What's that one card that prevents life totals from changing? Cram a deck full of Pyrohemias/Pestilences, Sprouting Phytohydras, Doubling Seasons, and find something that goes along with it. Perhaps this isn't within the realm of what you're looking for, but it's always fun to have your opponent staring down an army of 197 0/2 Defenders. (I've done it before!)
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Some facts of magic:
-Terror is an emotion which, when experienced, results in death.
-The pox was a disease notorious for having killed one-third, rounded up, of Europe’s population. Smallpox, on the other hand, killed only a single person.
-A person riding a horse cannot be stopped by foot soldiers, large animals, walls, archers, or even catapults.
Captains's Log: Been busy, but had a possible break though. I want to try to have the oppenent's life go infinite. In turn I want to go more infinite so I can actually kill them. My math skills are poor, but i think theres an idea in there somewhere...
The combo that Ive come up with so far is
1. Followed Footsteps
2. Wall of Shards
3. Sword of the Ages
So, Sword of the Ages needs atleast 20 walls to kill the opponent. Too bad for the Sword the walls make it hard on the sword.
The walls give the oppnent some amount of life per turn... N? So we have to figure out the power and number of walls required in order to overcome the constantly increasing life.
Haze of Rage is probably the only card capable to get the power necessary to do this.
Add in some crappy mana storage and we have a deck that might just work.
If Haze is too good, then a crappier pump may have to do it.
------
Deck v1
1. Followed Footsteps
2. Wall of Shards
3. Sword of Ages
4. Haze of Rage - more than likely have to be swapped for something...
5. Thran Quary
6. Calciform Pools
7. Red Mana Battery
I can't just cast any of my creatures to win -- the tokens will always beat a hardcast creature.
1. Slagheap, golden urn, wait
2. Soul foundry imprinting Bairn
3. Start doubling the number of counters on slagheap by making a barin, attacking into the tokens, untapping, and doubling the counters.
4. Once you've saved enough, you can kill 1 token every 2 turns by tapping slagheap for 1 mana, using it to make 8 mana, casting assassin, shooting a token, casting sharding phoenix, sacing it, and returning Assassin to your hand with recover for half your life, and on the following turn you can return phonix to your hand for 3 mana.
5. Eventually you kill all the tokens and you attack for the win.
Who else is a math buff? Maybe I'll find some time to do this this weekend...
EDIT:
I can't remember why I didn't think of putting assassin on soul foundry... that deck doesn't work at all...
Some facts of magic:
-Terror is an emotion which, when experienced, results in death.
-The pox was a disease notorious for having killed one-third, rounded up, of Europe’s population. Smallpox, on the other hand, killed only a single person.
-A person riding a horse cannot be stopped by foot soldiers, large animals, walls, archers, or even catapults.
I can't just cast any of my creatures to win -- the tokens will always beat a hardcast creature.
1. Slagheap, golden urn, wait
2. Soul foundry imprinting Bairn
3. Start doubling the number of counters on slagheap by making a barin, attacking into the tokens, untapping, and doubling the counters.
4. Once you've saved enough, you can kill 1 token every 2 turns by tapping slagheap for 1 mana, using it to make 8 mana, casting assassin, shooting a token, casting sharding phoenix, sacing it, and returning Assassin to your hand with recover for half your life, and on the following turn you can return phonix to your hand for 3 mana.
5. Eventually you kill all the tokens and you attack for the win.
Who else is a math buff? Maybe I'll find some time to do this this weekend...
EDIT:
I can't remember why I didn't think of putting assassin on soul foundry... that deck doesn't work at all...
Then repeat. This loop gets 2 damage every iteration instead of 1, while still only costing 3/4 of life total.
Looks like you're right. I think the deck still gets over a million, though.
But I think replacing Pyromania with Oblivion Crown will fix the problem. That way, you have to use the loop you mentioned. Cast Crown on a spare goat. Then, each iteration discard the Reiterate to pump the goat by 1.
Either Version:
Slagheap, Golden Urn
Wait
Charge Slagheap
Phoenix
Assassin, in response blow up Phoenix
Wins pretty quickly
Phoenix only kills creatures WITHOUT flying. The orchard tokens are immune. EDIT: Except they don't have flying... facepalm. Let me find a better creature...
I can't just cast any of my creatures to win -- the tokens will always beat a hardcast creature.
1. Slagheap, golden urn, wait
2. Soul foundry imprinting Bairn
3. Start doubling the number of counters on slagheap by making a barin, attacking into the tokens, untapping, and doubling the counters.
4. Once you've saved enough, you can kill 1 token every 2 turns by tapping slagheap for 1 mana, using it to make 8 mana, casting assassin, shooting a token, casting sharding phoenix, sacing it, and returning Assassin to your hand with recover for half your life, and on the following turn you can return phonix to your hand for 3 mana.
5. Eventually you kill all the tokens and you attack for the win.
Who else is a math buff? Maybe I'll find some time to do this this weekend...
EDIT:
I can't remember why I didn't think of putting assassin on soul foundry... that deck doesn't work at all...
Nevermind, I remember now. It definitely works.
I can't imprint bairn or assassin -- no matter what I need to pay their mana cost to make one, and to do so I need to make more tokens than the creatures can attack through. The only way to win is to double my mana enough times to do the assassin loop enough times to kill all the tokens I made when I made the mana.
This is seriously a contender. I know the doubling cube version needs to halve it's life total at least 13 times, and the bairn version is much slower.
Play Molten Slagheap, cast Golden Urn, wait
Sac Golden urn for enough life, play Forbidden orchard, start storing mana, wait
Crack slagheap for enough black mana, Cast both Doubling cubes, Tap 'em, Cycle Garza's assassin until all the tokens are dead and 1 assassin is still alive.
Attack 10 times
To kill X tokens, you halve your life total X times.
To kill X tokens, you need 3X black mana
To store X mana, you create X tokens.
X stored mana produces 2* (2* (X-5) - 5)... = 4x-30 usable loop mana.
When you have 3 usable mana per token produced, (and 3 more to keep assassin up) you can start the loop.
2*(2*(X-5)-5) / X = 3
X = 30
+3
X = 33
LOL, only 33 tokens? Really? That's pretty funny. It's still a LOT of life though...
So you need to halve your life total at least 33 times...
That's 2^33 = 8,589,934,592 life you need to finish at 1 life.
Then there's some amount of turns you have to continue building up counters because the tokens attack you, but it's really negligible. It's in the hundreds. Let's say this takes 8.5 billion turns.
Bonus: If you really want to converge at infinite turns, then you need to make 1 token for every 1 time you can cast Assassin...
1) MS and Gu, wait
2) Forbidden orchard, charge slagheap
3) Soul Foundry Imprinting Bairn
4) Double slagheap's counters a few times until you have enough mana for 5 and 6
5) Cast Assassin, kill a token, cast Devourer, attack 4 times, finally they chump, recover assassin, kill a token
6) Upkeep, Return Devourer and sac him, recover assassin, kill a token. Repeat until all tokens are dead and you have an assassin on the board
7) Attack 10 times
It takes 10 usable mana to kill each token.
Every time you tap orchard, you make 1 token
Every time you attack with Bairn, they triple block and lose 1 token
When you need Devourer to die, they lose 1 token
You cast soul foundry after storing 3 counters. There are 4 tokens
Once you get a certain number of counters on slagheap, you don't need to tap orchard again.
It takes 6 mana to double the number of counters. You need at least 13 counters to "go infinite."
... This doesn't work. You can theoretically just keep attacking with Bairn until you win and ignore assassin altogether
Some facts of magic:
-Terror is an emotion which, when experienced, results in death.
-The pox was a disease notorious for having killed one-third, rounded up, of Europe’s population. Smallpox, on the other hand, killed only a single person.
-A person riding a horse cannot be stopped by foot soldiers, large animals, walls, archers, or even catapults.
Golden urn counteracts forbidden orchard a little too well. you only make 3 tokens when you hard-cast garza's assassin. the tokens would race if you're both at 20, but you only need an extra 20 or so life to change that.
I can't just cast any of my creatures to win -- the tokens will always beat a hardcast creature.
1. Slagheap, golden urn, wait
2. Soul foundry imprinting Bairn
3. Start doubling the number of counters on slagheap by making a barin, attacking into the tokens, untapping, and doubling the counters.
4. Once you've saved enough, you can kill 1 token every 2 turns by tapping slagheap for 1 mana, using it to make 8 mana, casting assassin, shooting a token, casting sharding phoenix, sacing it, and returning Assassin to your hand with recover for half your life, and on the following turn you can return phonix to your hand for 3 mana.
5. Eventually you kill all the tokens and you attack for the win.
Who else is a math buff? Maybe I'll find some time to do this this weekend...
EDIT:
I can't remember why I didn't think of putting assassin on soul foundry... that deck doesn't work at all...
My mana base is off for this deck, but here are my thoughts,
1. Followed Footsteps
2. Wall of Shards
3. Sword of Ages
4. Haze of Rage
5. Thran Quary
6. Calciform Pools
7. Red Mana Battery
So, what happens and the real math problem that Im having...
Ok, you put the Wall of Shards down to start off.
Each turn you put a counter on Wall of Shards. The opponent then gains 2 life for each counter on Wall of Shards.
T1 - 0 life gained by the opponent
T2 - 2 life gained by the opponent
T3 - 4 life gained... etc
...
Well each turn, after the first, you put down 1 copy of Wall of Shards and the same thing happens as above.
The increase of life for the opponent ends up being (X+1)X, I think.
---------
That's the part I've figured out.
Ok, so this has to kill the opponent... the only way that this deck can is with this card,
Sword of Ages, http://gatherer.wizards.com/pages/Card/Details.aspx?multiverseid=201233,
pretty much, it deals damage to the opponent equal to the total power of all of the creatures I control. For the Wall of Shards its easy, its power is 1, so number of Walls of Shards that are out there.
Ok, so if we didn't have the massive lifegain we would win in 20 turns.
20 Walls would do 20 damage and kill the opponent. Problem is... the opponent would have 420 life by then.
So, we have to figure out how much power we need to add to the walls so that we can kill the opponent.
The shot that we take is all or nothing.
The kill card I have gives all of the creatures +Y power.
It takes 4 turns to store up enough mana to increase the damage by 1 for each creature (because of how storing up mana works in this...).
How much power would be required to kill the opponent and what turn could I win?
Wall of Shards only gives your opponent 1 life/age counter.
First wall of shards gives your opponent (t-1)(t-2)/2 life.
Footsteps lands on turn 7, so first copy on t8.
Copies (together) give your opponent (t-8)(t-7)(t-6)/6. Haze of Rage is a sorcery, so you have to pay the last turn's upkeep.
So your opponent's life total on turn t is 20+(t-1)(t-2)/2+(t-8)(t-7)(t-6)/6.
You start charging for Haze turn 8 and gain 1 charge per 4 turns. On the turn you go off you have 2 extra mana from your lands.
So the number of Haze casts is floor((t-6)/4). The total power granted to each creature is floor((t-6)/4)*(floor((t-6)/4)+1)/2. So the total power of each Wall is floor((t-6)/4)*(floor((t-6)/4)+1)/2+1. There are t-6 walls, so you do (t-6)*(floor((t-6)/4)*(floor((t-6)/4)+1)/2+1) damage.
The kill plan is to trigger Rath's Edge, sacrificing itself to deal 1 point of damage. After that, you cast Doomsday to put Rath's Edge back on top of your deck. Draw it, replay it, blow it up again for another damage. Then cast your other Doomsday to put the first Doomsday and Rath's Edge back on top again. Repeat.
This means you have to cast Doomsday 19 times to win (the last use of Rath's Edge is free).
In order to do this, you need 2^19 life = 524288.
To gain life, you use Reality Twist, enchanted with Quiet Disrepair. Reality Twist has cumulative upkeep 1UU. In order to gain 524288 life, you need 262143 turns (you can save the last turn by stacking the triggers nicely). In order to pay upkeep on Reality Twist for that long, you need 1UU * (n*(n+1)/2) = 1UU * 34,359,607,296 = 103 billion mana. Which takes 103 billion turns with the storage land. The rest of the turns are rounding error.
I'm not actually sure I've really optimized this deck, so other people feel free to chime in to add more turns! Or to point out flaws in the deck I missed.
I'm considering a slow health growth deck with Rath's Edge + Doomsday + Doomsday as the win condition.
Rath's Edge
Dreadship Reef (Stores B/U)
Reality Twist
Quiet Disrepair
Elvish Spirit Guide (My source of green mana for Quiet Disrepair)
Doomsday
Doomsday
103 billion turns. Plus some scratch.
The kill plan is to trigger Rath's Edge, sacrificing itself to deal 1 point of damage. After that, you cast Doomsday to put Rath's Edge back on top of your deck. Draw it, replay it, blow it up again for another damage. Then cast your other Doomsday to put the first Doomsday and Rath's Edge back on top again. Repeat.
This means you have to cast Doomsday 19 times to win (the last use of Rath's Edge is free).
In order to do this, you need 2^19 life = 524288.
To gain life, you use Reality Twist, enchanted with Quiet Disrepair. Reality Twist has cumulative upkeep 1UU. In order to gain 524288 life, you need 262143 turns (you can save the last turn by stacking the triggers nicely). In order to pay upkeep on Reality Twist for that long, you need 1UU * (n*(n+1)/2) = 1UU * 34,359,607,296 = 103 billion mana. Which takes 103 billion turns with the storage land. The rest of the turns are rounding error.
I'm not actually sure I've really optimized this deck, so other people feel free to chime in to add more turns! Or to point out flaws in the deck I missed.
Doesn't work. You don't actually need that much life because you keep gaining 2 each turn. For example, say you are at 10 life. Doomsday brings you to 5. Next turn, you go up to 7. Doomsday brings you to 3. Next turn you go up to 5. Doomsday brings you to 2. Next turn you go up to 4. Doomsday brings you to 2. And so no, repeating.
If you're going to use a 2xDoomsday loop, you need a one-shot life gain. I actually considered something similar before finding the Reiterate plan. I used Stream of Life with spirit guide and Rath's Edge.
Doesn't work. You don't actually need that much life because you keep gaining 2 each turn. For example, say you are at 10 life. Doomsday brings you to 5. Next turn, you go up to 7. Doomsday brings you to 3. Next turn you go up to 5. Doomsday brings you to 2. Next turn you go up to 4. Doomsday brings you to 2. And so no, repeating.
If you're going to use a 2xDoomsday loop, you need a one-shot life gain. I actually considered something similar before finding the Reiterate plan. I used Stream of Life with spirit guide and Rath's Edge.
Casting Doomsday a lot while paying for upkeep works fine. Except that you don't actually manage to do any damage in that loop since you'll be using all your mana to just cast those 2 spells.
In order to do damage, you've got to sacrifice Rath's Edge, which costs 4 mana AND the Rath's Edge. The only way to generate mana is to use the storage land, which is STILL fine (since you can do it during upkeep to get mana to both Sac the land AND pay for the upkeep). However, once you've got Rath's Edge in the graveyard, you'll never be able to pay upkeep (during the upkeep phase) AND cast Doomsday (during the main phase). And if you ever don't pay upkeep, then Quiet Disrepair goes away. And since Elvish Spirit Guide is a one-shot, you'll never be able to cast Quiet Disrepair again.
Casting Doomsday a lot while paying for upkeep works fine. Except that you don't actually manage to do any damage in that loop since you'll be using all your mana to just cast those 2 spells.
In order to do damage, you've got to sacrifice Rath's Edge, which costs 4 mana AND the Rath's Edge. The only way to generate mana is to use the storage land, which is STILL fine (since you can do it during upkeep to get mana to both Sac the land AND pay for the upkeep). However, once you've got Rath's Edge in the graveyard, you'll never be able to pay upkeep (during the upkeep phase) AND cast Doomsday (during the main phase). And if you ever don't pay upkeep, then Quiet Disrepair goes away. And since Elvish Spirit Guide is a one-shot, you'll never be able to cast Quiet Disrepair again.
Ah, right. Sorry.
You can still optimize a bit by doing 4 iterations before starting your lifegain.
Wall of Shards only gives your opponent 1 life/age counter.
First wall of shards gives your opponent (t-1)(t-2)/2 life.
Footsteps lands on turn 7, so first copy on t8.
Copies (together) give your opponent (t-8)(t-7)(t-6)/6. Haze of Rage is a sorcery, so you have to pay the last turn's upkeep.
So your opponent's life total on turn t is 20+(t-1)(t-2)/2+(t-8)(t-7)(t-6)/6.
You start charging for Haze turn 8 and gain 1 charge per 4 turns. On the turn you go off you have 2 extra mana from your lands.
So the number of Haze casts is floor((t-6)/4). The total power granted to each creature is floor((t-6)/4)*(floor((t-6)/4)+1)/2. So the total power of each Wall is floor((t-6)/4)*(floor((t-6)/4)+1)/2+1. There are t-6 walls, so you do (t-6)*(floor((t-6)/4)*(floor((t-6)/4)+1)/2+1) damage.
Well, this is witch level math magic. Thanks for figuring this out. Tbh I'm kinda surprised that Haze doesn't eventually get larger than the lifegain
It's not that complicated once you realize a few key points.
The total paid to cumulative upkeep grows quadratically. Specifically, the sum of the series
1 + 2 + 3 + 4 + ... + n
is (1/2)*n*(n+1). If you use Followed Footsteps to make an additional wall each turn, you're multiplying the quadratic by a linear function, so you end up with a cubic function. Specifically,
(1/6)*n*(n+1)*(n+2)
Haze of Rage (when you store 1 mana each turn and then use it once) is similarly quadratic — on successive casts you get 1 copy, then 2, then 3, etc....sound familiar? And again you're multiplying it by a linear function — the number of walls. So once again you end up with a cubic function.
However, since you're making an extra wall a turn but only generating an extra Haze every few turns the life will grow faster than the damage. The exact ratio is 16/3.
The only way to win is to attack with Magus of the Tabernacle ten times.
One must sacrifice Lotus Bloom for three white mana to cast it, after which one can never get Lotus Bloom back.
Magus of the Tabernacle gives all creatures upkeep costs of {1}, including itself.
Eldrazi Spawn tokens from Growth Spasm are the only way to pay for that, but they also have upkeep costs from Magus of the Tabernacle.
Because of that, once Magus of the Tabernacle is on the battlefield, one must sacrifice half of one's creatures to pay for the upkeep costs of the other half every upkeep.
Growth Spasm cannot be cast once Lotus Bloom is lost.
Therefore, one must have 1023 Eldrazi Spawn tokens after Magus of the Tabernacle is cast, and one more is needed to cast it, for a total of 1024.
To get those, one must repeatedly retrieve Growth Spasm and Lotus Bloom with Dwell on the Past and Doomsday, and must also have Emerald Medallion on the battlefield.
Doomsday halves one's life total each time; one must gain life to survive it.
Ivory Tower is the only way to gain life, but once Emerald Medallion is cast, one can never gain life from Ivory Tower again; therefore, enough life must be gained beforehand.
Putting everything together, here is what one should do.
(At the start of each of the following lines is the turn number.)
1 Suspend Lotus Bloom.
4 Get Lotus Bloom, sacrifice it for three green mana, and cast Ivory Tower and Dwell on the Past targeting Lotus Bloom.
5 Draw Lotus Bloom and suspend Lotus Bloom.
8 Get Lotus Bloom, sacrifice it for three black mana, cast Doomsday, put Lotus Bloom and Dwell on the Past into one's library, and lose 10 life.
9 Draw one of those cards.
10 Draw the other one.
11 Gain 1 life from Ivory Tower, making one's life total 11.
12 Gain 1 life from Ivory Tower, making one's life total 12.
13 Gain 1 life from Ivory Tower, making one's life total 13.
[continue in the same way]
2^1024 Gain 1 life from Ivory Tower, making one's life total 2^1024, and suspend Lotus Bloom.
2^1024+3 Get Lotus Bloom, sacrifice it for three green mana, cast Emerald Medallion, and cast Dwell on the Past targeting Lotus Bloom and Doomsday.
2^1024+4 Draw Doomsday.
2^1024+5 Draw Lotus Bloom and suspend Lotus Bloom.
2^1024+8 Get Lotus Bloom, sacrifice it for three black mana, cast Doomsday, put Lotus Bloom and Dwell on the Past into one's library in that order, and lose 2^1023 life.
2^1024+9 Draw Lotus Bloom and suspend Lotus Bloom.
2^1024+10 Draw Dwell on the Past.
2^1024+12 Get Lotus Bloom, sacrifice it for three green mana, cast Dwell on the Past targeting Lotus Bloom and Doomsday, and cast Growth Spasm; there is no basic land to find, but one still gets an Eldrazi Spawn token.
2^1024+13 Draw Doomsday.
2^1024+14 Draw Lotus Bloom and suspend Lotus Bloom.
2^1024+17 Get Lotus Bloom, sacrifice it for three black mana, cast Doomsday, put Lotus Bloom, Dwell on the Past, and Growth Spasm into one's library in that order, and lose half one's life (2^1022 the first time).
2^1024+18 Draw Lotus Bloom and suspend Lotus Bloom.
2^1024+19 Draw Dwell on the Past.
2^1024+20 Draw Growth Spasm.
2^1024+21 [Repeat from seven lines above, 1022 times.]
2^1024+9219 Get Lotus Bloom, sacrifice it for three green mana, cast Dwell on the Past targeting Lotus Bloom and Doomsday, and cast Growth Spasm; there is no basic land to find, but one still gets an Eldrazi Spawn token.
2^1024+9220 Draw Doomsday.
2^1024+9221 Draw Lotus Bloom and suspend Lotus Bloom.
2^1024+9224 Get Lotus Bloom, sacrifice Lotus Bloom for three white mana and one Eldrazi Spawn token for one colourless mana, and cast Magus of the Tabernacle.
2^1024+9225 Sacrifice 512 Eldrazi Spawn tokens to pay for the upkeep costs of the other creatures and have Magus of the Tabernacle attack.
2^1024+9226 Sacrifice 256 Eldrazi Spawn tokens to pay for the upkeep costs of the other creatures and have Magus of the Tabernacle attack.
2^1024+9227 Sacrifice 128 Eldrazi Spawn tokens to pay for the upkeep costs of the other creatures and have Magus of the Tabernacle attack.
2^1024+9228 Sacrifice 64 Eldrazi Spawn tokens to pay for the upkeep costs of the other creatures and have Magus of the Tabernacle attack.
2^1024+9229 Sacrifice 32 Eldrazi Spawn tokens to pay for the upkeep costs of the other creatures and have Magus of the Tabernacle attack.
2^1024+9230 Sacrifice 16 Eldrazi Spawn tokens to pay for the upkeep costs of the other creatures and have Magus of the Tabernacle attack.
2^1024+9231 Sacrifice 8 Eldrazi Spawn tokens to pay for the upkeep costs of the other creatures and have Magus of the Tabernacle attack.
2^1024+9232 Sacrifice 4 Eldrazi Spawn tokens to pay for the upkeep costs of the other creatures and have Magus of the Tabernacle attack.
2^1024+9233 Sacrifice 2 Eldrazi Spawn tokens to pay for the upkeep costs of the other creatures and have Magus of the Tabernacle attack.
2^1024+9234 Sacrifice the last Eldrazi Spawn token to pay for the upkeep cost of Magus of the Tabernacle, have Magus of the Tabernacle attack, and win the game.
That is 2^1024+9234 or 179,769,313,486,231,590,772,930,519,078,902,473,361,797,697,894,230,657,273,430,081,157,732,675,805,500,963,132,708,477,322,
407,536,021,120,113,879,871,393,357,658,789,768,814,416,622,492,847,430,639,474,124,377,767,893,424,865,485,276,302,219,601,246,094,119,453,082,952,
085,005,768,838,150,682,342,462,881,473,913,110,540,827,237,163,350,510,684,586,298,239,947,245,938,479,716,304,835,356,329,624,224,146,450 turns.
and I could not find anything suitable to give life.
Next was one like the current one, but with Eladamri's Vineyard in place of Emerald Medallion, which does not work properly, because Eladamri's Vineyard gives green mana that can be used to cast Dwell on the Past.
It was then changed to Darkwater Catacombs, Izzet Signet, Helm of Awakening, and finally Emerald Medallion.
The only way to win is to attack with Magus of the Tabernacle ten times.
One must sacrifice Lotus Bloom for three white mana to cast it, after which one can never get Lotus Bloom back.
Magus of the Tabernacle gives all creatures upkeep costs of {1}, including itself.
Eldrazi Spawn tokens from Growth Spasm are the only way to pay for that, but they also have upkeep costs from Magus of the Tabernacle.
Because of that, once Magus of the Tabernacle is on the battlefield, one must sacrifice half of one's creatures to pay for the upkeep costs of the other half every upkeep.
Growth Spasm cannot be cast once Lotus Bloom is lost.
Therefore, one must have 1023 Eldrazi Spawn tokens after Magus of the Tabernacle is cast, and one more is needed to cast it, for a total of 1024.
To get those, one must repeatedly retrieve Growth Spasm and Lotus Bloom with Dwell on the Past and Doomsday, and must also have Emerald Medallion on the battlefield.
Doomsday halves one's life total each time; one must gain life to survive it.
Ivory Tower is the only way to gain life, but once Emerald Medallion is cast, one can never gain life from Ivory Tower again; therefore, enough life must be gained beforehand.
Putting everything together, here is what one should do.
(At the start of each of the following lines is the turn number.)
1 Suspend Lotus Bloom.
4 Get Lotus Bloom, sacrifice it for three green mana, and cast Ivory Tower and Dwell on the Past targeting Lotus Bloom.
5 Draw Lotus Bloom and suspend Lotus Bloom.
8 Get Lotus Bloom, sacrifice it for three black mana, cast Doomsday, put Lotus Bloom and Dwell on the Past into one's library, and lose 10 life.
9 Draw one of those cards.
10 Draw the other one.
11 Gain 1 life from Ivory Tower, making one's life total 11.
12 Gain 1 life from Ivory Tower, making one's life total 12.
13 Gain 1 life from Ivory Tower, making one's life total 13.
[continue in the same way]
2^1024 Gain 1 life from Ivory Tower, making one's life total 2^1024, and suspend Lotus Bloom.
2^1024+3 Get Lotus Bloom, sacrifice it for three green mana, cast Emerald Medallion, and cast Dwell on the Past targeting Lotus Bloom and Doomsday.
2^1024+4 Draw Doomsday.
2^1024+5 Draw Lotus Bloom and suspend Lotus Bloom.
2^1024+8 Get Lotus Bloom, sacrifice it for three black mana, cast Doomsday, put Lotus Bloom and Dwell on the Past into one's library in that order, and lose 2^1023 life.
2^1024+9 Draw Lotus Bloom and suspend Lotus Bloom.
2^1024+10 Draw Dwell on the Past.
2^1024+12 Get Lotus Bloom, sacrifice it for three green mana, cast Dwell on the Past targeting Lotus Bloom and Doomsday, and cast Growth Spasm; there is no basic land to find, but one still gets an Eldrazi Spawn token.
2^1024+13 Draw Doomsday.
2^1024+14 Draw Lotus Bloom and suspend Lotus Bloom.
2^1024+17 Get Lotus Bloom, sacrifice it for three black mana, cast Doomsday, put Lotus Bloom, Dwell on the Past, and Growth Spasm into one's library in that order, and lose 2^1022 life.
2^1024+18 Draw Lotus Bloom and suspend Lotus Bloom.
2^1024+19 Draw Dwell on the Past.
2^1024+20 Draw Growth Spasm.
2^1024+21 [Repeat from seven lines above, 1022 times.]
2^1024+9219 Get Lotus Bloom, sacrifice it for three green mana, cast Dwell on the Past targeting Lotus Bloom and Doomsday, and cast Growth Spasm; there is no basic land to find, but one still gets an Eldrazi Spawn token.
2^1024+9220 Draw Doomsday.
2^1024+9221 Draw Lotus Bloom and suspend Lotus Bloom.
2^1024+9224 Get Lotus Bloom, sacrifice Lotus Bloom for three white mana and one Eldrazi Spawn token for one colourless mana, and cast Magus of the Tabernacle.
2^1024+9225 Sacrifice 512 Eldrazi Spawn tokens to pay for the upkeep costs of the other creatures and have Magus of the Tabernacle attack.
2^1024+9226 Sacrifice 256 Eldrazi Spawn tokens to pay for the upkeep costs of the other creatures and have Magus of the Tabernacle attack.
2^1024+9227 Sacrifice 128 Eldrazi Spawn tokens to pay for the upkeep costs of the other creatures and have Magus of the Tabernacle attack.
2^1024+9228 Sacrifice 64 Eldrazi Spawn tokens to pay for the upkeep costs of the other creatures and have Magus of the Tabernacle attack.
2^1024+9229 Sacrifice 32 Eldrazi Spawn tokens to pay for the upkeep costs of the other creatures and have Magus of the Tabernacle attack.
2^1024+9230 Sacrifice 16 Eldrazi Spawn tokens to pay for the upkeep costs of the other creatures and have Magus of the Tabernacle attack.
2^1024+9231 Sacrifice 8 Eldrazi Spawn tokens to pay for the upkeep costs of the other creatures and have Magus of the Tabernacle attack.
2^1024+9232 Sacrifice 4 Eldrazi Spawn tokens to pay for the upkeep costs of the other creatures and have Magus of the Tabernacle attack.
2^1024+9233 Sacrifice 2 Eldrazi Spawn tokens to pay for the upkeep costs of the other creatures and have Magus of the Tabernacle attack.
2^1024+9234 Sacrifice the last Eldrazi Spawn token to pay for the upkeep cost of Magus of the Tabernacle, have Magus of the Tabernacle attack, and win the game.
That is 2^1024+9234 or 179,769,313,486,231,590,772,930,519,078,902,473,361,797,697,894,230,657,273,430,081,157,732,675,805,500,963,132,708,477,322,
407,536,021,120,113,879,871,393,357,658,789,768,814,416,622,492,847,430,639,474,124,377,767,893,424,865,485,276,302,219,601,246,094,119,453,082,952,
085,005,768,838,150,682,342,462,881,473,913,110,540,827,237,163,350,510,684,586,298,239,947,245,938,479,716,304,835,356,329,624,224,146,450 turns.
and I could not find anything suitable to give life.
Next was one like the current one, but with Eladamri's Vineyard in place of Emerald Medallion, which does not work properly, because Eladamri's Vineyard gives green mana that can be used to cast Dwell on the Past.
It was then changed to Darkwater Catacombs, Izzet Signet, Helm of Awakening, and finally Emerald Medallion.
The only way to win is to attack with Magus of the Tabernacle ten times.
One must sacrifice Lotus Bloom for three white mana to cast it, after which one can never get Lotus Bloom back.
Magus of the Tabernacle gives all creatures upkeep costs of {1}, including itself.
Eldrazi Spawn tokens from Growth Spasm are the only way to pay for that, but they also have upkeep costs from Magus of the Tabernacle.
Because of that, once Magus of the Tabernacle is on the battlefield, one must sacrifice half of one's creatures to pay for the upkeep costs of the other half every upkeep.
Growth Spasm cannot be cast once Lotus Bloom is lost.
Therefore, one must have 1023 Eldrazi Spawn tokens after Magus of the Tabernacle is cast, and one more is needed to cast it, for a total of 1024.
To get those, one must repeatedly retrieve Growth Spasm and Lotus Bloom with Dwell on the Past and Doomsday, and must also have Emerald Medallion on the battlefield.
Doomsday halves one's life total each time; one must gain life to survive it.
Ivory Tower is the only way to gain life, but once Emerald Medallion is cast, one can never gain life from Ivory Tower again; therefore, enough life must be gained beforehand.
Putting everything together, here is what one should do.
(At the start of each of the following lines is the turn number.)
1 Suspend Lotus Bloom.
4 Get Lotus Bloom, sacrifice it for three green mana, and cast Ivory Tower and Dwell on the Past targeting Lotus Bloom.
5 Draw Lotus Bloom and suspend Lotus Bloom.
8 Get Lotus Bloom, sacrifice it for three black mana, cast Doomsday, put Lotus Bloom and Dwell on the Past into one's library, and lose 10 life.
9 Draw one of those cards.
10 Draw the other one.
11 Gain 1 life from Ivory Tower, making one's life total 11.
12 Gain 1 life from Ivory Tower, making one's life total 12.
13 Gain 1 life from Ivory Tower, making one's life total 13.
[continue in the same way]
2^1024 Gain 1 life from Ivory Tower, making one's life total 2^1024, and suspend Lotus Bloom.
2^1024+3 Get Lotus Bloom, sacrifice it for three green mana, cast Emerald Medallion, and cast Dwell on the Past targeting Lotus Bloom and Doomsday.
2^1024+4 Draw Doomsday.
2^1024+5 Draw Lotus Bloom and suspend Lotus Bloom.
2^1024+8 Get Lotus Bloom, sacrifice it for three black mana, cast Doomsday, put Lotus Bloom and Dwell on the Past into one's library in that order, and lose 2^1023 life.
2^1024+9 Draw Lotus Bloom and suspend Lotus Bloom.
2^1024+10 Draw Dwell on the Past.
2^1024+12 Get Lotus Bloom, sacrifice it for three green mana, cast Dwell on the Past targeting Lotus Bloom and Doomsday, and cast Growth Spasm; there is no basic land to find, but one still gets an Eldrazi Spawn token.
2^1024+13 Draw Doomsday.
2^1024+14 Draw Lotus Bloom and suspend Lotus Bloom.
2^1024+17 Get Lotus Bloom, sacrifice it for three black mana, cast Doomsday, put Lotus Bloom, Dwell on the Past, and Growth Spasm into one's library in that order, and lose 2^1022 life.
2^1024+18 Draw Lotus Bloom and suspend Lotus Bloom.
2^1024+19 Draw Dwell on the Past.
2^1024+20 Draw Growth Spasm.
2^1024+21 [Repeat from seven lines above, 1022 times.]
2^1024+9219 Get Lotus Bloom, sacrifice it for three green mana, cast Dwell on the Past targeting Lotus Bloom and Doomsday, and cast Growth Spasm; there is no basic land to find, but one still gets an Eldrazi Spawn token.
2^1024+9220 Draw Doomsday.
2^1024+9221 Draw Lotus Bloom and suspend Lotus Bloom.
2^1024+9224 Get Lotus Bloom, sacrifice Lotus Bloom for three white mana and one Eldrazi Spawn token for one colourless mana, and cast Magus of the Tabernacle.
2^1024+9225 Sacrifice 512 Eldrazi Spawn tokens to pay for the upkeep costs of the other creatures and have Magus of the Tabernacle attack.
2^1024+9226 Sacrifice 256 Eldrazi Spawn tokens to pay for the upkeep costs of the other creatures and have Magus of the Tabernacle attack.
2^1024+9227 Sacrifice 128 Eldrazi Spawn tokens to pay for the upkeep costs of the other creatures and have Magus of the Tabernacle attack.
2^1024+9228 Sacrifice 64 Eldrazi Spawn tokens to pay for the upkeep costs of the other creatures and have Magus of the Tabernacle attack.
2^1024+9229 Sacrifice 32 Eldrazi Spawn tokens to pay for the upkeep costs of the other creatures and have Magus of the Tabernacle attack.
2^1024+9230 Sacrifice 16 Eldrazi Spawn tokens to pay for the upkeep costs of the other creatures and have Magus of the Tabernacle attack.
2^1024+9231 Sacrifice 8 Eldrazi Spawn tokens to pay for the upkeep costs of the other creatures and have Magus of the Tabernacle attack.
2^1024+9232 Sacrifice 4 Eldrazi Spawn tokens to pay for the upkeep costs of the other creatures and have Magus of the Tabernacle attack.
2^1024+9233 Sacrifice 2 Eldrazi Spawn tokens to pay for the upkeep costs of the other creatures and have Magus of the Tabernacle attack.
2^1024+9234 Sacrifice the last Eldrazi Spawn token to pay for the upkeep cost of Magus of the Tabernacle, have Magus of the Tabernacle attack, and win the game.
That is 2^1024+9234 or 179,769,313,486,231,590,772,930,519,078,902,473,361,797,697,894,230,657,273,430,081,157,732,675,805,500,963,132,708,477,322,
407,536,021,120,113,879,871,393,357,658,789,768,814,416,622,492,847,430,639,474,124,377,767,893,424,865,485,276,302,219,601,246,094,119,453,082,952,
085,005,768,838,150,682,342,462,881,473,913,110,540,827,237,163,350,510,684,586,298,239,947,245,938,479,716,304,835,356,329,624,224,146,450 turns.
and I could not find anything suitable to give life.
Next was one like the current one, but with Eladamri's Vineyard in place of Emerald Medallion, which does not work properly, because Eladamri's Vineyard gives green mana that can be used to cast Dwell on the Past.
It was then changed to Darkwater Catacombs, Izzet Signet, Helm of Awakening, and finally Emerald Medallion.
This is great, especially the combination of Doomsday and Ivory Tower. At first, I thought there was a much faster line involving going to 1 life and only needing to gain back one life before casting Doomsday again, but you can't do that because Medallion has to still be in your hand.
I also haven't found any substitutions to make this deck slower. My most promising attempt involved Tabernacle and Molimo, but I didn't see a good way to fit that into seven cards.
Basically, this deck is awesome, and I don't see anyway to improve it.
Some facts of magic:
-Terror is an emotion which, when experienced, results in death.
-The pox was a disease notorious for having killed one-third, rounded up, of Europe’s population. Smallpox, on the other hand, killed only a single person.
-A person riding a horse cannot be stopped by foot soldiers, large animals, walls, archers, or even catapults.
Can't that deck win faster by not making all of the attacks in a row. Like, instead of making exponentially many tokens, you instead make 5, play Magus of the Tabernacle, swing next turn, sac it the turn after, and then recur it all back with doomsday/dwell. This way, instead of needing ~1024 castings of doomsday, you only need 60.
Can't that deck win faster by not making all of the attacks in a row. Like, instead of making exponentially many tokens, you instead make 5, play Magus of the Tabernacle, swing next turn, sac it the turn after, and then recur it all back with doomsday/dwell. This way, instead of needing ~1024 castings of doomsday, you only need 60.
What generates colored mana to cast Doomsday or Dwell after Lotus has been sacrificed for white mana to cast Magus?
Hand: Reiterate
Stack: Doomsday|Infernal Contract
Library: Empty
Copy both using Buyback Reiterate
Battlefield: Pyromania
Hand: Reiterate
Stack: Doomsday|Infernal Contract|Infernal Contract|Doomsday
Library: Empty
Activate Pyromania's random discard, then sac it for 2 damage
Battlefield: Empty
Hand: Empty
Stack: Doomsday|Infernal Contract|Infernal Contract|Doomsday
Library: Empty
Graveyard: Pyromania|Reiterate
Doomsday Resolves, losing half life
Battlefield: Empty
Hand: Empty
Stack: Doomsday|Infernal Contract|Infernal Contract
Library: Pyromania|Reiterate
Graveyard: Empty
Infernal Contract resolves, losing half life
Battlefield: Empty
Hand: Pyromania|Reiterate
Stack: Doomsday|Infernal Contract
Library: Empty
Graveyard: Empty
Then repeat. This loop gets 2 damage every iteration instead of 1, while still only costing 3/4 of life total.
{мы, тьма}
2012: Best (False?) Role Claim - Worst Town Performance (Group) - Best Mafia Performance (Group) - Best SK Performance - Best Overall Player
2013: Best Non-SK Neutral Performance
2014: Best Town Performance (Individual) - Best Town Performance (Group) - Most Interesting Role - Best Game - Best Overall Player
2015: Worst Mafia Performance (Group) - Best Read
2016: Best Town Performance (Group) - Best Town Player - Best Overall Player
Noxious Revival x3
Calciform Pools
Grove of the Burnwillows
Evermind
This deck doesn't win until the next GAME.
Still beats the test deck eventually, amirite?
Heh
-Terror is an emotion which, when experienced, results in death.
-The pox was a disease notorious for having killed one-third, rounded up, of Europe’s population. Smallpox, on the other hand, killed only a single person.
-A person riding a horse cannot be stopped by foot soldiers, large animals, walls, archers, or even catapults.
More facts of magic
The combo that Ive come up with so far is
1. Followed Footsteps
2. Wall of Shards
3. Sword of the Ages
So, Sword of the Ages needs atleast 20 walls to kill the opponent. Too bad for the Sword the walls make it hard on the sword.
The walls give the oppnent some amount of life per turn... N? So we have to figure out the power and number of walls required in order to overcome the constantly increasing life.
Haze of Rage is probably the only card capable to get the power necessary to do this.
Add in some crappy mana storage and we have a deck that might just work.
If Haze is too good, then a crappier pump may have to do it.
------
Deck v1
1. Followed Footsteps
2. Wall of Shards
3. Sword of Ages
4. Haze of Rage - more than likely have to be swapped for something...
5. Thran Quary
6. Calciform Pools
7. Red Mana Battery
I took a page out of fnord's book... halving life is a lot more effective than cumulative upkeep.
This deck might approach or defeat fnord's... I'm not sure yet and lunch break is over.
I can't just cast any of my creatures to win -- the tokens will always beat a hardcast creature.
1. Slagheap, golden urn, wait
2. Soul foundry imprinting Bairn
3. Start doubling the number of counters on slagheap by making a barin, attacking into the tokens, untapping, and doubling the counters.
4. Once you've saved enough, you can kill 1 token every 2 turns by tapping slagheap for 1 mana, using it to make 8 mana, casting assassin, shooting a token, casting sharding phoenix, sacing it, and returning Assassin to your hand with recover for half your life, and on the following turn you can return phonix to your hand for 3 mana.
5. Eventually you kill all the tokens and you attack for the win.
Who else is a math buff? Maybe I'll find some time to do this this weekend...
EDIT:
I can't remember why I didn't think of putting assassin on soul foundry... that deck doesn't work at all...
Let's do the same thing, but replace soul foundry and bairn with Prototype portal and doubling cube
-Terror is an emotion which, when experienced, results in death.
-The pox was a disease notorious for having killed one-third, rounded up, of Europe’s population. Smallpox, on the other hand, killed only a single person.
-A person riding a horse cannot be stopped by foot soldiers, large animals, walls, archers, or even catapults.
More facts of magic
Either Version:
Slagheap, Golden Urn
Wait
Charge Slagheap
Phoenix
Assassin, in response blow up Phoenix
Wins pretty quickly
Check it out!
http://www.eternalcentral.com/resource-advantage-in-magic-part-1-one-shot-resources/
http://www.eternalcentral.com/resource-advantage-in-magic-part2-tempo/
I've also written a short primer on Manaless Dredge in Vintage:
http://www.eternalcentral.com/the-dredge-of-glory-an-introduction-to-manaless-dredge-in-vintage/
Looks like you're right. I think the deck still gets over a million, though.
But I think replacing Pyromania with Oblivion Crown will fix the problem. That way, you have to use the loop you mentioned. Cast Crown on a spare goat. Then, each iteration discard the Reiterate to pump the goat by 1.
Practice for Khans of Tarkir Limited:
Draft: (#1) (#2) (#3) (#4) (#5)
Phoenix only kills creatures WITHOUT flying. The orchard tokens are immune. EDIT: Except they don't have flying... facepalm. Let me find a better creature...
Nim Devourer will do the trick.
Nevermind, I remember now. It definitely works.
I can't imprint bairn or assassin -- no matter what I need to pay their mana cost to make one, and to do so I need to make more tokens than the creatures can attack through. The only way to win is to double my mana enough times to do the assassin loop enough times to kill all the tokens I made when I made the mana.
This is seriously a contender. I know the doubling cube version needs to halve it's life total at least 13 times, and the bairn version is much slower.
Original Version (8.5 billion turns)
Play Molten Slagheap, cast Golden Urn, wait
Sac Golden urn for enough life, play Forbidden orchard, start storing mana, wait
Crack slagheap for enough black mana, Cast both Doubling cubes, Tap 'em, Cycle Garza's assassin until all the tokens are dead and 1 assassin is still alive.
Attack 10 times
To kill X tokens, you halve your life total X times.
To kill X tokens, you need 3X black mana
To store X mana, you create X tokens.
X stored mana produces 2* (2* (X-5) - 5)... = 4x-30 usable loop mana.
When you have 3 usable mana per token produced, (and 3 more to keep assassin up) you can start the loop.
2*(2*(X-5)-5) / X = 3
X = 30
+3
X = 33
LOL, only 33 tokens? Really? That's pretty funny. It's still a LOT of life though...
So you need to halve your life total at least 33 times...
That's 2^33 = 8,589,934,592 life you need to finish at 1 life.
Then there's some amount of turns you have to continue building up counters because the tokens attack you, but it's really negligible. It's in the hundreds. Let's say this takes 8.5 billion turns.
Bonus: If you really want to converge at infinite turns, then you need to make 1 token for every 1 time you can cast Assassin...
CurrentUseless version (Wins in the hundreds) :1) MS and Gu, wait
2) Forbidden orchard, charge slagheap
3) Soul Foundry Imprinting Bairn
4) Double slagheap's counters a few times until you have enough mana for 5 and 6
5) Cast Assassin, kill a token, cast Devourer, attack 4 times, finally they chump, recover assassin, kill a token
6) Upkeep, Return Devourer and sac him, recover assassin, kill a token. Repeat until all tokens are dead and you have an assassin on the board
7) Attack 10 times
It takes 10 usable mana to kill each token.
Every time you tap orchard, you make 1 token
Every time you attack with Bairn, they triple block and lose 1 token
When you need Devourer to die, they lose 1 token
You cast soul foundry after storing 3 counters. There are 4 tokens
Once you get a certain number of counters on slagheap, you don't need to tap orchard again.
It takes 6 mana to double the number of counters. You need at least 13 counters to "go infinite."
... This doesn't work. You can theoretically just keep attacking with Bairn until you win and ignore assassin altogether
-Terror is an emotion which, when experienced, results in death.
-The pox was a disease notorious for having killed one-third, rounded up, of Europe’s population. Smallpox, on the other hand, killed only a single person.
-A person riding a horse cannot be stopped by foot soldiers, large animals, walls, archers, or even catapults.
More facts of magic
Edit: oh duh, double blocking of course
Golden Urn
Wait ~200 turns
Charge Slagheap
Play Shard Phoenix
Race with 200+ life and a flying attacker. GG. Win turn 210ish
Edit: late to the party apparently. WHoops!
My mana base is off for this deck, but here are my thoughts,
1. Followed Footsteps
2. Wall of Shards
3. Sword of Ages
4. Haze of Rage
5. Thran Quary
6. Calciform Pools
7. Red Mana Battery
So, what happens and the real math problem that Im having...
Ok, you put the Wall of Shards down to start off.
Each turn you put a counter on Wall of Shards. The opponent then gains 2 life for each counter on Wall of Shards.
T1 - 0 life gained by the opponent
T2 - 2 life gained by the opponent
T3 - 4 life gained... etc
...
Well each turn, after the first, you put down 1 copy of Wall of Shards and the same thing happens as above.
The increase of life for the opponent ends up being (X+1)X, I think.
---------
That's the part I've figured out.
Ok, so this has to kill the opponent... the only way that this deck can is with this card,
Sword of Ages, http://gatherer.wizards.com/pages/Card/Details.aspx?multiverseid=201233,
pretty much, it deals damage to the opponent equal to the total power of all of the creatures I control. For the Wall of Shards its easy, its power is 1, so number of Walls of Shards that are out there.
Ok, so if we didn't have the massive lifegain we would win in 20 turns.
20 Walls would do 20 damage and kill the opponent. Problem is... the opponent would have 420 life by then.
So, we have to figure out how much power we need to add to the walls so that we can kill the opponent.
The shot that we take is all or nothing.
The kill card I have gives all of the creatures +Y power.
It takes 4 turns to store up enough mana to increase the damage by 1 for each creature (because of how storing up mana works in this...).
How much power would be required to kill the opponent and what turn could I win?
First wall of shards gives your opponent (t-1)(t-2)/2 life.
Footsteps lands on turn 7, so first copy on t8.
Copies (together) give your opponent (t-8)(t-7)(t-6)/6.
Haze of Rage is a sorcery, so you have to pay the last turn's upkeep.
So your opponent's life total on turn t is 20+(t-1)(t-2)/2+(t-8)(t-7)(t-6)/6.
You start charging for Haze turn 8 and gain 1 charge per 4 turns. On the turn you go off you have 2 extra mana from your lands.
So the number of Haze casts is floor((t-6)/4). The total power granted to each creature is floor((t-6)/4)*(floor((t-6)/4)+1)/2. So the total power of each Wall is floor((t-6)/4)*(floor((t-6)/4)+1)/2+1. There are t-6 walls, so you do (t-6)*(floor((t-6)/4)*(floor((t-6)/4)+1)/2+1) damage.
So,
20+(t-1)(t-2)/2+(t-8)(t-7)(t-6)/6=(t-6)*(floor((t-6)/4)*(floor((t-6)/4)+1)/2+1)
There are no valid solutions. In other words, your opponent's life will grow faster than your damage.
Practice for Khans of Tarkir Limited:
Draft: (#1) (#2) (#3) (#4) (#5)
Rath's Edge
Dreadship Reef (Stores B/U)
Reality Twist
Quiet Disrepair
Elvish Spirit Guide (My source of green mana for Quiet Disrepair)
Doomsday
Doomsday
103 billion turns. Plus some scratch.
The kill plan is to trigger Rath's Edge, sacrificing itself to deal 1 point of damage. After that, you cast Doomsday to put Rath's Edge back on top of your deck. Draw it, replay it, blow it up again for another damage. Then cast your other Doomsday to put the first Doomsday and Rath's Edge back on top again. Repeat.
This means you have to cast Doomsday 19 times to win (the last use of Rath's Edge is free).
In order to do this, you need 2^19 life = 524288.
To gain life, you use Reality Twist, enchanted with Quiet Disrepair. Reality Twist has cumulative upkeep 1UU. In order to gain 524288 life, you need 262143 turns (you can save the last turn by stacking the triggers nicely). In order to pay upkeep on Reality Twist for that long, you need 1UU * (n*(n+1)/2) = 1UU * 34,359,607,296 = 103 billion mana. Which takes 103 billion turns with the storage land. The rest of the turns are rounding error.
Doesn't work. You don't actually need that much life because you keep gaining 2 each turn. For example, say you are at 10 life. Doomsday brings you to 5. Next turn, you go up to 7. Doomsday brings you to 3. Next turn you go up to 5. Doomsday brings you to 2. Next turn you go up to 4. Doomsday brings you to 2. And so no, repeating.
If you're going to use a 2xDoomsday loop, you need a one-shot life gain. I actually considered something similar before finding the Reiterate plan. I used Stream of Life with spirit guide and Rath's Edge.
Practice for Khans of Tarkir Limited:
Draft: (#1) (#2) (#3) (#4) (#5)
Casting Doomsday a lot while paying for upkeep works fine. Except that you don't actually manage to do any damage in that loop since you'll be using all your mana to just cast those 2 spells.
In order to do damage, you've got to sacrifice Rath's Edge, which costs 4 mana AND the Rath's Edge. The only way to generate mana is to use the storage land, which is STILL fine (since you can do it during upkeep to get mana to both Sac the land AND pay for the upkeep). However, once you've got Rath's Edge in the graveyard, you'll never be able to pay upkeep (during the upkeep phase) AND cast Doomsday (during the main phase). And if you ever don't pay upkeep, then Quiet Disrepair goes away. And since Elvish Spirit Guide is a one-shot, you'll never be able to cast Quiet Disrepair again.
Ah, right. Sorry.
You can still optimize a bit by doing 4 iterations before starting your lifegain.
Practice for Khans of Tarkir Limited:
Draft: (#1) (#2) (#3) (#4) (#5)
Well, this is witch level math magic. Thanks for figuring this out. Tbh I'm kinda surprised that Haze doesn't eventually get larger than the lifegain
It's not that complicated once you realize a few key points.
The total paid to cumulative upkeep grows quadratically. Specifically, the sum of the series
1 + 2 + 3 + 4 + ... + n
is (1/2)*n*(n+1). If you use Followed Footsteps to make an additional wall each turn, you're multiplying the quadratic by a linear function, so you end up with a cubic function. Specifically,
(1/6)*n*(n+1)*(n+2)
Haze of Rage (when you store 1 mana each turn and then use it once) is similarly quadratic — on successive casts you get 1 copy, then 2, then 3, etc....sound familiar? And again you're multiplying it by a linear function — the number of walls. So once again you end up with a cubic function.
However, since you're making an extra wall a turn but only generating an extra Haze every few turns the life will grow faster than the damage. The exact ratio is 16/3.
Practice for Khans of Tarkir Limited:
Draft: (#1) (#2) (#3) (#4) (#5)
One must sacrifice Lotus Bloom for three white mana to cast it, after which one can never get Lotus Bloom back.
Magus of the Tabernacle gives all creatures upkeep costs of {1}, including itself.
Eldrazi Spawn tokens from Growth Spasm are the only way to pay for that, but they also have upkeep costs from Magus of the Tabernacle.
Because of that, once Magus of the Tabernacle is on the battlefield, one must sacrifice half of one's creatures to pay for the upkeep costs of the other half every upkeep.
Growth Spasm cannot be cast once Lotus Bloom is lost.
Therefore, one must have 1023 Eldrazi Spawn tokens after Magus of the Tabernacle is cast, and one more is needed to cast it, for a total of 1024.
To get those, one must repeatedly retrieve Growth Spasm and Lotus Bloom with Dwell on the Past and Doomsday, and must also have Emerald Medallion on the battlefield.
Doomsday halves one's life total each time; one must gain life to survive it.
Ivory Tower is the only way to gain life, but once Emerald Medallion is cast, one can never gain life from Ivory Tower again; therefore, enough life must be gained beforehand.
Putting everything together, here is what one should do.
(At the start of each of the following lines is the turn number.)
1 Suspend Lotus Bloom.
4 Get Lotus Bloom, sacrifice it for three green mana, and cast Ivory Tower and Dwell on the Past targeting Lotus Bloom.
5 Draw Lotus Bloom and suspend Lotus Bloom.
8 Get Lotus Bloom, sacrifice it for three black mana, cast Doomsday, put Lotus Bloom and Dwell on the Past into one's library, and lose 10 life.
9 Draw one of those cards.
10 Draw the other one.
11 Gain 1 life from Ivory Tower, making one's life total 11.
12 Gain 1 life from Ivory Tower, making one's life total 12.
13 Gain 1 life from Ivory Tower, making one's life total 13.
[continue in the same way]
2^1024 Gain 1 life from Ivory Tower, making one's life total 2^1024, and suspend Lotus Bloom.
2^1024+3 Get Lotus Bloom, sacrifice it for three green mana, cast Emerald Medallion, and cast Dwell on the Past targeting Lotus Bloom and Doomsday.
2^1024+4 Draw Doomsday.
2^1024+5 Draw Lotus Bloom and suspend Lotus Bloom.
2^1024+8 Get Lotus Bloom, sacrifice it for three black mana, cast Doomsday, put Lotus Bloom and Dwell on the Past into one's library in that order, and lose 2^1023 life.
2^1024+9 Draw Lotus Bloom and suspend Lotus Bloom.
2^1024+10 Draw Dwell on the Past.
2^1024+12 Get Lotus Bloom, sacrifice it for three green mana, cast Dwell on the Past targeting Lotus Bloom and Doomsday, and cast Growth Spasm; there is no basic land to find, but one still gets an Eldrazi Spawn token.
2^1024+13 Draw Doomsday.
2^1024+14 Draw Lotus Bloom and suspend Lotus Bloom.
2^1024+17 Get Lotus Bloom, sacrifice it for three black mana, cast Doomsday, put Lotus Bloom, Dwell on the Past, and Growth Spasm into one's library in that order, and lose half one's life (2^1022 the first time).
2^1024+18 Draw Lotus Bloom and suspend Lotus Bloom.
2^1024+19 Draw Dwell on the Past.
2^1024+20 Draw Growth Spasm.
2^1024+21 [Repeat from seven lines above, 1022 times.]
2^1024+9219 Get Lotus Bloom, sacrifice it for three green mana, cast Dwell on the Past targeting Lotus Bloom and Doomsday, and cast Growth Spasm; there is no basic land to find, but one still gets an Eldrazi Spawn token.
2^1024+9220 Draw Doomsday.
2^1024+9221 Draw Lotus Bloom and suspend Lotus Bloom.
2^1024+9224 Get Lotus Bloom, sacrifice Lotus Bloom for three white mana and one Eldrazi Spawn token for one colourless mana, and cast Magus of the Tabernacle.
2^1024+9225 Sacrifice 512 Eldrazi Spawn tokens to pay for the upkeep costs of the other creatures and have Magus of the Tabernacle attack.
2^1024+9226 Sacrifice 256 Eldrazi Spawn tokens to pay for the upkeep costs of the other creatures and have Magus of the Tabernacle attack.
2^1024+9227 Sacrifice 128 Eldrazi Spawn tokens to pay for the upkeep costs of the other creatures and have Magus of the Tabernacle attack.
2^1024+9228 Sacrifice 64 Eldrazi Spawn tokens to pay for the upkeep costs of the other creatures and have Magus of the Tabernacle attack.
2^1024+9229 Sacrifice 32 Eldrazi Spawn tokens to pay for the upkeep costs of the other creatures and have Magus of the Tabernacle attack.
2^1024+9230 Sacrifice 16 Eldrazi Spawn tokens to pay for the upkeep costs of the other creatures and have Magus of the Tabernacle attack.
2^1024+9231 Sacrifice 8 Eldrazi Spawn tokens to pay for the upkeep costs of the other creatures and have Magus of the Tabernacle attack.
2^1024+9232 Sacrifice 4 Eldrazi Spawn tokens to pay for the upkeep costs of the other creatures and have Magus of the Tabernacle attack.
2^1024+9233 Sacrifice 2 Eldrazi Spawn tokens to pay for the upkeep costs of the other creatures and have Magus of the Tabernacle attack.
2^1024+9234 Sacrifice the last Eldrazi Spawn token to pay for the upkeep cost of Magus of the Tabernacle, have Magus of the Tabernacle attack, and win the game.
That is 2^1024+9234 or 179,769,313,486,231,590,772,930,519,078,902,473,361,797,697,894,230,657,273,430,081,157,732,675,805,500,963,132,708,477,322,
407,536,021,120,113,879,871,393,357,658,789,768,814,416,622,492,847,430,639,474,124,377,767,893,424,865,485,276,302,219,601,246,094,119,453,082,952,
085,005,768,838,150,682,342,462,881,473,913,110,540,827,237,163,350,510,684,586,298,239,947,245,938,479,716,304,835,356,329,624,224,146,450 turns.
The next one was incomplete:
and I could not find anything suitable to give life.
Next was one like the current one, but with Eladamri's Vineyard in place of Emerald Medallion, which does not work properly, because Eladamri's Vineyard gives green mana that can be used to cast Dwell on the Past.
It was then changed to Darkwater Catacombs, Izzet Signet, Helm of Awakening, and finally Emerald Medallion.
This is so sick it brought a tear to my eye.
This is great, especially the combination of Doomsday and Ivory Tower. At first, I thought there was a much faster line involving going to 1 life and only needing to gain back one life before casting Doomsday again, but you can't do that because Medallion has to still be in your hand.
I also haven't found any substitutions to make this deck slower. My most promising attempt involved Tabernacle and Molimo, but I didn't see a good way to fit that into seven cards.
Basically, this deck is awesome, and I don't see anyway to improve it.
BWTeysa, Orzhov Scion
GWRhys the Redeemed
GUKruphix, God of Horizons
GRXenagos, God of Revels
GThrun, the Last Troll
GStompy
-Terror is an emotion which, when experienced, results in death.
-The pox was a disease notorious for having killed one-third, rounded up, of Europe’s population. Smallpox, on the other hand, killed only a single person.
-A person riding a horse cannot be stopped by foot soldiers, large animals, walls, archers, or even catapults.
More facts of magic
I am so, so glad that I didn't. This is beautiful.
What generates colored mana to cast Doomsday or Dwell after Lotus has been sacrificed for white mana to cast Magus?
BWTeysa, Orzhov Scion
GWRhys the Redeemed
GUKruphix, God of Horizons
GRXenagos, God of Revels
GThrun, the Last Troll
GStompy