Arcum Dagsson (A work in process)

[The Dark Guardian]

Hello all,

I am hopnig to complete my last EDH deck I hope for a while. I have a deck that revolves ramping into giant creatures, a deck that revolves around graveyards. My last deck will have to do with revolving around artifacts, so who better than to wield Arcum Dagsson? Here are the cards I have so far:

[cards]Grand Architect
Phantasmal Image
Glen Elendra Archmage
Azure Mage
Trinket Mage
Phyrexian Metamorph
Etherium Sculptor


Expedition Map
Sensei's Top
VEdalken Shackles
Gauntlet of Power
Caged Sun
Basalt Monolith
Doubling Cube
Gilded Lotus
Coalition Relic
Sol Ring
Oblivion Stone
All is Dust

Cyclonic Rift
Evacuation
Stroke of Genius
Thirst for Knowledge
Fact or Fiction
Deep Analysis
Walk the Aeons
Spelltwine
Bribery
Brainstorm
Time Warp
Walk the Aeons
Negate
Foil
Force of WIll
Dismiss
Cryptic Command
Rewind
Hinder
Spell Crumple
nCounterspell
Dissapate[/cards]



I will be looking at other lists as well, but I was hoping here would be as good of a place as any to start. Hoping to have this deck done (at least, a first draft) by the end of Gen Con. Any recommendations are appreciated! Thank you!

[The Dark Guardian]

After looking at other lists, a few cards I am adding because of similarities:

[deck]

1x Epochrasite
1x Faerie Mechanist
1x Karn, Silver Golem
1x Tezzeret, the Seeker
1x Master Transmuter
1x Nevinyrral's Disk
1x Reshape
1x Guardian Idol
1x Mycosnth Latice
1x Mox Opal
1x Myr Retriever
1x Junk Diver
1x Blightsteel Colossus
1x Duplicant
1x SIlver Myr
1x Palladum Myr
1x Alloy Myr
1x Spine of Ish Sah
1x Swiftfoot Boots
1x Darksteel Forge
1x Copy Artifact[/deck]

[Azrael]

Dunno if you caught Redthirst's version on this site, but it seems to be a pretty ridiculously well-researched version.

http://community.ist.utl.pt/viewtopic.php?f=48&t=1017

There's certainly room to vary things up potentially by running more blue "good stuff", but in terms of using the list to cull for effective card choices, it's terrific.

[The Dark Guardian]

How the heck did I miss this....

Thank you so much!

[redthirst]

Thanks Azrael.

The deck really is quite ridiculous - even the hard-core competitive players don't really want to play against it and I can commonly role up to a 5 player table with it and still wreck face even when everyone knows what I'm doing (though I try not to do this too often since no one has fun but me).

That version I have listed is for 1-on-1 play, but if you'd like to make it better for circle games I'd include cards like [card]Mind's Eye[/card] (which is bonkers) and Staff of Nin (which is pretty good, but won't immediately make you a target).

+EDIT+ Oh, and Kill Switch, which I'm considering adding to my 1-on-1 version. It + Mycosynth Lattice = I do all my stuff, EOT I tap every permanent, everyone do whatever with their tapped permanents, my turn I untap it and everything else and do it again.


It's basically a slightly weaker but faster version of the Nev's Disk + Lattice + Darksteel Forge combo.

[redthirst]

Strictly multiplayer Arcum for your consideration:

[deck]Commander: 1
1 Arcum Dagsson

Creatures: 23
1 Myr Moonvessel
1 Silver Myr
1 Plague Myr
1 Manakin
1 Millikin
1 Copper Gnomes
1 Phyrexian Revoker
1 Myr Sire
1 Etherium Sculptor
1 Myr Retriever
1 Spellskite
1 Epochrasite
1 Walking Atlas
1 Cathodion
1 Junk Diver
1 Scarecrone
1 Master Transmuter
1 Phyrexian Metamorph
1 Su-Chi
1 Arcbound Reclaimer
1 Solemn Simulacrum
1 Kuldotha Forgemaster
1 Karn, Silver Golem

Artifacts: 31
1 Everflowing Chalice
1 Mana Crypt
1 Mox Opal
1 Expedition Map
1 Mana Vault
1 Sensei's Divining Top
1 Sol Ring
1 Springleaf Drum
1 Voltaic Key
1 Grim Monolith
1 Kill Switch
1 Lightning Greaves
1 Scroll Rack
1 Swiftfoot Boots
1 Basalt Monolith
1 Oblivion Stone
1 Rings of Brighthearth
1 Staff of Domination
1 Thousand-Year Elixir
1 Null Brooch
1 Helm of Possession
1 Nevinyrral's Disk
1 Unwinding Clock
1
Mind's Eye
1 Myr Turbine
1 Mindslaver
1 Mycosynth Lattice
1 Staff of Nin
1 Spine of Ish Sah
1 Possessed Portal
1 Darksteel Forge

Spells: 8
1 Power Artifact
1 Artificer's Intuition
1 Reshape
1 Transmute Artifact
1 Fabricate
1 Tezzeret the Seeker
1 Hinder
1 Spell Crumple

Lands: 37
1 Academy Ruins
1 Cavern of Souls
1 Hall of the Bandit Lord
1 Ancient Tomb
1 Seat of the Synod
1 Darksteel Citadel
1 Inkmoth Nexus
1 Blinkmoth Nexus
1 Mishra's Factory
1 Strip Mine
1 Wasteland
1 Dust Bowl
1 Tolaria West
1 Soldevi Excavations
1 Buried Ruin
1 Minamo, School at Water's Edge
1 Scrying Sheets
20 Snow-Covered Island
[/deck]

[Azrael]

It's definitely a threat.

Have you considered hacking out parts of the toolbox to add, say, Time Warp/Temporal Manipulation/Mystical Tutor? Taking two Arcum activations in a row seems good.

Alternately, call me crazy, but Twiddle/Dream's Grip effects? Adding just a tiny sprinkling of removal for stuff like Zur couldn't hurt, either, but wouldn't draw you into "good stuff" territory.

[redthirst]

To take multiple Dagsson activations you first get Thousand Year Elixir, use it to untap Dagsson, then grab Unwinding Clock. As long as you have enough creatures (say, from a Myr Turbine) then you take an Arcum activation during every opponent's turn.

The removal package is Nev's Disk, Oblivion Stone, and Spine and, in certain situations, Null Brooch and Helm probably qualify too (Null Brooch + Unwinding Clock is pretty great - if you also just happen to have Voltaic Key in play your opponent's pretty much can't stop you).

Really, the only thing IME the deck can't easily handle is if multiple players get amazing starts and start gunning for you or if someone drops a Stranglehold or similar before you get a chance to activate Arcum that you have no way to get rid of.

...and that one guy who plays an absolute shit-ton of artifact destruction and direct damage. Fuck that guy.

And just so you don't get the idea
that I'm dismissing the suggestion out of hand, the earliest versions of the deck ran Time Warp effects, but they were cut because they were so redundant when you could simply replace them with cards you can tutor for that have a larger impact.

Something I do miss, though, is [card]Hurkyl's Recall[/card] - tutor up Mycosynth Lattice and nuke one player back to the Stone Age. It's also a hell of a deterrent if you can show or bluff you have it. Everyone may know that they need to team up to kill you, but not many are willing to make the first blow if it means they're basically out of the game as well. In fact, I may try and find room to squeeze that one back in.

[Azrael]

To take multiple Dagsson activations you first get Thousand Year Elixir, use it to untap Dagsson, then grab Unwinding Clock. As long as you have enough creatures (say, from a Myr Turbine) then you take an Arcum activation during every opponent's turn.

The removal package is Nev's Disk, Oblivion Stone, and Spine and, in certain situations, Null Brooch and Helm probably qualify too (Null Brooch + Unwinding Clock is pretty great - if you also just happen to have Voltaic Key in play your opponent's pretty much can't stop you).

Really, the only thing IME the deck can't easily handle is if multiple players get amazing starts and start gunning for you or if someone drops a Stranglehold or similar before you get a chance to activate Arcum that you have no way to
get rid of.

...and that one guy who plays an absolute shit-ton of artifact destruction and direct damage. Fuck that guy.

And just so you don't get the idea that I'm dismissing the suggestion out of hand, the earliest versions of the deck ran Time Warp effects, but they were cut because they were so redundant when you could simply replace them with cards you can tutor for that have a larger impact.

Something I do miss, though, is [card]Hurkyl's Recall[/card] - tutor up Mycosynth Lattice and nuke one player back to the Stone Age. It's also a hell of a deterrent if you can show or bluff you have it. Everyone may know that they need to team up to kill you, but not many are willing to make the first blow if it means they're basically out of the game as well. In fact, I may try and find room to squeeze that one back in.

Elixir is pretty good for that, but it eats the first activation plus a critter to fetch itself. Seems like being able to instantly get a
two-card combo that essentially wins the game might be nice? There's some of those in there, right? Or are all they all three card? Either way, accelerating your win by a turn seems good, and the artifact tutor package seems to be packed pretty full. Surely there's some of those that aren't used very often?

[redthirst]

Lattice + Kill Switch doesn't win the game, but it makes it nearly impossible to lose - this does not work exactly like I thought it did, but it can still lock a few people out of the game combined with an Unwinding Clock. Not the best combo and I'll probably drop it.

Extra turn effects were dropped early because I only saw them about once every 5th game and, when I did see them, they generally didn't do anything that I couldn't do with just as well with Artifacts anyway.

That being said, I could probably afford to drop a tutor or two and try them out again, but it's hard to rank them on their value because I probably see about 12-13 cards total that I don't tinker for in the average game.