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Total Votes : 3
syndrome
Posted: Thu Mar 02, 2006 11:06 pm
Joined: 20 Jul 2005 Posts: 423 Location: A cold place.
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An in-depth look at the Kamigawa cycle snakes and their support cards. Contains decklist intended for casual play.
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The Ultimate Swarm

I’ve always had a soft spot for swarming decks. So, naturally, when I first picked up the Snake’s Path pre-constructed deck I became hooked. The first card to catch my eye was Orochi Hatchery. I had always been a fan of enchantments that allowed you to make creatures repeatedly, such as centaur glade, so this card appealed to me. After playing through a couple games with the deck, I got comfortable with the other dynamics (Sosuke and Sachi for example) and decided that I had to have my own version of the deck. I reluctantly handed the deck back to the buddy I had borrowed it from, and logged onto Cobra Cards to do some deck-building.

I discovered other powerful snake cards, like Seshiro, and began tweaking with the decklist. The following is the fruit of my obsession:

____________________
The Perks:

Green is good at getting lands out and these snakes are not without their ways to abuse your mana pool. Sachi, Daughter of Seshiro has one of the best mana-abuse abilities I’ve ever used. Every one of your shamans becomes two additional mana that you can spend the very moment Sachi enters play.

Which brings me to my next point – snakes gain power from each other. The decklist I’ll be posting at the end uses the creature types of snake, warrior, and shaman to spread abilities as well as additional power and strength among your vast amount of minions.

Swarming. The purpose of this deck is to get large amounts of snakes on the field so that you can pump them up and decimate your opponents life total through combat damage. Although I’ve had many games where just the abilities were enough, the ability to call forth many upon many creatures to your disposal often grants you victory.


The Cons:

Your legends are vital to this deck. Of course, you should have a kashi-tribe elite or two to protect them from harm… but that only goes so far. Eventually, however sad it may be, your opponent may break through the ‘lites.

Another problem, and the only other one I can think of at the moment, is if you don’t draw a way to start your army. It’s not always a big deal, but for the majority of games you’re going to want to have a small legion.

____________________
The Snakes:

Here I will discuss all the Kamigawa snakes, and in the case of the latter ones, explain why they weren’t chosen to be in the deck.


Creatures included in my decklist:

Seshiro the Anointed – It should only take you a few seconds to realize why this beast belongs in the deck. Very first line of text: Other Snakes you control get +2/+2. All the 1/1 creatures you’ll be creating are now 3/3s. Then there’s the nifty secondary effect which lets you draw multitudes of cards. Love it.

Sachi, Daughter of Seshiro – She is another snake that gives all your creatures a bonus. Having her on the field not only increases all of your snake’s toughness’, she gives your shamans the nifty little ability to add mana (I discussed it earlier.)

Sosuke, Son of Seshiro – Sachi’s counterpart; Sosuke adds 1 to all of your snake’s strength. His secondary ability, if you can call it that, is simply amazing. Whenever a warrior of yours does combat damage to a creature, that creature is destroyed at the end of combat. Seriously, how can anyone not want to play this deck?!

Sakiko, Mother of Summer – Need more mana for your Orochi Hatchery? Get some of your creatures to hit and you’ll have some extra mana for the post-combat main phase. It’s kind of nice… isn’t it? If Seshiro is out, you’ll not only get the extra mana, but you’ll also get to draw a card for each of your snakes that hit. She also carries the creature type shaman, meaning she can be used as a mana source.

Orochi Eggwatcher/Shidako, Broodmistress – Eggwatcher: Useful if you didn’t manage to draw a Sosuke’s Summons, or if you can’t get it to bounce to your hand again. But of course, the real beast here is Shidako: if a creature of yours hits, simply tap a couple lands and sacrifice the same amount of snakes. Your opponent should succumb shortly. Both sides carry the creature type shaman.

Kashi-Tribe Elite – If you haven’t noticed, The Ultimate Swarm bases a lot of it’s strength on legendary creatures. Luckily, there is a snake card which can provide most adequate protection for them. Although his secondary is somewhat helpful, he is a warrior; once you get Sosuke out, every time he hits an opponent’s creature, it takes a trip to the graveyard (making his secondary useless in most situations.)

Kashi-Tribe Reaver – Like our friend above, Reaver carries both the ability to tap creatures and the warrior creature type. What makes her shine is her ability to regenerate. I consider this the “berserker” of the deck. Attack, it’ll kill whatever hit hits, and if it is destroyed in the process you can just regenerate it.

Matsu-Tribe Decoy – If Kashi-Tribe Reaver is the berserker of the deck, Matsu-Tribe Decoy is definitely an assassin. When used in conjunction with Sosuke, you can force any creature able to defend your Decoy to enter a battle it surely cannot come out alive.

Sakura-Tribe Elder – Your elder’s are used in one of two ways, which both end up providing additional mana. If your low, and don’t have another means to get out some lands, you can sacrifice him to put one into play tapped. If you happen to get Sachi out, Sakura-Tribe Elder carries the shaman creature type and therefore is as effective as two lands.


Kamigawa snakes not used in this deck:

Orochi Sustainer – It’s ability is somewhat helpful, but in my opinion Elder’s are more versatile. Both carry the shaman keyword, so your Sustainer’s ability will be overcast anyways, but I guess… the same is true with the Elder. The thing is, Elders actually bring out Land cards when needed, which are harder to destroy than creatures.

Orochi Ranger – Carrying no extra abilites (other than the creature tapping ability, which your other warriors carry) it has nothing better to offer than the other snake warriors in this deck. Yes, it’s cheaper… but you shouldn’t have any mana problems playing this deck.

Orochi Leafcaller – It’s ability is awesome, if your playing a multicolored deck. This deck has only one color, and therefore the Leafcaller has no place in it.

Shisato, Whispering Hunter – I actually like this card, but it’s only useful late game. If you can spare to sacrifice extra snakes to keep him out, you can probably win the game already.

Shizuko, Caller of Autumn – She adds mana to your opponent’s pool to. I don’t see why you’d play with her.

Matsu-Tribe Birdstalker – He’s pretty good, but unlike your Reaver and Sniper, he’s only worth having in your deck against flying decks. I guess if you have a side-deck, you could throw him in there, but otherwise… there just isn’t enough room in the deck for him.

Sakura-Tribe Scout – Mana is definitely not an issue with this deck… and I don’t see her ability justifiable enough to put her in your deck. It’s all up to you I guess.

Sasaya, Orochi Ascendant/Sasaya’s Essence – Sasaya’s Essence would be amazing if you were playing in a format allowing upwelling to be used. The only problem is the requisite for flipping Sasaya is just too steep to bother.

____________________
Token-Generating Cards:

The following are the cards used in the deck to create your mass amounts of creature tokens. Note that the Eggwatcher isn’t mentioned below as she has already been discussed above.

Sosuke’s Summons – This card usually creates the majority of your snake creatures, and it should be easy to see why. The ability to bounce it back to your hand is choice; I’ve ended up playing the same one three times in a single turn. It’s a nice card.

Orochi Hatchery – Although this struck me as the primary source for snakes when I first started playing snakes, I soon found myself to be mistaken. It’s still nice, but harder to make full use of early game. I usually kill my opponent before this card can be of adequate use.

Seed the Land – Yes, it gives your opponents snakes too. The thing is, you should be playing more with your Kodama’s Reach than they are… and yours get stat boosts. In the end I think it’s a worthy card.

Endless Swarm – It’s expensive, and it’s risky. But you only need one in your deck to make it a viable option during gameplay, an option which may be worthwhile pending on the situation. Note that you can still use your hatcheries to continue to produce snakes when this card is out.

____________________
Support Cards:

Here are the other cards I’ve decided to include in the deck:

Time of Need – As I’ve said before, your legends are pivotal to this deck. Time of need not only allows you to keep from putting multiples of the same card in just to draw it, but also is more of a wild than doing so. If you need more mana than you need the warrior’s ability to kill, you can pull Sachi instead of Sosuke. It should be a no-brainer for this deck.

Kodama’s Reach – It’s use is to greaten your amount of lands. Note that it provides additional snakes when played with Seed the Land on the field.

Joyous Respite – It provides excellent healing, especially considering the fact that this deck is very good at land-whoring.

Wear Away – Your basic anti-enchantment/artifact card. Remember you can splice this one.

Konda’s Banner – You thought it was cool to have a mass amounts of 4/4 minions out? With Konda’s Banner your minions can get an additional +2/+2. This deck has lots of legends in it, so you should always have a viable target.

Okina, Temple to the Grandfathers – It’s secondary can be useful to keep your legends alive, or to cause additional damage to your opponent. If it’s not needed to do so it can act like an additional land. Why not throw it in?

A card you’ll want to consider is Doubling Season. You won’t be solid Kamigawa cycle anymore, but it is a simply amazing card when paired with this deck (although I personally haven’t tried it yet, I can imagine.) For the sake of keeping this article solid-Kamigawa, however, I’ve decided to leave it off the decklist.

____________________
The Ultimate Swarm Decklist[62]

Creatures[19]:
General[14]:
4 Sakura-Tribe Elder
4 Kashi-Tribe Elite
3 Kashi-Tribe Reaver
3 Matsu-Tribe Decoy
Legendary[4]
1 Seshiro the Anointed
1 Sosuke, Son of Seshiro
1 Sachi, Daughter of Seshiro
1 Sakiko, Mother of Summer
Flipper[1]
Orochi Eggwatcher/Shidako, Broodmistress

Artifacts[5]:
General[3]:
3 Orochi Hatchery
Legendary[2]:
2 Konda’s Banner

Enchantments[2]:
2 Seed the Land

Instants[2]:
2 Wear Away

Sorceries[13]:
4 Sosuke’s Summons
3 Time of Need
3 Kodama’s Reach
2 Joyous Respite
1 Endless Swarm

Lands[21]:
Basic[20]:
Forest
Legendary[1]:
Okina, Temple to the Grandfathers

____________________
In Closing…

… I’d like to thank Cobra for this awesome site that all of us MTG and LOTR TCG fans can come together and read articles, find out more about the games and just hang out. I’d also like to thank the reader for taking the time to read my article, and I hope it has inspired you to try out the deck. Please overlook the absence of a stratagem section, as I felt that the rest of the article was enough to give the reader a general understanding of how the deck should work.

Comments and Criticism are most welcome!

~Phazanzar
Last edited by syndrome on Sun Mar 05, 2006 4:09 am; edited 1 time in totalhttp://myspace/delicatesituation
La_Sin_Grail
Posted: Fri Mar 03, 2006 5:41 pm
Joined: 14 Aug 2005 Posts: 806 Location: Maryland
Hey man! I didn’t realize your deck is 62 cards. There’s no reason good enough for me to make a deck anything over 60. SOme cards are better than others, so you need to make room for only the best.

No respite- it’s just bad, and no swarm because you will win without it or lose without it. Add in more wear away/another time of need for starters.

Edit: Note that I’ll wait to vote until I see people argue with you because only by seeing how you argue can I determine how the deck was made.
syndrome
Posted: Fri Mar 03, 2006 10:42 pm
Joined: 20 Jul 2005 Posts: 423 Location: A cold place.
I personally don’t see a reason that the additional 2 cards could hurt you at all. The reason I came to this number is because I’ve been adding cards over time, and it just so happened that I added another ’lite and sakiko before writing this article. I also added 1 more sosuke summons, but took out a hatch.

I will not remove the respites, because they heal like crazy and the fact is you may just need some additional health to stay alive. I would, however, think about removing the two seed the lands and another hatch. I agree that the swarm can go.

Why? Because sosuke summons does a dandy job at adding creatures by itself. Seed the Land is somewhat of a double edged sword, and therefore takes a bit of stability away from the deck. Then there’s the fact you’ll never need more than a hatch or two, and you don’t want to draw one early game anyway.

Then, you can safely remove 1 forest (as you have 21 lands as it is in the deck) which brings the total to 57, allowing for +2 wear aways and +1 time of need.

Thanks,
~Phazanzar

P.S. I’d be most thankful if the others that voted stated why they believe their votes are accurate.
http://myspace/delicatesituation
La_Sin_Grail
Posted: Fri Mar 03, 2006 10:49 pm
Joined: 14 Aug 2005 Posts: 806 Location: Maryland
It’s more of a theorhetic thing than anything else. Really, 60 cards isn’t that much better. The problem is it shows indecisiveness, which is a bad pattern to make.

I don’t know.. I’m pretty sure hatchery will get artifact hate upon sight, and I think seed the land won’t really help you too much.
syndrome
Posted: Fri Mar 03, 2006 11:10 pm
Joined: 20 Jul 2005 Posts: 423 Location: A cold place.
La_Sin_Grail wrote:
I don’t know.. I’m pretty sure hatchery will get artifact hate upon sight, and I think seed the land won’t really help you too much.
Are you agreeing with my choice of cards to drop then?
http://myspace/delicatesituation
inresponse
Posted: Sat Mar 04, 2006 2:00 am
Joined: 18 Oct 2005 Posts: 162 Location:
actually, the problem with playing 62 cards is that you won’t get to your best cards as frequently. The less cards in your deck, the more mathematically likely you are to draw what you need.

The problem with this deck is that it is just not that good. It loses to a variety of cards, including any mass removal, any larger creatures, and any deck that is remotely faster than it.

What are you playing against? Very casual decks or against serious decks? if casual, then you can probably work with this lsit to provide better results. But if it’s competitive at all, then you are going to run into a lot of very difficult match ups.
La_Sin_Grail
Posted: Sat Mar 04, 2006 11:41 am
Joined: 14 Aug 2005 Posts: 806 Location: Maryland
Phazanzar wrote:
La_Sin_Grail wrote:
I don’t know.. I’m pretty sure hatchery will get artifact hate upon sight, and I think seed the land won’t really help you too much.
Are you agreeing with my choice of cards to drop then?


I suppose so. Looks good to me. I’m thinking that no matter how much you work on this, though, snakes will never be competitive T2, as inresponse stated. Of course, it could be some sweet casual if thats your idea.
syndrome
Posted: Sat Mar 04, 2006 3:27 pm
Joined: 20 Jul 2005 Posts: 423 Location: A cold place.
I play strictly casual atm, I probably should have stated that somewhere.
http://myspace/delicatesituation
La_Sin_Grail
Posted: Sat Mar 04, 2006 3:38 pm
Joined: 14 Aug 2005 Posts: 806 Location: Maryland
Yeah, sounds like fun casual! I’m building an autochton wurm/shining shoal deck and I’d love to playtest against you sometime Smile. It’s a pretty sweet deck, really. Congregation for three wurms to go with a shining shoal and a nourishing in my hand.
The First
Posted: Sun Mar 05, 2006 8:20 am
Joined: 07 Oct 2005 Posts: 195 Location: Anderlecht, Belgium
IMO, you need more Sosukes and Sachis in the deck. They are your "early" game "answers" to aggro decks.

Patron of the orochi is a must. My friend used it in his snakes deck and it really made a huge difference. Played against both versions (with and w/o Patron). The thing is that he allows you to create and use your massive mana generation from Sachi. He allows you to create 2 tokens each turn with the Eggwatcher. He allows you to first play 2 Sosuke’s Summons and still attack with your entire group afterwards.

Arachi is also a must against flyers. Be it dragons or a herd of flyers from the WWr, Arachi is here to deal with them.

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