Hello, readers! It feels like I've been away for a long time! But I'm back now, and I decided to do a little 2 for 1 today to help more people at once! I had two separate readers send in requests for help with their Simic Graft decks, and they are similar enough that I think we can cover them both at the same time! Here are the two e-mails I received:
 

Sup! Well, about a year ago, I got the Dissension Simic Deck and since then, I managed to get cards to trade and improve my deck. It has been a long way, but I almost have all the cards I need (excluding duplicates). This deck is pretty good against control decks in metagames, but I'm always getting owned by my little bro's Dimir mill deck (Which you have recently reviewed). Well, anyway, here it is:

 

Lands

6 Forest

7 Island

4 Simic Growth Chamber

2 Noviegen, Heart of Progress

2 Llanowar Reborn

 

Creatures

1 Sporeback Troll

2 Simic Guildmage

3 Simic Initiate

2 Coiling Oracle

2 Cytoplast Manipulator

2 Silkwing Scout

2 Vigean Hydropon

1 Plaxcaster Frogling

2 Simic Ragworm

1 Momir Vig, Simic Visionary

1 Trygon Predator

1 Simic Sky Swallower

1 Experiment Kraj

1 Omnibian

1 Helium Squirter

1 Cytospawn Shambler

1 Plaxmanta

1 Vigean Graftmage

2 Assault Zepplid

 

Instants/Sorceries

1 Giant Growth

1 Evolution Charm

1 Cytoshape

1 Biomantic Mastery

2 Thrive

1 Recollect

 

Enchantments/Artifacts

1 Simic Signet

1 Leafdrake Roost

1 Shape of the Wiitigo

1 Doubling Season

1 Evolution Vat

 

Well, it's not like I don't like duplicates; it's just I never have the chance to get any. Anyway, enjoy!

 

Hey Mattedesa!  I have a grafting-oriented Simic(blue-green) deck that could use some improving. Most of my cards are from Ravnica, but I've thrown in some older cards too. I would like to keep most of my cards with grafting abilities, but do whatever you think is right. Please pimp my deck! Here's it is:

 

# of cards-60

 

Land-22

forest x 10

island x 8

breeding pool x 2

Simic growth chamber x 2

 

Creatures/artifacts-25

Sporeback troll x 4

Vigean hydropon x 3

Simic ragworm x 3

Coiling Oracle x 2

Aquastrand spider x 2

Simic ragworm x 2

Simic Initiate x 2

Novijen sages x 1

Assault zeppelid x 1

Llanowar elves x 1

Surveilling sprite x 1

Helium squirter x 1

Simic basilisk x 1

Plaxcaster frogling x 1

Tidewater minion x 1

Defense grid(artifact) x 1

 

Sorceries/instants-7

(I have 1 of all of these)

Thrive

Sleight of hand

Gigadrowse

Cytoshape

Vigean intuition

Repeal

Natural

Natural Affinity

 

Enchantments/enchant creatures-6

Shielding plax x 2

Fists of ironwood x 2

One with nature x 1

Broken fall x 1

 

Please help my deck Thanks!

 

Okay, since we're working from 2 decklists here, I'm going to have to do this a little differently. Let's talk through what these decks should be doing, and then see which of the cards our submitters are using should be kept and which ones don't make the cut.

 

Simic graft loves creatures. Both decks do have a lot of creatures, but not all creatures are created equal. I know, Martin Luther King, Jr. might not like me saying that, but it's the truth. Let's start with the absolute best:

 

Coiling Oracle: Drawing more cards is a wonderful thing, and with another card I will be suggesting soon, this will be a early game staple!

 

Plaxcaster Frogling: 3/3 for 3 mana might be good enough on it's own, but the ability to make your guys untargetable can really mess with your opponent's plans!

 

Assault Zeppelid: Your opponent will rarely be glad to see this guy hit the table, and at only 4 mana, he is a bargain.

 

Simic Sky Swallower: Do I really need to explain this? More times than not, he is nearly impossible to stop.

 

These three I would definitely suggest putting in your decks. The Sky Swallower is expensive (both mana cost and money), so 2 or 3 should be plenty, but the others should be 4-ofs.

 

Now comes the second class of characters. This is where things get a bit muddy. There are several different ways we could go with this, and since both readers had a little bit of everything, it's hard to know which way to go, but I'm going to choose the direction of abusing the graft ability. That means putting in as many good graft creatures as possible. Here are some of the better choices:

Cytoplast Manipulator: When your opponent plays a creature you like, simply move one of your counters from something onto that creature and gain control of it! Perfect!

 

Novijen Sages: When one of your creatures is about to die, just remove all it's counters and draw cards! Plus, he provides a 4/4 body to start with which is something your opponent must deal with. He does cost 6 mana, so 2 of these is plenty.

 

Aquastrand Spider: Really, I recommend him because he's a cheap way to get counters more than his reach ability, although that will be useful at times, too.

 

Vigean Graftmage: Being able to untap your guys makes it easy to attack more freely, since you can untap and block during their turn.

 

Here comes one card recently reprinted in 10th that fits this deck very well: Stampeding Wildebeests. Every upkeep he asks that a green creature return to your hand! At first, that seems like a drawback, but with your creatures, it's an advantage! You could return the Coiling Oracle each turn for an extra card each turn, or return one of your grafters to replay him and reset his graft counters! That would almost be good enough without the 5/5 trampling body!

Now, with all these graft abilities and having to replay a green creature every turn, we're going to need some mana! Birds of Paradise would be perfect, since they can tap for either color, and they also can be the recipient of graft counters to make for an eventually large flying attacker! If you can't get any of those, though, Llanowar Elves should fill the spot sufficiently.

Also, you might play a land searcher like Search for Tomorrow or Edge of Autumn.

 

I'd really suggest that you keep your decks mostly creatures. Of the non-creature spells you two mentioned, the only one that excites me is Doubling Season. If you can come up with a copy or two of that to make your graft guys huge, it would be great. Other than that, a combat trick like Giant Growth (or something else that pumps your creatures at instant speed) or maybe a Boomerang effect would keep your opponents on edge a little, knowing that you might have a surprise up your sleeve.

 

The main thing you need to do is decide on a strategy. I perfectly understand that it's hard to get multiples of uncommons and rares sometimes, but at least make sure your cards fit together well. A whole lot of cards that do different things make your deck unpredictable and hard to play.

 

Hopefully my incoherent thoughts made enough sense to help you two (and other readers). I'll be back soon with some more of your decks!

 

-mattedesa