Growing Allies - Selfmade Fatties

[Peavey]

Hi!

I'm playing this wonderful game now for 1 1/2 weeks and decided to play a shadow mage.
In my youth I played Magic from end of 4th Edition to Middle of 6th Edition and stopped because as a poor student I had not enough money to more.

My actual deck is following, with it my rating is between 228 and 235:

Majiva

Allies:
4x Ironhide Karash
2x Infernal Gargoyle
2x Voracious Arachnid
4x Evolving Abomination
4x Phoenix Urigon

4x Fireball
2x Lightning Strike
2x Supernova
4x Stoneskin
4x Bloodthirsty
3x Transmogrification Curse
4x Tome of Knowledge

Total: 40 Cards

My thinking is to create a growing ally with Bloodthirsty and/or Stoneskin and sometimes it works well (best was Arachnid with 13 damage 5 health), somestimes not. With adding 2x Infernal Gargoyle (with both attachments it's a tough Ally) and remove 2x Arachnid it works better, but I feel this could run better.

Today I've got the Shadow Crystals for a Raikka deck.
My thought of making the deck more well running:
- Adding Rampant Krygon and Death Collector.
- Change drawing engine from TOK to Amulet of Conjuring.
- Maybe it runs better with Gravebone instead of Majiva?

Hopefully any shadow mage expert could help me out or can share his experiences that such deck can't run well.

[blueblurr]

This type of deck world much better with Elementalis. You have no way to buff HP. AoE like Supernova is going to ruin your day.

Also, you have no attachment hate. Warriors are going to ruin your day.

Day ruined

[dejvo]

AS blueblurr said, you have no way to deal with warriors.

I would probably drop Stoneskin and Bloodthirsty and add Sacrificial lamb, this way you can sac disabled allies and get cards, this also helps Arachnid to grow. Also 3x Transmog curse is bit of a overkill, two is enough. Add 3 Rapacious Vermin to deal with attachments and he's pretty solid T2 drop anyway. Add 2 lightning strikes.

AoC in current meta is not a good draw engine, last change has killed it. It's good for finishing move, but other than that, I don't recommend it as primary draw engine (now only usable with rush Aramia).

This kind of deck actually works best with Maiya, don't know why, but it's like that (tried similar with Raikka & GB).

[Peavey]

Thanks for your advices, I changed and tested my deck last week and had a peak of 252 in the rating and pendled between 245-250.

In the new season I started with a winning streak of 6 or 7 wins to 262 points against Warriors, Hunters, Mages, Rogues... than I lost against a member of Warriors of the Blue Phoenix Guild

Actual build is:

Majiya

2x Cinderborn Fatebreaker
3x Rapacious Vermin
4x Ironhide Karash
3x Voracious Arachnid
4x Evolving Abomination
4x Phoenix Urigon

3x Transmogrification Curse
4x Fireball
4x Lightning Strike
2x Supernova

3x Sacrificial Lamb
4x Tome of Knowledge

Total: 41 cards

Last change was from 2x Stoneskin to 2x Cinderborn Fatebreaker, which was nice upgrade. Next test is reducing or exchange Voracious Arachnid with another allie, the feeling is that this is acutal the weakest point in the deck.

Supernova saved my ass in 2 of the last 4 matches and it's my favourite "Finish Move", I never will drop it

*** Edit 7th April ***
Heighten up to rating ~295, peak of 299 with above deck.