I just posted this in a long-overdue update to my compendium (more coming in the next 3 days, hopefully), but this deck deserves its own topic for discussion. I'm fairly certain that this deck will prove to be tier 1 competitive, and it's currently almost totally unknown.
This is probably the fastest and most consistent combo deck in the format. It's been a well-kept secret amongst EDH deckbuilders on MWS for many months now. Many people have worked on it, some independently: I first became aware of it when I got stomped by an early version piloted by one Kilikua. A couple months later, I encountered it again, as my friend Moondust was developing a very similar deck. The list posted here is a composite list I developed and tested, taking the best elements from both lists.
I'm sure that this list still isn't perfect, but it's very, very strong. I'm releasing it to the public in the hope that the collective minds here at MTGS can help develop it even further. Do note that this is an extremely difficult deck to pilot optimally...it would be not be an overstatement to say that this is the toughest deck I've ever played in any format, and I've played them all. It's powerful enough to still win most games with poor play, but it takes a master (and a lot of practice) to play it at its full potential.
So, why is this deck so good? It has a blazingly fast and resilient primary win condition, a powerful and disruptive secondary win condition, more tutors than any other deck in the format, and it still has room for a hefty and versatile disruption package. It's also as lean and efficient as they come: the curve tops out at 3, and most of the spells cost only 1 or 2. There's no dead weight here.
The simplest version of the kill is: activate Hermit Druid. Win. Yes, it's actually that easy. There are no basic lands in this deck, so a single Hermit Druid activation mills your whole deck. Narcomoeba pops into play. Unearth Fatestitcher, make sure the coast is clear with Cabal Therapy (if you have an extra creature), and flashback Dread Return on Crypt Champion, which returns Saffi Eriksdotter. With the other Crypt Champion trigger on the stack, sacrifice Saffi targeting the Champion, and repeat that loop a billion times. Then use Crypt Champion to return Caller of the Claw. That gives you a billion bears, and thanks to Anger, they all have haste. Ta da! Dead opponent. If Hermit Druid isn't destroyed on sight, this happens relatively consistently by turn 3.
Obviously, it's not always that simple, but there's a lot of resiliency built into this plan. Apprentice Necromancer and Shallow Grave help ensure that Hermit Druid is able to do his thing. Cephalid Illusionist and Lightning Greaves offer an alternate means of milling yourself if something happens to the Druid. The suite of flashback removal spells can deal with just about anything that might stop you from winning post-milling. This plan is remarkably hard to stop: it can even beat instant-speed graveyard hate sometimes, though it's somewhat painful to do so. By looping Krosan Reclamation and Pull from Eternity, you can (slowly) draw whatever cards you need, even if your whole graveyard and library are exiled!
An alternate kill, which is extremely efficient even if the rest of the deck isn't coming together, involved just beating down with Scion of the Ur-Dragon. This list only contains 2 dragons, but that's all it needs to kill in 2 attacks. Strike first as Nicol Bolas, wiping out your opponent's answers. Then swing as Dragon Tyrant, pump once, and that's 21 general damage. It says a lot about this deck that a strategy as efficient as this one is a distant plan B.
There are many other subtle and effective gameplans with this deck, such as the early Life from the Loam lock or the Quiet Speculation flashback control plan. The most difficult part of piloting this deck is figuring out how to use all the tutors, since there's a tremendous array of options, and not all of the tutors will be able to get the card you want most. For instance, do you Entomb for Anger? Life from the Loam? Hermit Druid? Ancient Grudge? All of these (and more) can be the correct answer; learning to recognize when to get what with each tutor takes a lot of foresight, practice, and skill. Learning the best ways to play around hate is also important. This deck has the answers to beat anything, but recognizing how to use those answers can be very challenging.
I'd encourage anyone wanting to further develop this deck to goldfish it at least 10 times before playing a real opponent, just to get your head around how the combos and the tutor package fit together. Then play a patient opponent, since real games get much more complicated and you'll have a ton of decisions to make every game.
Once you get a feel for how it plays against a real opponent, you can start experimenting with changes--there are definitely a lot of flexible slots in this list, especially in the disruption and tutor packages, but it takes a while to get a sense for how useful each piece can be (and all the cards in this list are good, if not necessarily the best). Other cards I've considered/tested that could well make their way back into the list at some point include Sylvan Tutor, Grim Tutor, Gamble, Corpse Dance, Sensei's Divining Top, Dosan the Falling Leaf, Gilded Drake, Imperial Recruiter, Dimir Infiltrator, and Volrath's Shapeshifter.
Does it, reanimating Necrotic Ooze with Kiki-Jiki and Mogg Fanatic in the bin (and Anger) looks like the same amount of deck slots to me unless im missing something.
HOWEVER if you also include Devoted Druid (in the graveyard) then your combo is also immune to non-slit second creature removal.
Old version:
Dread Return resolves targeting Crypt Champion.
Crypt Champion Trigger on the stack.
Swords to plowshares targeting Crypt Champion, gg.
OR
Dread Return resolves targeting Necrotic Ooze.
Tap Necrotic Ooze using Kiki Jiki's ability targeting itself.
Swords to plowshares targeting Necrotic Ooze, gg.
New Version:
Dread Return resolves targeting Necrotic Ooze.
Tap Necrotic Ooze using Kiki Jiki's ability targeting itself.
Swords to plowshares targeting Necrotic Ooze.
Untap Necrotic Ooze using Devoted Druids ability.
Tap Necrotic Ooze using Kiki Jiki's ability targeting itself. GG for the good guys!
Hold on a second, this also allows us to make infinite mana with Birds of Paradise / Noble Hierarch in the yard.
Perhaps this can allow us to utilize a better kill condition than Mogg fanatic, something slightly useful outside the combo. Off the top of my head:
Grim Lavamancer
Recoup -> Yawgs Will (meh too much space)
Krosan Reclamation (targeting dragon tyrant and pact of negation) -> Deep analysis -> Cast Tyrant and swing with Pact backup
Sliver Queen as a General and cast her and make infinite slivers and swing.
Anyways it sounds like Ooze kill with Devoted Druid is strictly better. Nice that Devoted Druid is a passable card by herself and can conveniently bin herself if you need her dead to lend her abilities to the Ooze.
EDIT: Preordain should be in.
EDIT 2: I just realized the Devoted Druid kill is way easier than that, you can just swing with the Necrotic Ooze copies.
Scion was my first EDH, and my main combo was Niv-Mizzet + any Curiosity effect. It may not be so good in this one, but it can't hurt to mention it as an opportunity.
I've used that combo in a more traditional Scion deck, but I don't think it has any place here. As a back-up kill, it seems inferior to both the Nicol Bolas + Dragon Tyrant plan (since it requires another card besides Scion) and a Worldgorger Dragon + Animate Dead plan (which requires another card, but at least that card is good in this deck).
It doesn't pay to focus too much on the Scion kill though...it happens sometimes, but this deck usually wins before it reaches 5 mana.
Necrotic Ooze
I've thought about it, but didn't see an advantage to using a Necrotic Ooze kill. The infinite damage versions take up the same amount of slots (not counting Anger, which we would play anyway), but the cards are much less useful (and harder to play) individually. It's extremely annoying to not be able to go off because a key card is stuck in your hand. There are a few tools that let you discard these cards or shuffle them back into your deck, but it's bad to have to rely on those.
The best thing about the current combo is that Saffi Eriksdotter and Crypt Champion are far from dead cards on their own. Both are relatively easy to play (Saffi moreso than the Champion), both get themselves into the graveyard, and both help to stick a Hermit Druid/Illusionist long enough to go off. Caller of the Claw is still dead outside of the combo and annoying to draw, but at least it's not too hard to flash it into play as a blocker and get it killed.
In contrast, none of the Necrotic Ooze pieces do anything on their own, and Kiki-Jiki is very hard to cast/kill in a pinch. Considering that both combos take up the same number of slots, this is plenty of reason for me to consider the Saffi/Champion combo better, at least until I hear a more convincing argument.
It might seem that the Saffi/Champion combo is more vulnerable to spot removal, but that's never been an issue for two reasons. First, if an opponent has instant-speed spot removal, they're almost always going to use it to try to kill Hermit Druid or Illusionist, so if you manage to mill your deck you're probably okay. Second, and more importantly, we have Cabal Therapy to make sure we don't walk into any nasty surprises. If you suspect that your opponent might be sandbagging STP or any other nasty surprise, you can check that the coast is clear before casting Dread Return. If you miss with the Cabal Therapy but your opponent has another trick, you can pull some tricks with Krosan Reclamation to handle it (this situation has yet to come up in practice, but we do have solutions).
Also, the distinction between infinite damage and infinite attackers is essentially meaningless in this case, because the deck is so fast and has access to flashback removal. Between Cabal Therapy, Ray of Revelation, Ancient Grudge, and Crippling Fatigue, it's possible to deal with anything that would stop an attack from being lethal (again, this almost never comes up, but we have the answers).
The Devoted Druid kill isn't any better: at that point we're adding another slot for the combo (unless the kill is just attacking with Necrotic Oozes, but how is that better than Saffi/Champion?). Devoted Druid isn't good on its own in this deck...the curve stops at 3, and the useful acceleration costs 0-1 mana and fixes colors. Devoted Druid is slow and doesn't fix mana at all, so it's pretty mediocre.
To summarize, I still think the Saffi/Champion kill is better, because Saffi and Crypt Champion are quite good outside of the combo, and the Necrotic Ooze pieces are all very bad on their own. The advantages of the Ooze combo over the Saffi/Champion combo are negligible, and outweighed by the first consideration.
Quote from Narglfrob »
Preordain should be in.
Yep, you're right. Could likely cut Thought Courier for it, though a creature discard outlet can be very useful. Still probably a good switch.
No, it's not horrible. Notice any similarities between those lands? They're all mountains. Because of Anger, it's very important for this deck to always have access to a mountain (or 2, in case of LD) by turn 2-3, even though there aren't too many red costs. Running extra red duallands helps to make sure that can be achieved. Plateau may seem like a poor fit, but it's important: if you only have 1 fetchland but need white mana and a mountain, what else are you going to do?
Quote from Narglfrob »
Also Autumn Veil is much easier to cast than either Silence or Chant.
It's a little easier to cast, but it's not as good. Plenty of cards (Swords to Plowshares, Cryptic Command, Volcanic Fallout, etc) can all interfere with your win. Autumn's Veil does nothing against answers like these, whereas a resolved Orim's Chant or Silence guarantees victory. The manabase is robust enough that it can easily handle the white mana.
Quick question. What's your insurance should your caller combo fail? (for example route) Have you thought about adding something like progenitus to prevent decking?
Krosan Reclamation prevents you from decking if something goes wrong post-combo, and helps you find a way to win. If it's a simple problem, flashbacking Reclamation in your upkeep for the solution and a cantrip can get you to it, mana permitting. If it's more complicated, you can recur Pull from Eternity instead of a cantrip, to reuse Krosan Reclamation indefinitely. By looping these cards, you can draw into whatever you need and never get decked. Countermagic or graveyard hate can disrupt this plan, but hopefully you won't need to rely on it for long--you have so many tools available after comboing that you should be able to figure out how to win quickly.
I forgot that anger needs a mountain, that is unfortunate, but I cant help but wonder if Llanowar Wastes shouldn't replace Plateau.
As for the Saffi + Crypt Champion + Caller of the Claw vs Necrotic Ooze + Kiki Jiki + Devoted Druid, debate you bring up some interesting points that I hadn't considered. Kiki jiki costing RRR2 really does suck, I would like to point out tho that the ability for creatures to kill themselves is totally irrelevant, since you can sacrifice them to Cabal Therapy or Dread Return.
"The Devoted Druid kill isn't any better: at that point we're adding another slot for the combo (unless the kill is just attacking with Necrotic Oozes, but how is that better than Saffi/Champion?)"
Well its better because its immune to creature removal, however as you pointed out this is not that important and kiki jiki's casting cost is actually prohibitive.
A card that you have not mentioned at least testing is Lim Duls Vault, I would have thought this would be good enough.
Also with this mana base, Arbor Elf is almost as good as Birds of Paradise or Noble Hierarch
Edit: Also, this allows for you to ALWAYS have a creature for Cabal Therapy prior to Dread Return.
In addition to this, what are you thoughts on cards like City of Solitude that also shut off activated abilities, so your opponent can't hose you with their board?
Yawgmoth's will (albeit generally bad in EDH imo) seems to fit perfectly with Recoup in this deck in order to provide alternate win conditions from the yard should the combo fail
Though definitely a late game card, as a last resort to your combo you can always cast shared fate, generally causing your opponent to be locked out of their draws while keeping you sustained; especially if for some obscure reason you can't win out of your yard.
Keep in mind my suggestions are geared towards playing this deck in a mid-range game, maybe 2-4 players. Backup plans are lovely.
Interesting deck, Nice info. Though a lot of your card links are broken due to 2 spaces between words. Making it annoying to try and understand the combos.
Nomads en-Kor mills your deck with Cephalid Illusionist even if you don't have another creature (compared to greaves), hes also a creature so the whole combo can be searched with survival of the fittest if need be. Shuko is also an option. Obviously you still keep greaves because it lets you activate druid immediately and stuff, but another option is worth considering since the combo is basically a two card druid.
Not good enough. Birds and (to a lesser extent) Hierarch are good because they can give you access to colors your lands can't make. Arbor Elf only ever gives you colors you already have access to. More importantly, with only 6 forests in the deck, many hands with Arbor Elf basically get 2-for-1ed by Wasteland/Strip Mine. That's just not acceptable, especially considering that we don't really need another mana dork.
When you have access to every tutor ever printed, even some good ones don't make the cut. Fauna Shaman is definitely too slow and vulnerable--Survival of the Fittest is acceptable because it can quickly assemble the combo kill without going off, but even it is almost too slow for this deck.
Lim-Dul's Vault is borderline in terms of speed...being able to order 5 cards is not very relevant, and a 2 mana topdeck tutor is okay but a little subpar. On top of that, the mana cost is tricky enough to make it probably not worth the effort. It's not bad, but I don't think it's better than any of the other tutors in the deck, and I'd very likely include Sylvan Tutor or Gamble before Lim-Dul's Vault if I had room for more tutors.
I've considered it, but it doesn't really do anything. It's definitely worse than Caller of the Claw, since it's much more easily disrupted, and there's no need for a second Caller. The only realistic situation where that would be useful is when you draw Caller, can't discard/shuffle it, and don't have time to play it. That doesn't happen nearly often enough to justify a card so redundant. It does allow you to always have a creature for Cabal Therapy, but this deck has enough creatures that finding something to sacrifice is very rarely an issue.
I've tested Dosan the Falling Leaf, which is similar and has better synergy with the deck. He wasn't bad, but didn't seem to do quite enough. I'd forgotten that City of Solitude also prevents activated abilities...but I'm not sure how relevant that is. The only important thing that does is protect you from artifact graveyard hate, but that's not an effect we especially need: Ancient Grudge is great for that task, and is a superior tutor target in most situations.
No, no. This deck never makes enough mana to actually make that good. I don't think I've ever gotten above 7 mana in maybe 100 games with this deck, and even that is rare. Usually I don't get more than 5. This deck is extremely fast, and wins or loses (usually wins) before this sort of thing would be usable. Shared Fate is bad for similar reasons. It really doesn't pay to include "last resort in case the combo fails" cards, especially ones that are only useful if you've succeeding in milling yourself (the hard part). 99% of the time they're just dead cards since you combo off and win. The 1% of the time you don't, flashback answers and Krosan Reclamation already give you a solid backup plan that's cheap and always available.
Quote from rageinuyasha »
Keep in mind my suggestions are geared towards playing this deck in a mid-range game, maybe 2-4 players. Backup plans are lovely.
I guess this deck should work in multiplayer, but it's only intended for 1v1. This deck doesn't do late-game in the usual sense. Or mid-range. It doesn't need to. It operates on a different time frame from other decks in this format...for us, turn 5 is "late-game." Anyway, I can't imagine more of a fun-killer for multiplayer than this deck. You're either going to polarize the table against you (and still probably win by turn 4) or warp the metagame beyond recognition.
This one interested me initially, but the more I think about it, the worse I think it is. The problem is that it's very linear...it's only any good in one specific circumstance, with one other card, and even in that role it's redundant with a better card (Lightning Greaves). And Cephalid Illusionist isn't even the main plan!
Lightning Greaves is nice because it's really good in this deck anyway. Sometimes you tutor for it even when you're going for the Hermit Druid plan, and it just gives you a backup plan if that doesn't work out (2 backup plans really, since it helps Scion a lot too). The Cephalid Illusionist combo isn't something we tutor for aggressively, since Hermit Druid is just better unless you draw into Illusionist or Greaves naturally.
I don't mean to pooh-pooh everyone's suggestions (which are all appreciated), but nothing so far (except Preordain) has been a great fit. If you think I'm dismissing a card unfairly, tell me why and perhaps I'll test it, but I feel fairly confident that my theory-craft assessments of these cards are accurate.
More suggestions are always welcome, but I'm also hoping to generate some meta-analysis of this deck as people start to pick it up and test it. There's more to discuss about this deck than the nitty-gritty card choices...even in a not-completely-optimized form, I think it legitimately constitutes a new pillar of the competitive 1v1 metagame. It's different enough from any other EDH deck that it could shake up the format considerably.
It's a thing of beauty, and as expected, extraordinarily tight. My only suggestion at the moment is Gemstone Cavern. You said yourself that the deck wins consistently on turn 3, so the odds of drawing the Cavern without it being in your opening hand are fairly slim, especially considering all of the library manipulation. If you can stand the card disadvantage (which typically isn't a problem for fast combo decks), it could push the kill one turn ahead.
The games you've lost: How did you lose them? Was it to mana screw? Poor tutoring decisions? Opponent had all the right answers? I'm not asking for a full-on metagame analysis, but some insight as to the deck's vulnerabilities could be useful.
Been playing this deck some, and I really like it.
What do you think of cutting Thought Courier for Vexing Shusher?
Also considering we do not consume life as a part of our combo, I would think we would be able to get good value out of using Lim Duls Vault aggresivly.
How aggressively do you mulligan for tutors, especially vs counterspell heavy decks. For instance, vs a counterspell + zur deck I drew the following hand, how would you mulligan?
Preordain, Vexing Shusher, Spell Pierce, Pact of Negation, 3 lands (assume colors are good to go)
More suggestions are always welcome, but I'm also hoping to generate some meta-analysis of this deck as people start to pick it up and test it. There's more to discuss about this deck than the nitty-gritty card choices...even in a not-completely-optimized form, I think it legitimately constitutes a new pillar of the competitive 1v1 metagame. It's different enough from any other EDH deck that it could shake up the format considerably.
Bingo. This deck terrifies the crap out of me! As a Sisay player, I can tell you that I'm already thinking about how I can possibly counter this: I feel like I'll have to run both Chrome Mox and Mox Diamond and hope I can get Linvala in my hand early. Or start the game with Swords to Plowshares and hope it doesn't get countered/discarded. Hmm, I guess I'm at an advantage over a lot of decks running Stonecloaker, but holy crap. Even if no one in my playgroup even becomes aware of this deck's existence, I can't help but want to improve mine.. just in case. Peace of mind, I suppose.
The only suggestion I have is maybe run Inquisition of Kozilek instead of Duress, so you can hit Stonecloaker or something like it. The CMC restriction should be a non-issue, given that this deck has little reason to consider post-turn 4 plays.
Unearth seems like a good way around the "creature in play" necessity for Dread Return, but you'd have to have it in hand.
I'll toss out more when I can think of something that would work. Just looking at this decklist gives me chills, I don't need to face it to know what it can do.
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EDH FTW
Currently running:
BRG Xira Arien BRG UR Melek, Izzet Paragon UR WUG Jenara, Asura of War WUG WRG Mayael the Anima WRG WB Triad of Fates WB BG Mazirek, Kraul Death Priest BG BR Rakdos, Lord of Riots BR WR Aurelia the Warleader WR WBG Ghave, Guru of Spores WBG WUBRG Horde of Notions WUBRG
If you are wondering, I also run a deck similar to this. It kills with the aformentioned ooze/kiki-jiki/mogfanatic combo or revielark/bodydouble combo. The nice part about running the lark combo is that it can be cast with horde of notions, making your general more useful (and freeing up that dragon tyrant slot).
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Cockatrice Alias: Knullset
My Current EDH Decks WUBRG Lorwyn Block Horde of Notions WUBRG UG Momir Vig Glimpse Combo UG UW "Rasputin Dreamcrusher" Control UW
Hey Lentini, would it be possible for you to post your list? It would be nice to have more lists to work off of; however, if you'd rather keep it a secret then thats fine too.
Hey Lentini, would it be possible for you to post your list? It would be nice to have more lists to work off of; however, if you'd rather keep it a secret then thats fine too.
Sure, but if you don't mind I'd like to wait until I have a little more time; it's 1:15 and I'm tired
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My Current EDH Decks WUBRG Lorwyn Block Horde of Notions WUBRG UG Momir Vig Glimpse Combo UG UW "Rasputin Dreamcrusher" Control UW
Interesting. I hadn't considered it, but it's not without potential. We should be able to afford the card disadvantage. What I'm worried about is the impact on the 50% of games where we win the coin flip. This deck has very heavy color requirements, since it needs to get all the right mana in the first few turns in order to win as fast as it does. We don't have any room for colorless producing lands, because just playing one is likely to slow down our clock by a turn. Is the benefit the 50% of the time its good worth the downside the 50% of the time when it's almost dead? My gut says no, but I'm not sure. I will test it when I have a chance (won't be til next month though).
Quote from d0su »
The games you've lost: How did you lose them? Was it to mana screw? Poor tutoring decisions? Opponent had all the right answers? I'm not asking for a full-on metagame analysis, but some insight as to the deck's vulnerabilities could be useful.
This is a good question. I've lost games to Crop Rotation into Bojuka Bog, which can be devastating if you don't expect it (if you know your opponent plays this combo, you want to make sure you have disruption for it before attempting to go off). I've lost games to Aven Mindcensor, who is a beating and a half against this deck if you can't draw into one of the 2 spells that kill it. I've lost really awkward games where I just couldn't draw any tutors to save my life, Scion got killed/countered repeatedly, and I wasn't able to get anything going before I died. I've lost a few times to my Gaddock Teeg deck when it got enough action and protection going to create an unbeatable board (though the matchup is at least 80-20 in Scion's favor). I don't remember ever losing to manascrew, but it's probably happened once or twice. The mana is pretty good really.
I will say this: almost every time I lose with this deck, I feel in retrospect that I could have won the game if I had played better. It's that kind of deck. The huge number of tutors tends to create almost infinite decision trees, and the deck has the answers to deal with anything. I doubt anyone is good enough to play this perfectly (I'm certainly not), but with enough practice, I think almost every game could be winnable.
Quote from Narglfrob »
What do you think of cutting Thought Courier for Vexing Shusher?
That's not the worst (though I think I'm cutting Thought Courier for Preordain, so we'd have to find another slot). I'm not sure how much I like it though. I'm not especially worried about counterspells...a lot of cards in this deck, like the flashback spells, are inherently good against permission. It also helps that we can safely just play important spells like Hermit Druid...yeah, it probably gets countered, but we expect that...there are plenty of ways to get it out of the graveyard with haste, so we're not especially worried about resolving any particular spells.
Games against permission heavy decks (and I've played these a lot) generally go one of two ways. If you have a good hand, you can almost always overpower them with speed. The first time they tap out out for something, go off (hopefully with a 1 mana disruption spell for insurance). If they don't tap out, that's fine...they won't be doing anything, so just build up your hand and lands a little longer and force something through when you can. Our key spells are so cheap that you can out-efficiency a permission deck around turn 5 or 6 and resolve something critical.
If you're forced to keep a mediocre hand, then you have to grind the game out, but that's doable too. These are the longest games you ever get with this deck (but they're still pretty fast, even by 1v1 standards). Go for Genesis, flashback spells, or a Life from the Loam lock, and just grind them out til you get a chance to go big. You can win as soon as you get an opening, just make sure to have a Chant or a discard spell to make sure you're really clear.
So the point is, I'm not sure we need a narrow hate card against permission decks. In my experience, these games tend to be skill-intensive, but quite favorable, since the stuff we can do is just vastly more explosive than the stuff they can do. In any case, if you do want to play a card for this, I think Dosan the Falling Leaf is probably better, and I'd try him instead. He's a lot less narrow...shutting down removal and other tricks on all of your turns is nice in many matchups, not just blue. Also, I'm concerned about the mana cost on Vexing Shusher...it's definitely a late game card, because we won't usually have enough mana early to go off quick and protect our spells with Shusher. Keeping your spells covered with Shusher probably extends the game at least another 2 turns, which is pretty bad. Shusher does have an advantage over Dosan of being uncounterable itself...but again, it's not that hard for us to reanimate little creatures.
I suspect that Dosan is probably slightly better than Shusher in this deck, and that both are unnecessary, but I might easily be wrong on both counts. I'd recommend first playing around 20 games against permission decks without either one (you probably need about 10 games to learn how to play the matchup properly). If you still feel like the matchup isn't good enough with the current list, then by all means test the Shusher or Dosan. Either one will probably help a lot.
Quote from Narglfrob »
Also considering we do not consume life as a part of our combo, I would think we would be able to get good value out of using Lim Duls Vault aggresivly.
We can use it aggressively, but that usually means it's a Vampiric Tutor that costs UB and a little more life. In theory you can get 2 cards you want off it, but I find that's really rare in reality, and this deck doesn't want to wait 2 turns to draw cards anyway. It's pretty decent, but is it better than any of the other tutors? I don't think so. The 1 mana tutors are really important in this deck, the 2 mana tutors are better, and the 3 mana tutors are incredibly powerful in this deck (Intuition, Buried Alive) or have other very relevant uses (Muddle the Mixture, Shred Memory). And again, I think Sylvan Tutor and Gamble are still probably better than Lim-Dul's Vault, because 1 mana tutors are just that good, and often make the kill a full turn faster...and I don't even have room for those right now. If we could play 110 cards, all 3 of these would be in, but as is I think Lim-Dul's Vault just misses the cut.
Quote from Narglfrob »
How aggressively do you mulligan for tutors, especially vs counterspell heavy decks. For instance, vs a counterspell + zur deck I drew the following hand, how would you mulligan?
Preordain, Vexing Shusher, Spell Pierce, Pact of Negation, 3 lands (assume colors are good to go)
Fairly aggressively. You don't necessarily need a lot of tutors, but you need a plan. This is not a control deck, you really want to be faster than the other guy. That hand is really bad, because it has no plan at all. With that hand, I would mulligan Pact of Negation, Vexing Shusher, Spell Pierce, and 1-2 lands, depending on how the mana is (I'd keep 1 5-color land, or 2 otherwise). Between 3-4 new cards and Preordain, you ought to be able to find some action. Spell Pierce is tempting (and possibly correct) to keep in order to hit his acceleration, but since we actually need to draw into something I think I would pitch it. If you happen to know that the Zur deck is REALLY heavy on counterspells you might keep the Shusher, but I don't think it's a good call in general...the odds seem high that he'll have some black or white removal for it, or Zur will just get something to kill it on turn 4 while you sit there with no action.
Quote from Riley »
This deck terrifies the crap out of me! As a Sisay player, I can tell you that I'm already thinking about how I can possibly counter this: I feel like I'll have to run both Chrome Mox and Mox Diamond and hope I can get Linvala in my hand early. Or start the game with Swords to Plowshares and hope it doesn't get countered/discarded. Hmm, I guess I'm at an advantage over a lot of decks running Stonecloaker, but holy crap. Even if no one in my playgroup even becomes aware of this deck's existence, I can't help but want to improve mine.. just in case. Peace of mind, I suppose.
You actually seem moderately well positioned to have a chance against this deck. More than most at least. Linvala, Keeper of Silence is often too slow, but if you live long enough to find and play her she's really really good here. If you can play her early and find a way to keep her from dying to a tutored Vindicate, you'll win. Stonecloaker is also decent against this deck, though holding 3 mana up around turns 3-6 (when you need it) is really, really obvious and should be played around by a competent Scion pilot. You should be sure to play Aven Mindcensor as well, that's one of the very best answers against this deck.
The only suggestion I have is maybe run Inquisition of Kozilek instead of Duress, so you can hit Stonecloaker or something like it. The CMC restriction should be a non-issue, given that this deck has little reason to consider post-turn 4 plays.
Inquisition of Kozilek would be good here. 4+cc cards aren't totally irrelevant (we don't ALWAYS win on turn 3-4, and stuff like Force of Will costs 5), but Inquisition does hit most of the stuff we care about. That said, Duress is still better...Stonecloaker is one of quite few creatures under 4cc that we care about, but forcing a discard on Stonecloaker is actually HORRIBLE. People tend to forget that Crypt Champion is symmetrical...if Stonecloaker is in your graveyard, I can't even go off. It's way better to wait for a Chant or for you to tap out (or just to kill you before you can afford to hold up mana for Stonecloaker, which is most likely). So yeah, Inquisition would be pretty good, but it's another question of space. I'm not sure what can be cut for it right now, though I would like to squeeze it in somehow.
Quote from destinytrigger »
I may be missing something, but don't you need a second creature for Greaves to work with Illusionist?
Yes, but it's not an issue. This deck has a lot of creatures. I've literally never encountered a situation where I wanted to go off with Illusionist but was missing a creature to do so.
Not really good enough. As with Lim-Dul's Vault, the difference between 1 and 2 mana is huge, and is even more pronounced on this kind of card, that you want to play the turn you go off. With protection, we're aiming to win on turn 4 or 5 most of the time. 2 mana for this effect is too much for us to easily pay.
Thought Courier seems a little better in this deck, and he isn't even that good. It's not so much that we want to discard a lot of cards...we don't, really. We just want to be able to discard a card in a pinch, if we happen to draw something that needs to be in our deck/graveyard in the turns before we go off. Thought Courier is nice because he helps you draw into things and ensures that you can always get rid of something. The problem with Careful Study is that you really want to cast it pretty early, because having a spell like this sit in your hand "just in case" is very weak and quite possibly dead...but if you cast it early, you might not be able to discard something important when you need to. That would be pretty ugly, and I can see it happening a lot.
Nah. We have Reanimate for this purpose, and that works fine. Unearth doesn't work in this deck since you usually want to reanimate Crypt Champion, which costs 4.
Quote from Lentini »
If you are wondering, I also run a deck similar to this. It kills with the aformentioned ooze/kiki-jiki/mogfanatic combo or revielark/bodydouble combo. The nice part about running the lark combo is that it can be cast with horde of notions, making your general more useful (and freeing up that dragon tyrant slot).
If it's a Hermit Druid combo deck like this one, please post it. Otherwise, it should be a separate thread, since Hermit Druid is really the heart of this deck and makes it really different from any other EDH deck. (I ask if yours is because I don't see the point of running Reveillark/Body Double in a Hermit Druid deck: as a combo, it's slower, redundant, and just worse than the other options available, and you don't need a backup graveyard combo in this kind of deck.
As for Horde of Notions...well, that might free up the Dragon Tyrant slot, but I bet your Reveillark combo takes up more space than my 2 dragons. I'm very happy with those 2 slots and the Scion back-up plan...needing nothing but Scion and 2 attacks to win is really awesome, since you're not dependent on drawing anything. I used to play Sliver Queen as the general and Mana Echoes in the deck, which wasn't terrible and took up 1 less slot, but Scion is loads better.
That tight huh? I might want to start goldfishing with this just to see for myself now.
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EDH FTW
Currently running:
BRG Xira Arien BRG UR Melek, Izzet Paragon UR WUG Jenara, Asura of War WUG WRG Mayael the Anima WRG WB Triad of Fates WB BG Mazirek, Kraul Death Priest BG BR Rakdos, Lord of Riots BR WR Aurelia the Warleader WR WBG Ghave, Guru of Spores WBG WUBRG Horde of Notions WUBRG
I'm not saying that these cards should necessarily be changed--I think most of them may well be optimal. It's just that I'm 99% certain that every other card in the list is essential/optimal, so these are the only ones you can really consider messing with. They're all very good though...
Unless I miscounted, there are only 98 cards in that decklist. I checked twice.
I was also wondering where a couple of those cards even get used. For example, Deep Analysis costs too much to typically want to hardcast unless you're completely out of options, and its only use post-combo (as far as I can tell) is with Krosan Reclamation, and that already costs 4+ mana and leaves you again with an empty library.
BRG Xira Arien BRG UR Melek, Izzet Paragon UR WUG Jenara, Asura of War WUG WRG Mayael the Anima WRG WB Triad of Fates WB BG Mazirek, Kraul Death Priest BG BR Rakdos, Lord of Riots BR WR Aurelia the Warleader WR WBG Ghave, Guru of Spores WBG WUBRG Horde of Notions WUBRG
I think Sylvan Tutor deserves a slot. Also, what do you think of Unearth? Seems like a decent addition to me, it can bring back most of your creatures, and you can cycle it, if not of use. Maybe for Aven Mindcensor and Quite Speculation...
You know, I think you're probably right. I'm wary about including too many topdeck tutors (and I do have a LOT), but increasing the odds of turn 2 Hermit Druid is so sweet that I still really want this one. It deserves more testing at least.
I mentioned Unearth in my wall of text above. The problem is that it doesn't bring back Crypt Champion, which is frequently the card we want to reanimate (This often comes up if you use Buried Alive or Survival of the Fittest to set up the combo). Reanimate and Shallow Grave do this job very well, and we don't need more.
Cycling is really bad in this deck, by the way. Even though all our spells are so cheap, mana is precious. When playing this deck, I frequently use every single mana I can produce every single turn of the game. Ain't got time to cycle.
Quote from destinytrigger »
Unless I miscounted, there are only 98 cards in that decklist. I checked twice.
I just counted 3 times, and managed to get a different number every time. I think I'm tired :). If it really is 98 cards, I'll figure out what's missing tomorrow after I get some sleep. I hope it's 98 cards though, an extra slot would be sweet!
Quote from destinytrigger »
I was also wondering where a couple of those cards even get used. For example, Deep Analysis costs too much to typically want to hardcast unless you're completely out of options, and its only use post-combo (as far as I can tell) is with Krosan Reclamation, and that already costs 4+ mana and leaves you again with an empty library.
Like I said, Deep Analysis is potentially a flex slot. It does have it's uses though. Probably the most important is that makes Quiet Speculation very good, whereas it would probably not be good enough otherwise. It's also randomly useful in a lot of situations in that it's fairly flexible, likes to be discarded/milled, and generates a whole lot of card advantage no matter how you use it. That said, it's definitely not essential, and I'm not convinced my arguments are good enough for it to stay. I'm definitely willing to consider cutting Deep Analysis and Quiet Speculation for other cards we want (though Quiet Speculation for essential removal/essential removal/Deep Analysis is really awesome and will be missed).
Quote from Thoughtcast »
I put the list into MWS and have been goldfishing heavily. It is absolutely insane how this deck consistantly goldfishes a win by turn 4-5 (And it always seems to have a million answers ready.)
I'm curious if Frantic Search has been considered? I've found on occasion that I draw dread return/anger/etc and I need a way to quickly bin it. Thought Courier works, but unless you're reanimating it it doesn't have haste and that turn slowdown can hurt. However search gives you a spell to tutor for that isn't a creature, allows you to discard cards you need to get rid of while drawing more fuel/protection and doesn't set you back on mana.
Glad you like it (how many cards is it? heh). It is insane.
I had not considered Frantic Search. It's very similar to Careful Study, which I dismissed a little while ago (probably slightly better though). Being essentially free is nice, and it can even fix colors a little bit, which is kind of cool. It has the same problem I brought up with Careful Study though: you don't want to hold onto it until you draw a card you need to discard (because that might never happen, and then you're making a card that would have been useful into a dead card), but you also don't want to use it early, or it might not prevent the problem it's supposed to (if you draw a crucial card right before you need to go off). I do like Frantic Search better than Careful Study because the effectively 1 mana difference in cost really is a big deal, but I'm quite unsure about how it compares to Thought Courier. It's not any sort of autoinclude (as it's pure card disadvantage), but I could see how it might be better. I'd say it's definitely worth testing.
Don't get me wrong, I'm a fan of the Quiet Speculation package. But QSpec is kinda clunky being at sorcery speed, doing nothing but setting up other cards for use on its own, and still costing 2 mana just to use. I think I'd rather see something like Frantic Search as Thoughtcast suggested in that slot, and switch the standard QSpec fetch package to Grudge/Ray/Therapy.
Edit: Thanks for the confirmation. I threw in Mirri's Guile to test, it seems almost as useful as Sylvan Library and hits turn 1.
Private Mod Note
():
Rollback Post to RevisionRollBack
EDH FTW
Currently running:
BRG Xira Arien BRG UR Melek, Izzet Paragon UR WUG Jenara, Asura of War WUG WRG Mayael the Anima WRG WB Triad of Fates WB BG Mazirek, Kraul Death Priest BG BR Rakdos, Lord of Riots BR WR Aurelia the Warleader WR WBG Ghave, Guru of Spores WBG WUBRG Horde of Notions WUBRG
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1 Scion of the Ur-Dragon
1 Underground Sea
1 Bayou
1 Scrubland
1 Badlands
1 Tropical Island
1 Tundra
1 Volcanic Island
1 Savannah
1 Taiga
1 Plateau
1 Polluted Delta
1 Verdant Catacombs
1 Marsh Flats
1 Bloodstained Mire
1 Misty Rainforest
1 Flooded Strand
1 Scalding Tarn
1 Windswept Heath
1 Wooded Foothills
1 Arid Mesa
1 Steam Vents
1 Stomping Ground
1 Overgrown Tomb
1 Watery Grave
1 Blood Crypt
1 City of Brass
1 Forbidden Orchard
1 Reflecting Pool
1 Gemstone Mine
1 Urborg, Tomb of Yawgmoth
1 Twilight Mire
1 Horizon Canopy
1 Strip Mine
1 Wasteland
1 Hermit Druid
1 Cephalid Illusionist
1 Saffi Eriksdotter
1 Crypt Champion
1 Caller of the Claw
1 Anger
1 Narcomoeba
1 Fatestitcher
Plan B:
1 Nicol Bolas
1 Dragon Tyrant
Other:
1 Birds of Paradise
1 Noble Hierarch
1 Weathered Wayfarer
1 Mother of Runes
1 Dark Confidant
1 Thought Courier
1 Apprentice Necromancer
1 Stoneforge Mystic
1 Qasali Pridemage
1 Gaddock Teeg
1 Aven Mindcensor
1 Eternal Witness
1 Genesis
Artifacts:
1 Chrome Mox
1 Lotus Petal
1 Lightning Greaves
Combo:
1 Dread Return
1 Reanimate
1 Shallow Grave
1 Cabal Therapy
1 Krosan Reclamation
1 Ray of Revelation
1 Ancient Grudge
1 Crippling Fatigue
1 Deep Analysis
1 Vampiric Tutor
1 Worldly Tutor
1 Mystical Tutor
1 Enlightened Tutor
1 Entomb
1 Brainstorm
1 Preordain
1 Ponder
1 Demonic Tutor
1 Survival of the Fittest
1 Sylvan Library
1 Eladamri's Call
1 Quiet Speculation
1 Muddle the Mixture
1 Shred Memory
1 See Beyond
1 Intuition
1 Buried Alive
Non-Flashback Disruption:
1 Pact of Negation
1 Thoughtseize
1 Duress
1 Orim's Chant
1 Silence
1 Dispel
1 Vindicate
Recursion:
1 Pull from Eternity
1 Life from the Loam
1 Regrowth
1 Grim Discovery
I'm sure that this list still isn't perfect, but it's very, very strong. I'm releasing it to the public in the hope that the collective minds here at MTGS can help develop it even further. Do note that this is an extremely difficult deck to pilot optimally...it would be not be an overstatement to say that this is the toughest deck I've ever played in any format, and I've played them all. It's powerful enough to still win most games with poor play, but it takes a master (and a lot of practice) to play it at its full potential.
So, why is this deck so good? It has a blazingly fast and resilient primary win condition, a powerful and disruptive secondary win condition, more tutors than any other deck in the format, and it still has room for a hefty and versatile disruption package. It's also as lean and efficient as they come: the curve tops out at 3, and most of the spells cost only 1 or 2. There's no dead weight here.
The simplest version of the kill is: activate Hermit Druid. Win. Yes, it's actually that easy. There are no basic lands in this deck, so a single Hermit Druid activation mills your whole deck. Narcomoeba pops into play. Unearth Fatestitcher, make sure the coast is clear with Cabal Therapy (if you have an extra creature), and flashback Dread Return on Crypt Champion, which returns Saffi Eriksdotter. With the other Crypt Champion trigger on the stack, sacrifice Saffi targeting the Champion, and repeat that loop a billion times. Then use Crypt Champion to return Caller of the Claw. That gives you a billion bears, and thanks to Anger, they all have haste. Ta da! Dead opponent. If Hermit Druid isn't destroyed on sight, this happens relatively consistently by turn 3.
Obviously, it's not always that simple, but there's a lot of resiliency built into this plan. Apprentice Necromancer and Shallow Grave help ensure that Hermit Druid is able to do his thing. Cephalid Illusionist and Lightning Greaves offer an alternate means of milling yourself if something happens to the Druid. The suite of flashback removal spells can deal with just about anything that might stop you from winning post-milling. This plan is remarkably hard to stop: it can even beat instant-speed graveyard hate sometimes, though it's somewhat painful to do so. By looping Krosan Reclamation and Pull from Eternity, you can (slowly) draw whatever cards you need, even if your whole graveyard and library are exiled!
An alternate kill, which is extremely efficient even if the rest of the deck isn't coming together, involved just beating down with Scion of the Ur-Dragon. This list only contains 2 dragons, but that's all it needs to kill in 2 attacks. Strike first as Nicol Bolas, wiping out your opponent's answers. Then swing as Dragon Tyrant, pump once, and that's 21 general damage. It says a lot about this deck that a strategy as efficient as this one is a distant plan B.
There are many other subtle and effective gameplans with this deck, such as the early Life from the Loam lock or the Quiet Speculation flashback control plan. The most difficult part of piloting this deck is figuring out how to use all the tutors, since there's a tremendous array of options, and not all of the tutors will be able to get the card you want most. For instance, do you Entomb for Anger? Life from the Loam? Hermit Druid? Ancient Grudge? All of these (and more) can be the correct answer; learning to recognize when to get what with each tutor takes a lot of foresight, practice, and skill. Learning the best ways to play around hate is also important. This deck has the answers to beat anything, but recognizing how to use those answers can be very challenging.
I'd encourage anyone wanting to further develop this deck to goldfish it at least 10 times before playing a real opponent, just to get your head around how the combos and the tutor package fit together. Then play a patient opponent, since real games get much more complicated and you'll have a ton of decisions to make every game.
Once you get a feel for how it plays against a real opponent, you can start experimenting with changes--there are definitely a lot of flexible slots in this list, especially in the disruption and tutor packages, but it takes a while to get a sense for how useful each piece can be (and all the cards in this list are good, if not necessarily the best). Other cards I've considered/tested that could well make their way back into the list at some point include Sylvan Tutor, Grim Tutor, Gamble, Corpse Dance, Sensei's Divining Top, Dosan the Falling Leaf, Gilded Drake, Imperial Recruiter, Dimir Infiltrator, and Volrath's Shapeshifter.
Thoughts? Questions?
HOWEVER if you also include Devoted Druid (in the graveyard) then your combo is also immune to non-slit second creature removal.
Old version:
Dread Return resolves targeting Crypt Champion.
Crypt Champion Trigger on the stack.
Swords to plowshares targeting Crypt Champion, gg.
OR
Dread Return resolves targeting Necrotic Ooze.
Tap Necrotic Ooze using Kiki Jiki's ability targeting itself.
Swords to plowshares targeting Necrotic Ooze, gg.
New Version:
Dread Return resolves targeting Necrotic Ooze.
Tap Necrotic Ooze using Kiki Jiki's ability targeting itself.
Swords to plowshares targeting Necrotic Ooze.
Untap Necrotic Ooze using Devoted Druids ability.
Tap Necrotic Ooze using Kiki Jiki's ability targeting itself. GG for the good guys!
Hold on a second, this also allows us to make infinite mana with Birds of Paradise / Noble Hierarch in the yard.
Perhaps this can allow us to utilize a better kill condition than Mogg fanatic, something slightly useful outside the combo. Off the top of my head:
Grim Lavamancer
Recoup -> Yawgs Will (meh too much space)
Krosan Reclamation (targeting dragon tyrant and pact of negation) -> Deep analysis -> Cast Tyrant and swing with Pact backup
Sliver Queen as a General and cast her and make infinite slivers and swing.
Anyways it sounds like Ooze kill with Devoted Druid is strictly better. Nice that Devoted Druid is a passable card by herself and can conveniently bin herself if you need her dead to lend her abilities to the Ooze.
EDIT: Preordain should be in.
EDIT 2: I just realized the Devoted Druid kill is way easier than that, you can just swing with the Necrotic Ooze copies.
Also the mana base for this deck is horrible.
1 Blood Crypt
1 Steam Vents
1 Stomping Ground
1 Taiga
1 Plateau (especially this one)
1 Volcanic Island
Also Autumn Veil is much easier to cast than either Silence or Chant.
I've used that combo in a more traditional Scion deck, but I don't think it has any place here. As a back-up kill, it seems inferior to both the Nicol Bolas + Dragon Tyrant plan (since it requires another card besides Scion) and a Worldgorger Dragon + Animate Dead plan (which requires another card, but at least that card is good in this deck).
It doesn't pay to focus too much on the Scion kill though...it happens sometimes, but this deck usually wins before it reaches 5 mana.
I've thought about it, but didn't see an advantage to using a Necrotic Ooze kill. The infinite damage versions take up the same amount of slots (not counting Anger, which we would play anyway), but the cards are much less useful (and harder to play) individually. It's extremely annoying to not be able to go off because a key card is stuck in your hand. There are a few tools that let you discard these cards or shuffle them back into your deck, but it's bad to have to rely on those.
The best thing about the current combo is that Saffi Eriksdotter and Crypt Champion are far from dead cards on their own. Both are relatively easy to play (Saffi moreso than the Champion), both get themselves into the graveyard, and both help to stick a Hermit Druid/Illusionist long enough to go off. Caller of the Claw is still dead outside of the combo and annoying to draw, but at least it's not too hard to flash it into play as a blocker and get it killed.
In contrast, none of the Necrotic Ooze pieces do anything on their own, and Kiki-Jiki is very hard to cast/kill in a pinch. Considering that both combos take up the same number of slots, this is plenty of reason for me to consider the Saffi/Champion combo better, at least until I hear a more convincing argument.
It might seem that the Saffi/Champion combo is more vulnerable to spot removal, but that's never been an issue for two reasons. First, if an opponent has instant-speed spot removal, they're almost always going to use it to try to kill Hermit Druid or Illusionist, so if you manage to mill your deck you're probably okay. Second, and more importantly, we have Cabal Therapy to make sure we don't walk into any nasty surprises. If you suspect that your opponent might be sandbagging STP or any other nasty surprise, you can check that the coast is clear before casting Dread Return. If you miss with the Cabal Therapy but your opponent has another trick, you can pull some tricks with Krosan Reclamation to handle it (this situation has yet to come up in practice, but we do have solutions).
Also, the distinction between infinite damage and infinite attackers is essentially meaningless in this case, because the deck is so fast and has access to flashback removal. Between Cabal Therapy, Ray of Revelation, Ancient Grudge, and Crippling Fatigue, it's possible to deal with anything that would stop an attack from being lethal (again, this almost never comes up, but we have the answers).
The Devoted Druid kill isn't any better: at that point we're adding another slot for the combo (unless the kill is just attacking with Necrotic Oozes, but how is that better than Saffi/Champion?). Devoted Druid isn't good on its own in this deck...the curve stops at 3, and the useful acceleration costs 0-1 mana and fixes colors. Devoted Druid is slow and doesn't fix mana at all, so it's pretty mediocre.
To summarize, I still think the Saffi/Champion kill is better, because Saffi and Crypt Champion are quite good outside of the combo, and the Necrotic Ooze pieces are all very bad on their own. The advantages of the Ooze combo over the Saffi/Champion combo are negligible, and outweighed by the first consideration.
Yep, you're right. Could likely cut Thought Courier for it, though a creature discard outlet can be very useful. Still probably a good switch.
No, it's not horrible. Notice any similarities between those lands? They're all mountains. Because of Anger, it's very important for this deck to always have access to a mountain (or 2, in case of LD) by turn 2-3, even though there aren't too many red costs. Running extra red duallands helps to make sure that can be achieved. Plateau may seem like a poor fit, but it's important: if you only have 1 fetchland but need white mana and a mountain, what else are you going to do?
It's a little easier to cast, but it's not as good. Plenty of cards (Swords to Plowshares, Cryptic Command, Volcanic Fallout, etc) can all interfere with your win. Autumn's Veil does nothing against answers like these, whereas a resolved Orim's Chant or Silence guarantees victory. The manabase is robust enough that it can easily handle the white mana.
Quick question. What's your insurance should your caller combo fail? (for example route) Have you thought about adding something like progenitus to prevent decking?
I forgot that anger needs a mountain, that is unfortunate, but I cant help but wonder if Llanowar Wastes shouldn't replace Plateau.
As for the Saffi + Crypt Champion + Caller of the Claw vs Necrotic Ooze + Kiki Jiki + Devoted Druid, debate you bring up some interesting points that I hadn't considered. Kiki jiki costing RRR2 really does suck, I would like to point out tho that the ability for creatures to kill themselves is totally irrelevant, since you can sacrifice them to Cabal Therapy or Dread Return.
"The Devoted Druid kill isn't any better: at that point we're adding another slot for the combo (unless the kill is just attacking with Necrotic Oozes, but how is that better than Saffi/Champion?)"
Well its better because its immune to creature removal, however as you pointed out this is not that important and kiki jiki's casting cost is actually prohibitive.
A card that you have not mentioned at least testing is Lim Duls Vault, I would have thought this would be good enough.
Also with this mana base, Arbor Elf is almost as good as Birds of Paradise or Noble Hierarch
Edit: Also, this allows for you to ALWAYS have a creature for Cabal Therapy prior to Dread Return.
In addition to this, what are you thoughts on cards like City of Solitude that also shut off activated abilities, so your opponent can't hose you with their board?
Yawgmoth's will (albeit generally bad in EDH imo) seems to fit perfectly with Recoup in this deck in order to provide alternate win conditions from the yard should the combo fail
Though definitely a late game card, as a last resort to your combo you can always cast shared fate, generally causing your opponent to be locked out of their draws while keeping you sustained; especially if for some obscure reason you can't win out of your yard.
Keep in mind my suggestions are geared towards playing this deck in a mid-range game, maybe 2-4 players. Backup plans are lovely.
My Current EDH Decks
WUBRG Lorwyn Block Horde of Notions WUBRG
UG Momir Vig Glimpse Combo UG
UW "Rasputin Dreamcrusher" Control UW
Not good enough. Birds and (to a lesser extent) Hierarch are good because they can give you access to colors your lands can't make. Arbor Elf only ever gives you colors you already have access to. More importantly, with only 6 forests in the deck, many hands with Arbor Elf basically get 2-for-1ed by Wasteland/Strip Mine. That's just not acceptable, especially considering that we don't really need another mana dork.
When you have access to every tutor ever printed, even some good ones don't make the cut. Fauna Shaman is definitely too slow and vulnerable--Survival of the Fittest is acceptable because it can quickly assemble the combo kill without going off, but even it is almost too slow for this deck.
Lim-Dul's Vault is borderline in terms of speed...being able to order 5 cards is not very relevant, and a 2 mana topdeck tutor is okay but a little subpar. On top of that, the mana cost is tricky enough to make it probably not worth the effort. It's not bad, but I don't think it's better than any of the other tutors in the deck, and I'd very likely include Sylvan Tutor or Gamble before Lim-Dul's Vault if I had room for more tutors.
I've considered it, but it doesn't really do anything. It's definitely worse than Caller of the Claw, since it's much more easily disrupted, and there's no need for a second Caller. The only realistic situation where that would be useful is when you draw Caller, can't discard/shuffle it, and don't have time to play it. That doesn't happen nearly often enough to justify a card so redundant. It does allow you to always have a creature for Cabal Therapy, but this deck has enough creatures that finding something to sacrifice is very rarely an issue.
I've tested Dosan the Falling Leaf, which is similar and has better synergy with the deck. He wasn't bad, but didn't seem to do quite enough. I'd forgotten that City of Solitude also prevents activated abilities...but I'm not sure how relevant that is. The only important thing that does is protect you from artifact graveyard hate, but that's not an effect we especially need: Ancient Grudge is great for that task, and is a superior tutor target in most situations.
No, no. This deck never makes enough mana to actually make that good. I don't think I've ever gotten above 7 mana in maybe 100 games with this deck, and even that is rare. Usually I don't get more than 5. This deck is extremely fast, and wins or loses (usually wins) before this sort of thing would be usable. Shared Fate is bad for similar reasons. It really doesn't pay to include "last resort in case the combo fails" cards, especially ones that are only useful if you've succeeding in milling yourself (the hard part). 99% of the time they're just dead cards since you combo off and win. The 1% of the time you don't, flashback answers and Krosan Reclamation already give you a solid backup plan that's cheap and always available.
I guess this deck should work in multiplayer, but it's only intended for 1v1. This deck doesn't do late-game in the usual sense. Or mid-range. It doesn't need to. It operates on a different time frame from other decks in this format...for us, turn 5 is "late-game." Anyway, I can't imagine more of a fun-killer for multiplayer than this deck. You're either going to polarize the table against you (and still probably win by turn 4) or warp the metagame beyond recognition.
This one interested me initially, but the more I think about it, the worse I think it is. The problem is that it's very linear...it's only any good in one specific circumstance, with one other card, and even in that role it's redundant with a better card (Lightning Greaves). And Cephalid Illusionist isn't even the main plan!
Lightning Greaves is nice because it's really good in this deck anyway. Sometimes you tutor for it even when you're going for the Hermit Druid plan, and it just gives you a backup plan if that doesn't work out (2 backup plans really, since it helps Scion a lot too). The Cephalid Illusionist combo isn't something we tutor for aggressively, since Hermit Druid is just better unless you draw into Illusionist or Greaves naturally.
Being able to search for Illusionist + Nomads with Survival of the Fittest is irrelevant, since Survival gets you the combo by itself anyway. You can get Hermit Druid + Anger or Apprentice Necromancer...or you can just get Anger, Saffi Eriksdotter, Caller of the Claw, Crypt Champion (cast the Champion) and win without even milling yourself.
I don't mean to pooh-pooh everyone's suggestions (which are all appreciated), but nothing so far (except Preordain) has been a great fit. If you think I'm dismissing a card unfairly, tell me why and perhaps I'll test it, but I feel fairly confident that my theory-craft assessments of these cards are accurate.
More suggestions are always welcome, but I'm also hoping to generate some meta-analysis of this deck as people start to pick it up and test it. There's more to discuss about this deck than the nitty-gritty card choices...even in a not-completely-optimized form, I think it legitimately constitutes a new pillar of the competitive 1v1 metagame. It's different enough from any other EDH deck that it could shake up the format considerably.
The games you've lost: How did you lose them? Was it to mana screw? Poor tutoring decisions? Opponent had all the right answers? I'm not asking for a full-on metagame analysis, but some insight as to the deck's vulnerabilities could be useful.
Draft my Mono-Blue Cube!
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What do you think of cutting Thought Courier for Vexing Shusher?
Also considering we do not consume life as a part of our combo, I would think we would be able to get good value out of using Lim Duls Vault aggresivly.
How aggressively do you mulligan for tutors, especially vs counterspell heavy decks. For instance, vs a counterspell + zur deck I drew the following hand, how would you mulligan?
Preordain, Vexing Shusher, Spell Pierce, Pact of Negation, 3 lands (assume colors are good to go)
Bingo. This deck terrifies the crap out of me! As a Sisay player, I can tell you that I'm already thinking about how I can possibly counter this: I feel like I'll have to run both Chrome Mox and Mox Diamond and hope I can get Linvala in my hand early. Or start the game with Swords to Plowshares and hope it doesn't get countered/discarded. Hmm, I guess I'm at an advantage over a lot of decks running Stonecloaker, but holy crap. Even if no one in my playgroup even becomes aware of this deck's existence, I can't help but want to improve mine.. just in case. Peace of mind, I suppose.
The only suggestion I have is maybe run Inquisition of Kozilek instead of Duress, so you can hit Stonecloaker or something like it. The CMC restriction should be a non-issue, given that this deck has little reason to consider post-turn 4 plays.
My Captain Sisay Duel Commander Primer
Duel Commander Mega-Thread
And is Abeyance not good enough to make the cut?
Draw/discard effect: Careful Study?
Unearth seems like a good way around the "creature in play" necessity for Dread Return, but you'd have to have it in hand.
I'll toss out more when I can think of something that would work. Just looking at this decklist gives me chills, I don't need to face it to know what it can do.
Currently running:
BRG Xira Arien BRG
UR Melek, Izzet Paragon UR
WUG Jenara, Asura of War WUG
WRG Mayael the Anima WRG
WB Triad of Fates WB
BG Mazirek, Kraul Death Priest BG
BR Rakdos, Lord of Riots BR
WR Aurelia the Warleader WR
WBG Ghave, Guru of Spores WBG
WUBRG Horde of Notions WUBRG
One-Eyed Black | Orzhov Combo | Ooze Reanimator | Mindwheeling Pain
My Current EDH Decks
WUBRG Lorwyn Block Horde of Notions WUBRG
UG Momir Vig Glimpse Combo UG
UW "Rasputin Dreamcrusher" Control UW
Sure, but if you don't mind I'd like to wait until I have a little more time; it's 1:15 and I'm tired
My Current EDH Decks
WUBRG Lorwyn Block Horde of Notions WUBRG
UG Momir Vig Glimpse Combo UG
UW "Rasputin Dreamcrusher" Control UW
This is a good question. I've lost games to Crop Rotation into Bojuka Bog, which can be devastating if you don't expect it (if you know your opponent plays this combo, you want to make sure you have disruption for it before attempting to go off). I've lost games to Aven Mindcensor, who is a beating and a half against this deck if you can't draw into one of the 2 spells that kill it. I've lost really awkward games where I just couldn't draw any tutors to save my life, Scion got killed/countered repeatedly, and I wasn't able to get anything going before I died. I've lost a few times to my Gaddock Teeg deck when it got enough action and protection going to create an unbeatable board (though the matchup is at least 80-20 in Scion's favor). I don't remember ever losing to manascrew, but it's probably happened once or twice. The mana is pretty good really.
I will say this: almost every time I lose with this deck, I feel in retrospect that I could have won the game if I had played better. It's that kind of deck. The huge number of tutors tends to create almost infinite decision trees, and the deck has the answers to deal with anything. I doubt anyone is good enough to play this perfectly (I'm certainly not), but with enough practice, I think almost every game could be winnable.
That's not the worst (though I think I'm cutting Thought Courier for Preordain, so we'd have to find another slot). I'm not sure how much I like it though. I'm not especially worried about counterspells...a lot of cards in this deck, like the flashback spells, are inherently good against permission. It also helps that we can safely just play important spells like Hermit Druid...yeah, it probably gets countered, but we expect that...there are plenty of ways to get it out of the graveyard with haste, so we're not especially worried about resolving any particular spells.
Games against permission heavy decks (and I've played these a lot) generally go one of two ways. If you have a good hand, you can almost always overpower them with speed. The first time they tap out out for something, go off (hopefully with a 1 mana disruption spell for insurance). If they don't tap out, that's fine...they won't be doing anything, so just build up your hand and lands a little longer and force something through when you can. Our key spells are so cheap that you can out-efficiency a permission deck around turn 5 or 6 and resolve something critical.
If you're forced to keep a mediocre hand, then you have to grind the game out, but that's doable too. These are the longest games you ever get with this deck (but they're still pretty fast, even by 1v1 standards). Go for Genesis, flashback spells, or a Life from the Loam lock, and just grind them out til you get a chance to go big. You can win as soon as you get an opening, just make sure to have a Chant or a discard spell to make sure you're really clear.
So the point is, I'm not sure we need a narrow hate card against permission decks. In my experience, these games tend to be skill-intensive, but quite favorable, since the stuff we can do is just vastly more explosive than the stuff they can do. In any case, if you do want to play a card for this, I think Dosan the Falling Leaf is probably better, and I'd try him instead. He's a lot less narrow...shutting down removal and other tricks on all of your turns is nice in many matchups, not just blue. Also, I'm concerned about the mana cost on Vexing Shusher...it's definitely a late game card, because we won't usually have enough mana early to go off quick and protect our spells with Shusher. Keeping your spells covered with Shusher probably extends the game at least another 2 turns, which is pretty bad. Shusher does have an advantage over Dosan of being uncounterable itself...but again, it's not that hard for us to reanimate little creatures.
I suspect that Dosan is probably slightly better than Shusher in this deck, and that both are unnecessary, but I might easily be wrong on both counts. I'd recommend first playing around 20 games against permission decks without either one (you probably need about 10 games to learn how to play the matchup properly). If you still feel like the matchup isn't good enough with the current list, then by all means test the Shusher or Dosan. Either one will probably help a lot.
We can use it aggressively, but that usually means it's a Vampiric Tutor that costs UB and a little more life. In theory you can get 2 cards you want off it, but I find that's really rare in reality, and this deck doesn't want to wait 2 turns to draw cards anyway. It's pretty decent, but is it better than any of the other tutors? I don't think so. The 1 mana tutors are really important in this deck, the 2 mana tutors are better, and the 3 mana tutors are incredibly powerful in this deck (Intuition, Buried Alive) or have other very relevant uses (Muddle the Mixture, Shred Memory). And again, I think Sylvan Tutor and Gamble are still probably better than Lim-Dul's Vault, because 1 mana tutors are just that good, and often make the kill a full turn faster...and I don't even have room for those right now. If we could play 110 cards, all 3 of these would be in, but as is I think Lim-Dul's Vault just misses the cut.
Fairly aggressively. You don't necessarily need a lot of tutors, but you need a plan. This is not a control deck, you really want to be faster than the other guy. That hand is really bad, because it has no plan at all. With that hand, I would mulligan Pact of Negation, Vexing Shusher, Spell Pierce, and 1-2 lands, depending on how the mana is (I'd keep 1 5-color land, or 2 otherwise). Between 3-4 new cards and Preordain, you ought to be able to find some action. Spell Pierce is tempting (and possibly correct) to keep in order to hit his acceleration, but since we actually need to draw into something I think I would pitch it. If you happen to know that the Zur deck is REALLY heavy on counterspells you might keep the Shusher, but I don't think it's a good call in general...the odds seem high that he'll have some black or white removal for it, or Zur will just get something to kill it on turn 4 while you sit there with no action.
You actually seem moderately well positioned to have a chance against this deck. More than most at least. Linvala, Keeper of Silence is often too slow, but if you live long enough to find and play her she's really really good here. If you can play her early and find a way to keep her from dying to a tutored Vindicate, you'll win. Stonecloaker is also decent against this deck, though holding 3 mana up around turns 3-6 (when you need it) is really, really obvious and should be played around by a competent Scion pilot. You should be sure to play Aven Mindcensor as well, that's one of the very best answers against this deck.
Inquisition of Kozilek would be good here. 4+cc cards aren't totally irrelevant (we don't ALWAYS win on turn 3-4, and stuff like Force of Will costs 5), but Inquisition does hit most of the stuff we care about. That said, Duress is still better...Stonecloaker is one of quite few creatures under 4cc that we care about, but forcing a discard on Stonecloaker is actually HORRIBLE. People tend to forget that Crypt Champion is symmetrical...if Stonecloaker is in your graveyard, I can't even go off. It's way better to wait for a Chant or for you to tap out (or just to kill you before you can afford to hold up mana for Stonecloaker, which is most likely). So yeah, Inquisition would be pretty good, but it's another question of space. I'm not sure what can be cut for it right now, though I would like to squeeze it in somehow.
Yes, but it's not an issue. This deck has a lot of creatures. I've literally never encountered a situation where I wanted to go off with Illusionist but was missing a creature to do so.
Not really good enough. As with Lim-Dul's Vault, the difference between 1 and 2 mana is huge, and is even more pronounced on this kind of card, that you want to play the turn you go off. With protection, we're aiming to win on turn 4 or 5 most of the time. 2 mana for this effect is too much for us to easily pay.
Thought Courier seems a little better in this deck, and he isn't even that good. It's not so much that we want to discard a lot of cards...we don't, really. We just want to be able to discard a card in a pinch, if we happen to draw something that needs to be in our deck/graveyard in the turns before we go off. Thought Courier is nice because he helps you draw into things and ensures that you can always get rid of something. The problem with Careful Study is that you really want to cast it pretty early, because having a spell like this sit in your hand "just in case" is very weak and quite possibly dead...but if you cast it early, you might not be able to discard something important when you need to. That would be pretty ugly, and I can see it happening a lot.
Nah. We have Reanimate for this purpose, and that works fine. Unearth doesn't work in this deck since you usually want to reanimate Crypt Champion, which costs 4.
If it's a Hermit Druid combo deck like this one, please post it. Otherwise, it should be a separate thread, since Hermit Druid is really the heart of this deck and makes it really different from any other EDH deck. (I ask if yours is because I don't see the point of running Reveillark/Body Double in a Hermit Druid deck: as a combo, it's slower, redundant, and just worse than the other options available, and you don't need a backup graveyard combo in this kind of deck.
As for Horde of Notions...well, that might free up the Dragon Tyrant slot, but I bet your Reveillark combo takes up more space than my 2 dragons. I'm very happy with those 2 slots and the Scion back-up plan...needing nothing but Scion and 2 attacks to win is really awesome, since you're not dependent on drawing anything. I used to play Sliver Queen as the general and Mana Echoes in the deck, which wasn't terrible and took up 1 less slot, but Scion is loads better.
Currently running:
BRG Xira Arien BRG
UR Melek, Izzet Paragon UR
WUG Jenara, Asura of War WUG
WRG Mayael the Anima WRG
WB Triad of Fates WB
BG Mazirek, Kraul Death Priest BG
BR Rakdos, Lord of Riots BR
WR Aurelia the Warleader WR
WBG Ghave, Guru of Spores WBG
WUBRG Horde of Notions WUBRG
In my opinion, the only slots that can be tweaked are:
I'm not saying that these cards should necessarily be changed--I think most of them may well be optimal. It's just that I'm 99% certain that every other card in the list is essential/optimal, so these are the only ones you can really consider messing with. They're all very good though...
I was also wondering where a couple of those cards even get used. For example, Deep Analysis costs too much to typically want to hardcast unless you're completely out of options, and its only use post-combo (as far as I can tell) is with Krosan Reclamation, and that already costs 4+ mana and leaves you again with an empty library.
Currently running:
BRG Xira Arien BRG
UR Melek, Izzet Paragon UR
WUG Jenara, Asura of War WUG
WRG Mayael the Anima WRG
WB Triad of Fates WB
BG Mazirek, Kraul Death Priest BG
BR Rakdos, Lord of Riots BR
WR Aurelia the Warleader WR
WBG Ghave, Guru of Spores WBG
WUBRG Horde of Notions WUBRG
You know, I think you're probably right. I'm wary about including too many topdeck tutors (and I do have a LOT), but increasing the odds of turn 2 Hermit Druid is so sweet that I still really want this one. It deserves more testing at least.
I mentioned Unearth in my wall of text above. The problem is that it doesn't bring back Crypt Champion, which is frequently the card we want to reanimate (This often comes up if you use Buried Alive or Survival of the Fittest to set up the combo). Reanimate and Shallow Grave do this job very well, and we don't need more.
Cycling is really bad in this deck, by the way. Even though all our spells are so cheap, mana is precious. When playing this deck, I frequently use every single mana I can produce every single turn of the game. Ain't got time to cycle.
I just counted 3 times, and managed to get a different number every time. I think I'm tired :). If it really is 98 cards, I'll figure out what's missing tomorrow after I get some sleep. I hope it's 98 cards though, an extra slot would be sweet!
Like I said, Deep Analysis is potentially a flex slot. It does have it's uses though. Probably the most important is that makes Quiet Speculation very good, whereas it would probably not be good enough otherwise. It's also randomly useful in a lot of situations in that it's fairly flexible, likes to be discarded/milled, and generates a whole lot of card advantage no matter how you use it. That said, it's definitely not essential, and I'm not convinced my arguments are good enough for it to stay. I'm definitely willing to consider cutting Deep Analysis and Quiet Speculation for other cards we want (though Quiet Speculation for essential removal/essential removal/Deep Analysis is really awesome and will be missed).
Glad you like it (how many cards is it? heh). It is insane.
I had not considered Frantic Search. It's very similar to Careful Study, which I dismissed a little while ago (probably slightly better though). Being essentially free is nice, and it can even fix colors a little bit, which is kind of cool. It has the same problem I brought up with Careful Study though: you don't want to hold onto it until you draw a card you need to discard (because that might never happen, and then you're making a card that would have been useful into a dead card), but you also don't want to use it early, or it might not prevent the problem it's supposed to (if you draw a crucial card right before you need to go off). I do like Frantic Search better than Careful Study because the effectively 1 mana difference in cost really is a big deal, but I'm quite unsure about how it compares to Thought Courier. It's not any sort of autoinclude (as it's pure card disadvantage), but I could see how it might be better. I'd say it's definitely worth testing.
Edit: Thanks for the confirmation. I threw in Mirri's Guile to test, it seems almost as useful as Sylvan Library and hits turn 1.
Currently running:
BRG Xira Arien BRG
UR Melek, Izzet Paragon UR
WUG Jenara, Asura of War WUG
WRG Mayael the Anima WRG
WB Triad of Fates WB
BG Mazirek, Kraul Death Priest BG
BR Rakdos, Lord of Riots BR
WR Aurelia the Warleader WR
WBG Ghave, Guru of Spores WBG
WUBRG Horde of Notions WUBRG