Quick(Re)mix

So there is one little thing that came out of the last bans: I have an illegal deck. Quickmix has four copies of Volcanic Island and four copies of Expressive Iteration. One of them has to go: cutting EI means the deck can be Legacy legal, cutting Volcanic Island means the deck can easily slide into Modern. 

Now, you know I love me those Liege decks so taking the deck apart isn't on the table. So I suppose the question is: Is there a U/R card that can make up for the power loss of cutting Expressive Iteration? Or is there a land that produces U/R that can make up for the power loss of cutting Volcanic Island. Spoiler: There isn't. Volcanic Island is such a powerful land that there is just no way to find a comparable replacement.

But. Liege decks are never going to be top of the line. They're going to be fun, yes and I am always entertained playing them. But their power level will always be hampered by the restriction of being a Liege deck. No regrets: I chose that and I like it.

Whereas Volcanic Island could provide a genuine boost to a deck that is teetering on the edge of being good, if only the mana were better. 

So I think the cut here is to Volcanic Island. Given the rest of the manabase, I am fairly certain that I want to use at least two basics to replace them, and then...I'm not sure. While there are a lot of options, many of them are bad. 

But Wandering Fumarole does fit into this deck's themes. Activation is expensive but with a Liege out, a 3/6 that can flip at will to a 6/3 is pretty good. With only two in the deck, the ETB effect shouldn't be too pronounced and it produces the right colors. 

Don't you worry though, Volcanic Island. I'll find a deck for you.

While I'm here, though, those two copies of Hypersonic Dragon are just...not helping. Mostly because the deck is surprisingly light on removal. I wonder if Izzet Charm might be the answer. That or Winterflame have intriguing options, but Bloodwater Entity's ETB ability might win out. Regrowing Expressive Iteration seems good.

Set and Cure

For the moment, I'm not sure I can take this deck any further. It's got a strong early game but it needs a little sauce for the next step and I'm not sure what that would be. In many cases the strong early game will be enough! But I don't think it's there yet.

Other tweaks that could be made would involve shifting the manabase to include Scalding Tarn, just so I can thin the deck. If I want to stick to the theme, though, I think this is where it's at. 

4 Riverfall Mimic
3 Mindwrack Liege
4 Lightning Stormkin
4 Prismari Apprentice
2 Hypersonic Dragon
2 Elemental Expressionist 

4 Clout of the Dominus
2 Electrolyze
2 Schismotivate
3 Prismari Command 

7 Mountain
4 Volcanic Island
1 Izzet Boilerworks
7 Island
4 Frostboil Snarl 

3 Ral Zarek 

4 Expressive Iteration

I think if I was going for a sideboard, it would look like this:

4 Leyline of Punishment (lifegain decks are no fun)

4 Tormod's Crypt

3 Mindbreak Trap

2 Elixir of Immortality 

2 Meltdown or 2 Locust God 

I like Locust God because it's a problem unto itself. As a six drop, it is the kind of thing that can take over a game. If Quickmix wasn't thematically focused on the Mindwrack Liege/Mimic, that would probably be the big gun.

However, Meltdown is Meltdown and there are decks that just fold to that card. Apply as necessary, I suppose. 

Rotation

Because I have to deal with unusual decks, sometimes testing results are as illuminating as I would like. 

For example: I got multiple games with Quickmix in over the weekend and the decks I played against were speed mill decks and W/x lifegain decks. 

Not your standard fare, but also how can I end up playing four different games with two different opponents and still play similar themes??

The larger point, though, is that against lifegain decks, an aggressive strategy like this one just folds. I had one opponent down to 4 life and the win next turn, but when they gave lifelink to all their creatures and gained 9 that was it: I couldn't generate enough momentum to finish. 

That is a frustrating thing, especially since my early game felt so good. I was getting a lot of damage in quickly and things were setting up well. The early game strength has been repeated in multiple games.

The problem came against Ruin Crab, of all things. My removal only does 2 damage and I couldn't interact well with my opponent's stuff.

Usually I don't want to-and perhaps I should've been playing more aggressively as a result. However, Ruin Crab is the symptom, the symbol of a card that I can't quite get around, but an aggressive deck like this needs to. 

This is the kind of thing that makes Sideboards a real boon. Leyline of Combustion could make the Hedron Crab target a problem-along with any other mill spells, and Leyline of Punishment good for the lifegain decks. Although Skullcrack might be better, since it is more proactive. 

As an aside; I dig on what Leyline of Combustion is doing. That's the sort of card I would like to maindeck. 

I believe I'll be finished with Quickmix soon. I'd put this at a B-B+ tier, and needs just a little something to get it over the top. That something will come eventually, it's only a matter of time.

The Pour

Time to talk about the changes made:

The addition of four Prismari Apprentice gives me the chance to make another unblockable creature. It's not optimized, as I don't have any instants or sorceries over 3 mana but it still rewards me for playing my spells aggressively. As a two drop, that means that I can play it the turn after a Riverfall Mimic and possibly enchant it with Clout of the Dominus, allowing me to attack for 7, three of which is unblockable, four is untargetable. 

That's pretty solid for a turn 3 sequence. Even if that doesn't happen, I can play the Apprentice (or Mimic) and on turn three Expressive Iteration to both create an unblockable attacker and churn through the deck. 

The hole at the four mana spot is a pretty big problem. It took some digging before I was able to find some cards that I felt might fit in, and at first I was trying Protean Raider. There was just too much stuff at the three value spot though. In addition, the Raider wants me to attack first in order to get the trigger and Quickmix doesn't want to order turns that way. 

So I went to the four mana spot and found Ral Zarek and Elemental Expressionist. 

Ral lets me play the Planeswalker game, which is the shittiest subgame in Magic but alas, one of the most powerful ones. And the updated text on Ral says that the middle ability does three damage to any target, which is very useful. 

Elemental Expressionist is the beefiest creature for four mana that I could find in U/R. Is it good? No idea. Is it a 4/4 for four that might have useful text? Yes. 

I cut the Crag Pucas for these cards as well as two lands. I'm hoping that isn't a risky move: twenty three lands is solid but there are cards at the five and six slots. Since the Liege is meant to be my haymaker win card, I want to be able to play it on turn six if it's in my hand. The card draw in Quickmix ought to smooth those draws out to ensure that I have mana, but I do acknowledge the risk.

The Blend

The mana sources for Quickmix are right, at least from a percentage view, it's the curve that's troubling. This is relevant because now I have to revamp the creature suite. With lots of turn two plays, some of those turn two plays are actually turn three plays (Expressive Iteration), and all of my creatures at three mana suck.

Plus, there's nothing at the four mana value spot, and at five mana, Dominus of Fealty does not have the impact I want. My next best option seems to be Hypersonic Dragon and I don't hate 4/4 hasted fliers for five but they aren't exciting either.

The other thing I want to do is add in Prismari Commands, as I believe they'll give me a lot of flexibility. That means cutting down on Schismotivate and Electrolyze. Electrolyze isn't so bad, but Schismotivate can represent a whole bunch of damage. I don't want to cut all of them: 7 unblockable damage in a turn can be a huge shift in a game. 

However, before I get to that, there's the issue of seven lands that ETB tapped. That's too many and although two of those lands can enter untapped, the Wandering Fumaroles are just in the wrong deck. Added to Quickmix when I thought this would be a deck that would extend more into the Liege territory, the idea of having a 3/6 land that could flip for six damage seemed great!

But that isn't what this deck wants to do and maybe it never was, so I should adapt accordingly. With the Fumaroles out, Frostboil Snarls can be maxed out, giving me only five lands that enter tapped, with the potential to have merely one land entering tapped. 

In addition, with a focus on the mana curve, it is possible that 25 lands is too many for this deck. All the more reason to find the right slots. If I'm trimming lands, I really want to make sure I can play everything out on time.

My problem has been getting games to close, though. Swinging for 3-5 each turn seems like a winning proposition but my creatures are pretty vulnerable to removal. Since I don't have a great deal of interaction with my opponent's stuff, getting games to close out is important. I believe that might be an issue caused by threat density, which means cutting two lands for something that can win could be huge. 

Quickmix

It's time for the R/U Liege deck. Named after the very weird transformer...what can I say? I wanted a deck with a Q name and there aren't a lot of songs with a title starting with Q.

4 Noggle Hedge-Mage
4 Riverfall Mimic
3 Crag Puca
2 Dominus of Fealty
3 Mindwrack Liege
4 Lightning Stormkin  

4 Clout of the Dominus  

3 Schismotivate
4 Electrolyze 

7 Mountain
4 Volcanic Island
1 Izzet Boilerworks
7 Island
4 Wandering Fumarole
2 Frostboil Snarl 

4 Expressive Iteration

Now, as a Liege deck that really wants to use Riverfall Mimic as a way to get in chip damage every turn, with Mindwrack Liege as the final haymaker there are already some restrictions on what should go into the deck. 

Still, I love Liege decks and can't wait to start to tackle Quickmix and make it more consistent, as well as up the power level a bit. 

The obvious problem with this deck is that it's clearly dated. The creature base is more than enough to tell you that, so that's probably where I will start with my revisions. 

With Strixhaven having enemy colored themes in it, there should be some great substitutes for some of the weaker creatures here. If nothing else, though, Expressive Iteration (which I added in automatically over Research the Deep, the deck's initial draw engine) should be a big upgrade.