NLSR, Braids Edition v.2.08 (Orzhov Midrange) + Primer ! (Pioneer)

Welcome to Never Let Sorin Resolve, Braids Edition, version two-point-oh-six ! (This means the primer is out of date, and I will have to rewrite parts of it, again)

I am your host, HollowShell, and today we come to the conclusion that cards are broken and Wizards of the Coast probably smokes unreal amounts of crack to let a list like this come about.

Your gameplan is simple: overwhelm your opponent in every sense imaginable.

Play amazing turn one plays like Thraben Inspector and Knight of the Ebon Legion in order to either draw into better cards a turn later, give Braids a nice crispy artifact to crunch or set-up board presence.

Not a fan of your opponent sending seventy-three spells per turn ? Dismantle your opponent's gameplan with Collective Brutality, or set up for one of the most oppressive interactions in Pioneer with Jadar, Ghoulcaller of Nephalia. If you're the type of player who hates reading cardboard, play Hushbringer. And hey, if you're playing against one of those pesky mono-colored metadecks, side in Vanishing Verse. It's on the house.

By turn three, ruin your opponent's night with Braids, Arisen Nightmare. If they like playing creatures, too bad, because you can stack your Jadar triggers so that every endstep, you sacrifice his token. They either sacrifice a creature (which gives you the advantage), or they lose a chunk of their life and you draw a card (which also gives you the advantage.) If they play artifacts, sacrifice the clues you make with Thraben Inspector. The best play on their end is to sacrifice an artifact, because you'd be drawing a card with it anyway: they'll simply lose life for it also otherwise. Hell, if they are manascrewed, sacrifice your own lands: and if they can't, congratulations, they lose life and you renew your cards. They got some real problematic fellas on the board ? Murderous Rider comes to the rescue, send them to sleep with the metaphorical fishes (he's in a swamp so the joke still lands.) Oh, and as a nice little addition, we don't need Thalia's Lancers in the five mana slot anymore: we can run Search for Glory. It fetches all of our nice legendary creatures, allows us to complete our synergies or fetch our much needed interaction if need be, or even card-advantage. Plus, we can even gain some life back thanks to the addition of snow lands, all very neat. I almost forgot to mention Archon of Emeria: since you are playing some instant-speed interaction, he's a nice, solid little dude to add to really mess with the explosive decks.

Turn four allows you to consolidate your board. Ajani, Adversary of Tyrants allows you to bring back your small dudes, or pump the ones you already have on board. A lot of people will utterly disregard Knight of the Ebon Legion as a pesky one-drop, but once you start pumping him ? He becomes a real problem. I used to run some shenanigans with Gonti and Kaya's Wrath, but honestly ? You'd much rather send a Settle the Wreckage in the face of those aggressive and midrange decks. They can't stop themselves from swinging sideways, and it's your job to execute on that.

On your fifth turn is where, ideally, your deck shines the brightest. First of all, you can drop Ao, the Dawn Sky. That's a great card to sacrifice to Braids if ever need be, to really press your advantage and put the pressure on your opponent. But ideally, it's also where you can combine a bunch of your previous stuff together, kinda like that one scene in Ratatouille where the rat mixes and matches a bunch of stuff together. Wanna stay completely put, and wait for your opponent to do something ? You can wait a turn with a clue on the field, and Murderous Rider in your hand. Want to heat it up ? Play Jadar and Braids in the same turn. Play a Knight of the Ebon Legion, or a Thraben Inspector, and wait for your opponent to swing in before casting Settle the Wreckage.

And finally, on turn six is Sorin, Grim Nemesis. This card is f-cking busted. The first ability draws you a card, drains your opponent and makes them curl into a ball and cry. The second ability allows you to snipe pretty much anything in the format, as well as gain a metric f-ckton of life in the process. The ultimate, as a cherry on top, is obviously a very powerful wincon. If this spell resolves, you are pretty much set to win the game... Unless you have no board presence, which is possible after a boardwipe. This is where our right hand girl comes in, Elspeth, Sun's Champion. Making a bunch of dudes is great. Destroying powerful creatures is amazing. Making all of our creatures bigger and better is game-ending.

Never Let Sorin Resolve, the advice you'll give your opponents to not get banned from your local gamestore.