It's that time again, so here comes another listing. My personal build will be below after sufficient blank space.

Here ya go:

Black
Cremate
Cursed Flesh
Dredge
Duskwalker
Firescreamer
Hypnotic Cloud
Soul Burn
Tainted Well
Death Bomb
Sinister Strength
Volcano Imp
Volcano Imp

Blue
Barrin's Unmaking
Blind Seer
Exclude
Manipulate Fate
Stormscape Apprentice
Tower Drake
Wash Out
Arctic Merfolk
Escape Routes
Hunting Drake
Rushing River
Sea Snidd
Sea Snidd
Sisay's Ingenuity

Gold
Llanowar Knight
Shivan Zombie
Sleeper's Robe
Sterling Grove
Crosis's Charm
Fleetfoot Panther
Hull Breach
Rith's Charm
Silver Drake
Steel Leaf Paladin

Green
Kavu Climber
Pulse of Llanowar
Quirion Trailblazer
Saproling Infestation
Thornscape Apprentice
Tranquility
Vigorous Charge
Wandering Stream
Whip Silk
Alpha Kavu
Falling Timber
Gaea's Might
Root Greevil


Red
Chaotic Strike
Crown of Flames
Hooded Kavu
Kavu Scout
Overload
Scarred Puma
Viashino Grappler
Keldon Mantle
Thunderscape Familiar

White
Angel of Mercy
Benalish Lancer
Glimmering Angel
Orim's Touch
Razorfoot Griffin
Rewards of Diversity
Spirit of Resistance
Strength of Unity
Disciple of Kangee
Hobble
March of Souls
Pollen Remedy
Sunscape Battlemage

Land
Ancient Spring
Sulfur Vent
Forsaken City
Treva's Ruins


**********************************************
space to think (conveniently filled in with Simpson's quotes:


"No TV and no beer make Homer something something"
"Go crazy?"
"Don't mind if I do!"

"He thought that trip to the guillotine factory was just for sightseeing, but really it was the perfect place to shoot him."

"Oh no! Beta!"


"Slag off"
"What happened to you man? It used to be about the MUSIC!"
"I said slag off!"


end space to think. no thinking from this point on
*********************************************


Welcome back. This card pool features some easy decisions to begin, with increasingly more difficult ones later on. You only really have main colour depth in 2 colours, white and blue, and these also feature powerful spells. As usual, though, they are about 2-4 spells away from a solid deck, and they lack early drops.

Time to look at the support colours, leaving tricky decision number 1. Red is non-allied and has little to offer. Green gives an extra tapper, a solid early drop, and fleetfoot panther, a very versatile card. Black gives 2 solid flyers, a pump spell and 1 splashable removal spell.

A normal inclination here would be to go with black, after all we only really need a few spells to splash, and it does provide a much needed removal effect (mind you one that must be used carefully). However, a closer look at the mana curve shows that this would leave us devoid of early plays an with a dangerous 4 mana spell glut.

So we look to green, and the problem with this colour is obvious. If we are going to splash it for fleetfoot , llanowar knight and thornscape , you will need that green mana early, which means you need a fair bit of green mana available. Also, even with green's help the mana curve is pretty awful and pretty high. The best we can do is try to minimize this. I came up with the following list:


1cc
Stormscape Apprentice
Thornscape Apprentice

2cc
Llanowar Knight
Hobble

3cc
Fleetfoot Panther
Silver Drake
Tower Drake
Escape Routes
Rushing River
Exclude

4cc
Quirion Trailblazer
Blind Seer
Glimmering Angel
Razorfoot Griffin
Wash Out

5cc
Hunting Drake
Kavu Climber
Sea Snidd
Angel of Mercy
March of Souls

6cc+
Benalish Lancer
Sunscape Battlemage

Treva's Ruins
6x island
6x plains
5x forest

As you can see, we have a major hole where our 2-drops should be. This problem is made worse by 2 gating 3 drops (especially since we want to keep our apprentices active, not bounce them). Lots of removal and bounce are available though, and we have a deck filled with tricks.

The late additions to the above build were Kavu Climber and Quirion Trailblazer, neither of which particularly thrill me here. When I realized how much green mana I was going to need though, it made sense to spread the mana balance. So a Sea Snidd disappeared for Kavu Climber and I reluctantly cut disciple of kangee of trailblazer, my reasoning being that I already had a glut of flyers, and that either creature would often be a chumb blocker. The additions also help me see more cards to fix mana problems and let me play for midgame card advantage, which along with flying has to win the game for us. The CIP effects work nicely with the gaters and escape routes, and hopefully we can take over some games with blind seer. I expect this deck to see 4-5 more cards than an opposing deck, and the real question mark is survivng the opening.

If you can T8 with this card pool, you truly are the king of kings.