This week I'm having a break from the angel series and instead I'm going to show you two decks I've been playing for the past few days since the M11 pre-releases.

For the first deck we join the travels of Ajani Vengeant as he returns from the hot and steamy jungles of Naya his home plane to once again step foot or should that be paw on the plain of Lorwyn. Ajani is still on his quest to find the killer of his brother Jazal and in that quest he calls upon the help of the mighty giants of Lorwyn and the Titan of Sun's for who else could help Ajani in these dark times and bring a new light to his troubled soul. 

As mentioned the new card I will be building around this week is the Sun Titan. He has quite a high mana cost so I decided to run the deck in the tribal format and include some more of the giants from Lorwyn to give the deck a bit of a theme. I picked up three of the promo Sun Titan's as they were quite cheap on the secondary market. Let's have a look at what the card does, it costs  for a 6/6 his abilities are below.

Vigilance
Whenever Sun Titan enters the battlefield or attacks, you may return target permanent card with converted mana cost 3 or less from your graveyard to the battlefield.

His ability gives lots of options a lot of people expect him to be played in weenie decks but by the time you cast him you should have already defeated your opponent. So I looked for something else that I could bring back from the graveyard to help our giant's. I decided in the end on Seal of Fire so every time the Titan attacks you get a free Shock as well, which is quite nice in tribal. You are also able to bring back lands as well as they have a converted mana cost of 0, the best I could think of was Wasteland which could be a very good source of denial if you are playing decks using multiple colours as they tend to use a lot of non basic lands. I also included Oblivion Ring as well as they are usually destroyed in most games I play so a way to bring them back gives us a good advantage.

Moving on to the other giants in the deck we have Stonehewer Giant first with his ability to search out weapons and equip them while on the attack which is very powerful when you include Sword of Fire and Ice and Sword of Light and Shadow, I'm also going to include the new Sword of Body and Mind for protection from green when FTV: Relics is released.

The next giant is Thundercloud Shaman which acts as a board sweeper for non giants, when he enters play he deals a point if damage equal to the number of giants you control to each non giant in play. Even with two giants he can clear the board of weenies. Brion Stoutarm is in the deck as he has a really decent mana cost of  for a 4/4 with Lifelink he also has the ability to throw his fellow giants at the opponents face. Speaking of flying giants I also included Cloudgoat Ranger and her Kithkin entourage. Wandering Graybeard is a card I wanted to try out as he has the potential to give back life after we have been assaulted by weenie decks in the first half of the game. Also along for the ride is a single copy of Desolation Giant I'm not 100% convinced he's the right card for the deck but he did tell me he would pull his own weight and for a giant that's a lot to live up to. Lastly in the creature section is the giant who isn't really a giant unless you look at him in the wrong light in that case he could be anything including your worst nightmare, although I doubt he would want to be a rabbit beast. The card I'm speaking of is Taurean Mauler the shapeshifter with a big attitude.    

The other cards to note in the deck are Volcanic Fallout for weenie removal and Boros Garrison to help speed out the giants 

Here's the finished deck list   

Fun in the sun

by Flippers_Giraffe

Creatures 3 Brion Stoutarm 2 Cloudgoat Ranger 1 Desolation Giant 2 Stonehewer Giant 3 Sun Titan 4 Taurean Mauler 3 Thundercloud Shaman 2 Wandering Graybeard 20 cards Other Spells 2 Ajani Vengeant 3 Oblivion Ring 3 Seal of Fire 1 Sword of Fire and Ice 1 Sword of Light and Shadow 2 Volcanic Fallout 12 cards

Lands 2 Ancient Amphitheater 3 Boros Garrison 1 Hammerheim 1 Karakas 4 Mountain 5 Plains 4 Plateau 4 Sacred Foundry 1 Urza's Factory 3 Wasteland 28 cards

The deck did very well and performed as expected, in quite a few games when the Sun Titan came out he was throwing Seal of Fire's all over the place crushing the smaller tribes under his feet. In one game the giants went up against a up against an epic wurm army but Ajani managed to pull the tide by keeping them tapped and finally pull off his ultimate destroying all their lands leaving the giants to run rampant. 

I was even bold enough to enter the deck into the Tribal Apocalypse event on Saturday and managed to go 2-1 losing to the eventual winner Ranth in my first match. The giants were out classed as they faced a super fast elemental tribe.

The Desolation Giant did indeed prove his weight in gold in one match annihilating a horde of dryads.

Back from the Crypt

For the next deck I knew I wanted to be a bit more evil this time round I decided to base the deck in Legacy.

Now there were two cards I wanted to try with Sun Titan in this deck the first being Pernicious Deed which I thought would be an excellent card to keep the table clean every turn while I bring it back with the Sun Titan each attack phase, the second card is Crypt Rats which will also have a similar effect.

Now we need to be careful of what other creatures we include with Crypt Rats as we don't really want to be killing all our own creatures each turn. I decided on a few protection from black creatures to help things along Great Sable Stag and Chameleon Colossus. As the Titan would be an auto target I also added Eternal Witness to bring him back if the situation arose. This also acts as a double edged sword as the Crypt Rats will kill the Eternal Witness which in turn can be brought back by the Titan and they can return any card from your graveyard to your hand. It's a nice little loop which I really wanted to try out.

On the removal front we also have some cards the titan can return in the form of Executioner's Capsule and Oblivion Ring. This was rounded out by Maelstrom Pulse which is an excellent source of removal and is falling in price everyday it gets closer to rotation in October. The odd ball card in the deck is Redeem the Lost which is used to protect our Titan. I wanted to keep the Titan protected but at instant speed to catch people out and waste their removal.

Here's the deck in its full glory

Back from the Crypt

by Flippers_Giraffe

Creatures 4 Bloodghast 2 Chameleon Colossus 4 Crypt Rats 3 Eternal Witness 4 Great Sable Stag 3 Sun Titan 20 cards Other Spells 2 Executioner's Capsule 4 Khalni Heart Expedition 3 Maelstrom Pulse 3 Oblivion Ring 2 Pernicious Deed 3 Redeem the Lost 17 cards

Lands 4 Bayou 4 Forest 3 Plains 4 Savannah 2 Scrubland 2 Swamp 4 Verdant Catacombs 23 cards

Well the deck worked really well it crushed all of the decks I played in the casual room without any doubts, so I decided to give it a run in the tournament practice room for a few hours and it done really well, I was only playing single matches as I haven't the time this week to make a decent sideboard up. The best match up is against counter top decks they just can't handle the creature base of Great Sable Stag, Bloodghast and Sun Titan, you can't counter top that guy.

I must agree with Lord Erman and say that Sun Titan is indeed also my favourite card from M11 as well. Just writing this article has given me more ideas to test out.

Over all Sun Titan is a great card to build round there are so many more options that I want to try like Engineered Explosives, Lotus Bloom, Mangara of Corondor. The list goes on but sadly time has run out for me in this article due to me being too busy at work at the moment to bring you a third deck this week.

Next week I'll be showing you the results of the Coalition League and preparing you all for the next season which is going to be completely different to the first so stay tuned. For all those angel lovers out there I've not forgotten part three I'll be looking at deck lists to bring to you over the next week or so.

Until next time may your sun burn the brightest.

Links

  My PureMTGO Archive / The Rare Drafter July / The Coalition League