Note: Alrund's Epiphany is in the deck as a placeholder for Karn's Temporal Sundering

"It's a win-win arrangement. I just happen to win the most."  —Duke Thalamra Vanthampur  (Cut Your Losses)

 That basically describes this deck.  This is Gen3 Heliod.

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**This decklist has been greatly changed and upgraded, as of 7/15/24.  I changed about 40 cards, so it's far from what it used to be... the same vein of operations, just better and more efficient overall.  BUT much fine tuning is next on the agenda.  I've never built/played a deck that operates quite like this, so my ratios of different card mechanics will need adjusting in due time.

**Upgrades happened again 7/20/24, swapping out 17 cards.  But I went 3-1, while being a target in the last three games, so I think they were good changes.  More counterspells, and put (back) in more cheap casting cost cards for early-game opponent draws.  Plus stuff like Spark Double and Quantum Misalignment to copy Heliod.  I liked the outcomes.

**A few more minor upgrades/changes as of 7/29/24.  Time Warp and Scroll Rack went in, added Teferi's Protection, upgraded a few lands, took out some unnecessary ones.  Time Warp and Teferi's Protection effectively secure wins by getting you and your board state to your next turn intact so you can attack with a horde of creatures before a board wipe can remove them.  Scroll Rack turns all those extra lands and unnecessary cards into "draw", effectively, except without the draw triggers, and requires colorless to activate, which is a bonus when you need as many color sources available as possible... I look at it as another "draw X cards" type of card, just in a different way.  I'll be buying a few mana rocks to upgrade with, but aside from big investments in cards I don't have yet, like Jeweled Lotus, Chrome Mox, Mox Opal, Ancient Tomb, etc, and the free counterspells like Fierce Guardianship, there aren't many big changes left to make, just refining with small card-swap tweaks.  But in due time those cards will be purchased and added to the decklist.

**Aaaand a few more changes made... upgraded some counterspells, some wincon cards... trying to maximize the flexibility of the deck to handle the most scenarios as early and efficiently as possible.

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So this is the deck I'm running (versus an untested "virtual" deck), and in a nutshell, it's a mass-draw engine that tries to draw you into various wincons and lockdown control cards.  Obviously, the more cards your opponents draw, the cheaper your spells will be, which can make something like Ultramarines Honour Guard a likely game-ender after three opponents have drawn 25+ cards each, so you can now just pay one white mana and get ~35+ token copies of it, giving you ~36x Warriors that are 37/37 (or bigger).  If a board wipe doesn't clean things up, that's game over once your next turn comes around.  So the deck's main concept is to draw yourself into a tutor or an "each player draws X cards" card, then cast a bunch of mana rocks for free, letting you pay for all your shenanigans in your hand (counterspells!), then win with one of the various wincons, like above. 

This deck doesn't want to play long games, and a T6 win seems slow.  That being said, upgrades to mana ramp, like Moxen, etc, can make this a top-level cEDH deck.  But as is, it's still very strong, probably about level 9.  Its primary drawback is Heliod's four mana casting cost, followed by three mana (and two life) to transform it... that makes this current version realistically a T3 deck at best (maybe T2 with a God hand), but it could be a potential T1 deck with appropriate upgrade$.  It should also be noted that about $500 of the value of the deck is in 10 cards that can easily be swapped out for cheaper cards that do similar enough, so this can effectively be built for probably ~$300 and still be very strong overall.

So, now, for an example of how things typically go....

Heliod, the Radiant Dawn // Heliod, the Warped Eclipse is in play (i.e. the back side), and say my opponent attacks me with five 4/4 flying Angels, of which I have nothing to block with.  I tap Lore Broker to make all four opponents (and myself) draw a card and discard a card, which, after their draw-step card, makes a total of five cards drawn by my opponents, reducing my spells by 5 generic mana.  I cast Day's Undoing for one blue; we all shuffle our hands and graveyards into our libraries and draw seven cards each, making the total 33 cards drawn by my opponents.  I drew Prosperity, so I cast it with X equals 33, making each player draw 33 cards.  I've still only spent two blue mana, and now I have plentiful options in my hand.  Plus, that's now a total of 165 cards drawn by my opponents.  So I cast Zephyrim for one white mana, with the squad 3 add-on paid 54 times, creating 54 copies of the original... you know, to block the Angels attacking me.  And for fun I cast Ultramarines Honour Guard for one white, making 81 token copies for free, giving me another 82x 83/83 Astartes Warrior creatures... and that was only by spending four total mana from land or mana rocks.  And what if you have to spend your last available mana to cast Prosperity?  No problem!  All the mana rocks you draw can be cast for free, giving you plenty of mana to keep casting spells.  At the time being, there 17 cards that can be cast on an opponent's turn to provide more mana for spells, and 13 of those are mana rocks you are likely casting for free.

This is the (Heliod) way...

And you're being forewarned, your opponents will tire of you doing more stuff on their turn than they do.  But, this is the (Heliod) way...

Also, another forewarning, it's great having 80 cards in your hand, but if your opponents also have 30-80 cards in their hands, they will likely have answers for a lot of your spells, so going thick on counterspells in the deck is a need, both early in the game, and especially late.  As mentioned below, Spell Burst is a hero of the deck.  Typically you only have to cast Heliod once... and when played right, once is enough (so far). 

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**Reactions to gameplay:

7/23/24 - If someone else doesn't win by T4 or T5, I usually win.  It's close to cEDH level in terms of consistency in winning games relatively early, and with some more upgrades to make it faster, it could be securing T3 wins with relative ease if not T2 on occasion.  But T1 is asking a lot, because of needing opponents to draw cards, after spending seven mana to cast and flip Heliod, plus needing WW to cast Heliod in the first place (Plains, Mana Crypt, Mana Vault, and Arcane Signet can get Heliod in play, or Mox Opal or Chrome Mox could get the second white mana, then a blue mana for Training Grounds to help flip it...).  Popping off on T2 is within reach, where something like Laboratory Maniac can easily win a game by drawing out your deck, but T1 is a mighty mountain to climb, as the total mana and colors needed are a lot to draw in your opening hand.

7/29/24 - It was 4-1 with its current decklist until I royally screwed up while popping off... and I had the game in hand 100%.  We had a huge stack building up, close to 20 spells, with everyone (Urza, Gen2-Heliod, Solphim, Jodah, plus two more) on red alert trying to stop me (but failing), while I selectively let the stack resolve, I didn't read all of Calamity's Wake (cast by Gen2 Heliod), and let it resolve because... I was just being an idiot... I mean, I didn't need my graveyard.  Epic failure.  No excuses.  And no take-backsies.  That let Gen2-Heliod win on its next turn, after Urza messed up on his turn (Teferi's Puzzle Box made him put 42 cards on the bottom of his library, then draw 43 cards, which would have overlapped cards... he should have stacked the cards on the bottom from his hand, then draw them as the last three cards of those new 43... he maybe would have won (albeit after my epic failure) if he was paying attention.  I had the win....... and the deck should be 5-1.  Alas, Mr. Dumbass made it 4-2.  Kids: don't smoke pot. 

It didn't take long for this deck to establish itself as one of the dominant decks in the group, so now I'm reserving it for only when all the decks wearing big boy pants are coming out.  As is, I would say it's a solid 9.  Add in cheaper/faster ramp, and free counterspells, and it's probably a 10.  It's just too much to deal with when you can cast Spell Burst over and over and over for one blue each time.

8/10/24 - The more I play the deck, the more I realize it can use so many layers and levels of protection to win with ease, and they're all available once you draw 80% of your deck into your hand, and that's the "100% win zone", being nearly unstoppable (honestly, once I have 20+ cards in my hand, the game is already 100% over [99% of the time ]).  Plus, most of the protection cards have good flexibility in being useful before and after flipping Heliod, which seems to be the main division in the progress of any given game... are cards useful in helping me get Heliod flipped safely and casting spells for cheap?  Are they also useful afterwards when I have 30 cards in my hand, or 80 cards?  Can they help seal a win?  Ideally, the deck wants and needs cards that help at both ends.

8/23/24 - Just for a quick update, the deck is now 5-4, and each time I lose, there's a clear reason why, a clear path I should have taken that would have secured a win.  The win is always there, I just pilot it incorrectly on occasion, and usually, it's because I get overconfident in the win already being in hand, and I don't do enough of the things I can (easily) to better secure the win before passing the turn, etc.  Like, I should always draw at least 70 cards into my hand (but I've been lazy about it, being okay with ~35 cards instead)... it sounds dumb, but sometimes I settle for a riskier path to a win than I have to, almost just to speed the game up and not take too long (my game-winning turns aren't often short; I'm still learning how best to pilot the deck 'in the moment', versus in my computer chair daydreaming about card interactions... Ha!!  I mean, I'm still learning and growing as a player).

Now, regarding deck tech, with Heliod the stack is your friend... the more cards you have in your hand, the more options you have to cast at instant speed with flash to keep spells flowing out... and hence why drawing so many cards is necessary.  If you cast something, and an opponent responds to it, you can respond by just casting something else, perhaps totally unrelated to their response card... just leave it all on the stack to resolve later.  Cast more mana rocks for free, cast more control cards that lock down the win.  Let them respond.  Then cast more wincons before any of it resolves.  Eventually, you'll get everything you need in play, including a big horde of creatures, and they'll be out of responses, then cast Time Warp and let the stack resolve... pretty much game over.  So yeah, get a big hand, and abuse the f%#k out of the stack!  We had ours up to 22 cards once, all on the stack unresolved, after another 5+ spells had already resolved.  But I can cast everything at flash/instant speed, with plenty of wincon redundancy/options, so I had the game in hand at all times. 

And again, Spell Burst really is the finisher move... use your other cheap counterspells first, and draw all of your opponents' counters out, then Spell Burst counters the rest... and I mean anything on the unresolved stack that you don't like, that wasn't already countered, repeatedly use Spell Burst to counter whatever you want.  This is also where Astral Cornucopia shines... I try to wait and cast that last... cast and use my other mana rocks (as needed) before I cast Cornucopia, then tap for blue and clean up with Spell Burst.

Also, I get bored with decks that win the same way every time, and this deck already gets uncomfortably close to being like that.  BUT it's not redundant... there are enough different ways to win that each game finishes differently enough to keep things interesting.  It's also fun to 1) be the prime target at the table, and 2) consistently feel like I will win the game anyway.  No matter how strong my competition is, I'll more than likely win the game.  IF I play my cards correctly!  Which I keep failing to do!  lol

^_^_^_^_^_^_^ Card Talk ^_^_^_^_^_^_^

Wandering Archaic has great early-game value, even though it's not making opponents draw, and it has great late-game value as well, making opponents use up their mana faster to cast responses... effectively the same late-game value as God-Pharaoh's Statue, but cheaper, and with earlier-game value on the backside (give me an instant or sorcery!  And a land!).  It's a must-include.

I typically think of Psychosis Crawler as kind of a lame way to win, but in this deck, it's one of the few ways to win on the turn you pop off, so yeah, it's in for the win!  So far, I've had little luck (only once) drawing Psychosis Crawler early enough to play it before drawing too many cards and dwindling my deck too low.  But here's the thing... there are a few Windfall type spells that you'll have in hand once your deck is that low, which will make everyone shuffle their hands and graveyards into their libraries, then draw seven cards.  But the trick (when 80% of your library is in your hand) is to cast something like Prosperity or Skyscribing for like X equals 50, or however much it takes to kill everyone with Psychosis Crawler, then with that on the stack cast your Windfall, which resolves first, shuffling your hand and grave into your library, refreshing your library for drawing those 50 cards, and then win when Prosperity/Skyscribing resolves, with Psychosis Crawler doling out death.

In the same vein as Psychosis Crawler, Laboratory Maniac and Akroma's Memorial (removed for Time Warp) serve a similar win-now purpose, versus waiting for your next turn to attack with an army.  Akroma's Memorial allows that army to attack now, if you conjured it on your turn, and LabMan allows you to draw yourself into the win on anyone's turn.  These three cards make it viable to start making opponents draw on your turn and have a solid expectation of winning on that turn, or safely getting to your next turn to win.

While everyone knows the value of Teferi's Protection, it takes on even more value in this Heliod deck.  The reason is that you are likely to be drawing and casting tons of spells on another player's turn, ideally creating a massive army of tokens to attack with on your next turn, and Teferi's Protection guarantees you and your army will get to that next turn intact.  If it's among the 30-80 cards you draw that turn, it simply helps seal the deal.

It should go without saying that this is a deck that thrives off of instant and sorcery tutors, providing any answer not already in your hand.  Yet I left Mystical Tutor out because it puts the card on the top of your library.  Sure, there's a decent chance we can activate an ability to draw it, but if not, it'll be too slow to take advantage of the casting cost reductions we've been building up.  You need that card in your hand now, to cast it next.  And since you'll only be paying the colored costs, Solve the Equation and Spellseeker become better options than Mystical Tutor.  You can tutor into a counterspell if needed, but I find I'm digging for Heliod's Intervention to gain life more often than not.  My deck is a known threat in the group, so my life total is a common target, and I rarely have blockers beyond Heliod, either.  So, gaining an abundance of life is often a pressing issue, just so I can get to my next turn.  This is also why the deck has 11 counterspells... they're very much needed.

That being said, Spell Burst and Forbid are amazing cards!  Once opponents have drawn enough cards, Spell Burst costs one blue to counter a spell and put it back into your hand... which is basically game over.  Forbid has the same kind of value, because it doesn't take long before you have plenty of excess lands to discard to pay its buyback cost, making it equally reusable for two blue mana (which feels expensive!! ).  And with all the mana rocks you can drop once you make everyone start drawing tons of cards, paying two blue multiple times isn't hard to do (in case Spell Burst finds its way into your grave or exile).  The one thing with these counterspells is that they only go back to your hand if they resolve, which means they can get stuck on the stack if someone responds to it, preventing you from reusing it until it resolves.  For this reason I recommend using your other counterspells first, using those on all the first counterspells and responses you encounter, letting those get stuck on the stack if it should grow into a heap (we had 20 cards on the stack like this last week).

Having both Thought Vessel and Decanter of Endless Water is a must for this deck, helping to ensure you will keep all your drawn cards if you decide to go crazy on your turn instead of an opponent's turn... you don't want to be drawing 75 cards, and then have to discard down to 7.

Chromatic Lantern and Chromatic Orrery do some much-needed color fixing when it matters most, on top of providing extra mana, so I consider both to be a must-have in the deck as well.

Replication Technique is in there to get extra mana by copying your biggest/best mana rock twice, or maybe by copying a nonlegendary copy of Heliod...?  Its value is more "late" game (after making opponents draw tons of cards that turn) than early (i.e. still trying to safely get Heliod into play and flipped).  And giving an opponent a copy of a nonland permanent isn't that big of a deal, since you get to pick which opponent, and if it's getting "late game" use, then you're probably about to win anyway.  (And it's even better after a Cyclonic Rift.)

This isn't a cheap card to buy these days, but if you have a Minamo, School at Water's Edge, it fits great in the deck!  While untapping Heliod isn't a game-changer by any means, the other five legendary cards in the deck all benefit from being untapped, and can help a lot if they are, so it's worth using if you have one. 

Peregrine Drake is a borderline include/exclude, primarily because it has little early game value, and when you pop off and start pushing for a wincon, at most you should have six lands in play, and the faster the deck, the fewer the lands that will be in play to untap.  A deck that consistently wants to win on T3 is too fast for Peregrine Drake, soooo... whether you include it or not will depend on if you build your deck to win fast or not.  At the moment I'm torn between pulling it for Mana Vault or not, which has the deck straddling to be a more consistent T4 deck (and T3 on rare occasions).

Not gonna lie, but Sea Gate Restoration might actually get replaced for a basic Island... it costs 3 life to play it untapped, which hurts when you're the primary target at the table, and for three blue and X, well, I always have better "draw-X" cards in hand to cast for fewer required color mana.  That basically means it has negative early-game value (i.e. worse than an Island) and pretty much no late-game value either (not much better than drawing an Island)... it's just too slow and clunky for a deck this fast on the draw, and the possible scenarios that give it value are just too unlikely to happen anyway.  So yeah, I've talked myself into taking it out...

Lightning Greaves is tempting to put in for the early game protection on the cheap and easy (in place of a counterspell), but shroud can be a limiting ability once you're casting impactful spells that might need to target Heliod, like Irenicus's Vile Duplication or Quantum Misalignment.  Given the counterspells I own and have access to (i.e. none of the good free-to-cast ones),

Karn's Temporal Sundering, Time Warp, etc, make for a nice way to "skip" everyone else's turns and go right to yours next, allowing you to attack with your new wincon horde of creatures before anyone else can cast a sorcery board wipe, or try to win themselves.  This way you can do your shenanigans on an opponent's turn, so they're a little cheaper, casting everything during the player's end step, so no more sorcery speed spells can be cast, then finish off with Karn's Temporal Sundering, removing that pesky Propaganda, then go to your turn next and win.  These are more "win now" cards, similar to why Akroma's Memorial was in the deck, which will give your creatures haste if they happen to be created on your turn before combat, which is quite possible if the right cards are in your hand and/or in play.  [Edit: I took out Akroma's Memorial for Time Warp, because Time Warp will help no matter whose turn you go big on, whereas Akroma's Memorial is only really in there for when you pop on your own turn, which is too circumstantial and limited compared to Time Warp (etc).

God-Pharaoh's Statue is a borderline card... on the one hand, it's not cheap to cast early, but it gets work done once in play.  On the other hand, once you can cast it for free it does even more work, making those pesky counterspells and instant spell responses from opponents cost a lot more to cast, limiting how many, if any, they can use.  My deck is threat #1 on the table now, having earned everyone else's respect and ire from not losing much, even against the big decks in the group.  It just gets hard to stop really fast, once Heliod is flipped, and then being able to continually respond at instant speed to cast mana rocks and more draw spells makes it kinda go crazy and never give up control... so everyone is now geared up to stop me.  That means I get every counterspell they draw, and our group's Urza is loaded with them, plus all the interaction our group's Gen2 Heliod deck has to both protect its shenanigans and stop everyone else's (both decks are level 8.5-9)... well, being able to flop God-pharaoh's Statue into play for free can change a lot of that. 

Temple Bell and Teferi's Puzzle Box are both valuable in the late game, being castable for free, then providing/forcing opponents to draw extra cards, so your spells are reduced again if needed before your turn comes around, as that Spell Burst might come in handy again.  Folio of Fancies would be a backup option if you don't have one of the other two, but I would recommend having two of the three in your deck.  Folio of Fancies is a borderline include, but the blue mana requirement to cast, and the XX to activate make it slow enough in the early game that it didn't make the cut.  And that no maximum hand size is great too, but Decanter of Endless Water and Thought Vessel cover that well enough.

The counterspells in the deck are primarily there to serve Heliod as its protection.  That means protecting casting Heliod, protecting it in play before being flipped, and then protecting it after.  But at least on the "After" side of the equation, we're typically drawing tons of cards and getting a plethora of counters to choose from, making the main need early-game protection, and as such, most of the ones I picked are usable then and are cost-efficient.  But, the fun part of the "after" side of the equation is the cost reduction, where a 2cc spell with only one blue, versus one with two blue, has considerably more value than a slightly "better" card that costs two blue.  This is why you're not seeing Counterspell on the decklist.  After Heliod flips, but before you can start casting a bunch of mana rocks for free, every blue mana you have available is precious... the difference between a spell costing one blue or two blue can be a lot.  And after Heliod is cast, but before he's flipped, requiring two blue for a counterspell can be asking a lot, since a good chunk of the early-game ramp is colorless, so having two untapped blue sources is far from a guarantee, since over 75% of the deck is blue.  It all adds up to enough that I'm convinced that, given the way Heliod plays out each time, I'd rather have Memory Lapse than Counterspell... that being said, Mana Drain is totally worth the two blue, as we crave ramp and extra mana (but that should go without saying, as every deck wants extra ramp).

Wheel and Deal is an interesting card, because you only get to draw one card, and you don't have to discard your hand, while everyone else discards their hands and draws seven.  But this is awesome if you've just made all your opponents draw a ton of cards and you want to reduce their hand size back down to seven, while not intruding on anything you're doing in your hand.  And of course, it also serves a major purpose in getting opponents' card draw totals up early in the game, albeit it would be awesome if we could have drawn more than one card in the whole process.

I'm putting in Fall of the Thran to mate up with Cyclonic Rift, as I don't currently own any other land destruction cards.  The idea here is you Rift and destroy all lands after making a massive army to run down everyone's throats... then you're pretty much assured your win.  I had a recent loss to my buddy's Urza deck, even after cleaning the board with a Rift... I made my army, played out all my mana sources available, including a pumped up Astral Cornucopia as my last source of colored mana, being white, and I had to cast Teferi's Protection to seal it off.  Before my turn came back around, Urza popped off, because I had bounced all his cheap artifacts back into hand.  Fall of the Thran ensures that won't easily happen again.  For any opponent, running any commander.

Due to the game against Urza mentioned above, I'm also adding Blind Obediance and/or Frozen Aether, which help early game to slow opponents down, but also help in the late game to shut down anything that plans to win by creatures or artifacts entering play (Treasures, Urza's artifacts, a massive crit swarm with haste, etc).  Remember, the name of the game is 'I Win'.  Plus Blind Obedience floats our life back up with extort, which can matter.  Frozen Aether also hits their lands, shutting down a lot of landfall shenanigans that put land into play repetitively, removing mana generation.  Both are welcome card draws at every point in the game.

Archon of Emeria also helps add another option to clamp down on opponents' ability to respond.  Grand Abolisher or Defense Grid are on the maybe-list too, because responses are annoying (I still need to pick up a Grand Abolisher).