Slivers - Aggro (Casual)

This is my very own aggro sliver deck for casual games with friends, customization of the preconstucted deck Sliver Evolution from Time Spiral. It's lots of fun to play because it still has the overwhelming stenght of sliver but being slower than usual for a sliver deck gives the opponent some chance to have fun trying to avoid destruction. Also, bare in mind that it's a budget deck so with the exception of Sliver overlord there's no fancy expensive cards such as Sliver queen, Aether vial and of couse fancy lands.

The most interesting thing of this deck to me is the lands system, of which I'm quite proud. Usually for vintage decks the land sets are extremely expensive, and for five-color sliver decks people normally relay on amazing cards like Reflecting pool, Ancient ziggurat and Cavern of souls, of course along with Sliver hive and even dual lands from Alpha or Beta. Those ones I can't afford so I devised this inexpensive set of lands that cover pretty much everything you need: Unclaimed territory is just the most beautiful thing, and replaces any of the mentioned above. Having one of these in your opening hand or first two or three turns will really solve the game for you. If you don't have one, the Thriving and Vivid lands, although a bit slower than desired still play the role of dual land pretty well: choosing Vivids for the most abundant colours of the deck (red, white, green) gives you the flexibility you need to play an early blue or black creature, while choosing Thrivings for the less represented colours (blue and specially black) makes sure that you'll always have red, white or green mana in case you don't have an early of these basic lands to play. Terramorphic expanse is an emergency resource if you are missing one colour and gives you some extra felxibility. Still despite the slowness of these, the deck includes 11 basic lands and the 4 Unclaimed territory come into play untapped and ready to be used, and that's 70% of the lands in the deck. So this way you make sure that there are at least 8 lands that can tap for one colour (for example black, the less represented, can be generated by all three Vivids, the 1 Swamp plus the 4 Unclaimed territory, a pretty good ratio for only 2 black cards in the deck). The good thing about this system is that you can rework it a bit depending your needs and still make all the numbers work, and I belive it can be used for any five-colour sliver deck just giving a little thought to the proportions rather than using lands worth up to a few hundreds each.

I have been desconected since Time Spiral so I avoided all slivers released after it (especially M14 slivers because I hate how they look!) even if there are better choices. That's why there's not Galerider sliver, no Striking sliver, no Bonescythe sliver but Fury sliver, no Syphon sliver but Essence sliver, no Venom sliver but Toxin sliver. The only exception is the 2 Cloudshredder sliver, which could be replaced along with 1 Quilled sliver and 1 Sidewinder sliver by 2 Winged Sliver and 2 Heart sliver.

I have really kept the essence of the original deck (for example Fungus Sliver and Pulmonic sliver could be easily replaced by better ones but they serve to this prupose, or even removed along with three lands of your choice to make a 60 card deck). That's why I use Bonesplitter sliver, Watcher sliver and Might sliver rather that Predatory sliver, Muscle sliver or Sinew sliver; and the not-so-straight-forward combat advantage with Sidewinder sliver and Spined sliver. In this sense it really steps away from the classical super fast sliver deck whith a bounch of 1/1 that cost 1 or 2 mana. The result is a slower and heavier deck sort of mid/late game oriented, where most creatures are at least 2/2 and, despite more expensive to cast, have more explosive results and are more difficult to deal with individually. Gemhide sliver is the most overpowered mana ramp artificer - and actually makes the land set conjectures a bit useless. Toxin sliver, Essence sliver and Shifting sliver add some spice to the game and by the time one of them hits the battlefield, if you have 2 or 3 more guys out there, it will create a massive unbalance that will turn the game in your favor in just a couple turns. Crystalline is a classic that keeps your people safe and because it's only 2 mana it will be out before most of the real threats, protecting them by the time they hit the battlefield. Sliver overlord is not really necesary and rises the overall price a lot, but it's fun and satisfying to cast. The non-creature spells from the original deck have been replaced by slivers with the same effect amplified by the sliver synergy (for instance Essence sliver replaces Spirit Loop or Crystalline sliver replaces Avoid fate).

About sideboard, root sliver works well against blue spell decks. If you don't want to play Crystalline sliver, make sure you have Crypt sliver (replacing Sedge sliver) along with Ward sliver. The other ones just add a bit of power to this or that aspect of the deck but don't really make big difference.

About the possible cards, pretty much any sliver is welcome. Appart from Winged sliver and Heart sliver replacing Cloudshredder sliver, Hibernation sliver works well with Essence sliver and against spell decks (but the mechanic is more difficult that just using Crystalline sliver). Hunter sliver could be fun for an extra aggressive build taking over Shifting sliver's place. About the big guys, Horned sliver is obviously a better choice than Battering sliver (which is actually too heavy) but I just don't have it, and Talon sliver (and of course Bonescythe sliver) may well be an alternative to Fury sliver, but again I rather keep the essence of the deck. Slivers with cool effects such as Victual sliver, Acidic sliver, Necrotic sliver, Mnemonic sliver, Mindwhip sliver, Psionic sliver or Basal sliver don't really help the aggro conception of the deck, so they are not considered, but if you are interesred on playing them check out two other versions of my sliver deck way more original than this one that I recently built.
https://deckstats.net/decks/217629/2794802-sliver-control
https://deckstats.net/decks/217629/2798434-slivers-combo