Wizard Deck

[RobPro]

Ahoy.

I made this deck last summer around when I joined the forums, but never had a chance to play it much. I think I might have my sideboard mixed in with my actual cards... ME decks were 40 cards, with a 10 card board, right?

I still remember some of what I was thinking at the time, so I'll outline the strategy.

Character: Lord Zycon

Creatures:
1x Twisted Sorceror
2x Illusionist
2x Wizard Recruiter
3x Sneaky Snyder
2x Morlock Debaine
3x Cranial Leech
4x Morlock's Disciple
4x Wizard Apprentice

Spells:
2x Legion of Skulls
4x Thoughtful Study
1x Tranquil Touch
4x Lightning Bolt
2x Chain Lightning
2x Wizard Battle
1x Spontaneous Combustion
3x Forget It
1x Cleanse

Items:
4x Dust of Invisibility
1x Bibliotheque
1x Ring of Temporal Acceleration
1x Ring of Charisma
1x Trade Agreement

Effects:
1x Sacred Ground

I believe my strategy was to use illusionists and direct damage spells to stall while I got my engine online. Morlock and the Recruiters would be used to fetch apprentices every turn to power out the thoughtful studies. The idea is to use thoughtful study to dump half the deck in the graveyard, and then use Legion of Skulls to summon a bajillion tokens. I don't think it every worked very well in goldfishing.

Any ideas on if this is a good strategy? Comments? Suggestions? Notice cards that are definitely sideboard in the main deck? 8) I have most of the cards from the first edition, and I'm thinking about picking up some of the other sets.

[Nosferatu]

I haven't looked at any ME cards in a while, but I don't believe the combo works. Last I knew, when you discard a Creature card from your hand, it goes to the Discard Pile. When you case Legion of Skulls, it takes them from the Cemetery. But, other than that, I am having trouble seeing the reason for running 1 Twisted Sorcerer (he has 15 Loyalty, but great synergy with Legion), with only 1 Ring of Charisma. Other than that, it seems like it could be fun. Not every day you see Lord Zycon commanding an army of Zombies.

EDIT: And your deck size is 49 plus one Character. I believe the sideboard is 10 cards, but I've never built one in my playtesting endevours.

[RobPro]

Oh, the Cemetary is different than the Discard Pile?

The Twisted Sorcerer lest me get card draws off the apprentices Morlock fetches, since he can get ones that are already dead. I only have one Ring of Charisma and one Ring of Temp. Accel, or I'd probably put more in.

[RobPro]

I've read over the card a bunch of times, and it does seem like this combo doesn't work as I thought it did.

So, only Creatures go to the Cemetary? Do they have to be killed from play to go there, or is that where they go even if discarded by hand?

If they go there from the hand, the combo still works and the Twisted Sorcerer aides it tremendously. I'd just have to change the balance to mostly creatures, so Thoughtful Study dumps them into the Cemetary.

Do tokens come into play disengaged? If they don't, I guess making as many up to the leadership will have to do, instead of like a bajillion.

[Nosferatu]

Well, my understanding is that Creatures only go to the Cemetery from play when they die. Creatures that are discarded (from the hand) go to the Discard Pile. Thusly, Thoughtful Study will put lots of Creatures into the Discard Pile.

Tokens are treated exactly the same as a normal creature. Therefore, they come into play fully engaged, unless it says otherwise, just like a normal creature.

The point I was making with the 1 Twisted Sorcerer and 1 Ring of Charisma, is that Twisted Sorcerer will have to roll a Loyalty Check each turn (He has 15 Loyalty, and Lord Zycon only has 12 Leadership). I would then assume that, if you wanted to keep him around for comboing, you would find some consistant way to raise your Characters Leadership, like Ring of Charisma. But, because you only ran 1 Ring of Charisma, I was confused. If you wanted to base the deck more around the Twisted Sorcerer, than I would suggest running other cards like Gossipmonger, Declaration of War (which is in Reckoning. I noticed you don't use any Reckoning cards, but I'll suggest it anyway), or maybe even Mantle of Brutality (because it puts creatures in your Cemetery), which all can be used to keep the Twisted Sorcerer around.

I would suggest perhaps focusing the deck more on Legion of Skulls and sacrificing abilities. Lots of your spells will have very little impact on that 'combo' or sorts, and could be replaced with more creatures to bolster your Legion. I had a lot of fun playing with the "Dark Union" preconstructed deck, which based itself around sacrificing creatures and using Legion of Skulls to win, and I think this has potential to be a much stronger version of that deck. Keep posting updates, and I'm sure I will keep posting suggestions.

[RobPro]

Reading through the cards again, Sneaky Snyder's affect was how I planned to recruit items from the deck. I didn't realize there were separate discard and cemetery piles at the time, but I bet I can work something out.

Got two Reckoning boxes coming in the mail soon, maybe they hold the answer.