B/W Pod Mid-Range

[JMAnonymous]

So I took a list I saw that was very zombie based and took it to a whole new level. I really like the way it feels but have no time to test it out. I also need a side board/ help on what might work best, here it is. The rats and cats as sac outlet make up for lack of discard spells which can really make an opponent lose a game. They pod into splicer and messenger which are essential to combo with Restoration Angel, and serve as early chump blockers. Let me know what you think!

Land
11 swamp
5 plains
4 Isolated Chapel
2 Vault of the Archangel

Creatures
4 direfraf ghoul
3 Fume Spitter
3 Doomed Traveler
2 Ravenous Rats
2 Black Cat
2 Thalia, Guardian of Thraben
2 Porcelain Legionnaire
2 Blade Splicer
4 Geralf's Messenger
3 Restoration Angel
2 Phyrexian Metamorph

Artifacts
3 Birthing Pod

Spells
2 Oblivion Ring
1 Go for the Throat
2 lingering souls

[vger]

@JMAnonyomous,

How about starting from these changes?

-3 Doomed Traveler
-3 Fume Spitter
-2 Lingering Souls
-1 Oblivion Ring
-4 Plains
-2 Porcelain Legionnaire
-2 Thalia, Guardian of Thraben
-1 Vault of the Archangel

+3 Blood Artist
+2 Disciple of Bolas
+1 Doom Blade
+4 Evolving Wilds
+4 Gravecrawler
+1 Go for the Throat
+2 Mortarpod
+1 Swamp

I'll briefly explain the reasons for such changes.

Doomed Traveler is being replaced by Gravecrawler here due to various reasons. Playing with Gravecrawler instead of Doomed Traveler prevents you from stretching your manabase in the early turns - you can still cast a Geralf's Messenger on turn 3 normally. Moreover Gravecrawler provides a lot more value than Doomed Traveler since it can recur multiple times, granting you enough sacrificial fodder for Birthing Pod. Furthermore, your list is much more suitable playing with Gravecrawler due to it being a more aggressive card, allowing you to race better in a deck that is hurting itself with Phyrexian spells.

Thalia, Guardian of Thraben meanwhile hurts you a little, due to her having anti-synergy with your main strategy - Birthing Pod. Now you can only cast your Birthing Pod on turn 4 earliest without getting an activation out of it, granting your opponents more tempo as if you have just time-walked yourself by doing nothing significant on your own turn. Besides your need for her in this list isn't as great as other aggressive decks, since your creatures are more resilient to Vapor Snag tricks and wrath effects (due to Undying and ETB effects).

Porcelain Legionnaire is removed because it actually doesn't really accomplish much here, being vanilla and very vulnerable as compared to other creatures in your creature suite. And I don't think you want to keep hurting yourself with phyrexian mana when used in conjunction with Birthing Pod and its activations.

Lingering Souls isn't really powerful here and shares little to no synergy with the rest of the build. Not to mention that your 3 mana slots are a little occupied as of now.

Blood Artist is now played in conjunction with Ravenous Rats and Black Cat as your 2 drops, which helps to chip some life points off your opponent whenever your creature dies either to combat, removal or Birthing Pod/Mortarpod activations. And also, he helps to Recoup some life points to prevent yourself from dying to Phyrexian mana.

Disciple of Bolas meanwhile has great synergy with Geralf's Messenger, Blade Splicer and Restoration Angel, allowing you to gain some life (to prevent yourself from dying to Phyrexian mana again) and draw some cards from his effect.

Mortarpod replaces Fume Spitter since they do almost similar stuff - killing weenies, except that Mortarpod can be a late-game winner by being a Fireball with Gravecrawler.

The manabase is tweaked a little as well, so as to accomodate the spells being played in this list. Since the need for white is now greatly reduced, you don't actually need to play that many plains. Evolving Wilds help to search for plains while filtering your deck, allowing you to draw into actual spells in the late game.

As for the sideboard, you may want to consider a combination of Nihil Spellbomb, Sword of War and Peace/Sword of Feast and Famine, Ratchet Bomb and Phyrexian Obliterator.

My personal advice is that BW aren't exactly the best colours to adopt Birthing Pod strategies, since the manabase is such a wreck. But since you are at it, this post is made to suggest whatever changes possible to modify your list. Hope this helps!

[JMAnonymous]

Ya, but with 3 pods in the deck this has to have an alternate win condition. Gravecrawler only gets 2 drops from pod and can't block t2 Rancor SRG, by the time pod hits it will be time to finish the game with Restoration Angel is the idea here. Blood Artist I over looked slightly and will be bringing in to the deck at 4 of. - 2 rats - 2 cats - 1 o ring - 2 legionaire - 2 vault - 1 swamp - 1 Thalia + 4 Blood Artist + 1 Go for the Throat + 2 Disciple of Bolas + 1 metamorph + 3 woodland cemetary

[vger]

@JMAnonyomous,

While it is true that Gravecrawler can't block anything, but that still doesn't justify playing Doomed Traveler over it. How much damage can actually Doomed Traveler block, especially in the face of Rancor which grants trample?

If what you are saying is justified, then why do you still play 4 copies of Geralf's Messenger instead of Blade Splicer when it also can't block the turn it enters the battlefield? Blade Splicer even has less colour restrictions than Geralf's Messenger, making it arguably the better card in such a logic.

Yet obviously those aren't reasons to why you are playing a full set of Geralf's Messenger over Blade Splicer. Just because going on the defensive isn't part of your game plan. Just because Geralf's Messenger tends to be a far more aggressive card overall, which allows you to hit and race better in order to win the game. If you were to be playing with Doomed Traveler, he just doesn't reinforce such a game plan very well being a defensive card. It would be a lot more difficult for you to win the damage race if you were to be playing Doomed Traveler in the place of Gravecrawler.

The greater issue is that playing Doomed Traveler just thwarts your manabase and plays too much, especially if you are aiming to hardcasting Geralf's Messenger on turns 3-4. It just isn't feasible trying to play a Doomed Traveler on turn 1 and then a Geralf's Messenger on turn 3, considering that there are no BW dual-lands in Standard that don't enter the battlefield untapped. If this were to be a list solely based on Blade Splicer and Restoration Angel, then I guess it's fine playing with Doomed Traveler. Otherwise, Gravecrawler is a better card here.

The extra utility provided from Gravecrawler with Pod isn't exactly the main focus here, to why I argue Gravecrawler is a better fit here. Rather the reasons above justify playing it over Doomed Traveler, either for utility purposes or consistency/synergy issues.

[JMAnonymous]

Point well taken.
- 3 Doomed Traveler
- 1 Lingering Souls
- 1 disciple

+ 3 Gravecrawler
+ 2 Bloodgift Demon

Now I am still stuck on sideboard.
2 Lingering Souls
2 Blade Splicer

I haven't played magic since rav days. I miss my ghost council, confidant, Mortify and every other b/w card that made me love the colors. I'm purchasing this deck Friday that's why I'm trying to get something together that has potential to come out of nowhere and dominate.
Even without the pod, I believe this deck has a lot to offer, maybe moving pod to s/b and adding a few other cards could make this viable?

[vger]

@JMAnonymous,

So far Zombie Pod decks tend to be RB or UB for their colours, at least that is what I have observed. They do have a better manabase overall, despite lacking the Restoration Angel interactions. With a better manabase, they are more open to better sideboard options than BW can achieve. I hope this doesn't actually stop you from pursuing what you want to be playing with, but that is how it stands currently.

Of course, things may be a lot more easier if your main objective is just to play a deck in BW colours. Recently there are a few BW Control decks that seem to be doing decently well on the competitive scene, either in real-life tournaments or MTGO. Perhaps you have heard of it, it actually plays Sorin's Vengeance as one of its win conditions. If you haven't, you may want to check it out.

[JMAnonymous]

New deck list.

12 swamp
4 plains
4 Isolated Chapel
3 woodland cemetary
3 Birthing Pod
4 Diregraf Ghoul
3 Gravecrawler
3 Fume Spitter
1 thalia (she's here to slow things temporarily, which wont affect me because odds are I never see her)
4 Blood Artist
3 Geralf's Messenger
3 Blade Splicer
2 Phyrexian Obliterator
3 Phyrexian Metamorph
3 Restoration Angel
1 Bloodgift Demon
2 Lingering Souls
2 Go for the Throat

I am aware r/u b zombies is there, but sideboards don't have options to beat the win condition since its not widely played. There are many options and unless they have massive burn or t3 hitting me for 10 this deck will cause a presence that will cause many mistakes. I need the sideboard to have answers but in what form I'm unsure of. Dismember, Corrosive Gale, Act of Aggression and Surgical Extraction those cards come to mind, maybe more Lingering Souls and o ring? Another Thalia against spell heavy decks.

[vger]

@JMAnonyomous,

Quite frankly, I am still a little unconvinced about playing Lingering Souls over the last Blade Splicer in this list. Not that Lingering Souls isn't a great card, but I thought that Blade Splicer has more synergy with Birthing Pod and Restoration Angel.

As for the sideboard, I do find it very problematic to build one in such an archetype. Not that there aren't any sideboard options, but they all require you to jump through some hoops.

Say you are concerned with decks that play equipment and want to have answers against them, you may look into Divine Offering and Revoke Existence. However your manabase can be rather frail to support them if you don't actually play enough white sources for it. And when you do, you are now playing several Plains which severely hurts the manabase... which is something I actually dislike when playing with Geralf's Messenger.

However if we were to just look into black/artifact cards for sideboard options because the manabase honestly can't support it, then it lacks the versatility and adaptability to face other decks. Either way, there would be a trade off somewhere and I thought this is one of the biggest strikes against such an archetype.

As much as I would like to suggest a list of great sideboard options for such an archetype, I don't think I can. Because at that point of time, those sideboard options are included with the consideration of its manabase... rather than the consideration of what matchups they are good against.

Edit: Try looking into Nihil Spellbomb, Duress, Dismember and Ratchet Bomb as possible sideboard options.

In my opinion, the best way to build such a deck is to stay strong with one of the colours while making a very slight splash for the other. The manabase for BW is still not quite there yet to support a luxury of options, it is basically the reason why BW Tokens don't play that many black cards despite having access to Isolated Chapel.

[JMAnonymous]

Thanks for the feedback, I may just have to use the remaining copies like an angel, a metamorph, a pod, etc to just increase/decrease as I find them working per situation. I like the way the deck feels and yeah not seeing a reprint of the b/w core dual made me very upset with the way magic is in this standard format and the past few years. But I guess if bw control based on kind of luck and gimmick could work, I see why this couldn't. T5 - 7 this deck will have your opponent thinking unclearly. The addition of phyrexian oblit was a great choice. Until rotation when I start drafting rtr, I think this ~225$ deck for the price will compete with most decks in standard. I will post results later Down the road, thanks for your time

[vger]

@JMAnonymous,

Not a problem! Hope I have provided some help here.

Well BW Control works because it is very strict with its manabase and colour discipline. You can see it plays tons of colourless artifacts (Ichor Wellspring, Mycosynth Wellspring, Solemn Simulacrum, Pristine Talisman etc), ways to dig into their lands (Ichor Wellspring, Mycosynth Wellspring, Solemn Simulacrum) and their spells aren't colour restrictive like Geralf's Messenger. And due to them being a control deck, they do and can take their time to draw into the right cards.

The great news though, is that shocklands should be returning when RTR hits.