Classic Ixtun Gardens shell with a twist! You've probably seen the combo before, but for those who haven't: the game plan is to survive long enough to draw 1x
Solfire and 2x
Trail Stories and use them to burn out your opponent. You can obviously deal 27 damage with 9 mana, 24 with 8 mana, 21 with 7, etc etc. I've found a surprising amount of consistency with this combo in this specific list. That being said, the remaining card choices explained:
Plunk Wumpkin: My most recent addition to this list. Don't know how I didn't think of adding him sooner, considering his relevance. Just a strong, sticky unit that helps us draw cards and get damage on our opponent early, the latter being quite a bit more significant than I originally considered.
Bulletshaper: His ultimate seems incredibly useful in this list. To be honest, though, I've yet to have it be a game-winning ability. That being the case, if I had to make changes to this list he's the first card I'd look at slimming/cutting. In theory, though, 2 extra mana on your combo turn is incredibly useful. He also has the added benefit of making our
Rakano Cylixs do their thing more consistently by providing influence. He soaks hard removal as well, but this usually doesn't matter too much since we don't run any other units without aegis (to be fair, though, most opponents won't know this so it creates an interesting mind game/bluff).
Garden of Omens: This has consistently been one of the better sites in the game ever since its addition. Comes with semi-hard (can't think of a better word lol) removal attached to it with
Ice Bolt, can draw our combo pieces with
Resurface, and, if need be, can deal with pesky attachments with
Melt Down. Basically just has 3 good spells on it and has the additional, very strong benefit of making it so that all of our spells, notably
Harsh Rule, can't be countered or blocked by aegis while it's on the board.
Draw choices:
Strategize,
Wisdom of the Elders,
Honor of Claws
Removal choices:
Defiance,
Hailstorm,
Harsh Rule
The market access I went with for the deck is
Transpose because it can be used to pop player aegis or deal additional face damage and can be played at fast speed. The 4 cost market options in Ixtun are quite good as well, as you can see:
Elemental Fury: Probably the card I've marketed for the most so far. Deals with wide boards when you don't draw
Hailstorm and can also be used to deal with sites, which we otherwise don't have any removal for besides having to commit a
Solfire.
Furnace Mage: I've only had to grab him a couple times so far, but I feel much safer playing this list on ladder when I have even more ways of dealing with annoying attachments.
Long Live the Queen: Probably the first market card I'd change if I had to pick one, considering I don't think I've had to grab it yet. I do think it's cute to be able to
Transpose at fast speed to grab and immediately play a counterspell, though. Could definitely be switched out for the more common transpose market option in
Rejection, but I do think the card draw from
Long Live the Queen is especially useful in this deck specifically.
Resurface: Draws combo pieces. Nuff said.
Turn to Seed: Very common market card at this point. Hard removal that can also be used to deal with strategies that use annoying units like
Dawnwalker.
I've done a decent amount of testing, but I'd love to hear any improvement ideas that y'all can think of.