Sadistic Sacrament and Temporal Extorion come in late and clog up your hand until then, disabling Infernal Tutor.For the "Swamp"-Theme check out Liliana of the Dark Realms and Mutilate. Vendetta is a better Devour in Shadow.
Permalink
Substitute Tracker's Instincts for Beast Hunt and play a single Island to fetch for a potential flashback.Check out Garruk's Companion and Leatherback Baloth. Efficient beaters. Same goes for Strangleroot Geist and Scythe Tiger.Green Sun's Zenith is banned. Chord of Calling is an alternative.For non-Budget additions you may try to get your hands on Thrun, the last Troll, Thragtusk or Tarmogoyf.Keep in mind that Mvonwuli Beast-Tracker can NOT get a creature with Shroud.Lastly, with a curve that high you'll need more than 19 lands. More along the lines of 22-24. Consider mana ramp creatures like Llanowar Elves.
2 more Guttersnipes are really needed here.Try looking for Searing Spear or Pillar of Flame for some direct burn. Explosive Impact really isn't worth 3 slots in your deck.Another three Izzet Charms would be great, too.And to top it off some way to reuse your spells or acquire more of them. Augur of Bolas and Archaeomancer are both very cheap and very useful. Cut the Weirds to make space for them.
Prophetic Bolt may have the new card frame, but it's last "proper" print was still Apocalypse. It isn't modern legal. In addition I'd argue that Tablet of the Guilds really isn't worth it. Try getting more Guttersnipes.
Master Biomancer would work nicely, agreed. Though I'd repeat that "Melira, Sylvok Outcast" could really make this deck worthwhile.
I'd disagree. Let's say you use Zameck Guildmage to put a +1/+1 counter on an entering Kitchen Finks. It gets terminated, the counters are removed and it's placed in the graveyard, awaiting its persist trigger to resolve (this opens up Persist creatures to instant speed graveyard hate). It enters the battlefield again, with a -1/-1 counter on it as usual. I assume you thought the counters would cancel out, allowing for an additional Persist?
Melira usually works extraordinarily well with Persist creatures, even outside of the usual Pod combo. She makes them practically indestructible.
@buzz-gsc: Thanks for pointing out "Induce Paranoia", but I'd prefer something with a small cmc. I'll give a try in playtesting though. Ghost Quarter however should work nicely, both for the Crab (Ghost Quartering myself) or for enabling Archive Trap, which I promptly bumped up to 4.@Ely: I'd wager my deck is still faster than your more creature-based approach. I took some ideas from it, though.@AlleywayJack: Thanks, I misunderstood the card. First time using it.Thanks for the great input, guys.