First things first, the name of the deck is from a song by Blue Oyster Cult called oddly enough Veteran Of The Psychic Wars. It was used on the soundtrack to Heavy Metal. An animated film from 1981 from the people who made Heavy Metal magazine. And the cards that have inspired this deck are Psychic Vortex
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Words of War
. Hence, The Psychic Wars.
When you look at Psychic Vortex it seems to be nothing special with some huge drawbacks. You get a cumulative upkeep that progressively lets you draw cards but every turn you lose a land and your hand. So more downside than usefulness and does not bring a lot of real value to a deck.
Unless you pair it with Words of War. Then this card really begins to shine. At your upkeep, you count up your cumulative cost, but instead of drawing that many cards, you replace the draws with Words of War's activated ability. So instead of every card draw, you instead spend and get 2 points of targetable damage. This is pretty cool by itself and only limited by your available mana as turns progress. But a mana limit is bad too. So I have added Braid of Fire to the works. Now, every turn you get a card draw for each turn of Psychic Vortex's cumulative upkeep. Then you get for every turn of Braid of Fire's cumulative upkeep. Then you spend it all during your upkeep on Words of War's activated replacement ability. Braid of Fire
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Psychic Vortex
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Words of War
is a combination of cards that gives you an ever increasing amount of free targetable damage. It will do 20 total points of damage by the 4th upkeep after all 3 cards are in play. Pretty Awesome.
The downsides of Psychic Vortex are twofold. First, you sacrifice a land every turn. That is why Groundskeeper is in the deck. Groundskeeper
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Psychic Vortex
lets you recover the land you sacrifice every turn allowing you to keep the vortex in play indefinitely. Second, you discard your hand. Discarding your hand should not matter once your combination is online. You can always choose NOT to replace the draw effect with the Words of War ability. This would quickly refill your hand and let you play anything you needed.
Card Choices:
Psychic Vortex: The card the deck is built around. This is the key element of your combination allowing you to do big chunks of damage every turn essentially for "free".
Words of War: This is the source of this deck's damage and it's win condition. Psychic Vortex
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Words of War
delivers an ever increasing amount of damage to your opponent and/or their creatures.
Braid of Fire: This is the source of the mana we need to activate Words of War multiple times during our upkeep. Can also be used for any instant spells or other activated abilities as long as they are used during your upkeep.
Groundskeeper: This guy is how we keep getting our land back after sacrificing it to maintain Psychic Vortex.
Life from the Loam: This is a backup in case the Groundskeeper does not make an appearance or gets hated out.
Eternal Witness: Can also return land from the graveyard to your hand. Or get back any missing combination piece you need.
Rattleclaw Mystic: Ramps us up and into our win conditions. Also mana-fixes for our multi-colored costs.
Savage Knuckleblade: You get a lot of quality for it's mana cost and this can be a game-winning threat on it's own.
Lightning Bolt: Targeted instant speed removal when needed. This card is amazing.
Mana Leak: A counter to help protect your game plan.
The Sideboard:
At the moment I do not have a sideboard figured out yet and only 2 cards are in it.
Library of Leng: This card allows you to discard to the top of your library. This is a great way to keep you from decking yourself out while you cycle through your library from all the draws Psychic Vortex will create. I am probably going to put it main deck depending on playtesting.
Words of Wilding: In the sideboard at the moment but this is another card that may go into the main deck to give me more options of play. Psychic Vortex
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Words of Wilding
could generate a lot of Grizzly Bears.
That's it for the deck, if you have any suggestions feel free to comment!
