Wacky Wednesdays: Telekinetic Slivers

It is time once more for Wacky Wednesdays.  This month, I've got an alternate take on a tribal deck that is close to being good enough to break into the modern format: slivers.  Most of the time, if you see a sliver deck, it plays similarly to merfolk in that it focuses on deploying as many slivers that give +1/+1 as it can and beating its opponent to death.  Well, today I want to look at a build of slivers that tries to win on the opposite end of the spectrum, control and resource denial.

Witness, Telekinetic Slivers.

Creatures x3 Diffusion Sliver x4 Dormant Sliver x4 Gemhide Sliver x4 Manaweft Sliver x2 Necrotic Sliver x1 Opaline Sliver x2 Psionic Sliver x2 Sliver Hivelord x3 Striking Sliver x3 Telekinetic Sliver x3 Venom Sliver	Land x4 Ancient Ziggurat x4 Cavern of Souls x3 Copperline Gorge x2 Forest x1 Mana Confluence x3 Reflecting Pool x4 Sliver Hive x2 Mutavault Other Spells x4 Chord of Calling x2 Descendants' Path
Sideboard x3 Darkheart Sliver x1 Diffusion Sliver x4 Harmonic Sliver x2 Necrotic Sliver x3 Tormod's Crypt x2 Virulent Sliver

    

The goal of this deck is to flood the field with slivers and use Telekinetic Sliver's ability to keep your opponent's lands tapped down.  At some point you should end up with a Sliver Hivelord and a Psionic Sliver in play.  At this point, you can use whatever slivers aren't tapping out your opponent to ping them to death.

    

Now, Modern is a fast format that is full of efficient removal, so our slivers are going to need some help if they are going to flood the board.  Diffusion Sliver and Sliver Hivelord make it difficult to remove our slivers using targeted removal and boardwipes.  Opaline Sliver helps restock your hand if your slivers are taken out.  Finally, the team of Striking Sliver and Venom Slivers help hold those pesky Tarmogoyfs and Siege Rhinos at bay you set up.  As a last resort, Necrotic Sliver is our catch-all answer to any troublesome permanent out opponent may have.

  

Now that we can protect our slivers, let's look at how we get a large number of the in play.  Dormant Sliver is a huge player in this deck.  It allows us to have a great amount of card advantage as its ability stacks with multiple Dormant Slivers.  Defender is no drawback as we don't plan to attack anyway.  Manaweft and Gemhide Slivers ensure we have enough mana to play the slivers we draw.  Descendants' Path allows us to frequently get free slivers each turn.

    

With so many slivers doing different jobs, it helps to have the ability to grab the exact one you need at any given time.  This is where Chord of Calling comes in.  Need a Venom Sliver to go along with your Striking Sliver to stop that incoming Tarmogoyf?  Need a Sliver Hivelord to negate the Wrath of God that's on the stack?  Need a Diffusion Sliver counter the path to exile targeting you Sliver Hivelord?  Chord of Calling saves the day in all these scenarios and more.

    

One great benefit of playing tribal slivers that I haven't mentioned yet is the sheer number of five color lands with benefits that you get to play.  Sliver Hive, Cavern of Souls, Reflecting Pool, and Ancient Ziggurat make up the majority of  you mana base.  Because of this, it is incredibly rare to not be able to play a sliver due to not having access to the right colors.

    

The sideboard contains various slivers that serve to improve matchup against specific decks.  Darkheart Sliver is useful against burn, Harmonic Sliver is great against affinity, and it is hard to go wrong with Necrotic Sliver.  Venom Sliver is there on the off chance you find yourself up against a deck with an infinite life combo and Tormod's Crypt buys time against graveyard decks.

That brings us to the end of this article.  Thanks for reading and, as always, let me know what you thought in the comments below.  See you next time!