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Main » Articles » Decks Inspired by Magic Origins

Decks Inspired by Magic Origins

Abe Sargent
Posted on July 6, 2015
 Reddit

Hello, folks! It’s that time again. A new set has been spoiled, and now it’s time for us to delve into the corners of Magic Origins and unearth some strong cards for our decks. Sometimes, we’ll find a card or three that make perfect additions to existing decks. When that happens, it’s wonderful!

But often, we’ll see one of those cards and just be inspired to build a new deck from scratch. After reviewing the spoilers and checking some cards out, I have been pushed to build a quartet of new decks for you folks.

This is a great time to push yourself to add a deck or three to your decks. Here we go!

Hellhounds of Victory ? Casual Standard | Abe Sargent

This is a Standard-legal deck, built so that you can use fun themes in Origins without worrying about acquiring some older cards. It has a sacrifice theme focused on sacrificing it's creatures for various effects. The Blazing Hellhound was the inspiration behind this deck since it's one of my pet cards from Magic Origins, with its 4/3 body and useful sacrifice effect. I added in some additional sacrifice effects: Vulturous Aven, Sidisi, Undead Vizier, and Merciless Executioner. Since we are expecting to sacrifice things anyway, we may as well run those, too.

We have a few cards that make useful fuel for your Hellhounds and company. Black Cat gives you a random discard, Bloodsoaked Champion can be brought back from the dead for another use, and we have tokens from Hordeling Outburst and Mardu's Favorite Strike Leader 2015.

Because the Hellhounds sacrifice for damage, I felt that Mardu Heart-Piercer would give us some useful damage-dealing that could add in with sacrifices to kill off a creature—plus, more bodies to sacrifice! Every single nonland in the deck either is a creature or makes multiple creatures—that way, the sacrifices can keep coming.

You could easily expand this deck into janky fun cards (Pyre Zombie), fun older cards (Lyzolda, the Blood Witch), or even Goblin Bombardment. From Siege-Gang Commander to Bloodghast, there are a lot of fun angles to explore!

Enchanting Spirits ? Casual | Abe Sargent

This deck was inspired by Blessed Spirits and Starfield of Nyx. This is not your normal enchantments-are-awesome deck because this thang wants to win the game. So I put an emphasis on cards that do things with enchantments rather than just play around with them. You can make token creatures with Ajani's Chosen or Sigil of the Empty Throne and then pump Blessed Spirits and with Celestial Ancient. I've found way too many yay-enchantment decks in the past that just frump around and do either nothing or next to it. Not this one!

Most of these pro-enchantment cards trigger when you play an enchantment, and that makes Gossamer Chains an awesome callback to a call from so far back in Magic's history that you probably forgot about it—or never knew about it. Check it out! Pop it back your hand, and keep on playing it for increasingly more and more triggers from anything like Mesa Enchantress to Sigil of the Empty Throne. Our deck loves you.

Joining Gossamer Chains, we have Sphere of Safety, and these two guys can help to keep you comfortably alive while you swing away your tokens, +1/+1 tokens creatures, or more. And don't forget that, when you churn out tokens with Heliod, God of the Sun, those things are enchantments, too! I even included Fountain Watch and Vigilant Martyr to keep your stuff alive.

Bellowing for Wins ? Casual | Abe Sargent

I like-a the Bellower-a. When it arrives, you get a free 3-drop (or less) from your library as a nice little buddy. Since the creature works when it arrives on the battlefield, and since you can easily abuse that fact with a Scud-missile number of cards in Magic-dom, there are a lot of ways to bend. I wanted to push toward a flexible package of creatures that give the deck some useful abilities and some beating, too.

Troll Ascetic has applied to be the Bellower's Best Buddy, and I think that's a link that sticks in my mind as lovingly beat-tastic. From there, it's simple to toss in something like Eternal Witness, Reclamation Sage, and such to give you some fun and flexible forces to fit whatever the board state is. From mana-making to land-fetching, we have a lot of useful cards here!

And don’t forget a handful of ways of bringing that Bellower out, like Green Sun's Zenith. Play the Zenith, and fetch up the Bellower. Don’t forget that if we wind up with too many creatures in the graveyard, you can grab the Loaming Shaman to shuffle the key creatures back so we can keep fetching them. Note that you can't Bellower into Nylea, God of the Hunt (she's legendary), but you can still grab her with your other stuff, so that works.

Since the deck has so many creatures, I felt that Somerwald Sage and Shaman of Forgotten Ways would be useful ways to ramp up the deck or to give you a creature to fetch out with the Bellower as needed. They will really help you to drop the fun from your hand.

Welcome Back, Elves ? Casual | Abe Sargent

It has been a while since we’ve seen Elves really supported by a set. Even though we only have a handful of tribal entries from Origins into the Elvish goodness, Elves have always rivaled Goblins and Zombies for the most beloved tribe, and thus, one it’s of the most commonly played tribes in Casual Land. It’s been a while since I’ve regularly run into sixty-card Elf decks.

Welcome back, Elves!

This deck uses a variety of well-known Elf entries from years past, along with Elves from Magic Origins that will blow out the our pointy-eared concept. We’ve had Elf blocks (Lorwyn, Onslaught) Elf sets (Magic Origins), one-ofs, and a lot more. You can find a ton of great Elves for your casual decks.

I choose to use popular Wellwishers and Timberwatch Elves along with lords of various sorts that pump the whole team. From Imperious Perfect to Dwynen, we have a lot of leaders here. And you can always dip into more, like Elvish Champion.

Since every nonland in the deck is an Elf or a tribal Elf card, you can easily grow into a dominant position. In fact, these Elves work so well together that the deck could feel more like a Sliver deck than an Elf deck (in a good way, of course.)

Check out Gempalm Strider as a nice way to play a card out of nowhere to pump the team (and draw a card at the same time). People probably aren’t expecting that sort of trick from your Elf deck. You’ll show them! Elvish Promenade should be good for a metric ton of Elves.

And while I choose to steer clear of fun cards like Priest of Titania, you could easily delve into mana-hungry space with aplomb. From Skyshroud Poacher to Ambush Commander, and from Nissa Revane to Lys Alana Huntmaster, there are a ton of different ways you can explore.

Welcome back, Elves!

 

I hope you had fun looking at these four decks of happiness and joy from deep back in Magic Origins! Are you ready to rock the block? Are there any cards out there that you are hankering to unleash on your opponents?

P.S. Next week, we’ll be looking at the Top 10 cards from Magic Origins for casual aficionados.

Order Magic Origins booster boxes and singles from CoolStuffInc.com today!

TAGS articles, strategy, casual, deck lists, decks, kitchen table, abe sargent, #mtgorigins, magic origins

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