Best Third Ally Colour

[Kieran Symington]

So I'm looking to make a new ally deck for some post-scars standard. The base colour has to be White, since all the best allies (Freeblade/Blademaster/Evangel/Paladin) are in that colour. The card I really want to try out in the deck is Genesis Wave, since putting multiple allies into play at the same time would be quite degenerate. This means the second colour needs to be green, and fortunately it also provides the awesome ally mana guy Harabaz Druid (Plus it means I can play Survivalist, giving me another two-drop). 

 

The only question is which third colour to take with these two, as I have space for two more allies in the deck. All three other colours have their charms, and they all have both a two-drop ally and a high-end ally with a useful ability. Red has the super-aggressive Akoum Battlesinger and the amazing but expensive Kazuul Warlord. Black has Bojuka Brigand - who is basically Survivalists 5-8 - and Bala Ged Thief, who helps out against control decks and when coming in off a Wave will basically take your opponent's hand. Blue has two copy effects - Jwari Shapeshifter who gives you a second copy of your best man, but doesn't do anything by himself, and Clone, which can be a Jwari Shapeshifter but can also copy your opponent's Wurmcoil Engine or Frost Titan.

 

Thses three options are too hard to decide between, so I'm putting it out there and asking for some advice. Which makes the best option? Should I just man up and play four (or even five) colours? Am I missing something obvious that would make the deck better?

 

[Simon Baldwin]

Have you thought about:

- Main deck the red ones as they're faster
- Add the other two colours (incl. land) as a sideboard, and switch colour depending on the match up

I'm fairly sure that would need a lot of tweaking to sort out properly, but its something to think about.

[Raymond Wat]

As I attempted to pilot you deck in the senior tourney recently, I like Black being the third Ally colour. The discard effect is very good and the life lost help winning the final points. However, as Simon mentioned earlier, it's probably best against U control. So, perhaps SB. Red is aggressive with Akoum Battlesingers which I think should be how this Allies deck play. Go R and you could add a few burns in to remove early blockers. I don't like Blue in this deck.

[Kieran Symington]

I suppose Red is probably the best colour since the effects of the two Red allies are just better at killing opponents. Plus it means I can play two sets of Scars lands and only one set of fetches. Can probably sideboard into black to play Thief against control decks since putting a couple of Marsh Flats main over plains shouldn't affect the deck at all and the rest of the black lands can come in from the board.

[Dan Barrett]

I think you have to play black, because elsewise your opponent can just wrath you with DoJ/Consume the Meek, so the hand disruption to protect your vastly over-extended board is required.

I wouldn't play green tbh.

[James Mills]

Why wouldn't you play green? If you are worried about mass removal you can always throw in a set of Vengevines to make the deck more powerful and less vragile to mass removal.



Dan Barrett said:

I think you have to play black, because elsewise your opponent can just wrath you with DoJ/Consume the Meek, so the hand disruption to protect your vastly over-extended board is required.

I wouldn't play green tbh.

[David Collard]

I tested WGR before and Akoum Battlesinger is amazing. Tuktuk Scrapper might also be relevant.

[Dan Barrett]

This reminds me of testing the deck at Tom Baker's house when it had Bloodbraid Elf in it, and I managed a draw that won on turn 4 through his Day of Judgement - nice deck!

David Collard said:

I tested WGR before and Akoum Battlesinger is amazing. Tuktuk Scrapper might also be relevant.

[David Collard]

It was ALA-M10-ZEN, I had Violent Outburst cascading into Akoum Battlesingers. That was fun.

Dan Barrett said:

This reminds me of testing the deck at Tom Baker's house when it had Bloodbraid Elf in it, and I managed a draw that won on turn 4 through his Day of Judgement - nice deck!

[Peter Dun]

just in case you are interested, I tested WU allies with proliferate as a serious deck for the nats qualifying season... I will try to find a decklist, but it's nothing you wouldn't expect...

 

all the solid W allies, umara raptors, venser (for the second ability), inexorable tide, gitaxan probe + pre-ordain

allows you to sb white or blue asenscion etc. The results were reasonably solid. The deck did well vs cawblade (the main reason to play the deck was because of how bad batterskull made most aggro decks...

[Kieran Symington]

I've been giving some thought to bringing back my old B/W Allies deck that did so well at the end of Zendikar block. It's been pretty dormant until now because there weren't any good replacements for what it lost from Shards block, but I think it might be time for another go, since NP provides some awesome new cards. Phyrexian Metamorph is by far the best new creature - being any ally you currently have out for only 3 mana of any colour, and possibly even copying your opponent's stuff. Tezzeret's Gambit provides the hand refill the deck never had before - plus it pumps your entire team as a bonus and plays well with any Contagion Clasps you're running. Despise is a pretty useful new discard spell for B, and Gitaxian Probe could even show up just because it cycles for free. Definately going to try this out at the next game day.

[Kevin Blake]

I've been running a U/W/r Allies list, playing Spell Pierce, Lightning Bolt and Preordain main.  It's had a fair amount of success, is pretty good against Caw Blade and generic aggro strategies but weak against Valakut and U/B.  I can put up some details if you're interested.

[Kieran Symington]

Would definately like to see everyone's ally deck lists - then I can shamelessly net-deck already tested builds!