Creatureless Blasphemous Act

Thanks! Yeah, all my decks are hypothetical. The budget could easily be fixed by changing out the alpha lands with shock lands (or other dual/triple lands), which are still pricey but much more affordable.

I proxy these decks and just play them casually for fun, many of the decks I build are based around the idea of "how well can I get a certain card/strategy to work"? Hence the prevalence of Alpha and Urza lands in many of my decks, they basically just display the potential of the cards under optimal conditions.

Isochron scepter paired with tangle IS DIRTY! I like it... It would also serve to insure against a mass enchantment board wipe (though many such cards also deal with artifacts). The only problem is you have to tap it to activate it, and I generally play my decks in a multi player setting, meaning Isochron would only serve against the first attacker (that being said the same complaint could be made against Maze of Ith).

Out of curiosity, what would you remove from the deck in order to make room for Isochron scepter?

Personally, I would drop one Rhystic Tutor and one Gush to add two Scepters, as I would see more consistent protection a bit more valuable than a couple extra cards. As for the Scepter tapping, you could save it for not just the first attackers, but for the most threatening player. If it bothers you that much, you could drop another card (I would drop the other Gush) for a Voltaic Key, to untap the Scepter for another use. These are simply suggestions, and I don't know how well they would work out in this deck or how important Gush is to this strategy.

Sidenote: If you are truly aiming for optimal conditions, why not Ancestral Recall? If you are just getting proxies, the exorbitant price wouldn't matter xD

inzendium has deleted this comment.

^Double post^

Note: I have won with this deck several times when I used to play it in casual multiplayer on Cockatrice, so the mana base does work well enough though the deck certainly isn't beyond improvement.

Well said! Yeah, this deck is pretty thematic and I think I agree with most of what you've said. I built it a few years ago and I think collective restraint was a "let's see if I can maximize this effect" card, though even if I had 2 fewer land types it would still be very powerful. It is generally ideal to run as few colors as possible in order to simplify play and maximize resources.

Sterling Grove is a great card, I'm not sure why I didn't include it originally.

Mystic Remora synergises beautifully, and is even better in multiplayer! The cumulative upkeep is heavily offset by its low initial casting cost, and the fact that if people pay to counter its card draw it will mean that they won't have enough mana left to attack through my other defenses.

Mana analysis when compared to Gush (total cumulative mana spent vs effect):
Gush - 5 mana (or 2 islands returned to hand)
Mysitc Remora -
Turn 1 - 1 mana (casting cost)
Turn 2 - 2 mana (1 upkeep)
Turn 3 - 4 mana (2 upkeep)
Turn 4 - 7 mana (3 upkeep)
Sacrifice it somewhere between here and 2 turns from here, and I'm likely to have drawn more cards off of it than I would have off of Gush (particularly in multiplayer).

One of the reasons I like Gush is it can actually act like a mini mana accelerant (for one turn). Tap two islands, float the mana, return them to hand to play gush and draw 3 cards, put one of the islands in hand back in to play and tap it a second time. Ultimately this puts you one turn behind in lands but by mid game most people don't have more than one land in hand regardless. With the card draw, assuming you draw one more land, that means two more turns of playing lands before you're completely caught up and ahead of the game due to the draw. It's a mid game card (hence there only being two of it in the deck). No need to use it to draw early game as I'll still have cards I want to play in hand, and by mid game I have the means I need to play it.

Basically, with more than half of the lands in play able to produce blue I can't remember ever running in to a problem when it came to having the correct color mana in this deck. I always do an analysis of how many of each mana symbol appear in the casting cost of the cards in my decks and use those numbers to derive percentages in order to balance the mana available in the deck, and Vesuva/Forbidden Orchard really allows me to be more flexible. Omitting my opponent's lands (in multiplayer where it becomes more likely that someone is running the colors I need), Vesuva still has 10 targets in this deck to produce blue mana from.

You are right though, I could eliminate white and black and still have plenty of defenses in the deck to make the strategy go off.

I considered Stuffy Doll previously, but I designed this deck around the idea of it being creatureless and using enchantments to protect the player. Replacing Stuffy Doll would be powerful, but it would require me to have at least two in play for each player I'm against. Relying on repercussion means all I need is for my opponents to have 2 creatures in play. I think Stuffy Doll would significantly slow the deck down, though a Blasphemous Act+Stuffy Doll combo could work very well if one wanted to build a deck around it. I'd probably want to rework at least half the deck if I did that (though this deck would be a good basis for that kind of idea).

You've got loads of decks man, are there any you would like me to take a look at and drop a comment? You post really good analysis and criticism/advice.

I took a look at Sphere of Safety, and while I agree it does fit the theme well, I find its mana cost to be prohibitive. I need these defensive enchantments out ASAP to deter attacks, waiting until turn 5 at the earliest (when I would normally play either my win con, or a gush to get my win con) would throw off the pacing for the entire deck. This deck should win in 6-8 turns (ideally, though it could win by turn 4 if the mana/creatures fall properly and I can do a 1 mana blasphemous act) and throwing in a turn 5 card that does something that should be done by turn 3-4 just wouldn't play well.

As it is people usually have to pay 8-12 mana to attack me with a single creature anyway, and even if they can manage that cost there is usually a Maze of Ith or two to prevent that one creature from doing anything.

This deck goes through a few specific phases when it is being played. Early game is dropping mana and playing defensive enchantments, suspending Ancestral Vision in prep for mid game. Mid game is draw all the cards and put creatures in to play under your opponent's control until you have what you need for your win con. Mid to late game is where the win con goes off.

I really, really enjoy your way of thinking and expressing your analysis and choice of cards, so I am very interested in further cooperation and will happily comment/advice on all of your decks whenever I can find the time. You could do the same - just pick a random deck of mine and comment if you have the time. Over time we'll be able to cover everything. Usually I write in the description if a deck needs help (and almost always state WHAT kind of help). Despite, since we have similar styles and philosophy of deck building I am sure each other's decks are interesting enough just to read, bouncing off ideas here and there. But a deck I am somewhat stuck with would be this:
http://www.mtgvault.com/puschkin/decks/oath-of-thieves/

Back to this:
It is still hard to believe for me that the mana base actually works. Not only because of the coloured mana requirements, Gush and domain, also because you are running off only 18 mana producing lands and no other mana producers (no Sol Ring for example) even though the deck isn't the fastest. Most spells cost 3-4 mana and the cheaper ones are the card draw and instants that you need to keep open additional mana for. You *could* get away with that if you player in an environment that is a bit slower and where nobody runs Strip Mines, Wastelands and things like Vindicate that have the option to go for lands. In my environment it is way too risky to run mana bases that tight - because if you have *just* the mana in play that you need, smart opponents will happily blast a land of yours and leave you there helpless. Over the years I have learned to always put in 2-4 more mana sources than I mathematically need but since I also want to avoid being manaflooded those extra mana sources should be something that has an additional use (like those Wastelands) or can replace itself (cycling lands, Mind Stone etc.).

About Stuffy Doll: If this deck explicitly wants to be creatureless for the heck of it, then that's very fine with me :) It's actually my exptertise: To tweak decks within their themes without warping it into something different.

BTW, here is a deck of mine with Blasphemous Act with a very different approach that might get some lolz from you:
http://www.mtgvault.com/puschkin/decks/occ-selfawareness-trip/

It's true that 18 mana producing lands is a little on the low side, but don't forget to consider that there are 6 cards in here that give me card draw off of either one mana+suspend, or returning two tapped islands to my hand (as explained before, a mini accellerant). Slower decks tend to fare better in 4 person + multiplayer because people find themselves in stalemates of "if I attack him, then I'll be open to be attacked". Many of my decks optimize around that strategy, where I have some way of deterring others from attacking me until I can violently swing the game in my favor (my front page zombie deck is a good example, giving deathtouch/fist strike to everything while waiting for the proper card combo to suddenly make them unblockable).

What's more, my main deterrent enchantments only cost 3 mana, even with this mana base that isn't usually hard to achieve. Once you drop one or two of those enchantments (especially early game when few have mana to spare) almost no one wants to waste time attacking the guy who doesn't have any threats present on the field. Even if it takes an extra turn or two to get the third mana, you should be able to survive a few turns because no one wants to go all out against someone that early in multiplayer, where being overly aggressive can lead to being punished by other players.

While, yes, there is comparatively little mana in this deck, there is also no reason to cast anything at a cost of more than 4 mana. Even the one turn drop of the win con only takes 4 mana to drop both cards in one turn (remember again, multiplayer means more creatures, which lowers Blasphemous Act's casting cost very quickly).

However, as you said, we could theoretically do without the Ghostly Prisons, thus doing away with white and allowing room for two more mana. Both eliminating one color and adding two more lands would make it much easier to draw what you need expediently.

I'll take a look at those decks.

Oh, and thanks for liking how I think. Back when I was active one of the reasons I got 3 decks to the front page was because I always left decently useful comments on other people's decks, so they kept coming back for advice. Eventually I developed a small following for a while, lol.

It is worth noting that when I play casual I do allow people to mulligan for free until they have at least 3 mana in hand (also free mulligan if you have 5 or more mana, because being mana screwed or mana flooded isn't fun for anyone), and the majority of my decks require at most 5 mana to be effective at what they do.

Based on your advice I removed the 4 tangles and put in 4 more lands. I was thinking back to when I used to play this deck (years ago) and I can't think of a time I ever actually needed to play Tangle. Between people not being able to attack through the cost of my enchantments, and the deterrent of a free to tap Maze of Ith, I may have never used the tangles, so they are off to the sideboard. Instead there are 4 more dual land islands, because price doesn't matter...

Simplest solution, put on your big boy pants and step out of the safe world of modern in to the scary world of, well, this. ;)

I have a modern deck that would love this card. Runs melira, blas act, and everlasting torment. It's on my profile if interested.

Link it, I'm lazy, lol.