Repay In Kind #1: Artifacts And Blue Connect These Two

I know I talk too much about myself, my opinions, and my own style of building.
I promise you though- I'm not THAT vain.

So TGZ's got a new article segment called Repay in Kind, where we're going to give shout outs to random people on TappedOut who I find to have outstanding or interesting deck architecture.

The first deck is m477r4z's deck, Mishra's Shadow Games.

Yeah, that's right. This guy had the guts to go deep and make a very un-EDH Commander viable.

How's this possible?

Well, I think my cosmic mentor, his Dudeness, the el Duderino himself says it much better than me.

According to The Gatherer, Mishra's actual text has been errated, and by changing one tiny-but-crucial word, it now reads:

"Whenever you CAST an artifact spell, you may search your graveyard, hand, and/or library for a card with the same name as that spell and put it into play. If you search your library this way, shuffle it."

Effectively, this is a big game for the 4/4 for four. Which is, let's face it, what everyone was really thinking was his only game. In fact, Mishra allows you to make your artifact spells uncounterable.

Additionally, the down-low hipster tech of the last year and a half has provided the Artificer Prodigy with some fairly hawt tech to disrupt and abuse your opponents too. The most recent is Nightveil Specter. Working backwards though, we've got Praetor's Grasp, Fiend of the Shadows, and Silent-Blade Oni joining Thada Adel and her little team of Acquire and Spelljack as viable options for this dark metal brew.

Though I've seen a few expensive decklists trying to abuse Nether Void and Nullstone Gargoyle, I like m477r4z's deck because he's kept it pretty basic. Blood Funnel is one of the major abusive parts of the deck, allowing him to make his stuff cheap and uncounterable with Mishra out.

But the card I was most inspired by in his design is Prototype Portal. When I first saw this card, I'd always imagined it would get its fair share of abuse. And m477r4z's done it. With 30 other targetable pieces in the deck, the Portal has a pretty good chance of having something to copy in your hand. And as he mentioned, putting Gauntlet of Power or Caged Sun on it is a fairly big game with cards like Hellkite Tyrant on the board.

Another little piece of silly and awesome is Grinning Totem. This is an old card that's pretty cheap, but fits both the mold of being an artifact and allowing you to get into your opponent's deck- which is awesome.

While I'm not sure I'm a fan of playing only the lone instant of Gifts Given, his design has inspired me to work up my own little collection of Grixis Goodies. And yes, mine comes with Head Games. I can't wait.

Our next salute goes out to UnknownWMD's "Mistform Ultimus: Defenders of the Universe" build. 

This is obviously a proxy.

Ultimus Prime here is every creature type. His reminder text tells you that, and I'm reminding you about that. Cause it's the focal point of the deck.

In case you weren't an avid enjoyer of old 80's cartoons and missed his deck's relevant-title, this is a mono-blue Voltron deck.

So naturally, the deck is a swiss army knife, loaded to the brim with all the Swords and equips money can buy.

What makes this deck special though is the not-so-common cards that become insanely powerful as a result of Ultimus Prime's seemingly strange ability to be everything at once while also not being a shapeshifter, technically.

My favorite of these is Oathkeeper, Takeno's Daisho. For starters, this card reinforces the fact that Ultimus is in fact a Samurai, and gives him a nice power boost as well as cool protection. You're not gonna find a better home for this mega-goofy legendary Kamigawa goody. It also inhibits a powerful infinite turn combo with Wanderwine Prophets. So yeah, this card's a damn All-Star here.

Mana-wise, I think he runs a little low, but he's got the good ones. Elephant Graveyard, because Ultimus is an Elephant, and it helps him regenerate. Swarmyard, because he's also an Insect, Rat, Spider, and Squirrel and can also find such a grimy place rejuvenating. And Griffin Canyon, because he's a Griffin, and he needs +1/+1 and to be untapped. Also feel free to play Cavern of Souls naming Tetravite, Rabbit, Coward, Homarid, Camel, or any silly thing Wizards has come up with throughout the history of Magic. You're not wrong. Mistform Ultimus is all of those things. Here's an all-encompassing list I found so you can say whatever you want. Mistform Ultimus' Actual Creature Type

There's a bunch more cool things in this deck, but you should really go see for yourself. It's a really nice build. Also, I picked his brain quite a bit in the comments below, so you can get a much bigger sense of mechanics in the deck, as well as how cool paying Prowl Cost can be.

Well, that's all I've got time for now.

 
-UL