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Built another deck. Actually I've been working on it for awhile and mostly just needed to grind mythic rare wildcards on arena to finish it, but now its done.
It's based of the first arena deck I built, which was a blue/black milling deck, and I had some success with it. It was a little rough around the edges, but it was fun to play.
So naturally, l took the base and improved upon it. It's still a blue/black milling deck but with now with more rogues., and probably too many cards (80) but like all decks, I'm still fine tuning it. Coincidentally, WOTC are releasing a pre-built deck that this shares some similarities with, so that's neat.
Deck List:
Creatures
1 Relic Golem
2 Merfolk Windrobber
2 Shadow Stinger
2 Tetsuko Umezawa, Fugitive
3 Nimana Skydancer
3 Zulaport Duelist
4 Merfolk Secretkeeper
4 Ruin Crab
4 Soaring Thought-Thief
4 Thieves' Guild Enforcer
Instants
2 Frost Breath
2 Glacial Grasp
2 Into the Roil
3 Stern Dismissal
3 Unsummon
Sorcery's
2 Maddening Cacophony
3 Compelling Argument
3 Mind Drain
Enchantments
3 Ichthyomorphosis
2 Patient Rebuilding
Artifacts
2 Folio of Fancies
2 Sword of Body and Mind
Lands
7 Swamp
12 Island
2 Dismal Backwater
1 Temple of Deceit
It's also one of the few decks I've built that has a sideboard
Sideboard
1 Frost Breath
1 Mind Drain
1 Tetsuko Umezawa, Fugitive
2 Radiant Fountain
2 Tormod's Crypt
3 Frogify
3 So Tiny
Key cards this time round are:
Thieves' Guild enforcer
Anytime a rogue enters your side of the field, your opponent mills two cards. Then it gets a buff once they have eight or more cards in their graveyard.
Soaring Thought-Thief
Anytime a rogue attacks, your opponent mills two cards.. Then it buffs all rogues when they've got eight or more cards in their graveyard.
Ruin Crab (I like the alt art more)
Opponent mills three cards whenever you play a land, which ideally will be every turn.
Maddening Cacophony
Save this one for later and you can empty most of their deck in one go.
Sword of body and mind
Buffs your creature, but most importantly, anytime it hits your opponent they mill ten cards and you get a free 2/2 creature. Oh and whatever it's attached to is safe from green and blue cards.
Unlike my previous lifegain deck, this one doesn't really have any fancy combos. Sure you could cast Merfolk Secretkeeper as a sorcery (milling four cards), summon it as a creature then cast Unsummon on it, returning it to your hand allowing you to recast it as a sorcery again(milling another four cards), but you're mostly aiming to get the duel over with or get control as quickly as possible.
Combos like Tetsuko and Soaring Thought-Thief allow you to hit and mill your opponent without being blocked early on. Mind drain can thin out their hand to put them under pressure. Ichthyomorphosis, Frogify and So Tiny can take care of heavy hitters your opponent brings out.
Tormod's crypt is a double-edged sword. It costs nothing to bring out or use (that's why I included it) and can exile their graveyard. So that's great if they're running a delve, dredge or escape deck, but you'll lose the buffs from Soaring Thought-Thief and Thieves' Guild Enforcer in the process. So there's that small trade-off. The same can be said for using Radiant Fountain versus Dismal Backwater/Temple of Deceit. Radiant Fountain doesn't come into play tapped and gives you 2 life, but you can only use it to pay generic mana. Dismal Backwater and Temple of Deceit meanwhile, both come into play tapped but can provide blue and black mana and either give you one life or let you see the top card of your deck respectively.
Some cards are pulling double duty like Zulaport Duelist which can soften up a threat and mill two cards when it enters the field, and Merfolk Secretkeeper which can be cast as a sorcery to mill four cards then summoned as a creature to act as defense.
Honestly, it's still a little rough around the edges but the most important thing for me when I build and run a deck, is that it's fun. And this one is pretty fun to run.
It's based of the first arena deck I built, which was a blue/black milling deck, and I had some success with it. It was a little rough around the edges, but it was fun to play.
So naturally, l took the base and improved upon it. It's still a blue/black milling deck but with now with more rogues., and probably too many cards (80) but like all decks, I'm still fine tuning it. Coincidentally, WOTC are releasing a pre-built deck that this shares some similarities with, so that's neat.
Deck List:
Creatures
1 Relic Golem
2 Merfolk Windrobber
2 Shadow Stinger
2 Tetsuko Umezawa, Fugitive
3 Nimana Skydancer
3 Zulaport Duelist
4 Merfolk Secretkeeper
4 Ruin Crab
4 Soaring Thought-Thief
4 Thieves' Guild Enforcer
Instants
2 Frost Breath
2 Glacial Grasp
2 Into the Roil
3 Stern Dismissal
3 Unsummon
Sorcery's
2 Maddening Cacophony
3 Compelling Argument
3 Mind Drain
Enchantments
3 Ichthyomorphosis
2 Patient Rebuilding
Artifacts
2 Folio of Fancies
2 Sword of Body and Mind
Lands
7 Swamp
12 Island
2 Dismal Backwater
1 Temple of Deceit
It's also one of the few decks I've built that has a sideboard
Sideboard
1 Frost Breath
1 Mind Drain
1 Tetsuko Umezawa, Fugitive
2 Radiant Fountain
2 Tormod's Crypt
3 Frogify
3 So Tiny
Key cards this time round are:
Thieves' Guild enforcer
Anytime a rogue enters your side of the field, your opponent mills two cards. Then it gets a buff once they have eight or more cards in their graveyard.
Soaring Thought-Thief
Anytime a rogue attacks, your opponent mills two cards.. Then it buffs all rogues when they've got eight or more cards in their graveyard.
Ruin Crab (I like the alt art more)
Opponent mills three cards whenever you play a land, which ideally will be every turn.
Maddening Cacophony
Save this one for later and you can empty most of their deck in one go.
Sword of body and mind
Buffs your creature, but most importantly, anytime it hits your opponent they mill ten cards and you get a free 2/2 creature. Oh and whatever it's attached to is safe from green and blue cards.
Unlike my previous lifegain deck, this one doesn't really have any fancy combos. Sure you could cast Merfolk Secretkeeper as a sorcery (milling four cards), summon it as a creature then cast Unsummon on it, returning it to your hand allowing you to recast it as a sorcery again(milling another four cards), but you're mostly aiming to get the duel over with or get control as quickly as possible.
Combos like Tetsuko and Soaring Thought-Thief allow you to hit and mill your opponent without being blocked early on. Mind drain can thin out their hand to put them under pressure. Ichthyomorphosis, Frogify and So Tiny can take care of heavy hitters your opponent brings out.
Tormod's crypt is a double-edged sword. It costs nothing to bring out or use (that's why I included it) and can exile their graveyard. So that's great if they're running a delve, dredge or escape deck, but you'll lose the buffs from Soaring Thought-Thief and Thieves' Guild Enforcer in the process. So there's that small trade-off. The same can be said for using Radiant Fountain versus Dismal Backwater/Temple of Deceit. Radiant Fountain doesn't come into play tapped and gives you 2 life, but you can only use it to pay generic mana. Dismal Backwater and Temple of Deceit meanwhile, both come into play tapped but can provide blue and black mana and either give you one life or let you see the top card of your deck respectively.
Some cards are pulling double duty like Zulaport Duelist which can soften up a threat and mill two cards when it enters the field, and Merfolk Secretkeeper which can be cast as a sorcery to mill four cards then summoned as a creature to act as defense.
Honestly, it's still a little rough around the edges but the most important thing for me when I build and run a deck, is that it's fun. And this one is pretty fun to run.