Compare your deck with a themed-guild deck:

Any deck w/ U will bounce, thus killing your hellbent and ridding you of potency.

Any deck w/ W will remove/fetter your threats.

Any deck w/ R will burn.

Any deck w/ B will kill.

Any deck w/ G...well...it doesn’t matter, G has UWRB.

Your deck will kill if your opponent is unprepared for what is to come. However, considering spells like mortify, faith’s fetters, lightning helix, putrefy, loxodon hierarch, Azorious Herald, Ghost Council, Wrath of God, Devouring Light, Char, eye of nowhere, boomerang, even mark of eviction, you’ll have tough competition of killing your opponent.

Sure, you’ve got Rusalka to prevent spells such as fetters and helix triggering life gain, but you’ve still given your opponent an answer to your creature threats. Not to mention, wouldn’t your opponent be smart enough to target your Rusalka first so you’ll have to sac it?

Ghost council may not allow quicker life gain, but it’ll slow down your tempo of beatdown. Thus, giving your opponent more time to answer to your threats. And, if it’s Ghost Council, expect your opponent to throw stuff like shining shoal and sickening shoal as well as mortify.

How about this scenario:

Opponent (turn 1): hallowed fountain tapped.

Opponent (turn 2): plains and a Howling mine.

Opponent (turn 3): plain and a Paladin en-Vec, blocks whatever threat you have w/ it.

Opponent (turn 4): worship. Game over.

Now, on turn 3, you may out an Avatar of discord and beat your opponent for 5, along w/ your rusalka and drekavac to put as much emphasis on the beat down as possible, but most likely, your drekavac will get blocked both times and your opponent will have taken 18 damage at the most. Thus, you will be too late to successfully stop your opponent even at the fastest speed.

Furthermore, the howling mine will kill the hellbent you have.

Now, an answer to this would be something like a "lose life" spell.

Rain of gore may help your cause in crushing opponents who play life gaing spells and may even pin them from playing stuff like hierarch, fetters, or helix. Hmm, so instead of asituation in which your opponent jumps from 4 to 8 life and stops a creature threat, your opponent can’t do anything but pass his turn cause he knows his spells will be the cause of his downfall.

(P.S. the "opponent" was Osion w/ his standard U/W howling mine deck that crushed my extended red deck which had lightning bolt, chain lightning, incinerate, and fireblast.)

Most players are smart enough to not play the Fetters while Rusalka is out, unless they have no other choice.

I begin dropping tough creatures from turn 2 AND I have 27 creatures in my deck. You have 27 removal in your deck? Or get at least 3 removal cards to deal with thoughness 3 creatures?

I play with Dark Confidant myself. 1 Howling mine most defenately doesn’t mean no Hellbent.

Osion’s "Howling Mine" deck has quotes around it for a reason. It’s really U/W Worship control with lots and lots of decking. Anyways, I don’t think you can really win if you play avatar of discord against any deck with Blue (bounce), red (burn), or black (Last gasp) because you’ll be paying three cards for one!

I’ve been working on a U/G powerbeat deck that absolutely DEMOLISHES this because it’s so easy to get a turn three kodama of the north tree. Also, WoG is a consideration, and blowing up the o-naginata. Why would poppet ever be good? If you have hellbent, he’s burning-tree shaman without the ability...

Well, I can’t blame your for not knowing, but Osion overabuses his howling mine deck with a different strategy: deck your opponent.

He’ll play spells such as walking archive, kami of the crescent moon, mikokoro, center of the sea, and nonetheless, howling mine. Your dark Confidant will only contribute to his cause.