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I miss the Tempest block. To me, it's the greatest ever. Every color had powerful cards, even if Green kinda got the shaft. So when I open my inbox and find a White/Black SHADOW deck, my heart skipped a beat. It was beautiful.

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Hey kevin! Erik here. This is my shadow deck. It is very strong. I have restrictions on some cards though. I have one request, leave the one Hatred in, it has won me many games.

* all i have

Land 22
1 Kor Haven*
14 Swamp
7 Plains

Creatures 25
4 Dauthi Jackal
4 Soltari Visionary
3 Dauthi Horror *
3 Dauthi Slayer *
1 Sorceress Queen *
4 Dauthi Warlord
3 Soltari Foot Soldier *
1 Soltari Crusader *
2 Dauthi Cutthroat *

Spells 13
1 Feast of the Unicorn *
1 Hatred *
1 Blessed Reversal *
3 Larceny *
4 Dark Triumph
3 Mirror Strike

Mirror Strike, Blessed Reversal, Larceny, and Sorceress Queen defend you from attackers because my shadow creatures can only block other shadow creatures. Please go by my restrictions but make a second expensive deck for the future.

eRiK
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This is gonna be a fun article. Expect about four or five decklists. First, Erik's deck for now. I ignored some of your restrictions not because I'm a bad listener, but because they are commons and uncommons the players in your area have buried in their boxes. You should be able to find and trade for them pretty easily.

1 Kor Haven
14 Swamp
8 Plains

3 Soltari Visionary
4 Dauthi Horror
3 Dauthi Slayer
4 Dauthi Warlord
4 Soltari Foot Soldier

3 Swords to Plowshares
1 Hatred
4 Diabolic Edict
4 Unholy Strength
4 Duress
3 Seal of Cleansing

This ain't a bad deck. It has a good shot a creature deck since they aren't very likely to block your creatures and you can kill theirs. Enchantments? You have six cards to take care of that. Counters? Duress. Sometimes Hatred pops in for a surprise win.

But, it's missing some things. Here's what you could play as an expensive version.

8 Swamp
10 Plains
4 Scrubland

4 Dauthi Horror
4 Soltari Priest
4 Soltari Monk
4 Dauthi Slayer

4 Swords to Plowshares
3 Diabolic Edict
4 Tithe
4 Mox Diamond
4 Duress
3 Seal of Cleansing

These are the best of the shadow creatures. Yeah, you will have some mana problems. What did you expect from putting two non allied colors together in a deck? I tried to use every trick in the book to smooth the mana, but sometimes you are just going to get screwed.

That's why most shadow decks are cleverly diguised White Weenie and Hatred decks. The Rath block constructed decks showed this a lot, which is pretty much a duh-ism for those of us who were there. This part isn't for you, it's for the new players.

White Weenie Sketch

4 White Knight
4 Soltari Priest
4 Soltari Monk
4 Mother of Runes
4 Warrior En Kor

3 Seal of Cleansing
4 Swords to Plowshares
4 Cursed Scroll
4 Tithe
4 Mox Diamond

17 Plains
4 Wasteland

You get the basic idea. Play creatures, play spells, win. Look for Armageddon in the 'board, with more enchantment hate. Probably Wrath of God or Peacekeeper. I don't have as much experience with White Weenie as I should have, so this isn't a definitive guide or anything, but it should point you in the right direction.

Hatred Sketch

4 Carnopahge
4 Sarcomancy
4 Dauthi Slayer
4 Dauthi Horror
4 Phyrexian Negator

4 Hatred
4 Duress
4 Diabolic Edict
3 Bad Moon

3 Lake of the Dead
4 Wasteland
18 Swamp

Cursed Scroll, Masticore, Perish, and who knows what else in the sideboard. This deck mourns the loss of Dark Ritual, but with Lake of the Dead Mox Diamond is unusable. It's one or the other, and Lake lets you win on the third turn. What would you do? Bad Moon isn't the greatest, but throw out a few 2/2's and it starts to get a lot better.

Things will change once Apocalypse hits the shelves, since non-allied colors get all the power cards. I'll look at possible B/W decks later.

Until a box of Apocalypse spontaneously combusts, Make Mine Magic.

Kevin Williams
Kevin@pojo.com