Feln Reanimator Elves

This is a elf tribal deck utilizing void synergies.

Card choices:

Pitfall Trap: Extra interaction against aggressive decks, aegis units, or face aegis. Provides a relic to turn on your Zende, the Heart-Binder and discards units to reanimate with Haunting Scream, Zende, the Heart-Binder, or Vara, Fate-Touched.

Suffocate: Some early interaction. I prefer Suffocate to interact with Statuary Maiden.

Haunting Scream: Versatile card in the deck. You can nut draw with Direwood Beastcaller making two early 5/5s, bring back a Lethrai Skystrider to fill up your graveyard further and dig for a Grasping at Shadows, bring back Kerendon Merchant to get a reanimation piece, or Lethrai Skystrider / Tavia, Lethrai Raidleader to give your elves flying and extra damage.

Herald's Song: Puts cards in your void and provides 'free cards' to gain value from Kerendon Merchant or looting / discard cards: Pitfall Trap, Master Cartographer, and Tavia, Lethrai Raidleader.

Master Cartographer: Discard outlet and also an elf.

Tavia, Lethrai Raidleader: Sometimes you can get an aggressive curve with: turn two Tavia, Lethrai Raidleader, turn three Rhysta, Acantha's Herald, and turn four Lethrai Skystrider. You can Haunting Scream it to provide extra damage for you other elves, and works really well with Vara, Fate-Touched if a board stalls. You activate Tavia, Lethrai Raidleader's ability to discard a unit (for example), make two Dark Elf and then trigger Vara, Fate-Touched ability twice bringing back the unit you discarded.

Direwood Beastcaller: An elf that is a great Haunting Scream target. You can often Haunting Scream it the first time and then use Vara, Fate-Touched or Zende, the Heart-Binder's ability to bring it back later and it will still have flying and charge (similar to how Dark Return works). Also works well with Lethrai Skystrider to provide it with additional evasion.

Rhysta, Acantha's Herald: Another good three drop elf. Power fills your hand with cards to make your looting effects more effective or get you closer to five and six power for Grasping at Shadows and Zende, the Heart-Binder.

Lethrai Skystrider: This elf does so much for the deck. Provides card advantage by grabbing a spell, fills up void with units, and lets you fly over their board with your other elves to do lethal. Lethrai Skystrider is great if you can grab a Haunting Scream or Grasping at Shadows off it while simultaneously filling your void with units. Even if you whiff you are still digging yourself deeper towards a reanimation spell and potentially filling your void with units. Nice with Herald's Song to fill up your hand with fodder for your Kerendon Merchant and other discard and looting outlets.

Grasping at Shadows: Key targets are Zende, the Heart-Binder or Vara, Fate-Touched. This deck can operate like a traditional reanimator deck but rather than bringing back Vara, Fate-Touched and Azindel, Revealed you are bringing back Vara, Fate-Touched and Zende, the Heart-Binder and then flying over their board with Lethrai Skystrider and Tavia, Lethrai Raidleader damage.

Zende, the Heart-Binder: A payoff elf that is a key target for Grasping at Shadows or Vara, Fate-Touched's first trigger. Unlike Azindel, Revealed you can often just hard cast this with six power to stabilize a board. Smooths out the deck's power base with its pledge ability. Remember that Vara, Fate-Touched with Zende, the Heart-Binder will put seven units total in play: Vara, Fate-Touched, Zende, the Heart-Binder from Vara, Fate-Touched's trigger, two elves from Zende, the Heart-Binder's trigger, and three additional units from Vara, Fate-Touched's trigger.

Vara, Fate-Touched: Goal is to get Vara, Fate-Touched into the void and bring it back with Grasping at Shadows. You often will gain an overwhelming advantage through trading your units off early in combat or filling up your void in the meantime.

Powerbase: Chairman's Contract fill up your void. I have eight Shadow Sigil since you want to get them off Rhysta, Acantha's Herald's ability late in the game to trigger Tavia, Lethrai Raidleader's empower ability.

Market Choices:

Annihilate: Spot removal in a pinch. Key targets are Sandstorm Titan or various mono-faction fliers so your Lethrai Skystriders become active again.

Burglarize: This is a concession to Adjudicator's Gavel.

Haunting Scream, Grasping at Shadows, and Zende, the Heart-Binder: These are some of your best cards so you want additional virtual copies.

Common interaction and advice:

- Be cautious with your Rhysta, Acantha's Herald's warcry ability. You have many card draw and discard effects that interact with warcry units off the top of your deck. For example: You may want to play Lethrai Skystrider first and then attack with Rhysta, Acantha's Herald so as to not discard your warcried units.

- Sometimes you want to play units off curve so you can get also activate Pitfall Trap's looting ability.

- Sequencing correctly with Pitfall Trap can be tricky as you often are using its looting ability in conjunction with obtaining your turn's main objective. For example: You planned on Haunting Screaming a Direwood Beastcaller but while in the process of setting it up you activated Pitfall Trap's looting ability and were able to top deck and discard a Vara, Fate-Touched and bring it back with Grasping at Shadows instead.

- Don't hesitate to use Pitfall Trap's looting ability if your hand is empty. Discarding the top card off you deck can be useful in filling up your void with more units.

- This deck's combat math can get really tricky and you can often win out of nowhere especially if there is a Zende, the Heart-Binder and/or Vara, Fate-Touched involved with several Tavia, Lethrai Raidleader and an attacking Lethrai Skystrider. Be conscious of your ability to one turn kill your opponent while reanimating or playing your payoff elves.

- This deck has no life gain so against aggressive decks you want to try and stall with chump blocking to buy you time to set up your Grasping at Shadows or Zende, the Heart-Binder. Make sure to value your life total appropriately.

- Sometimes you will need to Haunting Scream a Lethrai Skystrider early on to help you build your void and dig for a Grasping at Shadows. Often you do very little damage with this attack but may be worth it for later. Remember that you need an additional elf in play since Lethrai Skystrider has elf ally so don't Haunting Scream it on an empty board!

- Haunting Scream will maintain the charge and flying battle skills on the unit once it is sacrificed. This works well if you bring it back later with Grasping at Shadows, Zende, the Heart-Binder, or Vara, Fate-Touched.

Cards I am not running:

This deck is a work in progress and there are cards that I am not running such as Dark Return, and Secret Passage that I want to fit in the deck. I also experimented with a list splashing justice for Privilege of Rank similar to what traditional reanimator does.