Hello, and welcome back to our weekly jaunt through all things casual! I apologize for my disappearing act for the last month of so – but as frequent readers of my column know, August and early September is a super-busy time of the year for me in my job. However, I’m back and ready to continue where we left off.
Today I am writing another entry in the Bad Rare series. The rules are simple: I have a box of “low-value rares” that I keep beside my computer. I pull one out at random, then have to build a deck around it. There have been some real winners in the past – cards like Thran Weaponry, Masked Gorgon, Glowrider, Elder Druid, Caribou Range, and more.
I’ve been very proud of some of my decks. I find the restriction of coming up with a deck built around a bad rare to be exhilarating. I like doing one of these articles as a follow-up to a weekly series, because I am already in deck building mode. It’s a nice segue.
With that in mind, I should mention that I recently added a whole slew of cards to the “low value rare” box. There should be some really nice challenges in here as a result. I hope. Let’s see what we get.
Bad Rare Challenge #1: Timesifter
I just want to write a quick preamble about Timesifter. I personally believe that Timesifter is one of the worst possible cards to ever see print. I shiver at the thought of building a deck around this nasty card.
Obviously, you’ll want cards with high casting costs in order to take extra turns…. But you can’t have that get in the way of actually being able to play your cards. Waiting until turn 6 to get going isn’t a valid option! There was an expansion set based around casting costs, however, that just might help me out.
This deck tries to abuse high casting costs through several ways. The Timesifter should hopefully be giving you extra turns, but you can never be sure when you’ll show a pair of lands in a row, so your deck has to be prepared to survive not taking several turns in a row. That’s where the walls come in. You have six cheap walls to slap down, and then most of the other cards have high casting costs. Also using casting costs are Undying Flames and Erratic Explosion. Between the two, you should be able to kill people rather quickly.
You have several cards that use high casting costs of creatures in play. Rush of Knowledge and Torrent of Fire can both quickly put you over the top. Between Scornful Egotist’s eight casting cost or the Aven’s six or the Quanar’s five, you should be set.
I love the Quanar in this deck. The best time to use him is when you cast Undying Flames in order to get a second set of epic spells resolving every turn. You could easily win on the following turn when that happens. If a morphed Quanar is surrounded by your walls (or is your only creature), you can flip it to Fork a Rush of Knowledge or Torrent of Fire and then get the Quanar’s five casting cost. Rush and Torrent do not set their number until resolution, so you can flip in response.
Undying Flames can sometimes take several turns to win. Hopefully, you’ll be the one getting those extra turns instead of your opponent. If you don’t, then the same walls and defensive creatures that will keep you alive when your opponent gets several turns from a Timesifter will also keep you alive until the Undying Flames does its job.
To be honest, this is not a particularly original deck idea. Scourge essentially built the deck for you, and there was a precon with this idea. However, adding Timesifter, Undying Flames and the walls to the deck really makes sense. It’s like a modern version of the old precon.
Bad Rare Challenge #2: Icatian Town
I’m not really sure what to do with an Icatian Town. I pulled the rare version from Fifth Edition. There’s nothing that Icatian Town does that other token generators don’t do more cheaply or better. After thinking for a bit, I have the backbone of a deck.
Creatures (33)
- 1 Preacher
- 3 Aysen Bureaucrats
- 2 Icatian Moneychanger
- 1 Hand of Justice
- 2 Repentant Blacksmith
- 1 Zealous Inquisitor
- 1 Miracle Worker
- 1 Argivian Blacksmith
- 4 Volunteer Militia
- 4 Town Sentry
- 4 Mtenda Herder
- 3 Auspicious Ancestor
- 1 Revered Elder
- 1 Tragic Poet
- 1 Devout Harpist
- 2 Guard Dogs
- 1 Stern Judge
Lands (23)
- 23 Plains
Spells (4)
Every so often, I like to make a theme deck that is so bad, we have to make up new rules just to play it… And welcome to today’s deck! This deck is based around a medieval town. When playing this crappy deck, you get to play by extra rules! As long as your casual table doesn’t mind, players of this deck get to do all of the following:
Citizen Arrest – You can sacrifice any citizen, townsfolk, or bureaucrat in order to put an arrest counter on target creature. As long as that creature has an arrest counter on it, it cannot attack, block, or use any activated ability (just like the Arrest card).
Town Square – You can sacrifice four of your creatures and create great confusion. Put two Town Square tokens into play. You cannot be attacked as long as you have a Town Square token. During each of your upkeeps, remove a Town Square token from the game.
Rally the Masses – You can sacrifice eight of your creatures. Your townsfolk have decided to mass a horde to protect the town. Bury (destroy without regeneration) all creatures with a power of four or more in play.
The Inquisition Mounts – You can sacrifice any of your religious-oriented (like Miracle Worker, Preacher, Zealous Inquisitor, Revered Elder, and so forth) creatures in order to make all of your creatures “religious-oriented” until the end of the turn.
Destroy the Infidels! – You can sacrifice four religious-oriented creatures in order to destroy (with the possibility of regeneration) up to four target non-religious creatures on the table. The group decides what is and is not religious oriented (it doesn’t matter what the religion is).
Apprenticeship – You can sacrifice any citizen, townsfolk, or bureaucrat to bring back any creature from your graveyard into play.
Regular Commerce – You can sacrifice any creature in order to gain a life.
So, there you go. Between the Town Sentries, Blacksmiths, Moneychangers and more, you have a very flavorful deck. I hope that you enjoy this Icatian Town deck!
Bad Rare Challenge #3: Nefashu
The problem with doing a Bad Rare Challenge is that occasionally you don’t get something that immediately suggests a deck idea. Nefashu is hardly a good card, but it doesn’t suggest an immediate combination, either. I’m racking my brain trying to come up with an idea, when it hits me, and I light upon a really nice partner for the deck.
This deck can play like your basic Black control deck with a few modifications to make it work with a Nefashu. The first idea I lit upon was the use of Horobi in this deck. With a Horobi out, you can conceivably kill up to five of your opponent’s creatures. You attack, target a bunch of creatures, thereby killing them, and you get a hit in with Nefashu, because you’ve likely killed all of your opponent’s blockers.
There are several other ways of killing creatures once Horobi is in play. Spinal Graft will just kill a creature. Fevered Convulsions and Consumptive Goo will take out any number of creatures. Ashes to Ashes will target the creatures, they’ll die, then the Ashes to Ashes will be countered due to a lack of targets, and you’ll not have to lose five life.
I wanted another ability to supplement the Nefashu besides the Horobi. The Nefashu often lacks staying power because it can’t kill very many creatures with its ability. Enter Thrashing Wumpus. The Wumpus will be able to kill off X/2s and X/3s after Nefashu hits them with its ability. This can really change the board quickly.
I wanted one other ability to work well with Nefashu. I chose two each of Consumptive Goo and Fevered Convulsions. I wanted a creature-based way of giving creatures -1/-1 counters in order to make them killable by the Nefashu. A Creature-based method is easily recursable, while an enchantment-based method does not die to Thrashing Wumpus – so I chose to split and go two and two.
After that, I decided to round out the deck with some control cards. Rend Flesh is a great all-purpose removal spell, while Nantuko Shade is a great beater. Toss in Consume Spirit, Haunted Crossroads, and Cabal Coffers and you have a well-rounded deck. I even found space for a player’s set of Spinal Graft, so that you have a backup to Horobi. It plays like an old Black control deck while also having some interesting new elements.
Bad Rare Challenge #4: Marjhan
The problem with Marjhan is that you really have to get around several weaknesses in order to properly use it. You have to sacrifice a creature to untap it. Opponents have to have islands in order for you to attack. This is not an easy solution, and normally I’d lean towards Homarid Spawning Bed at this point – but I think I use the Bed too much in my decks as a Deus Ex Machina. Let’s see what else I can do.
Marjhan is one of those silly Homelands rares that we all know and love. To begin, I spent some time looking at Marjan’s first disadvantage – the requirement to sacrifice a creature to untap. Like I said earlier, I usually use the Spawning Bed to support these types of ideas in Blue. This time I decided to go with Green. I have splashed six Green cards. Four of them are Aether Mutation, which will give nice tempo while also creating several tokens. The other option is Spontaneous Generation, a nice spell that can give you several tokens as well.
Between Treasure Trove, Concentrate, and Compulsion, you should hopefully be able to find the pieces that you need in order to make your deck work. They will also help fill your hand with a variety of cards to assist the Generations.
The next disadvantage I looked at was the islandhome one. I decided to go with Quicksilver Fountain and Tidal Warrior to give an opponent an island if they need one. I then decided to push that envelope with several other Islandhome creatures. The Seasinger can steal creatures as long as an opponent controls an island, which your opponent will. You can then sacrifice that creature to the Marjhan in order to make it untap.
Manta Ray and the Serpent can only attack if opponents have islands, but they will. Both are mid-range creatures of some size. The Kukemssa Serpent also doubles as an emergency island-maker in case the Tidal Warrior or Fountain are nowhere to be found (or have been destroyed).
I tossed in a single Trident to use to abuse the Marjhan. Although you can only use its ability to sacrifice a creature and untap during your upkeep, you can use it multiple times. Tap the Marjhan and remove the Trident to hit for eight. Then sacrifice and untap again. During your main phase, equip and hit for another eight. That’s a pretty quick kill once you get the mana. Enjoy your Marjhan deck.
Bad Rare Challenge #5: Overabundance
Great! This is a nice way to finish the day. I was tired of Marjhan, Icatian Town, and Nefashu decks; let’s build a deck around a real card.
In order to use Overabundance properly, I need to play both Red and Green. Either Mana Flare or Heartbeat of Spring can do what Overabundance does when it comes to making mana. Manabarbs does what Overabundance does when it comes to dealing damage. What I need is a way to combine both.
Lands (24)
Spells (36)
Okay, as you can tell, this is a very Abeish deck; it’s very convoluted and you might not be able to tell how it works at first glance. Let’s take a look.
There are several things in the deck that deal damage to both players. Overabundance, Pyrostatic Pillar and Citadel of Pain. Your protection from those lies with Sphere of Law. A Sphere of Law will protect you from these various effects while whittling away at your opponent’s life total.
Your deck also has ways to use extra mana. From Fireball to Centaur Glade, there are several ways to abuse your extra mana. In order to avoid taking damage from the Citadel of Pain, you need to tap everything except two lands. The two (or less) damage is then prevented by the Sphere.
Helping you are several interesting tricks. The Land Tax–Scroll Rack engine is included as your major method of card advantage. With Overabundance, you’ll rarely need to play many lands. As a result, you can use extra lands for Racking and getting lands with the Tax. You’ll also be able to avoid Citadel damage more frequently.
Extra lands in the hand will also help you keep whatever you tutor for with Wild Research. Wild Research will help you find the right enchantment for the combo. You also have Sterling Grove, both for its ability to tutor for a combo piece and to protect the enchantments as well.
In case a Wild Research discard goes awry (or if opponents destroy your enchantments), I tossed in a pair of Replenishes in order to keep you going. Combine that with a set of Moment’s Peace in order to protect yourself long enough to deal a lot of damage, or to set up some defense with Centaurs and Fireballs.
I really like Rith’s Grove in this deck because it can help to keep your land count low while also returning a needless land to your hand to use for the Rack, protect against Research, and more.
You could run a lot more in the way of defense: Powerstone Minefield, Enlightened Tutor, Gamble, Aether Flash, and more. I really like this deck, and I’m sure that you can find a home for it (or something like it).
Well, that’s that. Whew! I really like the Overabundance deck. Hopefully you’ll find a deck here that really fits your style. Remember, I build decks so that you can get inspiration from them. Feel encouraged to modify, add or delete anything that you want from one of these decks. I wish you luck!
Until later,
Abe Sargent