We could insert Militia's Pride in between Kithkin Mourncaller and World at War, if we had a hasted nontoken creature. It doesn't look like we have one though, and losing Chrome Mox makes it harder to insert one without losing a card slot.
Although Goblin Grenadiers won't work, because after going through the combo no attacking goblin remains on the battlefield to be sacrificed. Morkrut Necropod would work as a replacement. The trigger remains on the stack and when we get to it we can sacrifice any creature.
EDIT: Ugh, spoke to soon. Godtoucher is a cleric, so we can't use the Misery Charm version.
hmm, so we need to either replace Godtoucher, or replace Misery Charm. Something that would target a white creature would be convenient. Unfortunately, the closest thing I could find was Execute, which also draws a card. The other options also targeted another color. Glare of Heresy is too cheap with Izzet Guildmage (since it can target Metallurgeon), and doesn't work without it (due to timing problems with Spellweaver Helix.)
Uhm, I might just be missing something stupid, but I think we can just cut the Copper Gnomes/Academy Rector from the deck completely. After the Worldfire we can get a Leyline of Anticipation back onto the battlefield by resolving a Dual Nature trigger for it, that we set up before putting the transition on the stack... So not only do we get rid of cheap sacrifice, but we also save another card.
EDIT: Looking at it closer, using Evacuation instead if Retract for the hyperstage transition doesn't work out after all. We can use the ressources in the higher stage to imprint Metallurgeon on Mimic Vat and then activate the Vat in the lower stage to gain an extra token. Having Evacuation as an extra instant in the deck should still be fine as long as it doesn't return the life we need to cast it. In the non-Metallurgeon stages, where the cost is meaningless there is no equivalent to the "higher stage using the same creature" that we would need to worry about.
Don't know how to get six cards out of it though; the best we currently have is adding Finest Hour. A possible idea: if we need to deal damage to the enemy, we could just deal 19 damage rather than having to add Phelddagrif.
CTNC: Yes, those cards work together.
[EDIT] Now that we have some card space, I was considering the possibility of adding stages by removing Evacuation. That means we need another way to pull our natural creatures back to our hand. For Horobi, Death's Wail there's Urgent Exorcism, for Wormfang Behemoth there's Krosan Groundshaker, and Titania, Protector of Argoth can almost certainly be replaced by noncreature cards. That leaves Drake Familiar, which is causing problems. I don't see an easy way to bounce it; bouncing flying or blue creatures loses us stages. Ironclad Slayer isn't easy to bounce either, we have Humans in the stages and white creatures are problematic as mentioned before. Glare of Heresy, even with Izzet Guildmage, is too expensive (either via Spellweaver Helix or with a red mana). We could make it cheaper by switching the hyperstage and hyperhyperstage colors. I suppose that could work. But no, then we have to bounce Izzet Guildmage!
Other than Ironclad Slayer, the only thing I can think of is something like Skull of Orm. But that moots all the colors except red, so we can't actually add more mana stages.
[EDIT] I think we can replace Mox Sapphire with either Azorius Keyrune, or probably better, Eye of Ramos. I don't think either go infinite, since we need green mana to repeat the stage. Of course, that would mean we would have to use Undiscovered Paradise in the opening hand, so we may want to switch Mana Crypt back to Black Lotus.
[EDIT] Huh, I don't know how I forgot about Kiora's Dismissal as a replacement for Drake Familiar. So all the creatures in our hyperhyperstage can be bounced or replaced.
If it works, that is a hyperhyperstage + 12 stages. Of course, the end is very puny; if we could duplicate the results of the previous start, we could access the full combo by the seventh draw, so that we could apply F_{w^3 + w12} a couple of times. But, we don't have the mana artifacts that we had last time, so I don't know if it can be done.
We could really use a card reduction, since then we could add Consecrated Sphinx, and the start should be much easier.
I don't think Chrome Mox mana stages will work. We can't really avoid white, green and red mana in the hyperhyperstage, due to the flashback spells and Metallurgeon. Horobi, Death's Wail is a black creature and Wormfang Behggemoth a blue creature. Both seem very hard to replace with the current setup. Presumably we need to bounce both of them in some way to save them from Worldfire, so blue and black are available from Chrome Mox as well. That leaves no color for a stage.
Is there any chance for 12 stages using only tokens?
Of course 6 layers, or 5 layers with opponent draw as last limiter would be better than Finest Hour. Is there anything we can put between drawing cards and the stages that would give more layers?
I would guess that there is probably a way to get 12 stages. In earlier versions we had 12 stages with Gideon, Ally of Zendikar a required card in the deck, but I don't think that that is possible now. Stages that we are missing include a tapped creature stage, a colorless creature stage, and a Goblin stage further down. We could replace Goblins at the beginning with Merfolk. Then there are the stages that we can never seem to fit in, like Thrulls, Minotaurs, and creatures with shadow.
It seems tough though. Some combinations are not possible, like Possessed Barbarian, Paragon of Open Graves, and one of the red creatures that target creatures with power less than or equal to 2. And of course Godtoucher eliminates all the Paragons.
We have previously had drawing cards higher up in the layer sequence, but usually that was because we had Night Dealings as a pseudo-card drawer, and that card is not allowable now. We would likely be better off if we could replace Core Prowler, but that card is so useful right now. Instead of Reality Spasm, we could start with something that targets creatures like Korozda Gorgon, or maybe Kozilek's Pathfinder to target with colorless mana. Korozda Gorgon is probably not going to work since it uses counters, and both cards aren't worth a layer on their own, so it's not so promising.
We know how to gain a few layers with damage bouncing, but it becomes harder without Night Dealings or Angelheart Vial. I suppose there is still Curiosity, however as you have pointed out, the creature it enchants will probably not generate a layer. Another option is to have opponent life as limiter, although I don't know a good way to do that without Cultural Exchange.
Presumably Cultural Exchange + a card that gives opponent creatures is not worth it.
[EDIT] Is Minion of Leshrac worth anything? In the old layer deck days, this card was worth 15 layers, but right now it looks like it's worth nothing.
But alas, Evacuation can also get Simian Spirit Guide back in our hand to exile it. It looks like can only rely on tapping for stages.
So we can get blue via Merfolk, red via Goblins, and black via Thrulls. If we want a mana stage, we will have to go from blue or black to red. As far as I know, the only creatures that run on blue and are still available are Ninjas and Spirits; Wizards are used later on, and I don't think Weaver of Lies or Master of the Veil will work, due to Worldfire killing off all the tokens. As far as black goes, the only thing I can think of is Black Poplar Shaman; Zombies and Nectar Faerie are both used later on. Maybe Zombies could be removable without losing a stage though. Anyway, none of those creatures seem to be mana producers.
So, if we can remove Frightshroud Courier from the end without losing a stage, we'll have 12.
[EDIT] Actually, it looks like Master of the Veil and [c}Weaver of Lies[/c] can work: You play it face-down, paying a blue mana allows you to target creatures with morph, and then Evacuation brings the card back to your hand. Can we use Rattleclaw Mystic to provide mana? That almost works, except that Evacuation allows us to morph it too cheaply. In order for Dwarven Blastminer to work, we need a land that provides blue, but if blue mana can turn into red mana then the hyperhyperstage goes infinite. So no success yet.
But as I write this I see that it probably goes infinite. We can use Evacuation to bounce Llanowar Dead with one black mana in the pool. That allows us to replay it and spend the black to create a new token, getting the mana back and a bunch of free Psychic Battle trigger in the process.
Hmmm, so I guess mana stages are completely out. We could make the changes to eliminate Evacuation, but that adds 3 cards to the card total, and switching to Goblins - Zombies - Thrulls adds 3 as well. So we need further card cuts in order to fit 12 stages in.
The idea is that we would cast a bunch of Gaze of Pain, and then attack with a bunch of creatures. But, it looks all the Gaze of Pains and attacking creatures all trigger at once, and doing a lot of damage to Phyrexian Negator to sacrifice many permanents at once will trigger all the Dragon Appeasements at the same time as well. So this is worth just 5 layers.
It would be nice if there was a card that dealt damage to all creatures when it attacked, but the closest I could find was cards like Ronin Cliffrider that deal damage to creatures defending player controls only.
Nice layer sequence. But let's go for more stages instead
I have another way to get 12 stages, keeping Evacuation in the deck and using mana only to transition between stages. It ends up using the same number of cards as the other sequences. Although we can almost cut Perpetual Timepiece in this one
I don't see how you get those numbers with Psychic Possession. Are you keeping in mind it's an aura? Opalescence doesn't make it a creature, so we don't get Dual Nature tokens directly.
Oh phooey. Hmm, so if we have Psychic Possession and Copy Enchantment in the opening hand, we can draw 4 cards - one short of what we need. We can cast Words of Wisdom a second time, but it will be somewhat of a pain to get it back for a third cast. I'm guessing Consecrated Sphinx is actually better now.
Cast Copy Enchantment, copying nothing. We get two token copies; copy Dual Nature with both of them. Cast Leyline of Anticipation. Cast Drake Familiar; this will generate 4 token copies of Drake Familiar, and we will have the opportunity to return an enchantment to our hand 5 times. Return and replay Copy Enchantment all five times. For the first three times, copy nothing with the original, then have all the tokens copy Dual Nature. This will create 4, then 8, then 16 Dual Nature tokens, resulting in 31 Dual Nature tokens in total. For the fourth time, copy Dual Nature with the original, causing all 33 of the token copies to be Dual Natures as well; we now have 64 token copies of Dual Nature. When we bounce Copy Enchantment for the fifth and final Drake Familiar, we get a bunch of Dual Nature triggers to exile Dual Nature tokens. Respond to that trigger by replaying Copy Enchantment, copying nothing; we get 65 token copies, of which we use 64 to copy Dual Nature, and one to copy Opalescence. This will cause both Opalescences to be creatures. Cast Allay, bouncing the original Opalescence; this will trigger all the Dual Natures to exile the token Opalescence. Allow that token to be exiled. Cast Evacuation, brining Consecrated Sphinx and Drake Familiar back to our hand. Play Opalescence again. Play Drake Familiar, getting 129 token copies, allowing us to return an enchantment to our hand 130 times. Each time we return Copy Enchantment and replay it, copying nothing, and using all the token copies to copy Dual Nature. (For the second to last time we use the original to copy Dual Nature as well.) This will take the number of Dual Natures to 129 * 2^130 + 2. Play Consecrated Sphinx, getting 129 * 2^130 + 3 copies in total. Play Spellweaver Volute on Words of Wisdom, and cast Flash of Defiance, triggering Spellweaver Volute to cast Words of Wisdom. We will draw 129 * 2^131 + 8 cards, two at a time.
Next, we draw all the nonland permanents in the deck. We cast March of the Machines and Psychic Battle. Cast a sorcery to cast Allay from the graveyard, bouncing Copy Enchantment repeatedly, resulting in more than 2^^(129 * 2^130) Dual Natures and Psychic Battles. Save one Cowardice trigger; before it resolves, cast Perpetual Timepiece and Mirror of Fate, getting more than 2^^(129 * 2^130) copies of each. Then bounce March of the Machines with the last Cowardice trigger. We now have the power to mold our library, graveyard, and exile zones however we want. Mill the two lands into the graveyard. Play Titania, Protector of Argoth, getting token copies and bringing the two lands onto the battlefield. Tap the two land for mana. Use the mana to activate a Perpetual Timepiece token, bringing Black Lotus back to the library. Use a couple of Mirror of Fates to choose the seven cards we want in our library, putting Allay and Black Lotus first. Draw Allay and Black Lotus. Play March of the Machines, then play Black Lotus. The Black Lotus enters as a 0/0 creature and is put into the graveyard as a state-based action, but not before it triggers all the Dual Natures. Before those Dual Nature triggers resolve, cast Allay, creating a bunch more Dual Natures and Psychic Battles (more than 2^^2^^(129 * 2^130)) and bouncing March of the Machines back to our hand. Resolve the Dual Nature triggers, getting more than 2^^(129 * 2^130) Black Lotuses. Put Allay back in the library, and draw Allay and Reality Spasm. Use all but four of the mana from the Black Lotuses to cast a bunch of Allays with buyback, creating more than 2^^^(2^^(129 * 2^130)) Dual Natures and Psychic Battles. Play Precursor Golem, getting more than 2^^^(2^^(129 * 2^130)) copies. Play Reality Spasm.
Since we now have the full deck at our disposal, we can run the full combo for Reality Spasm, so we generate more than F_{w^3 + w12 + 1}(2^^^(2^^(129 * 2^130))) token copies of Dual Nature by the end of it. We can draw Reality Spasm more than 2^138 more times, so that will generate more than F_{w^3 + w12 + 2}(2^138) Dual Natures once we are done drawing cards. And we can cast Words of Wisdom 51 more times; by the end we can create more than F_{w^3 + w12 + 2}^52(2^138) > F_{w^3 + w12 + 3}(52) hasted Metallurgeons. Enter the combat phase and swing with everything.
That's a good start. 51 cards left with access to the full combo is amazing.
The preparation for the second Words of Wisdom can be improved a bit:
- Draw the cards Deedlit11 suggests. Play Leyline of Anticipation and Spellweaver Volute enchanting the Words of Wisdom.
- play Copy Enchantment as itself, go to 4 Dual Nature copies.
- play Cowardice and Allay to bounce the Copy Enchantment. Go to 8 Dual Natures.
- play Drake Familiar. Use 8 of the triggers to double the Dual Nature copies, 1 to bounce Opalescence. We have ~2^11 Dual Natures.
- play Evacuation. play Opalescence and then play Drake Familiar again and double Dual Natures with most of the 2^11 tokens. Also bounce Opalescence again and copy a Spellweaver Volute enchanting Evacuation. We have ~2^2^11 Dual Natures.
- play Flash of Defiance. Two Volutes trigger. Resolve the Evacuation first.
- replay Opalescence and Drake Familiar again. Double Dual Natures with every trigger. We have ~2^2^2^11 Dual Natures.
- play Consecrated Sphinx and get some token copies before resolving the Words of Wisdom. We get to draw about 2^2^2^11 cards, 2 at a time.
Nice! We can have the first Copy Enchantment copy Dual Nature, getting 6 and then 10 Dual Natures. We get 10,242 Dual Natures after the first Drake Familiar, more than 2^10,256 after the second, and more than 2^2^10,256 after the third.
I like "megastage", referencing the "megacombo" prior versions of this deck were called. But I do see the allure of hyperhyperstage since it's more descriptive, but also seems like it could become unwieldy in the future if we ever get much further.
I like hyperhyperstage for two reasons. The first is that I'm used to it. That's not a good reason, but I felt like I should say it's one of my reasons. The better reason is that it says what it is compared to the hyperstage and makes naming a hyperhyperhyperstage easier if we ever find one.
If we go with hyperhyperstage, we should probably shorten it to hyper^2stage or hyper^2-stage.
[EDIT] Question: which card or cards should we generally have in the library to use with Psychic Battle?
[EDIT] Another question: can we complete the combo if we do what I did in my last post, namely put a Spellweaver Volute on Allay and cast it, putting Allay in exile? It seems like it should be possible, but I'm having trouble getting further.
We never need Show and Tell after the start, so we can keep that in the library, I guess.
okay, let's try to optimize the start even more. Same card draws:
1. play Copy Enchantment as Dual Nature. 6 Dual Natures.
2. Bounce Copy Enchantment with Allay. Continue in response to the token removal. (5 DN)
3. play Copy Enchantment as itself. copies as Dual Nature. (10 DN)
4. play Drake Familiar. Bounce Copy Enchantment 9 times, replay it as itself 8 times, tokens as Dual Nature. Replay it as Dual Nature the last time. (10*2^9+2 DN)
Bounce Opalescence. Play Evacuation, return Drake Familiar to hand. Replay Opalescence.
Bounce Copy Enchantment, Continue in response to the token removal triggers.
Replay Copy Enchantment as itself. All but two tokens as Dual Nature. two as Spellweaver Volute. (10*2^10 DN)
5. play Flash of Defiance, triggering Volutes on 3 instants.
6. Resolve the Allay Volute, bouncing Copy Enchantment. Replay as itself, tokens as Dual Nature. (10*2^11 DN)
7. play Drake Familiar. Use all but one bounces to replay Copy enchantment as itself, tokens as Dual Natures. ((10*2^11)*2^(10*2^11) > 2^20494 DN)
Bounce Opalescence.
8. Resolve the Evacuation Volute. Return Drake Familiar to hand. Replay it. Use all bounces to replay copy enchantment as itself. ( > 2^2^20494 DN)
9. Play Consecrated Sphinx, then resolve the Words of Wisdom.
So the extra doubling from recasting Allay can actually be seen in the estimate
Getting access to the combo from that point:
- draw all the nonland permanents.
- play Perpetual Timepiece. Mill both lands.
- Play Titania, Protector of Argoth, return the lands to the battlefield, tap them for mana.
- Play Mirror of Fate, activate it. Put Allay into the library.
(- If necessary to not deck ourselves later play some creatures into Cephalid Shrine to get them into the graveyard.)
- Activate the Timepiece, shuffle Black Lotus, Mirror of Fate (and some other cards?) into the library.
- draw Black Lotus, Mirror of Fate and Ally. Play March of the Machines. Then Mirror of Fate. Then Black Lotus, in response to Dual Nature, bounce March of the Machines with Allay.
- Get lots of Mana. Use a Mirror of Fate token to get the Timepiece out of exile.
...
I see no difficulties accessing any card from this point. Are there any problems?
EDIT: Found one more (somewhat meaningful) spot where we can play Copy Enchantment as Dual Nature. Edited that in.
I think it's public, I've never made a web page before.
Please feel free to make comments and corrections!
[EDIT] Okay, another question: What is the best way to handle Dual Nature when we are bouncing and destroying creatures? I guess just bounce the Dual Nature, and live with all the tokens leaving the battlefield? But we can't set up a stage with just one Psychic Battle, nor with just one Bloodbond March.
[EDIT] So with the suggested changes, we could go
Reality Spasm
Precursor Golem
Dragon Appeasement
Goblin Grenadiers
World at War
for five layers.
Although Goblin Grenadiers won't work, because after going through the combo no attacking goblin remains on the battlefield to be sacrificed. Morkrut Necropod would work as a replacement. The trigger remains on the stack and when we get to it we can sacrifice any creature.
EDIT: Ugh, spoke to soon. Godtoucher is a cleric, so we can't use the Misery Charm version.
Can Phyrexian Bloodstock work? We can activate the ability of tokens by bouncing Dual Nature, and then destroy tokens of Academy Rector. We have a limited number of token copies of Phyrexian Bloodstock, and we can only replenish them with Evacuation, so I don't think it can go infinite.
The
Necromancer (or Noob)
Cat.
Don't ask, I don't know why ether...
EDIT: Looking at it closer, using Evacuation instead if Retract for the hyperstage transition doesn't work out after all. We can use the ressources in the higher stage to imprint Metallurgeon on Mimic Vat and then activate the Vat in the lower stage to gain an extra token. Having Evacuation as an extra instant in the deck should still be fine as long as it doesn't return the life we need to cast it. In the non-Metallurgeon stages, where the cost is meaningless there is no equivalent to the "higher stage using the same creature" that we would need to worry about.
So going back to Fountain of Youth, here's the deck with updates:
2 Psychic Battle
3 Cowardice
4 Horobi, Death's Wail
5 Bloodbond March
6 Cephalid Shrine
7 Mimic Vat
8 Omniscience
9 Leyline of Anticipation
10 Mirror of Fate
11 March of the Machines
12 Perpetual Timepiece
13 Drake Familiar
14 Dual Nature
15 Copy Enchantment
16 Allay
17 Mox Sapphire
18 Saltcrusted Steppe
19 Core Prowler
20 Metallurgeon
21 Acorn Harvest
22 Battle Cry
23 Retract
24 Spellweaver Volute
25 Fountain of Youth
26 Fountain of Youth
27 Fountain of Youth
29 Wormfang Behemoth
30 Divine Congregation
31 Worldfire
32 Flash of Defiance
33 Flash of Defiance
34 Flash of Defiance
35 Spellweaver Helix
36 Titania, Protector of Argoth
37 Undiscovered Paradise
38 Goblin Gardener
39 Mad Auntie
40 Godtoucher
41 Everglove Courier
42 Nectar Faerie
43 Ghosthelm Courier
44 Possessed Aven
45 Centaur Archer
46 Maze Glider
47 Possessed Centaur
49 Frightshroud Courier
50 Dwarven Warriors
51 Possessed Barbarian
52 Minion of Tevesh Szat
53 Precursor Golem
54 Reality Spasm
55 Dragon Appeasement
56 Morkrut Necropod
57 World at War
58 Show and Tell
59 Mana Crypt
60 Wheel of Fortune
Here's another 5-card ending sequence:
Reality Spasm
Precursor Golem
Sylvan Echoes
Sentry Oak
World at War
Don't know how to get six cards out of it though; the best we currently have is adding Finest Hour. A possible idea: if we need to deal damage to the enemy, we could just deal 19 damage rather than having to add Phelddagrif.
CTNC: Yes, those cards work together.
[EDIT] Now that we have some card space, I was considering the possibility of adding stages by removing Evacuation. That means we need another way to pull our natural creatures back to our hand. For Horobi, Death's Wail there's Urgent Exorcism, for Wormfang Behemoth there's Krosan Groundshaker, and Titania, Protector of Argoth can almost certainly be replaced by noncreature cards. That leaves Drake Familiar, which is causing problems. I don't see an easy way to bounce it; bouncing flying or blue creatures loses us stages. Ironclad Slayer isn't easy to bounce either, we have Humans in the stages and white creatures are problematic as mentioned before. Glare of Heresy, even with Izzet Guildmage, is too expensive (either via Spellweaver Helix or with a red mana). We could make it cheaper by switching the hyperstage and hyperhyperstage colors. I suppose that could work. But no, then we have to bounce Izzet Guildmage!
Other than Ironclad Slayer, the only thing I can think of is something like Skull of Orm. But that moots all the colors except red, so we can't actually add more mana stages.
[EDIT] I think we can replace Mox Sapphire with either Azorius Keyrune, or probably better, Eye of Ramos. I don't think either go infinite, since we need green mana to repeat the stage. Of course, that would mean we would have to use Undiscovered Paradise in the opening hand, so we may want to switch Mana Crypt back to Black Lotus.
[EDIT] Huh, I don't know how I forgot about Kiora's Dismissal as a replacement for Drake Familiar. So all the creatures in our hyperhyperstage can be bounced or replaced.
So, how about:
2 Psychic Battle
3 Cowardice
4 Horobi, Death's Wail
5 Bloodbond March
6 Cephalid Shrine
7 Mimic Vat
8 Omniscience
9 Vedalken Orrery
10 Mirror of Fate
11 March of the Machines
12 Dual Nature
13 Copy Enchantment
14 Allay
15 Saltcrusted Steppe
16 Core Prowler
17 Metallurgeon
18 Acorn's Harvest
19 Battle Cry
20 Retract
21 Urgent Exorcism
22 Kiora's Dismissal
23 Spellweaver Volute
24 Fountain of Youth
25 Fountain of Youth
26 Fountain of Youth
28 Krosan Groundshaker
29 Divine Congregation
30 Worldfire
31 Flash of Defiance
32 Flash of Defiance
33 Flash of Defiance
34 Spellweaver Helix
35 Gem of Becoming
36 Walking Atlas
37 Perpetual Timepiece
38 Mountain
39 Chrome Mox
40 Tilling Treefolk
41 Black Poplar Shaman
42 Spike Jester
43 Mad Auntie
44 Godtoucher
45 Everglove Courier
46 Nectar Faerie
48 Possessed Aven
49 Centaur Archer
50 Maze Glider
51 Possessed Centaur
52 Eastern Paladin
53 Frightshroud Courier
54 Dwarven Warriors
55 Possessed Barbarian
56 Disciple of Tevesh Szat
57 Reality Spasm
58 Show and Tell
59 Black Lotus
60 Wheel of Fortune
If it works, that is a hyperhyperstage + 12 stages. Of course, the end is very puny; if we could duplicate the results of the previous start, we could access the full combo by the seventh draw, so that we could apply F_{w^3 + w12} a couple of times. But, we don't have the mana artifacts that we had last time, so I don't know if it can be done.
We could really use a card reduction, since then we could add Consecrated Sphinx, and the start should be much easier.
Is there any chance for 12 stages using only tokens?
In the 11 stage version we can make room for that Finest Hour by replacing Mox Sapphire and Mana Crypt with Black Lotus. We don't need the mox since we can recast Omniscience without blue mana thanks to a Dual Nature token of Omniscience.
Of course 6 layers, or 5 layers with opponent draw as last limiter would be better than Finest Hour. Is there anything we can put between drawing cards and the stages that would give more layers?
It seems tough though. Some combinations are not possible, like Possessed Barbarian, Paragon of Open Graves, and one of the red creatures that target creatures with power less than or equal to 2. And of course Godtoucher eliminates all the Paragons.
We have previously had drawing cards higher up in the layer sequence, but usually that was because we had Night Dealings as a pseudo-card drawer, and that card is not allowable now. We would likely be better off if we could replace Core Prowler, but that card is so useful right now. Instead of Reality Spasm, we could start with something that targets creatures like Korozda Gorgon, or maybe Kozilek's Pathfinder to target with colorless mana. Korozda Gorgon is probably not going to work since it uses counters, and both cards aren't worth a layer on their own, so it's not so promising.
We know how to gain a few layers with damage bouncing, but it becomes harder without Night Dealings or Angelheart Vial. I suppose there is still Curiosity, however as you have pointed out, the creature it enchants will probably not generate a layer. Another option is to have opponent life as limiter, although I don't know a good way to do that without Cultural Exchange.
Presumably Cultural Exchange + a card that gives opponent creatures is not worth it.
[EDIT] Is Minion of Leshrac worth anything? In the old layer deck days, this card was worth 15 layers, but right now it looks like it's worth nothing.
I thought I had something with
Simian Spirit Guide
Spectral Shepherd
Mindshrieker
Sea Scryer
Merfolk Sovereign
Godtoucher
Everglove Courier
But alas, Evacuation can also get Simian Spirit Guide back in our hand to exile it. It looks like can only rely on tapping for stages.
So we can get blue via Merfolk, red via Goblins, and black via Thrulls. If we want a mana stage, we will have to go from blue or black to red. As far as I know, the only creatures that run on blue and are still available are Ninjas and Spirits; Wizards are used later on, and I don't think Weaver of Lies or Master of the Veil will work, due to Worldfire killing off all the tokens. As far as black goes, the only thing I can think of is Black Poplar Shaman; Zombies and Nectar Faerie are both used later on. Maybe Zombies could be removable without losing a stage though. Anyway, none of those creatures seem to be mana producers.
The other failed idea was to use something like Hoodwink to replace both Drake Familiar and a Fountain of Youth. But then the Worldfire transition can only bring back two Fountain of Youths, not enough life.
[EDIT] How about:
Polluted Dead
Llanowar Dead
Boneknitter
Basal Thrull
Thrull Champion
Godtoucher
Everglove Courier
So, if we can remove Frightshroud Courier from the end without losing a stage, we'll have 12.
[EDIT] Actually, it looks like Master of the Veil and [c}Weaver of Lies[/c] can work: You play it face-down, paying a blue mana allows you to target creatures with morph, and then Evacuation brings the card back to your hand. Can we use Rattleclaw Mystic to provide mana? That almost works, except that Evacuation allows us to morph it too cheaply. In order for Dwarven Blastminer to work, we need a land that provides blue, but if blue mana can turn into red mana then the hyperhyperstage goes infinite. So no success yet.
Goblin Gardener
Flameshroud Courier
Dralnu's Crusade
Llanowar Dead
Boneknitter
But as I write this I see that it probably goes infinite. We can use Evacuation to bounce Llanowar Dead with one black mana in the pool. That allows us to replay it and spend the black to create a new token, getting the mana back and a bunch of free Psychic Battle trigger in the process.
[EDIT] Well, it sorta fits:
2 Psychic Battle
3 Cowardice
4 Horobi, Death's Wail
5 Bloodbond March
6 Cephalid Shrine
7 Mimic Vat
8 Omniscience
9 Vedalken Orrery
10 Mirror of Fate
11 March of the Machines
12 Dual Nature
13 Copy Enchantment
14 Allay
15 Saltcrusted Steppe
16 Core Prowler
17 Metallurgeon
18 Acorn's Harvest
19 Battle Cry
20 Retract
21 Urgent Exorcism
22 Kiora's Dismissal
23 Spellweaver Volute
24 Fountain of Youth
25 Fountain of Youth
26 Fountain of Youth
28 Krosan Groundshaker
29 Divine Congregation
30 Worldfire
31 Flash of Defiance
32 Flash of Defiance
33 Flash of Defiance
34 Spellweaver Helix
35 Gem of Becoming
36 Walking Atlas
37 Perpetual Timepiece
38 Mountain
39 Goblin Gardener
40 Mad Auntie
41 Dralnu's Crusade
42 Llanowar Dead
43 Boneknitter
44 Everglove Courier
45 Nectar Faerie
46 Ghosthelm Courier
48 Centaur Archer
49 Maze Glider
50 Paragon of Eternal Wilds
51 Devout Chaplain
52 Royal Assassin
53 Paragon of Open Graves
54 Lightbringer
55 Dwarven Warriors
56 Karplusan Yeti
57 Reality Spasm
58 Show and Tell
59 Black Lotus
60 Wheel of Fortune
Again, we have to see if we can get started with just Wheel of Fortune and Reality Spasm, with no mana artifacts except Black Lotus.
[EDIT] Thinking about the 6-card ending just in case the 12-stage sequence doesn't work. How about:
Reality Spasm
Precursor Golem
Dragon Appeasement
Phyrexian Negator
Gaze of Pain
World at War
The idea is that we would cast a bunch of Gaze of Pain, and then attack with a bunch of creatures. But, it looks all the Gaze of Pains and attacking creatures all trigger at once, and doing a lot of damage to Phyrexian Negator to sacrifice many permanents at once will trigger all the Dragon Appeasements at the same time as well. So this is worth just 5 layers.
It would be nice if there was a card that dealt damage to all creatures when it attacked, but the closest I could find was cards like Ronin Cliffrider that deal damage to creatures defending player controls only.
[EDIT] Oh, I have it:
Reality Spasm
Precursor Golem
Dragon Appeasement
Pitchstone Wall
Curse of Chaos
World at War
I have another way to get 12 stages, keeping Evacuation in the deck and using mana only to transition between stages. It ends up using the same number of cards as the other sequences. Although we can almost cut Perpetual Timepiece in this one
2 Psychic Battle
3 Cowardice
4 Horobi, Death's Wail
5 Bloodbond March
6 Cephalid Shrine
7 Mimic Vat
8 Omniscience
9 Leyline of Anticipation
10 Mirror of Fate
11 March of the Machines
12 Drake Familiar
13 Perpetual Timepiece
14 Dual Nature
15 Copy Enchantment
16 Allay
17 Saltcrusted Steppe
18 Core Prowler
19 Metallurgeon
20 Acorn Harvest
21 Battle Cry
22 Retract
23 Spellweaver Volute
24 Fountain of Youth
25 Fountain of Youth
26 Fountain of Youth
28 Wormfang Behemoth
29 Divine Congregation
30 Worldfire
31 Flash of Defiance
32 Flash of Defiance
33 Flash of Defiance
34 Spellweaver Helix
35 Titania, Protector of Argoth
36 Volcanic Island
37 Goblin Gardener
38 Mad Auntie
39 Facevaulter
40 Deathrite Shaman
41 Everglove Courier
42 Nectar Faerie
43 Ghosthelm Courier
44 Possessed Aven
45 Centaur Archer
46 Maze Glider
48 Eastern Paladin
49 Frightshroud Courier
50 Embalmer's Tools
51 Devout Chaplain
52 Royal Assassin
53 Paragon of Open Graves
54 Lightbringer
55 Dwarven Warriors
56 Karplusan Yeti
57 Reality Spasm
58 Wheel of Fortune
59 Show and Tell
60 Black Lotus
2 Psychic Battle
3 Cowardice
4 Horobi, Death's Wail
5 Bloodbond March
6 Cephalid Shrine
7 Mimic Vat
8 Omniscience
9 Leyline of Anticipation
10 Mirror of Fate
11 March of the Machines
12 Drake Familiar
13 Perpetual Timepiece
14 Dual Nature
15 Copy Enchantment
16 Allay
17 Saltcrusted Steppe
18 Core Prowler
19 Metallurgeon
20 Acorn Harvest
21 Battle Cry
22 Retract
23 Spellweaver Volute
24 Fountain of Youth
25 Fountain of Youth
26 Fountain of Youth
28 Wormfang Behemoth
29 Divine Congregation
30 Worldfire
31 Flash of Defiance
32 Flash of Defiance
33 Flash of Defiance
34 Spellweaver Helix
35 Titania, Protector of Argoth
36 Volcanic Island
37 Goblin Gardener
38 Mad Auntie
39 Facevaulter
40 Basal Thrull
41 Thrull Champion
42 Godtoucher
43 Everglove Courier
44 Nectar Faerie
45 Ghosthelm Courier
46 Possessed Aven
48 Maze Glider
49 Possessed Centaur
50 Eastern Paladin
51 Frightshroud Courier
52 Dwarven Warriors
53 Possessed Barbarian
54 Minion of Tevesh Szat
55 Reality Spasm
56 Precursor Golem
57 Consecrated Sphinx
58 Wheel of Fortune
59 Show and Tell
60 Black Lotus
We could probably replace Wheel of Fortune with Words of Wisdom so the opponent can draw more often. Getting started can't be that hard with a Consecrated Sphinx in there.
It would be nice to redraw Black Lotus with March of the Machines and lots of Dual Natures in play, so that we can get lots of token copies of Black Lotus. At that point we are probably set. But, we need two mana to use Perpetual Timepiece to put Black Lotus back in the library. I'm not seeing a way, other than to tap both lands for mana. That would mean we couldn't use Core Prowler for mana until we destroyed Saltcrusted Steppe with either Worldfire or Goblin Gardener. But maybe it's what we have to do.
[EDIT] Oh yes, we definitely want Psychic Possession. First draw we can draw Copy Enchantment and Drake Familiar. That will allow us to create up to 65 Psychic Possessions. We will stop at 48 so as not to deck ourselves. Or wait, we can draw Leyline of Anticipation as well... so we might as well go the full 65.
No, we need to draw Flash of Defiance, Spellweaver Helix, and either Perpetual Timepiece or another Flash of Defiance. So anyway, we pick as many Psychic Possessions as we need to draw the deck (minus however many cards we would rather mill). What is the best way to proceed after we have drawn the deck?
[EDIT] Whoops, Words of Wisdom is an instant. So we can draw Spellweaver Volute, a sorcery, Copy Enchantment, Drake Familiar, and Leyline of Anticipation. It's probably best then to create 67 Psychic Possessions, getting 1 draw of 2 cards followed by, 67 draws of 1 card. Or, we could have the original Copy Enchantment copy Dual Nature, getting six Dual Natures and seven Drake Familiars. When we bounce Copy Enchantment, that's a nontoken Dual Nature, so we lose all the Dual Nature tokens, and one of the Psychic Possession tokens. So we get 2,4,8,16,32,64 Dual Natures, then 66 Psychic Possessions, and draw 68 cards. Wait, somehow that turned out worse. However, we can use the original method, then use the final Copy Enchantment to copy Psychic Possession, getting 68 Psychic Possessions for 70 card draws.
Or actually, use the second to last Copy Enchantment to copy Dual Nature, getting 66 Dual Natures, then copy Psychic Possessions for 69 of them and 71 card draws.
[EDIT] Okay, Consecrated Sphinx is much better:
So we start with
Black Lotus
Show and Tell
Omniscience
Opalescence
Dual Nature
Consecrated Sphinx
Words of Wisdom
Play the cards in order, getting 2 Dual Natures, 3 Consecrated Sphinxes, and drawing 8 cards with Words of Wisdom. We draw:
Copy Enchantment
Leyline of Anticipation
Drake Familiar
Cowardice
Allay
Evacuation
Spellweaver Volute
Flash of Defiance
Cast Copy Enchantment, copying nothing. We get two token copies; copy Dual Nature with both of them. Cast Leyline of Anticipation. Cast Drake Familiar; this will generate 4 token copies of Drake Familiar, and we will have the opportunity to return an enchantment to our hand 5 times. Return and replay Copy Enchantment all five times. For the first three times, copy nothing with the original, then have all the tokens copy Dual Nature. This will create 4, then 8, then 16 Dual Nature tokens, resulting in 31 Dual Nature tokens in total. For the fourth time, copy Dual Nature with the original, causing all 33 of the token copies to be Dual Natures as well; we now have 64 token copies of Dual Nature. When we bounce Copy Enchantment for the fifth and final Drake Familiar, we get a bunch of Dual Nature triggers to exile Dual Nature tokens. Respond to that trigger by replaying Copy Enchantment, copying nothing; we get 65 token copies, of which we use 64 to copy Dual Nature, and one to copy Opalescence. This will cause both Opalescences to be creatures. Cast Allay, bouncing the original Opalescence; this will trigger all the Dual Natures to exile the token Opalescence. Allow that token to be exiled. Cast Evacuation, brining Consecrated Sphinx and Drake Familiar back to our hand. Play Opalescence again. Play Drake Familiar, getting 129 token copies, allowing us to return an enchantment to our hand 130 times. Each time we return Copy Enchantment and replay it, copying nothing, and using all the token copies to copy Dual Nature. (For the second to last time we use the original to copy Dual Nature as well.) This will take the number of Dual Natures to 129 * 2^130 + 2. Play Consecrated Sphinx, getting 129 * 2^130 + 3 copies in total. Play Spellweaver Volute on Words of Wisdom, and cast Flash of Defiance, triggering Spellweaver Volute to cast Words of Wisdom. We will draw 129 * 2^131 + 8 cards, two at a time.
Next, we draw all the nonland permanents in the deck. We cast March of the Machines and Psychic Battle. Cast a sorcery to cast Allay from the graveyard, bouncing Copy Enchantment repeatedly, resulting in more than 2^^(129 * 2^130) Dual Natures and Psychic Battles. Save one Cowardice trigger; before it resolves, cast Perpetual Timepiece and Mirror of Fate, getting more than 2^^(129 * 2^130) copies of each. Then bounce March of the Machines with the last Cowardice trigger. We now have the power to mold our library, graveyard, and exile zones however we want. Mill the two lands into the graveyard. Play Titania, Protector of Argoth, getting token copies and bringing the two lands onto the battlefield. Tap the two land for mana. Use the mana to activate a Perpetual Timepiece token, bringing Black Lotus back to the library. Use a couple of Mirror of Fates to choose the seven cards we want in our library, putting Allay and Black Lotus first. Draw Allay and Black Lotus. Play March of the Machines, then play Black Lotus. The Black Lotus enters as a 0/0 creature and is put into the graveyard as a state-based action, but not before it triggers all the Dual Natures. Before those Dual Nature triggers resolve, cast Allay, creating a bunch more Dual Natures and Psychic Battles (more than 2^^2^^(129 * 2^130)) and bouncing March of the Machines back to our hand. Resolve the Dual Nature triggers, getting more than 2^^(129 * 2^130) Black Lotuses. Put Allay back in the library, and draw Allay and Reality Spasm. Use all but four of the mana from the Black Lotuses to cast a bunch of Allays with buyback, creating more than 2^^^(2^^(129 * 2^130)) Dual Natures and Psychic Battles. Play Precursor Golem, getting more than 2^^^(2^^(129 * 2^130)) copies. Play Reality Spasm.
Since we now have the full deck at our disposal, we can run the full combo for Reality Spasm, so we generate more than F_{w^3 + w12 + 1}(2^^^(2^^(129 * 2^130))) token copies of Dual Nature by the end of it. We can draw Reality Spasm more than 2^138 more times, so that will generate more than F_{w^3 + w12 + 2}(2^138) Dual Natures once we are done drawing cards. And we can cast Words of Wisdom 51 more times; by the end we can create more than F_{w^3 + w12 + 2}^52(2^138) > F_{w^3 + w12 + 3}(52) hasted Metallurgeons. Enter the combat phase and swing with everything.
The preparation for the second Words of Wisdom can be improved a bit:
- Draw the cards Deedlit11 suggests. Play Leyline of Anticipation and Spellweaver Volute enchanting the Words of Wisdom.
- play Copy Enchantment as itself, go to 4 Dual Nature copies.
- play Cowardice and Allay to bounce the Copy Enchantment. Go to 8 Dual Natures.
- play Drake Familiar. Use 8 of the triggers to double the Dual Nature copies, 1 to bounce Opalescence. We have ~2^11 Dual Natures.
- play Evacuation. play Opalescence and then play Drake Familiar again and double Dual Natures with most of the 2^11 tokens. Also bounce Opalescence again and copy a Spellweaver Volute enchanting Evacuation. We have ~2^2^11 Dual Natures.
- play Flash of Defiance. Two Volutes trigger. Resolve the Evacuation first.
- replay Opalescence and Drake Familiar again. Double Dual Natures with every trigger. We have ~2^2^2^11 Dual Natures.
- play Consecrated Sphinx and get some token copies before resolving the Words of Wisdom. We get to draw about 2^2^2^11 cards, 2 at a time.
We can also put a Spellweaver Volute on Allay as well, but we can't resolve the Allay until we cast Evacuate and then play Drake Familiar to put a Spellweaver Volute on Evacuate, so the extra doubling is quite small in effect.
It looks like this deck is rounding into shape - it may be time to start thinking about writing this thing up.
A question for everyone:
What is the best nomenclature for the various levels of stages?
layer, stage, hyperstage, hyperhyperstage
layer, stage, hyperstage, megastage
layer, stage, hyperstage, ultrastage
layer, w-layer, w^2-layer, w^3-layer
Or add you own suggestions!
If we go with hyperhyperstage, we should probably shorten it to hyper^2stage or hyper^2-stage.
The
Necromancer (or Noob)
Cat.
Don't ask, I don't know why ether...
[EDIT] Question: which card or cards should we generally have in the library to use with Psychic Battle?
[EDIT] Another question: can we complete the combo if we do what I did in my last post, namely put a Spellweaver Volute on Allay and cast it, putting Allay in exile? It seems like it should be possible, but I'm having trouble getting further.
okay, let's try to optimize the start even more. Same card draws:
1. play Copy Enchantment as Dual Nature. 6 Dual Natures.
2. Bounce Copy Enchantment with Allay. Continue in response to the token removal. (5 DN)
3. play Copy Enchantment as itself. copies as Dual Nature. (10 DN)
4. play Drake Familiar. Bounce Copy Enchantment 9 times, replay it as itself 8 times, tokens as Dual Nature. Replay it as Dual Nature the last time. (10*2^9+2 DN)
Bounce Opalescence. Play Evacuation, return Drake Familiar to hand. Replay Opalescence.
Bounce Copy Enchantment, Continue in response to the token removal triggers.
Replay Copy Enchantment as itself. All but two tokens as Dual Nature. two as Spellweaver Volute. (10*2^10 DN)
5. play Flash of Defiance, triggering Volutes on 3 instants.
6. Resolve the Allay Volute, bouncing Copy Enchantment. Replay as itself, tokens as Dual Nature. (10*2^11 DN)
7. play Drake Familiar. Use all but one bounces to replay Copy enchantment as itself, tokens as Dual Natures. ((10*2^11)*2^(10*2^11) > 2^20494 DN)
Bounce Opalescence.
8. Resolve the Evacuation Volute. Return Drake Familiar to hand. Replay it. Use all bounces to replay copy enchantment as itself. ( > 2^2^20494 DN)
9. Play Consecrated Sphinx, then resolve the Words of Wisdom.
So the extra doubling from recasting Allay can actually be seen in the estimate
Getting access to the combo from that point:
- draw all the nonland permanents.
- play Perpetual Timepiece. Mill both lands.
- Play Titania, Protector of Argoth, return the lands to the battlefield, tap them for mana.
- Play Mirror of Fate, activate it. Put Allay into the library.
(- If necessary to not deck ourselves later play some creatures into Cephalid Shrine to get them into the graveyard.)
- Activate the Timepiece, shuffle Black Lotus, Mirror of Fate (and some other cards?) into the library.
- draw Black Lotus, Mirror of Fate and Ally. Play March of the Machines. Then Mirror of Fate. Then Black Lotus, in response to Dual Nature, bounce March of the Machines with Allay.
- Get lots of Mana. Use a Mirror of Fate token to get the Timepiece out of exile.
...
I see no difficulties accessing any card from this point. Are there any problems?
EDIT: Found one more (somewhat meaningful) spot where we can play Copy Enchantment as Dual Nature. Edited that in.
https://sites.google.com/site/deedlitsplace/ultracombo
I think it's public, I've never made a web page before.
Please feel free to make comments and corrections!
[EDIT] Okay, another question: What is the best way to handle Dual Nature when we are bouncing and destroying creatures? I guess just bounce the Dual Nature, and live with all the tokens leaving the battlefield? But we can't set up a stage with just one Psychic Battle, nor with just one Bloodbond March.