Tribal has rarely found a place as a Standard Staple, ("but what about Fairies") I said RARELY. But with the recent slew of Vampires with interesting synergy, I have to say I'm curious to see how viable such a deck could be. So come along with me, and maybe this can be a T2 Deck, even T 1.5 if we're ambitious enough!
THE BLOOD AND BUTTER
4x Sanctum Seeker - This card, for lacking haste, can have devastating potential even on the turn it hits, considering it's ability triggers for each Vampire that attacks. Add to that a decent body for 4 CMC with the potential to add more life drain as more hit the field, I see no reason to not add 4
4x Vicious Conquistador - REMOVED They didn't make the "cut".
4x Metallic Mimic Tribal blah blah blah, Mimic, blah blah blah, counters, blah blah blah.
3x Skymarch Bloodletter It's not a big body for 3 CMC, but it has evasion and a ETB drain, and can work really well with Bishop of Rebirth EDIT: Went down to 3, taking the advice of a fellow Tapper, but I still have high hopes for this card. We'll see how the meta unfolds.
HEMATOLOGICAL HELPERS
2x Bishop of Rebirth Why not 4? Because 5 CMC is a really high price, and you don't want to have more than 1 in your hand. When it sticks though, a majority of your creatures can now be chumped or sacrificed just to be brought back on your Combat phase.
4x Legion Conquistador "Why?" Because I like to reminisce about Caw-Blade, that's why. Honestly, I want to test there guys out. A potential to fill your hand with replacements in a tribal deck based around attacking for drains has some good possibilities. Keep in mind though, Caw-Blade was fantastic not just because of Squadron Hawk (which costs 1 less than legion and has evasion), but because it synergized well with the rest of the incredibly broken deck. If Legion's replacement ability turns out to be useless, it's more important to find a better 3 drop in its place.
2x Yahenni, Undying Partisan He has potential. A 3 drop with haste with potential to grow and a way to work around board wipes, destruction abilities, and more importantly, tanking those pesky gods. Will probably add 1 to SB for decks that have Hazoret the Fervent.
2x Bloodcrazed Paladin I'll be honest, I'm not sure if I'm as crazy about this guy as he is about blood. The potential is THERE, but how often will it show up in a FNM? There can be some synergy with him and Yahenni and possibly the pseudo-Diamond Valley, but for now, he is a 2 drop that can fall anywhere between bad and great, and this deck needs some 2 drops.
1x Deathless Ancient "Okay, you got a lot of high CMC cards for a aggro deck." True, BUT, this guy is VERY hard to get rid of and is a hard body with evasion in the instances where he can attack. He sticks around for now. EDIT: Down to 1.
2x Mavren Fein, Dusk Apostle Interesting ability, 3 CMC so Bishop can hit him, doesn't need to attack to trigger is ability. Bad news, he's legendary and a pretty weak bod. On an unrelated note, I originally mistyped him as Duck Apostle, now I want someone to do an alter. Just throwing it out there. EDIT: Up to 2, I don't want to go higher than this simply because he's legendary, a 2/2, and for a deck that may make a lot of tokens the trigger is slightly situational.
4x Gifted Aetherborn Why only 2? That damn double B can ruin a lot of potential. I should probably up this to 4, but some playtesting is in order first. Otherwise, this card is day-umn. EDIT: Went to 4 because how could I not?
SANGUINE SUPPLEMENTS
3x Fatal Push - We're running black, why wouldn't we want this? The only downside is we don't have a lot of ways to trigger revolt.
3x Vraska's Contempt I feel like 3 is too many, but gods, Gideon, and potentially Vraska will absolutely wreck our steaze. I certainly have no problem dropping this to 2 should I feel the need for more bodies, maybe Vona, Butcher of Mogan?
3x Legion's Landing
I don't know why I like this card. Maybe because it's easy for us to flip, maybe because it creates chump blockers with Lifelink that can also synergize with Sanctum, Yahenni, and Temple of Aclazotz
. I really want this card to work. EDIT: Up to 3 due to losing Conquistador and needing something for that 1 drop slot.
Lands up slightly to compensate for high CMC critters.
1x Arguel's Blood Fast This card would be nice if it worked. One of the issues of aggro is running out of cards soon, this gives us a decent outlet to gain these back at little cost but be WARNED, current metagame appears to be very aggro favored, and this card may need to be cut to protect from killing yourself too quickly.
Sideboard is still a work in progress. I'm thinking Authority of the Counsuls for Ramunap, and Vona. What do ya'll think?
