Card/Deck U/B Ninjutsu

I think I finally found a way to change my Dimir archetype into Ninjas. I envision the archetype not as actual tribal but as a tempo deck getting value from the ninjas ninjutsu and saboteur abilities. But first I'd like to check if the riptide gang has (as usual) something useful to say to that topic.

For starters, you'd need a bunch of ninjas, I guess. Those here are my favorites currently (but I probably need more):



Here are all the cards with the ninjutsu ability: https://scryfall.com/search?q=o:ninjutsu&unique=cards&as=grid&order=color&dir=
Sucks a bit that 4 of them are gold cards, since I only have 2 slots in Dimir for them. I wonder how many actual Ninjas a 40 card deck with a low curve wants.

My first idea was to pair them with cheap EtB creatures that fit the tempo nature of the deck, optimally being evasive too. Stuff like this:



Cards like these are far from narrow and work well with a blink theme, which I have in WU like many others here. I already run a few incidentally.

Now, you could add stuff that makes your ninjas come trough. But I think you'll start looking at narrow cards quickly. Stuff like Artful Dodge just doesn't seem appealing for any non-ninja-drafters, and maybe not even there, it will be too great. Things might change if one does also run archetypes like heroic or auras, but for me that's not the case. Since we're in blue/black though, I think the best thing to do is grabbing some bounce and kill spells to keep the path clear, once you ninjutsu'd a ninja or two into play. EtB bounce/kill guys like Man-o'-war or Nekrataal seem especially sweet.

But in general, evasive creatures and those with EtB abilities are great cube cards for most power levels anyway. I imagine and hope, the Ninjas will be a cool element to tie them together in a tricky archetype. But before I start with the work (it will be days), I'm eager to hear your thoughts. Probably there are many cool cards to add and things to try within that archetype, as well as traps to pass - all of which I haven't thought of yet.
 
One of the best non-official ninja's



He get's through, he is cheap to recast and he can trigger your Dimir ninjas.

Also wears equipment like a champ and can randomly enable zombie or human synergies you might have.

Also, not a ninja, but fits the saboteur theme



2 mana Ophidian type card is solid!
 
Oh yeah, Changeling Outcast is a given, even with the minimal tribal synergy within this archetype. Drawing an extra card every now and then is a nice bonus on top of an already solid attacker (I've run Tormented Soul in the past).

I just tested a few rounds with this deck against the deck my girlfriend drafted during todays 4-people draft (it was a solid WU blink deck. The draft happened before any changes).

Gruul Aggro Madness from CubeTutor.com











15 of those 23 cards are already in my cube, so that's a good thing. The games also went pretty well. I quickly realized that Ink-Eyes is indeed too powerful on the board for my meta. We swapped her out for Ninja of the New Moon, but I didn't draw him. I'm not too happy with the black Ninjas beyond Okiba-Gang and Throat Slitter. Azra Smokeshaper was decent at least, comes in cheap to rebuy an EtB and is of decent size. What I'm very happy with is the way this deck played. It was aggressive, but clearly not aggro, playing more like value orientated aggro-control. And it also worked well enough without the ninjas, even though I was always happy to draw one.

Today I also won a draft 3-0(6-0)with a really synergistic Gruul Madness deck. From now on you might hear me talk and complain more about U/B Ninjas actually! :D
 
I really fucking hate that last sentence on Yuriko. It takes the card from another Deep Hours and makes it a not-too-unreasonable 7 damage hit on turn 2.

Other than that, my current project has most of what you listed. My WU themes are blink and flyers, so it sits right next to it perfectly.
 
I really fucking hate that last sentence on Yuriko. It takes the card from another Deep Hours and makes it a not-too-unreasonable 7 damage hit on turn 2.

Other than that, my current project has most of what you listed. My WU themes are blink and flyers, so it sits right next to it perfectly.

I'd just play Ingenious Infiltrator and leave it at that, Yuriko does nothing fair.
 

Onderzeeboot

Ecstatic Orb
Yuriko is the bee's knees and hasn't been breaking my format. At all.

i don't run the entire gamut of ninjas though.
 
Is Yuriko really a problem in single player games? I mean for 7 damage on turn 2 you'd need to reveal a 6 drop. I'd also be cool with playing Silent-Blade Oni. I don't think Fallen Shinobi is any less busted, I'd say more actually.

On a positive note: Higure proved in testing to be great (but fair) even with just 3-4 targets in your 40. The last ability is a useful game-ender, just the right power level for my cube.
 
Ninja of the Deep Hours and Moonblade Shinobi are pretty cool to play with, Mistblade Shinobi and Throat Slitter are cards I'm not sure of. Okiba-Gang Shinobi and Ninja of the New Moon could both be interesting if their Ninjutsu was 1 mana cheaper. Fallen Shinobi is interesting, but I hesitate adding cards that make you play with your opponent's cards (the only reason why I'm not sure if I should try cards like The Eldest Reborn and Soul Seizer).

All in all, I love Ninjutsu, as it has a surprise factor and is a great way of reusing EtB, it's cooler than the majority of blink cards.
 
I think Okiba-Gang Shinobi is great. A Mindrot on a 3/2 for 4 can be pretty devastating in my experience.


Had anyone cubed with Sakashima's Student? I don't think it's unfair and I'll test it to find out, but still I'm a liiitttlle worried. It's not quite Phantasmal Image, but kinda close, right? I mean, clone effects probably scale quite well with the environment, but what's a fair cost for the ability?
 
...but I hesitate adding cards that make you play with your opponent's cards (the only reason why I'm not sure if I should try cards like The Eldest Reborn and Soul Seizer)...

Why? This is where all the gravy happens :)
And by gravy I mean you have your main course which are the themes you run but games will sometimes feel a bit like the same if you’ve played 20 games with them so enter the gravy: Villain’s cards. This is how variaty and adapting to new situations on the fly may happen.

I really like your Gruul Madness and Dimir Sabojutsu

What themes are you running for the 8 other Guilds?
 
Why? This is where all the gravy happens :)
And by gravy I mean you have your main course which are the themes you run but games will sometimes feel a bit like the same if you’ve played 20 games with them so enter the gravy: Villain’s cards. This is how variaty and adapting to new situations on the fly may happen.

I really like your Gruul Madness and Dimir Sabojutsu

What themes are you running for the 8 other Guilds?

{G/U} is landfall with lots of ramp and card draw, as well as ways to bounce your lands or play more than 1 per turn.

{U/R} is spell focused control, counterspells, draw and removal until you can finish the game with a handful of instant/sorcery payoffs.

{R/W} is gowide aggro, where you use 1-drops and cheap token makers in combination with anthems and similar effects.

{W/B} is lifegain, which I also made pretty aggressive to prevent endless, boring games. Aggressive cards that cost life or trigger on lifegain help.

{B/G} is value dredge, where you use and recur stuff from the graveyard and get more and more power with every creature in your graveyard.

{W/U} is midrange-y blink, getting more draw/life/tokens by retriggering EtBs, although I try to keep the blink targets fair to allow strong engine cards.

{B/R} is a grindy, almost control-ish version of the sacrifice deck, saccing recursive skeletons or creatures with death triggers over and over again, bleeding opponents to death.

{G/W} is going wide to the fullest with a slow but strong token deck, generating advantage with some sweet little combos.

I also have 5 archetypes centered in a single color:

{W} is the classic white wheenie deck, playing many small creatures that make each other stronger, supportet by anthems and such.

{U} is the control color, where you can play the drawgo-game, often splashed with black, red or white.

{B} is the egoistic devotion color, having the one archetype that actively encourages you to not play other colors, and rewarding you for lots of swamps and black mana symbols.

{R} supports the wildfire/big red deck with sweepers and finishers, often splashing 2 colors. Mono red is incidentally often aggro, because of gruul/boros support and burn.

{G} is the ramp color and allows for splashes easily. All those crazy Gx decks happen.
 
Just wanted to give a shoutout to this guy:




He played better than he looked so far. 6 power is just alot on a 4-drop and enables both, trading up with fatties and killing opponents out of nowhere. If they would've pushed this guy any further, he could maybe even be a tad too strong for my specific environment.
 
Actually thought about trying it, too, as 6 damage on t4 looks pretty good. Giving a tool to UWBG (which is my EtB section) while also supporting aggro sounds very good to me.
 


Seem like fun ways to make white a good support for ninja decks without ignoring traditional white aggro

edit: The first card is Kitesail Cleric and it looks like the auto-image isn't ready for ZNR yet
 
I wonder how many actual Ninjas a 40 card deck with a low curve wants.

Prowess in M21 has a tempo (granted, UR not UB) feel, and has an as-draft appearance rate of ~7-8 cards per draft (if all cards were randomly drafted, you'd see ~5 per seat).

In CHKx2 BOKx1 and CBS block draft, ninjutsu had an as-draft appearance rate of ~7 cards per draft.

In MH1x3, ninjutsu had an as-draft appearance rate of ~8.5 cards per draft.


In a 360 cube you'd want around 8 ninjas minimum probably, 10 would probably be better. 12 is heading toward 'feels generous'.


A big part of putting the UB ninja deck together in CHKx2BOKx1 was finding a way to make stuff unblockable, there were ~2 of these per draft typically.

edit: for how many the deck would play if you could have as many as you wanted? probably 10. Depends a bit on the quality of the rest of Dimir since Ninjas that aren't getting in on their Ninjutsu triggers are usually a bit behind curve.
 
Ninjas aren't parasitic in the same way that prowess or traditional tribal decks are, IMO. It's more of a value tempo deck that happens to abuse ninjitsu and saboteur triggers. I think you can have a {U} or {B} based tempo deck with only 2-3 ninjas and still feel good about things.
 
Sure, but 8 ninjas in the cube doesn't mean 8 ninjas at the UB seat. (in the above retail cases you'd get something like 5 on average in a random seat if cards were drafted randomly.)

If the plan is for "ninjutsu" to be a theme, you need some density to make that happen. If it's just "UB tempo where sometimes I have ninja of the deep hours" that's different, but it's also not "UB Ninjutsu" as an intentional draft archetype.
 
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