FJP Control (Pretend Armory) - NEW VERSION

Deck brewed by Rhike and The_Hierophant

Short Summary:

A multilayered win condition draw-go control deck with which, if piloted perfectly, can succeed against any archetype. It is not countered by any deck in the current metagame, if used by a good enough player. In fact, it counters the meta as far as our experience is concerned.

Stick around though, this deck needs serious explanation. Also requires serious experience in it.

General Strategy:

Winning with this deck: Surviving to exactly 6 mana, which is easier against some decks than others, then using Relic Weapons which you draw either normally or through Rise to the Challenge to create card advantage (by removing multiple minions or forcing multiple enemy cards to be used) or deal face damage, leaving the enemy to topdeck for potential answers while you pummel them down. When you run out of weapons, Display of Honor (4) to get two back to outvalue your opponent. Alternatively, West-Wind Herald from your market will enable you to re-use spells from your void, with Brilliant Idea being a legitimate win condition among them. As a last resort, especially against aggro, Xo works well as a finisher.

Against Control: The easiest matchup of them all, you can easily afford to Rise to the Challenge (4) into needed cards or win conditions along with your Merchants (6). You shouldn't have any problems getting answers to anything they put out, with Resurface giving you plenty of options to choose from (namely Bore), and Eilyn's Choice (4) in the main deck against any big spells like End of Hostilities (Relevant right now), Grasping at Shadows (Relevant right now), Solitude, Maul, Rain of Frogs, Channel the Tempest etc. Be wary of possible counterplay with cards like Unseal. Do not forget that in a pinch you can Rise into Merchants as well. As a possible win condition, you can rush the enemy by using Champion of Fury from your market along with your merchants and Throne Wardens.

Against Midrange: Your trump card will be Auric Runehammer (2) from Rise to the Challenge (4) which will let you remove any midrange threat in the game apart from very high HP ones like Worldbearer Behemoth, because it will have 6 damage. It is advised to use Molten Fist or Stonescar Maul against beefier targets like Amilli (I recommend using Polymorph or Display of Honor against them instead). Otherwise, use Eilyn's Choice (4), Display of Honor (4), Harsh Rule (2), and Polymorph from the market to remove any threat that does not have Aegis. Use fast spells wisely and alternate between defending yourself and drawing to outvalue midrange decks. You may use Rise to the Challenge (4) or Resurface to get various required cards (especially Harsh Rule from Resurface), but some matchups don't let you do that too much, so you might need to rely on conventional means to survive.

Against Aggro: Use Defiance (4), Torrential Downpour, and Hailstorm from your market. If all else fails, employ removal aimed against midrange, Harsh Rule (2), and Display of Honor (4) on your units, especially the Jennev Merchant 4 (cannot be torched or permafrosted) or Champion of Fury to lifesteal back up. When they run out of steam due to you getting value out of sweepers, draws and unit/weapon trades, finish them off with any means possible. If you draw a bad hand full of Rise to the Challenge, get Throne Warden (6/4 heal for 4) to keep you in the game.

Explaining Rise to the Challenge

If you treat this card as garbage: The deck has a lot of survivability, so having a dead card in your hand doesn't amount to much and can be counted as a sigil draw. Your usual win conditions, if you topdeck them, are just as dead in your hand as this card until their turn. Besides, for win conditions to be consistent you need to run multiples, which muddies the deck - this deck can afford to run 1 ofs easily. Drawing Rise opens you up to a gallery of cards on any turn after the 3rd, not only one set win condition. Do not forget that this deck has a lot of cycling from Crests and Strategize which allows further dead card removal (and you can pull those dead cards back when you need them with Rise)
If you treat this card as a tempo loss: The card has an extremely strong synergy with Auric Runehammer which gives you the ability to cleanly trade with most threats, and playing it on curve against midrange (Rise on 4, Hammer on 5) is viable as far as our playtesting goes. Other relic weapons benefit from this as well, especially Starsteel Daisho with TWELVE DAMAGE to face on turn 6.
If you'd rather just play merchant: The market can only hold 5 cards. All of them except Icaria are defensive, and they're limited in influence. You can be flexible and choose the exact card you need in a given situation with Rise, which has a larger pool.

Let me explain every single card that you might want to pull with Rise, and possible scenarios where you'd use it.
Merchants are self-explanatory, although that's a big tempo loss to Rise. However, this deck doesn't need tempo. Rise into Merchant is 7 power, you can use any market options next turn.
Auric Runehammer is one the main reasons to Rise, explained above.
Throne Warden is an amazing defensive drop that is a 2 for 1 because of Aegis and immediately heals you and buffs up your Relic Weapons. Becomes a 6/4 with Rise, which trades the same way like Runehammer but in a unit form - ignoring Aegis.
Starsteel Daisho is your main win condition because of how early into the game you can play it and how much damage it deals (12).
Molten Fist is the defensive relic weapon option, for when you want to smash up midrange units and still retain your weapon. Better than Sword of the Sky King because you can cast it on turn 6.
Stonescar Maul is similar to Molten Fist, where Molten Fist does 8 damage. However, Overwhelm on this weapon is extremely important and allows you to chip through tokens like Polymorph targets or Grenadin (Scrappy Hour).
Xo of the Endless Hoard, if pulled by Rise, is an alternate win condition that also has an immediate effect in form of a draw spell. This way, it's not a dead card to have in the openind hand as well.

With that out of the way, let's review the Market.
Champion of Fury is a proactive play that closes out games, but, MOST IMPORTANTLY, it's a clean answer to all sites. Relic weapons cannot target sites. A good turn 5 play is ChaFu into Display of Honor, as well.
Hailstorm makes most aggro decks fall apart.
Polymorph is a solid anti-revenge anti-recursion removal which leaves a token that dies to your merchants.
Resurface lets you pull any spell in your deck to the top, such as Bore, Harsh Rule, Display of Honor, Brilliant Idea, and so on. Extremely flexible and it is simply a spell version of Rise.
West-Wind Herald is an extremely flexible market addition which lets you re-cast any spell you have previously casted (or had it discarded), and also serves as a chip unit against any type of deck that doesn't use flying units. Survives Torrential Downpour, but not Hailstorm. Once again, casting Brilliant Idea with him is game-winning because you get to amplify without paying the initial cost.

Miscellaneous
Two Torrential Downpour are great against aggro, can do anything a Snowball can do, like removing Runehammer. Suck a bit against midrange, hence having two of them. Also they clean up the Goats after Display of Honor.
We run two Auric Runehammer for semi-guaranteed Rise value, an increased chance of drawing it (because it's a good card), and to expend weapons to recur from the void. Why not 4? Because Hammer redundancy is dangerous, talking from experience. Ultimately, it's a dead card vs aggro.
Strategize (4) lets us put our wincons away in the deck without fear, as Rise will fetch them back.
Wisdom of the Elders (4) gives us plenty of value to overpower other decks.
Exactly 6 merchants is the perfect balance for this deck.
Two Eilyn's Favor are for face aegis, which is important against things like Sabotage off Regent's Tomb or Solitude.
This deck usually wins the topdeck war because of the sheer amount of value you can get. 6 Merchants, 4 Rises, 1 Xo, 1 Daisho, 1 Maul, 1 Molten Fist, 4 DoH, 9 draw cards.
We've tried a lot of things. And I mean a lot. Most of what people may suggest may have already been tried. We didn't have Rise for a while at first. We had two. Then three. Then four. It only made our deck better. So did the other cards.
The aggro vs midrange removal has been thoroughly tested and thought about. Those are the ideal amounts as of this meta.
Countering Azindel's Gift is really easy - Merchant into Resurface is a 7 mana play, topdeck Bore next turn. Alternatively, use it proactively to keep your hand. Read the opponent, heh.
If you're stuck with a lot of power and a merchant or two in lategame, Resurface into Rise into Daisho/DoH works.

Before you ask, yes, this deck is teched to win against FTP Mid, FJS, Warhelm Rakano, Maul, TPS Relic Control, Vara Reanimator, Combrei Empower Crew and Kennadins. The only thing this deck is soft to right now is relic tempo through things like Golem Press and Xenan Obelisk due to a bit costly access to Bore. Haunted Highway could pose a threat because we don't have ways to tutor Gavel, but we run a lot of fast spells. Reanimator is countered by Eilyn's Choice.