Topic: Murmaider! (opinions, legacy, casual play)

So I've talked up the Trepanation Blade and Keening Stone combo, but after some added playtesting, I've found that it doesn't fit in my discard deck.  So that means it's time to make a mill deck; but I want to venture outside the norm.  I'd also wanted to pair up Seasinger, Lord of Atlantis, some merfolky goodness and Phantasmal Terrain.  So here's what I've come up with thus far.  I'm open to thoughts, but I don't want to deviate from the merfolk too much if possible.

http://deckbox.org/sets/183377

I'm also thinking Mana Short will work quite well with Mana Leak, Broken Ambitions, and even Vodalian Mage.  Pair that with Lullmage Mentor and I should be able to produce some merfolk tokens and be able to counter a fairly good amount of what the opponent is trying to do.

Merrow Commerce works wonders with both Lullmage Mentor and Drowner of Secrets.  There's not much better than being able to tap my merfolk to either counter your spells or to make you mill a bunch of cards off your deck.

Then to top things off, either cast directly or via Seahunter, Wanderwine Prophets will light the enemy up to give me added turns with Merfolk Sovereign making them unblockable, or via islandwalk thanks to Lord of Atlantis and Phantasmal Terrain.

Given the mill nature of the deck I've considered Hedron Crab and even Ghostly Flicker to trigger landfall a bunch, but I don't know whether I want to go down that path.

I'm open to thoughts/suggestions.  Also, for your listening pleasure and to set the mood for the deck... http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=zsnbYXyP … re=related

Re: Murmaider! (opinions, legacy, casual play)

First I think that it's awesome to make tribal-type decks with a purpose smile

Second, you seem to need a LOT of mana to pull this stuff off, your mana short is a bit pricey, I'm assuming you would use it immediately after an opponent's untap step, or right before their end step but even still it seems like trying to pay for mana leaks would be pretty difficult, Force Spike is the better option, if a bit more expensive, and I won't bother suggesting Flusterstorm because quite frankly it's not worth the money in my opinion.

Another Possibility for counter if you can drain their pool is Cursecatcher

Also Phantasmal Terrain is nice but you're running Merfolk, use Aquitect's Will

Next a card that would work extremely well with this deck is Faces of the Past, an amazing untap engine especially for a tribal deck that uses tapping so regularly (I've actually tried to design a deck that it works well in and your deck fits it way better)

Why have Jace Beleren?? If you have Memory Adept he seems like the better option

Other blue cards I love to use for mill: Traumatize and Jace's Erasure, if you're drawing cards the Erasure can be better than the curse of the bloody tome and traumatize... Well I mean gotta love it with Keening Stone

I hope some of these ideas help

Just saw another card, Murkfiend Liege, I'm not sure if I recommend it because it isn't tribal but it suits the mechanics

Last edited by imsully2 (2012-06-07 07:33:53)

http://deckbox.org/users/imsully2

Re: Murmaider! (opinions, legacy, casual play)

Realistically, I don't know that the mana are such a problem.  The curve is pretty far down on the low end if you think about it, with only five cards in the whole deck coming in at four or more mana.  To that end, the purpose of Mana Short is to be played as soon as the enemy tries to cast something to ensure that a Vodalian Mage, Mana Leak, or Broken Ambitions will be successful in countering the spell.  It's a little bit of a gimmick, but not only does it ensure that their spell is countered, but that their turn effectively ends there.  I can see where Force Spike could prove useful, but that's the ability of the Vodalian Mage (henceforth referred to as VM), so I'd rather keep Mana Leak for a more surefire counter spell when they might have one or two mana leftover (as opposed to needing to use the VM AND a Force Spike to get the same effect.  (I should note that it's actually been quite difficult to figure out how to cut down the number of cards in this beast, as there are soooooo many good ways to take it.)

For Cursecatcher, I can see where that's nice, but then you're sacking a creature for a Force Spike or even just VM's ability.

I can see where Aquitect's Will is nice on the points that it is both cheaper (one is better than two for once!) and will, in most likelihood, have me draw a card.  However, where it falls short is that the land is still considered its original type in addition to being an island.  One of the beauties of Phantasmal Terrain is that the land can no longer be used for it's original color (or colors if you're enough of a dick to cast it on a dual).  In cases where people are running two or three color decks, not only does Phantasmal Terrain help me out, it can put a big ole monkey wrench in their gears (unless they're running blue, at which point I don't need it for islandwalk and can just screw with their mana base).

Faces of the Past is sick and would TOTALLY speed up Drowner of Secrets' milling goodness.  I will have to pick one up for that.

The thought on Jace Beleren comes from two points.  First, he's two cheaper to play out, meaning that he fits the scheme of this deck and it's low cost much better.  Second, I only have one Jace, Memory Adept and he's currently slotted for my "Double Rainbow" Eldrazi deck (and I'd like to think both decks can be played at the same time or against one another, although Kozilek, Butcher of Truth going to the graveyard would certainly screw up that whole milling thing wouldn't it?).

Jace's Erasure and Traumatize are both nice and have been added.  Drop two curses, add one of each, now they're losing cards when I draw, when they cast a spell, each of their upkeeps, etc... and if things go too long, I can drop Traumatize on them and finish the job with Keening Stone (nice find there!).

Lastly, Murkfiend Liege would be nice, but really, that's just adding more whipped cream to an already diabetic-coma inducing sundae isn't it?

Re: Murmaider! (opinions, legacy, casual play)

All of the points you make are valid and I agree on all points, thinking about it alot of people I know run mana producing artifacts or mana dorks so mana leak is probably better, I just like to suggest alot of things incase you havn't seen them before, the Liege is pretty mean and for this deck probably not worth it's cost, Faces is better IMO, good luck with this deck I like it alot, I've never seen Merfolk used to mill before, i've only seen Zombies and Faeries so it's pretty cool to see, I hope it works out

http://deckbox.org/users/imsully2