Whispers of the Muse: Prophylaxis’s “Phyrexian Poison”
Today’s Whispers of the Muse comes our way courtesy of longtime reader Prophylaxis, who’s looking to go competitive with an infect strategy.
I kept the core theme, but it has a lot of different card choices. This deck originated from the precon “Phyrexian Poison”.
Current decklist: http://tappedout.net/mtg-decks/bg-infect-55/
Comments:
Yup, it’s an infect deck. Never tested against FNM crowd, though I’m planning to (I don’t go to tournaments all too often, as I’m usually late for them). All of my card choices and the reason I picked them are on the link. I know I need:
Verdant Catacombs – Expensive.. 12 a pop makes me vomit.
Inkmoth Nexus – Expensive and hard to find. I would put only 2 or 3 in there because of mana problems.
Consuming Vapors – I’m debating whether or not to put this in or not. It costs good mana, but its effect is tremendous.
There are some other stuff I’m debating on:
Infiltration Lens – Could very well take place of Adventuring Gear.
Canopy Cover – Intriguing, but I have Vines of Vastwood for the second effect.
Any help? I’d like this to be a Standard deck, and I would also like this to be a aggressive deck, with some late-game backup in the form of the Vatmothers, Crusaders, and Praetors.
Ertai's Lament 
More Plague Myr? A little more acceleration to hopefully pop say Hands or Mother earlier.
That’s about all I can really say. Not really into infect too much or toyed with it really.
What about Plague Rats? With an infect deck like this, your opponent will likely have a poison counter sooner than later (and if they don’t, you have bigger problems) at which point you’ve got a 3/3 infect attacker for 3CMC. (yes, a 2/2 defender, but still good imo)
Er, Septic Rats rather. 😛
I feel like Phyrexian Crusader is more better than the rats.
I made sure to read through the comments and suggestions over at tappedout so I wouldn’t be repeating something already said. I think the Infect decks that I’ve seen be most dangerous are ones that include a playset of Phyrexian Crusaders and use Inkmoth Nexus as well. As you already noted, Inkmoth can be hard to find, but I know a lot of people are trading around the Crusader. Between Groundswell, Vines of the Vastwood, Virulent Swipe, and Prey’s Vengeance, Adventuring Gear, and Livewire Last you have over a dozen ways to pump up your creatures. However, the biggest weakness of creatures with Infect is that they are slow to show up on the battlefield. It may be worth your while to keep the Groundswells and a couple Adventuring Gear and then find some stalling tactics, such as additional removal, to give yourself more time to bring your main deck online. Or, as an alternative, you could find a way to mana ramp with Llanowar Elves, Harrow, and Plague Myr. I think you could wreak some havoc with Canopy Cover too and it’s cheaper and faster than Whispersilk Cloak. One creature with Infect and Canopy Cover will win a game pretty quick if you have the removal to deal with any flyers or critters with reach. Good luck!
What really works well with poison counters and infect is the Proliferate mechanic.
Apart from the obvious Contagion Clasps, I’d recommend you try the Plaguemaw Beast. It fits well in your deck, as you’re playing G, plus it can help you get rid of a Vatmother when it’s getting too dangerous for you. Another upside is that you would be able to precisely time the death of the Necropede.
Don’t like proliferate with an aggro infect deck.
It’s too slow and your artifacts sit there doing nothing because you chose to run only 22 land.
I feel more and more that an infect strategy should be based on control. Aggro infect seems like it’s having trouble getting off the ground. When vanilla aggro (boros, kuldotha red) can kill just as fast or faster, there’s a problem with infect.
Personally I’d lean more towards BU or UG using blue for control to buy time to proliferate someone to 10 counters. You can easily land that one counter. Then sit back and control/prolif for the win.
Notice what you said about them, and you CAN work around them, but Verdant Catacombs are a HUGE help.
Also, decide now if you want Putrefax. If you do, up the number to 3 or 4, if you don’t, get rid of it. An infect deck with Putrefax will play WAYYY differently than one without, and not always in a good way.
Same goes for Hands of the Praetors, honestly, I swapped it out of mine for Flesh-Eater Imp, because that card is absolutely insane, whereas that Praetors is really more controllish, you’ll find that he doesn’t impact the board as much as you would like, and he’s really, really, really big removal fodder. Overall, doesn’t do as much as he should, especially at his cost, IMHO, you’re better off with the Imps if you really want a 4-drop.
Well, I should say a second 4 drop, because there is almost no way you can go wrong with Vatmother. Infect isn’t played too much, and she can take advantage of that, being a huge, cheap infector with, really, a minimal drawback, you’ll have to be careful against control decks, and if you play another infect deck, but she is an auto-include.
I don’t want to leave you with a huge post on “you must build your deck THIS way” and I hope this doesn’t sound like that. I’ve been playing infect since the thing was released, heck, I even started out with the intro pack and went from there. But you should definately experiment.
Putting that aside though, here are some other “staples” for the deck you might want to go over.
Skithiryx: EXTREMELY GOOD. An absolute bomb. Prepare for him to not be taking much time in the red zone, as your best bet with him is to play him just to close out games. He has been one of the MVP’s of my infect. However, I do know that he is expensive price wise, and he basically costs six mana, so not everyone likes him. You be the judge. However, it’s either Putrefax or this, not both. The curve for infect shouldn’t neccesarily be “as low as possible” but it should be conservative.
Crusader: Another extremely good card. Hoses decks like Boros, good against caw-blade actually.
Blight Mamba: at least around here, a lot of guys are singing praises to this guy. I don’t buy it. But, I would experiment with him and come to your own conclusion on that.
And, lastly,
Plague Stinger: Ok. I don’t care if you completely disregard all my other advice. That’s fine. But you MUST. absolutely MUST run 4. They are early damage, and they are still great in the late game. This guy will be your best friend.
Hope that helps, and hopefully this didn’t sound too much like “how to build infect” and more like “here are some tips”
Best of Luck! If you suck, don’t worry, infect is a tricky build to get right!
Putrefax: I don’t like him. I would much rather put him as a finisher in a Green Infect control deck which uses him and Mimic Vat.
Hand of the Praetors: I agree with you – the Praetors aren’t pulling their weight. The Vatmothers are more aggressive, but I like those Hands. I’m keeping them until I draw a HoTP and wished it was a Vatmother.
Skithiryx: I’m debating about putting him in or not. He’s good, but he is 12 dollars and possibly on the rise. I’ll maybe snatch two copies.
Crusader: Don’t know what to sub out for these guys.
Blight Mamba: Used to run these, but now I subbed these for Plague Myrs.
Plague Stinger: I run 4.
I don’t have suggestion but only a question that I hope will make you think a bit.
Are you sure green is necessary? If i will ever make an infect deck I’ll probably go whith mono black artifact, adding more removal to let me gain some time, maybe something to proliferate. This is probably the control way however.
I am absolutely sure green is necessary because of it’s pump. Double Groundswell, Plague Stinger, 4 lands is a very strong land.
If anyone is interested I’m selling my sealed / Mint Theme Deck collection pretty much for a loss at what I paid for them all. If you’re wanting to start a collection this is pretty much everything from as late as Mirrodin all the way to Eventide. The only two decks that I’m missing are Darksteel Transference and Saviors of Kamigawa Critical Mass.
Here is a complete list:
****************Eventide****************
Battle Blitz
Sidestep
Superabundance
Life Drain
Death March
****************Shadowmoor****************
Aura Mastery
Overkill
Mortal Coil
Army of Entropy
Turnabout
****************Morningtide****************
Going Rouge
Shamanism
Warriors Code
Battalion
****************Lorywn****************
Elvish Predation
Boggart Feast
Kithkin Militia
Elementals’ Path
Merrow Riverways
****************Future Sight****************
Fate Blaster
Future Shock
Rebels Unite
Suspended Sentence
****************Planar Chaos****************
Endless March
Ixidor’s Legacy
Rituals of Rebirth
Unraveling Mind
****************Time Spiral****************
Fun With Fungus
Hope’s Crusaders
Reality Fracture
Sliver Evolution
****************Coldsnap****************
Aurochs Stampede
Kjeldoran Cunning
Beyond The Grave
Snowscape
****************Dissension****************
Azorius Ascendant
Simic Mutology
Rakdos Bloodsport
****************Guildpact****************
Code of the Orzhov
Izzet Gizmometry
Gruul Wilding
**********Ravnica: City of the Guilds************
Golgari Deathcreep
Charge of the Boros
Dimir Intrigues
Selesnya United
****************Saviors of Kamigawa****************
Critical Mass
Spirit Flames
Soratami’s Wisdom
Truth Seekers
****************Betrayers of Kamigawa****************
Dark Devotion
Ninjutsu
Rats’ Nest
Spiritcraft
****************Champions of Kamigawa****************
Kami Reborn
Spiritbane
Snake’s Path
Way of the Warrior
****************Fifth Dawn Theme Decks*************
Nuts and Bolts
Special Forces
Stampede
Sunburst
***************Darksteel Theme Decks****************
Master Blaster
Swarm & Slam
Mind Swarm
*************Mirrodin Theme Decks********************
Bait and Bludgeon
Little Bashers
Wicked Big
Sacrifcial Bam
All these decks are brand new in mint condition and are sealed both on the inside and outside.
Why sell these after collecting so many? Why sell these at a loss? Well, I’m closing on a house and I’m about to need all the money I can get for it.
I’m willing to sell this whole collection for $577.93 + $15 shipping. I know I’m going to lose money on this deal as all these decks combined together feels like a ton when I carry them around. Most of these theme decks are getting hard to find and some of them are quite expensive. You won’t be seeing any deals like mine around trust me. It took me forever to track down all these decks.
I’ve come to the price of $577.93 based a little under the going value of most of these decks if you can even find them, minus the shipping however. You’d cry if you had seen what I spent total on all these after shipping.
I’d be selling via Paypal with the buyer getting an Invoice detailing the transcation for both my protection and yours. If you have more patience than I have could buy these and sell them in sets and make a profit. The older ones will probably gain value as they get harder and harder to find.
Send me an e-mail at jakecourtney@gmail.com if you’re at all interested. Wish I could of found a deal like this at the time.
Price adjusted to $540 with Free Shipping.