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BMoor's Magic The Gathering Deck Garage
Mighty Morphin' Creature Changers
November 27, 2006

Creatures
1 Brine Elemental
1 Coral Trickster
1 Disruptive Pitmage
1 Echo Tracer
1 Fathom Seer
2 Fledgling Mawcor
2 Hystrodon
2 Ixidron
3 Llanowar Elves
1 Nantuko Vigilante
2 Patron of the Wild
1 Primal Whisperer
1 Quicksilver Dragon
2 Riptide Entrancer
2 Serpentine Basilisk
1 Teferi, Mage of Zhalfir
1 Vesuvan Shapeshifter
1 Voidmage Apprentice
1 Voidmage Prodigy
2 Wall of Deceit
2 Willbender

Artifacts
4 Dream Chisel
4 Sensei's Divining Top

Lands
8 Forest
9 Island
4 Simic Growth Chamber
------------------------------------------------------------------------
How it Works
I want to get out a lot of creatures that are face-down so that the
opponent has no idea what's going to happen next. He tries a
Pyroclasm? Flip Voidmage Apprentice. He tries to attack? Flip
Serpentine Basilisk. He plays out an army of Slivers? Hit him with
Ixidron. He gets out Akroma, Angel of Wrath? Copy it with Vesuvan
Shapeshifter, then flip your Echo Tracer, and use Voidmage Prodigy
when he plays her again. He thinks he can block safely? Prove him
wrong and flip that 8/8 Primal Whisperer. He opts to take the damage?
Show him your Riptide Entrancer. Etc.

The main goal is to keep the enemy guessing, so there's no point in
having only five or six different creatures in the deck--that makes it
too easy to guess. No, I've got over twenty different guys that my
humble face-down creature might be. This makes it very intimidating,
and the opponent is sure to make a lot of wrong decisions. Unless he's
a master poker player, that is, and he catches tells I don't even know
I'm making, but that's what sunglasses are for, right?

A few of the cards stand out above the rest. Teferi allows me to play
face-down creatures at the end of the opponent's turn, thus letting me
keep mana open the whole time to pay for Morph costs. He also does a
whole lot of other amazing things, of course. Vesuvan Shapeshifter
enables lots of tricks by letting me reuse my Morph triggers, the most
potent of which being Brine Elemental, which occasionally will give me
a complete lockdown on the opponent's untap step. Ixidron is very
powerful, as I've discovered playing this deck. Besides the havoc it
wreaks on four-player melees, it's basically a one-sided mass removal
spell most of the time, turning all of your opponent's creatures into
worthless 2/2 losers while my creatures retain the ability to turn
face up again, and get to reuse the abilities that had already
triggered previously. If I happen to have out a Primal Whisperer with
all those face downs in play, well then that's just ideal, isn't it.
Llanowar Elves allows a turn 2 Morphed creature, and Quicksilver
Dragon is pretty much the spells-bounce-right-off-me finisher that
singlehandedly ends games.

Do you have any suggestions?

Why yes, as a matter of fact I do.  I've got to say, I love the idea of making your opponent guess what they're blocking/attacking into/targeting.  It's like mini-games in video games, where you can make your opponent play the shell game during your attack phase!  (Note: the rules state you have to make it obvious which face-down creature is which.  In other words, it has to be obvious which one came into play this turn versus which one is the one that's been flipped face down a dozen times.  No "three-card monty" sleight of hand when your opponent isn't looking.)  The only trouble is, with a singleton deck like this that thrives off keeping your opponent guessing, you may find yourself in real dire need of a specific morph trigger that you don't have on the board.  Normally I'd suggest tutors, but with a tutor you have to reveal the card you searched for to ensure it fits the parameters of what the tutor can get.  Unless it's Diabolic Tutor, which just says "a card", but green and blue doesn't have any like those.  So, I guess we just have to make sure each individual card is as strong as it can be, and get plenty of copies of the cards that don't need to be a surprise.
 
So, you've got a justifiable reason for committing one of my notable pet peeves: lots of one-ofs.  I know I tend to harp on that, but I readily accept it IF the deckbuilder did it for a reason, and your reason is a good one.  But it only applies to the morph cards.  Ixidron is a power beater that resets all those morph triiggers.  You'll never really be unhappy to draw it, so at least 3 copies sounds appropriate.  You've got 3 Llanowar Elves, which is enough, but I'd recommend a fourth if there's room simply because Llanowar Elves does its best work on Turn One.  You really want to draw one in the early turns, but then you're dissapointed to see it in the late game when you needed an Ixidron.  I guess 3 is the right number for that.  And Teferi really needs at least a second copy.  All your cards are creatures save Dream Chisel and the Top, which means Teferi lets you play anything as an instant.  In a deck that relies so heavily on unmorphing things in response to something, you really need to be able to leave mana open.  And playing all your spells at your opponent's EOT is the best way of doing that.
 
Next, I've got an idea for an utterly backbreaking combo you could make use of: Natural Affinity and Ixidron.  Picture this-- you play Natural Affinity turning every land into a 2/2 creature until end of turn.  Then you play Ixidron, turning all creatures face down--including all lands!  Every land is face down, unable to tap for mana, and Ixidron is positively enormous!  Best of all is when you can do it at the end of your opponent's turn with Teferi, even if that means Teferi stops being Teferi.  Even better if your opponent tapped out that turn and is defenseless against your onslaught!  Armageddon plus a threat usually wins games, but the trouble is that deprives you of all your mana which I just said you have so much use for.  I'll leave it up to you if you want to use that strategy or not, but if you do, I would probably drop the Divining Tops for Affinity.  It's really the only card that can come out here, but it's still useful.
Finally, I'll wrap up this workshop session with a rundown of some notable morph creatures that you aren't running, but might want to.  I feel it's my duty to make my clients aware of all the different avenues they could pursue without forcing their hand (that's why I don't do "before and after decklists" like many of my predecessors), so let's take a look at some of your options.
 
 
Aphetto Alchemist- Like Coral Trickster, a timely unmorph could be quite unpleasant.  Also interacts well with the Top.
 
Chromeshell Crab- An old favorite that plays Spawnbroker without the restrictions.
 
Mischievous Quanar- Might be hard to obtain, but a Fork morph trigger is certainly welcome here, especially since it can remorph and re-unmorph at will. 
 
Mistform Seaswift- 3/1 flyers are hard to trifle with.
 
Raven Guild Master- I know your deck isn't really a milling deck, but you might actually steal a win with it, plus it makes a great bluff card to mislead opponents about your opponent's strategy.  Against a reanimator deck, though, I'd keep it face down.
 
Riptide Survivor- With your singleton strategy, any card drawing is good card drawing.  And remember, if you play out your whole hand before unmorphing it, you don't have to discard anything to it!
 
Root Elemental- The creature you put into play has to be face up.  Putting Ixidron into play this way just makes me smile.
 
Scornful Egotist- I like the idea of a creature that's completely useless face-up.  It's like every targeted removal spell or block has a chance of killing nothing.  Though, if you did that, you'd probably want to use Proteus Machine instead-- at least that has some metagame potential by turning into a Sliver.
 
Titanic Bulvox- It's a 7/4 trampler.  Pretty straightforward.
 
Venomspout Brackus- 5 damage for 1G is a good deal, even if the target has to have flying and be attacking or blocking.  Though if it's flyers you're worried about, Spitting Gourna might work better.
 
 
That's about all the good ones I can find-- and a few bad ones most likely.  Your selection is already awesome, but you might want to switch things out every once in a while so people don't gradually learn which ones you're running.  You might actually convince people you've got one of every green or blue morph creature ever printed-- or that you're cheating.  Good luck with that one!
 
~BMoor
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