Season Finale: Zack Snyder's Avengers: Endgame 2045 Reloaded

This blog was birthed from a homework assignment for my Social Media Marketing Class. After the first post, I instantly fell in love with the medium, and reached an audience I never thought I could. What started as a task has become a hobby, and I intend to pursue this, hella. 

NONETHELESS, ya boy is only human, and needs time to create the content this platform deserves. So yeah, season finale time. I think it's time FlavorTown evolved a bit. 

Meanwhile, the deck I will showcase today is different from the rest. This is a deck that exists as a love letter to the game of Magic. Over the past year, I have slowly fallen in love with strategies based off of Storming. For those who aren't familiar with it, Storm is a strategy centered around casting a large amount of spells in succession, popping off a chain of effects simultaneously. Playing the Kykar, Wind's Fury artifact Storm build, (you can see a deck tech on this post) gave me a craving for an explosive and dynamic artifact deck. Channeling the colors of Esper, I have crafted a build I passionately titled “The FrankenBrew.” 

The Brain:

Time Sieve. What a card, I mean just look at that thing. This card caught my attention about two years ago, and sent me on a deck-building bender where I built a ridiculous combo deck. Ever since then, I looked at artifacts differently within the play space. Hell, my first post on this blog was an Azorius artifact build. Recently, I haven't been too happy with the state of Kykar. Even though it can do the fifteen minute, "and then I'm going to cast..." turns, I can't close a game. I sit there, throw a ton of artifacts at people, and just wait to win via attrition. IF I'm lucky my opponents don't kill me by then. So, I took a look at my personal collection and altered cards. How about I actually make that idea from two years ago actually work? 

So, what's the strategy to actually close out a game? Get to a combo and/or lock your opponents out of the game using extra turns. If all else fails, hit 'em with artifact shenanigans. 

Here's are all the combos : 

Pili-Pala + Grand Architect = infinite mana

Time Sieve + Master Trinketeer + (infinite mana) = infinite turns

Reveillark + Karmic Guide + Ashnod's Altar = infinite colorless mana

Reveillark + Karmic Guide + Altar of Dementia = infinite milling of any player’s library 

Lazav, the Multifarious + Mirror-Mad Phantasm = throw your entire library into the graveyard :)

The Head: 

Like our favorite green monster, I gotta shove some screws in and get things jumping like House of Pain. The Commanders are problem solvers for this deck, and helpful aids to make sure I pull off the combo. My partner Commanders are Silas Renn, Seeker Adept and Rebbec, Architect of Ascension. 

Silas was one of the partners from the old build, and has a neat role in the deck. Not only is he an artifact himself, he also allows me to cast artifacts from my graveyard if I am able to deal combat damage to an enemy. He can even be sacrificed to Time Sieve and other artifacts in a pinch, directly from the command zone. 

Rebbec, Architect of Ascension is the new Commander in the duo. Allowing me to splash white, Rebbec also gives my artifacts protection from all kinds of spells. Removal spells typically cost around 2-5 mana in Commander. Therefore, Rebbec can single handedly become a budget Darksteel Forge with the right board state. With all the artifacts we have, Rebbec will definitely get a chance to do so. 

The Body:

To me, Magic's mechanics feel like code I can dissect and reform. I have never played a long-running game where I enjoy customization depth this much. Complex interactions within the game’s mechanics can give players an avenue to run wild and break the game. Taking a lesson from Storm, I want the deck to constantly sling spells and gain momentum. Taking a lesson from the Flavor Gods, I am using artifacts to go buck wild. Along with classic mana and value artifacts, I got support to make sure I have enough fodder for Time Sieve. The best way to make a crap-ton of anything is to make tokens. Hidden Stockpile is a card I had for years that never really had a home. Time Sieve itself is a card based on great sacrifice for equal value, therefore, I want cards that may not do the same thing, but have the exact same concept.

Even if I don't get the infinite mana combos, I can hypothetically create multiple turns for myself using the Magistrate's Scepter or Karn's Temporal Sundering in tandem with Time Sieve to slow down the clock. So not all hope is lost. 

There is also a goofy combo built into the deck with Lazav + Mirror-Mad Phantasm. This combo is a kill or be killed move, similar in result to the Altar of Dementia combo. Sorry to the people who are new to Magic, it might get weird. First, I use Lazav's ability and target Mirror-Mad in my graveyard. I could then use the activated ability on "Mirror-Mad" (Aka Lazav in a ghost dress). Since there is no Mirror-Mad in my library because the real one is in my graveyard, the milling doesn’t stop. I end up throwing what's left of my library into the graveyard as a result. When I need to throw the right hook, I can mill myself using this combo and retrieve the artifact I need. Whether it be during an attack with Silas or a main phase untapped Emry, Lurker of the Loch, I can be dramatic and search my library the hard way. 

Writing this blog over the past few months has taught me so much about not only my favorite game, but about myself. I'm starting to regain the discipline I once had as a teenager, and that's something I will continue to sharpen as I move forward in life. I realized that I wanted to make MTG content when I did ratchet MacBook MTGArena streams on Twitch. With my MacBook running hot, I tried to do Arena streaming for about 2 weeks. Similar to this deck build, it took me a year to truly learn the lesson ahead of me. I look back on that, and am now grateful for the awkward chaotic streams. I think I'm ready to enter the arena again, but I am not going to do it the same way I did last time. Some things are simply better with age. 

Find the build here

-Harland 

- Editor: Gem Díaz Velázquez

IG: _Harleys_Angels_

Twitter: @TyronicTheTrill