Party in the Storehouse (casual Shirei)

[GwafaHazid]

If you're still running the Magus of the Coffers, with 6 swamp and Umbral Mantle you get infinite mana. Likewise, another combo I like to use for tons of mana and whatnot is Krark-Clan Ironworks, Blade of the Bloodchief, and Pentavus/Triskelavus/Thopter Squadron. Triskelavus in-and-of-itself can win the game singlehandedly with the other two combo pieces, and the others give you ridiculous board position(thousands of 1/1 fliers, one infinite/infinite guy, and as much mana as you want). The Blade itself is worth throwing in simply because you're expecting to lose your creatures constantly anyway. Likewise, if you haven't thrown in the Stuffy Doll yet, I would. It provides an immediate deterrent for attacking, particularly nice.

[RedPanda]

Banshee's blade doesn't compare to blade of the bloodchief in this deck! +1/+1 counters on shirei for general damage killing power or on mindless automaton for massive card draw or on any other creature you can abuse counters with. Banshee's blade doesn't let you abuse counters.

I'm also looking forward to abusing it on our new m11 sac outlet, viscera seer

Also, noxious toad + thoughtpicker witch = gg

[Brutschlund]

Originally Posted by viperesque

IBesides, isn't Noxious Toad better for multi?

Instead of arguing about Noxious Toad and it's multiplayer uses I'd like point you to the following update on it: Lilianas Specter from M11.

[RedPanda]

Originally Posted by Brutschlund

Instead of arguing about Noxious Toad and it's multiplayer uses I'd like point you to the following update on it: Lilianas Specter from M11.

Well that's great, but it has a power of 2. Shirei can't recur it. Shirei can recur the toad, and with a proper sac outlet he can make opponents discard at instant speed. While I like specters, repeatable instant speed discard is on a level of its own.

[viperesque]

Alright, cumulative response/update post go!

Originally Posted by Nayaa

Might have overlooked this little nifty fella ... but he's quite evil with your general:

+ Abyssal Gatekeeper: this little mob + your general can keep the board pretty clean, and you sac'ing one of your other 1/x mobs can be very beneficial

Just a thought

I'm really suspicious of this guy. On one hand, if all goes well, you nuke your opponents' boards repeatedly, and he's Grave Pact #3. On the other, some well-placed removal can just make you sacrifice Shirei.

Originally Posted by GwafaHazid

If you're still running the Magus of the Coffers, with 6 swamp and Umbral Mantle you get infinite mana. Likewise, another combo I like to use for tons of mana and whatnot is Krark-Clan Ironworks, Blade of the Bloodchief, and Pentavus/Triskelavus/Thopter Squadron. Triskelavus in-and-of-itself can win the game singlehandedly with the other two combo pieces, and the others give you ridiculous board position(thousands of 1/1 fliers, one infinite/infinite guy, and as much mana as you want). The Blade itself is worth throwing in simply because you're expecting to lose your creatures constantly anyway. Likewise, if you haven't thrown in the Stuffy Doll yet, I would. It provides an immediate deterrent for attacking, particularly nice.

Blade seems like it would rarely be anything more than overkill. In situations where you can really spam up the sacrifices, you've probably won anyway. Yes, it can stick around past board wipes, but a lot of those board wipes are going to be wiping it too. I'd prefer to go with Nightmare Lash, as mentioned already.

Originally Posted by RedPanda

Banshee's blade doesn't compare to blade of the bloodchief in this deck! +1/+1 counters on shirei for general damage killing power or on mindless automaton for massive card draw or on any other creature you can abuse counters with. Banshee's blade doesn't let you abuse counters.

It seems tempting. Not so great with Pentavus, but awesome with Triskelavus or Automation. Then again, it's as good as useless otherwise, and I'd rather have consistency than splashy combos. I'm considering taking out the Elixir for the same reason.

I'm also looking forward to abusing it on our new m11 sac outlet, viscera seer

Me too! In fact, I've already abused it some. Delicious.

Also, noxious toad + thoughtpicker witch = gg

As I think I already mentioned, I'm leaving Toad out of the deck for politics, not power level, reasons. I don't want people hating on me because I'm eating their hands and keeping them empty, even if they don't actually have any gas to hate with. I'd rather keep my friends.


M11 Update


Oh boy, what do we have here?

In

• Viscera Seer: Free sacrificing on a 1-power dude with a supremely relevant ability? Sign me up!
• Crystal Ball: More fixing is definitely still needed, and this looks like a pretty good way to get it.
• Reassembling Skeleton: So I heard this was good with repeatable sacrifice?
• Sorceress Queen: I really want to test this baby out.
• Nightmare Lash: I have a reasonable amount of evasion in the deck, and this seems like a fairly powerful finisher.

Out

• That Which Was Taken: I have better things to do with my mana.
• All is Dust: Not hitting artifacts is a pain way more often than it is a boon, and slaughtering my army and my enchantments for the privilege is too much.
• Magus of the Coffers: Slow and dies a lot.
• Summoner's Egg: Whiffs a lot.
• Reiver Demon: The anti-reanimation clause really kills it for me.

[TvashTar]

I found this through you sig and don't know if you're still using or updating it, but it seems to me that you're running Shirei as your general and fail to run Shizo. Even if you don't need it, how could you not run it? You got plenty of Swamps to replace with it (I know cards like the Leash suffer, but... come on... he's the Caretaker of the damn place ^^)

[viperesque]

Originally Posted by TvashTar

I found this through you sig and don't know if you're still using or updating it, but it seems to me that you're running Shirei as your general and fail to run Shizo. Even if you don't need it, how could you not run it? You got plenty of Swamps to replace with it (I know cards like the Leash suffer, but... come on... he's the Caretaker of the damn place ^^)

To be honest, I don't really care much for flavour when it comes to my EDH decks. I'm much more of a Melvin than a Vorthos (quelle surprise, right?). And since there are no other legendary creatures in the deck, it does much less than a Swamp. Sorry.

[haoban3]

I like your list pretty well, just wanted to chime in on the Abyssal Gatekeeper note, he's not as good as he looks, but is much better than you fear, worth playing. Realistically, to avoid the situations you mentioned you just need to play consciously: don't play gatekeeper with only Shirei out (should be obvious), always keep a way to sacrifice him up if you have an indestructible Shirei so as to survive board-sweeps by using it and saccing something else in response to the sweeper. Also, Extraplanar Lens is risky, but I've usually found it to be worthwhile.

[viperesque]

Originally Posted by haoban3

I like your list pretty well, just wanted to chime in on the Abyssal Gatekeeper note, he's not as good as he looks, but is much better than you fear, worth playing. Realistically, to avoid the situations you mentioned you just need to play consciously: don't play gatekeeper with only Shirei out (should be obvious), always keep a way to sacrifice him up if you have an indestructible Shirei so as to survive board-sweeps by using it and saccing something else in response to the sweeper. Also, Extraplanar Lens is risky, but I've usually found it to be worthwhile.

The problem I've always had with Gatekeeper is that it needs you to be so careful with it. Doesn't let you get as much mileage out of your other engines, for example. And it will only tend to kill a few dudes before you stop wanting to recur it. But it's high risk, high reward, I suppose. I'll think about it, maybe try it out.

Lens seems awkward because there are only 20 Swamps, and even Urborg doesn't get round it. It's pretty easy to ameliorate the risk by going Snow-Covered though. I just don't like how it powers down the Coffers engine in early turns as well. Plus, I'm generally averse to running it because of how owned you get if it gets destroyed or bounced.

[viperesque]

A couple of changes with Scars, although only one is actually related:

-Royal Assassin
-Plaguebearer
+Fume Spitter
+Oversold Cemetary

The latter change is just an experiment. I somehow can guess that it will end up as Phyrexian Reclamation instead.

EDIT: One more: Sorceress Queen having failed to impress, gets booted out for Scarecrone.

[clustro]

How about Gigantomancer?

[viperesque]

Originally Posted by clustro

How about Gigantomancer?

Gigantomancer is green...

(Oh, how'd I love access to other colours. Sakura-Tribe Elder anybody?)

[Evilempire22]

Question on how to use Shirei...If you have a way to sacrifice a creature that is valid for Shirei's ability, do you get to return it once and only once at the beginning of the end step, or can you keep re-sacrificing it at the beginning of the end step to basically get an infinite combo?

Thanks,

--Evil

[viperesque]

Originally Posted by Evilempire22

Question on how to use Shirei...If you have a way to sacrifice a creature that is valid for Shirei's ability, do you get to return it once and only once at the beginning of the end step, or can you keep re-sacrificing it at the beginning of the end step to basically get an infinite combo?

Thanks,

--Evil

You 'only' get to use it once per turn. If you sacrifice it during an end step, that end step has already begun, so the delayed triggered ability created by Shirei's ability won't trigger until the end step of the next turn.

[ash and fire]

I will say vesper, that in my experience, having a royal assasin or a sorceress queen on the board with shirei is generally always a positive. In an environment looking for ledgitimate answers to the likes emrakul, royal assasin proves his worth time and time again. Plus having him on the field is such a deturrant to your opponents feeling froggy. And the versatility of the queen is ledgendary with shirei. Having it make your pact on a stick a 0/2, or your phyrexian plaguelord a 0/2 so they will reccur is some supreme hotness. Especially with a thousand year elixir to grant them hastiness so you can sack em and do it again.