MTG Salvation

I am tired of Azami and wanted to try out something new. I am going for the whole "no win condition except those in my opponent's decks" decks. Thada Adel seems like a good General to start the stealing early, but every slot in the deck is flexible.


Cut:
1 Rhystic Study (tear :()
1 Persuasion
1 Recall
1 Mnemonic Wall
1 Copy Enchantment
1 Body Double
1 Domestication
1 Time Spiral
1 Crystal Ball
1 Ancestral Vision
1 Cloud Key
1 Helm of Awakening
1 Sapphire Medallion
1 Rewind
1 Trickbind
1 Venser, Shaper Savant
1 Capsize
1 Inundate
1 Wash Out
1 Relearn
1 Future Sight
1 High Tide
1 Palinchron
1 Turnabout

Have you tried the morph route with cards like Mischievous Quanar, Willbender and Chromeshell Crab?

I like it, but it seems like you might be a bit short on win conditions (being entirely reliant on others). I could very well be wrong as you may steal the right things every game. How does the deck play for you?

You could try Copy Artifact, Copy Enchantment, Clone, Duplicant, Quicksilver Gargantuan, and Body Double. All of those are great utility copy and often removal effects (ok, so Copy Enchantment is pretty weak generally ;-p). I would also suggest Helm of Possession (sacrifice one of the creatures you've stolen if you want a new one).

you really should play those to support the stealing theme:

• acquire
  
• knowledge exploitation
  
• reins of power
  
• spelljack
  
• desertion

they are also just very good edh cards.

Thanks guys. I have a list of things I want to add, but for me the hard part is always what to take out.
Out:

• Relearn
  
• Inundate
  
• Wash Out

In:

• Blatant Thievery
  
• Spelljack
  
• Acquire

No, really: You should reconsider Knowledge Exploitation. Thada's a rogue.

Quote from RedPanda

No, really: You should reconsider Knowledge Exploitation. Thada's a rogue.

It's good enough it should be in there regardless; you can play Time Stretch or Emrakul or something equally game-changing for 7 instead of 10 or 15. Don't even talk to me about playing one of those for 4...

I'm just saying... Prowl costs are not a minor detail to be discarded.

Im a big fan of Telemin Performance.
Mostly because it places the cards in the graveyard, that always leads to more fun things

And how about the 2 Jace Planeswalkers? Better then ancestral visions if you ask me

Thank you everyone! I should have clarified that I am trying to figure out what to cut more than what to add. In total, you all suggested 19 cards to add to a list that already had 100 cards in it. Soooo, what do you cut?

Well, first I'd cut power artifact. Yep.

Quote from Galspanic

Thank you everyone! I should have clarified that I am trying to figure out what to cut more than what to add. In total, you all suggested 19 cards to add to a list that already had 100 cards in it. Soooo, what do you cut?

If you really want to stay on your theme of only using your opponent's win conditions, cut some of the combos. And Ulamog.

Much appreciated! I tested it out last night for one game and it ended when Sharuum played a Magister Sphinx, pissed me off, so I Blatant Thievery'd the Sphinx and the other guy's Karrthus....Top decked a Time Stretch and beat Sharuum with Karrthus all three turns.

Modifications will be made and I'll repost the list.

Quote from Galspanic

Much appreciated! I tested it out last night for one game and it ended when Sharuum played a Magister Sphinx, pissed me off, so I Blatant Thievery'd the Sphinx and the other guy's Karrthus....Top decked a Time Stretch and beat Sharuum with Karrthus all three turns.

Modifications will be made and I'll repost the list.

Hah, it's like you played both of my decks at once ;-p Funny since I'm thinking about building one similar to yours!

Updated and much more focused. Anything else that really needs to come out?

Persuasion seems kinda weak to me. It seems a bit redundant when you already have so much creature theft and it's basically the weakest of the bunch.

I'd replace it with Spreading Seas as a way to make sure Thada Adel gets past anybody all while turning off problematic lands and cantripping in the process.

I feel Umezawa's Jitte would help enable your general to go all the way quicker.

You've got far too many theft effects for my liking, many times they'll be completely dead draws.

Quote from Gaka

I feel Umezawa's Jitte would help enable your general to go all the way quicker.

You've got far too many theft effects for my liking, many times they'll be completely dead draws.

I do agree that something like Jitte would help, but I don't see the point in running Jitte when YOU are running Jitte. Last weekend I attacked with Thada Adel after Dominating an opponent's Rafiq and was able to grab a Sol Ring with the first hit and then Lightning Greaves with the second. For 1 mana I got pass my turn with a Sol Ring and a Shroudy general. The whole point of the deck is to steal, so running my own threats goes against the theme - and I am a sucker for flavor. I can't imagine ever wanting to win through my own General's damage when beating you over the head with your guy is so much more satisfying

You are right that I will often have dead cards in my hand, but if the cards are useless it means that I am already in the driver's seat. I have had a hard time convincing myself to drop all the "good stuff cards" but for flavor reasons I have to run all the stuff.

This may seem like a spike card but I feel that you might want to include this "for flavour reasons". Mindslaver. It can be quite an evil card but it is the ultimate theft -- stealing your opponent's permanents is one thing but stealing your opponent's mind? That's something else altogether

Maybe run quicksilver fountain? Ensures that your thada will get there every time, especially if it ends up gutting removed or bounced after it's first spin around the board.

Also, any thought to capsize? I don't see any bounce, and it feels like a repeatable bounce to help you stall of threats, or force them to recast so you can steal on the way in if you have those type of effects.

Mindslaver has been added since it does go so well with the theme of the deck. The recurring Academy Ruins Mindslaver combo is just vinegary douch gravy on top.

I like the idea of Quicksilver Fountain, but I'm not sure what I would cut - same with Capsize. Capsize is one of the 10 best blue cards in EDH, but it got swapped out for something else pretty early on. I started with a Mono-Blue Good-Stuff deck and I kept running into "Do I bounce/remove it or just take it?" Taking it seems even better than bounce.

Thanks for the ideas!

Do you still use this deck? I am in the middle of building a Thada deck, and stumbled across your thread.

So any good stories with the deck? Does everyone start hating on you when you sit down with this deck?

Some cool cards I found that might go in the deck:
Dominating Licid - nice, because you can steal as an instant
Empress Galina - how could you not put this one in there?!
Rite of Replication - does this count as stealing? It should!
Duplicant
Ray of Command - instant!
Redirect - steal their spells!
Deflection - steal their spells again
Twincast - use it for yourself!
Callous Oppressor
Guilded Drake
Draining Whelk - you're kinda stealing their spell to power your creature
Lighthouse Chronologist - doesn't really go with the theme per se, but if you get it all the way leveled up, you "steal" a turn between everyone else's!

Also, I'm sad you took out Wash Out! What a great card for making someone's field wide open!

Also, it's cool that you have a couple of avenues to do something to their creature once you have it (Culling Dias, Rishadan Pawnshop) - if they are about to get their creature back (enchantment destruction, etc), it's nice to have an alternate avenue. I didn't think about that. Thanks for the idea!

I actually put it back together last night.... weird coincidence.

I turned it into a really annoying deck that couldn't win and could only drag out games indefinitely. But I like the people I play with so I'm going back to the Theft.dec.

I have Rite of Replicaiton under the small "copy" section, but all the others could make it in there too. Honestly, there are 45 cards for about 30 slots and it doesn't seem to matter if you have Empress Galina or Vedaken Shackles - as long as you have the quantity.

I do think that Gather Specimen type spells are the best because you get the ETB abilities so I think I run all of those.

I took out Culling Dias and put in Helm of Posession. I used to think that it was bad since I didn't run a lot of creatures, but it's really good at stealing stuff but it also acts as the same type of sac outlet, so yeah!

And Wash Out is amazing too and I really hate getting rid of it, but I found that with all the tutors I could grab Evacuation, All is Dust, or O-stone instead and it just didn't seem necessary. It's definitely on the cusp though.