There are a lot of things that can lead to brewing a new deck. Sometimes we may be trying to come up with a strategy to combat one particular deck. Sometimes there may be a crazy theme involved. And sometimes it all starts with a single card:
Hour of Need. Pretty neat, right? For three mana, you can transform one of your lowly 1/1 minions into a beefy sphinx. For five mana, you can do it twice! But we're thinking bigger than that.
This dynamic duo makes it possible for Hour of Need to target a big number of creatures without spending tons of mana. It takes at least five Sphinxes to get a one-turn-kill, which would normally clock in at eleven mana. If you have out one each of the human and the goblin, it'll only cost five mana.
It's pretty obvious that the Thaumaturge was designed with Strive cards in mind, but he works great with any targeted instant or sorcery. Remember when Lightning Bolt was Standard legal? Well, with this guy on the field, that's exactly what Lightning Strike will become. One mana, three damage, no problem.
What else might go in this list? Well...
4 Battlefield Thaumaturge
4 Frostburn Weird
4 Goblin Electromancer
4 Omenspeaker
4 Young Pyromancer
The creature package is pretty straightforward. Omenspeaker and Frostburn are great on defense, while providing card filtering and offense, respectively. Young Pyromancer gives us some early chump blockers, as well as providing targets for Hour of Need.
4 Hour of Need
4 Cyclonic Rift
4 Magma Jet
2 Syncopate
1 Harness by Force
Our spells provide us with tempo control. We can't necessarily shut down the opponent like a control deck, but we just want to slow them down long enough for us to assemble our pieces. Rift is great early or late, as the Overload can sometimes lead to a total blowout.
Same with Harness by Force. Just one, because some decks won't have worthwhile targets. But then you play against a Monstrous deck and beat 'em down with their own creatures.
For the burn, I prefer Magma Jet over Lightning Strike. There aren't THAT many situations where the extra point of damage will matter, and the Scry can sometimes save you from drawing useless lands. Speaking of...
4 Shivan Reef
4 Steam Vents
3 Temple of Epiphany
7 Island
7 Mountain
Even though we are only running two colors, it is critical that we have a good mix of mana-producing lands. The Strive spells will always cost one colored mana per target, so you always want to make sure you have the right color. Mana Confluence is a possibility if you are still having problems.
So there you go. Is it the best deck in Standard? No. But it's fun, it's different and it has an awesome name.
Until next time.
-Ash
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