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Peasant Magic Decks - 2009

/////White-Green-Red Slivers - Robert Barone

Lands-19

8 Plains
8 Forest
3 Mountain

Creatures-33

4 Ward Sliver*
1 Might Sliver*
4 Muscle Sliver
4 Sinew Sliver
4 Plated Sliver
3 Bonesplitter Sliver
3 Talon Sliver
2 Sidewinder Sliver
1 Homing Sliver
1 Heart Sliver
1 Spinneret Sliver
1 Quick Sliver
4 Gemhide Sliver

Instants-4

4 Manamorphose

Enchantments-4

4 Rancor


Overview
This deck is a basic Sliver tribal deck. As you can tell, there are A LOT of slivers. For a sliver deck to function properly there must be more creatures than in a normal deck. The deck tends to build up a small army of slivers, and then roll over the opponent once it reaches a critical mass (or once it resolves a timely Ward Sliver).

Noncreatures
The only non-creature cards in the deck are Manamorphose (4) and Rancor (4). Manamorphose helps to smooth out the mana difficulties associated with running 3 different colors. It also is a free cantrip, so there is no significant loss in running it. Rancor is simply a powerful, quick, recurring nightmare for the opponent. Giving the slivers trample gives you the opportunity to finish of the opponent much quicker, and the +2/+0 on your already huge slivers is simply awesome.

Creatures
Ward Sliver is the best sliver in the deck, as a resolved Ward Sliver can mean game over to any mono colored deck and even some two colored decks. It makes your slivers untargetable, unblockable, and unaffected by combat damage from the chosen color.

Might Sliver (1), Muscle Sliver (4), Sinew Sliver (4), Plated Sliver (4), and Bonesplitter Sliver (3) all serve to power up other slivers. The majority of slivers in this deck are pump slivers because their effects are cumulative. For example, there is no benefit for the other slivers in play if you have two Heart Slivers instead of one. However, if you have two muscle slivers, then the abilities stack and all of your slivers get +2/+2. Sinew Sliver and Muscle Sliver are mirror images of one another and the most basic pump slivers. Plated Sliver is a quick 1-drop that helps keep your slivers alive as you build them up in numbers. Bonesplitter Sliver packs a punch and quickly turns an army of complacent slivers into a threat to your opponent’s life total. Might Sliver is the singleton uncommon slot left, and he’s the biggest pump sliver.

The other slivers in the deck help to give special abilities to your sliver legion. Talon Sliver is the only sliver with three copies in the deck that isn’t pump because first strike is really powerful in this deck. Sidewinder Silver is also a powerful sliver that is run in multiples even though more than one is redundant because it is so powerful. Homing Sliver is also very good, but because red is a stretch for the deck there is only one. It functions as a tutor for Ward Sliver. Heart Sliver works great with Gemhide Sliver and creates unexpected bursts of aggressive slivers. Spinneret Sliver (a 2/2 for G1 which is actually ahead of the curve for a sliver) and Quick Sliver grant slivers conditional abilities that can sometimes be game breaking.

Gemhide Slivers deserve their own paragraph because they are so important. More than one Gemhide sliver out is pointless, but there are four Gemhide Slives in the deck because you want to play one ASAP. Having Gemhide Sliver out solves any existing colored mana problems and allows you to quickly overwhelm the opponent. You generate so much mana from them that slivers just fall out of your hand at an amazing rate. Expect an experience player to target the Gemhide Slivers.

It might seem that since the deck has more creatures than almost any other deck that trading creature for creature would be a good idea because the opponent would run out of creatures before you; however, creatures are ALL that you have. It is best to play conservatively at first and keep most of your early slivers. You should only trade creatures if you absolutely have to in the early game. The tide will begin to turn in your favor once you get four to five slivers in play. At this point, depending on your match up, it may beneficial to begin attacking. With experience, you will recognize when the deck is ready to switch from conservative mode to aggressive mode. The deck is fairly simple to play, as it only requires you to find the optimal order in which to play your slivers. The bulk of thought during a game goes into the combat phase.

The deck has a lot of options with both the number and types of slivers that it can run. Feel free to send me your ideas and feedback at rbarone293@gmail.com