One hit-and we're hoping this is it!

In the end, I split the difference and I was able to do it thanks to Oblivion Stone.

Increasing the damage oriented mass removal wouldn't matter and the Disk would take out my artifact lands. In a deck with only 19 lands, I can't afford to take that risk, even if the Disk falls on my curve.

But, Oblivion Stone does everything else I need it to do and in games with Lauriel, Caitlin and Matt, the Stone proved to be the kind of haymaker that I needed.

Matt was playing a Stasis deck and Oblivion Stone broke his lock for me, or ate a counterspell that later couldn't stop the wave of creatures I was able to put into play. On my final turn, despite having my entire board locked down and with Matt at 2, I was able to play a Mountain and use the trigger from Flamewake Phoenix and win.

I didn't fare quite as well against Caitlin's Aluren deck-a combo deck using Cavern Harpy and Parasitic Strix. She made a great play in game 3, using Thoughtsieze to bait me into tapping all my mana to get in for 6 damage with Kuldotha Phoenix and Flamewake Phoenix and was able to combo out her next turn.

I had a Lightning Bolt in hand and could've prevented it.

The lesson: if you know you need 1 mana open to prevent your death, keep that mana open.

Lauriel wasn't able to mount enough pressure with her BW Spirits deck in the face of Oblivion Stone. And, this time I had a Lightning Bolt for her early Twilight Drover.


Two Oblivion Stones and suddenly my pet is behaving like it's housetrained and giving me moments like this:

That's three Demigod of Revenge appearing off of one being cast, on an empty board.

Holy cow. But that is what I'm talking about.

Now, RotF isn't a massive powerhouse. To take on tier one Legacy decks, it would need to have cheaper card draw and more disruption. Matt suggested cards like Chalice of the Void could do wonders and that's fair: against almost any blue deck, CotV set to 1 would be awful. Sure, it'd also turn off my Lightning Bolt but there are a TON of replacements for that card.

It would also need some way to get through countermagic. After playing yesterday against Matt's Stasis deck, and on Friday versus Noah's Delver deck it was my inability to stick a permanent on board that killed me. Recursion isn't great if nothing is allowed to recur...

Still, I think I've taken this as far as it can go without dipping into just being a burn deck. It's got some great answers and although it feels a little inconsistent, has a pretty big stick to swing with. It's fun more often than not, so it's time to move on.