Hi BeJose.

 

I've recently built this casual deck for use in multiplayer FFA with anywhere from 4 to 10 players at a time.  There are no specifications regarding format, except that we don't allow the Unhinged/Unglued blocks. Problems/metagame etc will be described after the decklist.

 

Here is the decklist:

//Creatures

4x Wall of Nets

4x Wall of Souls

Total: 8

 

//Spells etc.

4x Ensnaring Bridge

4x Congregate

4x Diabolic Tutor

4x Bottled Cloister

4x Pestilence

4x Dark Suspicions

2x Death Pits of Rath

2x Dingus Staff

2x Privileged Position

Total: 30

 

//Lands

8x Plains

13x Swamp

1x Godless Shrine

Total: 22

Total Cards: 60

 

 

The way it works:

It's basically a lockdown on opponents creatures using Bottled Cloister and Ensnaring Bridge. Then it sets up Pestilence/Dingus staff/Death pits for damage and creature removal, along with Dark Suspicions which will, using Bottled Cloister, make opponents lose 1 life for each card in

hand as I will have an empty hand.
 

That's about it, as the rest of the cards are just there to ensure I get the cards I need and that the enchantments and artifacts won't be removed. Congregate is for staying alive long enough for Dark Suspicions to work, in case I met a burn deck or some other creature-light deck. The walls are pretty much just for protection against rushing the first few rounds.

 

Metagame:

The core of it is quite nice for the metagame I'm usually playing against, which is mostly creature-based, but I feel it needs some way to deal with enchantment/artifact removal decks, or decks running few creatures as I fear my win condition might be too weak for such decks.

 

What I'd like you to look at:

Obviously I want you to give your whole opinion on the deck along with any changes you feel it needs, but I'd like you to look specifically at a few things:

 

1: If it would somehow be possible to cut the white completely and find a replacement for privileged position. (Since that's the major reason for splashing white)

2: Please look over the win-condition and see if you could come up with a better one that fits the deck, ideally one that is less dependent on opponents having creatures.

 

Own considerations: (Just to give an idea of my thoughts on some of the points mentioned above)

I've considered implementing Congregate/False Cure as a win-condition, but once again it's very dependent on creatures.

I've also considered just cutting Congregate as I feel it doesn't quite contribute to the deck, as I'm not really using the gained life for anything, except maybe

withstanding burn-decks. I couldn't think of what to put in it instead though.

 

 

Well, with all that said I hope you can help me out a bit with some advice.

 

Thank you in advance : )

 

-Ronni Gaba

 
You've got a pretty interesting deck here, lets see what I can do to help
 
Two problems stand out:
1. You don't have very strong win condition.
2. You've got a fairly fragile defense set up.
 
Right now your win-condition is Dark Suspicions, the only problem with this is that your opponent can simply empty their hand and take no damage. In addition Ensnaring Bridge and Bottled Cloister don't work very well together, the bridge wants you to have few cards in hand while the cloister draws you more cards.
As for cutting white, I would say keep it as it gives you plenty of stall options.

These are some other lockdown options:

• Ghostly Prison in place of the bridge.
• Also for walls, I suggest Souls of the Faultless, it can both gain you life while causing your opponent to lose life, that should deter attacks.
• Wrath Of God*/Damnation are always a nice way to reset the board if the creature rush is getting to much
• Stuffy Doll will also deter opponents from attacking and survive through Wrath/Damnation, it is also a key card that we can use, I'll explain why in a moment. The other thing that is very nice about the doll is that it is very hard to remove which makes it an excellent defense.
• Kitchen Finks, blocks twice and gain you 4 life and it also lives through wrath, very nice card,

Winning

• I really like Pestilence in this deck. It can chip away at your opponents life and help keep the board clear. Because your running walls (which generally have a high-toughness) you can kill off most of your opponents creatures while keeping the enchantment around. I would suggest Pestilence as one of your main win-cons. While someone is bound to have removal for it is multi it is still a very good card. Stuffy Doll is valuable here because it doubles the damage to 1 opponent and ensures the Pestilence will stay on the board. The main problem i see is that people are likely to gang up on you once they see what your trying to do so make sure you have a strong board position before you start chipping away at everyone's like.

 
General

• Oblivion Ring is a nice catch-all card for dealing with creatures and the artifacts/enchantments you mentioned.
• I'd say cut the death pits as it causes your pestilence to die unless you've got a stuffy doll on the board and other otherwise it just turns into a 2-card expensive damnation
• You said you were thinking about cutting Congregate, if you use pestilence as your win-con then I'd say keep it as it allows you to gain alot of life, especially in multi. As for using False Cure as an alternate win-con its not a bad idea so long as you keep some tutors in the deck.
• Watch out if you keep using wall of nets, while it is good at removing creatures, if you (or someone) else wraths** then everyone will get their creatures back.

 
Good luck with the deck and I hope I've helped

*I've noticed some of the Wold Championship cards (such as wrath etc) showing up on ebay. These are gold bordered that are not legal for tournament play. However because of this they are significantly cheaper than normal versions as such are good for casual play.
**I use the term 'wraths' meaning any board clearing spell