guslto

Have you considered making it U/R and using Nova Chaser and Vexing Devil? You could also throw in Hunted Phantasms and make it less dependent on artifacts.

nice, seems simple enough, and surprisingly cheap! i imagine it could be good to accelerate your mana though. have you thought of anything that could do that and fit well here?

Yeah, tag it as cheap / pauper so it gets more views. Us poor folks with few cards who just play casual can benefit a lot from such ideas :)

I also have a Hecatomb deck, and I understand what you mean about vulnerability to Oblivion Rings... I recommend one of two alternative strategies. On the one hand, you could remove your big demons and increase the number of weenie blacks (or use a zombie token generator) and use a full set of 4 Hecatombs. This way, you can basically play out as a weenie/zombie/tribal deck, with Hecatomb as a bonus, and if they get rid of one Hecatomb, whatever, you can keep going with your creatures and bring out another Hecatomb soon enough anyway. Right now it looks like you have competing interests with sacrificing to Hecatomb or to the big demons... so if your enchantments are exiled or naturalized, you don't get to deal direct damage and you are left stuck with few creatures in play and demons in your hand that you can't play. That's the worst of both worlds.

On the other hand (and this is what I have done with my deck), you can actually attempt to overwhelm your opponent with enchantments. After all, there are only so many Oblivion Rings or Naturalizes that they can pack (and draw out) during a game. Grave Pact and Quest for the Gravelord are great for a Hecatomb deck, and you might also want to add Desolation (especially since you would NOT have to sacrifice your land for tapping it to Hecatomb), No Mercy (go ahead and throw 4 of them in there, they're awesome), and Death Pits of Rath (which turns your Hecatomb into a super efficient murder machine, and basically gives deathtouch to your weenie creatures). This way your opponent can get rid of some of your enchantments along the way, but as long as you can keep creatures coming, you will eventually lock down enough enchantments to win the game. (In casual play, but probably not against hardcore players in tournaments and such.)

Take a look at my Hecatomb deck and let me know what you think, maybe it'll give you some more ideas too!

http://www.mtgvault.com/guslto/decks/hecatomb-combo/

Thanks for the suggestions, BaronCappucino. I do encounter lots of regenerate, and also lots of cards returning from graveyards, so I like Disintegrate. But you're right, Thunderous Wrath, Rift Bolt, and Chain Lightning are almost certainly going to make their way into my deck. I'm also tempted to scrap the blue control and just turn it back into a classic burn deck, like your Balls to the Wall. After all, I brought in all the blue control cards because it was not possible to make a burn deck back in the day that didn't fizzle out halfway through the game, but now it seems quite doable.

Thanks, Puppyloafer. I think Puschkin is right, Disintegrate has done me well against lots of green and black modern decks, and I gotta keep some XR in the deck for these creatures, or for the endgame.

Thanks again for the comment, Puschkin. I really like these new double cards like Fire/Ice. Relatively cheap for their effects, and the flexibility for early or later game play is awesome! Still thinking through all your earlier suggestions.

Thanks for replying with this feedback, vernock. You're right that Ambush Commander would leave me vulnerable to All is Dust and other spells that wipe out creatures. But these spells are usually sorceries, and usually when my Ambush Commander comes into play I am able to wipe out the opponent that very same turn (with the combination of Elvish Guidance and Tribal Unity, or even just a couple of Heedless Ones and the normal effect of the Timberwatch Elf and Seeker of Skybreak). Now, for multiplayer it wouldn't be so easy, but I'm still not too worried. What I might actually add are a couple of Elvish Archdruids or Joraga Warcallers (like you've got), replacing Alpha Status and Wirewood Heralds.

Given that you encounter decks with lots of sacrifices as you say, I can see why you keep the Tajuru Preservers.

The card that you mention here is Triumph of the Hordes. I wasn't playing when this set came out, and I'm surprised to find such an awesome tribal card in that set! I thought it was basically all artifacts, but the infect mechanic here does give tribal decks one for the victory! I might throw one of those into my elf deck indeed!

Very creative. Well done! I could imagine having Temporal Mastery (at least one of them) in the main deck could give you victory quicker than using Supreme Verdict, so why not swap (at least one of) them? How has Supreme Verdict become so useful for you?

"oh me too!" has two o's, by the way...

You certainly need some counterspells to hold back their attempt to destroy your enchantments (at least in your sideboard). If you don't particularly care to keep it legal in modern, I like to use Psychic Venom, Wall of Tears and Backfire in my control(-burn) deck as well, super annoying for the opponent. Why don't you take a look at it too, and let me know what you think? I am trying to update that one with modern cards to make it stronger.

http://www.mtgvault.com/guslto/decks/creatureless-controlburn/

Yes, I own 4 Death Pits. Sometimes I play with 2 or 3 in the library. I had reduced the number to one before because sometimes the deck was too slow. And you're right - especially for a combo deck, it is ideal to have it right at 60.

Thank you so much! This is a really helpful survey of new cards to revamp my deck! I will look through them, try out a couple, see what I can get, and then comment back.