Fish Five-0: Mardu Feather (Standard, Magic Arena)
At the beginning of #MTGWAR there were a few Feather decks running around but they were mostly Boros. What if we added black and turned it into a Mardu variant?....
Gameplan
The deck is all about playing a few small threats and then make them really difficult to kill. The best way to do this is to assemble a nice engine in Dreadhorde Arcanist and Feather, the Redeemed.
The interaction some may overlook between these two is the replacement effect that Feather applies with Dreadhorde Arcanist as the card you cast with the Arcanist will return your hand. This means you can get spells like Sheltering Light and Defiant Strike and reoccur these. Combine any of those spells with cards like Tenth District Legionnaire and you've got a pretty resilient threat.
Why Add Black?
The issue that most Feather decks face is its inability to draw and climb back into a game after a sweeper or something deals with our threats.
This is where Sorin, Vengeful Bloodlord enters into the picture. Being able to continuously bring back our cheap threats and ping down opposing walkers and dealing 1 damage to the opponent isn't a joke.
On top of Sorin, we get another powerhouse two drop with haste in Dreadhorde Butcher
This is a card that doesn't really need a ton of spells to start growing as this card connecting with a player or planeswalker will instantly grow it. This also makes it difficult in a Teferi, Time Raveler world where they bounce this and then you can just redeploy and kill Teferi. The butcher also gives us much needed reach to burn out an opponent in the event they board wipe us.
With the addition of black, we also get to upgrade our disruption with Duress and have solid removal cards like Angrath's Rampage and Mortify to deal with problematic big threats that could get in the way. Being able to cast Angrath's Rampage and then swinging with a pumped Dreadhorde Arcanist can be huge as that could be two creatures or planeswalkers sacrificed which will keep the coast clear!
Conclusion
I think the deck adding black was sweet as I really enjoyed Dreadhorde Butcher to add more aggression and Duress to pick off key removal spells against more controlling opponents. Sorin definitely gave us the ability to grind and keep fighting. The only thing I'd look into is more discard and potentially a fourth copy of Dreadhorde Butcher as that card felt great on turn two. Obviously, the deck has its weaknesses like its mana base being three colors, but the power is definitely worth it. For those looking to play some Feather, the Redeemed in Standard, I highly recommend taking this into the queues or a local FNM.
See you at the next one!
-TheAsianAvenger
Twitter: @TheAsianAvenger || twitch.tv/TheAsianAvenger || Email: theasianavenger@mtggoldfish.com
