This deck has not been tested yet, since I am out of wildcards. The janking will continue however once I am done. Be free to put in some feedback.

Abzan Verspermalarky

Good evening, folks, Shdorsh here from Failure Guaranteed. With the release of Jumpstart: Modern Horizons, we got a bunch of brand new cards. These can be used, of course, in very janky ways, so I decided to make my own take on a new combo right here. Let's see what this is about while I learn to memorize the shards' and wedges' names (Shdorsh, It's Abzan, you moron):

 The combo

 With the release of the new perpetually mechanics, that change a card for the whole match no matter where it goes (professionals are currently arguing whether this might even include up your butt), most people were crying out that we might become Hearthstone 2.0, while real jankers revelled in the thought. It wouldn't be too long before people started thinking of running this in endless combo decks.

So basically, this deck toys around the idea to give your Vesperlark forever 1 power and -1 toughness with Davriel's Withering, which makes it die as soon as it comes into play. Once Vesperlark has entered the graveyard already, its rules text takes effect, which makes it return a card from your graveyard.

What's that? A Vesperlark that now has less than or equal 1 power? Sure, let's bring it back and see it die right away, as it is a 1/-1! You highly likely see where this loop is going. Now, how do we take advantage of this?

Turning the engine into raw damage

So, this is it: All we need with this card is another creature or enchantment that deals damage each time a creature of yours dies. Luckily, there's quite a number for this to run well:

• Cruel Celebrant gives an additional 1 life, if you really need it. It  should work pretty well for surviving a tiny bit more, I guess, as it is also a blocker.
• Bastion of Remembrance  is the same in enchantment form, which comes with a free 1/1 that you can use to shield yourself.
• Blood Artist is the same thing, only without the need for white mana and targets a single opponent. This means hexproof will render it non-functional.

Drawing what you need quickly

Problems with combos usually lie in the game's inconsistency (or variance). You can't get the combo going because you're lacking 1 card and you're left with cards that are pretty bad outside of the context of their synergy. The opponent probably disrupts the combo before it can start while your one card is hiding in your deck and it's over, as you lose too much time: Your lifepoints dwindle and the opponent gets bigger an bigger creatures or fills his hand with counterspells. As such, I have found a bunch of cards that could fit well in here.

Rushed Rebirth works nicely to get something that synergizes with your about to be modded Vesperlark card. Just think of applying it before Davriel's Withering, please.

Collected Company also helps putting the whole combo except Davriel's Withering on the board, except it costs 4 and is clunky. I hence decided to exchange it for a Fauna Shaman: With 18 creatures, we got enough to sacrifice anyway. I would have loved that Wizards of the Coast put in Eladamri's Call in the set, as we are quite starved on creature fetches. Diabolic Intent would have been a close second, Altar of Bone a third. There's also the stupid idea of putting in a few Season of Growth and looping the Vesperlark infinitely until you can see your whole deck and choose a nice spot where you'd like to continue the draw with the scry, but that's... very questionable. I might have to try it for the memes.

I still got 2 Harrow in the deck, just to thin it out without losing too much tempo. We don't have many basic lands, but we aren't running tons of land fetches anyway. A little edit here for clarification, these lands do come in untapped, which means that if you got only green mana or you're missing one color, this card pretty much saves the day. Wonderful.

Instrument of the Bards can help if your Vesperlark is hiding below the top 6 cards in your library. Just think of keeping it at 3 counters and not going above that number.

Halp, my combo is in my graveyard!

No worries, mate, I got you covered. In case Davriel's Withering is the missing piece because you used it as a defense against an opponent's creatures, Mavinda, Students' Advocate can help you cast it from your graveyard. So long as you target your own creature, which will be Vesperlark, of course, you can cast it for the same cost. Else, it will cost you a whopping 8 more mana.

In case a creature is missing, Mavinda, Students' Advocate can help too so long as you got Rushed Rebirth in your graveyard: You put it on your Vesperlark, kill it with Davriel's Withering and instantly search for a Cruel Celebrant or Blood Artist, finishing the opponent off for 3 mana.

Else I also have a few Call of the Death-Dweller, which lets you put any creature in your graveyard into play since all of them are 3 mana at most. I doubt you'll need the deathtouch and menace, but I guess it can help you out in a pinch. This turns your graveyard into a combo storage, from which you can always finish off your opponent. Come on, tell me I'm genius, baby! I even put in a Malakir Rebirth in case you need Mavinda to survive.

Land Base

We're running 3 colors, so mana screw can always be a thing. Luckily, Indatha Triome lets us cover all our basic needs right away. As it comes in tapped, the pathways do the rest so that we can get what we need as quickly as possible.

Matchups

Since I haven't gotten a lot of feedback, it is hard to tell. There are a couple of cards that might ruin this deck real hard though and it is foreseeable how:

• Test of Talents could be very deadly if the opponent has it: It removes all your Davriel's Withering right away and makes sure you can't run the combo. Without combo, this deck becomes pretty much garbage, as you only have 2/2 at most.
• Anything that would interrupt your Vesperlark from coming back or exiles the graveyard for a long duration. Hence, abilities that last for the duration of a permanent being in the game or instant-speed graveyard hate can completely disrupt the loop. This includes cards like Leyline of the Void, Tormod's Crypt, Valentin, Dean of the Vein, Rest in Peace, Erebos's Intervention, Cling to Dust, Tymaret, Chosen from Death, Apostle of Purifying Light, Return to Nature, Scrabbling Claws, Soul-Guide Lantern, Verdant Command, Consecrate // Consume, Scavenger Grounds, Silent Gravestone, Sentinel Tote, Relic of Progenitus and Scavenging Ooze.
• The more I jank out decks, the more I start to believe Soul Warden was put into the game just to create atrocious, neverending fights. No for real, a card that feeds off of your opponent's loop, giving both players unkillable lifepoints? Also, Sangromancer can end up in an endless loop as well. When this occurs, the timer will eventually just run out and cause a draw if both players are too thickheaded to move on and not waste their time.
• I am not entirely sure how Ashes of the Abhorrent would work with that. The ability of Vesperlark goes onto the stack before it gets sacrificed, so normally, it should make the loop possible. One thing is sure though: Ashes of the Abhorrent gains the player who owns it life on a creature dying, meaning a matchup against it will result in a Soul Warden/Sangromancer-like draw. In the same vein: Authority of the Consuls, opposing Blood Artists.
• Rampaging Ferrocidons could actually exploit the loop against you. They just kill whatever source of damage you have i case you would win, then use the loop to ping you to death.

The future of this deck

If Davriel's Withering doesn't get banned outright and this deck lives, it might be able to improve with newer cards, which I already said. Besides, the Minion of the Mighty deck is starting to look very reliable now with Scale Up on turn 2 kills, so I believe WotC will prioritize pruning there, as this combo here isn't as fast and can be interrupted by a slew of cards, as noted above. I made a variant of Bandit_Mtg's insane deck, which you can find here. Also, Tibalt's Trickery is now even more consistent with the addition of Cascade in Throes of Chaos and there are more 3 or more-cost Cascade spells that could be released. People say it is inconsistent, but I've just had a day of 6 different Tibalt decks all popping off correctly, which is just either stupid unlucky or very consistent and not everyone runs counterspells. Anway, here's a quick list of replacements for Vespermalarky I'd take for old cards releasing into Historic:

• Instrument of the Bards gets replaced by Diabolic Intent: Turn 3 (since you need a creature to sacrifice) search anything, including your Davriel's Withering, so you have a way to search instants as well as cards.
• Fauna Shaman gets replaced by Eladamri's Call: It is instant speed of an instant vs summoning sickness of a creature. A little bit more specific since it needs white mana as well. Lets you search for a creature card right away without sacrificing a creature or discarding a creature card and spending more mana to do so.

All in all

This looks like a funny deck that could work very well. There are a lot of counters and getting the combo is pretty inconsistent for now, so I don't see any reason why they would ban it, but hey: They banned Brainstorm for no solid reasons. The fact that Cruel Celebrant deals damage past hexproof means that unlike Selesnya Papercuts, this deck here has no probems with Shalai, Voice of Plenty and Leyline of Sanctity. Valkmira, Protector's Shield will still remove 1 damage, turning your damage output 0, but at least you can get infinite life, which might turn the match into one of the slowest mill fights ever, or just make your opponent concede.

Anyway, that's it for today.I hope you liked this bit of jank combo and as usual, feel free to follow me for more janky decks. Please give me feedback on whether it works, as I am currently extremely short on wildcards for this jank. I want to know how consistent this deck can be, so that I may tune it up a bit for you. I currently have an idea for the Ultimate Delina^tm ,which some people like KnightsWhoSayYee (shoutout to you, bro) have already heard about. Sadly, we need a certain card from Kamigawa in the game.

As usual, stay cool stay fresh, and I see you next time, folks!