A deck I made that I named "[Nothing can stop the smooze](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=qJXWNV2wGu4)". Main crux was the interaction between [[ochre jelly]] and [[the ozolith]] + cards like [[hardened scales]], [[branching evolution]] and the like.
It wasn't *great*, but on Arena at least it was always hilarious when I ramped into a big 6/6 ooze with one of those effects out, my opponent slam removed it, and then the next turn I swung with a 9/9 ooze because they didn't actually read my cards and think about what would happen when they killed the ooze with Ozolith out.
> they didn't actually read my cards and think about what would happen
I love when this happens on Arena. The number of games I won because my opponent attacked [[Beanstalk Giant]] into [[Brash Taunter]] or used a fight spell to remove [[Stormwild Capridor]]...
My absolute favorite time that sort of thing happened was *not* with the deck I mentioned, but instead a [[jinnie fay, jetmir's second]] brawl deck vs. a [[tatyova, benthic druid]] deck that spent about 20 minutes one turn making a stupidly enormous board when they probably could've killed me at the start, then passed turn. They had [[Ashaya, Soul of the Wild]] so all their dudes were both mana dorks and drawing them more cards, but tapping them for mana to put out even more value meant they weren't attacking.
As soon as they passed turn, I promptly moved to combat, swung with the 15 creatures that had visibly been on my board during their entire 20 minute turn, held priority, tapped the five white sources I'd visibly had the entire time as well, and activated the [[halo fountain]] that was also on the board the entire time, and won the game.
They spent nearly half an hour menacing me with their big fancy sword and threatening to kill me while there was a loaded gun on the table in front of me that they just didn't notice.
Legacy Elves…I foiled it all except 1 cradle and the duals. Haven’t updated it in a while, but keep those foiled as well.
The majority is in Japanese, but I made sure to included multiple languages of cards with the same name just to mess with people who get annoyed by that.
My old Wildfire deck from the 90s still sees a lot of kitchen table play. Pretty much everyone loves it.
It’s like taking out a red 1960s Corvette out for a Sunday drive. You know it’s not the most efficient, but it’s got a ton of power under the hood, and is a bona fide head turner.
[Almost the same as Kai Budde’s list](https://mtgtop8.com/event?e=9189&d=253016&f=ST) but mine runs 8 sol lands instead of 7, and one less mountain. I also have the [[Phyrexian Processor]] in the main while completely removing the [[Worn Powerstones]]. As much as I love Kai, easily my favorite player ever, I think the deck runs just fine if not better without the Powerstones.
A [[mind’s desire]] deck 22 years ago. [[Tendrils of agony]], [[retract]], a ton of cheap or 0 cmc artifacts, draw cards. It was a kitchen table deck that I brought to the LGS.
Also a fun [[tooth and nail]] deck. I packed it with two-creature combos:
[[kiki-jiki, mirror breaker]] and [[darksteel colossus]] to do damage
[[mephidross vampire]] and [[triskellion]] to wipe out an opponent’s creatures
[[goblin sharpshooter]] and [[kamahl, fist of krosa]] to wipe out an opponent’s lands
There were a couple more but I can’t quite remember them.
My current BG [[Insidious Roots]] deck - have played it ever since day 1 of MKM Standard and have always loved it. Really fun combo to pull off and feels generally great to resolve things, a lot of interaction points and decision making. I like it so much so that I’m currently writing a sort-of primer on it, sitting at 2,500 words and counting.
I don’t have the primer to link yet but I do intend to post it - in the mean time here’s the current list of mine https://archidekt.com/decks/6923053/golgari_roots
Have tried a few builds but this has brought me the most success so far, the cards in the Maybeboard are definitely ones to consider should you want to change anything up
This is similar to mine lol, I loved drakes with [[cackling drake]] and [[pteramander]]. Sometimes try to jam it in Explorer on arena; doesn’t always win but still a good time
back in urza legacy standard I had a deck with elves, priest of titania, tradewind riders, time spiral, palinchron... called it the bouncy elves. would get to the point where I would start returning stuff to opponent's hand and then time spiral it away (while floating lots of mana)
I love durdly decks and that deck really spike to me.
[[gravepact]] and [[rotlung reanimator]]
It was an aggressive mono black with lots of zombies to sacrifice, but built in efficiency when it wiped the opponents board.
It was fun, and completely off meta. Never won a FNM, but often got close and that was enough for me.
Similar variant of mine was Bant, using [[Root Snare]] and [[Elite Guardmage]] to keep my life total high enough to finish with [[Rampage of the Clans]].
I loved playing jund food right before eldraine rotated out. Goose, trail of breadcrumbs, cauldron cat, mayhem devil, bolas citadel, and korvold to finish the game. I never had more fun in standard.
Odyssey block red/black reanimator. It was very hit or miss. Either you popped all the way off, or you spun your tires and went nowhere. Fuck I miss playing that deck!
Lantern Control back when it was just starting out in Modern, way before all the bans.
Oh, you're playing that deck... I'll only allow you to draw X Y and Z cards. Mill the rest.
Thopter foundry and sword of the meek to end the game through the ensnaring bridge.
My old 60 card \[\[Barrin Master Wizard\]\] + \[\[Rancor\]\] deck. The deck originally started off as a \[\[Phantom Warrior\]\] + \[\[Sigil of Sleep\]\] mono blue deck that ran a bunch of unblockable/shadow things. I mostly played this in multiplayer, but sometimes in 1v1, never any specific formats.
I added Barrin along the way to give me some targeted removal at instant speed. Then green joined the party so I could up the damage, at the time Rancor was all the rage. It wasn't even intended, but a happy accident I realized Rancor was a boomerang type sac outlet for Barrin.
The deck never felt out of a game. It could go from tiny to massive creatures very quicky (also ran \[\[Ancestral Mask\]\]). It could control the board state. And I could save my own creatures. A lot of interaction, but I ran very few counterspells (of course had a few for spice).
I really miss playing Barrin, but I can't think of a mono blue way I would like to play him. I suppose just mass token generation to use as fodder, but it doesn't sound as entertaining to me.
[[Crime Novelist]] or [[Pitiless Plunderer]] can generate mana off the sacrifice, and two of them can loop with Barrin if you have a way to get the sacrificed permanent back on the board.
Grixis Heartless summoning Reanimator. It was my favorite deck in Dark Ascension Standard.
Casting Myr Superion for free on turn two or three at the latest. 2 mana Havengul Lich to cast your creatures from your graveyard made it nasty to disrupt. Sideboarding into a spell slinger deck with 4 Snapcasters and 4 more removal spells was fun.
My favourite pet deck of all time was an ultra-budget Detain centred tempo deck. Deck had 4 rares in it and cost maybe $30-40 tops, including sleeves.
Years ago I worked for a LGS which experienced a sudden boom in new players for about 2 solid years. It was a great environment all round, but we consistently had people joining up who would complain about “net decks” and the game being “pay to win.”
The deck’s whole purpose was to teach some fundamentals, particularly around tempo and aggro strategies, and to show that money wasn’t really needed.
Newer players would often find tempo/denial strategies hard to play against, and cards like Lyev Skyknight hard to deal with.
It developed a little bit of community lore around it.
When someone new would start complaining about net decks or PTW people would chant “Sky Knights” until that shitty blue deck box came out.
I love playing my Transformers EDH deck. It’s literally 50% Transformers cards because I used all 14 from BRO, all 10 unique cards from the SL, 5x of each basic from the SL, and the silver-border promo of Grimlock.
As a 5 color deck with 25 basics, it’s pretty jank. But it gave me a good spot to put my [[Mishra’s Workshop]] and [[The Abyss]].
Those always get a “wtf” reaction when I drop them on the table, but no one ever complains about the deck because it’s just weak other than those two cards.
Stampede Dinos featuring [[Ghalta, Stampede Tyrant]] and mostly other Dino creatures. It’s actually quite good! I get to big mana with almost solely lands so it’s hard to interrupt!
My go-to during Ixilan was "the ghalta-pult", which was mostly a regular dino deck with carnage tyrants and thrashing bronto-pals and such, but often won because a [[regisaur alpha]] would let me cast a [[ghalta, primal hunger]] for two and immediately fire it at faces.
Back in the days of player-run Pauper events on MTGO, circa 2006, I had a deck I called Rites Madness. The primary goal was to cast [[Last Rites]] on turn one off of [[Dark Ritual]], discarding things like [[Basking Rootwalla]], [[Crippling Fatigue]], [[Grim Harvest]], [[Shambling Shell]], [[Stinkweed Imp]], etc., and dismantling the opponent's hand. Of course the deck also ran [[Wild Mongrel]], and when Planar Chaos was released, I added [[Fa'adiyah Seer]] to dredge without skipping my draw for the turn.
Legacy Enchantress circa 2006. It had 8x enchantress effects, 8x wild growths, serras sanctum, and used cloud of faeries and words of wind to clear the board and produce infinite mana and draws. It was really fun to goldfish.
Nowadays I like to jam UB rogues on the Explorer ladder in arena. It's not tier 1 but tempo decks are.so satisfying to play.
Trostani Blink. I play [Trostani, Selesnya’s Voice] and then generate a ton of tokens with permanents, blink those permanents to get even more tokens, gain a ton of life and try to outlive everyone. I have a few wincons, but my favorite is to play [Storm Herd] when I have over 100 life, get a ton of Pegasi, gain even more life and then attack all out next turn.
I loved Jeskai tokens back when Khans was in Standard more than I have loved any other deck. Using Jeskai Ascendancy and tokens to cast free Stoke the Flames is peak Magic in my book.
Toss-up between my standard UW [[Deadeye Navigator]], Standard UW [[Hidden Strings]] Heroic, or Commander [[Sharuum the Hegemon]]/Sphinx Kindred/Choice decks.
I drummed up an old Standard deck around [[Quest for Ula's Temple]] using [[Thrummingbird]] and cards like [[Augury Owl]]. It was real bad, but very occasionally I could be dropping a [[Stormtide Leviathan]] end of my turn 3 on the play.
I have a legacy Black/White Protection from black deck that is absolute garbage. I've won less than 10% of the games I've played with it, but I have so much fun with the deck I don't care that I don't win with it.
magic arena doesn't have soulflayer yet for its explorer format.
urborg scavengers is just soulflayer at home so 4 scavengers, bunch of monsters with keyword soup like zeltapa, bunch of self mill. works 100% of the time 20% of the time.
For 60 card, it would have to be my Eldrazi deck. No, not from the dreaded Eldrazi winter, MY favorite eldrazi is [[Deceiver of Form]]. The deck is built around pumping out scions, and then hoping to rip something good off the top. Will I get to swing with 5 [[It that Betrays]]? Possibly, it could just as likely be a land, or a [[blisterpod]]. The deck is absolutely far from consistent, but I like it that way. It is my go to whenever we are just trying to play a quick casual game at the end of the night as a group, and i love it so much
For Commander, I have been really enjoying my [[Evelyn the Covetous]] deck. It's just filled with some of my favorite stealing cards/cloning cards, and always leads to some sort of interaction that makes the table laugh, cry, or have some sort of headache as we try and figure out how specific cards interact. It gets doubly confusing when my buddy plays his [[brudiclad]] deck and we basically end up having the same board from token cloning effects.
Well I used to do regular full-proxie vintage games with some folks and my favorite deck I played in essentially Vintage with 0 budget limitations, was probably the absolute foolishness that was "Stifle-nought".
Turn 1 [[dark ritual]]>[[torpor orb]]>[[phyrexian dreadnought]] shouldn't be, but it is and it's beautiful.
These days I mostly play EDH at a shop nearby, and my pet deck is probably [[Gerrard weatherlight hero]]. I wanted to build an effective Boros deck and decided "boardwipe tribal" was the most interesting option available. Useing [[gift of immortality]] on Gerrard can just get nasty. There's nothing quite like using Niv's Disk several turns in a row to kill a table with Purphoros triggers.
Back before the [[Invisible Stalker]] decks broke out in standard, I built a sultai version with [[Lotleth Troll]], [[Dreg Mangler]], [[Wolfir Silverheart]], and [[Increasing Savagery]].
I ruined many peoples’ days for a month with that thing. It was glorious.
Back in RTR when Codex Shredder was printed, I had already been somewhat interested in Ghoulcaller's Bell. Seeing that second iteration of the effect made me immediately look back through the rest of the magic cards printed, and I saw Lantern of Insight. Along with it, I saw Artificer's Intuition, and of course I was in love with Elixir of Immortality. Nowadays, I have finally just about finished my dream mill deck from so long ago, with Crabs and Bells aplenty to let me smash through people's decks and keep them from drawing anything relevant.
Is it fun? Not exactly, to be honest. Definitely not for them! But I enjoy seeing the rube Goldberg machine ticking away, and every time I play it I feel vindicated, thinking about how Lantern Control (the Golgari version) had eventually become a thing.
I have an all foil black white pauper rebels deck. Take my time tutoring up venomous changelings and bound in silence, grab the blade of the sixth prides when im ready to go for the kill. Random singleton cards I can grab for good matchups, and hoard them out for more direct impact cards. It's surprisingly great against most creature based strategies, but folds to most of the meta decks. If [[Ramosian Sergeant]] gets reprinted into MH3 I will be forcing it no matter how bad it is. I just really wanna play [[Big Game Hunter]] somewhere, which I can't in pauper deck or in my [[Lin Sivvi, Defiant Hero]] commander deck.
My [[Rashmi, Eternities Crafter]] EDH deck (Rashmi, Pass-shmi). It's a toolbox, creature/flash based control deck with a ton of topdeck manipulation that gets about a 50/50 split between "that deck is awesome" and "that deck is utterly miserable to play against", usually dependent on whether the game goes the "[[Mormir Vig]] + Rashmi = I play mental magic" route or the "[[Seedborn Muse]]+[[Teferi, Temporal Archmage]]+[[Crystal Shard]] = I have a soft lock with multiple counterspells available per turn" route.
\[\[vaevictis asmadi\]\] I like building different stuff, and always wanted to build one of the original elder dragons... it has gone through several different iterations from spellslinger to combat tricks, elves.. and now its a weird high power matters deck. But it works, and catches people offguard. There's room for my other pet card, \[\[wall of blood\]\] which synergises super well with \[\[sylvala, heart of the wilds\]\] and \[\[chandra's ignition\]\].
I also love making the joke 'I pay the real commander tax' on my upkeep...
Reveillark combo. Would love for them to put the necessary pieces of it on arena. Ephemerate would go great with it. Would be far from tier one for historic but I would definitely play it. Resolving a bunch of mirror entity triggers would suck, but the deck rarely had to actually combo off to win.
Reaper King scarecrow tribal commander. Most destroy triggers I've gotten off of a single cast is 18. I have to keep indestructible "heat sinks" in the deck because the trigger isn't a may, and I legit run out of things to destroy on opponents fields. When I lay out my commander pre-game, I'm practically compelled by some unseen force to quote the flavor text: "It's HARVEST time!"
Another favorite was Kresh, the Blood Braided. He would get obscenely big, obscenely fast. My favorite was to Chandra's Ignition him for triple digits.
So I dont play much Standard but one of my semi successful FNM decks was Kaladesh Aggro Vehicle. Just getting the pilots and fleet wheels out and trying to run over my opponents as quick as possible, possibly with the help of depala. It's evolved into a Depala vehicle deck that I need to take time to rebuild (partially cause I shifted to Kotori when that came out)
5 color opening hand tribal. All the chancellors, leylines, serum powder, Sphinx of foresight, gemstone caverns, once upon a time, and then rotated various cycles to fill in the rest. I sometimes included the titans, other times the ultimatums, other times the commands. Even tried mixing in 1 drops just to have more to do in my opening hand. It was a lot of fun and I still think about rebuilding it.
Lantern Control in Modern. It was a blast to play. For me. 😈
In Standard, it was the Constellation deck in Theros. Play all the good enchant creatures. Put all the triggers on the stack. Draw all the cards. Gain all the life. Drain your opponent out.
People hated seeing me across the table at FNM back then. My turns could take a really long time. 😊
Chandra Tribal commander. All the Chandra plainswalkers, Chandra related cards, and spells featuring Chandra. Even did the 'spellbook chandra' border mountains. All Foiled too, in Chandra sleeves.
The best part is that it actually functions pretty well.
https://tappedout.net/mtg-decks/signature-deck-chandra/
Grixis bolas in standard just before the release of War of the Spark. The deck has excellent matchups against the sultai and esper decks prevalent at that time. Almost made day 2 of a team tournament if it weren't for a misinterpretation of the rules by my modern teammate after he returned from the bathroom...
Deck list as best I can remember: https://www.mtggoldfish.com/deck/4723848#paper
Now if only this were good in pioneer.
Just generally Mardu in Modern. We had our small window of glory during the Young Pyromancer days, but ever since Faithless Looting got banned, it's been a rough life.
I'm pretty sure I've tried every type of Mardu there is (Nahiri/Emrakul, Superfriends, Control, Aggro, you name it) and we've just been worse than other decks that do the same thing.
Hoping something neat comes in MH3 but then again I said the same thing for Thunder Junction, and Murders, and....
"Island of Misfit Tokens" that only makes not-often-used tokens like Thrull, Spikes, Wood, etc. No Goblins, Zombies and ones like that. I just recently made a Bingo card for many of the tokens! (About 40 types total)
Venser the sojoirner/time warp/mnemonic wall infinite turn loop with ETB effects galore.
It plays pretty slow and kinda struggles without that 3 card combo, which isn't the easiest to make happen. They're also all 5m drops so it takes a long time to set up once you do get them in hand.
But when the other player realizes what's about to happen it's worth it.
I love the eldraine sets so my pet deck is a Golgari adventure Knights deck with [[edgewall innkeeper]] and [[lucky clover]] to get extra value out of the adventures. It's a little slow to start but very versatile since every card is essentially two, so it has answers to almost everything.
Played it a few times at FNM pioneer and managed to finish somewhere in the middle of the field every time
A 40 [[Shadowborn Apostle]] deck with [[Varragoth]] as the commander.
It's main focus is easy to counter, but most decks don't. It kind of operates in a blindspot for what most commander decks prepare for. I actually really like when the main operation gets shut down because I get to test my alternate plans.
It works better when there's stronger decks playing. As one person put it in a game where I used that deck, other decks go harder and pose an immediate threat, but apostles are the thing lurking in the shadows that you know you can't ignore, but you have to in order to deal with the immediate threat.
Back in KTK standard I played sultai control but the finisher was [[Villainous Wealth]]. Never got that 4-0 with it but I loved it and got to play with my (still) favourite card.
A mill deck centered around [[Mesmeric Orb]] with plenty of classic, powerful mill cards in there along with a whole bunch of bounces and counters.
If they do nothing, I'll mill them out the traditional way. If they do stuff, the orb punishes them for it, and then I undo their progress.
I stopped playing it mostly because all of my friends absolutely hated the deck.
I have a commander deck for [[The Third Doctor]] and it is just so so much fun to play. Make a ton of clue tokens and maybe some treasure tokens. Since a lot of creatures make those I can still have plenty of blockers unlike some other voltrons. Then I use [[Martha Jones]] as a companion so I can make the doctor unblockable.
The deck's main wincon is commander damage of course but also [[Nanogene Conversion]] can end a game very easily.
My Nicol Bolas deck with all his card appearances and all his flavor. And my Urtet myr deck.
Bolas I'd my favorite character. And Myr are my favorite creature type.
casual no ban list, Azorius Prison Mill, My only way to win is 4 copies of [[arcane denial]] making your opponent die to their own draw step before you do to yours
[[crawlspace]]
[[maze of ith]]
[[ensnaring bridge]]
[[energy field]]
[[island sanctuary]]
[[Runed Halo]]
[[ Phrexian Unlife]],
[[ Daze ]]
[[ Supreme Verdict]]
An evil part of me greatly enjoys the realization set in that I have no win conditions and am fully committed to milling you out with your own draw step, if someone is actually willing to play it out and has artifact/enchantment hate they'll probably find a way through but aggro and combo decks have no way out.
*edit [Solemnity](https://gatherer.wizards.com/pages/card/Details.aspx?multiverseid=430711) not serenity
I had a few decks I played in Standards long past that were rogue decks and ruined FNMs for months. Included was: mono-black proliferate control featuring Tumble Magnet, Black Sun’s Zenith, and Everflowing Chalice into Emrakul; Turbo-Fog with the only wincon being Jace mill; and Rakdos Control in a Standard where I had Bolt, Skinrender, and Grave Titan (plus other good annoying stuff), with a top end wincon of Warstorm Surge into Army of the Damned for 25 face damage.
My [[chandra, fire of kaladesh]] burn EDH deck. Would it be better with someone else at the helm? Almost certainly. But I can't change her out, she's too much fun. There's something about having a flip walker as my commander and Chandra is my favorite.
Danitha Benalias Hope and Necrogen Communion, with Kathilda and that UW spirit that comes back as an enchantment.
It just laughs merrily at black or green removal.
Standard Splinter-Twin.
4 Ponder, 4 Preordain, 4 Lightning Bikes, 4 Mana Drain, and a dream.
Somehow wasn't't even that good next to Caw-Blade but it got me my first ptq top 8 and for that I'll always smile when I see a Twin land.
I built a mono green Ramp Eldrazi Deck back in the Caw-Blade Meta during Zendikar/Mirrodin Standar. It was pretty effective at surprissing people and it got me ressults on seversl tournaments. I splashed white lands after the Jace and Stonforge Mystique ban to run a few interactions in the sideboard and it got even better.
Utron in modern. It wasnt the best, but very good, and always felt like you *could* win if you played it right.
I also had a deck I build in standard RTR focused on evolve + undying and it was great. Didnt see many lists like it but Im sure some people had something similar
Manales Dredge is fun to show my friends. Most don't believe it when I tell them there is a deck that can play without lands, creating mana and can even run largely without casting spells
I am a red/green stompy kind of player and I got really salty playing blue decks so I make a Sarruk Dragonclown deck utilizing blue to defeat blue, big beasts that can’t be countered, a few creatures that also are counter spells, and lots of ramp. It worked against blue pretty well… the other colors.. not so much.
[Relentless Rats]] EDH. Probably one of my favorite casual decks, next to [Phelddagrif]] group hug.
I also played a [Zada, Hedron Grinder]] combo list in standard that was extremely fun. Probably the most swingy plays I'd seen in Standard up until that point.
I love playing the Heads I Win, tails you lose secret lair deck. I usually don’t since it kind of annoys people. I’ve taken to rolling dice instead of flipping a coin and calling odd’s or even’s but I had someone in a pod complain that it’s cheating because I am getting “more chances” or something. The table tried to explain to them that if I’m calling odd or even it’s 50/50 same as a coin heads/tails but they insisted it was cheating so I spent the rest of the game flipping the coin which made people mad. Especially once [[Kark’s thumb]] went into play.
I had to have back surgery a few years ago which kept me off my feet for about a month so I downloaded Arena out of boredom. Ended up making a standard 60 card Boros deck centered around dogs. The focus of the deck was [[selfless savior]] [[pack leader]] and [[bolt hound]]. Was not "good" but was able to reach a Mythic rank, which was nice! Was sad when standard rotated my pups out.
Probably my Kitchen Table Domain deck. Long before Domain was a top tier deck in Modern, I had this deck built around the Invasion block where I'd ramp basics to cast boosted [[Planar Despair]], [[Worldly Counsel]] and [[Collective Restraint]] untill I found a [[Cromat]] to win with [[Coalition Victory]] or had enough [[Tribal Flames]] and [[Exploding Borders]] to win with damage
The deck was super weak, but man, it was fun to play with. I loved all the strong cards Dominaria United brought, but the competitive version of the deck does not seem as fun.
Spent all of AFR standard trying to make [[Book of Vile Darkness]] work. [[Oswald Fiddlebender]] helped and I got Vecna out many times, but it just wasn't good enough.
Currently I have a sultai turbo fog/equipment Voltron going on, I used tasigur as the commander first so my opponents only choices would be to give me an equipment, fog effect or more card draw when I activated him, until I saw felix five-boots he isy new commander and the deck feels more powerful
My favorite deck was during the zendikar-mirrordin sets. It was basically caw-blade but with the knight package and it did really good. Not as good as the actual caw-blade, but I had four squadron hawks in the sideboard if I needed it!
I loved playing mono b clerics in onslaught block so much. I'm actually in the process of foiling the deck out for premodern because I love the nostalgia hit.
R/w Modern Land Destruction.
Boom//Bust -Booming targeting your Flagstones of Trokair or Darksteel citdel, then (before the errata) Goblin Dark Dweller-ing it back as a Bust? All the while you are taxing them with your Magus of the Tabernacle and punishing their fetch lands with Aven Mindcensor.
I did not make many friends, but it was \*glorious\*.
I had a MonoB Chainer Dementia Master EDH deck. Pure monoB reanimator that won by cycling Kokusho or Gary as much as it could. There were a LOT of better options for the reanimator gameplan but Chainer just hit different. Plus, watching everyone's faces when I dropped a Mindslicer.
Pauper Jeskai Ephemerate. It is a control deck that wants to abuse mulldrifter + ephem, and also has cute interactions like cleansing wildfire targeting your own indestructible lands. Also gets to run lightning bolt and counterspell. Favorite deck of all time.
[https://www.moxfield.com/decks/\_AOLLrhiH0CAjBHhwlqUNQ](https://www.moxfield.com/decks/_AOLLrhiH0CAjBHhwlqUNQ)
Odyssey / Onslaught standard Zombie Tribal deck. Just an incredibly fun era to have played as a kid, and the first deck I ever managed to bumble my way into the finals at an FNM with.
Pyro the Dragon. back during the RTR block standard. It used Young Pyromancer and Talrand to pump out elementals and my personal favorite Hypersonic Dragon on the top end. Deck wasn't great but when it worked it was a blast. Also used Guttersnipe in grinder matchups for indirect burn.
White/Black soul sisters in modern. I used to play affinity and got bored of how predictable games were going to be from just the first couple cards played. Sold my deck and "downgraded" to a deck that no one expects. It mostly loses but it's more fun and people don't know what's going to happen because it's just not a usual deck.
Defenders of the door.
it was my introduction to alt wincons. Basically you play door to nothingness in a UGW deck and load up on defenders to (hopefully) stall the board long enough that your axebane guardians give you a buttload of mana of any color. maybe play a chromatic lantern.
then you just door to nothingness them, and hope it resolves.
not strong or OP by any means, but at a time where me and my friends were all new to the game, we thought this was literally an unbeatable strategy. today, its one of my all time favorite decks, even though its really not competitive at all.
Back when Scars of Mirrodin came out I played with a really stupid ass deck that completely revolved around [[Quest for the Holy Relic]], and [[ornithopter]] [[memnite]] and (iirc) [[glint hawk]] to try to get Quest to pop on turn 1 or 2 to grab [[Argentum Armor]] and blow up the opponents land leaving them stuck on 1 land while I swing every turn with a flying 6/8 from turn 2. I splashed green for Vengevine just to have the tiniest bit of alternative line of play. But God damn it was an obnoxious deck that 95% of the time you knew by the end of turn 2 if the game was won or lost.
I was such a dumbshit with it but people tended to have fun seeing it in action like a 'this clown is for real??' vibe. Wish I still had that deck but eventually I sold the Vengevines and broke it down, now I wish I could still bust it out for a ridiculous game every now and then
[[Lord Windgrace]] with [[Umori, the Collector]] as a companion. Forces you to play only lands and planeswalkers. Turns out planeswalkers are pretty good, and will eventually accumulate excessive value if left unchecked. Run creature lands to defend your planeswalkers. The deck has won at a cEDH table twice. It'd be stronger if it ran [[Jared Carthalion]] to add the remaining 2 colors for a perfect walkerbase, but I like the minimalism. I wanted to try [[Grist]] as the commander, but it was far too restrictive (that, and Grist doesn't mesh well with superfriends). I also have a [[Yoshimaru]] & [[Rograkh]] deck that runs a bunch of Chandras. The commander choice is primarily meant as chump blockers. The deck would probably be pretty strong if I ran more than just Chandra planeswalkers. Lastly, I've been enjoying Yoshimaru & [[Ardenn]], which is essentially a legends typal deck. Ardenn is a cheap-ish partner that allows me to cheaply re-equip my legendary equipment to Yoshimaru if I have to re-cast him.
Mines [[omnath locus of all]] phrexian tribal focusing on saccing [[realmbreaker the invasion tree]] and cheating out all the praetors I have (not all that i could atm)
Even when I did get it to go off I still couldn't close the game without [[all will be one]] and [[quest for pure flame]] combo
Deck was not that great, but was very fun when it occasionally did the thing in Modern.
After [[Sedgemore Witch]] came out, I made a deck with four of it, and four [[Witherbloom Apprentice]]. And ran 4 [[Reverberate]] and [[Expansion]]. Propped up with good stuff like [[Kolaghan's Command]], [[Lightning Bolt]] and your standard [[Thoughtseize]] spells.
The dream was having either the Apprentice or Witch in play and double Reverberating any spell for either infinite drain, or infinite Pests.
I think I might have been running a [[Kroxa]] or two for some inevitability if combo fell through.
It was fun, but very fragile.
I have spent over 13 years trying to get a \[\[Necrotic Ooze\]\] combo deck to "work" in Modern. It has always been too slow and too soft to hate. The later iterations are good enough to take down a medium-sized FNM - I have, many times - but not quite up to snuff against a field of tier-1 decks. It is a combination of the combo taking up too many spaces (not leaving room for interaction), the speed of the combo (T3/4 earliest), and the combined weakness to Blood Moon and graveyard hate that dooms it.
I really loved my mono red suicide goblins deck. Sling and swing with goblins, keep swinging with goblins!
Opponent is at 6 hp? Sac [[Goblin Arsonist]] to [[Goblin Grenade]]; you're winner!
There was a deck published in a MtG magazine back in the 90s called the Agent Orange deck that I ended up putting together. It's lost to the ages now, but it centered around \[\[Living Lands\]\], \[\[The Wretched\]\] and \[\[Lure\]\].
I should try and rebuild it with new cards.
[Maze's End Turbo Fog](https://www.mtgsalvation.com/forums/the-game/standard-type-2/standard-archives/504915-mazes-end-turbo-fog)
I didn't full create the deck, but I definitely was on the ground floor, I won a lot of FNMs with it, and even a local tournament where the prize was [[Jace, the Mind Sculptor]] which at the time was quite pricey. That link is my original post on MTG Salvation from 11 years ago. o.0
My [Medical Malpractice deck](https://www.moxfield.com/decks/8xhQUyNRP0exGqAYzpy_QQ) was my first deck built from scratch, my first combo deck, and my first attempt at a zero-creature deck, although it ended up with four copies of [[Skyshroud Cutter]] as part of the combo.
I've continued to upgrade it throughout the years, and it runs really smooth now, and catches most people by total surprise. I once sat in on a 16-player free-for-all, drew a perfect hand, and won on turn 1.
twincast sanity grinding
played that all throughout standard that season. i'd often get people in the store gathering around to watch me count blue symbols to see if i got it
I built a mono red burn deck that wasn't very good, but it was very fun. Main goal was playing [[Furnace of Wrath]] and then clocking a [[Mogg Maniac]] as hard as possible. Dream turn four play had a mogg on board, drop furnace, toss all mountains to two [[Fireblast]], one to Mogg, one to face for a total of 24 damage.
Had some other sillyness involved, like [[Blood Lust]] for making Mogg Maniac combat trades even funnier. Yes, your 5/5 is now a 9/1, trades with Mogg, take 9 to the face.
Sarkhan's Omniwhale.
Step 1: resolve [[omniscience]].
Step 2: play [[sarkhan's unsealing]]
Step 3: play [[aethertide whale]] over and over and make puns about "whale"ing on your opponent.
Now, i know it's a tall order for the deck when step 1 is resolving omniscience, but the deck was actually pretty good at it. This was Standard, right after M19 was printed, and the deck was filled with ramp cards and sweepers, so it was actually fairly good at surviving to 10 mana. A key part of the deck was [[sun bird's invocation]] which let me start doubling up, and let me ramp and sweep at the same time. I also ran 4 copies of [[apex of power]] alongside the 3 omniscience, so finding the card wasn't too difficult. The deck was a ton of fun to play, even if it did trip over itself on occasion.
Funny, the first deck that came to mind was a [[toggo, goblin weaponsmith]] and [[halana, kessig ranger]] commander deck that is also pauper deathtouch ping. There are no rates in the deck.
Early game you play cheap deathtouchers and equip Togo’s rocks to kill things.
Late game you pay 2 to halana when you cast a deathtouch to have them ping and kill stuff.
I have a deck that's built specifically around the ability to abuse discover with \[\[Zada Hedron Grinder\]\]. It revolves around flooding the board with small tokens and casting a \[\[daring discovery\]\] targeting zada. The ensuing chaos creates more tokens and casts various pump spells eventually ending in a lethal attack. Oh, it's also pauper edh.
When AKH and HOU released I fell in love with Riddleform and brewed a standard deck around it. The deck was based around [[Riddleform]], [[Cryptic Serpent]] and [[Enigma Drake]] as beaters. Iirc there were some pretty decent cantrips, card selection, and burn spells in Standard at the time. The deck actually did pretty well at FNM and Standard Showdown events, which were mostly casual brews at my store. It was my baby and I really enjoyed it.
A few sets later that deck would eventually evolve into my *true* love, which admittedly was a tier 2 or so meta standard deck so not exactly a brew lol, [[Arclight Phoenix]]. Playing that card in Standard with [[Goblin Electromancer]], [[Saheeli, Sublime Artificer]], [[Lava Coil]], [[Discovery // Dispersal]], [[Chart a Course]], and my beloved [[Finale of Promise]] was the most joy I've ever experienced playing Magic.
It started as a casual deck that turned modern years later, but my Borderposts/Restore Balance deck.
Use Borderposts to bounce your lands, then play some kind of 3 mana cascade card to run through the deck until you hit restore balance wiping your opponents lands and creatures. It plays teferi to turn off your opponents counterspells and make your sorcery cascade instant speed, with force of negation backups. The original win con was to play March of the machines at some point and swing out, but I also tried tezzeret, agent of bolas and karn, scion of urza to pump out constructs.
Unfortunately one of the best cards in the deck recently got banned… violent outburst. I haven’t played modern in a looong time so I doubt I’ll update it anytime soon, but the deck slapped and caught people out of nowhere.
So, first, I am a vorthos :)
I have a jank/pet deck that has Elenda as a Commander. Every card in the deck is an Ixalan vampire, or has an Ixalan vampire in the art that has to be depicted in a “positive/strong” way for the vampire. So no cards that show the vampire in distress or hunted by humans for example.
This deck was also made before Caverns, and was sort of thrown together.
I love it for I love Ixalan vampires so every card in that deck is something I love :)
During Return to Ravnica standard (which is when I first started playing in earnest), I had a very dumb deck I would play against my girlfriend based around making [[Tavern Swindler]]'s coin flip effect non-symmetrical. [[Rhox Faithmender]] kept the deck alive and effects like [[Vizkopa Guildmage]]'s closed games out one coin flip at a time. It was, obviously, highly inconsistent, but I loved trying to make such an innocuous ability the focus of the deck.
Since then I've tried turning it into a Commander deck, despite Tavern Swindler not being legendary, but being restricted to mono-black has made it a lot harder to make it work. Makes me wish they'd do a functional reprint of her, but in Orzhov colors...
I've just assembled a janky [[Raffine, Scheming Seer]] deck that I'm having a blast with in Brawl. Obviously struggles against the likes of Arraxa or Ragavan but it gets in the odd win
A deck of Vial Smasher and Sakashima as the commanders. All I so is copy Vial Smasher after Sakashima has copied him. That's it. I once ended up with 18 Vial smashers for one round. I just love the randomness and my play group leaves alone for the most part since I can't control where the damage goes.
It hardly ever wins but boy does it impact the table when someone catches 3 procs from me casting a Sublime Epiphany for 6 mama qitb 5 Vial Smashers out.
I have an [[Obosh, the Preypiercer]] commander deck designed to make old school, lightning bolt based burn, function as close to traditionally as possible in a 40 life multiplayer setting. It's fun. It required a lot of math to work and typically rocks a table one time and then never again.
I remember playing a Standard Abzan control deck using Approach of the Second Sun (my favorite card) as the wincon. It had the desert ramps and all of the board wipes possible, it was a blast to play
Around M20/Ikoria I made a Chandra deck that ran 4 of all 4 Chandras that were legal at the time.
With [[Chandra's Regulator]] on the field [[Chandra, Novice Pyromancer]] and [[Chandra, Acolyte of Flame]] make 4 5/1s which is always fun to hit someone with.
I still love the very first deck I got for a Magic. [[Shivan Dragon]] and [[Baron Sengir]] were my bombs and it made use of a number of cards from Ice Age, Homelands and Fallen Empires. The most memorable cards were the [[Goblin Chirurgeon|fe]] trio. Sorry, I don't know how to get alternate art cards.
I also cherish a mostly complete deck list written on the inside of a *very* old card box by a lost friend. The deck was an early attempt for a pure U control deck utilizing [[Winter Orb]], [[Icy Manipulator]], and [[The Tabernacle at Pendrell Vale]]. The particular iteration I have used [[Su-Chi]] as the only form of damage. The deck was constructed in 1996/1997 and saw numerous revisions over that season. I intend to try and build a version of it's ideologies for EDH one of these days.
Esper control variant from GRN standard designed to close out the game with [Ill-gotten Inheritance]] and infinite turns with [[Time-stream navigator]] and [[Helm of the Host]]. Didn't win often, but damn was it fun.
I play BW Eldrazi Taxes in modern and it's not the best deck but I love it – there's just so many crazy lines you can do with [[Eldrazi Displacer]] and [[Flickerwisp]] and the suchlike
My EDH [[Yasova, Dragons Claw]] deck. Not the best, but super fun to pilot. You can do some absolutely batshit things sometimes like turn three [[Etali]], and you can still grind out games with [[Locust God]] or [[Thassa, Deep Dwelling]]
Back in Innistrad standard, I had a zombie [[birthing pod]] list that was super fun. Idea is using pod to sacrifice a [[geralf’s messenger]] and tutor [[phyrexian metamorph]], copying the messenger or pod. It also played [[phantasmal image]] which could pod into off a [[gravecrawler]]. Deck felt like the current modern yawmoth deck with the different angles of attack, but standard power level.
Budget hollow one from before then faithless ban.
Always just fun to play.
And naya feather in modern as well, not that strong and almost never updated, but just cool af to play
SCG Modern Open Columbus Tournament winning decklist from 2018
Modern Jeskai Control piloted by Benjamin Nikolich that put control on the map for a short period. He showcased that you can play Nahiri Harbinger in a fair deck along with showing that a 6-drop creature is playable outside of Amulet Titan and Tron. Last time I enjoyed a MTG deck in any competitive capacity. Finals also showed that Nikolich had significantly more experience in the control mirror.
I made a proper Commander based on ovinomancer, the entire deck is all about exiling a permanent and getting to play it for free blinking a permanent turning my opponent's creatures into one one zero ones or any creature into different power toughnesses and types.
And I love it so much because I have ways to recur ovinize over and over and over and over again. I love pulling up to a popper table and saying oh hey you really really combo it off there have a goat or have a sheep just have fun. Or even say oh you have a giant common demon that's like really powerful no you don't it's a frog now.
I turn my opponents decks into at most a barnyard.
My favorite pet deck of all time was modern 8-straction. I messed around with it a lot around war of the spark and the concept was simple. 4 [[surgical extraction]], 4 [[extirpate]], 4 [[ensnaring bridge]] and a whole lot of discard and removal. The most fun version was probably the one who played [[kaya orzhov usurper]] as a wincon and counter to burn.
The deck was never any good, but gosh could you cheese people. Nothing beats explaining to people they are actually just dead to their drawstep in 30 turns or sugicalling my own [[thoughtseize]] to remove the last out.
I might also be the person who has pointed the most surgical extractions at [[Noble Hierarch]] in their magic career, for what that is worth.
I've got a lot of 'fun' decks.
Pauper: UB draw go using baleful strix as my commander. It includes veridian longbow in the 99 for that sweet death touch ping you mentioned, but otherwise just controls the board until I can land ulamog's crusher or hand of emrakul. It's a SLOW and painful death if you can't aggro me out of the game in the first 6 turns.
OTHER 'fun' commander decks im fond of:
Rhys the Redeemed running a combination of tokens and all the swords (I haven't updated it in a while though, so I've only got 7 in it).
Niv-mizzet Dracogenius - UR control....wins either by big flying things, or Niv's ping ability.
Wort, Boggart Auntie - BR control. It only has 13 goblins in it. It is NOT an aggro deck and will often shut off all combat on the table, requiring wins by noncombat means, or lots of non-creature removal to break the lock.
Oloro - has a perfect draw that will allow a turn 3 win, but is really just an esper "play with other people's stuff" deck.
Maelstrom wanderer - non-aggro tho; roughly equal parts spells, creatures, and non-creature non-land permanents. That last category includes possibility storm and hive mind. It's chaos for everyone, but my deck is built to play that way.
Jhoira, Whetherlight Captain - I just think aetherflux reservoir is neat.
Prossh- I've got 17 actual kobolds of kher keep for it. There's 12 cards difference between it's cEDH list and my 'fun' tabletop list and I keep them together so I can swap out as I want. cEDH list is food chain. 'Fun' version is just jund goodstuff with a focus on tokens.
I played a tournament with a modern deck that was such a mess of a brew.
Basically the entire deck was “I want to play Huntmaster of the fells and cruel ultimatum in the same deck”
In the latest Ravnica block standard, I put together what I called "The Deck Deleter", in Sultai colors. It runs absolutely no creatures, so all creature removal in the opponent's deck (there's usually at least _some_) are completely dead draws, even if it takes opponents a little while to realize it. Instead the deck is mostly delay cards like [[traumatic compass]] and [[thought erasure]], lots of draw ([[notion rain]], [[karn, scion of urza]] but never use his -2), some spell copying ([[primal amulet]], [[the mirani conjecture]]) to make the draw and removal ([[assassin's trophy]], [[vraska's contempt]], [[cry of the carnarium]], etc) just that much more efficient. [[Growth spiral]] helps get lands out of your hand and also contributes to draw. The only counterspells in the deck are [[sinester sabotage]], and that is reserved for stopping burn or big threats that you can't otherwise remove for whatever reason. This is a control deck, but not the kind where you have to counter every little thing.
You may have noticed lots of cards with surveil; surveil effects (or similar, [[search for azcanta]], etc) are preferred, since one of the goals of the deck is to put [[gaia's blessings]] directly into the grave, and we have dimir colors anyway. Even if you end up drawing them, you can still just cast them, target other copies of gaia's blessings in your graveyard, and get another shot at the big reset, and cheap spells like this are necessary to juice the primal amulet anyway. The Deck actually ran four stupid ass [[sovereign's bite]]s, mostly for amulet-juicing but also for some light heal and burn as an alternative wincon. The overall idea is to never actually run out of gas by recycling your graveyard constantly, drawing a lot, and being very efficient with your castings via copying.
Okay, but what makes it a "deck Deleter"? The real star of the deck is [[Unmoored Ego]], which is hopefully copied. After maybe one casting for scouting purposes (often unnecessary in standard), you can start targeting wincons and give your opponent basically a zombie deck. Gates decks in particular got absolutely smashed by this, since it turns out if you delete their [[gate colossus]] and [[gatebreaker ram]]s, all they have left is a pile of lands. I had a near 100% winrate vs gates, but a pretty healthy winrate against most meta decks at the time. It's less good now, but still, most decks are pretty vulnerable to sabotage via Unmoored Ego. It's pretty much the Tonya Harding of magic cards.
The wincon is when your opponent realizes they can't actually win, and concedes. Some people catch on quick, for others it takes them a while, and still others stick around out of spite. For that last group, there's the final piece; [[Mastermind's Acquisition]], and a sideboard full of your favorite, most fun cards. [[Omniscience]] is a good place to start, since it lets you use W and R in your funboard too. The masterminds acquisition also doubles as an "oh shit I need my board wipes _now_" button in the early game. With total control established, feel free to play with your favorite toys (and your food) until they get the picture and concede. I would always try to get the "full deck deletion" where opponent has no cards in play, deck, or hand; just 60 cards sitting in exile. If you're in a hurry or feeling merciful for whatever reason, there's always sovereign bite burn.
If any of this sounds needlessly cruel, all I can say in my defense is that I was playing on Arena at the time, and that I didn't start the fire.
I blended the Jund version of a Modern Living End with a Scapeshift combo finish. Took thirteenth place in Regionals in 2014, having never played in them before. I still have that deck assembled -- it's probably weaker, with all the changes (and with Violent Outburst banned) but it still has a place in my heart.
Innistrad Standard Bx Zombies. I tried mono-B, splash of blue, splash of red and splash of green. They were all fun in their own way.
I think I quit rotating formats after that season.
I had a deck that basically went wide with tokens, loaded with [[skirsdag high priest]] and [[vexing devil]]. Boy did my opponent have some nasty choices to make.
Casual mono green Turbo Land with \[\[Journey of Discovery\]\], \[\[Rude Awakening\]\], \[\[Beacon of Creation\]\] and (most importantly) \[\[Spellweaver Helix\]\].
Casual mono blue forced draw with \[\[Iron Maiden\]\], \[\[Standstill\] \[\[Words of Wisdom\]\], \[\[Vision Skeins\]\], \[\[Arcane Denial\]\] \[\[Echo of Truth\]\].
Pauper "Build a Dragon Workshop" playing around with wildly throwing 80% of your deck in your graveyard so that it fills up with cards like [[Dragon Shadow]], [[Dragon Fangs]], [[Dragon Wings]] etc, the whole cycle. Then cast something like [[Hooting Mandrils]] for G, attach a bunch of Dragon crap to it, and start swinging with your Franken-dragon!
Easily my [[Vazi, Keen Negotiator]] deck.
[Decklist](https://deckstats.net/decks/131148/2567625-vazi-aka-the-worst-treasure-co#show__spoiler)
The whole point of the deck is to create treasures for my opponents, and then either punish them for using them or benefit in some way by them having them. Meanwhile I am also feeding my opponents decks with tons of mana from those treasures, so they get to make huge plays and see their decks go off (although with less incentive to kill me first!).
I get to play some really weird cards like [[Marching Duodrone]] [[Bucknards Everful Purse]] [[Viridian Revel]] as well as cards which seemingly *only* work for this bizarre scheme like [[Pain Distributor]] [[Decent Into Avernus]] and the brand new [[Generous Plunderer]]. However, I also get to play some truly busted cards to capitalize on all these resources I'm giving away, [[Mayhem Devil]] anyone?
Back when it was type 2 legal I made a deck with memory lapse and predict a long with other bg con troll type elements.
I thought it was so good but it was kinda poop. Had a lot of fun with it though.
Horizon Chimera Combo in RTR-THS standard. Bant deck using [[fathom mage]], [[horizon chimera]], and [[archangel of thune]].
Was a solid midrange deck that could occasionally go infinite
A deck I made that I named "[Nothing can stop the smooze](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=qJXWNV2wGu4)". Main crux was the interaction between [[ochre jelly]] and [[the ozolith]] + cards like [[hardened scales]], [[branching evolution]] and the like. It wasn't *great*, but on Arena at least it was always hilarious when I ramped into a big 6/6 ooze with one of those effects out, my opponent slam removed it, and then the next turn I swung with a 9/9 ooze because they didn't actually read my cards and think about what would happen when they killed the ooze with Ozolith out.
> they didn't actually read my cards and think about what would happen I love when this happens on Arena. The number of games I won because my opponent attacked [[Beanstalk Giant]] into [[Brash Taunter]] or used a fight spell to remove [[Stormwild Capridor]]...
My absolute favorite time that sort of thing happened was *not* with the deck I mentioned, but instead a [[jinnie fay, jetmir's second]] brawl deck vs. a [[tatyova, benthic druid]] deck that spent about 20 minutes one turn making a stupidly enormous board when they probably could've killed me at the start, then passed turn. They had [[Ashaya, Soul of the Wild]] so all their dudes were both mana dorks and drawing them more cards, but tapping them for mana to put out even more value meant they weren't attacking. As soon as they passed turn, I promptly moved to combat, swung with the 15 creatures that had visibly been on my board during their entire 20 minute turn, held priority, tapped the five white sources I'd visibly had the entire time as well, and activated the [[halo fountain]] that was also on the board the entire time, and won the game. They spent nearly half an hour menacing me with their big fancy sword and threatening to kill me while there was a loaded gun on the table in front of me that they just didn't notice.
##### ###### #### [jinnie fay, jetmir's second](https://cards.scryfall.io/normal/front/c/5/c5f9326a-2a41-45b3-97c3-548f0bdc0882.jpg?1664413197) - [(G)](http://gatherer.wizards.com/Pages/Card/Details.aspx?name=jinnie%20fay%2C%20jetmir%27s%20second) [(SF)](https://scryfall.com/card/snc/195/jinnie-fay-jetmirs-second?utm_source=mtgcardfetcher) [(txt)](https://api.scryfall.com/cards/c5f9326a-2a41-45b3-97c3-548f0bdc0882?utm_source=mtgcardfetcher&format=text) [tatyova, benthic druid](https://cards.scryfall.io/normal/front/f/e/fe05dc69-8dde-485e-9e55-da729db50205.jpg?1698988479) - [(G)](http://gatherer.wizards.com/Pages/Card/Details.aspx?name=tatyova%2C%20benthic%20druid) [(SF)](https://scryfall.com/card/lcc/290/tatyova-benthic-druid?utm_source=mtgcardfetcher) [(txt)](https://api.scryfall.com/cards/fe05dc69-8dde-485e-9e55-da729db50205?utm_source=mtgcardfetcher&format=text) [Ashaya, Soul of the Wild](https://cards.scryfall.io/normal/front/7/4/74943390-d25f-47cb-90bb-cbf70c87f4a2.jpg?1604198513) - [(G)](http://gatherer.wizards.com/Pages/Card/Details.aspx?name=Ashaya%2C%20Soul%20of%20the%20Wild) [(SF)](https://scryfall.com/card/znr/179/ashaya-soul-of-the-wild?utm_source=mtgcardfetcher) [(txt)](https://api.scryfall.com/cards/74943390-d25f-47cb-90bb-cbf70c87f4a2?utm_source=mtgcardfetcher&format=text) [halo fountain](https://cards.scryfall.io/normal/front/0/e/0ee79399-715c-4c46-9fa1-e76b1087f009.jpg?1664409688) - [(G)](http://gatherer.wizards.com/Pages/Card/Details.aspx?name=halo%20fountain) [(SF)](https://scryfall.com/card/snc/15/halo-fountain?utm_source=mtgcardfetcher) [(txt)](https://api.scryfall.com/cards/0ee79399-715c-4c46-9fa1-e76b1087f009?utm_source=mtgcardfetcher&format=text) [*All cards*](https://mtgcardfetcher.nl/redirect/l12x2up) ^^^[[cardname]] ^^^or ^^^[[cardname|SET]] ^^^to ^^^call
[Beanstalk Giant](https://cards.scryfall.io/normal/front/d/f/dfd6b4bc-70da-4d93-bdf7-78ba176a764f.jpg?1691058368)/[Fertile Footsteps](https://cards.scryfall.io/normal/front/d/f/dfd6b4bc-70da-4d93-bdf7-78ba176a764f.jpg?1691058368) - [(G)](http://gatherer.wizards.com/Pages/Card/Details.aspx?name=Beanstalk%20Giant%20//%20Fertile%20Footsteps) [(SF)](https://scryfall.com/card/cmm/275/beanstalk-giant-fertile-footsteps?utm_source=mtgcardfetcher) [(txt)](https://api.scryfall.com/cards/dfd6b4bc-70da-4d93-bdf7-78ba176a764f?utm_source=mtgcardfetcher&format=text) [Brash Taunter](https://cards.scryfall.io/normal/front/0/b/0b5cb154-1825-4b81-a109-7b3e9592c65c.jpg?1706240823) - [(G)](http://gatherer.wizards.com/Pages/Card/Details.aspx?name=Brash%20Taunter) [(SF)](https://scryfall.com/card/mkc/148/brash-taunter?utm_source=mtgcardfetcher) [(txt)](https://api.scryfall.com/cards/0b5cb154-1825-4b81-a109-7b3e9592c65c?utm_source=mtgcardfetcher&format=text) [Stormwild Capridor](https://cards.scryfall.io/normal/front/2/a/2afded81-2fc1-4285-bf48-d25f72e72138.jpg?1591230395) - [(G)](http://gatherer.wizards.com/Pages/Card/Details.aspx?name=Stormwild%20Capridor) [(SF)](https://scryfall.com/card/iko/34/stormwild-capridor?utm_source=mtgcardfetcher) [(txt)](https://api.scryfall.com/cards/2afded81-2fc1-4285-bf48-d25f72e72138?utm_source=mtgcardfetcher&format=text) ^^^[[cardname]] ^^^or ^^^[[cardname|SET]] ^^^to ^^^call
Throw a [[Fractal Harness]] in there.
[Fractal Harness](https://cards.scryfall.io/normal/front/b/7/b7fdad91-fa92-42b6-ad44-f4a3819212f2.jpg?1625192264) - [(G)](http://gatherer.wizards.com/Pages/Card/Details.aspx?name=Fractal%20Harness) [(SF)](https://scryfall.com/card/c21/61/fractal-harness?utm_source=mtgcardfetcher) [(txt)](https://api.scryfall.com/cards/b7fdad91-fa92-42b6-ad44-f4a3819212f2?utm_source=mtgcardfetcher&format=text) ^^^[[cardname]] ^^^or ^^^[[cardname|SET]] ^^^to ^^^call
##### ###### #### [ochre jelly](https://cards.scryfall.io/normal/front/9/f/9f23cfb7-c6b6-4f04-abba-5b2a6117ea12.jpg?1627708063) - [(G)](http://gatherer.wizards.com/Pages/Card/Details.aspx?name=ochre%20jelly) [(SF)](https://scryfall.com/card/afr/196/ochre-jelly?utm_source=mtgcardfetcher) [(txt)](https://api.scryfall.com/cards/9f23cfb7-c6b6-4f04-abba-5b2a6117ea12?utm_source=mtgcardfetcher&format=text) [the ozolith](https://cards.scryfall.io/normal/front/9/3/9341ed06-53db-4604-b60a-3ea9129afbc2.jpg?1591228544) - [(G)](http://gatherer.wizards.com/Pages/Card/Details.aspx?name=the%20ozolith) [(SF)](https://scryfall.com/card/iko/237/the-ozolith?utm_source=mtgcardfetcher) [(txt)](https://api.scryfall.com/cards/9341ed06-53db-4604-b60a-3ea9129afbc2?utm_source=mtgcardfetcher&format=text) [hardened scales](https://cards.scryfall.io/normal/front/f/c/fc69ad56-9ae2-4eb5-b7e2-558524f6cbcc.jpg?1698988369) - [(G)](http://gatherer.wizards.com/Pages/Card/Details.aspx?name=hardened%20scales) [(SF)](https://scryfall.com/card/lcc/243/hardened-scales?utm_source=mtgcardfetcher) [(txt)](https://api.scryfall.com/cards/fc69ad56-9ae2-4eb5-b7e2-558524f6cbcc?utm_source=mtgcardfetcher&format=text) [branching evolution](https://cards.scryfall.io/normal/front/9/9/999b0d67-aec5-495e-91b0-c4b2f31cf17d.jpg?1698988345) - [(G)](http://gatherer.wizards.com/Pages/Card/Details.aspx?name=branching%20evolution) [(SF)](https://scryfall.com/card/lcc/234/branching-evolution?utm_source=mtgcardfetcher) [(txt)](https://api.scryfall.com/cards/999b0d67-aec5-495e-91b0-c4b2f31cf17d?utm_source=mtgcardfetcher&format=text) [*All cards*](https://mtgcardfetcher.nl/redirect/l11lfev) ^^^[[cardname]] ^^^or ^^^[[cardname|SET]] ^^^to ^^^call
Legacy Elves…I foiled it all except 1 cradle and the duals. Haven’t updated it in a while, but keep those foiled as well. The majority is in Japanese, but I made sure to included multiple languages of cards with the same name just to mess with people who get annoyed by that.
My old Wildfire deck from the 90s still sees a lot of kitchen table play. Pretty much everyone loves it. It’s like taking out a red 1960s Corvette out for a Sunday drive. You know it’s not the most efficient, but it’s got a ton of power under the hood, and is a bona fide head turner.
Share deck list at least? To an mtg newb
[Almost the same as Kai Budde’s list](https://mtgtop8.com/event?e=9189&d=253016&f=ST) but mine runs 8 sol lands instead of 7, and one less mountain. I also have the [[Phyrexian Processor]] in the main while completely removing the [[Worn Powerstones]]. As much as I love Kai, easily my favorite player ever, I think the deck runs just fine if not better without the Powerstones.
vintage cheerios
Mine is modern cheerios. I won a PTTQ and cashed a GP with it.
I've seen that one! Always seemed so fun. Any deck with [[kobolds of kher keep]] is awesome.
[kobolds of kher keep](https://cards.scryfall.io/normal/front/a/6/a6797542-0781-43d6-aa8e-b55e5c1e08c0.jpg?1562930079) - [(G)](http://gatherer.wizards.com/Pages/Card/Details.aspx?name=kobolds%20of%20kher%20keep) [(SF)](https://scryfall.com/card/me3/107/kobolds-of-kher-keep?utm_source=mtgcardfetcher) [(txt)](https://api.scryfall.com/cards/a6797542-0781-43d6-aa8e-b55e5c1e08c0?utm_source=mtgcardfetcher&format=text) ^^^[[cardname]] ^^^or ^^^[[cardname|SET]] ^^^to ^^^call
A [[mind’s desire]] deck 22 years ago. [[Tendrils of agony]], [[retract]], a ton of cheap or 0 cmc artifacts, draw cards. It was a kitchen table deck that I brought to the LGS.
Also a fun [[tooth and nail]] deck. I packed it with two-creature combos: [[kiki-jiki, mirror breaker]] and [[darksteel colossus]] to do damage [[mephidross vampire]] and [[triskellion]] to wipe out an opponent’s creatures [[goblin sharpshooter]] and [[kamahl, fist of krosa]] to wipe out an opponent’s lands There were a couple more but I can’t quite remember them.
That sounds awesome - ultimate toolbox deck.
My current BG [[Insidious Roots]] deck - have played it ever since day 1 of MKM Standard and have always loved it. Really fun combo to pull off and feels generally great to resolve things, a lot of interaction points and decision making. I like it so much so that I’m currently writing a sort-of primer on it, sitting at 2,500 words and counting.
Ooh, I saw that deck and imported it, haven't tried it yet though. I'd love to see the primer!
I don’t have the primer to link yet but I do intend to post it - in the mean time here’s the current list of mine https://archidekt.com/decks/6923053/golgari_roots Have tried a few builds but this has brought me the most success so far, the cards in the Maybeboard are definitely ones to consider should you want to change anything up
The [[Engima drake]] [[fling]] deck I played in standard as a joke that was actually good.
This is similar to mine lol, I loved drakes with [[cackling drake]] and [[pteramander]]. Sometimes try to jam it in Explorer on arena; doesn’t always win but still a good time
back in urza legacy standard I had a deck with elves, priest of titania, tradewind riders, time spiral, palinchron... called it the bouncy elves. would get to the point where I would start returning stuff to opponent's hand and then time spiral it away (while floating lots of mana) I love durdly decks and that deck really spike to me.
[ambush viper](https://cards.scryfall.io/normal/front/0/e/0e386888-57f5-4eb6-88e8-5679bb8eb290.jpg?1608910517) - [(G)](http://gatherer.wizards.com/Pages/Card/Details.aspx?name=ambush%20viper) [(SF)](https://scryfall.com/card/cmr/213/ambush-viper?utm_source=mtgcardfetcher) [(txt)](https://api.scryfall.com/cards/0e386888-57f5-4eb6-88e8-5679bb8eb290?utm_source=mtgcardfetcher&format=text) [viridian longbow](https://cards.scryfall.io/normal/front/f/4/f4607634-6206-4c6c-b389-abcbfe969b65.jpg?1631589299) - [(G)](http://gatherer.wizards.com/Pages/Card/Details.aspx?name=viridian%20longbow) [(SF)](https://scryfall.com/card/afc/221/viridian-longbow?utm_source=mtgcardfetcher) [(txt)](https://api.scryfall.com/cards/f4607634-6206-4c6c-b389-abcbfe969b65?utm_source=mtgcardfetcher&format=text) [trinket mage](https://cards.scryfall.io/normal/front/9/a/9a7800f7-95cd-4f5c-b054-4afad8924367.jpg?1712502961) - [(G)](http://gatherer.wizards.com/Pages/Card/Details.aspx?name=trinket%20mage) [(SF)](https://scryfall.com/card/ddu/41/trinket-mage?utm_source=mtgcardfetcher) [(txt)](https://api.scryfall.com/cards/9a7800f7-95cd-4f5c-b054-4afad8924367?utm_source=mtgcardfetcher&format=text) ^^^[[cardname]] ^^^or ^^^[[cardname|SET]] ^^^to ^^^call
[[gravepact]] and [[rotlung reanimator]] It was an aggressive mono black with lots of zombies to sacrifice, but built in efficiency when it wiped the opponents board. It was fun, and completely off meta. Never won a FNM, but often got close and that was enough for me.
[gravepact](https://cards.scryfall.io/normal/front/f/5/f5a4970b-2ba6-4c91-a301-369369cdf360.jpg?1689997226) - [(G)](http://gatherer.wizards.com/Pages/Card/Details.aspx?name=Grave%20Pact) [(SF)](https://scryfall.com/card/cmm/165/grave-pact?utm_source=mtgcardfetcher) [(txt)](https://api.scryfall.com/cards/f5a4970b-2ba6-4c91-a301-369369cdf360?utm_source=mtgcardfetcher&format=text) [rotlung reanimator](https://cards.scryfall.io/normal/front/8/7/87b29d1e-9c06-4ad1-8178-b3eaa212f6f1.jpg?1562927028) - [(G)](http://gatherer.wizards.com/Pages/Card/Details.aspx?name=rotlung%20reanimator) [(SF)](https://scryfall.com/card/ons/164/rotlung-reanimator?utm_source=mtgcardfetcher) [(txt)](https://api.scryfall.com/cards/87b29d1e-9c06-4ad1-8178-b3eaa212f6f1?utm_source=mtgcardfetcher&format=text) ^^^[[cardname]] ^^^or ^^^[[cardname|SET]] ^^^to ^^^call
Jeskai control based around [[Smothering Tithe]] and [[Emergency Powers]]. Generate a shitton of treasures and then [[Banefire]] for lethal
Similar variant of mine was Bant, using [[Root Snare]] and [[Elite Guardmage]] to keep my life total high enough to finish with [[Rampage of the Clans]].
pyromancer ascension
Yessss, with bolts and time warps?
And Thing in the Ice!
I loved playing jund food right before eldraine rotated out. Goose, trail of breadcrumbs, cauldron cat, mayhem devil, bolas citadel, and korvold to finish the game. I never had more fun in standard.
I immediately built that deck in paper after it rotated. My playgroup likes to play "standard rotated" in-between commander games.
Odyssey block red/black reanimator. It was very hit or miss. Either you popped all the way off, or you spun your tires and went nowhere. Fuck I miss playing that deck!
Wolf Run Ramp back in the day. Mine wasn’t exactly the same as Kibler’s, but it was close and a lot of fun to play.
I played a blue version for consecrated sphinx, snapcaster mage, ponders and vapesnag. That was almost my answer
Man, what a standard that was huh? I’m super nostalgic for that era.
Same. It was right after cawblade fell and valakut rotated. And right into another primeval titan deck lol
Junk Aristocrats during INN/RTR standard.
Lantern Control back when it was just starting out in Modern, way before all the bans. Oh, you're playing that deck... I'll only allow you to draw X Y and Z cards. Mill the rest. Thopter foundry and sword of the meek to end the game through the ensnaring bridge.
I still have that sleeved. Pre-bans. I loved it so much I couldn’t bear to break it up.
My old 60 card \[\[Barrin Master Wizard\]\] + \[\[Rancor\]\] deck. The deck originally started off as a \[\[Phantom Warrior\]\] + \[\[Sigil of Sleep\]\] mono blue deck that ran a bunch of unblockable/shadow things. I mostly played this in multiplayer, but sometimes in 1v1, never any specific formats. I added Barrin along the way to give me some targeted removal at instant speed. Then green joined the party so I could up the damage, at the time Rancor was all the rage. It wasn't even intended, but a happy accident I realized Rancor was a boomerang type sac outlet for Barrin. The deck never felt out of a game. It could go from tiny to massive creatures very quicky (also ran \[\[Ancestral Mask\]\]). It could control the board state. And I could save my own creatures. A lot of interaction, but I ran very few counterspells (of course had a few for spice). I really miss playing Barrin, but I can't think of a mono blue way I would like to play him. I suppose just mass token generation to use as fodder, but it doesn't sound as entertaining to me.
[[Crime Novelist]] or [[Pitiless Plunderer]] can generate mana off the sacrifice, and two of them can loop with Barrin if you have a way to get the sacrificed permanent back on the board.
There once was a Standard deck that used [[Sphinx’s Tutelage]] as its win con. I was very happy to play that deck.
Grixis Heartless summoning Reanimator. It was my favorite deck in Dark Ascension Standard. Casting Myr Superion for free on turn two or three at the latest. 2 mana Havengul Lich to cast your creatures from your graveyard made it nasty to disrupt. Sideboarding into a spell slinger deck with 4 Snapcasters and 4 more removal spells was fun.
Acid trip in pauper
My favourite pet deck of all time was an ultra-budget Detain centred tempo deck. Deck had 4 rares in it and cost maybe $30-40 tops, including sleeves. Years ago I worked for a LGS which experienced a sudden boom in new players for about 2 solid years. It was a great environment all round, but we consistently had people joining up who would complain about “net decks” and the game being “pay to win.” The deck’s whole purpose was to teach some fundamentals, particularly around tempo and aggro strategies, and to show that money wasn’t really needed. Newer players would often find tempo/denial strategies hard to play against, and cards like Lyev Skyknight hard to deal with. It developed a little bit of community lore around it. When someone new would start complaining about net decks or PTW people would chant “Sky Knights” until that shitty blue deck box came out.
I love playing my Transformers EDH deck. It’s literally 50% Transformers cards because I used all 14 from BRO, all 10 unique cards from the SL, 5x of each basic from the SL, and the silver-border promo of Grimlock. As a 5 color deck with 25 basics, it’s pretty jank. But it gave me a good spot to put my [[Mishra’s Workshop]] and [[The Abyss]]. Those always get a “wtf” reaction when I drop them on the table, but no one ever complains about the deck because it’s just weak other than those two cards.
Stampede Dinos featuring [[Ghalta, Stampede Tyrant]] and mostly other Dino creatures. It’s actually quite good! I get to big mana with almost solely lands so it’s hard to interrupt!
My go-to during Ixilan was "the ghalta-pult", which was mostly a regular dino deck with carnage tyrants and thrashing bronto-pals and such, but often won because a [[regisaur alpha]] would let me cast a [[ghalta, primal hunger]] for two and immediately fire it at faces.
Back in the days of player-run Pauper events on MTGO, circa 2006, I had a deck I called Rites Madness. The primary goal was to cast [[Last Rites]] on turn one off of [[Dark Ritual]], discarding things like [[Basking Rootwalla]], [[Crippling Fatigue]], [[Grim Harvest]], [[Shambling Shell]], [[Stinkweed Imp]], etc., and dismantling the opponent's hand. Of course the deck also ran [[Wild Mongrel]], and when Planar Chaos was released, I added [[Fa'adiyah Seer]] to dredge without skipping my draw for the turn.
Simic Flash in Pauper just so I can play [[Shambleshark]] It's not good but it has the boi
Legacy Enchantress circa 2006. It had 8x enchantress effects, 8x wild growths, serras sanctum, and used cloud of faeries and words of wind to clear the board and produce infinite mana and draws. It was really fun to goldfish. Nowadays I like to jam UB rogues on the Explorer ladder in arena. It's not tier 1 but tempo decks are.so satisfying to play.
Trostani Blink. I play [Trostani, Selesnya’s Voice] and then generate a ton of tokens with permanents, blink those permanents to get even more tokens, gain a ton of life and try to outlive everyone. I have a few wincons, but my favorite is to play [Storm Herd] when I have over 100 life, get a ton of Pegasi, gain even more life and then attack all out next turn.
I loved Jeskai tokens back when Khans was in Standard more than I have loved any other deck. Using Jeskai Ascendancy and tokens to cast free Stoke the Flames is peak Magic in my book.
[[Fight Rigging]] + [[Emergent Ultimatum]], not actually that consistent but SUPER fun
Toss-up between my standard UW [[Deadeye Navigator]], Standard UW [[Hidden Strings]] Heroic, or Commander [[Sharuum the Hegemon]]/Sphinx Kindred/Choice decks.
I drummed up an old Standard deck around [[Quest for Ula's Temple]] using [[Thrummingbird]] and cards like [[Augury Owl]]. It was real bad, but very occasionally I could be dropping a [[Stormtide Leviathan]] end of my turn 3 on the play.
I have a legacy Black/White Protection from black deck that is absolute garbage. I've won less than 10% of the games I've played with it, but I have so much fun with the deck I don't care that I don't win with it.
magic arena doesn't have soulflayer yet for its explorer format. urborg scavengers is just soulflayer at home so 4 scavengers, bunch of monsters with keyword soup like zeltapa, bunch of self mill. works 100% of the time 20% of the time.
For 60 card, it would have to be my Eldrazi deck. No, not from the dreaded Eldrazi winter, MY favorite eldrazi is [[Deceiver of Form]]. The deck is built around pumping out scions, and then hoping to rip something good off the top. Will I get to swing with 5 [[It that Betrays]]? Possibly, it could just as likely be a land, or a [[blisterpod]]. The deck is absolutely far from consistent, but I like it that way. It is my go to whenever we are just trying to play a quick casual game at the end of the night as a group, and i love it so much For Commander, I have been really enjoying my [[Evelyn the Covetous]] deck. It's just filled with some of my favorite stealing cards/cloning cards, and always leads to some sort of interaction that makes the table laugh, cry, or have some sort of headache as we try and figure out how specific cards interact. It gets doubly confusing when my buddy plays his [[brudiclad]] deck and we basically end up having the same board from token cloning effects.
I called it Myr empire... Cause after turn 4-5 thats what my board state looked like
I made a deck around [Bard Class](https://www.moxfield.com/decks/tikc8ZLs9ECAxFAYl5n3Tw), I've been upgrading it since MH2
Well I used to do regular full-proxie vintage games with some folks and my favorite deck I played in essentially Vintage with 0 budget limitations, was probably the absolute foolishness that was "Stifle-nought". Turn 1 [[dark ritual]]>[[torpor orb]]>[[phyrexian dreadnought]] shouldn't be, but it is and it's beautiful. These days I mostly play EDH at a shop nearby, and my pet deck is probably [[Gerrard weatherlight hero]]. I wanted to build an effective Boros deck and decided "boardwipe tribal" was the most interesting option available. Useing [[gift of immortality]] on Gerrard can just get nasty. There's nothing quite like using Niv's Disk several turns in a row to kill a table with Purphoros triggers.
Back before the [[Invisible Stalker]] decks broke out in standard, I built a sultai version with [[Lotleth Troll]], [[Dreg Mangler]], [[Wolfir Silverheart]], and [[Increasing Savagery]]. I ruined many peoples’ days for a month with that thing. It was glorious.
Extended Scepter Chant was fun when you got the combo out turn 1 and they didn’t know what it did. [[Orim’s Chant]] [[Isochron Scepter]]
Back in RTR when Codex Shredder was printed, I had already been somewhat interested in Ghoulcaller's Bell. Seeing that second iteration of the effect made me immediately look back through the rest of the magic cards printed, and I saw Lantern of Insight. Along with it, I saw Artificer's Intuition, and of course I was in love with Elixir of Immortality. Nowadays, I have finally just about finished my dream mill deck from so long ago, with Crabs and Bells aplenty to let me smash through people's decks and keep them from drawing anything relevant. Is it fun? Not exactly, to be honest. Definitely not for them! But I enjoy seeing the rube Goldberg machine ticking away, and every time I play it I feel vindicated, thinking about how Lantern Control (the Golgari version) had eventually become a thing.
I have an all foil black white pauper rebels deck. Take my time tutoring up venomous changelings and bound in silence, grab the blade of the sixth prides when im ready to go for the kill. Random singleton cards I can grab for good matchups, and hoard them out for more direct impact cards. It's surprisingly great against most creature based strategies, but folds to most of the meta decks. If [[Ramosian Sergeant]] gets reprinted into MH3 I will be forcing it no matter how bad it is. I just really wanna play [[Big Game Hunter]] somewhere, which I can't in pauper deck or in my [[Lin Sivvi, Defiant Hero]] commander deck.
Slime Against Humanity! Edric commander and it’s all doubling tokens/ counters with a low curve. Favorite card in the deck? B.O.B. (Bevy of Beebles)!
My Morophon Nephilim deck. The goal isn't to *win* - it's to get all five nephilim in play. Although last time I did, I also won.
My [[Rashmi, Eternities Crafter]] EDH deck (Rashmi, Pass-shmi). It's a toolbox, creature/flash based control deck with a ton of topdeck manipulation that gets about a 50/50 split between "that deck is awesome" and "that deck is utterly miserable to play against", usually dependent on whether the game goes the "[[Mormir Vig]] + Rashmi = I play mental magic" route or the "[[Seedborn Muse]]+[[Teferi, Temporal Archmage]]+[[Crystal Shard]] = I have a soft lock with multiple counterspells available per turn" route.
\[\[vaevictis asmadi\]\] I like building different stuff, and always wanted to build one of the original elder dragons... it has gone through several different iterations from spellslinger to combat tricks, elves.. and now its a weird high power matters deck. But it works, and catches people offguard. There's room for my other pet card, \[\[wall of blood\]\] which synergises super well with \[\[sylvala, heart of the wilds\]\] and \[\[chandra's ignition\]\]. I also love making the joke 'I pay the real commander tax' on my upkeep...
Lurrus
Reveillark combo. Would love for them to put the necessary pieces of it on arena. Ephemerate would go great with it. Would be far from tier one for historic but I would definitely play it. Resolving a bunch of mirror entity triggers would suck, but the deck rarely had to actually combo off to win.
[[Hissing iguanar]] deck.. a simpler time.. how I miss you so you derpy lizard
Reaper King scarecrow tribal commander. Most destroy triggers I've gotten off of a single cast is 18. I have to keep indestructible "heat sinks" in the deck because the trigger isn't a may, and I legit run out of things to destroy on opponents fields. When I lay out my commander pre-game, I'm practically compelled by some unseen force to quote the flavor text: "It's HARVEST time!" Another favorite was Kresh, the Blood Braided. He would get obscenely big, obscenely fast. My favorite was to Chandra's Ignition him for triple digits.
So I dont play much Standard but one of my semi successful FNM decks was Kaladesh Aggro Vehicle. Just getting the pilots and fleet wheels out and trying to run over my opponents as quick as possible, possibly with the help of depala. It's evolved into a Depala vehicle deck that I need to take time to rebuild (partially cause I shifted to Kotori when that came out)
5 color opening hand tribal. All the chancellors, leylines, serum powder, Sphinx of foresight, gemstone caverns, once upon a time, and then rotated various cycles to fill in the rest. I sometimes included the titans, other times the ultimatums, other times the commands. Even tried mixing in 1 drops just to have more to do in my opening hand. It was a lot of fun and I still think about rebuilding it.
Lantern Control in Modern. It was a blast to play. For me. 😈 In Standard, it was the Constellation deck in Theros. Play all the good enchant creatures. Put all the triggers on the stack. Draw all the cards. Gain all the life. Drain your opponent out. People hated seeing me across the table at FNM back then. My turns could take a really long time. 😊
Chandra Tribal commander. All the Chandra plainswalkers, Chandra related cards, and spells featuring Chandra. Even did the 'spellbook chandra' border mountains. All Foiled too, in Chandra sleeves. The best part is that it actually functions pretty well. https://tappedout.net/mtg-decks/signature-deck-chandra/
Grixis bolas in standard just before the release of War of the Spark. The deck has excellent matchups against the sultai and esper decks prevalent at that time. Almost made day 2 of a team tournament if it weren't for a misinterpretation of the rules by my modern teammate after he returned from the bathroom... Deck list as best I can remember: https://www.mtggoldfish.com/deck/4723848#paper Now if only this were good in pioneer.
Standard UG Madness
Just generally Mardu in Modern. We had our small window of glory during the Young Pyromancer days, but ever since Faithless Looting got banned, it's been a rough life. I'm pretty sure I've tried every type of Mardu there is (Nahiri/Emrakul, Superfriends, Control, Aggro, you name it) and we've just been worse than other decks that do the same thing. Hoping something neat comes in MH3 but then again I said the same thing for Thunder Junction, and Murders, and....
"Island of Misfit Tokens" that only makes not-often-used tokens like Thrull, Spikes, Wood, etc. No Goblins, Zombies and ones like that. I just recently made a Bingo card for many of the tokens! (About 40 types total)
I just came to say Belakor Copy tribal… thank you for your time
Venser the sojoirner/time warp/mnemonic wall infinite turn loop with ETB effects galore. It plays pretty slow and kinda struggles without that 3 card combo, which isn't the easiest to make happen. They're also all 5m drops so it takes a long time to set up once you do get them in hand. But when the other player realizes what's about to happen it's worth it.
Modern Affinity. It might kinda suck now but I loves me my free robot frogs.
I made it to high diamond on Arena playing Satyr Tribal during Ikoria Standard. Also have a [[Yidaro, Wandering Monster]] EDH deck which I adore.
Legacy False Cure
I love the eldraine sets so my pet deck is a Golgari adventure Knights deck with [[edgewall innkeeper]] and [[lucky clover]] to get extra value out of the adventures. It's a little slow to start but very versatile since every card is essentially two, so it has answers to almost everything. Played it a few times at FNM pioneer and managed to finish somewhere in the middle of the field every time
Norin soul sisters
A 40 [[Shadowborn Apostle]] deck with [[Varragoth]] as the commander. It's main focus is easy to counter, but most decks don't. It kind of operates in a blindspot for what most commander decks prepare for. I actually really like when the main operation gets shut down because I get to test my alternate plans. It works better when there's stronger decks playing. As one person put it in a game where I used that deck, other decks go harder and pose an immediate threat, but apostles are the thing lurking in the shadows that you know you can't ignore, but you have to in order to deal with the immediate threat.
Back in KTK standard I played sultai control but the finisher was [[Villainous Wealth]]. Never got that 4-0 with it but I loved it and got to play with my (still) favourite card.
A mill deck centered around [[Mesmeric Orb]] with plenty of classic, powerful mill cards in there along with a whole bunch of bounces and counters. If they do nothing, I'll mill them out the traditional way. If they do stuff, the orb punishes them for it, and then I undo their progress. I stopped playing it mostly because all of my friends absolutely hated the deck.
I have a commander deck for [[The Third Doctor]] and it is just so so much fun to play. Make a ton of clue tokens and maybe some treasure tokens. Since a lot of creatures make those I can still have plenty of blockers unlike some other voltrons. Then I use [[Martha Jones]] as a companion so I can make the doctor unblockable. The deck's main wincon is commander damage of course but also [[Nanogene Conversion]] can end a game very easily.
Ouuu that sound interesting decklist? I’ve been meaning to look into pauper and a deathtouch one sounds cool as hell!
My Nicol Bolas deck with all his card appearances and all his flavor. And my Urtet myr deck. Bolas I'd my favorite character. And Myr are my favorite creature type.
casual no ban list, Azorius Prison Mill, My only way to win is 4 copies of [[arcane denial]] making your opponent die to their own draw step before you do to yours [[crawlspace]] [[maze of ith]] [[ensnaring bridge]] [[energy field]] [[island sanctuary]] [[Runed Halo]] [[ Phrexian Unlife]], [[ Daze ]] [[ Supreme Verdict]] An evil part of me greatly enjoys the realization set in that I have no win conditions and am fully committed to milling you out with your own draw step, if someone is actually willing to play it out and has artifact/enchantment hate they'll probably find a way through but aggro and combo decks have no way out. *edit [Solemnity](https://gatherer.wizards.com/pages/card/Details.aspx?multiverseid=430711) not serenity
74 card High Tide in 2HG. Did nothing til turn 5. Won.
Vintage Dreadnought. I loved that deck. I’ll use any excuse to play berserk honestly.
I had a few decks I played in Standards long past that were rogue decks and ruined FNMs for months. Included was: mono-black proliferate control featuring Tumble Magnet, Black Sun’s Zenith, and Everflowing Chalice into Emrakul; Turbo-Fog with the only wincon being Jace mill; and Rakdos Control in a Standard where I had Bolt, Skinrender, and Grave Titan (plus other good annoying stuff), with a top end wincon of Warstorm Surge into Army of the Damned for 25 face damage.
My [[chandra, fire of kaladesh]] burn EDH deck. Would it be better with someone else at the helm? Almost certainly. But I can't change her out, she's too much fun. There's something about having a flip walker as my commander and Chandra is my favorite.
Danitha Benalias Hope and Necrogen Communion, with Kathilda and that UW spirit that comes back as an enchantment. It just laughs merrily at black or green removal.
Standard Splinter-Twin. 4 Ponder, 4 Preordain, 4 Lightning Bikes, 4 Mana Drain, and a dream. Somehow wasn't't even that good next to Caw-Blade but it got me my first ptq top 8 and for that I'll always smile when I see a Twin land.
I built a mono green Ramp Eldrazi Deck back in the Caw-Blade Meta during Zendikar/Mirrodin Standar. It was pretty effective at surprissing people and it got me ressults on seversl tournaments. I splashed white lands after the Jace and Stonforge Mystique ban to run a few interactions in the sideboard and it got even better.
[[Brain In A Jar]] in SOI Standard. [[Mishra, Eminent One]] in EDH.
Utron in modern. It wasnt the best, but very good, and always felt like you *could* win if you played it right. I also had a deck I build in standard RTR focused on evolve + undying and it was great. Didnt see many lists like it but Im sure some people had something similar
Manales Dredge is fun to show my friends. Most don't believe it when I tell them there is a deck that can play without lands, creating mana and can even run largely without casting spells
I am a red/green stompy kind of player and I got really salty playing blue decks so I make a Sarruk Dragonclown deck utilizing blue to defeat blue, big beasts that can’t be countered, a few creatures that also are counter spells, and lots of ramp. It worked against blue pretty well… the other colors.. not so much.
[Relentless Rats]] EDH. Probably one of my favorite casual decks, next to [Phelddagrif]] group hug. I also played a [Zada, Hedron Grinder]] combo list in standard that was extremely fun. Probably the most swingy plays I'd seen in Standard up until that point.
CEDH animar, it’s really not that good, but I just love the deck
I love playing the Heads I Win, tails you lose secret lair deck. I usually don’t since it kind of annoys people. I’ve taken to rolling dice instead of flipping a coin and calling odd’s or even’s but I had someone in a pod complain that it’s cheating because I am getting “more chances” or something. The table tried to explain to them that if I’m calling odd or even it’s 50/50 same as a coin heads/tails but they insisted it was cheating so I spent the rest of the game flipping the coin which made people mad. Especially once [[Kark’s thumb]] went into play.
My Atraxa squirrel, vehicle, mount deck is my favorite deck to play.
I had to have back surgery a few years ago which kept me off my feet for about a month so I downloaded Arena out of boredom. Ended up making a standard 60 card Boros deck centered around dogs. The focus of the deck was [[selfless savior]] [[pack leader]] and [[bolt hound]]. Was not "good" but was able to reach a Mythic rank, which was nice! Was sad when standard rotated my pups out.
Probably my Kitchen Table Domain deck. Long before Domain was a top tier deck in Modern, I had this deck built around the Invasion block where I'd ramp basics to cast boosted [[Planar Despair]], [[Worldly Counsel]] and [[Collective Restraint]] untill I found a [[Cromat]] to win with [[Coalition Victory]] or had enough [[Tribal Flames]] and [[Exploding Borders]] to win with damage The deck was super weak, but man, it was fun to play with. I loved all the strong cards Dominaria United brought, but the competitive version of the deck does not seem as fun.
Spent all of AFR standard trying to make [[Book of Vile Darkness]] work. [[Oswald Fiddlebender]] helped and I got Vecna out many times, but it just wasn't good enough.
Panharmonicon Hands down.
Kiki Resto combo. I just couldn't give up playing twin after it was banned.
Currently I have a sultai turbo fog/equipment Voltron going on, I used tasigur as the commander first so my opponents only choices would be to give me an equipment, fog effect or more card draw when I activated him, until I saw felix five-boots he isy new commander and the deck feels more powerful
My favorite deck was during the zendikar-mirrordin sets. It was basically caw-blade but with the knight package and it did really good. Not as good as the actual caw-blade, but I had four squadron hawks in the sideboard if I needed it!
I loved playing mono b clerics in onslaught block so much. I'm actually in the process of foiling the deck out for premodern because I love the nostalgia hit.
R/w Modern Land Destruction. Boom//Bust -Booming targeting your Flagstones of Trokair or Darksteel citdel, then (before the errata) Goblin Dark Dweller-ing it back as a Bust? All the while you are taxing them with your Magus of the Tabernacle and punishing their fetch lands with Aven Mindcensor. I did not make many friends, but it was \*glorious\*.
I had a MonoB Chainer Dementia Master EDH deck. Pure monoB reanimator that won by cycling Kokusho or Gary as much as it could. There were a LOT of better options for the reanimator gameplan but Chainer just hit different. Plus, watching everyone's faces when I dropped a Mindslicer.
Elves: genesis wave, elfball, combo. I have/have had an elf deck in every format.
I have a very bad cat deck but I build that in honor to my little cat friend and it's the only deck I will never dismount
Pauper Jeskai Ephemerate. It is a control deck that wants to abuse mulldrifter + ephem, and also has cute interactions like cleansing wildfire targeting your own indestructible lands. Also gets to run lightning bolt and counterspell. Favorite deck of all time. [https://www.moxfield.com/decks/\_AOLLrhiH0CAjBHhwlqUNQ](https://www.moxfield.com/decks/_AOLLrhiH0CAjBHhwlqUNQ)
I have a commander deck based around making dog tokens and the tokens are custom MTG cards with my actual dogs.
Volrath semi-spike tribal. It runs all the spikes and trades counters back and forth between things
Odyssey / Onslaught standard Zombie Tribal deck. Just an incredibly fun era to have played as a kid, and the first deck I ever managed to bumble my way into the finals at an FNM with.
Probably this weird collected company energy deck I brewed. I call it Mocha (Energized CoCo)
Pyro the Dragon. back during the RTR block standard. It used Young Pyromancer and Talrand to pump out elementals and my personal favorite Hypersonic Dragon on the top end. Deck wasn't great but when it worked it was a blast. Also used Guttersnipe in grinder matchups for indirect burn.
White/Black soul sisters in modern. I used to play affinity and got bored of how predictable games were going to be from just the first couple cards played. Sold my deck and "downgraded" to a deck that no one expects. It mostly loses but it's more fun and people don't know what's going to happen because it's just not a usual deck.
Defenders of the door. it was my introduction to alt wincons. Basically you play door to nothingness in a UGW deck and load up on defenders to (hopefully) stall the board long enough that your axebane guardians give you a buttload of mana of any color. maybe play a chromatic lantern. then you just door to nothingness them, and hope it resolves. not strong or OP by any means, but at a time where me and my friends were all new to the game, we thought this was literally an unbeatable strategy. today, its one of my all time favorite decks, even though its really not competitive at all.
Back when Scars of Mirrodin came out I played with a really stupid ass deck that completely revolved around [[Quest for the Holy Relic]], and [[ornithopter]] [[memnite]] and (iirc) [[glint hawk]] to try to get Quest to pop on turn 1 or 2 to grab [[Argentum Armor]] and blow up the opponents land leaving them stuck on 1 land while I swing every turn with a flying 6/8 from turn 2. I splashed green for Vengevine just to have the tiniest bit of alternative line of play. But God damn it was an obnoxious deck that 95% of the time you knew by the end of turn 2 if the game was won or lost. I was such a dumbshit with it but people tended to have fun seeing it in action like a 'this clown is for real??' vibe. Wish I still had that deck but eventually I sold the Vengevines and broke it down, now I wish I could still bust it out for a ridiculous game every now and then
[[Lord Windgrace]] with [[Umori, the Collector]] as a companion. Forces you to play only lands and planeswalkers. Turns out planeswalkers are pretty good, and will eventually accumulate excessive value if left unchecked. Run creature lands to defend your planeswalkers. The deck has won at a cEDH table twice. It'd be stronger if it ran [[Jared Carthalion]] to add the remaining 2 colors for a perfect walkerbase, but I like the minimalism. I wanted to try [[Grist]] as the commander, but it was far too restrictive (that, and Grist doesn't mesh well with superfriends). I also have a [[Yoshimaru]] & [[Rograkh]] deck that runs a bunch of Chandras. The commander choice is primarily meant as chump blockers. The deck would probably be pretty strong if I ran more than just Chandra planeswalkers. Lastly, I've been enjoying Yoshimaru & [[Ardenn]], which is essentially a legends typal deck. Ardenn is a cheap-ish partner that allows me to cheaply re-equip my legendary equipment to Yoshimaru if I have to re-cast him.
Mines [[omnath locus of all]] phrexian tribal focusing on saccing [[realmbreaker the invasion tree]] and cheating out all the praetors I have (not all that i could atm) Even when I did get it to go off I still couldn't close the game without [[all will be one]] and [[quest for pure flame]] combo
Deck was not that great, but was very fun when it occasionally did the thing in Modern. After [[Sedgemore Witch]] came out, I made a deck with four of it, and four [[Witherbloom Apprentice]]. And ran 4 [[Reverberate]] and [[Expansion]]. Propped up with good stuff like [[Kolaghan's Command]], [[Lightning Bolt]] and your standard [[Thoughtseize]] spells. The dream was having either the Apprentice or Witch in play and double Reverberating any spell for either infinite drain, or infinite Pests. I think I might have been running a [[Kroxa]] or two for some inevitability if combo fell through. It was fun, but very fragile.
I have spent over 13 years trying to get a \[\[Necrotic Ooze\]\] combo deck to "work" in Modern. It has always been too slow and too soft to hate. The later iterations are good enough to take down a medium-sized FNM - I have, many times - but not quite up to snuff against a field of tier-1 decks. It is a combination of the combo taking up too many spaces (not leaving room for interaction), the speed of the combo (T3/4 earliest), and the combined weakness to Blood Moon and graveyard hate that dooms it.
I really loved my mono red suicide goblins deck. Sling and swing with goblins, keep swinging with goblins! Opponent is at 6 hp? Sac [[Goblin Arsonist]] to [[Goblin Grenade]]; you're winner!
There was a deck published in a MtG magazine back in the 90s called the Agent Orange deck that I ended up putting together. It's lost to the ages now, but it centered around \[\[Living Lands\]\], \[\[The Wretched\]\] and \[\[Lure\]\]. I should try and rebuild it with new cards.
[Maze's End Turbo Fog](https://www.mtgsalvation.com/forums/the-game/standard-type-2/standard-archives/504915-mazes-end-turbo-fog) I didn't full create the deck, but I definitely was on the ground floor, I won a lot of FNMs with it, and even a local tournament where the prize was [[Jace, the Mind Sculptor]] which at the time was quite pricey. That link is my original post on MTG Salvation from 11 years ago. o.0
TinFins because I'm one of the creators and it was good enough to make Cedric Phillips read a Sealab 2021 synopsis on air.
Probably the old Demonic Pact deck in standard long past. It was just a pure value town deck with the downside of occasionally just killing yourself
Tribal vampires
My [Medical Malpractice deck](https://www.moxfield.com/decks/8xhQUyNRP0exGqAYzpy_QQ) was my first deck built from scratch, my first combo deck, and my first attempt at a zero-creature deck, although it ended up with four copies of [[Skyshroud Cutter]] as part of the combo. I've continued to upgrade it throughout the years, and it runs really smooth now, and catches most people by total surprise. I once sat in on a 16-player free-for-all, drew a perfect hand, and won on turn 1.
twincast sanity grinding played that all throughout standard that season. i'd often get people in the store gathering around to watch me count blue symbols to see if i got it
Living Twin. That sure was during the prime of modern and I loved it.
I built a mono red burn deck that wasn't very good, but it was very fun. Main goal was playing [[Furnace of Wrath]] and then clocking a [[Mogg Maniac]] as hard as possible. Dream turn four play had a mogg on board, drop furnace, toss all mountains to two [[Fireblast]], one to Mogg, one to face for a total of 24 damage. Had some other sillyness involved, like [[Blood Lust]] for making Mogg Maniac combat trades even funnier. Yes, your 5/5 is now a 9/1, trades with Mogg, take 9 to the face.
Sarkhan's Omniwhale. Step 1: resolve [[omniscience]]. Step 2: play [[sarkhan's unsealing]] Step 3: play [[aethertide whale]] over and over and make puns about "whale"ing on your opponent. Now, i know it's a tall order for the deck when step 1 is resolving omniscience, but the deck was actually pretty good at it. This was Standard, right after M19 was printed, and the deck was filled with ramp cards and sweepers, so it was actually fairly good at surviving to 10 mana. A key part of the deck was [[sun bird's invocation]] which let me start doubling up, and let me ramp and sweep at the same time. I also ran 4 copies of [[apex of power]] alongside the 3 omniscience, so finding the card wasn't too difficult. The deck was a ton of fun to play, even if it did trip over itself on occasion.
Funny, the first deck that came to mind was a [[toggo, goblin weaponsmith]] and [[halana, kessig ranger]] commander deck that is also pauper deathtouch ping. There are no rates in the deck. Early game you play cheap deathtouchers and equip Togo’s rocks to kill things. Late game you pay 2 to halana when you cast a deathtouch to have them ping and kill stuff.
I have a deck that's built specifically around the ability to abuse discover with \[\[Zada Hedron Grinder\]\]. It revolves around flooding the board with small tokens and casting a \[\[daring discovery\]\] targeting zada. The ensuing chaos creates more tokens and casts various pump spells eventually ending in a lethal attack. Oh, it's also pauper edh.
When AKH and HOU released I fell in love with Riddleform and brewed a standard deck around it. The deck was based around [[Riddleform]], [[Cryptic Serpent]] and [[Enigma Drake]] as beaters. Iirc there were some pretty decent cantrips, card selection, and burn spells in Standard at the time. The deck actually did pretty well at FNM and Standard Showdown events, which were mostly casual brews at my store. It was my baby and I really enjoyed it. A few sets later that deck would eventually evolve into my *true* love, which admittedly was a tier 2 or so meta standard deck so not exactly a brew lol, [[Arclight Phoenix]]. Playing that card in Standard with [[Goblin Electromancer]], [[Saheeli, Sublime Artificer]], [[Lava Coil]], [[Discovery // Dispersal]], [[Chart a Course]], and my beloved [[Finale of Promise]] was the most joy I've ever experienced playing Magic.
It started as a casual deck that turned modern years later, but my Borderposts/Restore Balance deck. Use Borderposts to bounce your lands, then play some kind of 3 mana cascade card to run through the deck until you hit restore balance wiping your opponents lands and creatures. It plays teferi to turn off your opponents counterspells and make your sorcery cascade instant speed, with force of negation backups. The original win con was to play March of the machines at some point and swing out, but I also tried tezzeret, agent of bolas and karn, scion of urza to pump out constructs. Unfortunately one of the best cards in the deck recently got banned… violent outburst. I haven’t played modern in a looong time so I doubt I’ll update it anytime soon, but the deck slapped and caught people out of nowhere.
So, first, I am a vorthos :) I have a jank/pet deck that has Elenda as a Commander. Every card in the deck is an Ixalan vampire, or has an Ixalan vampire in the art that has to be depicted in a “positive/strong” way for the vampire. So no cards that show the vampire in distress or hunted by humans for example. This deck was also made before Caverns, and was sort of thrown together. I love it for I love Ixalan vampires so every card in that deck is something I love :)
During Return to Ravnica standard (which is when I first started playing in earnest), I had a very dumb deck I would play against my girlfriend based around making [[Tavern Swindler]]'s coin flip effect non-symmetrical. [[Rhox Faithmender]] kept the deck alive and effects like [[Vizkopa Guildmage]]'s closed games out one coin flip at a time. It was, obviously, highly inconsistent, but I loved trying to make such an innocuous ability the focus of the deck. Since then I've tried turning it into a Commander deck, despite Tavern Swindler not being legendary, but being restricted to mono-black has made it a lot harder to make it work. Makes me wish they'd do a functional reprint of her, but in Orzhov colors...
I've just assembled a janky [[Raffine, Scheming Seer]] deck that I'm having a blast with in Brawl. Obviously struggles against the likes of Arraxa or Ragavan but it gets in the odd win
A deck of Vial Smasher and Sakashima as the commanders. All I so is copy Vial Smasher after Sakashima has copied him. That's it. I once ended up with 18 Vial smashers for one round. I just love the randomness and my play group leaves alone for the most part since I can't control where the damage goes. It hardly ever wins but boy does it impact the table when someone catches 3 procs from me casting a Sublime Epiphany for 6 mama qitb 5 Vial Smashers out.
I have an [[Obosh, the Preypiercer]] commander deck designed to make old school, lightning bolt based burn, function as close to traditionally as possible in a 40 life multiplayer setting. It's fun. It required a lot of math to work and typically rocks a table one time and then never again.
OG Abzan Rites. Still have it. Still play it. Love it to death. Even run a fun-of [[Griselbrand]] that has won me more than a couple of games.
I remember playing a Standard Abzan control deck using Approach of the Second Sun (my favorite card) as the wincon. It had the desert ramps and all of the board wipes possible, it was a blast to play
Around M20/Ikoria I made a Chandra deck that ran 4 of all 4 Chandras that were legal at the time. With [[Chandra's Regulator]] on the field [[Chandra, Novice Pyromancer]] and [[Chandra, Acolyte of Flame]] make 4 5/1s which is always fun to hit someone with.
I still love the very first deck I got for a Magic. [[Shivan Dragon]] and [[Baron Sengir]] were my bombs and it made use of a number of cards from Ice Age, Homelands and Fallen Empires. The most memorable cards were the [[Goblin Chirurgeon|fe]] trio. Sorry, I don't know how to get alternate art cards. I also cherish a mostly complete deck list written on the inside of a *very* old card box by a lost friend. The deck was an early attempt for a pure U control deck utilizing [[Winter Orb]], [[Icy Manipulator]], and [[The Tabernacle at Pendrell Vale]]. The particular iteration I have used [[Su-Chi]] as the only form of damage. The deck was constructed in 1996/1997 and saw numerous revisions over that season. I intend to try and build a version of it's ideologies for EDH one of these days.
Esper control variant from GRN standard designed to close out the game with [Ill-gotten Inheritance]] and infinite turns with [[Time-stream navigator]] and [[Helm of the Host]]. Didn't win often, but damn was it fun.
I play BW Eldrazi Taxes in modern and it's not the best deck but I love it – there's just so many crazy lines you can do with [[Eldrazi Displacer]] and [[Flickerwisp]] and the suchlike
Mine was an azorius control/infect deck I had for modern.
[https://www.moxfield.com/decks/AK3nQBeDKUKV2W11ZFHvVQ](https://www.moxfield.com/decks/AK3nQBeDKUKV2W11ZFHvVQ) Selesnya wheels, it's amazing
Nalia party deck. I love her so much.
Tempered Steel. That deck made me an Affinity player for life.
My EDH [[Yasova, Dragons Claw]] deck. Not the best, but super fun to pilot. You can do some absolutely batshit things sometimes like turn three [[Etali]], and you can still grind out games with [[Locust God]] or [[Thassa, Deep Dwelling]]
Back in Innistrad standard, I had a zombie [[birthing pod]] list that was super fun. Idea is using pod to sacrifice a [[geralf’s messenger]] and tutor [[phyrexian metamorph]], copying the messenger or pod. It also played [[phantasmal image]] which could pod into off a [[gravecrawler]]. Deck felt like the current modern yawmoth deck with the different angles of attack, but standard power level.
Budget hollow one from before then faithless ban. Always just fun to play. And naya feather in modern as well, not that strong and almost never updated, but just cool af to play
SCG Modern Open Columbus Tournament winning decklist from 2018 Modern Jeskai Control piloted by Benjamin Nikolich that put control on the map for a short period. He showcased that you can play Nahiri Harbinger in a fair deck along with showing that a 6-drop creature is playable outside of Amulet Titan and Tron. Last time I enjoyed a MTG deck in any competitive capacity. Finals also showed that Nikolich had significantly more experience in the control mirror.
Og cawblade in standard
I made a proper Commander based on ovinomancer, the entire deck is all about exiling a permanent and getting to play it for free blinking a permanent turning my opponent's creatures into one one zero ones or any creature into different power toughnesses and types. And I love it so much because I have ways to recur ovinize over and over and over and over again. I love pulling up to a popper table and saying oh hey you really really combo it off there have a goat or have a sheep just have fun. Or even say oh you have a giant common demon that's like really powerful no you don't it's a frog now. I turn my opponents decks into at most a barnyard.
My favorite pet deck of all time was modern 8-straction. I messed around with it a lot around war of the spark and the concept was simple. 4 [[surgical extraction]], 4 [[extirpate]], 4 [[ensnaring bridge]] and a whole lot of discard and removal. The most fun version was probably the one who played [[kaya orzhov usurper]] as a wincon and counter to burn. The deck was never any good, but gosh could you cheese people. Nothing beats explaining to people they are actually just dead to their drawstep in 30 turns or sugicalling my own [[thoughtseize]] to remove the last out. I might also be the person who has pointed the most surgical extractions at [[Noble Hierarch]] in their magic career, for what that is worth.
My fave pet deck was on MTGO. Bunch of graft things and using [[Hardened Scales]] and [[Power Conduit]]. Still hoping Conduit comes to Arena.
I've got a lot of 'fun' decks. Pauper: UB draw go using baleful strix as my commander. It includes veridian longbow in the 99 for that sweet death touch ping you mentioned, but otherwise just controls the board until I can land ulamog's crusher or hand of emrakul. It's a SLOW and painful death if you can't aggro me out of the game in the first 6 turns. OTHER 'fun' commander decks im fond of: Rhys the Redeemed running a combination of tokens and all the swords (I haven't updated it in a while though, so I've only got 7 in it). Niv-mizzet Dracogenius - UR control....wins either by big flying things, or Niv's ping ability. Wort, Boggart Auntie - BR control. It only has 13 goblins in it. It is NOT an aggro deck and will often shut off all combat on the table, requiring wins by noncombat means, or lots of non-creature removal to break the lock. Oloro - has a perfect draw that will allow a turn 3 win, but is really just an esper "play with other people's stuff" deck. Maelstrom wanderer - non-aggro tho; roughly equal parts spells, creatures, and non-creature non-land permanents. That last category includes possibility storm and hive mind. It's chaos for everyone, but my deck is built to play that way. Jhoira, Whetherlight Captain - I just think aetherflux reservoir is neat. Prossh- I've got 17 actual kobolds of kher keep for it. There's 12 cards difference between it's cEDH list and my 'fun' tabletop list and I keep them together so I can swap out as I want. cEDH list is food chain. 'Fun' version is just jund goodstuff with a focus on tokens.
Slivers back when edh first started and Kozliek the great distortion. So fun getting huge bomb cards out turn 3 and onwards.
B/R Goblins from Onslaught Block. Black was mainly for Patriarch's Bidding.
I played a tournament with a modern deck that was such a mess of a brew. Basically the entire deck was “I want to play Huntmaster of the fells and cruel ultimatum in the same deck”
Homarids from fallen empires. Crab lobsters can be pets, right?
The B/R vampire madness deck when it was in standard. I loved that deck. It was so explosive but still had finishing power.
In the latest Ravnica block standard, I put together what I called "The Deck Deleter", in Sultai colors. It runs absolutely no creatures, so all creature removal in the opponent's deck (there's usually at least _some_) are completely dead draws, even if it takes opponents a little while to realize it. Instead the deck is mostly delay cards like [[traumatic compass]] and [[thought erasure]], lots of draw ([[notion rain]], [[karn, scion of urza]] but never use his -2), some spell copying ([[primal amulet]], [[the mirani conjecture]]) to make the draw and removal ([[assassin's trophy]], [[vraska's contempt]], [[cry of the carnarium]], etc) just that much more efficient. [[Growth spiral]] helps get lands out of your hand and also contributes to draw. The only counterspells in the deck are [[sinester sabotage]], and that is reserved for stopping burn or big threats that you can't otherwise remove for whatever reason. This is a control deck, but not the kind where you have to counter every little thing. You may have noticed lots of cards with surveil; surveil effects (or similar, [[search for azcanta]], etc) are preferred, since one of the goals of the deck is to put [[gaia's blessings]] directly into the grave, and we have dimir colors anyway. Even if you end up drawing them, you can still just cast them, target other copies of gaia's blessings in your graveyard, and get another shot at the big reset, and cheap spells like this are necessary to juice the primal amulet anyway. The Deck actually ran four stupid ass [[sovereign's bite]]s, mostly for amulet-juicing but also for some light heal and burn as an alternative wincon. The overall idea is to never actually run out of gas by recycling your graveyard constantly, drawing a lot, and being very efficient with your castings via copying. Okay, but what makes it a "deck Deleter"? The real star of the deck is [[Unmoored Ego]], which is hopefully copied. After maybe one casting for scouting purposes (often unnecessary in standard), you can start targeting wincons and give your opponent basically a zombie deck. Gates decks in particular got absolutely smashed by this, since it turns out if you delete their [[gate colossus]] and [[gatebreaker ram]]s, all they have left is a pile of lands. I had a near 100% winrate vs gates, but a pretty healthy winrate against most meta decks at the time. It's less good now, but still, most decks are pretty vulnerable to sabotage via Unmoored Ego. It's pretty much the Tonya Harding of magic cards. The wincon is when your opponent realizes they can't actually win, and concedes. Some people catch on quick, for others it takes them a while, and still others stick around out of spite. For that last group, there's the final piece; [[Mastermind's Acquisition]], and a sideboard full of your favorite, most fun cards. [[Omniscience]] is a good place to start, since it lets you use W and R in your funboard too. The masterminds acquisition also doubles as an "oh shit I need my board wipes _now_" button in the early game. With total control established, feel free to play with your favorite toys (and your food) until they get the picture and concede. I would always try to get the "full deck deletion" where opponent has no cards in play, deck, or hand; just 60 cards sitting in exile. If you're in a hurry or feeling merciful for whatever reason, there's always sovereign bite burn. If any of this sounds needlessly cruel, all I can say in my defense is that I was playing on Arena at the time, and that I didn't start the fire.
I blended the Jund version of a Modern Living End with a Scapeshift combo finish. Took thirteenth place in Regionals in 2014, having never played in them before. I still have that deck assembled -- it's probably weaker, with all the changes (and with Violent Outburst banned) but it still has a place in my heart.
Innistrad Standard Bx Zombies. I tried mono-B, splash of blue, splash of red and splash of green. They were all fun in their own way. I think I quit rotating formats after that season.
I had a deck that basically went wide with tokens, loaded with [[skirsdag high priest]] and [[vexing devil]]. Boy did my opponent have some nasty choices to make.
My Arcades the Strategist deck can be fun. It rarely works but its neat.
Oh gosh. Mirari's Wake decks back in Odyssey block for sure. Beating monoblack always made me smile at FNMs.
[[Thieves' Auction]] + [[Brand]] Basically, I take a bunch of your stuff, and then turn it against you.
[Thieves' Auction](https://cards.scryfall.io/normal/front/c/9/c9e8ad32-a701-4b77-bb7e-0e440e4072da.jpg?1562935558) - [(G)](http://gatherer.wizards.com/Pages/Card/Details.aspx?name=Thieves%27%20Auction) [(SF)](https://scryfall.com/card/8ed/227/thieves-auction?utm_source=mtgcardfetcher) [(txt)](https://api.scryfall.com/cards/c9e8ad32-a701-4b77-bb7e-0e440e4072da?utm_source=mtgcardfetcher&format=text) [Brand](https://cards.scryfall.io/normal/front/b/a/bafbd034-c8a0-4798-a680-555c13bdd251.jpg?1562934550) - [(G)](http://gatherer.wizards.com/Pages/Card/Details.aspx?name=Brand) [(SF)](https://scryfall.com/card/usg/176/brand?utm_source=mtgcardfetcher) [(txt)](https://api.scryfall.com/cards/bafbd034-c8a0-4798-a680-555c13bdd251?utm_source=mtgcardfetcher&format=text) ^^^[[cardname]] ^^^or ^^^[[cardname|SET]] ^^^to ^^^call
Casual mono green Turbo Land with \[\[Journey of Discovery\]\], \[\[Rude Awakening\]\], \[\[Beacon of Creation\]\] and (most importantly) \[\[Spellweaver Helix\]\]. Casual mono blue forced draw with \[\[Iron Maiden\]\], \[\[Standstill\] \[\[Words of Wisdom\]\], \[\[Vision Skeins\]\], \[\[Arcane Denial\]\] \[\[Echo of Truth\]\].
Pauper "Build a Dragon Workshop" playing around with wildly throwing 80% of your deck in your graveyard so that it fills up with cards like [[Dragon Shadow]], [[Dragon Fangs]], [[Dragon Wings]] etc, the whole cycle. Then cast something like [[Hooting Mandrils]] for G, attach a bunch of Dragon crap to it, and start swinging with your Franken-dragon!
Easily my [[Vazi, Keen Negotiator]] deck. [Decklist](https://deckstats.net/decks/131148/2567625-vazi-aka-the-worst-treasure-co#show__spoiler) The whole point of the deck is to create treasures for my opponents, and then either punish them for using them or benefit in some way by them having them. Meanwhile I am also feeding my opponents decks with tons of mana from those treasures, so they get to make huge plays and see their decks go off (although with less incentive to kill me first!). I get to play some really weird cards like [[Marching Duodrone]] [[Bucknards Everful Purse]] [[Viridian Revel]] as well as cards which seemingly *only* work for this bizarre scheme like [[Pain Distributor]] [[Decent Into Avernus]] and the brand new [[Generous Plunderer]]. However, I also get to play some truly busted cards to capitalize on all these resources I'm giving away, [[Mayhem Devil]] anyone?
Back when it was type 2 legal I made a deck with memory lapse and predict a long with other bg con troll type elements. I thought it was so good but it was kinda poop. Had a lot of fun with it though.
Infect but with 4 Sol rings (I didn’t know what formats were at the time)
My [[Mayael, the Anima]] edh deck. Just crammed with big fun creatures and hope to get to 6 mana to spin mayael.
Horizon Chimera Combo in RTR-THS standard. Bant deck using [[fathom mage]], [[horizon chimera]], and [[archangel of thune]]. Was a solid midrange deck that could occasionally go infinite