I'm bored. Every week I think about which decks to showcase for my newest article and it's always some combination of Sylvan Plug, BUG Delver, and MUD. I don't need a new deck to show off to you guys but I'm sure you won't mind seeing more variety in my articles.

I've tried out other archetypes before: Reanimator, 4C Delver, and last week it was Jeskai Stoneblade. But there's one deck I've had my eye on for a while now and I finally purchased the cards to complete the list. The deck is Shardless BUG.

Why Shardless BUG? Well, for one I own BUG Delver so I already have the majority of the cards. The second reason is the idea of laying down a bear and drawing three cards seems too good not to be playing it. And that's basically what Shardless Agent is doing in the deck, pulling you ahead with some nice two-for-ones. Two-for-ones that are in your favor, I might add.

Shardless Agent into Tarmogoyf. Or Agent into Hymn to Tourach. Or into Ancestral Vision. Into Brainstorm. Baleful Strix. Abrupt Decay. Everything is just pure gold. Really the only times you'll whiff are when you cascade into Decay without any valid targets or into discard spells when your opponent's hand is empty. But that's what Brainstorm is for, to help set up Shardless Agent in order to minimize those chances.

Shardless BUG plays out just like a control deck should. A ton of card draw and disruption. You're not necessarily looking to land a threat as soon as possible here. No, no, Shardless BUG is in it for the long haul. This is not your tempo deck with Delver of Secrets or even like your other control deck playing Terminus. This deck aims to simply drown your opponent out through card advantage and straight value. In most games your hand will be brimming with spells to fling and your board state crawling with little Deathrite Shamans, Shardless Agents, and big fatty Tarmogoyfs.

At first my intention for this article was to pit Shardless Agent up against Delver of Secrets and see which creature was better, but soon into me writing this I realized it was an unfair fight. The Agent and Delver are two completely different animals. Agent is great value and the deck she's in is slow and calculating. Delver variants are quicker and more focused on winning before opponents can stabilize. These guys are only good if you build around them and it would be wrong to say one is absolutely better than the other. Both creatures are the best choice for their respective decks.

The one card in my list that may seem out of place is the Umezawa's Jitte. Unfortunately, I don't own a second Liliana of the Veil. I added the Jitte to fill the empty slot. I do think it's fine, though. We got a lot of little guys in here, namely Baleful Strix and Shardless Agent. Once they're done doing their job after entering the battlefield, it's nice turning them into a lethal threat with the Jitte.

I'm also a fan of the sideboard tech. Scrubland and three copies of the greatest busybody ever, Meddling Mage. Combo seems terrifying to play against so I'm thinking Meddling Mage will be the MVP in that regard. I am also afraid of dredge. There's no graveyard hate in the side other than Grafdigger's Cage and I've seen some lists running at least two Nihil Spellbomb or Surgical Extraction. For the most part I copied a paper list, but I believe there may need to be some tuning involved. The builds for online play all seem to include more graveyard hate. I could replace Chill for Nihil Spellbomb but then I'm dead against Burn, which does see a little play on Mtgo. I don't know what to do about this. I think I'll simply hedge my bets and end with one Chill and one Nihil Spellbomb. I'm open to suggestions on this matter and any would be greatly appreciated.

Please note: Now that daily events are twelve tickets to join, I really didn't want to jump into one with a deck I've never played before. It's not that I don't have any faith in Shardless BUG, it was more that I knew I was going to make some beginner mistakes with it. However, I did attempt to participate in some dailies with this deck but last Friday and Saturday's (9:00pm) dailies didn't fire. I'll blame that on the Battle for Zendikar prerelease. Therefore these recordings are from the Tournament Practice Room. Videos of me playing in a daily will follow next week.

My intention here is just to get a hang of the deck, learn how it operates, and become familiar with the cards.

Shardless BUG Vs. Imperial Painter

Shardless BUG Vs. ANT

Just a couple matches this week. Like I said, the goal was to familiarize myself with the deck, nothing more. I do like it, though. Shardless BUG is definitely strong and it's fun when you get to cast Shardless Agent blind and see what you cascade into. For me, there's a lot of replayability with this and I'm excited to take it into a daily. Videos of that should be next week, where I will also get a little more in depth with the card choices and explain some possible tweaks I might make to the list between now and then.

Thanks for taking the time to read my article and watch my videos! Any suggestions or critiques are always appreciated!