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So Brother, I'm not sure you gain all that much from having Khans and Fate over Battle, Oath, Shadows and Eldritch available to you. You would only lose Murderous Cut and Roar (Which admittedly is a win con). With the new(er) sets you'd have Sylvan Advocate (which is probably the best elf available to you). Grasp of Darkness is better than murderous cut in my opinion. You'd also get possibilities like cryptolith rite which combined with draw engines like the messengers, maybe gather the pack back in, or something like read the bones (or ideally Collected Company but that is like 15 bucks). Aside from those something like Duress might be a way for you to protect yourself from this decks biggest enemy, the board wipe. So things I would consider:Out:Murderous CutRoar of ChallengeTitanic GrowthUltimate Price (maybe)In:Sylvan AdvocateNissa, Vastwood Seer (Maybe)DuressCryptolith Rite (Maybe) with some more draw cards.Beast caller Savant (Maybe)In general I wonder if discard related control would work better for this deck than targeted creature control. Discard is the only way you can really deal with disruption and if this deck gets disrupted (board wipes are especially bad) you have a tough time recovering. So maybe even something like Mind Rot or Pick The Brain would be better for this deck than A lot of targeted destroy cards. I still think you should have someway to deal with the big creature that bulldozes your wall of elves but maybe that is ruinous path or murder instead of ultimate price, higher CMC but more versatile.Long I know but just some thoughts I had for this deck. I love the Shaman and think this deck is really cool it just certainly can be better. If anyone else has thoughts on this one?my comments about it feel free to join in.-B
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So the problem with this deck is that the creatures can be too small to attack into mid-sized blockers, and that if the creatures die, it runs out of gas. The one card that fixes this? Abzan Ascendancy (and they stack!). Yes, it means splashing white, but that also opens up cards like dromokas command and some pump all creature spells. Could be great. -Boyce
I actually really like the addition of white to this deck. It would make it much more resilient to board disruption except mass bounce spells. Although now that I think about it bounce spells would be letting you recast Shaman so that would still hurt them. Abzan Ascendancy is really great in this deck and is a fantastic answer to creatures being destroyed. Even better, in my opinion, is white lets him use Rally the Ancestors. This would be a major swing after getting board wiped, for 5 mana you could return most of your creatures to play and you get to stack the ETB triggers allowing you to get the most life change from a Shaman out of your graveyard, or crazy amounts with more than one in your graveyard. This also would allow you to run your own board wipe so if you are being out-gunned by a larger creatures you can reset the board then Rally your elves for a big swing in game state. You won't have access to Shadows block but there isn't anything you'd need from it anymore.Definite Adds: (All around .20 cents each!)Sylvan Advocate, Abzan Ascendancy, Rally The Ancestors, Sandsteppe Citadel, Other Dual LandsMaybe Adds:Duress, Board Wipe (End Hostilities, Languish, Planar Outburst, etc.), Harsh Sustenance (An instant speed Shaman effect that could be cast in response to having your board destroyed), Nissa, Vastwood Seer (can be returned by Rally easily, gets you a land to play which then you play and flip her and she doesn't get exiled on your next turn)Fringe Consideration:Dragon Throne of Tarkir (repeatable Overrun effect), Dark Deal (Causes everyone to dump their hands which with Rally wouldn't hurt you as bad), other card draw effects (Altar's Reap, Read the Bones)I think the addition of white could make this deck really hard to play against. Rally the Ancestors and Abzan Ascendancy means you can easily trade with Aggro decks, chump block Mid-Range decks and handle most control strategies. The biggest weakness would be exile effects but I'm not really sure what you could do to combat them other than running Naturalize or maybe Altar's Reap your Shaman in response to an Oblivion Ring so you net 2 cards and keep the Shaman somewhere you can utilize it. Or if Exile effects are a huge problem you go backwards to Theros/M15 instead of up to Battle and gain Back to Nature and/or Reclamation Sage though you would lose the Advocate.-Bill
Great call on Sylvan Advocate, Bill; that's got to go in. And Rally is SWEET, except it's unreliable in a deck that isn't built around it. It's only good here after a board wipe of some kind, and even then, only if like two Shaman of the Packs are in the graveyard. Granted, then it's REAL good, but it would often be a dead card. I think the list should be: 4 Gnarlroot Trapper, 4 Elvish Visionary, 4 Dwynen's Elite, 4 Sylvan Advocate, 3 Sylvan Messenger, 3 Dwynen, Gilt-Leaf Daen, 4 Abzan Ascendancy, 4 Might of the Masses, 3 Great Teacher's Decree, 23 lands.
While I like the go wide and buff your creatures strategy in general, two things worry me about applying this strategy to the Elf deck.1. This becomes incredibly dependent on having Ascendancy out. With the number of decks running early disruption or just better early creatures Sam would have to have ascendancy to keep the pressure up. Plus, the spirit tokens are almost better than his Elves if he doesn't get a Shaman because of their evasion. So, I'm worried it becomes get out Ascendancy and win or don't and lose.2. I'm also worried that building this deck around this Aggro Ascendancy strategy could be better achieved without the Elf tribal aspect. Dwynen and the Messenger are great but at 4 mana wouldn't he be better off playing two 2 drops than one of them (especially since messenger only puts creatures in his hand not onto the battlefield like Collected Company). Dwayne's elite is great for this, being 2 creatures for two mana, and the Advocate is an awesome 2 drop, but wouldn't creatures like Blood-soaked Champion, Consul's Lieutenant, Kytheon, Hero of Akros, or any of the many 2 power one drops that white has in this standard be better than the other Elf creatures, weakening the likelihood that Dwayne's Elite is 2 creatures. Plus in conjunction with Ascendancy, Avatar of the Resolute could be a monster and could be better than any other 2 drop he could get. In the same vein as the Avatar wouldn't something like Abzan Falconer be a better 3 drop than the Shaman with Ascendancy? The Shaman does chunk damage sure, but doesn't work if all he has are a bunch of spirit tokens. So, I don't know, while I do like the go wide strategy I'm not sure it is best served by the elf tribal shell he has. And I disagree on Rally being a dead draw often, I think it all depends on the matchup. Great Teacher's Decree or Might of the Masses can be just as much of a dead draw if he is getting slaughtered by Anger of the Gods or Supreme Verdict without Ascendancy out. I think the best thing this deck has going for it is the chunk damage that the Shaman can do and think building around doing that as many times as possible might be better for the deck than hoping he gets an ascendancy out before his creatures die.Anyway, I hope it doesn't seem like I'm trying to pick a fight or anything since I keep coming back to this deck and disagreeing with you. Though, I would like to get other peoples opinions on this deck so it feels less like Boyf and I arguing about it, especially Brother's since it is his deck.-Bill
Another route would be to add Gilt leaf winnower, yes its conditional removal but attached to a decent creature, add in some obelisk of urd to help buff and could be cast easily with convoke, and add two whip of Erebos since so many of your guys have solid etb effects.
Also if you are going into Abzan, the charm is a great utility card, and I think a one of Rally is the right call. E