Hi KrazyPandaLover!

I'm loving the aristocrats archetype! This deck has been more or less on pair with the decks in my LGS at FNMs and such, but I also believe that Cruel Celebrant is going to greatly increase the possibilities of this deck. Also, having a big sac outlet in God-Eternal Bontu has me excited!

Now, I play Gutterbones over the skeleton just because it hits harder, it fits much better on curve and so it's much faster. A very usual line of play is to play Gutterbones, into Priest of Forgotten Gods . Also, the 2-drop is super packed, I have 15 2-drops and I fear that adding a bunch more would make the deck super cluncky. But I might be wrong, the discussion between these two creatures has been present all along.

Thanks a lot for commenting, and thanks a lot for the suggestion. The more comments I see like this, the more I think the skeleton might be correct, so you gave me some testing to do, which is exciting! :D

Hi MurderforBrunch, I like the deck and its updates will try it out when WoS hits arena, but just wanted to you let you know as I didn't see a comment about it, but you can not exile Nexus of Fate from the yard with the reshuffle trigger on the stack. Nexus's reshuffle trigger is a replacement ability therefore Nexus never actually goes to the graveyard for it to be targeted.

Have you thought about more copies of Judith in the form of Mayhem Devil ? It has comparable mana cost and also isn't legendary PLUS things like Plaguecrafter ping your opponent twice if you both sacrifice.

Hi Droolcup and musicman3310!

I realized that with Nexus of fate in an FNM some time ago. I just forgot to update it in the description. Thanks a lot for commenting though, last thing I want to do is to mislead other people.

Also I’ve been considering Mayhem Devil for some time, specially since there’s a “bigger” sac outlet in God-Eternal Bontu . I didn’t realize it triggered on both players sacrificing, he’s definitelly going in now!

Thanks a lot to both for commenting! You helped a bunch!

Love the deck, been working on something similiar myself. I would like to bring up Teysa Karlov again as a sideboard against board wipe heavy decks. In the cases leading into turn four against something like Kaya's Wrath if you have anything similiar to Cruel Celebrant and Judith, the Scourge Diva on board playing a Teysa can mean the difference between them getting taxed 4 life or being taxed 12. Yes, Teysa is very win more in some cases but with how many good board wipes exist she can really help in those matchups.

Hi MgStrange

Due to the recent spoilers my approach to Teysa Karlov has changed definitely. I do not see her at all in the Sideboard for two reasons mainly. The first one is that she's much more niche than all the other Sideboard cards like Duress or Tithe Taker . The second reason is that post-sideboard, most decks will bring Cry of the Carnarium which is effectively a wrath against this deck that exiles the creatures.

That being said, I did consider to make this deck slightly grindier due to both Cruel Celebrant and Mayhem Devil , and thus create a board state that you bring up God-Eternal Bontu and drain them a ton. In that case, Teysa can easily represent lethal! So, with the new cards in the set, she might even be a Mainboard consideration.

Thanks for the comments a bunch! And have fun brewing! :D

I see your point. As a follow up what about Adanto Vanguard , it's a very hard to remove card that you can preserve until you have the right triggers. You have enough life gain to be able to pay the cost for the indestructible without worrying too much.

I like a lot Adanto Vanguard as a creature, I think it's great. Also I see your point of being quite a resilient creature. But I think I prefer to "not care" if my creatures die or not, mostly with stuff like the new Sorin, Vengeful Bloodlord or Command the Dreadhorde which is a mass reanimator. Also there's the point where I would have no idea of what to cut in favor of the Vanguard, the 2-drop is packed with more or less essential synergy cards. But thanks a lot for the suggestion! I was definitely thinking of sleeving up Mardu Aggro, with less sac outlets and more punch to see how it runs, and this would be an auto-include! :D

Hey you! Random person making a Mardu deck. I have been looking forward to this deck since I saw Cruel Celebrant get spoiled, so, I've been trying to "amass" the collection of cards for this deck. I have a few concerns about what I saw in your deck and then I'll slap you with what I got and you tell me what you think.

Your deck: I think Command the Dreadhorde is kinda poor due to the mana cost and life loss, I think it would be better in sb for control, maybe. I've seen people run Angrath, the Flame-Chained in the sideboard for control matchups, but, he's got a kinda high cost. At the same time though, he eats at their life total and their hand. The Sorin is really niche and I actually like it a lot when I think about it. Your description says you have Dreadhorde Butchers but you don't have any in the deck. Why only 2 footlight fiends? Also, you're not running Heartfire ? How do you feel about the new Tibalt, Rakish Instigator to stop control decks from gaining life in addition to him making footlight fiends?

My deck: What I've been able to acquire via trades so far is a single Lyra Dawnbringer , 2 Seraph of the Scales , a playset of Midnight Reaper (One is foil), a playset of Hero of Precinct One , 2 Judith, the Scourge Diva , playset of promo Mortify , 3 Gutterbones , a playset of Priest of the Forgotten Gods , and a playset of Footlight Fiend . Then I can acquire stuff from WoTS when it comes out.

So after about 30 some games of a variation of this deck on mtga I've found the big winners to be God-Eternal Bontu and Dreadhorde Butcher . Aside from the obvious win condition of Bontu I've found more use in his abilty to bring back games where you start to move into late game and are mana screwed. Usually I sac down to five lands and refresh to get the last bit of damage to close out. Butcher on the other hand just seems to always two for one and constantly pressure. Plus his synergy with Sorin is ubsurd, most of the loyalty counters I find myself spending tend to go to him.

Hi MgStrange and Shyvana_!

At the moment the deck formula is a little in standby until I can test a bit further. As spoilers were rolling, the changes appeared to be evident, but now that the full spoiler is out, I'm not sure what direction to ( Dreadhorde Butcher was there for a while and then got cut). The thing is that this list is an Aggro deck with "dies" synergies mostly. But with Cruel Celebrant a more combo-oriented version of the deck is possible. With a Hunted Witness , two Celebrants and a Teysa, you win the game if you play Massacre Girl on turn 5! It's 20 points of damage!

Anyway, for this iteration of the deck I do like Tibalt, Rakish Instigator in the Sideboard against control. On the other hand, I don't think Angrath, the Flame-Chained is that good in an Aggro deck, I like it more in Midrange decks. Also I don't like Heartfire in this deck. I do see it being played in Mono-Red but here it's not that great, I rather the removal to be unconditional, like Mortify . Also there's a ton of sacrifice effects with Plaguecrafter and Priest of Forgotten Gods . Another consideration is that Hero of Precinct One isn't that good in the deck. I'd rather play Dreadhorde Invasion which gives you a token every turn for sure and it doesn't push you to multicolours so hardly (I feel less bad cutting multicolor spells for Bontu).

Other interesting inclusions are God-Eternal Bontu which you can play, and with her trigger on the stack, you sacrifice Bontu and draw it again! Finally Sorin, Vengeful Bloodlord makes all the things that Revival / Revenge does, but better!

Anyway, thanks a lot to you both for the comments! You helped a bunch!

Dreadhorde Invasion isn't so hot because it only makes 1 token that slowly gets bigger while pinging you every turn. Though, it may have some applications if you can gain enough life with Cruel Celebrant to negate all that damage that the Invasion is dishing out to your own face.

Dreadhorde Invasion is interesting if you are offsetting the life gain. I tried that with an artifact deck and fountain of renewal. I Bri m the same could be said about cruel celebrant. I tried adding Plaguecrafter in yesterday and it feels like it is very solid. I am a fan of Dreadhorde Butcher and I took out my two Fireblade Artists for it. He’s starts off a bit weaker, but I didn’t use the sac outlet on every upkeep and I’ve won more than one game sacing a 5/5 version to pitiless poontiff when I otherwise had stalled.

I think I really like Dreadhorde Invasion , mostly because it gives you 1 token every turn to sacrifice to Pitiless Pontiff or Priest of Forgotten Gods . The life can be compensated by triggers by Cruel Celebrant or Lifelink from Sorin, Vengeful Bloodlord . And in some cases, the opponent plays a wrath, has a ton of counters, and you still have your Enchantment in play giving you a progressively bigger token in play that will eventually kill your opponent if unanswered!

On the other hand, I also do like Dreadhorde Butcher but the 2-drop in this deck is super packed! I'm not sure what to cut for it unfortunately

Thanks a lot for commenting again! I'll give some more consideration to the Butcher, it looks so good! :D