Harbynger,

We've joked about building around this card since Zendikar and I've finally done it :)

What do you think?

An another fan of Hedron Alignment and you will definitely get +1 from me hehehe!

You might get some ideas from me since Im brewing hedron alignment for the longest time and also help me improve it more hehe:

Emrakul Host of Hedron Alignments [KLD]

Standard usurphling

SCORE: 8 | 9 COMMENTS | 1420 VIEWS | IN 3 FOLDERS

As for your deck, I would suggest removing diabolic tutors for any zombies that can help you win games more. I understand that it helps you find the last alignment but I'll rather have some more zombies that can finish the game earlier than your original plan. Also, you dont want to have the expensive tutors on your opening hand; instead, I will start building walls of zombies then win the game eventually. From my simulations, building hedron alignment in standard is more of a sneaky alternate wincon than main. Gone were the days of Dig Through Time and Treasure Cruise and we dont have Intuition in standard to help us align the hedrons easier. Still if you want to have at least a tutor is up to you but ill suggest leave 1 or remove them in the deck. Just play grinding and resilient games with your opponent.

usurphling,

I think before I tweak any more numbers I need to do real play testing against real decks. I actually started at four Diabolic Tutors and dialed it back to two since I found it less and less useful beyond the single use. I did try a few hands with just one, but I never saw it and then when going back to two I got it the once a game as needed.

As far as more zombies I don't think two slots really changes anything, but from the sideboard if I'm up against a deck that is too fast I can ditch the Alignment strategy to focus on zombies which means I can drop the three tutor cards and all four Alignments to give me 7 slots for more zombie support like another Scrounger, Graf Harvest, and Shamble Back.

I'm intrigued by the name of your deck, when I get home I'll have to see how you built around Alignment and Emrakul :)

I built a deck similar to this and made Hedron Alignment work, Transgress the Mind is also another way to exile their cards or if you have Hedron Alignment in your hand, you can exile it that way or hit one of their key cards in your opponents hand.

I'd considered Trangress but couldn't make room for it. Legacy takes care of the Exile too efficiently to need more exile anyway, but I'm not sure it'll be needed until I get an opportunity to test out against some decks. I'll be keeping it in mind for sideboard. What other cards did you use in your build? I'm still considering other possible outside the box options.

More and more tests done with the current build and I've now gotten the instant win as fast as the 8th upkeep. In the last twenty or so trials it has never taken me longer than the 11th upkeep to achieve Alignment, and I was a couple of times able to dish out a gratuitous amount of damage with turn 4 Brutality and discarding two Alms for an 8 point swing in life followed up by a Masterpiece on turn 5 which was able to swing out with a Skaab on turn 6 for another 9 in the air. The zombie aggro is real.

Love this deck.

Interesting deck! +1 just for using Hedron Alignment! (Also for being a fan of Calvin and Hobbs).

Thanks

I proxied the extra cards I did not have to play it against my friends at our weekly game and it has been exciting.

This deck is no guaranteed win, but it's absolutely fun to play. It's not at all something I expect, but twice now I've gotten the nut draw that resulted in two to three Amalgam's and a Masterpiece brought back to the table on my opponents fourth turn and ready to attack for 13 to 16 damage on turn 5. On turn three I discarded the Masterpiece to Collected Brutality and paid the Madness cost on Alms to put them down to 15. I just played a land and passed turn on turn 4. I had one or two Amalgam left in hand and one already in the graveyard from Brutality on turn 2 to kill a creature and peek at my opponents hand so two to three come back when I discarded my hand to zero to bring back the Masterpiece. It was beautiful. These cards should never be that clumped together near the top of the deck, but I'll take it lol.

Compelling Deterrence may be a good sideboard option if you're facing too much hand attack. Allowing you to rely on the hexproof until you're ready to put it into your hand or graveyard... The zombie back up plan seems as solid as it can get, but I am worried that it just wouldn't be enough because of how popular zombies got their at the end of EMN, most decks have a lot of exile to deal with them and that could work against you here.

I forgot about that card, it could be decent in the sideboard. I'll have to give it a try, I know I have a few laying around somewhere.

Exile I'm not quite as worried about since I can always fall back on Eternal Scourge being able to be played from Exile so I'm never completely out of options. I could definitely be put on rough shape, but there's always a harder match up and U/W control is usually up there. It would be a long uphill battle for sure, especially if my tutors get countered.

I don't expect much in the way of Zombies at all in Aether Revolt, but the cards I'm starting to see are really quite gross and there might be some awesome support and control that I'll be interested in adding in as well.