Aura the Vaults Standard - Evo..

by Phoesune on 27 April 2010

Main Deck (60 cards)

Sideboard (15 cards)

Creatures (8)

Sorceries (1)


Enchantments (6)

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Deck Description

Round three. Battle scarred.

Ok after some play testing and meta-game considerations, I have changed the basic concept initially developed in Part Deux and expanded the scope of the deck. This version has more versatility to handle the various troubles that might befall the deck. Key additions include Day of Judgment and hindering light. Also I adjusted the land draw, 24 lands slows down the deck too much. I went all the way to 20 lands and suffered land poverty. With 22 I found a good balance. Of course, Soverreigns did not make the cut in the new version, this was due to its cost. Casting sovereign came too late in the game to be effective, or essentially lost me a turn cause it cost almost all my mana to cast.

Although Open the vaults is equally expensive, its utility is reserved to the late game anyways. Sovereign's ability is a mid game strategy with a late game cost. Besides, casting a DoJ when you have a creature dependent deck is just joy.

So lets turn to the deck and review:
Kor Spritdancer is the gem. Its does several things.
1) its cheap.
2) it gets +2/+2 for each aura attached
3) you may draw a card when you play an aura.
Follow that up with 18 auras in the deck. 13 costing less than 2 mana,
These cheap auras have built in abilities, but with a kor spiritdancer in hand on turn two, you can look at them all having at least the following "Enchanted creature gets +2/+2, Draw a card" on top of the ability built into the enchantment.

Other Creatures:
Aura Gnarlid - do I need to explain more than it should be always attacking.
Umbra mystic - this is just overkill that works well with the deck. Not needed to win but makes the whole deck stronger when played. Worth the 2W to cast and nothing more.
Mesa Enchantress - because I couldn't have 6 kor spiritdancers in the deck...

Auras:,
Lifelink - lifelink
Hyena - +1/+1 and first strike with totem
Spider - +1/+1 and reach with totem armor
Canopy Cover - unblockable except by flyers and reachers. (Spider and Canopy is ghetto flyer) Shroud for opponents only
Bear Umbra +2/+2 with "when creature attacks, untap all lands. (casting this will pay for itself.) Turn 3 Aura Gnarlid, Turn 4 Bear umbra - 5/5 can't be block unless blocking creature has 5 or more power, AG attacks, untap all lands. Second main phase cast more auras. Not to mention having land open for DoJs, Open vaults or hindering light.
Eldrazi conscription. If you ever get to cast this from your hand, you're doing it wrong. This was designed for open the vaults.

Spells:
Hindering light - basically a counter spell, cantrip, and protect from "sacrifice a creature" consuming vapors anyone?
Day of Judgment - Kill 'em all, umbras to grave. attack, untap all lands, open the vaults. pass turn and grin.
Open the vaults...so yeah, that Kor Spiritdance is a 40/42 lifelink, first strike, trample, with annihilator 4 and cannot be the target of spells or abilities and can only be blocked by flyers...ya want some? (I am allowed to dream)

Lands:
Misty Rainforest for island, if needed otherwise grab you forest. use this as soon as you can. not enough lands to pull otherwise. If you got 4 and 2 on the lands then use it for discard fodder.
Stirring Wildwood - Emergency creature.
Sunpetal Grove and the rest...duh.
22 lands is all you want. 24 is overkill for this deck. You get more lands than auras after a while and they get annoying.

Sideboard:
Meddling Mage - Naming Thought Hemorrhage, Tempest of Light, (Day of Judgment, then opponent has to decide if he wants to block it or not...meanwhile, you have swapped DoJ for meddling mage)
Crab Umbra - Great synergy with Bear umbra. (ghetto vigiliance)
Nimbus Wings - dealing with a flying deck
Spreading Seas - aura that hurts.
DoJ - just in case you need 1 more
OtV - just in case you need 1 more

Sideboard change - Tajuru Preserver replaces spreading seas and 1 OtV. Because this is too awesome to not have available.

Deck Tags

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Deck at a Glance

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Mana Curve

Mana Symbol Occurrence

2840017

Card Legality

  • Not Legal in Standard
  • Legal in Modern
  • Legal in Vintage
  • Legal in Legacy

Deck discussion for Aura the Vaults Standard - Evolved - Comments please

I think any deck which runs Open the Vaults should run Oblivion Ring. If they whack the ring early on, bringing it back as part of your Vault is devastating. Ring over Lifelinks, maybe?

Too bad Enchantresses' Presence is not Standard-legal, this deck could use it.

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Posted 27 April 2010 at 21:07

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I definitely can see the value. Lifelink is valuable because of the low mana cost and...well...life gain. Perhaps running O-Ring on the sideboard instead of spreading seas for an initial thought. trying to consider what to remove to add it as a mainboard item. Perhaps a swap for hindering light? 2 O-rings and a third OtV instead of hindering? though hindering is there to combat an opponents O-ring and even thought hemorrhage (target player). This deck feels so tight. Perhaps even canopy cover might be a good swap.

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Posted 27 April 2010 at 22:39

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This is awesome. I was thinking of making an aura deck with gnarlid and spiritdancers but I don't have time this week (damn finals) have you considered eel umbra? I think it's one of the better auras: 2 drop with flash and staying power. Although you're not using a lot of blue in the first place (only hindering light) why not drop blue all togther? You can consolidate your mana that way. You could could tajuru preserver against creature saccing and pop in a couple overruns or something for extra power. Just some thoughts. But again this looks like an awesome deck. Nice work.

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Posted 27 April 2010 at 23:09

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Hindering light is just good enought o have it. It also opens up the sideboard for Meddling mage and crab umbra. I really wanted to put eel umbra in, but its benefit is just not synergetic enough for the deck. Crab's value over eel is that it costs 1 less to cast. With the draw cards in the deck, its an issue more of being able to feed through the deck quickly. In the earlier version I had much more value for the buck from single cost auras. but then my hand ended up being nothing but lands. This set seems to keep at least one aura ready for the next turn.

I just updated the build to include the tajuru preserver (and ordered my playset) I had completely overlooked this card in RotE. I hope others will as well. =)

Thanks for the comment!

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Posted 27 April 2010 at 23:18

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I was just thinking further on the eel umbra.
Turn 1 land
Turn 2 land, kor spiritdancer
Turn 3 land, Aura Gnarlid
Turn 4 land, Bear Umbra on AG, draw card, Attack as 5/5, untap all lands, Eel umbra, hit for 7/7, second main phase, lifelink, hyena, and/or spider on kor, draw 1-2 cards or play another kor.
Turn 5 land, make sure all have umbras. attack, DoJ.
Turn 6 land, play auras, attack, OtV
Turn 7...

Yeah I might make room for eel umbra in the deck and put a little more blue mana source. A 7/7 "unblockable" on turn 4 is hard to resist.

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Posted 27 April 2010 at 23:31

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I like the eel umbra better than the lifelink in my opinion. I also don't understand how you are supposed to get the eldrazi consription out with OtV. Pacifism is also a decent enchantment to trigger Aura Gnarlid. I had trouble with fast decks and i threw in some wall of denial ( 0/8 defender shroud flyer for 1 U W) and that helped for defense until i threw out some shit. Other than that, the deck is really fun to play with.

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Posted 28 April 2010 at 11:20

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For eldrazi conscription, you overdraw your hand and dump it the graveyard.
I avoided the pacifism because I would end up putting it one of my own when I OtV. Wall of denial is in my list for potential revisions and meta game restructure. its really good. Although I prefer palace guards with the umbras.

For triggering aura gnarlid I was thinking enchant lands. Just too tight for the deck to throw them in. I am building a black, green, blue version of this which focuses on land chants.

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Posted 28 April 2010 at 23:03

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