But you don't get 2 extra counters, you get X+2 extra counters; even if you lose two, that's still X counters in addition to the X that Master Biomancer already has. So we can raise the Master Biomancer to 2X, or if it hits the toughness of some Old Man of the Seas you can raise those up as well.
Iijil: Getting recursion of the 25th stage would be nice; at this point, the best possibility for that looks like cutting a card from the sequence itself, as we seem to have mined the support cards for cuts. I've thought about this for a bit, but I've had no luck so far. A major problem is that we seem to have maxed out on stages, as Thrulls, Slivers and shadow creatures seem difficult to put in. (I suppose Dauthi Cutthroat could transition to power <= 2 creatures.) So we can't afford to lose any stage, we can only reorder. I thought about trying to put Old Man of the Sea in; we could try to transition from Nectar Faerie directly to Centaur Archer, but then we need to put Ghosthelm Courier somewhere. It could transition to humans, or possibly to Errant Doomsayers and then to humans, but what to link into Ghosthelm Courier, if not Nectar Faerie? Possibly Crafty Pathmage, but then Humans can't lead to Royal Assassin; if we try to lead into Steam Catapult, we have that Devout Chaplain problem...
Well, just sharing my difficulties. If you have any ideas, please share them!
I'm hoping to use Psychic Spiral as a card that moves from graveyard to library and back at the same time in the zubera build. It could be recast using Nucklavee, which is a nice blue target for beasts. so move treefolk back to the bottom using a red changling and now we only need a green vampire - except there is none.
So I'm trying to find other options for the vampire positions. Driver of the Dead seems to be a useable transition card, but I had no luck so far. It is however possible to push back the white mana quite a bit, so something like ((mercenary <- thrull <- black paragon)) might not be as useless as it seems at first glance.
Another idea I keep coming back to is using flashback spells. We could for example get a green mana stage that uses artifacts with Ancient Grudge. But that specific example doesn't work with the rust tick stage and there seems to be nothing else useful. Flashback would however be another way to control graveyard size.
But you don't get 2 extra counters, you get X+2 extra counters; even if you lose two, that's still X counters in addition to the X that Master Biomancer already has. So we can raise the Master Biomancer to 2X, or if it hits the toughness of some Old Man of the Seas you can raise those up as well.
You can reduce the P/T of Master Biomancer at will, so you can always make Master Biomancer smaller. Anyway, why does Old Man of the Sea do nothing without a smaller Master Biomancer? Aren't the Old Man of the Seas supposed to engage in some sort of self-targetting Ackermann combo?
I don't know why your last sentence is true. You can cast Fell the Mighty with Master Biomancer having at least one counter on it, certainly. And even if you don't cast Fell the Mighty, you can still bolster Master Biomancer along with other creatures of the same toughness.
Edit: I was using your definition of X, where you said that you get X+2 life from Soul's Grace. In any case, there's not much difference between X and X-2; in either case you can bump up your number of counters on Master Biomancer by a bunch, and can bump lower toughness Old Man of the Seas as well.
Iijil: Using Psychic Spiral sounds intriguing, although it looks like it would increase the number of layers rather than recurse the final stage multiple times. We could start something like:
and still get 13 stages in 26 cards. That Driver of the Dead does seem to mess things up.
Can you push white mana until after Zombies? Otherwise the Thrulls would just replace the Zombies.
I thought briefly about using Dralnu, Lich Lord to create flashback, although that would moot all instants and sorceries at the end.
Edit #3: Here's an idea that has some potential, I suppose. Use Parallel Evolution to make token copies of enchantments and artifacts at the bottom. Use Mimic Vat for the initial tokens. We can then cut Splinter Twin, Crown of the Ages, and Mirrorworks. For the first stage, we can add Copper Myr to lead into Rust Tick. So we've added two cards and removed three cards, saving a card. The downside is that we've used green mana, which costs us a stage. So we need to add a stage somehow; if we can add one using no more than two cards, we'll have a 25-stage deck with an extra card.
Another thing that gets opened up is that now we can move red mana to a later stage, so for example, if we could link from white mana to red mana in two cards, then we could remove Boreal Griffon, saving an additional card. I don't know any such two card link though; Walls require three.
Edit #4: Ah, I found a way to add a 25th stage: link from Parallel Evolution into Woodland Changeling into Assembly-Worker into Rust Tick. Then we can go to Archetype of Aggression, and then transtion from red mana to black in no more than three cards, and we have 25 stages with an extra card for Precursor Golem. Unfortunately, there are no red Treefolk, and we used the Changeling trick already. Going Everbark Shaman / Taiga requires extra support cards, so that doesn't work. We could go with Zombies for the red/black transition, or simply skip black, but either way we need to add a stage again.
Of course, we don't have to go to Archetype of Aggression, but then we need something that recycles Rust Ticks. Unfortunately the good ones seem to be taboo due to Parallel Evolution, like Wickerbough Elder. Are there any acceptable artifact targeters out there?
How would the Assembly Worker stage work? With artifact targeting only after it I don't see how the Changeling can produce green. I don't think the timing with copies of chrome mox from Parallel evolution works out. Unless we can work out a lowest layer for that stage that uses three reserved assembly worker tokens or something, to bounce the changleing while imprint triggers are on the stack? hmmm... Maybe I'm thinking about this the wrong way and its not a problem at all, but I would appreciate a run through the lowest level of that stage.
I have no solution for the black stage for now either. I'll think about it.
Parallel Evolution produces copies of the highest permanents, with haste, at the lowest stage. Even with that setup rendering it impossible to have any tokens of Mimic Vat at all, the ability to make a new Karplusan Yeti (in fact, several of them) for every 4GGG, along with more copies of Mirror of Fate to get back the flashback card for the next cycle, is way too good.
If you look at the official rulings for Felhide Spiritbinder, it says that if another creature comes into play as a copy of the token, it will not have haste and it won't be exiled. The relevant difference seems to be it says it "gains" haste, rather than it "has" haste, just as with Mimic Vat.
However, now that I think about it I'm not sure how to get the timing right with Chrome Mox either - will consider it further.
Edit: I believe I have found a solution: replace Woodland Changeling with Changeling Titan. When Changeling Titan enters the battlefield, we exile Chrome Mox; then when we bounce Changeling Titan, Chrome Mox comes back onto the battlefield, and we then imprint the Changeling Titan. This gives us a start that saves two cards over the current working deck; if only we can complete the sequence somehow...
We can use Changeling Titan to reset Mimic Vat as well. Not having any copies of Mimic Vat is a bit worrisome, but offhand I don't see a problem; I don't think there is ever a need to hold up on activating the Mimic Vat.
Hmm, the situation is actually rather delicate, since we need to be able to create a bunch of Assembly-Workers in order to process a stage, but to get another Assembly-Worker, it looks like we need to expend one to reset the sole Mimic Vat. I don't see a way around this problem at the moment, other than to add a card; that would still leave us with a card savings, but that makes the likelyhood of an improved sequence that much smaller.
Suppose we have Dual Nature which makes a token copy of itself, DN1. Then Copy Enchantment gets two triggers which make DN2 and DN3, for a total of four Dual Natures.
Now Changeling Titan comes in and pick up those four triggers, as well as a champion trigger. Choose to champion Copy Enchantment first of all, then the first Dual Nature trigger creates CT1.
The trick is, CT1 can champion the original Changeling Titan itself. That brings back Copy Enchantment, getting four more Dual Natures to go to 8, and it also triggers the Dual Nature abilities to wipe out all Changeling Titan tokens. CT1 goes away, returning original CT from champion, now on a board with 8 Dual Natures.
Obviously, this can be repeated forever, doubling the number of Dual Nature tokens each time. So this setup doesn't work.
Even if Dual Nature didn't have that trigger on anything LTB, it would still be forbidden because the second Dual Nature trigger creates CT2, championing CT1 and returning CT.
Is there a similar infinite loop without the copy enchantment?
Otherwise we can use a bottom layer of psychic battle triggers that can target the changeling to create more psychic battle/whatever tokens without the copy enchantment:
Situation: Dual Nature is championed by the changeling, X Psychic battle triggers on the stack.
- use 1 psychic battle trigger, bounce the changeling. Put the trigger for Dual Nature coming back on the stack.
- in response play the changeling and champion the originial psychic battle.
- have Dual Nature enter the battlefield, creating a copy of itself.
- use 1 psychic battle trigger, bounce the changling. Psychic Battle comes into play. Both Dual Natures put triggers to create a copy on the stack.
- in response play the changleing and champion the original dual nature, removing all dual natures and no additional tokens since neither dual nature created one yet.
- let the create token triggers resolve to get two psychic battle tokens.
We are now back in the start situation with two less psychic battle triggers, but two more psychic battle tokens.
To be honest I lost track of where that leaves us with card savings, or what still needs to be made working. First thing would be to check for dual nature infinite without the copy enchantment.
With just one Dual Nature and its token, we can do this:
-Play Changeling Titan for the first time. Champion and 2 token-making triggers go on the stack.
-Let Champion happen first. Pick up Mana Crypt, which needs to be animated. All Mana Crypt tokens are erased, not that this is important.
-Create a token CT1, and champion CT.
-Dual Nature and CT both get their "leave" triggers.
-Return Mana Crypt first. 2 Dual Natures trigger on this, creating 2 extra Crypt tokens.
-Dual Nature's trigger wipes out CT1.
-CT returns. Champion and 2 token-making triggers go on the stack.
-Let Champion happen first again. Pick up March of the Machines, and Dual Nature wipes out any tokens it might have had.
-The Crypts are now deanimated and can tap for 6 colorless mana.
-Create another token of CT and champion the original...
So this is already enough to get unlimited colorless mana and other effects that require tapping noncreature artifacts. It can also flicker anything else repeatedly, but their numbers will remain stable at 1 plus the number of Dual Natures in existence so that doesn't make progress. Increasing that number is then the base goal, and doing that requires bouncing or championing it, bringing it back before it can wipe out its own tokens, then intervening with another effect that can target it in response to its own ETB trigger. That results in doubling the number of DNs that stick around, from which we can bump up the population of Bloodbond March, Psychic Battle, and the artifacts.
Note that one of the options for champion is always "sacrifice this creature", which can put it on Mimic Vat with no outside help and allow us to create a token copy (with haste) and champion something at any time. As long as we require using up a Bloodbond March to bring the original back after that, though, this doesn't break anything.
So, it looks like we have an infinite mana combo, but not necessarily unlimited damage, so it doesn't break the rules as listed in SadisticMystic's articles. If we're comfortable with unlimited mana, it looks like that's a good way to go; we could replace Mana Crypt with City of Traitors, but then we need a mana source somewhere for Mimic Vat, so it's easier just to accept the unlimited mana.
Removing Copy Enchantment means we save two card slots; unfortunately, using four cards for the red-to-black mana stage gives those two cards back, so we wind up with a tie with the current working deck, but without Time Spiral it seems. (I was actually thinking of Boggart Loggers / Black Poplar Shaman / Taiga / Titania, Protector of Argoth, which doesn't require putting the land back in the library.) But it does seem like a promising avenue of attack. Dual Nature doesn't prevent ETB effects, but a Changeling does, so we can't use Batterhorn or Wickerbough Elder, either of which would give us that two card savings. It looks like we are going to have to make more substantial changes to the deck if we are going to make it work. We could follow the enchantment creature stage by the snow mana stage, leaving out Boreal Griffon, then transitioning to the black mana stage, except with Taiga replaced by Snow-Covered Forest. That would seem to save a card, but if we were to just connect the white mana stage to the Elf stage we would need to add something like Devoted Hero, which would lose our advantage again. But, now we can link white mana to something other than snow mana, if there is something else convenient.
Another idea is to use Dual Nature with Allay, with the idea of repeatedly playing Allay to build up the number of Dual Natures, then creating Psychic Battles, and then targeting something to take advantage of the Psychic Battles before the destruction triggers take effect. That would be a one card savings, but we mess up the enchantment creature stage. It would be nice to add Assembly-Worker to make up for it, but we would need some way to create colorless mana, and also recycle Mirror of Fate and Mimic Vat. Mana Echoes could take care of the colorless mana, but I have no idea how we would handle the artifacts.
Edit: Based on what you guys have written above, I think this entry for max damage in a seven card deck here might go infinite.
That 7 card combo is nice. Doesn't seem to go infinite because it can only increase the number of dual natures by exiling the dual nature in response to its own token entering the battlefield - using the one eureka cast. Otherwise the number is capped. can't exile dual nature ins response to a token dual nature trigger, nor continue with anything else in response to the remove all dual natures trigger.
For our deck: Can we use Bösium Strip to recast instant/sorceries? Allows the enchantment stage to go green for easy follow up with the treefolk.
Using the red Changeling/Dual Nature bottom layer that gets the 25 layers with a low amount of extra cards.
It would howerver make Chaos Warp too powerful. I'm hoping a Show and Tell, Enter the Infinite start will work. If I didn't forget any support cards and the start works theres room for first strike lifegain recursion in the end:
Edit: Ew, recurring Enter the infinite is too strong. As are most other spells that could be used to start when combined Bösium Strip. I'm not sure self limiting card draw like words of wisdom or zubera is good enough to start. hmm
Another possibility is Wheel of Fortune or Memory Jar; not as many uses, but you get seven cards each time.
I'm thinking Wheel of Fortune / Consecrated Sphinx might work; draw 21 cards right off the bat, then build up Consecrated Sphinxes for the next cast of Wheel of Fortune from the graveyard. That should give us one layer at the end; not sure what to do with the extra card, other than Yawgmoth's Bargain. No, Words of Wisdom is better; use Wheel just enough to get off the ground, and use Words of Wisdom for the rest.
Edit: I think Yawgmoth's Bargain, Words of Wisdom, and Consecrated Sphinx is the best. 19 card draws should be more than enough to get some Consecrated Sphinxes on the battlefield.
Yeah, wheel of fortune instead of enter the infinite might do it. If we really need to use the sphinx, then we also need a way to convert those draw triggers into fangtail tokens. Otherwise it doesn't add a layer. I'd only be able to convert draws that are not bound to trigggers on the stack into more fangtails, and that's assuming we have one hasty token to start with.
Hmm, so I suppose we go with Wheel of Fortune, Yawgmoth's Bargain, and Phelddagrif? Spatial Binding doesn't require that hasted token to generated a token of Viashino Fangtail; but I'm not sure that we can draw out the deck with just Wheel of Fortune. we can cast it a maximum of 7 times, so that accounts for 56 cards; Seahunter can fetch three more, but we're still short, unless I'm missing other fetch cards.
I rejiggered the early part of the sequence to get rid of Izzet Guildmage. Not sure which of Spatial Binding / Yawgmoth's Bargain / Bargain / Boon Reflection or Decree of Savagery / Consecrated Sphinx / Words of Wisdom / Yawgmoth's Bargain is better; it may come all the way down to the fact that Bargain gives 7 life. But there way be a way to get two layers with four cards.
get omniscience into play, last to cards Yawgmoth's Bargain and Spatial Binding.
Play yawgmoths and draw star field, dual nature, boon reflection, leyline, changeling, cowardice and bargain. (13 life)
play spatial binding, star field, leyline, cowardize and dual nature, making a token copy of the last.
play boon reflection put two create token triggers on the stack.
play changeling and champion the original dual nature, killing the other.
let the boon reflection tokens come into play.
follow the steps in post #448 to get 12 more boon reflection tokens out of the next 12 life with spatial binding.
with 15 Boon reflections in play cast bargain to gain 7*2^15=229376 life. That should be more than enough to get the combo going completely.
So this version should reach ...->52->2
I'd also replace Bösium Strip with Snapcaster Mage so that graveyard order is not important. Otherwise we have to cast the second bargain before we fill up the graveyard to activate threshold.
I think it should be ...-> 53 -> 2, since we get the full combo going after just one Bargain, which should be plenty to get to ...-> 1 -> 2. So after 53 Bargains it would be ...-> 53 -> 2.
Edit 3: Whoops, we have that problem with drawing Viashino Fangtail using triggers on the stack again. Replace Spatial Binding with Decree of Savagery.
I also forgot about a firststriking lifelinker, so ...->54->2.
Adding a layer would of course be better. But the Decree of Savagery starts have me worried. It seems tough to generate the colored mana for the first flashbacks while getting anything going.
Edit2: I guess the infinite mana thing with the changeling bottom layer makes this one impossible. It also generates an arbitrary amount of creatures. Those will disappear after a couple triggers, but we can still use them to collect +1/+1 counters and convert into arbitrary many fangtails :/
Even worse. We can use it to get an arbitrary amount of, for example boon reflections out and use those to gain any amount of life we wish.
That would actually kill most of the ways we have to get a layer going. We must not rely on something that can be produced by the Dual Nature, but instead need to produce the layer effect in some higher stage (e.g. using Phelddagrif)
Edit3: Even worse, worse. We can use the changeling + dual nature to temporarily gain an arbitrary amount of psychic battle ans start some higher layer with that. That kills the whole combo.
Edit4: I misunderstood the infinite mana thing. I think when going through it to try and generate some mana for the Korozda Gorgon I missed a <when the original leaves destroy all tokens trigger>. With that trigger not missed static abilities on permaments where the number matters should still be save.
Yes, that's what I believed - the fact that we have to resolve triggers to use Changeling Titan means we can't avoid resolving the "destroy all tokens" triggers from Dual Nature.
With Yawgmoth's Bargain as our only source of card draw, I believe we need five Bargains to gain access to all the cards - We draw 7 in our opening hand, can use Yawgmoth's Bargain 19 times before casting Bargain, and can fetch 3 Merfolk and 2 sorceries from the deck. That's 31 cards, and four Bargains gets us an additional 28, or one short. So with five Bargains required that gets us to 10 -> ... -> 50 -> 3. I suppose changing one or more of our transition cards into fetch cards would allow us to get the full combo going after just four Bargains.
It's too bad lifelink doesn't use the stack, or that would pump the number of life gains by 19 rather than just one.
Edit: Perhaps we can add a layer by going Archangel of Thune, Korozda Gorgon, Horizon Chimera, and Wheel of Fortune. With Wheel of Fortune we can only draw 49 cards, but we can fetch five more cards from the library, so we can just barely get there. That would be another layer, but the number of resolutions would drop from 50 to 1; still an improvement.
Iijil: Getting recursion of the 25th stage would be nice; at this point, the best possibility for that looks like cutting a card from the sequence itself, as we seem to have mined the support cards for cuts. I've thought about this for a bit, but I've had no luck so far. A major problem is that we seem to have maxed out on stages, as Thrulls, Slivers and shadow creatures seem difficult to put in. (I suppose Dauthi Cutthroat could transition to power <= 2 creatures.) So we can't afford to lose any stage, we can only reorder. I thought about trying to put Old Man of the Sea in; we could try to transition from Nectar Faerie directly to Centaur Archer, but then we need to put Ghosthelm Courier somewhere. It could transition to humans, or possibly to Errant Doomsayers and then to humans, but what to link into Ghosthelm Courier, if not Nectar Faerie? Possibly Crafty Pathmage, but then Humans can't lead to Royal Assassin; if we try to lead into Steam Catapult, we have that Devout Chaplain problem...
Well, just sharing my difficulties. If you have any ideas, please share them!
So I'm trying to find other options for the vampire positions. Driver of the Dead seems to be a useable transition card, but I had no luck so far. It is however possible to push back the white mana quite a bit, so something like ((mercenary <- thrull <- black paragon)) might not be as useless as it seems at first glance.
Another idea I keep coming back to is using flashback spells. We could for example get a green mana stage that uses artifacts with Ancient Grudge. But that specific example doesn't work with the rust tick stage and there seems to be nothing else useful. Flashback would however be another way to control graveyard size.
You're forgetting the cost of casting Old Man of the Sea. You start with X counters, pay 2 for Old Man of the Sea, pay 1 for Soul's Grace, get X-2 bolster triggers.
I don't know why your last sentence is true. You can cast Fell the Mighty with Master Biomancer having at least one counter on it, certainly. And even if you don't cast Fell the Mighty, you can still bolster Master Biomancer along with other creatures of the same toughness.
Edit: I was using your definition of X, where you said that you get X+2 life from Soul's Grace. In any case, there's not much difference between X and X-2; in either case you can bump up your number of counters on Master Biomancer by a bunch, and can bump lower toughness Old Man of the Seas as well.
Iijil: Using Psychic Spiral sounds intriguing, although it looks like it would increase the number of layers rather than recurse the final stage multiple times. We could start something like:
2 Splinter Twin
3 Mana Crypt
4 Rust Tick
5 Archetype of Aggression
6 Gleeful Sabotage
7 War-Spike Changeling
8 Black Poplar Shaman
10 Anaba Ancestor
11 Urgent Exorcism
12 Mindshrieker
13 Izzet Guildmage
14 Nucklavee
15 Krosan Groundshaker
16 Boreal Centaur
17 Boreal Druid
18 Ohran Yeti
20 Nectar Faerie
21 Driver of the Dead
22 Baron Sengir
23 Empress Galina
24 Merfolk Sovereign
25 Seahunter
26 Mercenary Informer
and still get 13 stages in 26 cards. That Driver of the Dead does seem to mess things up.
Can you push white mana until after Zombies? Otherwise the Thrulls would just replace the Zombies.
I thought briefly about using Dralnu, Lich Lord to create flashback, although that would moot all instants and sorceries at the end.
Edit #3: Here's an idea that has some potential, I suppose. Use Parallel Evolution to make token copies of enchantments and artifacts at the bottom. Use Mimic Vat for the initial tokens. We can then cut Splinter Twin, Crown of the Ages, and Mirrorworks. For the first stage, we can add Copper Myr to lead into Rust Tick. So we've added two cards and removed three cards, saving a card. The downside is that we've used green mana, which costs us a stage. So we need to add a stage somehow; if we can add one using no more than two cards, we'll have a 25-stage deck with an extra card.
Another thing that gets opened up is that now we can move red mana to a later stage, so for example, if we could link from white mana to red mana in two cards, then we could remove Boreal Griffon, saving an additional card. I don't know any such two card link though; Walls require three.
Edit #4: Ah, I found a way to add a 25th stage: link from Parallel Evolution into Woodland Changeling into Assembly-Worker into Rust Tick. Then we can go to Archetype of Aggression, and then transtion from red mana to black in no more than three cards, and we have 25 stages with an extra card for Precursor Golem. Unfortunately, there are no red Treefolk, and we used the Changeling trick already. Going Everbark Shaman / Taiga requires extra support cards, so that doesn't work. We could go with Zombies for the red/black transition, or simply skip black, but either way we need to add a stage again.
Of course, we don't have to go to Archetype of Aggression, but then we need something that recycles Rust Ticks. Unfortunately the good ones seem to be taboo due to Parallel Evolution, like Wickerbough Elder. Are there any acceptable artifact targeters out there?
I have no solution for the black stage for now either. I'll think about it.
However, now that I think about it I'm not sure how to get the timing right with Chrome Mox either - will consider it further.
Edit: I believe I have found a solution: replace Woodland Changeling with Changeling Titan. When Changeling Titan enters the battlefield, we exile Chrome Mox; then when we bounce Changeling Titan, Chrome Mox comes back onto the battlefield, and we then imprint the Changeling Titan. This gives us a start that saves two cards over the current working deck; if only we can complete the sequence somehow...
Hmm, the situation is actually rather delicate, since we need to be able to create a bunch of Assembly-Workers in order to process a stage, but to get another Assembly-Worker, it looks like we need to expend one to reset the sole Mimic Vat. I don't see a way around this problem at the moment, other than to add a card; that would still leave us with a card savings, but that makes the likelyhood of an improved sequence that much smaller.
Edit #2: An alternative is to replace Parallel Evolution with Dual Nature and Copy Enchantment, using Changeling Titan to exile and return Copy Enchantment and get lots of copies of Dual Nature and other enchantments. Replace Karn, Silver Golem with March of the Machines, which can now be exiled with Changeling Titan when necessary. Still just a one card savings, but the advantage here is that we can replace Changeling Titan with Changeling Hero or Changeling Berserker, so we can choose a different color to exclude at the beginning.
Now Changeling Titan comes in and pick up those four triggers, as well as a champion trigger. Choose to champion Copy Enchantment first of all, then the first Dual Nature trigger creates CT1.
The trick is, CT1 can champion the original Changeling Titan itself. That brings back Copy Enchantment, getting four more Dual Natures to go to 8, and it also triggers the Dual Nature abilities to wipe out all Changeling Titan tokens. CT1 goes away, returning original CT from champion, now on a board with 8 Dual Natures.
Obviously, this can be repeated forever, doubling the number of Dual Nature tokens each time. So this setup doesn't work.
Even if Dual Nature didn't have that trigger on anything LTB, it would still be forbidden because the second Dual Nature trigger creates CT2, championing CT1 and returning CT.
Otherwise we can use a bottom layer of psychic battle triggers that can target the changeling to create more psychic battle/whatever tokens without the copy enchantment:
Situation: Dual Nature is championed by the changeling, X Psychic battle triggers on the stack.
- use 1 psychic battle trigger, bounce the changeling. Put the trigger for Dual Nature coming back on the stack.
- in response play the changeling and champion the originial psychic battle.
- have Dual Nature enter the battlefield, creating a copy of itself.
- use 1 psychic battle trigger, bounce the changling. Psychic Battle comes into play. Both Dual Natures put triggers to create a copy on the stack.
- in response play the changleing and champion the original dual nature, removing all dual natures and no additional tokens since neither dual nature created one yet.
- let the create token triggers resolve to get two psychic battle tokens.
We are now back in the start situation with two less psychic battle triggers, but two more psychic battle tokens.
For a black to red mana transition we can use 4 cards: Black Poplar Shaman, Everbark Shaman, Taiga, Squandered Resources. (Assuming we have a way to move the land from graveyard to library)
To be honest I lost track of where that leaves us with card savings, or what still needs to be made working. First thing would be to check for dual nature infinite without the copy enchantment.
-Play Changeling Titan for the first time. Champion and 2 token-making triggers go on the stack.
-Let Champion happen first. Pick up Mana Crypt, which needs to be animated. All Mana Crypt tokens are erased, not that this is important.
-Create a token CT1, and champion CT.
-Dual Nature and CT both get their "leave" triggers.
-Return Mana Crypt first. 2 Dual Natures trigger on this, creating 2 extra Crypt tokens.
-Dual Nature's trigger wipes out CT1.
-CT returns. Champion and 2 token-making triggers go on the stack.
-Let Champion happen first again. Pick up March of the Machines, and Dual Nature wipes out any tokens it might have had.
-The Crypts are now deanimated and can tap for 6 colorless mana.
-Create another token of CT and champion the original...
So this is already enough to get unlimited colorless mana and other effects that require tapping noncreature artifacts. It can also flicker anything else repeatedly, but their numbers will remain stable at 1 plus the number of Dual Natures in existence so that doesn't make progress. Increasing that number is then the base goal, and doing that requires bouncing or championing it, bringing it back before it can wipe out its own tokens, then intervening with another effect that can target it in response to its own ETB trigger. That results in doubling the number of DNs that stick around, from which we can bump up the population of Bloodbond March, Psychic Battle, and the artifacts.
Note that one of the options for champion is always "sacrifice this creature", which can put it on Mimic Vat with no outside help and allow us to create a token copy (with haste) and champion something at any time. As long as we require using up a Bloodbond March to bring the original back after that, though, this doesn't break anything.
Removing Copy Enchantment means we save two card slots; unfortunately, using four cards for the red-to-black mana stage gives those two cards back, so we wind up with a tie with the current working deck, but without Time Spiral it seems. (I was actually thinking of Boggart Loggers / Black Poplar Shaman / Taiga / Titania, Protector of Argoth, which doesn't require putting the land back in the library.) But it does seem like a promising avenue of attack. Dual Nature doesn't prevent ETB effects, but a Changeling does, so we can't use Batterhorn or Wickerbough Elder, either of which would give us that two card savings. It looks like we are going to have to make more substantial changes to the deck if we are going to make it work. We could follow the enchantment creature stage by the snow mana stage, leaving out Boreal Griffon, then transitioning to the black mana stage, except with Taiga replaced by Snow-Covered Forest. That would seem to save a card, but if we were to just connect the white mana stage to the Elf stage we would need to add something like Devoted Hero, which would lose our advantage again. But, now we can link white mana to something other than snow mana, if there is something else convenient.
Another idea is to use Dual Nature with Allay, with the idea of repeatedly playing Allay to build up the number of Dual Natures, then creating Psychic Battles, and then targeting something to take advantage of the Psychic Battles before the destruction triggers take effect. That would be a one card savings, but we mess up the enchantment creature stage. It would be nice to add Assembly-Worker to make up for it, but we would need some way to create colorless mana, and also recycle Mirror of Fate and Mimic Vat. Mana Echoes could take care of the colorless mana, but I have no idea how we would handle the artifacts.
Edit: Based on what you guys have written above, I think this entry for max damage in a seven card deck here might go infinite.
For our deck: Can we use Bösium Strip to recast instant/sorceries? Allows the enchantment stage to go green for easy follow up with the treefolk.
Using the red Changeling/Dual Nature bottom layer that gets the 25 layers with a low amount of extra cards.
It would howerver make Chaos Warp too powerful. I'm hoping a Show and Tell, Enter the Infinite start will work. If I didn't forget any support cards and the start works theres room for first strike lifegain recursion in the end:
2 Changeling Berserker
3 Assembly-Worker
4 Rust Tick
5 Archetype of Endurance
6 Artisan's Sorrow
7 Everbark Shaman
8 Black Poplar Shaman
9 Felhide Brawler
10 Anaba Ancestor
11 Urgent Exorcism
12 Mindshrieker
13 Izzet Guildmage
14 Duskmantle Seer
15 Baron Sengir
16 Empress Galina
17 Merfolk Sovereign
18 Seahunter
19 Mercenary Informer
20 Boreal Griffin
21 Boreal Druid
22 Ohran Yeti
24 Nectar Faerie
25 Ghosthelm Courier
26 Possessed Aven
27 Grassland Crusader
28 Possessed Nomad
29 Shauku's Minion
30 Centaur Archer
31 Maze Glider
32 Paragon of Eternal Wilds
33 Devout Chaplain
34 Royal Assassin
35 Goblin Tunneler
36 Flamestick Courier
37 Dralnu's Crusade
38 Frightshroud Courier
39 Paragon of Open Graves
40 Viashino Fangtail
41 Spatial Binding
42 Phelddagrif
44 Show and Tell
45 Mimic Vat
46 Chrome Mox
47 Mirror Gallery
48 Bloodbond March
49 Cephalid Shrine
50 Cowardice
51 Horobi, Death's Wail
52 Psychic Battle
53 Omniscience
54 Leyline of Anticipation
55 Starfield of Nyx
56 March of the Machines
57 Mirror of Fate
58 Mana Crypt
59 Bösium Strip
60 Gideon, Ally of Zendikar
Edit: Ew, recurring Enter the infinite is too strong. As are most other spells that could be used to start when combined Bösium Strip. I'm not sure self limiting card draw like words of wisdom or zubera is good enough to start. hmm
Another possibility is Wheel of Fortune or Memory Jar; not as many uses, but you get seven cards each time.
I'm thinking Wheel of Fortune / Consecrated Sphinx might work; draw 21 cards right off the bat, then build up Consecrated Sphinxes for the next cast of Wheel of Fortune from the graveyard. That should give us one layer at the end; not sure what to do with the extra card, other than Yawgmoth's Bargain. No, Words of Wisdom is better; use Wheel just enough to get off the ground, and use Words of Wisdom for the rest.
Edit: I think Yawgmoth's Bargain, Words of Wisdom, and Consecrated Sphinx is the best. 19 card draws should be more than enough to get some Consecrated Sphinxes on the battlefield.
Edit: Yawgmoth's Bargain + Bargain seems good.
Edit: So Yawgmoth's Bargain, Bargain, and Boon Reflection? That will give us a layer, and 53 activations. I was going to suggest adding a target creature card to make Consecrated Sphinx into a layer, so maybe Wheel of Fortune, Consecrated Sphinx, and Decree of Savagery, but the former set of cards gets more activations.
The Decree of Savagery to turn sphinx into a layer is a good idea.
2 Changeling Titan
3 Assembly-Worker
4 Rust Tick
5 Archetype of Aggression
6 Hull Breach
7 Hurloon Minotaur
8 Anaba Ancestor
9 Horobi, Death's Wail
10 Rend Spirit
11 Ink-Eyes, Servant of Oni
12 Walker of Secret Ways
13 Duskmantle Seer
14 Baron Sengir
15 Empress Galina
16 Merfolk Sovereign
17 Seahunter
18 Mercenary Informer
19 Boreal Griffin
20 Boreal Druid
21 Ohran Yeti
23 Nectar Faerie
24 Ghosthelm Courier
25 Possessed Aven
26 Grassland Crusader
27 Possessed Nomad
28 Shauku's Minion
29 Centaur Archer
30 Maze Glider
31 Paragon of Eternal Wilds
32 Devout Chaplain
33 Royal Assassin
34 Goblin Tunneler
35 Flamestick Courier
36 Dralnu's Crusade
37 Frightshroud Courier
38 Paragon of Open Graves
39 Viashino Fangtail
40 Spatial Binding
41 Yawgmoth's Bargain
42 Bargain
43 Boon Reflection
45 Mimic Vat
46 Chrome Mox
47 Mirror Gallery
48 Bloodbond March
49 Cephalid Shrine
50 Cowardice
51 Shriekhorn
52 Psychic Battle
53 Omniscience
54 Leyline of Anticipation
55 Starfield of Nyx
56 March of the Machines
57 Mirror of Fate
58 Mana Crypt
59 Bösium Strip
60 Gideon, Ally of Zendikar
get omniscience into play, last to cards Yawgmoth's Bargain and Spatial Binding.
Play yawgmoths and draw star field, dual nature, boon reflection, leyline, changeling, cowardice and bargain. (13 life)
play spatial binding, star field, leyline, cowardize and dual nature, making a token copy of the last.
play boon reflection put two create token triggers on the stack.
play changeling and champion the original dual nature, killing the other.
let the boon reflection tokens come into play.
follow the steps in post #448 to get 12 more boon reflection tokens out of the next 12 life with spatial binding.
with 15 Boon reflections in play cast bargain to gain 7*2^15=229376 life. That should be more than enough to get the combo going completely.
So this version should reach ...->52->2
I'd also replace Bösium Strip with Snapcaster Mage so that graveyard order is not important. Otherwise we have to cast the second bargain before we fill up the graveyard to activate threshold.
But, I think we can get another layer with Night Dealings / Underworld Dreams, Wheel of Fortune, and I guess Spatial Binding. We just have to make sure that we can get started with Wheel of Fortune, but that should not be a problem. Replace Viashino Fangtail with another red creature that targets, like Flowstone Channeler.
Edit: Whoops, we'd need a way to keep the opponent from dying.
Edit 2: Okay, what about Well of Lost Dreams / Sangromancer / Wheel of Fortune / Spatial Binding. (It's somewhat annoying to have to use up a card just to get that one hasted token on the battlefield...)
Edit 3: Whoops, we have that problem with drawing Viashino Fangtail using triggers on the stack again. Replace Spatial Binding with Decree of Savagery.
Adding a layer would of course be better. But the Decree of Savagery starts have me worried. It seems tough to generate the colored mana for the first flashbacks while getting anything going.
Edit: Bargain, Yawgmoth's Bargain, Archangel of Thune and Korozda Gorgon should work. precursor golem style.
Edit2: I guess the infinite mana thing with the changeling bottom layer makes this one impossible. It also generates an arbitrary amount of creatures. Those will disappear after a couple triggers, but we can still use them to collect +1/+1 counters and convert into arbitrary many fangtails :/
Even worse. We can use it to get an arbitrary amount of, for example boon reflections out and use those to gain any amount of life we wish.
That would actually kill most of the ways we have to get a layer going. We must not rely on something that can be produced by the Dual Nature, but instead need to produce the layer effect in some higher stage (e.g. using Phelddagrif)
Edit3: Even worse, worse. We can use the changeling + dual nature to temporarily gain an arbitrary amount of psychic battle ans start some higher layer with that. That kills the whole combo.
Edit4: I misunderstood the infinite mana thing. I think when going through it to try and generate some mana for the Korozda Gorgon I missed a <when the original leaves destroy all tokens trigger>. With that trigger not missed static abilities on permaments where the number matters should still be save.
With Yawgmoth's Bargain as our only source of card draw, I believe we need five Bargains to gain access to all the cards - We draw 7 in our opening hand, can use Yawgmoth's Bargain 19 times before casting Bargain, and can fetch 3 Merfolk and 2 sorceries from the deck. That's 31 cards, and four Bargains gets us an additional 28, or one short. So with five Bargains required that gets us to 10 -> ... -> 50 -> 3. I suppose changing one or more of our transition cards into fetch cards would allow us to get the full combo going after just four Bargains.
It's too bad lifelink doesn't use the stack, or that would pump the number of life gains by 19 rather than just one.
Edit: Perhaps we can add a layer by going Archangel of Thune, Korozda Gorgon, Horizon Chimera, and Wheel of Fortune. With Wheel of Fortune we can only draw 49 cards, but we can fetch five more cards from the library, so we can just barely get there. That would be another layer, but the number of resolutions would drop from 50 to 1; still an improvement.