Pirates and Ninjas and Smokestacks - Oh my!

[Gizmo]

Parrots
4 Spiketail Hatchling
4 Spire Owl

Pirates
4 Rishadan Cutpurse
4 Rishadan Footpad
4 Rishadan Brigand

Ninjas
4 Mistblade Shinobi
3 Ninja Of The Dark Hours

4 Tangle Wire
3 Smokestack
3 Opposition

3 God's Eye, Gate To The Reikei
19 Island


I've wanted to make a Pirate deck ever since they came out, but they were never really competitive. I've had a fresh look at them here, and there's really two side to the Pirates if you want to maximise their effectiveness. Pirates CAN trade 2-1, but can also trade 0-1 if the opponent has the mana and the Pirates are just speedbumping bigger creatures, so you have to tackle both sides. Tangle Wire/Smokestack/Opposition are not only three cards that reduce your opponents mana available (making them vulnerable to the Pirate's CIP ability) but they also work on the basics - permanents - so to a Smokestack a Cutpurse is as valuable as a Myojin.

The Ninjas were added as a whim, they're tempo advantage and also allow you to reuse the Pirates, as another weakness of Pirates was only ever having 12 of them, so you'd only expect to draw 1 or 2 early on. If the Ninjas become the focal point of the deck I'd probably find some way of sneaking in Cloud Sprites (for 2nd turn Ninja drops) or something to give them evasion in midgame.

 

[evan d]

Looks fun. Why exactly the god eye? I like to play two in a row.

 

[orgg]

That's pretty nice. However, the old Type 2 Pirate deck used a few things that bounced land as well... Possibly a few boomerangs would work well? I'd pull one of each Parrot and two of the big pirate/bird.

 

[Jigglypuff]

Clever. I especially like the Ninjas allowing you to re-use the pirate dudes. Umbilicus/Blood Clock may also be interesting in the deck. It'd give you another way to return your pirate dudes and also helps your opponents stay low on permanents. Storm Cauldron would be pretty funny here, too. I also saw Overburden being used in a pirate deck.

(- Steve -)

 

[jorael]

Arrrrrr matey!

In multiplayer/2-headed giant, but also in duels Rhystic Study is big annoyance for opponents. Either it slows them down, or you draw cards or they can't protect themselves against the pirates.

Crystal Shard also taxes your opponent's mana and you can use it to reuse your pirates. I personally really like Withdraw as it is a cheap answer vs. decks that start really aggressive. Man-'o-War is also very good for this (or just return a pirate).

I'm not sure that you could call ninjutsu a way to gain tempo advantage: you return a creature to your hand.

Tangle Wire, Smokestack & Opposition look really nasty. I don't have those cards, so my pirate-build looks a bit more budget. I used a bunch of counterspells and tweaked the deck for 2-headed giant games (hence my choice for withdraw). The pirates became very infamous Good luck with your deck!

Arrrrrrrrr!
20 Island
4 Faery Conclave

4 Spiketail Hatchling
4 Man-'o-War
12 Rishadan pirates

4 Rhystic Deluge
4 Withdraw
4 Miscalculation
4 Force Spike

 

[Gizmo]

Ok, nice comments guys... from the top...

God's Eye is in mostly so that I sacrifice it to Smokestack and get another permanent to sacrifice next turn. I've not thought about if there's better lands I can use yet.

The Boomerang's role is pretty much the Tangle Wires, I'm not bouncing the land I'm tying it down for a while. I've also considered Fade Away in that slot, which is much better against creature-heavy decks decks (and maybe people taking this deck on would want to consider the Fade). Maybe if there was something that was like "U, Sorcery, Both players return a permanent to their hands" I'd be using that as it would give me the Pirates back. Boomerang certainly wouldnt be bad, but I'm not sure I'd be dropping key creatures to include them.

I'd forgotten Storm Cauldron even existed until I ran into somebody playing it last week. I just feel with Cauldron it's something you dont really benefit from as it effects both players equally, whereas both Tangle Wire and Smokestack have inbuilt advantages to them. Umbilicus would be good but they'd probably be too happy to lose the life and keep their creatures around, also you never know you wont meet a deck using better 187 effects than you.

I don't own Crystal Shard - its from the expansions I wasnt playing for, it would definately fit the deck nicely and I might look into adding some in, especially if the Ninjas dont work out (btw the tempo advantage I mentioned of the Ninja was more to do with their saboteur ability, as least for the Shinobi).

Oh, BTW that deck listed is only 59 cards - I wrote my spells out planning on 23 land, then when I got to the land changed my mind and put in 22. Add in whatever you want, I guess - I think I want a couple of Minamo Sightbenders in there.

 

[Gizmo]

Day Of Dragons... your measly Pirates morph into asskicking dragons, then when the Day is destroyed they come back to reactivate.

SCORE!