Popstar

This is a Selesnya budget deck designed for casual play in MTGO. I really like Selesnya overall as it was my guild at the pre-release charity event I attended.

The deck itself is still a bit of a work in progress but is full of potential. Unfortunately, I am getting tired of playing in economically mismatched games and am not playing Magic nearly as much or with as much enthusiasm. It is tiresome to constantly play a game in which economic imbalances ruin the experiences of the players involved. There are other games to play and I am moving on to them as well as other side projects.

In any event, the youtube video of an example round using the deck is here:

http://youtu.be/i2nmR2aIpyM

The deck I am using is called "Popstar" and it does okay at casual play in the MTGO section. Like most of my budget builds, this one will lose its fair share of matches, but when played carefully, the deck can win.

This deck highlights why playing Magic is still skewed by money. Many of the good cards right now are dual colored and the dual colored lands remain overpriced and out of reach of many budget players. Even with the affordable dual lands, I only have 4 dual lands to work with while many of my opponents may have 8 or 12.

I rarely use the side deck as most MTGO matches are single matches, so the sideboard is more of a suggestion than anything else.

With any luck, you can get a Call of the Conclave going fairly early in the game. Seller of Songbirds is mostly a chump blocker, but the bird is quite helpful. The Wayfaring Temples really add to the populating threat quickly.

The key, however, is usually careful use of the Rootborn Defenses. Using those, usually after the opponent has committed attackers but before you declare yours, often gives you a surprise indestructible set of blockers. Rootborn defenses is one of the better cards to come out in the RTR block as it can deal with a wide range of removal while actively adding to your creature base.