Introduction - Turn your weakness into strength.
I had the task to turn Mercenary scum into a decent deck. It was a fun yet hard task, though.
Searching for the way: tests and failures
Tried over-all known mercenaries from Mercadian's edition, but it didn't work by its own. Then I tried to make it suicidal, using Cateran Persuader to get the cheap garbage like Rampart Crawler and Molting Harpy, use them for blocking and throw them into the graveyard meant to combo with something like Grave Strength, but it wasn't good.
Inspiration: the answer
Then I came across Mercenary Knight, a mercenary creature with a solid 4/4 base. Of course, it HAS to have a drawback... but, is it really a drawback?
The wombo-combo - Bring me to life
The Doomed Necromancer can bring a creature from graveyard to the battlefield, that's why this deck contains a few big boys like Avatar of Woe, Visara the Dreadful, Ascendant Evincar and Cateran Overlord.
So far, so good; now, we all know that Doomed Necromancer is a reanimator cleric that is also a mercenary and he can be driven into action with either Rathi Assassin, Cateran Overlord or Cateran Summons if needed. But, how do I get these superpower creatures into the graveyard if I don't run Entomb in the deck?
The answer is Mercenary Knight, the three-drop 4/4 mercenary creature whose drawback is my advantage. Remember that one of those big creatures we want to reanimate is a mercenary (Cateran Overlord) and can be searched with our deck's tutor: Cateran Summons, which only costs a single .
Possible scenarios
Starting Hand
1) If I draw a hand that includes Mercenary Knight and a big boy like Avatar of Woe, then I will play the knight and discard the avatar so I can later bring her to the field.
2) If I draw a hand that includes Mercenary Knight but none of the big boys, then I will use Cateran Summons to search for Cateran Overlord so that I can discard "it" (I don't know if that creepy thing diserves a "him).
3) If I draw a hand that includes a big boy but no Mercenary Knight, then I will Cateran Summons him to do the same thing. Remember the knight it's a mercenary creature.
Otherwise, I'll probably use Cateran Summons to seek for Rathi Assassin, a core piece to my party.
Deck's Mechanics
This deck does not rely on that wombo-combo to win at all. It has bunch of synergy between it's cards.
4xSol Ring, works like a charm in this deck, and this is why:
a) It hurries the deck so that you can pull a TURN TWO Rathi Assassin for !
b) The "drawback" of Sol Ring is that the mana it adds are colorless. But since your mercenary search abilities cost colorless mana, you simply give a f--k about it! That's right, f--k you colors!
c) It ain't that unlikely to start with a pair of Sol Ring in hand, which means they'll both meet the battlefield at the first turn and you'll have available to bring hell upon your opponent as early as turn two!
d) It will pay for those big boys cost if you could not land the Doomed Necromancer combo.
So...
Once you've got Rathi Assassin on the battlefield, you should leave it untapped and end your turn with 3 mana open (2 if you've got Heartstone on play). Then, wait until the opponent attacks, if he/she does, use her destroyer ability; if he/she doesn't, use her searcher ability to get what you need according to cirumstances: you may need the 4/4 Mercenary Knight (remember you only have to discard a creature card if you play it from your hand, wink wink;) or Skulking Fugitive to stomp your enemy, or Doomed Necromancer for the reanimator wombo-combo, or Rathi Intimidator if you want to search for more creatures per turn (you can even use it as soon as it comes into play if you have Thousand-Year Elixir on the battlefield... twice!).
Then, Rathi Intimidator can be used to hit for two unblockable points of damage, but it's wiser to use it's searcher ability and bring those sexy Silent Assassin into the field.
With Silent Assassin on the battlefield, your opponent will be so afraid to block any attacker of yours that he'll curse your two-drop hottie all turns. You'll have mana to throw out the window, I guarantee it, remember the deck runs Sol Ring and Heartstone.
So as long as your mana is open:
-you attacks will reach the opponent because if they don't, there will be blood (says Silent Assassin!
-your opponent won't tap any good creature because if they do, Rathi Assassin says there'll be blood too!
-if your opponent does block or attacks, you'll spend your mana destroying his/her precious creatures; if he does none, you'll spend your mana searching for a bigger army and make his/her next turn even worse!
Finally, Grasp of Darkness will deal with the creatures your opponent doesn't tap nor use as a blocker.
Other spells
1x Illusionist's Bracers is pretty much self-explaining, right? Just picture killing two creatures with one Rathi Assassin activation or bringing two 4/4 creatures in a blink of an eye.
Enough said about the battlefield, we need assurance too!
3x Duress takes over the removal that could harm your beauties or the spells that could trouble your wombo-combo from your graveyard.
3x Imp's Mischief will help protecting your permanents too.
Lowering the price
Budget version here!
Note that for an even lower budget you can... Show
Total cost will drop from $180 to $60 and playability will remain the same.
Flavour
If you've read everything up here, it won't hurt to read the last part, right?
It's the "...but WHY?" part Show
More than ten years ago (in a galaxy far far away) there was a little kid (me) who discovered the awesome trading card game we love so much. Things were different back then, cards were very hard to get since online buying didn't exist by then. On top of that, I was still a kid, so spending lots of money wasn't an option twenty years ago, this little player had to trade his way up.
Mercenaries were my first deck attempt, but it remained incomplete and lost among my useless yet beloved cards. That's why I worked this sh--t deck; to finally complete what started thirty years ago.
Most Mercadian Masques mercenary creatures are pretty useless (pure garbage actually) when compared to modern tribal cards, so even though I tried building an absolut-mercenary deck, it had hard times dealing against not-that-old decks.
The difference is too grose, compare these two empowerers from their respective tribe, as an example: Phyrexian Driver vs Elvish Archdruid. It's SAD! Poor misshapen thing, I promise I'll use it as a token or make a good fire to stay warm (winter is coming, after all).
So, I kept trying to improve it without removing the +"mercenary deck"+ feeling and I finally came up with this not-at-all slow combo reanimator deck with a very good control over the battlefield. This is the best I've came up for as long as mercenaries concern. Tested it against different tribal decks and a few standards. Yes, it can beat the cr*p out of them!
Thank you for reading :) You rock!
...and feel free to comment whatever your thoughts are regarding this crap deck!
