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2 months ago ::
Mar 21, 2013 - 4:50PM
#1
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Date Joined:
Mar 21, 2013
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2 months ago ::
Mar 21, 2013 - 5:27PM
#2
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Date Joined:
Aug 27, 2009
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First, welcome to the boards!  Second, I see a few issues with the deck. Why is intangible virtue  in the deck when you want your tokens to die? I'm not saying to take anything out, I think intangible virtue is good. Have you considered splashing green for cards like verdant embrace  ? I personally see your deck lacking in token production, and you only have 8 token producing cards in the deck. My biggest concern is the fact that most of your cards assume that you already have tokens to spare, like bone splinters  , and especially unruly mob  . Your main sac-outlet looks to be killing wave  , which is a problem. I would use something more permanent, like ashnod's altar  or martyr's cause  . Using creatures that produce tokens, like geist-honored monk  , can be useful with cards that blink  and/or reanimate  . There are cheaper creatures that do that ability, just do a search on gatherer and you'll find them. Good luck with this! 
HOW TO AUTOCARD! When posting in a text box, type [c ]Plains[/c] to make your post show Plains  . Are you making a casual mill deck? Please read.
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Control is the key of a mill deck. You should free up your mana as much as possible so that you can respond to whatever your opponent is doing. Having some way to remove threats, both real and percieved, is necessary to survival. Real threats are those that are already on the field, and are something a simple unsummon  or doom blade  can remove. Percieved threats are those that aren't on the field, something a simple duress  or counterspell  can deal with. Controlling the board will allow your mill deck to continuously perform, if you use permanent style mill, that is.
One-Shot Mill spells are something you should avoid. You can toss tome scour  s at your opponent until your hand runs out, but that isn't going to be enough to mill them to death. With 1-shot mill spells, like tome scour , you have to treat them like burn spells. Therefore, the only "good" 1-shot mill spells are sanity grinding  (in the right deck) and mind funeral  . Try to find more permanent styles of milling, like memory erosion  , hedron crab  , and curse of the bloody tome  , so that you don't have to waste your mana each turn doing something that those permanents can do with a single mana/turn investment. Keeping your mana open allows you to respond with control elements.
Traumatize  Rant. Traumatize is a terrible card for a multitude of reasons. First, it costs 5 to cast, which is a large investment for a mill deck. Milling half a library sounds neat, but if you do the math, it really isn't that much. An average 60 card deck starts with drawing 7 cards. Then, barring any draw spells on their end, or ramp on yours, 5 turns will go by, where they draw 5 more cards, leaving 48 in the deck. Unless they had a deck with more than 60 cards, or you ramped it out, the most you'll ever mill with a single Traumatize on turn 5 is 24 cards. That's not too shabby, but hang on, there's more! If they drew any additional cards or if they were milled before turn 5, that number will be much lower. In addition, any more Traumatize's you draw will only mill less and less as the game goes on...which is the point of a mill deck. My whole point on Traumatize is the it is NOT worth the 5 mana investment, not even with haunting echoes  . You can mill more than 24 before turn 5...which you can then cast the echoes.
If you look at a mill deck like a burn deck, you'll notice that it takes longer to win with mill than with burn. For example, lightning bolt  costs 1 and does 3 out of the 20 damage needed to win (barring any lifegain or damage prevention). For mill, that same investment of 1 would have to mill 9 cards out of an average 60 card deck to be the equivilent of lightning bolt . The problem is that there is no mill card that can do that...except hedron crab , over a period of time. The initial investment of 1 will pay off in 3 more land drops to make the crab equal to a bolt. However, the crab nets you more mill beyond those 3 land drops, making it better as the game draws on. Other cards, like curse of the bloody tome , are excellent ways of milling an opponent because the initial investment of   is all you have to pay in order to put your opponent on a clock. All you have to do is stay alive, which is the true goal of a mill strategy.
There are other ideas for mill decks that are specific to certain types of strategies. Combo mill decks can mill an entire player's library out from under them. Secondary mill strategies are usually tied to another strategy, like drowner of secrets  in a merfolk deck, or halimar excavator  in an ally deck. Milling can be done in certain decks that are able to ramp out enough mana to make use of the higher costing mill spells, like using 16 x post  to pay for X on sands of delirium  or for ambassador laquatus  . Multiplayer mill decks are even tougher to build, but can be done. Being a slower environment[/c], it is easier to ramp in multiplayer, allowing for big X spells, like mind grind  , to be useful. Consuming aberration  is another star player. The more straightforward strategy is to use mesmeric orb  and dreamborn muse  while being the only deck at the table that can deal with it  . There are always new strategies coming out with each new set, so check gatherer for any new mill cards that you find to be the most fun for you!
Now you can say that you haven't fallen into the trap that most new players fall into when they build their first mill deck!
 : Order, Law, Faith.
 : Knowledge, Artifice, Control.
 : Corruption, Death, Self-Interest.
 : Freedom, Destruction, Victory.
 : Nature, Growth, Life.
 : Progressive, but too controlling.
 : Focused, but short sighted.
 : Skilled, but hypocritical.
 : Unified, but without a sense of self.
 : Cunning, but devious.
 : Inquisitive, but incautious.
 : Rational, but impulsive.
 : Powerful, but spiteful.
 : Instinctive, but selfish.
 : Fearless, but reckless.
Name:  Keino
 =100 Class: 
 x 236 Diety:
 125/200
Weapon: Staff of Fire ( =2x dmg/ =4+3 dmg)
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2 months ago ::
Mar 21, 2013 - 5:52PM
#3
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Date Joined:
Mar 21, 2013
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Thanks for the speedy response! I forgot to say that I'm playing standard. Do you think I should remove unruly mob / killing wave / bone splinters? And leave the killing to my opponent, when he blocks or attacks me? I don't think I'll be able to splash a third color without the appropriate lands, I really can't afford that many shocklands / dual lands. Should I focus more on the token aspect of the deck and remove the suicidal cards? There are very few permanent that allows me to sacrifice anything, save for Corpse traders  .
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2 months ago ::
Mar 21, 2013 - 6:05PM
#4
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Date Joined:
Aug 19, 2010
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Bloodthrone Vampire  is a good sac outlet in standard (and 2 cmc on top of that).
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2 months ago ::
Mar 21, 2013 - 6:06PM
#5
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Sorin, Lord of Innistrad  and Thraben Doomsayer  will give this deck some token makers and help you out when you need it the most! Don't take Bloodthrone Vampire Get Cartel Aristocrat  Way better card, cause it allows you to hit almost everytime.
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2 months ago ::
Mar 21, 2013 - 9:26PM
#6
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Date Joined:
Mar 21, 2013
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After reading all your replies, I am thinking of dropping 2x unruly mob , 3x killing wave , 2x immortal servitude , 1x crypt ghast  and 1x increasing devotion  . And take up 3x cartel aristocrat  and 3x skirsdag high priest  and 3x thraben Doomsayer  . What do you think?
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2 months ago ::
Mar 21, 2013 - 10:52PM
#7
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I didn't see it but I'd suggest taking out increasing devotion and putting in 4 doomed traveller  in the long run, 4 mana will net you 8 creatures. On a side note, they work well with avacyn's collar  . Also, I ran a similar deck with falkenrath noble  requiem angel  and ogre slumlord  . Then, I'd throw down heartless summoning  and watch everything start flipping. The blood artist  would cause both a spirit and a rat token to come into play, which would both die, which caused the rat token to create a spirit token, which would die. Making the noble alone cause 4 damage and four health. That's not including what happens from the artist dying.
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2 months ago ::
Mar 22, 2013 - 3:54PM
#8
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Date Joined:
Mar 21, 2013
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crusader of odric  or frontline medic  ? I like doomed traveller but i need high mana cost cards, because i'll be top deck on turn 4 or 5. I'll try it anyway. Thanks
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2 months ago ::
Mar 22, 2013 - 11:39PM
#9
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I went the opposite. I used heartless summoning to make 1 and 2 cost artifact creatures free, then played them to die to cause damage.
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(Standard format)
