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So, I feel like I should mention that Erayo, Soratami Ascendant / Erayo's Essence is super-duper banned in EDH. If your playgroup is alright with it, keep it in; but be aware that about 95% of players would not be happy.

I suggest replacing it with something like Counterbalance , which works nicely with your Sensei's Divining Top . Also, if your general is on the field, being able to look and see if you want to reveal the top card of your deck to counter a spell is pretty valuable.

Ponder , Preordain and Brainstorm are great in almost every blue deck, but here the top-deck manipulation makes them even better. I suggest including all three.

Mystical Tutor is awesome if your general is on the field, as it becomes a pseudo-tutor-to-hand effect.

Narset, Parter of Veils is a pretty busted card -- she even lets you clear a creature off of the top of your deck if you need it, in addition to her static hate-ability. Pairing her with a Windfall is especially powerful. Faithless Looting is another way to get past uncastable creatures and/or lands.

I've had good success with Treasure Cruise in my Elsha of the Infinite list. Similarly, I think Dig Through Time is probably a better Drawn from Dreams , as it is instant-speed. Other mass-draw spells to consider include: Fact or Fiction , Chemister's Insight , Chart a Course .

If you run only monks and your meta isn't tribal-heavy, Harsh Mercy may be worth including.

Your ramp package has some room for improvement. I've never been impressed with three-mana mana-rocks in EDH, since two-drop rocks are available and tend to be better. I suggest running some of the following instead of your Chromatic Lantern , Commander's Sphere , and a few other cards if you want to make cuts: Talisman of Progress , Talisman of Conviction , Talisman of Creativity , Mind Stone , Thought Vessel , Azorius Signet , Everflowing Chalice (which can be cast for zero off the top, if you really want to get past it), Prismatic Lens , Coldsteel Heart (maybe), Arcane Signet , Fellwar Stone or even Guardian Idol . This has the added bonus of allowing you to cut some lands -- I don't think you should be running more than 34, and probably want to be around 32 or 33.

By Force and Wear / Tear are very good multi-for-ones in EDH... you should at least consider running them.

If you craft your creature-package carefully, you can run effects like Kozilek's Return or Pyroclasm . Keep in mind that these trigger prowess, so your Monastery Mentor will survive a Pyroclasm , assuming you're the one who casts it.

If you can get ahold of one, I think Cyclonic Rift is way preferable to Planar Cleansing . Supreme Verdict is another excellent boardwipe.

Counterspells are tough in Elsha of the Infinite , since you can't cast them without a target and thus can clog the top of your deck. To fix this, try modal counters that can be cast with an empty stack. Some to consider: Pyroblast , Red Elemental Blast , Archmage's Charm , Mystic Confluence , Izzet Charm .

You appear to do very little library-searching. You can take advantage of this with Mindlock Orb , which punishes tutor-tribal decks (decks anything like the ones I build and play against) hard.

Steel of the Godhead is, I think, better than your Aether Tunnel . It does cost one more mana, but it gives Elsha of the Infinite lifelink, which means it can likely also replace Basilisk Collar and free up a card-slot.

Alright. That's all I got. Good luck!

1. So Preordain is awesome for the same reasons your Brainstorm and Ponder are... I suggest running it.

2. Narset, Parter of Veils is a great way to limit your competitive opponents. Especially if you pair her with a well-timed Windfall . Ashiok, Dream Render happens to be another way to punish people for playing tutor-tribal kinds of strategies.

3. Another hallmark of competitive decks is their ramp, especially zero and two-mana. In your description, you say you want to stay budget -- unfortunately, that rules out about all of the good zero mana ramp. ( Mox Tantalite is bad, and Mox Amber is hardly better most of the time.) So I suggest increasing your two-mana ramp, and maybe including Ancient Tomb if at all possible to speed up their presence on the board. Some to consider: Talisman of Progress , Talisman of Hierarchy , Talisman of Dominance , Coldsteel Heart , Fellwar Stone , Mind Stone , Everflowing Chalice , Prismatic Lens , etc. None of these should be more than a few bucks.

4. Concerning your lands: I think you're running too many, especially if you add some of the ramp mentioned in (3). I'd cut four-ish, maybe five. Generally, once you have a few (3 - 4) lands, you'd rather have a rock and a land in hand than just two lands, since you can cast the rock without using your land-drop. I'm not sure HOW budget you want to keep this deck, but Mana Confluence and City of Brass are each around $10, and they're great in any three or more color deck. Pain lands ( Caves of Koilos , Adarkar Wastes and Underground River ) are better than your tapped lands like Sejiri Refuge , as far as I can tell.

5. I think a reanimation package is probably better than running Show and Tell . Show and Tell is symmetrical, and is often actively dangerous to resolve in EDH, when everyone is trying to do busted stuff. I'm much more a fan of Buried Alive and Entomb to get your fatties in the bin, and then using Animate Dead , Dance of the Dead , Reanimate and/or Necromancy (which is $$$ for some reason) to get them back.

6. Tutors like your Demonic Tutor are good, but like zero mana rocks they tend to be pricy (see Vampiric Tutor and Enlightened Tutor ). One I do suggest is Lim-Dul's Vault , which is only a couple dollars these days. It also happens to be instant speed, which is kinda dumb-powerful, if you ask me.

7. Cumulative upkeep was designed to make powerful effects transient; however, Aminatou, the Fateshifter sorta changes that equation with her -1. Consider cards like Mystic Remora , which you can blink to keep around relatively indefinitely. Similar cards to consider are: Musician , Phyrexian Etchings , Tidal Control and Infernal Darkness (if you're particularly mean).

8. Divining Witch is interesting -- I'd actually never seen that card before. If you're trying to exile your deck and win with your Jace, Wielder of Mysteries , I think Demonic Consultation is probably a better way... though you might want to keep both. Another method (that I think is worse) is to use the card Doomsday , which is only a few dollars. The problem is that if you run Doomsday , you'd likely want to run a Doomsday -package, so you could win by just casting it and drawing into your top card... For that, I'd suggest talking to someone smarter than me, as I've never been able to get the hang of what the hell is going on with that strategy. All I know is that the package usually has something like Gitaxian Probe and Lotus Petal and ends with me being dead.

9. You may have good luck with card draw spells. Repeatable effects, like Phyrexian Arena and/or Dark Confidant , tend to be expensive; luckily, the spell versions are often decidedly less so. I suggest running a few or more of the following: Painful Truths , Night's Whisper , Treasure Cruise or Dig Through Time (running both can be tough since delve can get in its own way), Fact or Fiction , Thirst for Knowledge , Concentrate , Chemister's Insight , Oona's Grace (questionable, due to the high mana requirement), Ancient Excavation (good with the reanimation mentioned in (5)), Archmage's Charm , Chart a Course , Syphon Mind , Deep Analysis and/or Words of Wisdom -- pay extra attention to the instants you can cast on an opponents end step. Another way to do this is simply to steal your opponents' card draw with Notion Thief or Plagiarize .

10. Lastly, I know its around $11 these days, but I think Counterbalance would be dumb in this deck. Using your general's +1 will let you stack whatever you want on top, which can be especially devastating if you can keep an opponent's general off the board that way.

Good luck man! Love this deck.

Ponder and Preordain are great cards to slide into the 99. You have all the on-color and off-color fetches, so Brainstorm would be great, too...

Narset, Parter of Veils is quickly becoming a blue EDH staple... she's amazing. If you run her, include Windfall as well -- it refills your hand, but if Narset, Parter of Veils is out, it also reduces your opponents'.

Carpet of Flowers is a good mana source if your meta is like mine and everyone is in blue. If you don't want to run elves, you should at least consider one-mana enchant-lands like Utopia Sprawl or Wild Growth . These are pretty good turn one plays.

Since you're only running a few artifacts with activated abilities, consider Collector Ouphe -- he can be a real pain for decks relying on artifact mana. If you don't put him in, consider Slate of Ancestry as a draw-engine.

I think Jace, Vryn's Prodigy  ^Flip is enough better than Merfolk Looter you should run him instead... He's not a merfolk, but being able to recast important spells from the yard is extremely relevant.

If your meta is full of combo (mine is), consider Arcane Laboratory . It's worse than Rule of Law since it dies to Pyroblast , but since you can't run Rule of Law it's still pretty great.

I'd run Jace, Wielder of Mysteries instead of Laboratory Maniac if you want to go that route. Generally, you want combo pieces to have a large impact even if you don't have the combo in hand, and Laboratory Maniac is just a bear if you're not going off. Jace, Wielder of Mysteries is a draw engine as well.

Waterlogged Grove is a good land to consider. Also Flooded Grove . If you run Dryad Arbor , you'll be able to fetch it with Green Sun's Zenith . If you want to keep your basic land count high, also consider Back to Basics .

Mystic Remora can easily be an Ancestral Recall in inexperienced metas; and even in experienced ones, it's still worth including.

Triumph of the Hordes is a good win condition of the same sort as your Craterhoof Behemoth .

Good luck!

Hey man! I have a few suggestions; feel free to ignore any/all of them.

1. In Vintage, there's an idea called 'Xerox.' This refers to replacing a small portion of your land-base with low-cost cantrips, which can help you find lands if you need them, or dig you past them if you don't. The best ones currently available are Ponder , Preordain and Brainstorm ; I suggest you at least run Ponder and Preordain instead of two Snow-Covered Island s. The reason I'm not so adamant about Brainstorm is that, sans land-based shuffle effects, you're very likely to get stuck with cards you don't want on top of your deck a good amount of the time. If you want to run it, I suggest running at least four fetch lands (like Prismatic Vista or Flooded Strand ). Other cantrips to consider are: Sleight of Hand , Impulse , Serum Visions , Opt , etc.

2. I don't know how this deck plays, but I do not think the Urza's lands are very good in EDH. It takes some effort to assemble tron in a four-of, sixty card format like modern; in EDH, getting all three of these specific lands can be a huge amount more trouble than it's worth. I suggest just running basic Island s instead, since these produce blue mana and don't die to your own Back to Basics or an opposing Blood Moon / Ruination / Wasteland .

3. I don't know what the budget on this deck is, but since you're running Power Artifact , I assume it's high. I suggest running Grim Monolith in addition to your Basalt Monolith -- the Power Artifact -combo still works, and this one has the advantage of being mana-positive if you cast it early game.

4. Mox Opal is really good. It's about $100, but in an artifact deck it is always an all star. If able, run it; if you can't but your group allows proxies, print one out.

5. I don't think the Darksteel Forge -with- Nevinyrral's Disk combo is very good. It's a lot of mana to get online, and your opponents will have a turn to react (since Nevinyrral's Disk ETBs tapped). I think more mana rocks, like Mind Stone or Everflowing Chalice , are probably better. Especially since you already have Cyclonic Rift with a Mystical Tutor to get it.

6. Since I've never played with this list, I don't know exactly how the games will go. However, if you find them going long frequently enough (maybe around 50% of the time), you may have some luck with Muddle the Mixture as a tutor. Normally, I dislike this card, as the transmute ability is only sorcery speed and three mana can be a lot to pay. However, it gets so many pieces of your combos, I think it may be worth including; it can fetch up Isochron Scepter , Dramatic Reversal , Power Artifact and (if you should choose to run it) Grim Monolith . It also can get non-combo cards like Cyclonic Rift in a pinch.

7. There're some cool U artifact tutors to consider. If you want cards on par with your Power Artifact , Transmute Artifact is a pretty busted card that'll grab your combo pieces when you need them. (Side note: Basalt Monolith also goes infinite with Rings of Brighthearth ; idk if you want to run it, but I figured I'd mention it.) Reshape can be a redundant, if significantly less powerful, Whir of Invention .

8. You may benefit from two or three more mass card-draw effects. I think you should run either Treasure Cruise or Dig Through Time (but not both, since delve can get in its own way), as well as one or two other spells like Fact or Fiction , Thirst for Knowledge , Chemister's Insight , etc. Notice that, except for Treasure Cruise , these are all instants.

9. I think you may have overlooked Spell Snare as a counterspell. I think this card is, in general, highly underrated in EDH; however, I think it would be especially good here. It is a hard counter for a very frequent CMC, and can easily get rid of an unwanted Demonic Tutor , Sylvan Library or Cyclonic Rift . Better yet, it counters Null Rod , Collector Ouphe , Stony Silence , Kataki, War's Wage , Gaddock Teeg , Thorn of Amethyst and Lavinia, Azorius Renegade . It's cheap enough that leaving up mana for it isn't a problem, and it can keep you from getting hosed pretty well.

Good luck!

A few cards to consider adding:

• Adriana, Captain of the Guard : She’s a knight who adds value in a multiplayer game.

• Kinsbaile Cavalier

• Knights of the Black Rose : These’ll produce some card advantage.

• Mirran Crusader

• Valiant Knight

• Faithless Looting / Commune with Lava / Painful Truths / Phyrexian Arena : I notice you’re light on card draw/selection; adding these cards may help.

• Wear / Tear is a pretty good two-for-one in Boros.

• Steelshaper's Gift

• Finally, you may have luck with some more legacy-type equipment. Umezawa's Jitte , Sword of Fire and Ice , or even Sword of Sinew and Steel can all make attackers even more potent.

Good luck!

I'm surprised no one has mentioned it, but Timesifter happens to be one of the dumbest cards to run in colorless EDH. Most other decks are going to be doing their best to keep their curves reasonable, but since you have just buckets of colorless mana-producers your curve is going to run very high. If you run Sensei's Divining Top too, you can probably take around 80 percent of the extra turns.

Sculpting Steel is an excellent way to copy whatever your biggest mana-producer is.

I've never liked the tron lands in EDH. My reasoning is mainly that the reward is too difficult to obtain in a singleton, ninety-nine card deck, and that running more non-basics leaves you more open to attack from Back to Basics , Ruination and Wasteland . Many colorless decks already run a lot of non-basics, but you don't want to run more than you have to. I also think you're running a few too many lands, since you're also (ideally) going to be getting a lot of mana from your rocks. I think you should just do a straight trade of the tron lands for other accelerants.

There're also a few other colorless lands to consider. Cryptic Caves , I think, is better than Seraph Sanctuary ; typically you'd only gain one-ish life off the latter, and the ability to cycle Cryptic Caves late game can be very relevant. Ancient Tomb is a BOMB in most decks, especially colorless ones; if you have the ability to acquire it, run it. Thespian's Stage or Vesuva can copy a good land you want more of; Thespian's Stage is especially funny if you run Dark Depths , which also happens to interact favorably with your Mirage Mirror . Also Blast Zone . And Scorched Ruins .

In general, you want to run more two-mana rocks and fewer three-mana rocks. I don't like Pristine Talisman , Seer's Lantern , etc. simply because if you ran two-mana rocks instead, you could land the rock turn two, untap, play a land, and then land a four-mana spell like Thran Dynamo or Hedron Archive . There're enough two-mana rocks you can run in a colorless deck that I think you may find yourself playing a turn behind where you could be, unnecessarily. Some examples: Thought Vessel , Coldsteel Heart , Everflowing Chalice , Fellwar Stone , Grim Monolith (if you're rich) and Hedron Crawler ... I think replacing the aforementioned and other three-mana rocks with some of these is definitely worth trying. If you wanted, Metalworker is probably the best three-mana dork-rock ever made, though he is around $50 these days.

I strongly agree with multimedia: You should definitely run Voltaic Key and/or Manifold Key , and Mystic Forge seems like it'll be a powerhouse.

Tamiyo's Journal and Oracle's Vault are good ways to generate card-advantage in colorless decks. Same goes for Staff of Nin , Mind's Eye (which goes well with Victory Chimes , if you want to leave that in) and Karn, Scion of Urza .

My last suggestion's relevance will depend largely upon your moral compass. I have no issue being a grade-A douche in games, since they're just games, and a good person in important matters; you might feel otherwise. Stax, if you're like me, is the way to go with colorless decks that makes them way better, mainly because you have so much more mana than anyone else at the table can make. Consider some or all of the following: Lodestone Golem , Trinisphere , Thorn of Amethyst , Sphere of Resistance , Chalice of the Void (to be cast on X = 1), Winter Orb (especially good with your rocks and if you run something like Clock of Omens ... Relic of Progenitus is good against a lot of decks, and can cycle for a card when it isn't. Grafdigger's Cage is similar. Finally, you may have luck with Tangle Wire , although that can isn't at its best in the modern day.

Right. Good luck!

Hey man! I got a few suggestions -- I hope you find them helpful:

1. The best aspect of playing green is its access to turn one dorks. I'm sure you've noticed your Birds of Paradise is a great play to lead with; you should consider the following: Llanowar Elves , Elvish Mystic , Fyndhorn Elves , Avacyn's Pilgrim and Orcish Lumberjack . Bloom Tender and Priest of Titania are good two-mana plays in this sort of package.

2. Another benefit to running dorks in green, aside from their mana, is that they're bodies. An Overrun effect can easily take the game, if you have a critical mass of creatures. Ironically, Overrun itself is pretty mediocre as far as Overrun effects go... I suggest running Triumph of the Hordes and Craterhoof Behemoth , since these are great ways to make an army of tiny duders into an army of deadly duders. Craterhoof Behemoth is especially good, since you can fetch it out with Natural Order , should you choose to run that.

3. So, I'm not quite sure how your deck is going to play. However, I suspect you'll have a lot of creatures during the mid-game. I think you should consider running Shamanic Revelation and/or Slate of Ancestry .

4. Veil of Summer is one of the more absurdly good cards printed recently. I highly suggest running it in any green deck -- it's a cantrip that protects your guys from counters and spot removal. There're some really odd niche-cases it's good in, too, like against Bitter Ordeal .

5. I don't think Path to Exile is very good. In general, ramping your opponents in a format with forty life and several enemies trying to do busted things is a dangerous move. I like your Swords to Plowshares a lot more.

6. Naya has access to some serious hate, in the form of bears and in the form of regular stax pieces. You should at least consider some of the following: Aven Mindcensor , Aura of Silence , Winter Orb (especially if you're running the dorks mentioned in (1)), Linvala, Keeper of Silence , Price of Glory , Root Maze , Armageddon (if you're like me and don't mind getting flipped off), Gaddock Teeg , Collector Ouphe , Stony Silence , Null Rod , Kataki, War's Wage and similar such nonsense. These are a really good way to slow down opponents long enough to get your army out and swinging.

7. Finally, depending on your meta, there're a few green enchantments you should strongly consider: Choke , Carpet of Flowers and Compost are all super powerful, given the right meta. Blue and black are the two most common colors in EDH, so you can be pretty certain you'll be facing one or both most of the time.

Right. That's all I got for now. Good luck!

Ah crap... I forgot rocks. Yeah... those are good. You should run them. Good catch, whoisafiq!

What I suspect is going on is that your opponents are doing a lot on the aggro front. There're a few ways you can deal with this.

First, you can discourage your opponents from attacking you. Propaganda is probably the best-known card for this, but there're plenty of others. No Mercy comes to mind -- it was one of my favorite cards when I was a kid. Crawlspace and Silent Arbiter are good ways to limit the number of attackers an opponent can pressure you with, and assuming no trample, you likely can just chump away whatever they're hitting you with. Finally, Meekstone will keep the most dangerous ones tapped. I think any of these will probably be better than AEtherize , especially since none of them are 'single use.'

I don't know your meta. However, a lot of the time fatties come down without being hard-cast, like through Natural Order or Reanimate . Running hate cards, like Grafdigger's Cage , can prevent this.

You also seem to be light on wrath effects. Yuriko, the Tiger's Shadow ninjutsu ability gets around commander tax, meaning he'll really only ever cost to put down -- so feel totally free to wrath with him on the board. Kindred Dominance strikes me as being way too much mana to do real damage in the earlier stages of the game, especially if you're fighting a bunch of aggro decks. Damnation is, I think, preferable here, as are Toxic Deluge and Cyclonic Rift . Damnation and Toxic Deluge being four and three mana, respectively, means you can conceivably cast them before you're getting smacked but while your opponent has a summoning-sick army. Cyclonic Rift 's overload ability IS seven mana, but being instant speed makes up for that (at least in my opinion).

If you include wrath effects, non-creature token producers are worth including -- they'll give you creatures to 'return' with Yuriko's ability while surviving the wrath themselves. Bitterblossom is the best here, though like most good cards, it's relatively expensive. Other options include Breeding Pit , Graf Harvest (if you wrath Yuriko to the 'yard, you can exile him to the command zone to create a token, then ninjutsu him out on the token when it attacks), Spawning Pit and Volrath's Laboratory (which can make ninjas).

If you decide to run some of the above cards, they should replace your one-for-one removal cards. In general, EDH games will have you facing three opponents, and therefore three times the number of cards you have. You therefore want cards that will effect more than a single card your opponent has. Hero's Downfall and Grasp of Darkness may be great in one-on-one formats, but in EDH they simply don't pack enough punch. (One interesting exception to the 'limit your one-for-ones' rule is the inclusion of counter magic. In general, I think of counterspells in EDH as more than one-for-ones, since A) they can save more than one of your cards if you counter something like By Force or Fire Covenant , and B) they can stop combos cold, making your opponent waste all the combo pieces s/he/they cast before the countered card.)

I have some non-combat related suggestions, too -- I hope I'm not being presumptuous in offering them:

I'm sure you've noticed how awesome your Treasure Cruise is: being eight on a Yuriko flip but often costing around two or three mana at most to cast is pretty busted. There're other delve cards to consider, though I do think it is likely more than one or two in a list will occasionally cause issues when delve gets in its own way. Dig Through Time is a primary candidate here, as it is also eight mana, but it also happens to be an instant (yay!). Temporal Trespass also comes to mind.

In magic, there're a bunch of alternate casting-cost cards that work well with your general, as their CMC is usually pretty high. Unfortunately, some of them are expensive -- I'll just mention them, in case you have more money to blow than I typically do: Force of Will and Commandeer . Spinning Darkness , Gush and Misdirection are all more affordable and alright cards in their own right, though they are significantly less powerful.

Nexus of Fate is a pet card of mine, and I think it'd be genuinely good here. It hits for seven, but doesn't 'really' make you tap out since if it resolves you get another untap step right away.

A creature to consider is Baleful Strix . Having deathtouch and flying make it really hard to block, and if you keep ninjutsu-ing it back to your hand you can keep casting it for the draw trigger.

Top-deck manipulation is a good way to make sure your general hits his hardest, and your Brainstorm is a good start. Mystical Tutor isn't too much money, though the black version, Vampiric Tutor , definitely is a lot of money nowadays. Scheming Symmetry is an alright replacement, though you'll want to be sure to kill the opponent who searches, or at least remove his top card. Though they're pricey, Sensei's Divining Top and Jace, the Mind Sculptor really are the best ways to mess with your top few cards in the game; Jace has the added bonus, like Brainstorm , of being able to top cards that you want to reveal with Yuriko's trigger again. Dream Cache and Telling Time are both OK top deck manipulation.

Cantrips are good. I suggest running Preordain in addition to your Ponder and Brainstorm . It's not as good as the two you have (in this deck), since it can only leave one card on top of your deck for Yuriko triggers, but I still think it's worth playing. As a turn one play, it's gonna be hard to beat. (Of course, Ponder does still beat it.)

Finally, mass card-draw is a good thing. Even if it doesn't trigger Yuriko, having spells to cast is always preferable to not having them (exception: Mindslaver ). Windfall is excellent, especially if you put in Narset, Parter of Veils (I think you should). Fact or Fiction and Chemister's Insight are both good instant-speed draw spells.

Only good things! Hope this helped.

Hey man! Grixis is fun. I've got some thoughts... feel free to ignore any/all of them.

1. Your mana base is better than most, but it can still use some work. Consider City of Brass and Mana Confluence . Paying one life for an ETB untapped, chromatic land to generate mana is a great rate, and these two are functionally a second and third command tower. Generally, the one life cost-to-activate is irrelevant.

2. Similar to your land-base, mana rocks are a great way to hit your colors and ramp yourself faster than your opponents. Since you don't have access to dorks, you need to consider more two-mana mana-rocks; these are, in my experience, vastly superior to three-mana rocks. Consider running a few of the following: Talisman of Indulgence , Talisman of Dominance , Talisman of Creativity , Fellwar Stone , Arcane Signet , Mind Stone , Prismatic Lens and/or Coldsteel Heart . The diamonds ( Sky Diamond , Charcoal Diamond and Fire Diamond ) are really just worse Coldsteel Heart s. If you wanna go and bust the bank, Grixis decks often have the critical mass of artifacts necessary to make Mox Opal good; Mox Diamond and Chrome Mox are also great. Also Mana Crypt .

3. In general, one-for-ones like Hero's Downfall and Dreadbore are not going to be powerful enough in a format like EDH. You have three times as many opponents, meaning you're facing approximately three times the number of cards you yourself have available. So you're probably going to want to be able to remove multiple threats with one card -- this is part of the reason Wrath effects are so good. I like that you're running Damnation ; consider Toxic Deluge as another, similar effect that dodges Gaddock Teeg 's restrictions. I've always been a big fan of By Force as mass artifact removal, and Cyclonic Rift is always worth including. Finally, Fire Covenant is a great piece of mass spot removal.

4. One card especially good with Cyclonic Rift is Windfall . Pairing Windfall with a Narset, Parter of Veils (which I think you should definitely run) leads to instant fun. More generally, mass, repeatable card-draw and/or selection is a great thing in EDH and decides most games. Phyrexian Arena is probably the most common way to generate card-advantage in black, but also consider Graveborn Muse , Treasure Cruise or Dig Through Time (I don't recommend both, as delve can get in its own way), Fact or Fiction , Painful Truths (which is quickly becoming one of my favorite cards), Faithless Looting , Dack Fayden and the like.

5. Adding more cards to your counter package seems like a plausible route for improvement. If budget is no object, Mana Drain and Force of Will are the two best counters available. Also consider Force of Negation , which is excellent against combo decks, Dispel , which is great against Ad Nauseam decks, Pyroblast , which is good usually against at least one or two of your opponents and (on the off chance you run Dack Fayden and ult him) can steal a permanent, Flusterstorm , Spell Snare , Spell Pierce and other such cheap 'n efficient counter spells. If you want to go REALLY deep, I've found Counterbalance to be a high variance EDH card that tends to be good more often than not; you're already running Sensei's Divining Top , which is what really makes Counterbalance busted.

6. Lore-wise, Nicol Bolas is good at enrapturing and manipulating other, lesser creatures. Consider a Mr. Steal-yo-Gurl package, which is both flavorful and powerful. Sower of Temptation and Control Magic can both make opposing Ulamog, the Infinite Gyre s into your own threats; Bribery is similarly busted, and does not risk getting removed by a Toxic Deluge or (more likely) Nature's Claim . Also consider Treachery and Corrupted Conscience .

7. Since you're in blue, you have access to the best cantrips in magic. I highly, highly recommend running Ponder and Preordain -- These two don't look like much, but they'll dig you to what you need and past what you don't more efficiently than any other card. Brainstorm is also good, but I'd suggest holding off adding it until you get some more fetch lands in your deck. (Fetch lands' shuffle effect will make sure you don't get stuck with two dead cards on top of your deck.) Prismatic Vista and the off-color fetches like Flooded Strand or Verdant Catacombs are good ways to fill this role.

8. Your general has built-in discard. Another package to consider, therefore, is a Waste Not package. This is a relatively unique package in that it actually does not need the namesake card in order to be good; Raven's Crime , Words of Waste and Syphon Mind are all good in their own right, and made busted when Waste Not is on the field. Stick a Geth's Grimoire in the mix, and you can really go to town (especially with Words of Waste ).

9. Finally, as a kinda fun-z last suggestion, there's a 'Words' combo I've always liked that you may find interesting -- remember, though, it's really not the best. If you pair Words of Wind with Baleful Strix and a lot of mana, you can repeatedly return Baleful Strix to your hand with Words of Wind 's ability and make your opponents keep returning permanents. This would likely work best if your Omniscience was on the field, as it would end up effectively reading: ': Each opponent returns X permanents they control to their owners' hands.' However, this is likely a win-more type of thing.

There're some cards I think you should consider cutting in order to make room for my above suggestions. Wasp of the Bitter End strikes me as likely too weak in a format with three opponents; similarly, since Toll of the Invasion only hits one opponent, this should likely be considered on the chopping block. I think a boardwipe like Toxic Deluge is probably a lot better than Tyrant's Scorn . Lazotep Plating is probably worse than a regular hard counter. Finally, if you like the idea of artifact-based ramp in (2), thirty-eight lands is too many. I recommend cutting three to five, depending on how aggressively ramp-heavy you want your deck to play.

Right. That's all I got. Good luck!

I always liked elves. I have a few suggestions:

1. Concerning your land-base: I think you should cut Command Tower and (maybe) Reliquary Tower . Since your commander is mono-colored, Command Tower is only ever going to produce ; however, it will never be a forest or a basic land. This means that you cannot untap it with Arbor Elf and it dies to Blood Moon , Back to Basics , Wasteland , Ruination , Magus of the Moon , Dwarven Miner , Dwarven Blastminer , Shivan Harvest ... I think just a regular Forest is significantly better, as you generally want to avoid undue risk. Reliquary Tower is a bit trickier, and it will depend on how the deck plays. However, as a general rule, if you have an excess of seven cards in hand, then you should have a developed board to support it and either win or get down to seven. I have long ago stopped including unlimited hand-size effects in my decks, and I've never needed one since; however, if your experience with this deck says otherwise, do please ignore me.

2. Gaea's Cradle is amazing, but also about the same price as a used liver. For that reason, you may have more luck running something like Growing Rites of Itlimoc  ^Flip, which is essentially the same card (though slightly slower), and much more affordable. Pairing this with Deserted Temple results in instant fun.

3. Your general has an Overrun effect stapled onto him, so I'm assuming that's how you generally plan to win. However, my experience has always been that if your commander is your only win-condition, your opponents will learn that and keep him off the board more or less indefinitely. I suggest running one or two alternative but similar effects: Triumph of the Hordes and/or Craterhoof Behemoth . Triumph of the Hordes has the advantage of not actually needing a full board to be lethal -- in EDH, 10 points of poison still kills a player. Craterhoof Behemoth is around $30 nowadays, but it happens to be sorta an insanely good card -- especially if you tutor it out with Natural Order or similar effects.

4. One of the main weaknesses of 'go wide' creature decks is that they tend to be soft to mass-removal. The best way to counteract this is by keeping a full hand, meaning that card-advantage is at a premium. Slate of Ancestry is a great way to keep generating advantage from a full board, and if you hold up mana you can activate it in response to a Supreme Verdict or similar effect. Beast Whisperer is an elf I'm surprised to see you aren't running. Skyshroud Poacher , while not an elf himself, can grab you your duders without having to bother casting them -- if he and a few other cards are what you have left in hand after a wrath effect, he can help rebuild your board.

5. There are some meta-specific cards you might find helpful. Gaea's Herald , Carpet of Flowers and Choke are all good in a blue-heavy meta. Compost is another draw engine that frequently nets cards, as black is generally the second best EDH color (after blue). Veil of Summer is a good card born of M20.

6. If you want another Quirion Ranger effect, consider Scryb Ranger . It's one mana more, but the flash pretty much makes up for that.

Right. That's all I got... hopefully you find at least some of it helpful. Good luck!

Hey man! I have a few thoughts... I’m by no means an expert, but I have played this general and I’ve found a few things...

1. Monastery Mentor : This thing is a dumb card that should have never been printed. But it was, and we can play it. Pairing this with a Sensei's Divining Top is how I win half the time with this general. (The other half is a Splinter Twin combo.)

2. I’m actually not a huge fan of the Foundry Inspector style combo with top. I get it goes infinite, but without a payoff that’s it; drawing your deck is fine, but you still have to win. I think just including cards like Monastery Mentor or ways to get your general to slip past blockers will mean that a finite number of activations will be all you need. Then you can use the slot for tutors, card draw, etc.

3. Speaking of tutors: Whir of Invention is a great way to nab your Sensei's Divining Top our of your deck. Reshape , Transmute Artifact and Enlightened Tutor are all also great, though they can be pricy. Mystical Tutor also synergies well with your general.

4. I think you should run Preordain in addition to your Brainstorm and Ponder .

5. Windfall and (if you’ve got $100) to blow) Wheel of Fortune both go well with Narset, Parter of Veils .

Good luck!

So, I happen to be very much in accord with RNR_Gaming in the feeling that one-mana mana-dorks will greatly improve this deck. In my experience, in a four player game, people will have a lot of other threats to worry about than mana-dorks; and if the deck is built well, with an appropriate amount of card-draw, it'll recover from a board wipe rather well. That being said, if you want to go the route of enchantment ramp, there're a bunch not in the deck that you should consider. Utopia Sprawl is a favorite of mine, especially if you pair it with an Arbor Elf . Wild Growth , Elvish Guidance and (in the right meta) Carpet of Flowers can all also produce but-tons of mana.

Part of the reason I, and I suspect RNR_Gaming suggest dorks is because, being green, you have access to a lot of creature ramp that can replace artifact ramp. If that is done, you can run cards like Collector Ouphe or Stony Silence ; in competitive metas, these two cards can often times change the course of a game more than any other card. I love artifact ramp dearly -- Kess, Dissident Mage as Storm is my favorite EDH deck -- but it is simply not as good as one mana, dork-based ramp that dodges artifact hate.

One more reason to run dorks, though this one may not really be in accord with the theme of your deck, is that they go very well with the two best win-conditions green has to offer: Craterhoof Behemoth (AKA 'Hoof Daddy') and Triumph of the Hordes . If you use something like Natural Order to slam a Craterhoof for four mana while you have a critical mass of dorks out, you can rather easily end the game right away. Similarly, Triumph of the Hordes can snipe out an Oloro, Ageless Ascetic player like few other cards; Blightsteel Colossus is the only better attacker I can think of.

Give some thought to Sneak Attack . If you have three or four dragons in hand, smacking someone with them for that much red mana may well be what you need. Lathliss, Dragon Queen and Utvara Hellkite will also gain extra value from the ETB/attack triggers. Ilharg, the Raze-Boar has a similar effect that is arguably better than Sneak Attack .

In my experience (perhaps your is different), Path to Exile is really bad in EDH. In general, ramping opponents as a side-effect of removal in a format filled with high-cost, high-payoff strategies is going to be actively dangerous. Sometimes, Path to Exile can be good for removing blockers; however, there are better ways to do this, such as Taunting Elf or even just Renegade Tactics , which has the added bonus of not costing you a card. Same goes for Settle the Wreckage .

If your meta has any blue decks, Veil of Summer is really, really, REALLY good.

Your land-count is very high. If you want to spew out lands, consider Exploration and/or Burgeoning . These can help you get out of the gate much faster than your opponents, and work especially well with your Karoo lands, like Gruul Turf .

Wear / Tear is a good two-for-one. Decimate needs all of the mentioned four card types to be cast, but can be an even more powerful play than Wear / Tear .

Farseek is a ramp-sorcery that can grab typed non-basics; similarly, Nature's Lore does not have to grab a basic forest. I have generally had a good amount of luck with these two.

Flameshadow Conjuring seems like a pretty busted way to squeeze extra value out of your dragons. Notably, if you populate before you sac the token, you get to keep the copy of the original token.

Finally, Sylvan Library is a hallmark of competitive green decks. This is, for the first few turns it's out, a free draw three effect; after that, its card-sorting abilities are what make it good.

Alright man, good luck! That's all I can think of for now.

Hey man! I got a few suggestions:

1. Vintage Xerox-style cards are very powerful in EDH. Ponder and Preordain belong in pretty much any blue deck, and Brainstorm is good if you put in three or four more fetch lands to prevent yourself from getting Brainstorm -locked. Between them, these three will make sure you get to what you need and past what you don't; they may not look good, but they're busted. Some fetches (outside the Zendikar/Onslaught cycles) to consider: Grasslands , Flood Plain , Bad River (which will all grab your Hallowed Fountain and Prairie Stream ), Evolving Wilds , Prismatic Vista , etc.

2. Swords to Plowshares is the best spot-removal in the game... I suggest running it, even though I'm generally against one-for-ones in EDH as usually they're simply not efficient enough; however, Swords to Plowshares is one mana, does not ramp your opponent like Path to Exile , and a single one-for-one is alright.

3. Narset, Parter of Veils is an EXCELLENT card I see you're running. Consider universal mass-draw to accompany her: Timetwister is the best, but as it costs the same as a used car, Windfall is a much more common option.

4. You've got a good amount of artifact ramp, but there're some other rocks you should consider. Talisman of Progress is a really good two-mana mana-rock you should consider, and Voltaic Key / Manifold Key pair well with your Mana Vault and Basalt Monolith . Even if your general is flickering the vault so it enters untaps, the keys will make two additional mana.

5. Whir of Invention is an artifact-tutor to consider. If you have access, Transmute Artifact and Reshape are also great. These will get whatever Stax piece you need, or, more likely, find your Isochron Scepter if you have Dramatic Reversal in hand.

6. Silence is a good form of combo-protection. On the turn you want to go off, it can be difficult to ensure that you're not facing any counter magic. Silence is a must-counter that you can use to blank an opponent's turn if necessary.

7. There are some other flicker-able cards in your colors you should consider. Watcher for Tomorrow is a good way to Impulse every time you trigger your general. Rishadan Cutpurse is similar to your Rishadan Footpad , though being less mana to cast is significant; since Rishadan Footpad is four mana, it'll be competing with your general to be cast. I'm not sure if it's quite good enough for a final list, but I've seen Ichor Wellspring in a lot of Brago lists. If you choose to run snow-covered basics, Arcum's Astrolabe seems straight better than the wellspring. Finally, Snapcaster Mage can be BUSTED if you have the funds to get ahold of it.

8. I see you have the Archaeomancer + Temporal Manipulation loop. Have you considered Savor the Moment instead of Temporal Manipulation ? If you flicker your general and three mana in rocks, you can pull off the loop with less mana (your general untaps the mana and himself).

9. Depending on your meta, Devout Lightcaster seems like a pretty busted flicker target. Similarly, consider Chill , Sphere of Law and Tidal Control .

Good luck! Hope this helps.

Ponder and Preordain : They don’t look like much, but they’re extraordinarily powerful cards. I recommend including them both.

I’m tempted to suggest Force of Will or Force of Negation , but as you’re a control deck the card disadvantage of these cards may well be too high a cost. Maybe experiment with one as a proxy for a bit and see if you like it in the deck?

Talisman of Dominance , Talisman of Progress and Talisman of Hierarchy are all good rocks...

Hey man! I always liked zombies... it was one of my decks when I was growing up and still getting clubbed by my brother in Magic. I have some suggestions:

1. Zombie decks are, by nature, creature-based. Creature-based decks are, by nature, extremely vulnerable to boardwipes. Obviously, I don't know how your specific list plays, but experience tells me that this will be a problem. I suggest considering mass-recursion spells, the best of which for this deck is Patriarch's Bidding . After a boardwipe nukes your board, this card will get it back; or even if you don't get smacked with a Wrath of God , Patriarch's Bidding will reanimate creatures you bin with Varina, Lich Queen .

2. Path to Exile is a touch card to make work in EDH. In formats like this, people are all trying to do high-cost, busted things -- so ramping opponents is often actively dangerous. Additionally, one-for-ones are not the best in a format with three opponents (as having three opponents means you're facing three times as many cards). I suggest you consider things like Reckless Spite or Ashes to Ashes instead of your Path to Exile or Snuff Out , as these are invariably more efficient ways to kill threats.

3. Varina is blue, which means you have access to some of the best cards in the game. Though Ponder and Preordain may not look like much, there's a reason they're super-duper-banned in modern and Ponder is restricted in Vintage. These two give you a level of unparalleled card-selection, meaning marginal opening sevens go from ok to good really fast. Brainstorm is a similar card, though I am more reserved about it do to the potential of getting stuck with two dead cards on top of your deck (' Brainstorm Locked'). With your fetches, like Misty Rainforest or Flooded Strand , Brainstorm becomes very powerful; I advise you run it.

4. Card-advantage is real good in EDH. I realize that Varina, Lich Queen IS a sort of card-advantage herself (most good commanders are), but there's room for more -- especially since, sans other cards like Alhammarret's Archive , she is not card-POSITIVE. I see you're running Gravecrawler . Pairing this sucker with Skullclamp results in instant fun, as having the ability to ': Draw two cards' is kind of dumb. It is worth noting that this does not work if you have lords on the table who pump up the Gravecrawler 's toughness; however, with a sac-outlet like Carrion Feeder out, this problem is solved. Spell-based card advantage can also be very relevant. Painful Truths is a card I've been very impressed with in three-color black decks, and Fact or Fiction 's putting cards in your graveyard seems very synergistic with your Zombie theme.

5. I think you're running too many lands. Outside lands-matter strategies, I don't think most decks want to run more than thirty-two or thirty-three lands. Replacing a few with mana-rocks will speed up your deck, since mana-rocks are not limited by the 'one land-drop per turn' rule and can thus power out fatties faster than just hitting your land-drops would. With that same principle, it becomes evident that two-mana rocks are a lot better than three-mana rocks. I suggest you run a few of the following: Talisman of Hierarchy , Talisman of Progress , Talisman of Dominance , Dimir Signet , Fellwar Stone , Mind Stone , Prismatic Lens , Coldsteel Heart and/or the soon-to-release-and-drop-in-price Arcane Signet .

6. I may be stating the obvious, but if you can, you should include Demonic Tutor . It's like... really good.

Good luck!

Hey man! I always liked the idea of Nicol Bolas, the Ravager  ^Flip in EDH. I have some suggestions.

1. Blue Sun's Zenith is an interesting infinite mana outlet, but it is only going to kill one opponent at a time (assuming you have no way to tutor it back out of your deck). I think Exsanguinate is better, if only because it is a 'kill everyone' type of deal.

2. Vintage Xerox cards, like your Brainstorm , are a good way to filter through cards you don't want to get to those you do; cantrips like these seem underwhelming, but are banned in Modern and (some) are restricted in Vintage for a reason. I suggest adding Ponder and Preordain to the mix, as they can provide a lot of card selection and make marginal opening sevens much better.

3. Your lands have, like DemMeowsephs indicates, a lot of room for improvement. If you want your Brainstorm to be the best it can be, land-generated shuffle effects are the way to go. While the Onslaught/Zendikar fetches are the gold-standard here (like Polluted Delta or Scalding Tarn ), they are also roughly to price of gold; slightly more affordable options include Terramorphic Expanse , Evolving Wilds , Prismatic Vista , Bad River , Rocky Tar Pit ... Shock lands ( Steam Vents , Watery Grave and Blood Crypt , for this deck) are a good option, especially since they can be fetched with Bad River or Rocky Tar Pit . Chromatic lands, like City of Brass , Mana Confluence or even a well-timed Reflecting Pool are also great ETB-untapped sources of mana. Finally, I think you're running too many lands; generally, if you aren't a lands-matter oriented deck, you want to run around thirty-three at most. I suggest replacing four or five lands with mana-rocks, which will speed up your deck a lot.

4. Speaking of rocks, I'm glad to see you're already running the signets in addition to Sol Ring . In non-green color identities it's tough to ramp, and their inclusion shows you already recognize how powerful artifact ramp is. I suggest Talisman of Creativity , Talisman of Indulgence and Talisman of Dominance in addition to the signets. Two-mana ramp is significantly better than three-mana ramp, since by turn three you want to be doing things more relevant to the board; this becomes easier if you ramped on two, thus having four mana turn three. To that end, I suggest replacing some of your three-mana ramp with two mana ramp. Options include Prismatic Lens , Thought Vessel , Everflowing Chalice , Coldsteel Heart , Fire Diamond / Charcoal Diamond / Sky Diamond (I like these the least), and the soon-to-release Arcane Signet (hopefully its price will drop once the Throne of Eldraine releases).

5. Mass card-draw is at a premium in EDH, where doing busted things requires that you have a critical mass of busted cards. If you have the money, Wheel of Fortune is a second, better Windfall to pair with your Narset, Parter of Veils . As it has a similar but more powerful effect in conjunction with the Windfall effects, I suggest you bring in Notion Thief from your sideboard. I've always had a soft spot for cards like your Syphon Mind , as draw-threes are also great; consider Painful Truths . That's a card I've been very impressed with in my Tasigur, the Golden Fang list, and I think it'll be good in any three-color black deck. Mystic Remora is a great card that can be an easy Ancestral Recall if you drop it at the right time, especially in less experienced/less cutthroat metas.

6. In Magic, it is perhaps as important to stop your opponents from doing things as it is to do things yourself. If you choose not to run Notion Thief (or even if you do), Night of Souls' Betrayal is a brutal card to consider. Ashiok, Dream Render tends to be a pain for most decks (as the vast majority of decks try to tutor, at least in some way), and a REAL pain for graveyard decks.

7. Grixis, especially with Nicol Bolas-y decks, has access to a whole suite of discard magic not available to other commander identities. It takes a lot of crafting, but building a deck with Waste Not in mind can be really nice. Mass-discard, similar to your Syphon Mind and general's ETB trigger, keeps pressure on your opponents' hands and will help prevent them from killing you. Consider Raven's Crime , which turns late game land-blanks into repeatable one-for-ones, and Words of Waste , which can make your general's +2 all the more brutal.

Right. That's all I got. Good luck!

FYI: Gifts Given is not EDH legal. If you meant Gifts Ungiven , that’s banned.