Ain’t that the blues, Budgets that make you cry
Boy howdy look at this counter ingested not simic flashy mess!
I’ve wanted to build around ascendancy for awhile and this was a treat to put together, let me break it down:
a simic ascendant beyond a simic ascendant
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So there are a few win conditions in this deck, the obvious one being
Simic Ascendancy
and we’ve got some neat tricks for that, but also...
our boi
Galloping Lizrog
This miserable cretin is the mvp of this deck. Turn five if you’ve been adapting your
Benthic Biomancer
and proliferating
Merfolk Skydiver
Contentious Plan
this dude can easily drop for 10 counters. Huge tramping frog that also can just JANK the heck out of our ascendancy? It’s pretty rad.
Zegana, Utopian Speaker
is a nice way to turn all of our counter generators into beaters, and of course piling on those thicc Stax. Combine with
Biomancer's Familiar
for best results.
Those are the main ways we win, SA, Frog, and trample counters. But how do we feed into it?
even further beyond
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The gas to power this engine is coming from
Benthic Biomancer
and
Jiang Yanggu, Wildcrafter
for card draw and ramp respectively. With
Biomancer's Familiar
benthic becomes an excellent card filter every turn. In addition, you’ll notice a theme with the activated ability targets for the fam, with
Shapers of Nature
and
Merfolk Skydiver
. One blue to draw off a measly counter? That’s crazy value, and proliferating for one and simic is one of the best ways to stack ascendancy, since you get the counter from the proliferate and then the additional counters from the creature counters.
Opt
is a staple for good deck management, and the incubation half of
Incubation / Incongruity
is an excellent digger.
And we add
Simic Charm
for that spiciest of toolbox flavor.
So we’ve gone over the main board, but gosh it’s weak to burn! And flash, and golgari midrange... jeez let’s just look at our sideboard.
Channeling the big brain
———
Bond of Flourishing
and
River Hoopoe
replace the incubation, and the shapers. This is your anti-burn core. I know I know it looks frogging weird but hear me out. Bond is a better incubation but you lose out on the other removal half of the card, in exchange for 3 life. Every little bit counts and that life tempo is going to save you. But more importantly,
River Hoopoe
is hilarious. This price tag on the activated ability is steep, but taking the place of shaper, you can see how this looks familiar. Cut the cost down and suddenly 2 life and draw is looking pretty slick. Remember: burn is about out pacing you, not about the damage. If you can stall your life total for even two extra turns, you’ll have a much higher success rate.
Essence Capture
and
Admiral's Order
is your main counter suite. Against really heavy interaction decks I typically would suggest subbing out a couple Opts and the incubations.
Essence Capture
plays well with your strategy, of course, and the good admiral is just a sometimes better cancel, and being a sometimes one mana counter spell is more then Handy. Especially protects your
Galloping Lizrog
during big swing ins.
Return to Nature
is your artifact, enchantment, graveyard hate catch all card. It’s super underrated, and it’s dirt cheap. For just 1 and green you can hate on combos, and blow up two different strategies. R.I.P incubation and opts again. F
Engulf the Shore
this is your board wipe. Rarely are you going to have a situation where you have less toughness on your wincons then the number of islands, so this is usually one sided. Now the same could be said about their board state, but this is primarily for token heavy strategies and weenie decks. If you find that big beaters keep coming
Unsummon
is always a good tempo option.
That’s all there is to the sideboard, feel free to finagle as necessary. Some of these aren’t what I’d call optimal, but I just love the HOOPOE.
All in all you’re looking at a really affordable starting shell for your Simic Ascendant Dreams, that can do wonders as is. But you’re probably looking at your wallet like the degenerate you are and thinking you can dip into your savings account one more time to upgrade my build huh? Well let’s go over some costly additions before we wrap up..
Hyperbolic Krasis chamber
Incubation Druid
is a better ramping tool as compared to our planeswalker buddy. Adapt for that juicy
Biomancer's Familiar
reduction, more counters then jiang’s minus in a burst. One less mana.
Hardened Scales
pretty straight forward, double dips on the
Benthic Biomancer
counter trigger, makes the lizrog come in bigger and makes the proliferating counters a bit too fast.
Master Biomancer
consistency booster, creates some really strong situations where you’re speeding up on ascendency triggers. Drop him early and it’ll get out of hand. Is essentially a an early win combo with lizrog if he’s got three counters on him.
Hydroid Krasis
if you have the squid, use the squid. She’s a beaut and just reeks value into this deck, lizrog target, easy draw, flying, trample, can go nuclear with simic ascendancy. just do it.
Keep in mind that this isn’t expansive by all means, just some concept cards to get your gears turning. If you want to upgrade into a more control build, maybe a more aggressive one, ultimately the deck is yours and you should just have fun experimenting. That’s the simic way! Play with yourself for bolas’s sake! Grow some crab arms or something smh.
evolutionary leaps and bounds
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Well hey here we are, the end of my charade, I hope you all enjoyed the descent into trying to keep your dice from shifting off your cards, if you liked this build give me some feedback! Expand my modern horizons, this deck needs creative biomancers to give it some love.
Keep those budget blues away people!
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