Subject: Sylvan Promise [Exodus Deck] Date: Fri, 12 Jun 1998 09:22:20 -0700 (PDT) From: "Mike Donais." To: FK I forgot the Verdant touch so I am reposting with some more ideas at the end. Including another version of the deck. (Green/White) Sylvan Promise: Card Title: Oath of Druids Card Color: Green Type & Class: Enchantment Casting Cost: 1G Pow/Tgh: Card Text: During each player's upkeep, if that player controls fewer creatures than target opponent, the player may reveal cards from his or her library until he or she reveals a creature card. The player puts that creature into play and all other revealed cards into his or her graveyard. Rarity: Rare Sylvan Library with a consistent shuffler would be great. If you have Oath of Druids and a few gaea's you get this amazing sylvan shuffling effect. All your graveyard gets shuffled in each turn and you get to see new sylvan cards each turn. That would be ok, but not nearly good enough for a deck concept. If you start adding creatures like wall of blossoms you can gain some card drawing for free also. But then your opponent may use the oath, or at least maintain creature parity so you can not use the oath. If you add verdant force then all your tokens will allow your opponent to oath and with all the bounce these days it will not be consistent enough. So I decided to use creatures that will never be in play during your upkeep or your opponents upkeep unless you want them to be. The first few that come to mind are Spike Feeder and Bottle Gnomes. So every turn I get 3-4 life. Not bad with sylvan. I also can keep them around to block and then sac them or just keep them if my opponent has more creatures so I can Oath for another one next turn. I did look to see if any other creatures also fit this description. Ball Lightning looked pretty good, but hard to cast if I do draw it. Viashino Sandstalker looked amazing. Not only do I get some free beatdown I get it back in my hand! And it is easier to cast then ball lightning. Lastly I noticed mogg fanatic. But he was a little too slow and wimpy so I didn't include him. Some other cards I considered were flame elemental and 187 creatures. But they were not good for the deck. Here is the deck I came up with: Sylvan Oath: 3 Shock 3 Incinerate 2 Firestorm 2 Earthquakes =10 burn (anti-hatred) 4 Spike feeder 4 Bottle gnomes 2 Viashino sandstalkers 1 Ball lightning =11 creatures 3 Sylvan Lbrary 4 Oath of Druids =7 enchantments 2 Shattering pulse 2 Creeping mold 3 Gaea's blessing 2 Verdant Touch (Animates a Land) =9 Utility spells 1 Mogg hollows 4 Karplusan forest 2 Fetch lands 2 Undiscovered paradise (Firestorm) 2 Quicksands 6 Forest 6 Mountain =23 lands I forgot the Verdant Touches in the original version I posted. They seem fairly important in the deck though very few decks these days don't rely on creatures. These create a 2/2 creature that can easily be blocked by your life gain creatures. After blocking you can sac your creatures to gain life. You can also start animating lots of lands and firestorm/earthquake/shock them. I don't see this happening too often though. This deck seems to have a lot of synergy and card advantage. Remember the Oath of Druids is cumulative so you can use two of them if you have 2 or more out. Getting 8 life for 0 mana and 0 cards is not bad. Doing it every turn with a sylvan out is great. Earthquakes work well because you never have creatures in play and you have lots of life gain. Plus all the life gain and free blockers forces your opponent to play out more creatures. This means quake and firestorm have more targets. I also think a few other versions could be made. Perhaps a white version with Wrath of God, Disenchant, and perhaps cataclysm (save one enchantment) or geddon. White/Green Sylvan Promise: 4 Wrath of God 2 Firestorm 2 Earthquake =8 Removal 3 Armageddon 3 Disenchant 3 Gaea's Blessing 2 Verdant Touch 1 Cataclysm =12 Control 4 Spike feeders 4 Bottles Gnomes 1 Blinking Spirit =9 Creatures 3 Sylvan Library 4 Oath of Druids =7 Enchantments 3 Marble diamonds 3 Moss Diamonds 8 Various Multilands 2 Quicksands 4 Plains 4 Forests =24 Mana Sources Again lots of synergy. Mass Removal and Mass land kill being strong in today's cursed scroll environment. Thanks for listening. Mike Donais.