Hi all,
I was thinking about the card [mtg_card]Smallpox[/mtg_card] recently. When I got back into the game at M12 I dismissed it as garbage (it’s an easy new player mistake to look at a card with symmetrical effects like that and just see it as something that hurts you).
Older (depressingly so) and wiser (insufficiently so) I thought I’d have a crack at making up some decks that make use of it. So I’ve started working on some deck lists that use it.
Specifically deck lists in the modern format (I know legacy even less than modern, one of these days I’ll finish the last couple of cards for my all foil “just for fun” legacy deck and show it off here) which use four copies of [mtg_card]Smallpox[/mtg_card] and two copies of [mtg_card]Liliana of the Veil[/mtg_card] (because I own two Lilianas and I figure the two cards pair rather well).
[d title="Modern Smallpox 1 - WB Control"]
Creatures
2 Fulminator Mage
4 Vampire Nighthawk
Spells
4 Smallpox
4 Thoughtseize
2 Wrath of God
2 Disfigure
2 Geth's Verdict
2 Go for the Throat
2 Hero's Downfall
2 Victim of Night
Planeswalkers
2 Elspeth, Sun's Champion
2 Liliana of the Veil
2 Ob Nixilis Reignited
2 Sorin, Lord of Innistrad
Enchantments
2 Bitterblossom
Lands
2 Ghost Quarter
4 Godless Shrine
2 Plains
4 Shambling Vent
12 Swamp
Sideboard
2 Barter in Blood
2 Despise
2 Dismember
3 Duress
2 Fulminator Mage
4 Lifebane Zombie
[/d]
The basic plan here is to land a planeswalker or bitterblossom and then grind your opponent out with control spells until you can hit a big finisher like Elspeth. The Fulminator Mages are some additional anti-tron support. The Nighthawks are interchangeable with plenty of other things, they’re mostly there to gain some life and block, plus they might come in handy against some aggro decks that take an early lead.