Introducing the Poisonous Whale Wolf
This aggressive sultai deck revolves around Ukkima, Stalking Shadow, looking to quickly beat up our opponents by creating a large, unblockable creature and possibly give it infect. If we manage to make Ukkima a 10 power infect creature and have a way to make it leave the battlefield we will be able to kill two opponents in one turn.
The "[8]" behind the deck name is my estimate of the decks power level on a ten point scale after the testing I have done. It is very efficient, but is by no meassure tuned to absolute perfection. If you want to play a similar deck there are plenty of cards that can be switched out to get closer to cedh decks or more casual tables. But as is, this deck is capable of being very fast and powerful, able to throw big punches through combos and still capable of playing fair (comparatively...).
Some major updates to the deck
The deck now features a bit more control in the form of a small stax package where the cards all serve alternate purposes, and a set of combos that allow us to generate infinite mana and repeatedly cast Ukkima. The deck does not run Food Chain, since it is a bit too efficient for my meta, but capitalizes on the lessons we can learn from the card's interaction with Ukkima.
Speed is key
To get Ukkima out as soon as possible, we have a ramp package looking to ramp on turn one.
Birds of Paradise, Gilded Goose and Elves of Deep Shadow are our premium ramp cards since they provide colored mana to cast Ukkima with, Arbor Elf may or may not function in the same way. Deathrite Shaman can do this as well, but it requires the meta to be running a relevant amount of fetches.
Boreal Druid, Elvish Mystic, Fyndhorn Elves, Llanowar Elves and Sol Ring follow slightly behind since they don't help us with the colored cost of Ukkima (thus we cannot cast Ukkima on turn two if our land turn one was a basic forest).
We also run Sword of the Animist which is a terrific ramp card along with Ukkima, and Incubation Druid and Dramatic Reversal which can ramp us or function as combo pieces to give us infinite mana. (Incubation Druid combos with Vigean Graftmage and Dramatic Reversal combos with Isochron Scepter.)
Getting Swole
We have a good option for growing Ukkima bigger right in the command zone, with Cazur, Ruthless Stalker
at the ready to come in the turn after Ukkima. We complement this with cards that let us speed up the rate at which Ukkima grows. Flux Channeler, Hardened Scales, Winding Constrictor, Sword of Truth and Justice and Thrummingbird fill this role.
Keeping Safe
With so much of our strategy revolving around a central creature, we need good protection for our lead player. Veil of Summer, Vines of Vastwood, Blossoming Defense, Heroic Intervention, Golgari Charm, Snake Umbra, Muddle the Mixture, Arcane Denial, Fierce Guardianship, Stubborn Denial, Swan Song, Eel Umbra and Narset's Reversal let ut keep our opponents from disrupting our plans, while The Ozolith keeps our counters around even if Ukkima was to be removed.
For removal we run Abrupt Decay, Blink of an Eye, Beast Within, Cyclonic Rift, Deadly Rollick, Toxic Deluge and Nature's Claim to let us deal with threats allready on the board. Ashiok, Dream Render is our main answer to graveyard focused decks. Apart from Cyclonic Rift and Toxic Deluge we don't run any board wipes, mainly since we really don't want to kill Ukkima and since we want roo in the deck for things that let us keep Ukkima around. If there is a board state we simply cannot deal with we instead need to rely on other players bailing us out, or simply accept that we will lose this game. Hopefully we are fast enough to be the problem rather than face it...
We also run a set of stax effects that limit our opponents options to keep them playing by our rules. Ashiok, Dream Render stops all sorts of tutoring, Mystic Remora is an incentive to not cast noncreature spells, Narset, Parter of Veils keeps our opponents from drawing many cards and AEther Barrier and Tainted AEther both make it hard to play creature based strategies, while serving the alternate purpose of allowing us to continually sac Ukkima if we have accumulated infinite mana.
More Gas
To keep the ball rolling we run draw spells that synnergize with our game plan. Curious Obsession, Curiosity, Keen Sense, Snake Umbra, Sixth Sense and Sea-Dasher Octopus are all great with an unblockable creature as our main focus. Mystic Remora is good at any point in the game, early it will give us massive card advantage and late we are likely to have the mana to spend to keep it around for a few turns. Rashmi, Eternities Crafter will likely draw us a bunch of cards since we are playing a lot of cheap instants. Narset, Parter of Veils gives us card draw and card selection while making it harder to combo off.
Finishing Touches
The deck runs a set of Infect wincon cards, Phyresis and Tainted Strike. This is complemented by Isochron Scepter to let us cast Tainted Strike more than once. The deck is capable of going with this game plan even without however, since there are substitutes as unblockable attackers. These attackers, Birds of Paradise, Gilded Goose or Thrummingbird can stand in for Ukkima should we get hosed by a Darksteel Mutation or the like.
Our main alternate win condition is to combo off. We can use Isochron Scepter and Dramatic Reversal or Incubation Druid and Vigean Graftmage to generate infinite mana and follow up with playing Ukkima an infinite number of times, draining an opponent each time Ukkima leaves the battlefield. To do this we also need a way to make Ukkima leave the battlefield each time it enters, and we use Altar of Dementia, AEther Barrier and Tainted AEther for this purpose.
