Prognostic Sphinx lets you search for Ooze if you don't have it, fills your graveyard when you have it and protects the Ooze. Could be nice as a 1-of.

C7081 that card isn't in his colors and all it does is scry 3 when it attacks. Something like Jarad's Orders would be more appropriate.

Well he could just not cast it and only use it with the Ooze for the protection and discard effect, which Jarad's Orders can't do. Currently the opponent just needs to save his Path to Exile for the Ooze, unless there's both the combo in the grave and Jarad on the field.

Well he runs Thornling for some protection, something like Thrun, the Last Troll would be better for the hex proof in comparison to the Prognostic Sphinx

C7081 I agree the sphinx would be great in terms of its ability to fill my graveyard and protect the ooze. However, it isn't worth hassle of adding a third color.

as far as regen, in color. Lotleth Troll could allow you to discard as well as regen. and even the Erebos, God of the Dead would let you draw cards

derecksisco I have been strongly considering Lotleth Troll . What would you recommend taking out for some?

Call me crazy but with the druid, Birds of Paradise seems slightly redundant. I honestly couldn't give you an accurate sub-out simply because there isn't any fluff in the deck. You could shave your, quillspike, shaman, and druid to three, and then put in three lotleth's. I say that because it seems that once you get one in the graveyard, the other ones become redundant.

derecksisco I think I'll take you up on that and call you crazy. It isn't readily apparent unless you have played this deck some, but having birds turn 1 speeds up the deck tremendously. You're right in that there is not really any fluff in the deck. Fauna Shaman is easily the most powerful card in this deck (other than Necrotic Ooze ) because of the tutor/grave-fill effect and I definitely want to see one every game. Because Devoted Druid and Quillspike can combo on the battlefield as well as in the grave, I like having as many copies as possible. Taking all this into account, I have decided to move the maindeck Duress and Inquisition of Kozilek to the sideboard in favor of two Lotleth Troll s. The trolls increase the possibility of a turn 3 or 4 win as well as up the aggro abilities of the deck.

I had no idea anybody else had a deck like this, I didn't base mine off of anything. This just happened to be what I considered one of the coolest combos I had come across. One of my friends had a Thornling in his card binder and the idea just clicked. We both use the same combo but still have very different decks. With some suggestions that I had received, I moved mine towards a bit more control which also makes sense for the meta I generally play in.

Unlike yours I use Pack Rat and Lotleth Troll as beaters to hold back until I can combo with support from control cards.

My specific suggestion would be to possibly sideboard a few Maelstrom Pulse s to destroy whatever you may need to.

+1 Love the idea as you obviously saw with my deck. I really liked the Birthing Pod !

I love the idea behind this deck would you mind taking a look at my deck? Red Blue Self Draw

Flourishing Defenses deserves mention because of your 2 main combo creatures based on -1/-1 counters, even if the CMC might be too high.

One pretty good card in a Necrotic Ooze deck is Elvish Aberration . Yes, it has a high CMC but you're not going to be using it as a creature, just graveyard fodder. Forestcycle him asap so your Ooze can tap for some mana. (Also, Pili-Pala for the untap and mana and Orochi Leafcaller for the mana filter ain't half bad if you wanna open yourself up to more colors.)

I made an EDH deck based on Necrotic Ooze with Savra as the commander and it does pretty well in my playgroup. Take a look if you want some suggestions.

Glad to see someone else brewing up an idea similar to mine! This is the version that I brewed up today :Dhttp://tappedout.net/mtg-decks/15-08-14-necrotic-ooze/

Thinking of sleeving up this deck after putting Hatebears to bed. Any tips on playing the list (I think I'm going to have to goldfish a ton just to get a feel for the combo).

Why do you run Maelstrom Pulse over Abrupt Decay in the main? At instant speed the Decay surely does more?

How do you find the Twin matchup?

llamaza Thanks for your interest in the deck! My tip is don't sacrifice survivability for speed. This deck has a lot of inevitability. Thus far, I have found the most efficient order to set up the combo to be:

1. Get a Devoted Druid on the field. Because it can send itself to the graveyard at a moments notice, ramps mana, and combos with a Quillspike or Necrotic Ooze on the battlefield, it is best to cast the druid and wait until an appropriate moment to send it to the graveyard. The only times you want this guy in the graveyard are when you want to wipe their board with the Grim Poppet combo, Necrotic Ooze needs to untap itself, or in response to this guy being exiled in some way from the battlefield.

2. After that, what you get next is dependent on what the field looks like. If you are pressured, the next card to the grave should be Grim Poppet so you can have access to the boardwipe combo. If it looks like you have time, send Thornling to the graveyard.
   

3. Quillspike should be the last piece you send to the graveyard, unless it was sent there to search up one of the previous pieces of the combo. This is due to it having the weakest stand-alone ability.
   

Some general tips:

• Fauna Shaman is the strongest turn 2 play you have most of the time due to how efficiently it sets up the combos.
  

• It is important to understand the various ways Necrotic Ooze can protect itself and their costs. The cheapest (being free) is the combo between Devoted Druid and Quillspike allowing the ooze to survive lethal damage. Intermediately (costing G), we have Thornling allowing it to become indestructible and survive lethal damage and "destroy" effects. On the high end (costing 2B, tap, and a discard) we have Pack Rat allowing the ooze to create a copy of itself. This dodges everything except boardwipes, with the most notable being exile effects and Prison Term effects.

• Tree of Redemption is a very power card, yet is in the SB due to only being useful in certain matchups. You will want to bring it in against the faster decks like Burn, Storm, or other decks that go for your life in ways other than attacking. Once you get the ooze's p/t arbitrarily large, swap its toughness with your life total. From there, finish setting up your combo and win.

Regarding Maelstrom Pulse , my local meta has a good number of token decks running around. Overall, you are probably right that Abrupt Decay will do more work there.

Regarding the Twin matchup, it becomes a race to see who can combo off first. You need to balance your time and judge when it will be best to disrupt their combo or advance yours. I suggest setting up the Devoted Druid /Grim Poppet combo first as it allows you to negate their combo and gives you all the time in the world to finish setting up the rest of yours. Slaughter Pact is also very powerful against this deck because you can use it even if you are tapped out and I recomend holding it until they try to combo off. After SB, bring in Tree of Redemption as another way to negate their combo. As they have to stop creating tokens at some point and then attack, you can use this combo to bring your life up to a safe range each turn.

You should know, this deck is still a work in progress. I'm currently toying with a slightly different version, that I can share with you if you'd like to see it. I'd love to get your thoughts on the deck after playing it, be sure to let me know how everything goes.

Thanks for the info.

Will only be playing it in a couple weeks, but going to see what thoughts I can conjur in the meantime.

One thing I've noticed in goldfishing is that it's difficult to assemble all the pieces - do you have the same issue? What is the plan B for not getting the cards you need?

llamaza Plan B is aggro via Jarad, Golgari Lich Lord , Pack Rat , and Lotleth Troll . If you aren't getting combo pieces or Fauna Shaman , then you either have some combination of these and kill spells.

Your strategy should consist of using resilient creatures/planeswalkers such as Jarad, Golgari Lich Lord , Pack Rat , Lotleth Troll , Liliana of the Veil , and Vraska the Unseen to survive until you are in a position where you can combo off or quickly assemble the combo. This usually involves waiting until you see a Fauna Shaman or discarding combo pieces to the creatures and planeswalkers listed above in order to either survive longer or win the game through aggro.

You can also apply pressure with Quillspike and Devoted Druid on the field together. Thornling is also a decent threat on its own.

Caes not sure if you saw this list from the SCG newsletter: Goryo's Ooze

A very different direction, but gold-fishing and theory-crafting suggests some insanely quick plays.