an orchard which gives me 5 ways to get one. also orchard without an oath is well not good it seems. yes it's important but i think the 3 plus 2 setup works well. the wish also backs up as win. I'm kinda up the creak if the avatar gets busted out a the game. if its killed i can just oath it back up as it shuffles back in anyway

fire/ice works really well here. if i don't manage to hit a charge i can burn the little orchard tokens out of my way as i swing. the ice woks to either slow the other players tempo plus it cantrips anyway(can the ice part shut off things like tangle wire/spheres or does that not work? if it does it's that much better still).

that's the basics but i can go into more detail if you have any questions/suggestions. tweeking i am cetianlly open to as i believe this deck is still quite rough. i know it is diffenent tahn most oath decks but i wanted it that way. if there is stuff that they do that you all think is just too good to no include im all for it. at the very least i'll consider it

as for additions I'd like to make: burning wish, and maybe recoup

the red wish could lead to some crazy plays out of the Sb(yag will for starters)

so, what ya think?

[BigBarn]

Just a heads up, there's probably several better Oath lists out there - but if you're dead-set on your list you might want to upgrade Reckless Charge into Dragon's Breath (and I suppose Dragon's Fangs if you want to give it trample, but I think shadow is better).

[UnholyAlliance]

I like where your head is at with the Avatar. Seize the day maybe worth a look. Although I'm not sure how you would work that in yet with the avatar? I see the flashback cost on the charge  is a bit pricey too. I would agree about the Scourge dragon enchants, prob your best bet. Gamble may find a spot in here too, being as ballsy as this is. Have you looked into the russian roulette version of Oath? You may find some more inspiration there. I can’t find a link or decklist, anyone have that? That deck used Phage and stifles, sounds like it's right up your alley.

[mort-]

I do think that a second creature wouldn't be too bad.
StP = you have just lost the game.

[kibbe]

i think I'm gonna drop crop rotation for another living wish. it keeps the orchard access basically the same and gives me another out if avatar leaves the game.

is there a decent sized  creature that is pro white that isn't black? it will be in the Sb to start (wishable though). i think that keeping the deck to a single creature is the only way to go for now. if I'm going to get away from the home run style I'll probably go to a more traditional set up with 2-3 dudes and a blessing and go the more recurring theme

is the deck base pretty good or am i just missing something obvious(is mana leak still relevant or is it just bad?)? again I've been out for awhile so i tried to piece this together from the lists i was seeing.

also i can't find the fangs card you mentioned. the breath doesn't do it for me. without trample i can't get by my own tokens so the breath is out. and if fang's doesn't give haste then it too is out. again the idea is to win the turn oath activates so.

the Russian deck sounds cool but i can;t find a list yet

[UnholyAlliance]

The "fangs" card is Dragon Fangs, a green enchantment from the Scourge set. Scourge has an enchantment of every color that all begin with the word Dragon and they all grant the enchanted creature an ability associated with the color. Green trample, blue flight, and so on. More importantly they can jump out of the graveyard and enchant a creature with converted mana cost 6 or greater.
So if you loaded up on these Dragon Wings, Dragon Fangs, (and maybe Dragon Breath for haste) and Oathed up your Avatar...
Or Phage (provided Stifle of course)...

[kibbe]

thats why i couldn't find it i was looking in red. still if it only gives trample and not haste i don't see it being good enough to top charge(see below) plus loading up the deck with stuff like that would make it inconsistant and only if i went off and if i got the cards i wanted into the yard. i usually go for 10 plus cards but sometimes it's not very many and well if i don't hit what i need... see below, again


some other thoughts:

i need to get the 3rd charge in so for the time being i'm gonna bump the deck to 61 just to get it in there. if i don't hit the charge then the deck isn't really much faster than a regular oath deck. if that happens then the other oath decks are just flat out better everywhere else so why run mine? so 3's the charm for the charge

do i have enough protection/removal? it feels like if someone powers something out i might have a difficult finding an anwser soon enough or at all. i feel like i run about the same amount of removal as other vintage decks but it just doesn't feel like enough. 

[mr.grim]

I think its a neat idea for more of a pet deck.I fell bthat there a lot of better oaths out there that you could be playing..
take a look at
1.tyrant oath
2.b/g oath
3.angel oath
4.icbm king james oath

At the end of the day I think that there will be alot of ways to get around your oath deck.

I dont like the one creature count.the orchard count. i think you should keep crop rot .

[kibbe]

cutting crop and orchard count are both solved with the 2ND wish. plus it gives me another out if avatar goes bye. crop is faster and can be used proactively to respond to strip effects and for that reason i think that it i may still keep it in the board. for the most part though it's a tutor and the wish is still that. plus if i put the 4Th orchard the wishes make almost no sense(no orchard in the board anymore). i like the fact that the way i have it set up i can have access to the 4Th orchard with the wishes effectively upping my orchard count to 5 maindeck. plus i can use the wish to get a beater if I'm getting pummeled with no oath in sight or get a plan b if the avatar gets toasted.

and yes this is a pet deck to be sure and that's why i posted here instead of the open forum.

i put it out here to see if it can be made better(maybe even good?) to see if there is anything more to it than just a novelty act. i haven't explored the sideboard yet but i could always make a transformational Sb and make it closer to a "normal" deck for game 2 and 3. it should some out of left field game 1 though. if you don't have an answer in hand and i oath you lose. that's got to count for something.

as far as phage goes i don't like the fact that i can't oath till i have a stifle in hand. makes it even harder to get things going and with the nature of oath it can struggle to get going anyway. like i said i think this deck could be good but i think that phage makes things harder(all be it more deffinite if it does manage to go off) not easier

[kibbe]

I've seen null rods in other builds of oath, would they work in mine? i feel my deck is more combo(kind of but not really, so...) and null rod seems to be a solution to combo not a part of it but again I'm still rusty/green so i could be missing something here. I'll have to 2 fist some matches against some other decks to see how this puppy really works

so far chalice seems to be pretty good. my mana requirements are really low so chalicing for 0 early will likely hurt them more than me. i can win with only 3 mana, and 2(to cast oath) if i have the charge in my hand, so slowing them down is good cause it really doesn't hurt me that badly. chalicing for 1 will hurt most decks a ton and keeps chain vapor(popular bounce from combo and others) from seeing play against me. my only concern is kind of a question actually. does chalice for 1 shut down my reckless charge from the yard(and same for ancient grudge as well)? the casting cost is still one on top of the card but its three if flashed back? also how does chalice interact with all the split second cards? do they still go thorough or are they countered? sorry more of a rules post but it is kind of relevant to my deck as I'm a bit strapped for counters/stoppers

[UnholyAlliance]

Chalice counters the split second spells, as those spells do not prevent triggers (chalice)from occuring. chalice Split second spells only prevent players from playing spells and activated abilities while they are on the stack. Spells played from your yard with flashback are considered to have the same casting cost at the top right of the card for all purposes other then actually casting the card from your grave.
Hope that helps.

[Nefarias]

still if it only gives trample and not haste i don't see it being good enough to top charge(see below) plus loading up the deck with stuff like that would make it inconsistant and only if i went off and if i got the cards i wanted into the yard.

I can see why haste is more important than trample, and hence why Charge is better than Fangs, but I can't understand why you think Charge would be better than the red Dragon Breath. Reckless Charge still doesn't answer the fact that if you activated Oath, then that means they have blockers. The only advantages I can see Charge having is that a) it gives +3/+0, which can matched and sometimes surpassed by Breath's firebreathing; and b) it is slightly more castable out of your hand, which becomes untrue if you decide to go with Chalices. That said, I do agree with you that relying too heavily on the Dragon enchantments can lead to situations where you hit the creature before you hit them, but the blue and black ones both give evasion (flying and fear).

is there a decent sized  creature that is pro white that isn't black? it will be in the Sb to start (wishable though)

Breath would also allow you to run Simic Sky Swallower (6/6) or Empyrial Archangel (5/8) in your board, a card that can't be StP'ed or Reckless Charged, but can be Dragon Breath'ed (from the 'yard, not from your hand though).

[latrodectus55]

the main idea is to oath, hit avatar, and in the process dump a reckless charge in the yard cast the charge on the avatar(now hasted, trampling and buffed slightly) and swing for the win.

How does it have haste and trample?



Is there something I'm missing?
Having a bunch of the Dragon enchantments seems like the best bet if that's the direction you want to go. But it's still very vulnerable.

[kibbe]

*sigh, slumps shoulders* no, your not missing anything .... son of a ..... damn it!

ok so maybe this doesn't work at all. i though it gave both. damn it, this maybe be pointless then. guess this is what you get for thinking outside the box eh?

is there a flashbackable version of fling(or something like it)? otherwise this needs a complete overhaul

[UnholyAlliance]

Traitor's Clutch may help achieve something here.
Shadow nearly means unblockable. Just a quick thought.