Puschkin

Forums are up and working for a while now, you don't need to create pseudo-decks anymore to start a discussion. Just saying.

* Okay, Rancor is strong of course, but thematically Bear Umbra would be more fitting.

* And why vanilla Fog again? About every second set, Wizards prints another variation of Fog, but players just continue to add the same vanilla one since 1993 ...
... consider:
- Constant Mists (good synergy with Wearbears and Bearscape)
- Respite
- Spore Cloud/Tangle (can be a gamewinner if the opponent alphastrikes)
- Moment's Peace

* 16 creatures is a bit low for a deck like this. Sure, you also have Grizzly Fate and Bearscape, however, both don't add counters to Door of Destinies! Maybe cut those Doors altogether. Alpine Grizzly would be a great addition to this deck, it fits the mana curve nicely and still benefits from the Petroglyphs!

What do you mean with "wastes the threshold"? It's a Llanowar Elf for 2 mana that has the potential to become 4/4. It has bad synergy with Bearscape, though.

A samurai deck without Godo!? I would include at least 1 as a kind of "chef" guy. And a single Godo's Maul of course.

No Thrumming Stone!?

And how are you supposed to get that triple white mana for True Conviction!? Even getting two white mana for Righteous Charge will be more than difficult with just 7 sources of white mana. I also question why these cards are in the deck at all - do you really need to make those rats even bigger? Trample is what they need the most. So maybe think about a green splash instead of white. Make a Stand, at least, protects your rats for one turn and one white mana is okay to splash, but the other two enchantments have to go. You can add Vault of the Archangel instead of True Conviction. Or Akroma's Memorial for that matter.

I made some suggestions, mainly Fireblast, Monastery Swiftspear and Ash Zealot. And the Thunderous Wraths are really good, so consider upping them to 4 copies. You may need to add 2 more Mountains to support the Fireblasts, though. Keep the Quests for now, it's hard to say how they will do after the changes, only playtest can tell. Another really quick burn spell is Goblin Grenade, it requires you to sac a goblin, though, and you only run 4, so that's not an option for the current setup.

Well ... you could, you know, play with NATURAL BALANCE !!!
That way you are always on 5 mana where Lava Axe is King :D
Maybe even in full combo with Squandered Resources.

The other option would be to figure out the amount of lands needed to assure you have 5 on turn 5 and fill the rest of the deck with cheaper direct damage that, played in turn 1-4, deals accumulated 15 damage so Lava Axe will be the natural killer on turn 5. But that's a lot of math, so maybe stick to what you have or Natural Balance.

I like that thinking. You could also also discard it through Pyromancy to deal the final damage (where it does more damage than a Lightning Bolt or X-Spell would^^.

CATCH!

Well, Lava Axe IS a bad card, but I appreciate the effort to troll your friend :)

Then again, is ramping mana really the way to go? All that does is emphasizing that the more flexible X-spells are better than Lava Axe. The one and only quality about Lava Axe is that it deals 5 damage when you have exactly 5 mana. If you have more, there are better options. And even then you'd be better of playing with Beacon of Destruction ...

* Leyline should be in the sideboard (and Chain Lightning main!)

* Fork isn't needed here. With the exception of Thunderous Wrath Fork will just be another bolt here for about 3 damage, but at 2 mana and with a condition.

* Bomber Corps? Has no haste and you need two other guys (but half of yours die on their own) ... just for one additional damage? Then he does 2 per turn ... for a 2 mana guy? This should be Monastery Swiftspear!

* Red Sun's Zenith? It's an X-Spell! In a deck with just 14 lands!? Even if you had more lands, this wouldn't be "super fast", not even "fast" ... I mean you need to tap out on turn 4 (provided you even got 4 lands) just to do 3 damage ... Fireblast ist "super fast", Red Sun's Zenith is more of a card for control.

* Slith Firewalker isn't fast either. He needs time to grow, which you won't have. Compare to, say, Ash Zealot. If you play them on turn 2, Slith Firewalker needs 2 more turns just to get even!

* Stroke the Flames is horrible! If you tap a creature to pay for convoke, then that's a lot of damage it can't deal in combat, so what's the point?

* Quest for the Pure Flame is risky and not super fast either. It has, though, the potential to deal a lot of damage, but it pushes this deck in the realm of combo. However, if you keep it, I don't think you can afford to keep cards like Lightning Axe which can't hit opponnents. Then again, I think Litghtning Axe has to go anyway, you don't have carddraw to compensate for the discard and definately not the mana to pay 5 extra.

Glimmer of Genius should be in here! I mean, carddraw AND scry, exactly what you need to find your combo pieces.

I'd be careful with those - they are only good if you are already having a crowd with lots of counters. As you may have experienced, the porblem is to actually get there, since your stuff is getting destroyed pretty fast these days.

IF Scourge of Skola Vale should be the center of this, the first thing to do is get 2 more of them ;) Then, as numbers guy said, all you need is high toughness and walls have the best mana-toughness ratio. They also protect you while building up AND meanwhile there are lots of walls that also give you mana. Axebane Guardian, Overgrown Battlement, that kind of stuff. It would, however, change the current deck radically.

Another issue with Scourge is that it needs to tap in order to get more counters, which means you have to decide whether to pump it or to attack. So I would add equipments that grant vigilance. Sword of Vengeance is my favourite here, but the added trample is redundant. Shield of the Righteous is a card that hasn't seen play much but might be a good match here (if that blue mana isn't a problem).

And there is a card would fit this deck perfectly: Tower Defense! And maaaybe have a look at Assault Formation ...

Oh, I really like Stonebrow, have him in many decks. But as a commander? There are some things to worry about:

All he does is beefing your guys and you need tramplers for that. Which means you'll have an offensive deck with mostly fatties. An "honest" deck. In other words, a deck that will not do well against the typical streamlined EDH deck. Sure, IF you play against opponents that also run "honest" creature based decks, then you will have good chances. But even then you need to be careful with your mana curve and about the tricks your opponent will have.
EDH decks need lots of removal and denial to survive each other. Since your setup will be creature heavy, this means you need to put a lot of your removal and disruption on creatures, preferably ones with trample of course, but we won't always be able to do that. You have a few of them, like Spellbreaker Behemoth, but it's hardly enough. Most EDH decks run cards that would shut you down singlehandedly if you can't deal with them. Also, you run way too many expensive creatures without any form of mana acceleration (not even Sol Ring!?), which is waaaay too slow! And your fatties need to do something besides being big. Palakka Wurm and Borborygmos Enraged are good examples of fatties that are worth adding but guys like Craterhoof Behemoth are overkill, they don't add anything that you don't have already. Same is true for cards like Overrun, that's either "win more" or useless. Asceticism is good for this deck because it protects your guys and the hexproof part might even deny some of your opponent's defenses like Maze of Ith. However, what does Beastmaster Ascension add besides makin things that are already big even bigger? What is a bigger creature worth if it can't get past a Maze of Ith or it is dies to a Terminate?

With all of this in mind:

* I talked about creatures with removal, disruption and effects that hate popular EDH strategies. Here is a selection of creatures that will help you beating typical EDH decks while keeping up the high creature count and level of aggression:
- Hellkite Tyrant
- Kavu Predator
- Polis Crusher
- Skyshroud Warbeast/Wilderness Elemental (depending on if you using this for multiplayer or 1-on-1)
All the above have trampler, however, the ones I was actually thinking about don't:
- Ash Zealot
- Magus of the Moon (this might cause some players to lose instantly!)
- Burning Tree Shaman
- Bane of Progress (this is also a gamebreaker!)
- Reclamation Sage, Indrik Stomphowler, Acidic Slime
- Woodripper
- Vexing Shusher
- Tunnel Ignus
- Stigma Lasher
- Heartwood Storyteller
- Thrun, the Last Troll

* Avatar of the Resolute is strictly better than Garruk's Companion. However, you might as well keep the companion and cut one of the redundant fatties.

* Drum Hunter would be a very nice addition, it should provide extra cards AND it adds some much needed mana acceleration (even if that is slow). To make room I would cut the Wild Beastmaster. He is pretty worthless here since you a) don't beed more pump and b) it pumps others basing on it's own power, which is just 1.

* There should be a minimum of mana acceleration/ramp. At the very least Sol Ring but I would also consider options like Solemn Simulacrum. Even something like Cultivate will be very helpful.

* As I mentioned, in EDH there are lots of cards commonly played that render your entire plan useless, things like (Magus of the) Moat for example. The changes above will give you some options to remove those, however, that will not always work out. A nice way to deal that last damage when attacking isn't possible or worthwhile anymore is to just fling your big guys at the opponent directly. Fling itself is a card to consider but there are more:
- Bloodshot Cyclops (who is a fatty himself)
- Chandra's Ignition
- Soulblast (very risky because if it is countered or prevented, you have lost everything, but otherwise you have most likely won!)

* Is Quietus Spike needed? Your guys typcially neither need deathtouch nor additional damage that only triggers when they are doing damage - you need equipments that help your guys going through the defenses in the first place! There are so many great equipments out there for 3 mana, I think all of the Swords are each better than this. Of course, they aren't exactly cheap, moneywise. But still, I think something like a Whispersilk Cloak will serve you better, both against "honest" and "good" EDH decks.

* To my experience, almost every EDH deck makes use of his graveyard, this deck here being the exception. I would always run graveyard hate in my EDH decks.At the very least add Relic of Progenitus - it doesn't hurt you to lose your graveyard and if you don't need to exile opponents graves, just pop it anyway and draw a card to replace it!

* You'll need room for the changes, here is a list of cards I consider removing for the reasons I stated in the introduction:
- Overrun, Overwhelming Stampede, Beastmaster Ascension, Gruul War Chant (redundant pumpers)
- Craterhoof Behemoth, Pathbreaker Ibex, Decimator of the Provinces, Gruul Ragebeast (too expensive and redundant)
- Outland Boar, Centaur Chieftain, Godtracker of Jund, Grove Rumbler, Nacatl Outlander (don't do enough for their mana)
- All these changes will make the deck faster/cheaper, so maybe you can cut a land or two

* Depending on the selection of creatures you added and removed, you might end up with too few tramplers. In that case, add Brawn. In fact, you should run Brawn no matter what, replacing something like Centaur Chiefain. Same is probably true for his companion, Anger.

As we've seen last weekend, it works quite well in multiplayer :)

Here some things to consider:

* The Ichor Wellsprings are so good in this, I would play 4 copies of them! The good thing about them is that they can enter play turn 2 and animated on turn 3. That's one step into making this work in 1-on-1 games, without making it worse in multiplayer (because you draw so many cards). Since they replace themselves, you could almost afford to add two more without cutting any card.

* Glimmer of Genius is very excellent card draw for any deck that uses energy counters! I would play this instead of Read the Bones, which isn't a bad card, but since you can make use of energy counters and don't have much lifegain, Glimmer has the upper hand here.

* Echoing Truth can be very good, but personally I would prefer Into the Roil as the more solid card. And since you are also running black, Recoil is another option. This would be just a slightly improvement (and in some cases a setback), so if you don't have these cards, there is no reason to order them. I should have spare ones for you, anyway.

* Stir the Grave ... isn't that great. For this deck I would strongly recommend Beacon of Unrest. It costs five mana, but that's about what you would have to pay for Stir the Grave for most of your creatures. However, the Beacon can also be used on artifacts AND you can grab things from opponent's graveyards AND it shuffles itself back to the library! It's been reprinted many times and therefore shouldn't cost much, Games Island for example has them for 50 cent, but ask Lars first. It's a card you can reuse in many decks.

* Falkenrath Noble doesn't fit much here. Without any cards that pump vampires, I think, Sangromancer is the better choice for this slot (or more Nighthawks). It's also a card you can throw in any black multiplayer deck without making the deck worse and it's even cheaper than the Beacon.

* Biggest problem for this deck seems to be the lack of artifact/enchantment removal. Consider Nevinyrral's Disk or All is Dust. Or maybe Confiscate is more your style?

Great, love it!

Some suggestions:
There is actually a card called "Orc General", which is probably better suited for Gothmog than Zurgo, precisely because he doesn't have a name. His ability is also better fitting.

And I don't think that Maze of Ith is a good representation for Emyn Muil. The reprints show an actual labyrinth and the original is ... erm ... some mutant brain? I think the original (Tempest) version of Wasteland is very fitting.

Is this actually just Two Towers only? Because Gothmog and Grond are from Return of the King. I was about to suggest to repalce some of the orcs with other creatures that represent some of Saurons other allies, for example Burning Shield Askari as Haradrim and Trained/Crazed Armodon as Mumakil, but then thought, wait, this isn't Two Towers stuff.

And I think there should be the One Ring somewhere - Jinxed Ring sound about perfect :)

And ... you posted it in public to get no comments!? I just tried to help. Especially since the first poster said "it seems like a really great deck", which left me wondering if I am missing something. Most people here are complaining about the lack of attention their decks get.

Here is what I would do to make it more aggressive and therefore better (the defensive part right now makes no sense):
* Squee's Embrace is strictly better than Furor of the Bitten. It gives the same boost and instead of a drawback it has a special ability that helps you with your main problem: That you run out of cards quickly.

* Mana Clash is one of the worst cards ever printend and only ever makes sense when you play it in a deck build around coinflips (with Krark's Thumb and that enchantment that makes you win the game if you flipped enough coins). We need more creatures, ones that can actually attack. So, 4 open creature slots.

* You don't need the walls either. You could keep the Walls of Omens if you insist, because they replace themselves, but the Wall of Shards has to go since it gives the opponent life and once we are down in Walls, Defensive Perimeter becomes obsolete, too. That's 8 more open creature slots.

* For the open creature slots there are of course dozens if not hundreds of candidates. Here are some great picks for this colour combination. I'll try to keep them cheap both mana and money wise, I'll also keep in mind that you obviously like to have some defenvive capabalities (even though those Shrines are purely offensive):
- Soltari Priest: Basically unblockable and can't block, but has protection from red. Hard to deal with.
- Figure of Destiny: Great guy in all stages of the game! If you run out of cards, just use your mana to transform this guy!
- Boros Swiftblade: Good target for that Squee's Embrace
- Flamewright: This guy actually works well with walls! Only use if you keep Wall of Omens of course.
- Sunhome Guildmage: Another dude that helps you making use of access mana when your hand is empty!
- Monastery Swiftspear: So good with instants!
I hope you get the idea.

Now you have a decent deck.

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OR, you focus more on the white part and the walls. But first we need a game plan, most importantly, a way to win. Everyhing else depends on that.

Care to explain what this deck is trying to do? The red and the white parts look like they belong to two different decks ... I especially question that Wall of Shards and that Mana Clash. Seriously, add something to the "how to play" section or something, because right now I am baffled how this is supposed to win.

Das waren auch mehr Beispiele als betonfeste Vorschläge. Und viele davon müßtest Du haben, Comet Storm, Prophetic Bolt, Sun Droplet, sowas war bei den Karten dabei, die ich Dir besorgt hatte.
Und bevor Du was auf MKM kaufst, frag als allererstes Lars, günstiger wirst Du sie kaum bekommen^^

Ah, I missed the Bazaars, that's why!
Nevertheless, I've never seen someone playing reanimator without Mind Bomb, Entomb or Buried Alive, all of which were available in that period. I actually played in this era, you know. Both Entomb and Mind Bomb allow a second turn Nicol Bolas, Bazaar doesn't unless you also hold a Dark Ritual (but a 4 card-combo won't happen often enough).
Maybe the missing clue is that the article says this deck was for Type 1.5, which is now Legacy. This explains the absence of Wheel of Fortune.

Alan Comer was a known deckbuilder, but you have to know that everything was more casual back then and even the celebrities didn't know it all. This includes the author of the article ... it says Reanimator didn't had the necessary tools to compete, which is true, but it says Ice Age gave it these tools. This isn't true, the only cards that Ice added was Ashen Ghoul (and Zur's Weirding, which was more of a fun addition). The true gamechangers were Shallow Grave, Entomb, Buried Alive and of course Vampiric Tutor that helped to get what you needed. However, those 4 cards are from the Mirage block!