I ran a deck like this for a while. With the livewire lash, something I felt should be good but never was was Prey's Vengeance. Canopy cover was consistently useful, and I also liked Snake Umbra as a way to pump, protect from removal, and get a little card advantage.
What the deck really wants, however, is some sort of evasion. Canopy cover gets you there about half the time, but I never found anything else that helps. Tangle angler is too slow, and I always felt really stupid running prized unicorn. Something I considered but never tried was Sword of Vengeance. Trample + infect leads to some very ackward situations for your opponent.
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I think you need to maindeck doj and condemn. Creeping Tar Pit and Celestial Colonnade are both fairly common, evade your wall, and are uncounterable, so condemn will help there. DOJ is for the rest of the creature matchups. Since luminarch ascension is your only realistic win condition, you'll probably want something to dig for them. Heathen's suggestion of preordain seems reasonable.
Honestly, I don't see lumiarch ascension as a realistic card to build a deck around. It's a nice backup plan for control decks, but you really want something a little less difficult to pull off.
I've been thinking of running a list similiar to this. If it were me, I'd consider the following changes:
- Run Frost Titan instead of Grave Titan. The frost titan actively deals with threats (including non-creature threats), whereas the grave titan just generates a bunch of tokens.
- Find a way to run Venser, the Sojourner. Two reasons: 1) he gives your bombs a way to live through Day Of Judgement and 2) he's a sweet combo with Wall Of Omens and your titans.
- I know the mana base is a bit shakey, but Creeping Tar Pit is just too good. I'd try to fit four in.
- You might consider Sign In Blood for additional card advantage. The walls help, however, so this is lower priority.
I like the addition of smother. I run four doom blades in my BU deck, and it's just really bad against poison decks. Smother also helps against the rare vampire deck you run into. How has the Mimic Vat worked for you? I wouldn't think it'd add enough value.
Finally, and I'm not saying this is a good idea, but I like to run one or two copies of Volition Reins in a deck like this. In the rare case that you get to live the dream and steal a Jace, the card is just a soul crushing blow. Even if something that awesome doesn't happen, once they see it, people always play around it. Of course, it's also really expensive.
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It seems like red is the best equipped to deal with the infect deck. Of the infect creatures, I believe only two have more than two toughness. To me, that screams Pyroclasm. Bolts deal with putrefax. I've seen infect paired with proliferate, so manic vandal probably isn't a bad plan either.
As for a secondary color, I'd go with either white or blue for bounce to get rid of -1/-1 counters. White gets you Kor Skyfisher and Ajani, while blue gets you Aether Adept. I'd lean more towards blue for counterspells, but I think either would work.
Kefka's correct, if the gorger leaves the battlefield for any reason before its first ability triggers, its second ability will trigger first, giving you nothing before you're forced to discard your hand.
Not to say it isn't a compelling combo, but it just needs protection. For a while the Act of Treason + Bloodthrone Vampire combo was annoyingly popular, and having your thought gorger stolen then sacrificed (netting your opponent a ton of cards) would probably drive most calm, reasonable people into a murderous rage.
On to other things, I wouldn't try to shoehorn green in for the metalcraft plan. Ezuri's brigade is an efficient beater, but you've already got enough going on at the 4 drop slot, and efficiency isn't a huge concern with this deck. That, and trying to get the double green you require will be hard. I'd stick with the Wurmcoil Engine and something else as finishers. Something to consider would be Triskelion. If you're feeling really evil, you can combo it with something like Tainted Strike. If you time it right, you should be able to kill at least half a dozen creatures with all the counters you'll have on it.
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This deck and its variants have been making my life difficult on MTGO...almost to the point that I'm going to have to give up my precious doom blade :(.
Anyway, the thought gorger plan looks interesting, but seems really risky. It dies to all sorts of common point removal (disfigure, bolt, staggershock, etc.), and if they kill it before its enters the battlefield trigger goes off you're just hosed. Any one of the pyromancer ascension decks still running around is just going to laugh at you.
From what I've seen, the Lux Cannon plan is a ton more solid. With Oblivion Ring out of standard, most decks can't deal with it when it hits to board. (Except for the nonsense liquid metal coating decks floating around). I'd personally combo it with with everflowing chalice and voltaic key and treat it like a ramp deck as well for another win condition. I haven't tried that out, however, so it may just be a really stupid plan. Sounds fun though, running Ulamog in a blue deck is worth it just to see your opponent's expression.
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Well, Happy Birthday, Scootypuff! When is your Birthday?
I’d recommend either Zendikar, or M11.
In terms of value, if you average out the price of just Rare, and Mythic Rare + Chances of getting them per box, you will get Worldwake as best value, M11 as second best value, Zendikar, and then Rise of Eldrazi.
BUT, IMO Worldwake is not that fun to draft but that could just be me. Draft Rise is the most fun for me but you won’t get much value out of it.
Hence, I recommend Zendikar or M11 and both of them are kinda fun to play in limited format.
I don't recommend any set from Shards of Alara block though since it will soon out of Standards
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I would have pick Volition Reins. I really do feel your concerns of heavy blue investment though. My pick priorities are bombs, removals, and so on. Volition Reins is both removal and potential bomb in one package as people already mentioned it in this thread.
I won’t miss Spikeshot Elder too much because he depends on several conditions to be effective. 1) he needs to stay alive , 2) he probably need equipment or supporting cards to beef up his power or lots of mountain or else his damage would not make much dent.
it would be nice to play an infect deck, but the only problem with that is that there may not be enough infect creatures to build a deck out of.
You are absolutely right. Confirmed this issue in my sealed playtest last night. I tried to solve it by using normal creature and added "infect" ability on it using supporting cards like Tainted Strike and Grafted Exoskeleton. These two worked very well for me last night when I casted it on Blistergrub (my opponent has swamps)
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So if you're running 13 artifacts, you have a 79% chance to draw at least 3 by turn 4 (assuming you're on the draw). Something to keep in mind though is that your odds get much worse if your opponent is running ways to deal with artifacts.
The takeaway is that you don't have to be all that dedicated to trigger metalcraft by a reasonable turn, but it will depend on what you're trying to do. Assuming you open them, abusing Ezuri's Brigade seems completely reasonable with 11 or 12 artifacts. Lower down on the curve, I don't see anything that would really warrant the heavy artifact commitment, although I know I'm going to run into the screeching silcaw plan every other draft or so.
My overall impression is that the bonuses you get through metalcraft aren't really worth the artifact commitment, although they're nice in some cases. Of course, it's possible that I'm wrong and I'm going to get blown out by some guy running half a dozen Auriok Sunchasers at the prerelease.
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To answer your original question, I actually plan to try infect strategy.
Agreed with you somewhat that it might not be enough to build a deck out of sealed format. However, even when you don’t have enough infect creatures to win, they are still useful. On defense, infect creatures give your chump blocker more meaning and purpose in his life. On offense, infect creatures are either pseudo evasion because your opponent might not want to block with his big blockers, OR if they block, you permanently weaker their defense.
So with infect strategy, I might try a bunch of small cheap infect creatures + equipments + Untamed Might or Wing Puncture (if any luck opening ‘em) + some evasion supporting cards, plus, normal bombs with Tainted Strike. Also, there’s no ways to remove poison counter that I know of.
The problem you're going to run into with a deck like this is that it's significantly weaker when your opponent has no cards in hand, and a smart player will get rid of all his or her cards immediatly once caress hits the table.
Guul Draz Specter kind of helps (5/5 flyers always do), but something else you might consider is Sign In Blood or Temple Bell. Sign in blood can be pointed at your opponent for 2 damage and two tasty tasty cards to discard, or you can use it on yourself to dig through your deck. Temple bell lets you choose when to give everyone a card, so you can wait to activate it only when you have discard in hand. It's also a neat combo with Liliana (either discard the card you just gave them, or draw the card you tutored up with her -2).
Your deck also want some additional removal. Since you're running so many swamps, you might consider Quag Sickness or something else that cares about the number of swamps you have over limited removal like doom blade. Gatekeeper of Malakir isn't a bad choice either.
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I agree with ShaolinDolemite's analysis on the cards in Legit Choices and Cards that not a P1P1 in this group.
I agreed that the top 2 are Aether Adept and Cudgel Troll. My pick would have been Cudgel Troll because he's a decent big guy and not so easy to deal with. 4 power demands answers, and green is usually underdrafted anyway, so it's easier to pick other supporting cards in green.
Aether Adept, while it helps with tempo, it only buys you a turn or two. And a 2/2 body is not a significant addition to your army.
I really like Fire Servant, but in my experience, you can never get enough support cards for Fire Servant in draft because people always splash them.
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What the deck really wants, however, is some sort of evasion. Canopy cover gets you there about half the time, but I never found anything else that helps. Tangle angler is too slow, and I always felt really stupid running prized unicorn. Something I considered but never tried was Sword of Vengeance. Trample + infect leads to some very ackward situations for your opponent.
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Honestly, I don't see lumiarch ascension as a realistic card to build a deck around. It's a nice backup plan for control decks, but you really want something a little less difficult to pull off.
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- Run Frost Titan instead of Grave Titan. The frost titan actively deals with threats (including non-creature threats), whereas the grave titan just generates a bunch of tokens.
- Find a way to run Venser, the Sojourner. Two reasons: 1) he gives your bombs a way to live through Day Of Judgement and 2) he's a sweet combo with Wall Of Omens and your titans.
- I know the mana base is a bit shakey, but Creeping Tar Pit is just too good. I'd try to fit four in.
- You might consider Sign In Blood for additional card advantage. The walls help, however, so this is lower priority.
I like the addition of smother. I run four doom blades in my BU deck, and it's just really bad against poison decks. Smother also helps against the rare vampire deck you run into. How has the Mimic Vat worked for you? I wouldn't think it'd add enough value.
Finally, and I'm not saying this is a good idea, but I like to run one or two copies of Volition Reins in a deck like this. In the rare case that you get to live the dream and steal a Jace, the card is just a soul crushing blow. Even if something that awesome doesn't happen, once they see it, people always play around it. Of course, it's also really expensive.
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I'm not sure about the purists. They only come online on turn four, and don't really help against giant growth, Hand of the Praetors, or proliferate.
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As for a secondary color, I'd go with either white or blue for bounce to get rid of -1/-1 counters. White gets you Kor Skyfisher and Ajani, while blue gets you Aether Adept. I'd lean more towards blue for counterspells, but I think either would work.
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Not to say it isn't a compelling combo, but it just needs protection. For a while the Act of Treason + Bloodthrone Vampire combo was annoyingly popular, and having your thought gorger stolen then sacrificed (netting your opponent a ton of cards) would probably drive most calm, reasonable people into a murderous rage.
On to other things, I wouldn't try to shoehorn green in for the metalcraft plan. Ezuri's brigade is an efficient beater, but you've already got enough going on at the 4 drop slot, and efficiency isn't a huge concern with this deck. That, and trying to get the double green you require will be hard. I'd stick with the Wurmcoil Engine and something else as finishers. Something to consider would be Triskelion. If you're feeling really evil, you can combo it with something like Tainted Strike. If you time it right, you should be able to kill at least half a dozen creatures with all the counters you'll have on it.
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Anyway, the thought gorger plan looks interesting, but seems really risky. It dies to all sorts of common point removal (disfigure, bolt, staggershock, etc.), and if they kill it before its enters the battlefield trigger goes off you're just hosed. Any one of the pyromancer ascension decks still running around is just going to laugh at you.
From what I've seen, the Lux Cannon plan is a ton more solid. With Oblivion Ring out of standard, most decks can't deal with it when it hits to board. (Except for the nonsense liquid metal coating decks floating around). I'd personally combo it with with everflowing chalice and voltaic key and treat it like a ramp deck as well for another win condition. I haven't tried that out, however, so it may just be a really stupid plan. Sounds fun though, running Ulamog in a blue deck is worth it just to see your opponent's expression.
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I’d recommend either Zendikar, or M11.
In terms of value, if you average out the price of just Rare, and Mythic Rare + Chances of getting them per box, you will get Worldwake as best value, M11 as second best value, Zendikar, and then Rise of Eldrazi.
BUT, IMO Worldwake is not that fun to draft but that could just be me. Draft Rise is the most fun for me but you won’t get much value out of it.
Hence, I recommend Zendikar or M11 and both of them are kinda fun to play in limited format.
I don't recommend any set from Shards of Alara block though since it will soon out of Standards
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My P1P1 of your winning pack is Harding Dragon I think cloak is overrated by many people...
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I won’t miss Spikeshot Elder too much because he depends on several conditions to be effective. 1) he needs to stay alive , 2) he probably need equipment or supporting cards to beef up his power or lots of mountain or else his damage would not make much dent.
Why do you think blue is a weaker color in triple scars? I’d love to hear that. In this set, I'm a big fan of B/G
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You are absolutely right. Confirmed this issue in my sealed playtest last night. I tried to solve it by using normal creature and added "infect" ability on it using supporting cards like Tainted Strike and Grafted Exoskeleton. These two worked very well for me last night when I casted it on Blistergrub (my opponent has swamps)
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Artifact count
______ _10 _11 _12 _13 _14 _15 _16 _17 _18
Turn 1 31% 38% 45% 52% 59% 65% 71% 76% 81%
Turn 2 40% 48% 55% 62% 69% 75% 80% 84% 88%
Turn 3 49% 57% 64% 71% 77% 83% 87% 90% 93%
Turn 4 57% 65% 73% 79% 84% 88% 92% 94% 96%
Turn 5 64% 73% 79% 85% 89% 93% 95% 97% 98%
Turn 6 71% 79% 85% 90% 93% 95% 97% 98% 99%
Turn 7 77% 84% 89% 93% 96% 97% 98% 99% 100%
Turn 8 83% 88% 93% 95% 97% 98% 99% 100% 100%
So if you're running 13 artifacts, you have a 79% chance to draw at least 3 by turn 4 (assuming you're on the draw). Something to keep in mind though is that your odds get much worse if your opponent is running ways to deal with artifacts.
The takeaway is that you don't have to be all that dedicated to trigger metalcraft by a reasonable turn, but it will depend on what you're trying to do. Assuming you open them, abusing Ezuri's Brigade seems completely reasonable with 11 or 12 artifacts. Lower down on the curve, I don't see anything that would really warrant the heavy artifact commitment, although I know I'm going to run into the screeching silcaw plan every other draft or so.
My overall impression is that the bonuses you get through metalcraft aren't really worth the artifact commitment, although they're nice in some cases. Of course, it's possible that I'm wrong and I'm going to get blown out by some guy running half a dozen Auriok Sunchasers at the prerelease.
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Agreed with you somewhat that it might not be enough to build a deck out of sealed format. However, even when you don’t have enough infect creatures to win, they are still useful. On defense, infect creatures give your chump blocker more meaning and purpose in his life. On offense, infect creatures are either pseudo evasion because your opponent might not want to block with his big blockers, OR if they block, you permanently weaker their defense.
So with infect strategy, I might try a bunch of small cheap infect creatures + equipments + Untamed Might or Wing Puncture (if any luck opening ‘em) + some evasion supporting cards, plus, normal bombs with Tainted Strike. Also, there’s no ways to remove poison counter that I know of.
oh and ...
Me too!
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Guul Draz Specter kind of helps (5/5 flyers always do), but something else you might consider is Sign In Blood or Temple Bell. Sign in blood can be pointed at your opponent for 2 damage and two tasty tasty cards to discard, or you can use it on yourself to dig through your deck. Temple bell lets you choose when to give everyone a card, so you can wait to activate it only when you have discard in hand. It's also a neat combo with Liliana (either discard the card you just gave them, or draw the card you tutored up with her -2).
Your deck also want some additional removal. Since you're running so many swamps, you might consider Quag Sickness or something else that cares about the number of swamps you have over limited removal like doom blade. Gatekeeper of Malakir isn't a bad choice either.
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I agreed that the top 2 are Aether Adept and Cudgel Troll. My pick would have been Cudgel Troll because he's a decent big guy and not so easy to deal with. 4 power demands answers, and green is usually underdrafted anyway, so it's easier to pick other supporting cards in green.
Aether Adept, while it helps with tempo, it only buys you a turn or two. And a 2/2 body is not a significant addition to your army.
I really like Fire Servant, but in my experience, you can never get enough support cards for Fire Servant in draft because people always splash them.
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