dknight27

I'll preface this by admitting that my knowledge of pauper is negligible, but you can't get away with only 15 lands, especially when 4 of them are gunna come in tapped and useless most of the time. I'd advise kicking it up to at least 20 and cutting the curve a little so you've got more 1-drops.

So much for Roko's Basilisk

Are you going for budget casual here?

Hot damn do I enjoy the wizards build. There's just something about sticky little critters with synergy in the control shell that makes me smile.

Plus, there are so many fun little interactions.

Traditional wisdom in the build focuses on [[Tamiyo, Inquisitive Student // Tamiyo, Seasoned Scholar]], as it's a banger card on its own, is a 1-drop wizard, gets flipped by Flame of Anor, and a wincon to boot. It also uses stuff like [[Thundertrap Trainer]] for cheap card advantage.

Your build seems a little too top heavy to me. Fourteen 3-drops means a lot of clogged hands, even if Wizard's Lightning is conditionally a 1-drop. Stock up is a great card, but you've got no mana ramp to take advantage of it consistently, and without the abundance of free permission spells that rule legacy, you don't want to cast it turn 3 and let opponent run wild without the ability to do anything else in that turn cycle.

Ephemerate will devastate when it connects with an ETB critter if done correctly, but you've only got six of those and two Ephemerates, so that interaction's not likely to come up consistently. It's also a counterspell against spot removal, but it doesn't do anything at all on its own, so it's a terrible top deck.

I can't really see the place of Orim's Chant beyond generically 'taking a turn' from opponent, and even then they can still respond to it so it's not going to work against all builds.

Running Elegant Parlor also seems a bit much, as you're running 2 other Surveil lands and you really don't want a red/white land when the deck craves blue and only wants a little bit of white.

A lot of initial thoughts. Take em or leave em.

I love a good exalted build, especially one that wants to be low to the ground. I do see a couple areas in this build that are sort of working against each other, so there's some potential room for improvement.

The basic model of what you're shooting for is a bunch of exalted weenies and some payoff critters to take advantage of the exalted boost. Thus, you ideally want lots of cheap critters all around, as you need lots of critters fielded to make the plan work, and your payoff critters would rather be faster than stronger, as they're gunna get strong thanks to the exalted boost. The good news is that Aven Squire is a little bit of both, so you can get away with running 4 copies of it and then 4-6 other payoff critters and have the rest be exalted with some control elements.

Right now your payoff critters are going for bigger is better, which (see above) doesn't fit super well.

Raffine isn't worth the juice in here, as you only want to attack with one critter per combat, so you don't get the connive avalanche you want. Glastlord is going to be a bitch and a half to cast in here with only 19 lands, no acceleration, and 7 of them coming in tapped. Niko is slow and conditional, and you can get much better value out of other cards for the cost.

Instead, what you're looking for here in terms of payoff is something like [[Faerie Dreamthief]], [[Mockingbird]], and [[Momo, Playful Pet]]. You ideally want to cast a 1-drop turn 1, then turn 2 cast something with exalted and start swinging with the critter you cast turn 1, netting you damage and starting the clock. Alternatively, you could go for some bigger payoffs that hit with a bang like [[Sublime Archangel]].

Your support cards are a little underperforming and/or don't fit as well in here due to the mana curve. The two charms are too weak and too color-specific to be justified over other options, Counterspell is useless unless you have 2 open mana and the mana to field your other cards at the same time, plus it's UU specific, so only 12 of your 19 lands can cast it, Void Rend is nice but costs too much compared with something like [[Prismatic Ending]] unless you're using it against a very specific threat and/or you need it to be uncounterable.

I'd also advise upping the lands to 20 and cutting all the tapped lands, as you very much want the speed to use your early turns, and the bonus colors and extra frills just aren't worth the hassle. Ideally you'd run some shock lands like [[Hallowed Fountain]], some fetch lands like [[Flooded Strand]], and a basic land of each color, but that can be a bit pricy and that might be out of the budget range.

Just some thoughts, not trying to hate on the build.

I don't think I've seen a horrors tribal deck before, bravo for the novelty.

I do, however, think there's a bit of a synergy problem going on here, as your horrors don't actually help each other at all, so you don't really get any benefit for running horror-only cards. Your horrors also run on the expensive side, and mono-blue is notoriously bad at mana ramp and being able to stall out a game with spot removal until you can cast big things, so you've got a double synergy problem.

I'd advise cutting out the big nasty horrors and just running 4 copies of Chasm Skulker and Thing in the Ice and then check out [[Silent Hallcreeper]] which synergizes perfectly with your two other horrors, as it wants to be a copy of Skulker and gives you draw material to help flip Thing. Plus it powers itself up, so you've got a 3/3 unlockable clock going on its own, which is extremely nice.

Some of your instants aren't really high impact enough to justify their spots, but the good news is that there are plenty of good options to think about. I'd recommend cutting Cerulean Wisps (too low impact, better cantrips available), Clockspinning (does next to nothing and is expensive and slow), March of the Swirling Mist (not high impact enough to justify the cost), Rain of Revelation (too expensive), Twiddle (not high enough impact), and probably Exclude (3-drop counters are usually too expensive cause they slow you down in vital early turns).

Check out [[Remand]], [[Essence Capture]], [[Preordain]], [[Stern Scolding]], [[Hard Evidence]], [[Mental Modulation]], [[Grip of the Roil]], [[Counterspell]], [[Consider]], and [[Dismember]].

Just some thoughts, not trying to hate on the build.

I gotcha.

That opens up some really interesting (and relatively cheap) card options then. I'm gunna assume this is a budget build, please correct me if I'm mistaken. Some of the best options for a build like this are unfortunately expensive, such as [[Grave Pact]], [[Bitterbloom Bearer]], [[Orcish Bowmasters]], and other vintage staple cards. But that's ok, you can still build a dynamite build on a budget.

First and foremost, builds like this are crying for 4 copies of [[Skullclamp]]. They net you material like crazy and perfectly synergize with what you're doing to the point of lunacy. You're also allowed to run a copy of [[Sol Ring]], which would help speed things up quite a bit if you tweak the deck some (which I'm advocating) so it's not just all black mana pips.

You'd also very much like to run some recursion critters so you've got fodder to sacrifice, such as [[Bloodghast]], [[Marionette Apprentice]], [[Jadar, Ghoulcaller of Nephalia]], [[Forsaken Miner]], [[Timeline Culler]], [[Infestation Sage]], [[Bloodsoaked Champion]], [[Genesis Chamber]], and [[Ghoulish Procession]].

The best combo possible in this type of build is the [[Carrion Feeder]] and [[Gravecrawler]] combo, which would slot in very nicely with some of the sac fodder as well.

Then there are the payoff cards that benefit from you sacking, such as [[Zulaport Cutthroat]] and [[Grim Haruspex]], though you don't want to run too many of them, especially since you'll want to run Skullclamp which is your major payoff.

[[Case of the Stashed Skeleton]] would be a fun addition in here, as it gives you critter fodder and a followup [[Demonic Tutor]] kicker, which should go a pretty long way in the build.

I'd also advise cutting down the curve quite a bit, as you really want to be able to play a 1-drop turn 1 and keep accelerating from there. You've got fourteen 3-drops, and that's gunna clog up a lot of opening hands. Cutting Breathe Your Last helps, and you don't really want to mess with it anyway, as it will only net you a tiny bit of life and there are much better spot removal options available. Fain is also pretty slow/lower impact for the mana cost, and there are cheaper and better sac outlets available.

Just some ideas, not trying to throw shade at the build.

What format are you going for here?

I tried getting in touch via facebook and have had no response. If anyone knows another way, let me know

I probably won't either. Sixteen years or so into deckbuilding on here. I was a completely different person when I started. Hell, I played [[Dragonstorm]].

What legality and budget are you going for here?

Two copies of [[Feather, the Redeemed]] would round out your 60 nicely

Addendum: I double checked, and it works with adventure cards as well. So [[Horned Loch-Whale // Lagoon Breach]] and [[Sword Coast Serpent // Capsizing Wave]] are excellent cheats you can use.

Maybe it's because I'm tired of watching the things I love rot and die, but I hate this quite a bit even though I logically know this site is on its last leg

Brain in a Jar is a fascinating card. Did you know you can abuse it by playing around with split cards like [[Invert // Invent]]? You can 'cast' it as a 1-drop, using Invert, but then use whichever effect on the split card you want, so you can cast Invent as a 1-drop by using the Jar. This lets you get away with some extremely fun shenanigans if you build the deck around it. Since you're going for budget casual, you could even go full bananas and use [[Who // What // When // Where // Why]] and get whatever effect you want off the 1-drop part of the card.

I'd also advise cutting down on the expensive cards, as you really want to be able to do things in the early game, get to your cards faster, and give the Jar something to actually do on its lower settings. Cheap cantrips will really help with that, so try [[Consider]], [[Ponder]], [[Preordain]], etc. I'd also take a look at [[Hard Evidence]], as you'd very much like blockers here, and it cantrips at instant speed later, which is great for the build.

You'll also want to take a look at [[Muddle the Mixture]], as you can use it to fetch the Jar and as a counterspell if you already have it.

You could also very easily make this build 2 colors so you could take advantage of some non-blue cards the deck would really enjoy, but you can probably get away with it as is if you work in some tweaks.

Just some quick thoughts.

Are you going for modern legal here?

Check out [[Flame of Anor]] and [[Thundertrap Trainer]]. They're slightly more expensive than strictly budget cards, but they're extremely useful in a wizard build.

I was able to do it by upping the card count, haven't tested it by adding individual cards.

https://www.mtgvault.com/dknight27/decks/test-deck/

Check out [[Jorn, God of Winter // Kaldring, the Rimestaff]], [[Abominable Treefolk]], [[Isu the Abominable]], and [[Spirit of the Aldergard]]. You've absolutely got room to squeeze in some more nonland cards here, as running 27 lands with 1/3 of your deck as 1-drops is WAY too high. You can easily get away with trimming some lands and stuffing in more value material. I know you want to use Fastbond effectively, but your deck is almost half lands, so you're gunna be running quite a few games where you just flood out with nothing to do with all your quick mana.

Just some thoughts.

Makes sense to me. I'll do it if no one else wants to. I realize it's sort of like a Julius Caesar conundrum, and I'm happy for someone else to do it.

Some of these cards aren't legal in standard. Is that what you're going for? If not, there are some really good cards I can recommend for the build (assuming it's modern or casual).