Into The Amplifier

This one is locked in. After solid performances against an aggressive B/W deck and a more resilient Zombie deck piloted by Fuz, I knew Rollin was on the right path.

A few more games with Lauriel and I'm confident that this deck has some game. I could put it into a perpetual cycle of refinement but I like where it's at. 

The sideboard is meant to reflect things I have to face; token decks, enchantment/artifact heavy decks, along with Duress for combo and Leyline of the Void for graveyard strategies. 

Disenchant is the slot most up for change against a Delver heavy field, but I've faced multiple decks with cards that simply break this deck along Humility lines and it's only a matter of time before someone tries to use Leyline of the Void on me, so I'm not sure there's a better choice. 

Nonetheless, I really like where this ended up. 

3 Soul Warden
3 Cabal Archon
1 Rotlung Reanimator
4 Cleric of Life's Bond
2 Orah, Skyclave Hierophant
3 Suture Priest
3 Drana's Emissary
2 Vito, Thorn of the Dusk Rose
3 Archfiend's Vessel

4 Grave Pact

6 Plains
1 Starlit Sanctum
3 Salt Flats
6 Swamp
4 Caves of Koilos
4 Brightclimb/Grimclimb Pathway

4 Living Death
4 Winds of Abandon

Sideboard

3 Orzhov Pontiff
4 Leyline of the Void
4 Disenchant
4 Duress

The Mix Might Glow

Even though Rollin' has been working out well, there is still a point where I feel I have to ask: what if I'm just wrong? 

Edgewalker is a great card. Free or severely reduced costs are a great thing. 

But is it right for this deck?

Similarly, Order of Whiteclay is crowding the three mana slot, but with now six effects that bring creatures back, (I'm sticking with Orah) maybe something else should come to play.

Time to try out the Archfiend's Vessel! And while I'm going a little lower to the ground I can up the Cleric of Life's Bond to four, and maybe have a stronger threat count to deal with. 

The results have been very encouraging. Vessel's lifelink ability isn't irrelevant, and once it's in my graveyard, any reanimation effect gives me a 5/5 flyer. That's something people don't like to see. The Cleric can grow pretty big early, and still be a reasonable threat in the midgame. 

The other bonus of Archfiend's Vessel is that as a lifelinker, the card helps extend the game to the point where I can draw enough resources to overcome my opponent. Without card draw, I have to stack the odds in my favor to get a Winds of Abandon, Grave Pact, or Living Death and one way I can do that is to gain enough life to give me time.

It's been working so far, and I'm pretty happy about it!

Where I am still torn is on the Vito/Orah split, so I'm going to be keeping an eye on that in future games. 

 

 

Slip It Up

"It dies to Humility, though," Matt told me a couple weeks ago.

"I'm not going to give up on a deck because of one card out of 20,000, man," I replied. (I was also aware that Overwhelming Splendor did this, but my statement still held).

Well. Jason was about to teach me a lesson. Both in the number of cards that blanks my deck, and the importance of having a sideboard.

Of the three decks Jason decided at random to throw against me one had Humility. That was a loss that I expected, and though I am running Disenchants in the sideboard, it was good practice to play without them, looking at mulligans, play paths, etc. 

The second deck was a creature focused one using the Exalted mechanic which I pulled wins out of, essentially through the attrition gameplan. 

But the third deck had Torpor Orb. I love that card. But also, that card is bad for me when staring down a Phyrexian Dreadnought.

So there is a third card that makes Rollin have a fit. Does this mean I should deviate from my deck? No, I'm definitely sure of that. In both of the games that I lost, a Disenchant would have likely turned the game in my favor. 

Another card that might've changed things? Duress. Which I am not running, because I thought that doubling down on graveyard hate would be better, adding Consecrate/Consume in my sideboard. However, Duress would be good both in the 'weird' matchups as well as any combo matches, trying to whittle at their resources. 

I'm pleased to say that Winds of Abandon has been solid, and the addition of Brightclimb Pathway was outstanding. The new Zendikar lands are, in my opinion, must-haves. 

You Gotta Go

 

I got some more games in with Fuz, using the same build. His deck used creatures with Undying and cool effects like Pongify in order to both get cheap damage in early but also go wide. Plus, it doubles as removal in case I get out creatures that are just too good.

These games taught me about the double edged sword that is Grave Pact. If I have creatures out, that means my opponent has to think much harder about the use of their removal. 

If I don't, then I spent a turn doing nothing. And I know this because it happened. That didn't feel good, even though I was able to make my way back into the game, but I also think that it's something I have to accept. My mana curve is low enough, and I have enough creatures, that this should be an exception rather than the rule. More often than not, my issue was that I couldn't find a Grave Pact! 

Fortunately, Grave Pact isn't key to Rollin' winning the game; Living Death is as far more important card. Even Living Death isn't critical but Rollin' does have a far better game when I draw that card than when I don't. 

Once more, I found myself playing a grindy game, and was able to stall long enough to make a heck of a comeback in game 3, with a Grave Pact on the board after a Living Death making combat problematic. 

So far, so good. 

The Hot Mind On

Well! This has gone way better than planned. 

Which is always pretty nice. 

I got some games in against a G/B counters deck and a Goblins build, as well as an old school Pickles deck (the Pickles deck wants to lock you out of untap steps). 

All of those matches went well-the only one I lost was against the Goblins build which was a great matchup. Living Death has problems with Sling-Gang Lieutenant. 

Despite that, the match was split 1-2 and that last game I came fairly close to pulling it off, but all my lifegain triggers went on the stack before my opponent's and that was that. 

It's a new deck so I'm sure that my use of Orah, Skyclave Hierophant was suboptimal, though it may be that the card is not what the deck can use. Vito, Thorn of the Dusk Rose, however, was a rockstar. It wasn't quite a Hexdrinker rule situation, but Vito put a real hurt on. 

A card that I wasn't surprised about though was Drana's Emissary. Efficient and with a Vito in play is absolutely scary for opponents. 

Which means I'm off to a good start!

Tight Tension On

 I ran this deck through the Deckstats algo, and while I haven't felt that I was squeezed on black mana, it seems clear that I don't have enough black mana. So that'll be a tweak.

Fortunately for me, there's a whole new suite of really awesome lands that should take care of this, so I'm adding in four Brightclimb/Grimclimb Pathway. 

In addition, as fortune would have it, PowrDragn recently did a video of W/B Clerics. Sure, it's Standard and is tilted more aggressive, but there's still something to ponder here. Archfiend's Vessel and Speaker of the Heavens are cheap Clerics that could help give me time. Archfiend's Vessel plays well with Living Death, too.

However, for now there's been an overhaul of nearly 1/3rd of the deck:

-2 Plains
-2 Swamp
-1 Auriok Champion
-1 Ghost Council of Orzhova
-2 Orzhov Pontiff
-2 Headhunter
-1 Doubtless One
-4 Kor Sanctifiers
-3 Vile Deacon
-2 Skulltap

Replacing those cards we have:

4 Brightclimb/Grimclimb Pathway
4 Winds of Abandon
3 Cleric of Life's Bond
3 Suture Priest
2 Vito, Thorn of the Dusk Rose
2 Orah, Skyclave Hierophant
3 Drana's Emissary

There's a great deal of chip damage here, changing this deck's path to victory to a Living Death, you lose life, vs Living Death, now I attack plan. Along with the addition of Winds of Abandon to decrease my opponent's ability to make any gains off of a Living Death, in case the attack plan becomes necessary.

Cleric of Life's Bond, in addition to being cheaper than Vile Deacon, can have a more immediate impact on the board, even if it can't attack. Vito contributes to the chip damage and Orah might just be the Glory of Cool Things. But I want to give it a go and if doesn't work out, then slots open up for Archfiend's Vessel. 

Rollin

Named after the Soul Coughing song, this was my swing at a Cleric deck.

3 Soul Warden
1 Auriok Champion
1 Ghost Council of Orzhova
2 Orzhov Pontiff
3 Cabal Archon
3 Vile Deacon
2 Headhunter
1 Rotlung Reanimator
1 Doubtless One
2 Edgewalker
3 Order of Whiteclay
4 Kor Sanctifiers

4 Grave Pact

8 Plains
1 Starlit Sanctum
3 Salt Flats
8 Swamp
4 Caves of Koilos

2 Skulltap
4 Living Death

But really, it's a Living Death deck, right? You could probably stick a lot of tribal creatures in here and be happy. The Grave Pact is there to ensure that when I do cast Living Death, my opponent doesn't come out ahead. 

Still, it could be better; there's a lot of one-offs, there are likely mana issues, Vile Deacon is really expensive and I don't have any way to protect it, Skulltap can now be replaced with Village Rites, that sort of thing.

There's also the clear desire for this deck to have more copies of Rotlung Reanimator which butts up against my desire to not pay $10 for a single card. However, there are a lot more 'died' effects than there used to be, and new clerics from Zendikar Rising, so this is a prime time to do an upgrade!