OK, so here'a a deck that makes pretty good use of
Pyxis of Pandemonium
. Everyone I know says this this is a crummy card so I thought, "How can I make it less crummy?"
If I can completely shut down my opponent, then Pyxis is good.
This deck revolves mostly around activated tap abilities, and then triggered abilities of big cards when I use
Pyxis of Pandemonium
's "ultimate" (it's 7 mana ability).
OK, so I'll start with the Pyxis combo:
Sigiled Starfish
is there because Scry is very important. Don't want to be exiling anything we might want, do we? Plus it allows me to check the next card to see if it should be exiled, because those pesky giant creatures like Angel of Serenity or Ashen Rider need to go away... for now. Muahahaha.
Pyxis of Pandemonium
: Mill yourself while milling others in the process, but in one fell swoop, bring everything back onto the field. I realize that this could be problematic against decks that may also rely on triggered abilities, but we'll get to that soon.
Eidolon of Rhetoric can severely slow down an opponent's deck, especially late game. If you can get to late game, then you're already golden since you've most likely been exiling stuff. But wait, there's more:
Possibility Storm is what makes this beautiful. There's a reason why the word "shutdown" is in the name of this deck. Make sure you've got all of your stuff on the field to make this work, and preferably the opponent has little to no creatures. This plus Eidolon of Rhetoric essentially makes everything except lands unplayable. Nothing will resolve. If you cast a spell, you must exile it, and then reveal cards until you find a spell that shares a type, then you may cast it. Oh wait, you already cast a spell, sorry!
Now you're free to exile the crap out of your opponent, assuming you have
Pyxis of Pandemonium
on the field.
Now, for the rest of the deck:
Pretty much every bomb (with a triggered ability) is not meant to be cast, but to be exiled early.
Pyxis of Pandemonium
doesn't cast things, it just puts them onto the battlefield, allowing it to bypass the horrible Eidolon of Rhetoric/Possibility Storm combo.
- Sylvan Caryatid is there for defense and mana if necessary.
- Aegis of the Gods is there because I have hexproof now.
- Kiora's Followers are there for an alternate-win scenario, and to throw a fun infinite combo into the mix. If you have two Kiora's Followers and equip an Illusionist's Bracers to one of them, you can infinitely tap something, say, like
Pyxis of Pandemonium
.
- Trading Post is if I get any of those pesky huge drops into my hand. I can just tap one mana and make them disappear while gaining five life. It can also be used as a defensive measure against large creatures swinging on turn three or later.
- Elixir of Immortality: Remember those cards I just discarded with trading post? Well I'm gonna put them back into my library, gain 5 life, and attempt to exile them.
- Dissolves and Essence Scatters are there for a bit of extra control, to prevent those early-game nuisances.
- Chromatic Lantern is very nice, as it makes all of my land 5-color. If you can get this out early, don't worry about what kind of mana you get.
- Angel of Serenity, Ashen Rider, and Hammer of Purphoros once again, should not be played, but be exiled. The scry+Pyxis combo allows this to work a little more smoothly. One exception might be
Banisher Priest
because he provides good early-game control.
If the shutdown occurs, the optimal things (other than Eidolon of Rhetoric or Possibility Storm) to have on the field are
Pyxis of Pandemonium
,
Sigiled Starfish
, and Trading Post.
This deck is not competitive in any way. It's for casual play, but I wanted to keep it standard.
If anyone has any recommendations on increasing the speed of this deck, let me know.
