Let’s just say for an euphemism that I don’t play Songhai a lot.
Yesterday I was thinking how strong Scarzig+Scarzig was, and it got me to this hypothetical core:
People who know how to play, how does this look? Anything I obviously missed?
Edit: There should definitely be Tusk Boars in there.
Spiral Counter is a very awkward removal, even in Gauntlet.
You need some better removal, Phoenix Fire or Thunderbomb.
Okay!
Do you think I need to make room for Spiral Technique or another one-click finisher as plan B?
I somewhat question the deck concept as a whole: The different parts look like they’d work together somewhat awkwardly. The hard part of any Scarzig list is getting him to transform in the first place, and games in which you do get him to flip (especially early on) are already halfway won. Hence, Second Self on Feather Knight strikes me a somewhat of a win-more strategy - even more so because casting it will often require him to live through opponent’s turn.
What does intrigue me here is the use of Second Self together with the Opening Gambit value creatures. I think one could make a pretty decent budget midrange list based around that combo - even without buffs, 2 mana “draw another copy of Ki Beholder or Dancing Blades” seems like a durdly but OK card advantage engine.
Specific card notes: I echo what Boronian said about Spiral Counter being unwieldy. Inner Focus is almost strictly better for you than Assassination Protocol, since all of your minions have base attack 3 or less (and if they’re at 4 or more, then that means that they’ve survived a turn with buffs and you’re already in good shape). On the other hand, I like Maw over Tusk Boar here - both Feather Knight and Jaguar want minions that can stick to the board and accumulate their buffs. For a dedicated finisher, Zendo is probably a better option than Spiral Technique since he can use all your buffs himself.
Thanks for your thoughts! Convincing arguments about the deck.
Second Self for Opening Gambits? I hadn’t thought of that, it was meant more as a value (buff) backup, and yes maybe a flashy win-more guilty pleasure.
2 mana is expensive though, I need to try that.
Maybe the Boars will work better in a Mirkblood deck.
But isn’t including the Tusk Boar so that you can Second Self a Tusk Boar that’s been Killing Edged? It’s pretty good for 7 mana since you’d have 1 card open at that point in case your first one survives.
Second Self on anything that have an Edge is good for me, and yes with Rush it’s even better. 
Mainly the Tusk Boar idea was that it gets a significant buff with either Onyx Jaguar or Feather Knight on board: a cheap mini Makantor in these cases.
And a simple card draw in the early game (I saw that made a difference).
Ah, bro, you remind me of my own brew! Not optimised, not even good, but whatever:
It appears, it’s my minor tweak of the original @zabiool’s deck:
[swarm hai]MToxMDEsMjoxMjcsMzoxMzgsMzoxNDAsMjoxNTUsMjoxMDk3NSwzOjExMDA2LDM6MTEwNDYsMzoxMTEwOSwzOjExMTU3LDM6MTkwNDcsMzoyMDA4NiwzOjIwMTI5LDM6MjAxNjgsMzoyMDMyMw==
Maybe you’d want to incorporate some of my thoughts into your deck.
Here are the thoughts themselves:
Sooooo, given point 1, we want lots of minions. Not many spells. Here we are, good news, lots of minions.
Given point 2, we have Sinister Silhouette (and yeah, it sticks!) and Shiro, and all the other stuff, which is relatively low curve, so you may vomit loads of it midgame. And also Black Locust, which is a black hole for both budget and mana efficiency, but is very funny when it works. Actually, my goal was to compose the deck utilising Black Locust, but you always can get rid of him, to include something less funny, but more useful (like e.g. eternity painter).
Given point 3, we have Shiro (again), Mirkblood, Scarzig and Onyx. GLHF.
Given points 1,2 and 3, we have no removal whatsoever. Fck it, we are doing great (not really)
Enjoy. Swarm Hai is here. For other funny choices, one may add Zyx, Mirrorrim, for useful choices one may add some removal.
P.S. Btw, @miguelosz do you want to play Swarm somewhere outside Abyss? Here’s your chance 
Off the top of my head, my recommendation is battle pando instead of beholder, primus fist instead of maw, inner focus instead of protocol and tusk boar instead of counter. Be nice if we could fit some phoenix fires in, but meh.
I would also like more draw since bake and bandit are conditional, blaze hound would go great with scarzig/jaguar buff, spelljammer might be pushing it, lantern fox but I feel the meta isn’t very accepting of that card? Could be great with buffs and might make your opponent more avoidant of you to avoid proccing the card thus giving you more time for your battle plan. Overall, my suggestions are with the idea of making the deck aggro/boar meld -ish. Someone else suggested zendo and spiral which is good for lategame ending, my aggro idea flows more smoothly with the deck but has a similar problem with the original version which is ending the game in addition to the fact that
it is nowhere as a good as your average aggro deck. Scarzig is a hard sell for me, never liked the card but maybe you’ll have some luck.
Second self is also bad, super clunky in most situations, I think so many things would be better outside of joseki I guess.
Looking at alplod’s version, its very good except I disagree with no battle pando but that’s me, locust also seems to be pushing it since you already have one minion, scarzig that needs to be protected. Don’t really like shiro either since you want survivability, primus fist would replace it for me. It’s great at getting rid of stuff and putting a body on the board. Also works good at all stages of the game unlike shiro unless you count it being a 1/4 body.
I think everyone has good ideas and you should try them all! It’s a very flexible archetype since your core is basically scarzig, wreath, move spells and bake. Anything else goes.
I completely agree. But where should I put my Locust then? Please, let it stay at least here, it’s so lonely, just sitting in my collection…
Yeah, I count it survivable cause it’s a 1/4 body, so it can live up to the point of getting some buffs himself. And can give them to someone else. But Primus looks very interesting given our lack of removal. I may try it, thx for the idea.
Plenty of solid advice, good stuff about being minion-focused, and I really think it should go the “half aggro” route. This is where I’m at.
Still a very weird deck to play. 
Shiro is an even better buff target than buff giver. People just don’t see it as having an offensive value by itself and it catches people off guard. I’ve got extensive experience with Shiro in Abyss and everytime I pull a big DFC, Chakram, Reflection etc. play on the little dude it feels so good 
Although the synergies are a bit better with Lili’s bbs so there’s that.
This?
Source:
Oops. Maybe it wasn’t my brew after all. Just a tweak of his.
Edit. True:
Sorry for not giving credits to the original author.
Thanks! I will upload it to duelspot because Zabi is lazy
This topic was automatically closed 14 days after the last reply. New replies are no longer allowed.
