Elves of the Swarm (Budget)
Standard
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The Bant Company Test —Aug. 2, 2016
Current Standard is really a mess; both green and white are way too oppressive, warping the format. I'm fighting this oppression with Distended Mindbender. I'm at a crossroads where I must do the Bant Company Test (BCT). This unfortunately means that if this deck can't beat Bant Company, Sylvan Advocate, Spell Queller, Reflector Mage, Tireless Tracker and Archangel Avacyn Flip then I must include ways to beat it or move onto a different deck. You see Collected Company is not the problem it's all the powerful stuff it has the potential of spitting out onto the battlefield. Getting six mana worth of creatures for four mana is way too powerful when these same creatures also produce abilities that mimic other spells makes it completely broken. Mindbender has been the best way to combat Bant Company as a way to out value my Bant Company opponent. I out value my opponent by stripping the important card advantage engines from their hand while also having a 5/5 beatstick in play.
Mindbender is so good because he's a stand alone threat which lets him be slotted into this deck without changing much. As well as being a single threat he also has the possibility of taking two cards on cast from my opponent's hand. This discard ability is the reason to use him with Elves because he's a big creature, 5/5 which Elves really want because most of them are weak and because he can make my opponent discard cards that can hurt Elves as well as big creatures that Elves have a hard time dealing with. Elves are just not fast enough or powerful enough using the lone Shaman of the Pack strategy which means I need a card that can prepare me for the mid and late game. Mindbender is excellent at doing this. Being a 5/5 while also having the potential of stripping removal that can kill him or creatures that trump him in combat from my opponent's hand is excellent. Mindbender can't be targeted by Queller on the stack which is very important right now in Standard.
This deck is now built around getting the most potential value on turn four. I'm using three powerful cards centered around this turn, Mindbender, Duskwatch Recruiter Flip and Collected Company. It's no secret that turn four Mindbender should be the goal of any deck using him. To achieve this he must be emerged. Therefore, a new goal of this deck to emerge Mindbender turn four. I'm using both Duskwatch and Nissa, Vastwood Seer Flip to primarily do this although Leaf Gilder and Cryptolith Rite also help. Both of Duskwatch abilities are excellent with Mindbender and emerge in general. His Human side can find Mindbender and his Werewolf side can reduce Mindbender's emerge cost by 1, making it six instead of seven. The new rule with Double Faced Cards (DFC) also helps because Krallenhorde Howler Flip now counts as a two converted mana cost creature not zero like before. This means he can be sacrificed turn four to emerge Mindbender. Duskwatch is also excellent with Rite making his human side a card advantage engine.
A turn four Howler is very powerful in this deck not just with Mindbender, but because a majority of Elves are 2 drops. Being able to play a bunch of them from my hand for only one green mana each can mimic or even eclipse a turn four Company. I've used Duskwatch in the past because he is so good with Rite as a mana sink with Elves, but I'm just now starting to understand how good he really is. He can impact a game in huge ways which is amazing for a 2 drop.
To emerge Mindbender turn four it's best to have a 3 drop to sacrifice. This is where Nissa, Vastwood Seer Flip is great. Nissa gets me a Forest when she enters, this Forest might be the fourth land I need to make my land drop turn four which is most of the time needed to emerge Mindbender. Because Nissa fetches a land this means that all I theoretically need is her, Mindbender and two black sources to emerge turn four. Having this two card semi combo is very good giving this deck even more gameplay options. Nissa is legendary; sacrificing her to emerge can also be beneficial being able to play additional copies of her from my hand.
Both Cryptolith Rite and Leaf Gilder also can help immensely to emerge Mindbender turn four. They both have just as much application in the rest of this deck too, assisting in many gameplay options such as using Gilder for a turn three Collected Company or being able to cast two 2 drop Elves turn three. Gilder is great with Mindbender because he can be tapped to make mana before he is sacrificed to emerge. Although he can't make black mana which can sometimes be problematic. To emerge Mindbender double black mana must be paid, Rite can help with this restriction.
Passing the BCT has been difficult in my playtesting with Elves. I've tested a variety of strategies, two of which have impressed me a ton with both passing the BCT. Abzan with Eldrazi Displacer and Delirium with Ishkanah, Grafwidow and Liliana, the Last Hope. While both strategies have real potential both also have real problems. Displacer is very good right now in Standard as he has been since he first entered, but the Abzan manabase is really bad. Displacer is a way to counter Spell Queller. Blinking a Queller does not allow it to exile the card that it previously had exiled. This means that I get to put the card that was exiled by Queller into play and then Queller comes back into play, but there is no legal target for it on the stack.
I've been fascinated with Delirium since it was spoiled in Shadows Over Innistrad, but it never really had a powerful enough payoff card. Traverse the Ulvenwald is excellent, but it alone is not good enough to want to activate Delirium. Ishkanah is the payoff card that the Delirium strategy has been waiting for she is the reason to want to activate Delirium and Liliana is the best way to activate it. The problem with Delirium and Elves is the creature count needs to be much lower then traditional to be able to fit in a lot of other types of cards. 18 Elves is really bare minimum, 4x Sylvan Advocate, 4x Elvish Visionary, 4x Dwynen's Elite, 4x Shaman of the Pack, 2x Nissa, Vastwood Seer Flip. Add to these Elves 2-3x Ishkanah and that's my creature base. This low creature count doesn't allow the use of Collected Company. Cryptolith Rite also gets replaced by Oath of Nissa because Oath can find Liliana and Ishkanah and it replaces itself while also putting an enchantment in the yard. Liliana is surprising very good with Elves because she can get them back from the graveyard, this is especially good with Shaman of the Pack.
I haven't been as impressed with Decimator of the Provinces as a build around card and Eldrich Evolution is just way too risky to use. Both cards haven't passed the BCT. While Decimator can be really powerful he can also just not be fast enough. However, I've been sideboarding in one to fight through stalemate board states because Duskwatch can find him. If a game gets this far having a way to give my team of Elves and Mindbender trample is excellent at breaking through. Evolution can be a very powerful card, but not in this Standard. Spell Queller and Reflector Mage currently make Evolution unplayable. Getting my Evolution Quelled after I have sacrificed a creature to pay for its cast cost is much too damaging. The greatness of Evolution is being able to hugely jump the mana curve and get expensive creatures into play much faster than normal. Reflector Mage is a total counter to this, bouncing the creature I get with Evolution totally negates this incredible jump because it can't be cast the next turn. Both these cards are played in the current best deck in Standard meaning Evolution is just not in a good position right now.
Rite Elves will be completely dead in two months if nothing changes. At this time all relevant Elves except Sylvan Advocate rotate out of Standard. For Elves to survive for the next year will depend on if any are in Kaladesh. Kaladesh is the most important set in a long time; it must save the Elven Tribe from extinction.
RunningPigeon says... #2
My biggest issue with Cryptolith Rite with Elves is generally speaking all the creatures are so cheap that you don't ramp to cast them, lets say you have 4 land and 4 creatures and Rites on the field so basically 8 mana and how many targets in the deck need that much mana; as it stands 3 namely Distended Mindbender.
If the mana sinks were in then I would be all for it, but at least from my view point (whatever that's worth... probably not much ha!) currently you're running 6 cards to get 3 creatures all of which can't be hit by CoCo, so the reason why I would run the dorks instead is that they're additional targets for CoCo (although I'll admit it's already unlikely you'll whiff on a CoCo as it stands), plus they become targets for Westvale Abbey Flip and also increase the potential of Shaman of the Pack.
Totally agree regarding Transgress the Mind, don't know why I forgot that existed; I always drafted that thing when I could during BFZ, ended up with about 20 by the seasons end, glad to see they're over $1,50 each still.
Sure Eldritch Evolution is a risk being a 2 for 1, but if you're in neutral board state; i.e. topdeck battle or both have lethal swing-back situations then being able to sac off your weakest creature(s) to fetch probably Shaman of the Pack can actually win the game on the spot if their life is low enough even if they respond by removing/bouncing him.
Just checked to see if Foul-Tongue Shriek is still standard legal, turns out it is and works quite well with Thornbow Archer as a potential way to get early damage in and gives the deck a decent amount of life drain, might be a little bit janky but again more cards to consider.
July 21, 2016 7:25 a.m.
CloudThumper says... #3
multimedia, I have started with this list for a Jund version. After playing GR Tokens for the last several weeks, I am still convinced Nissa, Voice of Zendikar is good for Elves too, no matter which colors you go with. I think she's best as a 3-of or 4-of though, as you don't need to protect her as often with a second in hand. She's an excellent distraction.
July 21, 2016 10:49 a.m.
CloudThumper says... #4
Opening Night EMN: this Fresh Abzan Elfness, went 4 - 0 at FNM, defeating BUG Emerge, Naya Collected Company, Abzan Control, and GB Delirium. Elves! Getting it done.
Created and piloted by my son, with a little guidance from the Rite Elves list. He has yet to see the light from the Elvish Flameshadows (EMN). There's still time though.
July 23, 2016 4:54 p.m.
multimedia says... #5
RunningPigeon, you're right it would be much better to be able to use mana Elves than Cryptolith Rite the problem with this currently are the mana Elves are not good right now because of Collected Company. Not only can they not cast Company, but hitting any of them off of a Company is so bad. The reason to use Company is to get a huge value advantage as well as board presence very quickly. If all I'm hitting off Company are mana Elves this defeats the whole advantage that Company gives me. I even don't like using Leaf Gilder because of this, but he can at least be used to cast a turn three Company which can give a huge advantage.
My versions of these decks are all looking to utilize the best ways to use Collected Company with Elves. If Company didn't exist that would open this deck up to a lot of different options, including using more mana Elves, but it's here, it's overpowered and is the best. I honestly wish that Wizards would of banned or restricted Company in Standard in the July Banned and Restricted announcement, but they didn't.
Rite in this current version is kind of wasted because I'm not using many mana sinks just 2x Westvale Abbey Flip. I'm not trying to ramp into anything big; I'm looking to emerge Distended Mindbender not pay 8 mana for him. It still lets me create a lot of mana to use to play many more Elves than normal. This powerful effect is the reason I'm still using it. It's the only card that gives me this ability to possibly get the most Elves onto the battlefield the fastest.
I'm back to playtesting an Abzan version with Mindbender added, EMN Rite Elves. The manabase is still terrible and is the reason I stopped using Abzan in the first place, but Rite is so good with Eldrazi Displacer as a mana sink that I think even though I don't like the manabase using white looks to be the best with both Rite and Elves.
July 24, 2016 2:58 a.m. Edited.
multimedia says... #6
CloudThumper, huge congrats to your son. Go Elves! Wish there were some videos of his matches I would love to see the beat down!
I'm also back to playtesting Abzan, EMN Rite Elves because of Eldrazi Displacer.
Your son's decklist is very interesting, it has a lot of different options especially in the sideboard. Did any of them not work as well as others? How was Decimator of the Provinces did he get to cast it? I see no Distended Mindbender, not a fan?
July 24, 2016 3:12 a.m.
multimedia says... #7
CloudThumper, I like your Jund list you have a lot of interesting interactions going on, but I think it needs more land, 22-23x. You're really cramming a lot of different options into your deck maybe try to streamline it some?
I too like Nissa, Voice of Zendikar, but only when using a lot of good defensive creatures to protect her or a lot of other pump effects and being very aggressive. If I could get Sylvan Advocate turn two every game and Nissa turn three then she would be incredible, but this is not practical. The other Elves are just not very good at defending her. I also want to use Oath of Nissa when using her because it can find her this is hard to do if using Collected Company and/or Sylvan Messenger.
Atarka's Command is excellent with Nissa and Elves. Collective Defiance and Cryptolith Rite could be also be great. It's the manabase that's holding Jund back in my opinion.
July 24, 2016 4:32 a.m.
CloudThumper says... #8
The Abzan elf deck that I went 4-0 with at my FNM, in my opinion, had a lot of things going for it. The deck became very resilient when I added the 10+ spells that gave me card advantage (Collected Company, Duskwatch Recruiter Flip, Foul Emissary, Sylvan Messenger) and they allowed the deck to play more of a long game and they gave the deck more consistency. I attempted to streamline the mana base with as few tapped lands as possible because the deck can afford a tapped land on turn one (no one drops) but it needs untapped mana on turns 2 and 3 to really get going. every game the ideal draw would either be turn 2 Leaf Gilder into 2 2 drop elves or turn 2 any elf into untapped land Cryptolith Rite, elf. Decimator of the Provinces was insane and every single game I cast it, I either won the game on the spot or won the game the following turn. Casting it wasn't to much of a problem if I drew Cryptolith Rite, but even when I didn't I was usually able to cast it. The different options of the way the deck played gave it a lot of power in the late game. All of the different styles I used were: 1) Beat down with elves 2) Decimate the provinces 3) Pressure them with elves and finish them with Shaman of the Pack 4) Combo kill them with Eldrazi Displacer+Shaman of the Pack 5) Ormendal 6) Chump block and draw cards until you can take over the board. All of these lines of play so to speak won me differrent matchups and having all of the different options were helpful to make the deck work. In terms of sideboarding, through testing I had determined that my bad matchups were Languish decks, hence the 4 Duress, and decks with flyers, specifically spirits, hence the 4 Aerial Volleys. I have the same problem with mindbender in this deck as with Sylvan Advocate. They are both really powerful but don't very well synergize with the rest of the deck and I feel like the best thing that elves has going for it is the vast amount of synergy in the deck.
July 24, 2016 12:37 p.m.
Have you considered 4 decimator of the provinces main? I am running 4 sylvan messengers as well to emerge from instead of coco. Eldritch evolution is also a wonderful way to grab a shaman or soul of the harvest! I'm using decimator as a craterhoof and have been swinging for 20 on turn 4/5 pretty reliably. Elves forever!! (Well, at least for a month or two)
July 25, 2016 9:52 p.m.
multimedia says... #11
CloudThumper, thanks for your detailed writeup. It's great you're doing so well with your version.
I also think having options is good especially when the options have good synergy. The problem with using so many options is consistency of gameplay. I'm definitely a main deck builder of 4ofs and practice this line of deck building philosophy; using the maximum amount of the best cards to have the best chance of drawing them. If I was to again use white it's for 4x Eldrazi Displacer as he's the reason to use white. I tend to believe that the sideboard is the better place for options. Then these options can be applied to the deck as see fit for different matchups. You said that both Sylvan Advocate and Distended Mindbender don't have as much synergy with the rest of your deck and you're right, but having cards like these two that can win the game by themselves is a very important part of deck building. Don't cut down the most powerful cards for other cards that might give you more options.
July 26, 2016 12:34 a.m.
multimedia says... #12
TheFirst, hey, please post your list. Sounds like you are playing a variation of SaffronOlive's version, Decimator Elves. I'm just not a fan of Eldritch Evolution. Sylvan Messenger is definitely powerful with Decimator.
I like Olive's version, I think it has some problems, but I like it. The biggest problem is if you don't draw Decimator the deck just falls flat which is a problem with using Messenger instead of Collected Company. I really want a way to search for emerge if using it. While Messenger is excellent as emerge fodder she can't actually find these Eldrazi.
Really the ideal scenario would to use all four, Decimator, Messenger, Company and Duskwatch Recruiter Flip or Foul Emissary as ways to find emerge together in one deck which is what I'm playtesting here, EMN Golgari Rite Elves.
Or a version without Company, using Decimator, Messenger and Oath of Nissa, Duskwatch Recruiter Flip to find emerge here, EMN Rite Messenger Elves.
July 26, 2016 1:46 a.m.
multimedia SaffronOlive's decimator elves looks to be almost exactly what I'm running, actually. It does have issues, as you mentioned. I hope your deck lists work out!
Unfortunately, I won't be able to post my list soon, but it basically is a carbon copy of Saffon's list, with one or two changes.
multimedia says... #1
RunningPigeon, thanks for your input and suggestions. What is your version of Elves in Standard that you're playtesting?
I'm a fan of Beastcaller Savant, but not when using Collected Company in the same deck. He can't help to cast a turn 3 or 4 Company and getting him from a Company is terrible. You say you would rather play mana dorks than Cryptolith Rite? I don't understand this, Rite makes all creatures into mana dorks this lets you use the best Elves and all your other creatures to cast any spell with no restrictions. Rite is one of the best ramp cards when using small creatures strategies that has ever been in Standard. It's is own archetype, not a lot of cards have this honor.
I agree with you that Rite wants some mana sinks to take full advantage of it's power. I've been using Duskwatch Recruiter Flip with Elves and Rite for a long time now, same with Westvale Abbey Flip. They're great combos. I have just in the last couple of days or so cut Duskwatch in favor of new strategies. He might come back in some form I don't know yet. Tireless Tracker is in the sideboard he's excellent in control matchups because Company can get him.
All of those Eldritch Evolution scenarios you describe you are losing two cards and gaining one card. Then what happens if the creature you tutor for gets killed or bounced? In my playtesting with Elves and Evolution I need Sylvan Messenger to make the card worth it. Collected Company is better than Messenger and there is currently no room for both cards in this deck. Evolution is most powerful when you can hugely jump forward in the curve otherwise I have found it pretty lackluster. Spell Queller also makes Evolution too risky of a play. Getting it Quelled after I have sacrificed a creature to pay for it's cost to cast is brutal.
Transgress the Mind is better discard than Duress right now because of Emerge, Delirium and Kozilek's Return. Being able to exile these cards rather than put them into my opponent's graveyard is a huge plus.
July 21, 2016 3:59 a.m.