The objective of the deck is, with
Talir, Who Sees Beyond, a merchant or
Last Chance/
Dark Return, and one other card in hand, play Talir, then play a merchant or Last Chance/Dark Return one to get
Vodakhan, Temple Speaker out of the market, then Do What Comes Naturally; play a bunch of units, draw through your deck, and get
Grinva, Judge of Battles into your hand.
Then you sacrifice Vodakhan or one of your big units to play Grinva, dealing massive damage to the enemy player.
Unraveler of Destinies can sacrifice your entire board at once, letting you do over 200 damage in one fell swoop. Plus if you hit it during the combo you can sacrifice all of your small units to increase the chance of getting important stuff, like
Mystic Ascendant.
Punching aggro in the face and making it like it:
Swap Power Stones, Voice, Meditant, and/or Unravelers for the following:
Sandstorm Titan against fliers and permafrost-based aggro:
+Helps stall against aggro, is a time unit and will not make it harder to go off with the combo
-Must replace things that make the combo go off smoother
Vara, Vengeance-Seeker against go-wide and aegis aggro:
+Incredibly strong, can stall extremely hard
-Not a time unit, and will make it harder to go off with the combo
Moonstone Vanguard against slower aggro:
+Draws cards, is a time unit and will not make it harder to go off with the combo
-Must replace things that make the combo go off smoother, costs 5 and is thus notably slower than SST or Vara.
Defiance against go-tall aggro:
+Stops Plate on Red Canyon and other 3-drops
-Not a time unit, and will make it harder to go off with the combo
Anti-aggro replacement pros/cons:
Power Stone:
+If replaced with SST, makes combo go off more often
-Replacing reduces amount of ramp, may slow setup
Voice of the Speaker:
+Not very useful unless the combo is going off, replacing increases overall deck strength
-Replacing massively lowers potential damage, reduces potential available power at end of combo, slightly weakens Mystic Ascendants
Temple Artisan:
+Few downsides to replacing
-Replacing lowers potential damage, has pledge, can swing for 16 sometimes
Unraveler of Destinies:
+Costs 7, making it the second-costliest thing you want to hardcast
-Replacing makes the combo much less smooth, and replacing both makes dealing lethal damage potentially impossible against some decks
Market options:
Swap Eternity Core, Dissociate, and/or Dark Return for the following:
Find the Way:
+Not vulnerable to relic removal, can be swapped back by merchants
-Much slower than Eternity Core, cannot let you jump from 4 power to 7 in one turn, requires that you swap Amethyst Waystones for Shadow Sigils
Lost Scroll:
+Not vulnerable to relic removal
-Slightly slower than Eternity Core, only accessible via Ebon Dune Smuggler, requires that you swap Amethyst Waystones for Shadow Sigils
Disjunction:
+Better at removing relics than Dissociate, can get back Power Stone and Eternity Core
-Cannot stop counterspells
Excavate:
+Can prevent decking out if combo lacks sufficient damage, can be accessed by Auralian Merchant
-Worse than Dark Return at basically everything else
It can be bigger than Serene Meditant almost always and has pledge as well.