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What is Bubble Hulk
Bubble Hulk is a combo deck for Modern that's capable of winning the game incredibly quickly, and consistently, by taking advantage of Protean Hulk's ability to both tutor for groups of creatures, and put them directly into play. This can set up game ending sequences, and can be highly resistant to most forms of hate. The deck breaks Hulk by utilizing enablers like Footsteps of the Goryo, and Through the Breach, to both get the Hulk into play, and pop it to initiate the combo.
History of Bubble Hulk
-Flash Hulk in Legacy
Flash Hulk in Legacy was easily one of the most dominant decks the format had ever seen. For just 2 mana, Flash would put Protean Hulk into play at instant speed, and immediately pop the Hulk, initiating the game winning sequence. Back then they were initially running quite a different selection of creatures to pull off the combo win, usually consisting of Carrion Feeder, Body Snatcher, Karmic Guide, and Kiki-Jiki, Mirror Breaker to make infinite 2/2 bodies. This incredibly cheap, and easy to assemble combo, backed up with Legacy’s amazing card selection, tutors, and protection like Force of Will, gives you a seriously powerful and consistent deck. The deck proved to be so oppressive Wizards actually needed to ban Flash on June 1st, 2007.
-Extended Bubble Hulk
Of course after the tremendous success Flash Hulk combo had, players want to translate that without Flash. The team On The Bubble, which consisted of Daniel Ackland, Hugh Rayner, Kuan-Kuan Tian, Had been working fiercely on the deck for a while, but initially didn’t find a while lot of success. They had Footsteps of the Goryo, and Through the Breach to start the combo, but couldn’t find a great way to get the win. They were trying all sorts of combinations to find a combo win, but nothing was really working, until eventually they made a major breakthrough: Carrion Feeder, Body Double, Reveillark, and Mogg Fanatic, which lets you loop for infinite damage.
-Early Modern Bubble Hulk
After so much past success with breaking Hulks, players immediately began brewing Bubble Hulk decks for Modern. There has been all sorts of different brews, and lists to come up, but nothing really took off. There just didn’t seem to be the right selection of cards to make the deck as efficient as it had been in the past. There was a brief time when Dig Through Time was released where it seemed like there may be some Bubble Hulk revival, but nothing serious ended up materializing, and before we knew it, Dig Through Time was gone. For a long time no body was really playing or brewing on Hulk after that.
-Modern Bubble Hulk
While there wasn’t any major results for a while, slowly in the background a few players were still brewing on the deck. Eventually with the printing of things like Taigam’s Scheming, and revelations like playing Makeshift Mannequin, it seemed like a new life had been breathed into the deck. Players Zac Elsik, Clinton Whitehurst, Justin Maguire all recently proving the deck has some serious potential topping some major events. Which brings us to where we are now. An exciting moment in the decks life. The potential is there, and right now is the perfect time to hop on that Hulk train, and ride it straight to combo town.
Why play Bubble Hulk
Do like playing under the radar, complex combo decks? Do you enjoy playing non-interactive, linear magic? Do you like winning games of magic on turn 2-3? Do you enjoy highly resilient, easy to assemble combos?
Bubble Hulk is capable of turn 2-3 wins, and actually even t1 with a perfect hand. More reasonably though, Bubble Hulk is going to be consistently giving you t3-4 wins. The combo utilizes the grave, but essentially only needs 2 cards to go off. Get Protean Hulk in the grave, cast Footsteps of the Goryo, and win.
Unlike the other reanimation decks in the format, like the various Goryo's Vengeance-Griselbrand combo decks, once you reanimate Hulk, you win. Period. The other reanimation combo decks generally need to pay life with Griselbrand to draw into more combo/engine pieces, to enable an almost storm like win, and can often fizzle out if not drawing into the right cards. They also have to manage their life total, and if they lose to much life before comboing, they may not be able to actually combo off anymore. That’s not the case here though. Just reanimate Hulk, let him die, and win. This is a major advantage over the other reanimation decks in the format.
How it works
The deck works by utilizing its namesake, Protean Hulk, to create an instant win combo. When Protean Hulk dies, it lets you search your library for any amount of creatures, as long as they end up costing a total of 6 mana or less. This lets us tutor up a sequence of creatures, that lead into a game ending loop of infinite damage.
When Hulk dies we can go and search for a Viscera Seer, and a Body Double. The Body Double actually copies Protean Hulk, setting up another Hulk trigger once we sacrifice it with Seer. Now we can go and search up some more creatures, so this time we find a Mogg Fanatic and a Reveillark. This now initiates the actual infinite damage loop. From here we can sacrifice Mogg to deal 1 damage to the opponent. Now we sacrifice Reveillark with Viscera Seer, which lets us bring back Mogg Fanatic and Body Double. Body Double is going to come in copying Reveillark, and now we’re back to where we started with the infinite damage loop. Now you can just keep looping Mogg for the win.
So how do we get Hulk into play, get it do die, and trigger it’s ability? Well it’s actually pretty easy. By utilizing cards like Through the Breach, and Footsteps of the Goryo, we can both get Hulk into play, and get Hulk to sacrifice itself and initiate the combo. A lot like the original Flash Hulk decks that were playing Flash to break the Hulk.
Essentially the entire deck is split up into just 3 sections. Combo pieces, Deck manipulation, and Disruption. By keeping the deck so streamlined, it enables a surprising amount of consistency. And while the combo sounds a bit convoluted at first look, it’s actually pretty easy to sequence once you know what’s going on.
While older versions of the deck where able to utilize Flash to initiate the combo, in Modern we have some other options to take into consideration. All of the Modern Bubble Hulk decks are going to be running Footsteps of the Goryo as it’s main “Flash” spell to break the Hulk. Running just 4 enablers though isn’t quite enough if we want a consistent combo so we have to play something else as Goryo 5-6-7.
Here we have 2 major options: Through the Breach, and Makeshift Mannequin. Both of these options have various pros and cons. Both are playable, and neither is really a wrong choice.
Through the Breach is generally paired with Pentad Prism as a way to boost your mana into an early Breach. Running the Prisms has other utility as well; being able to let you actually hard cast your combo pieces, occasionally giving you chances to combo off without Goryo, or like combo enabler. Breach has some added advantages elsewhere as well. Its instant speed which can let you cast it on you’re opp EOT, which can bait out counters if you have access to another enabler on your upcoming turn. It can somewhat play around grave hate, but mostly by sideboarding Emrakul, the Aeons Torn along side it, as the actual combo with Hulk involves looping creatures through the grave no matter what.
Makeshift Mannequin has a few great advantages. For 1 its only 4 mana rather than 5, which let’s us run Simian Spirit Guide along side it rather than Pentad Prism. Spirit Guides can be more effective for mana boosts in some cases because you don’t need to spend a turn casting it to set it up, like you do with Prism. Mannequin also lets you play around Path to Exile, which can be a big issue for Hulk. The other major advantage for Mannequin is the fact that it lets you put all combo creatures right into the grave. With Breach versions, you have to decide whether to hold Hulk in your hand to use with Breach, or put it in the bin to use with Footsteps. With Mannequin everything goes in the bin, because you’re always looking to reanimate. This really lets the deck take great advantage of Taigam’s Scheming as well, which is an amazing set up, and search spell for the deck.
Winning with Bubble Hulk
When you first read about the deck, or see it combo off, it looks like the whole sequence is incredibly complex. In reality though, it’s actually pretty simple once you know what’s going on. This section here is going to break down proper sequencing, so when it comes to pulling off the combo, you’ll know exactly what to do.
-Combo Sequencing
So obviously the combo starts once Protean Hulk dies, but what happens then?
1.Protean Hulk dies, triggering its ability. Search for Viscera Seer, and Body Double. Body Double comes into play as a copy of Protean Hulk. 2. Use Viscera Seer to sacrifice the Body Double(Protean Hulk). Search for Mogg Fanatic, and Reveillark. 3. Sacrifce Mogg Fanatic to deal 1 damage to the opponent. Use Seer to sacrifice Reveillark to bring back Mogg Fanatic, and Body Double. Body Double comes into play as a copy of Reveillark. 4. Sacrifice Mogg Fanatic to deal 1 damage to the opponent. Use Seer to sacrifice Body Double(Reveillark) to bring back Mogg Fanatic and Body Double. Body Double comes into play as a copy of Reveillark. 5. Repeat steps 3 & 4 for infinite damage.
-Playing around creature kill
A common misconception that comes up when discussing this deck, is the idea that it’s soft to creature removal. As a matter of fact, if properly sequenced the deck can actually play around any amount of creature disruption(outside Path to Exile). How it’s done is actually pretty simple. It’s just a few extra steps in the combo sequence, and the opponent will be left with no time to be able to stop you. Here’s how it’s done.
1.Protean Hulk dies, triggering its ability. Search for Viscera Seer, and Body Double. Body Double comes into play as a copy of Protean Hulk. 2. Use Viscera Seer to sacrifice the Body Double(Protean Hulk). Search for another Viscera Seer, and another Body Double. Body Double comes into play as a copy of Protean Hulk. 3. Use Viscera Seer to sacrifice the Body Double(Protean Hulk). Search for another Viscera Seer, and Reveillark. 4. Use Viscera Seer to sacrifice Reveillark, which will bring back both Body Doubles. 1 comes in as a copy of Hulk, and the other as a copy of Reveillark. 5. Use Seer to sacrifice Body Double(Protean Hulk). Search for Mogg Fanatic and Reveillark. 6. Sacrifce Mogg Fanatic to deal 1 damage to the opponent. Use Seer to sacrifice Reveillark to bring back Mogg Fanatic, and Body Double. Body Double comes into play as a copy of Reveillark. 7. Sacrifice Mogg Fanatic to deal 1 damage to the opponent. Use Seer to sacrifice Body Double(Reveillark) to bring back Mogg Fanatic and Body Double. Body Double comes into play as a copy of Reveillark. 8. Repeat steps 6 & 7 for infinite damage.
If 1 Seer ends up in the grave you can still play around creature kill, but bringing out all Seers will let you play around any amount of creature hate your opponent could possibly have.
-Playing around Leyline of Sanctity
Another common argument that comes up against this deck, is that Leyline of Sanctity shuts down the combo, as we can no longer target the opponent with Mogg Fanatic. Well actually, if sidebaorded properly, we can bypass Leyline of Sanctity with some tricky tech mid combo. There are a few options that seem to be the best. Grave Titan can loop for infinite Zombie Tokens, Thopter Engineer and loop for infinite haste Tokens, and Venser, Shaper Savant can loop to bounce Leyline, and anything else in play. Again, it may seem complex at first, but it’s really pretty straight forward. Just a few extra steps in the combo. Here’s how it’s done. We’ll use Grave Titan as the example.
1.Protean Hulk dies, triggering its ability. Search for Viscera Seer, and Body Double. Body Double comes into play as a copy of Protean Hulk. 2. Use Viscera Seer to sacrifice the Body Double(Protean Hulk). Search for another Viscera Seer, and another Body Double. Body Double comes into play as a copy of Protean Hulk. 3. Use Viscera Seer to sacrifice the Body Double(Protean Hulk). Search for another Viscera Seer, and Reveillark. 4. Use Viscera Seer to sacrifice Reveillark, which will bring back both Body Doubles. 1 comes in as a copy of Hulk, and the other as a copy of Reveillark. 5. Use Seer to sacrifice Body Double(Protean Hulk). Search for Grave Titan, which makes 2 Zombie Tokens when it comes into play. 6. Use Seer to sacrifice Grave Titan. Use Seer to sacrifice Body Double(Reveillark), which will bring back both Body Doubles. One copies Grave Titan, which makes 2 more tokens when it comes into play, and the other Body copies Reveillark. 7. Repeat step 6 for infinite tokens.
If you’re using Thopter Engineer, you can reanimate with Makeshift Mannequin in the main phase, make infinite tokens, and attack right away for the win. You can also use Viscera Seer, or Slaughter Pact, etc, to sacrifice a Hulk in your main phase, when reanimated with Footsteps of the Goryo. This way you can attack with the haste tokens. Keep this in mind when using Thopter Engineer. When reanimating with Footsteps of the Goryo alone, Hulk will die in your end step, so you won't be able to attack with the haste tokens.
If you’re playing Venser, then you can just bounce Leyline, and then continue with the regular combo with Mogg Fanatic.
It’s worth mentioning you can use this loop to continuously copy Hulks with the Body Doubles and bring out every creature from your deck. So if you get caught g2 against a Leyline, and you forgot to side it Titan/Engineer/Venser, you can still just bring out all your creatures and go on the beat down plan.
It’s also worth mentioning, if you bring out everything like we did in the sequence with the infinite Zombie Tokens, you are also immune to sweepers, as the Reveillarks can just bring back Seers and Body Doubles and rebuild the board.
Tips and Tricks
Mulliganing- The deck will mull quite frequently, but actually mulls fairly well. The deck is pretty redundant in the way it’s built, and you’re really only looking for 2 things; Hulk and Footsteps, so taking a mull can actually be very beneficial in some cases. Don’t be afraid to mull with Bubble Hulk, just don’t go to crazy with it.
Beating Auriok Champion- Auriok Champion has protection from red and black and has the Soul Sister effect. Beating this card requires nothing extra, or special. Remember that your combo is done at instant speed. Every time Champ triggers for Lark and Mogg Fanatic coming into play just respond by sacrificing the Mogg, let damage resolve, sac Lark again and repeat. Your opponent will be dead with 40+ “gain 1 life” triggers on the stack.
Draw – Discard- Sometimes you can actually use your discard step as a way to get Hulk in the graveyard. Depending on what kind of hand your looking at, it can be completely reasonable to use your first turn to draw to 8, end your turn and use your discard step to discard Hulk. Usually you want to do this if you have access to Simian Spirit Guide so you can then combo off right away turn 2 or 3.
Winning without Hulk- You don’t actually need to pop off Hulk to combo off. The real combo is done with Body Double, Reveillark, Mogg Fanatic, and Viscera Seer. In some cases you can hard cast pieces into play and go off, and other times you’ll end up milling everything but Hulk and can go off reanimating Reveillark to start the loop.
Winning without Footsteps/ Mannequin/ Breach- you don’t actually need an enabler to combo off. Let’s say you end up with Hulk in the grave, and a Seer in play. You can hard cast a Body Double as a Protean Hulk clone, and sac it with Seer to initiate the combo. Sometimes Evoking Reveillark can be a great way to kick things off as well. There’s all sorts of weird lines you need to keep your eyes open for. The more you play the deck, the more often you'll be able to spot all the odd options available.
Infinite Scry- If you don’t have Mogg, but have Seer, Body, Reveillark in play/ grave, you can loop the Reveillark/ Body for infinite scry to get Mogg on Top of your library, and then combo off for the win next turn when you draw it. It's super simple, just use Seer to sac off Reveillark, or a Body Double copying Reveillark. This will give you a scry, and bring back Body Double right into play, which copies Reveillark, and there you go. Loop for infinite scry.
Body Double Tech- Body Double can actually copy creatures from you’re opponents graveyard also, which is worth remembering. In some corner cases you can use Makeshift Mannequin to Reanimate a Body Double with an opponent’s Emrakul grave trigger on the stack, and get a permanent Emrakul clone.
Comboing at instant speed-Makeshift Mannequin, if you have a Seer in play, or removal in hand, will actually let you combo off entirely at instant speed. Even with a Pact of Negation trigger on the stack.
Card Choices
-Combo Nuts Protean Hulk- The namesake of the deck. This card provides the incredibly powerful ability to both tutor for creatures, and get them directly into play. By abusing this ability, this is how we initiate our combo sequence.
Body Double- One of the main combo pieces. This really lets us break Reveillark, as its power is technically 0 when it’s in the grave.
Reveillark- Another main combo piece. Lets us loop various creatures from the grave yard.
Viscera Seer- A main piece of the combo sequence. This is our sacrifice outlet which lets us sacrifice off Hulks/ Body Doubles/ and Reveillarks. We play 2-3 to allow sequencing around creature hate. Extra Seers if drawn before comboing can be played early to play around Path to Exile, or even just to block, and sac for the scry.
Mogg Fanatic- This is the card that actually wins us the game. The combo sequence lets us loop this card for infinite damage. There are a few other options for things you could use here, but Mogg is hands down the best. He provides outside utility beyond the combo by being able to ping off problem creatures as well.
-Combo Bolts Footsteps of the Goryo- The other namesake of the deck. In past formats they once had access to Flash, but now in Modern our main source of breaking Hulk is Footsteps. For just 3 mana it gets Hulk into play, and pops it to start the combo.
Through the Breach- A common option for Footsteps 5-7. It costs 5 mana so it is usually paired with Pentad Prism as a way to ramp into it. You will often see extra copies of Breach and Emrakul in the board in these versions as well, as a way to play around graveyard hate.
Makeshift Mannequin- A newer option being played in recent lists as extra copies of Footsteps. Makeshift has a few great advantages like comboing instant speed, and playing around Path to Exile, but requires and extra combo card which can then target Hulk. Rather than pair with Pentad Prism, when playing Makeshift Mannequin most play Simian Spirit Guide along side it instead.
Dark Petition- A theoretical option you could play, but hasn’t really been fully tested. You can use this card to grab Footsteps of the Goryo, which essentially make it function as Goryo 5-7. You would probably want to play this with Pentad Prism. The main advantage here would be a similar option to Mannequin, that doesn’t need an extra card, but still lets you play all creatures right into the yard. With Breach you have to decide whether to hold Hulk in hand or put it in the grave, but with Mannequin, and Petition, Hulk is always going to the grave.
-Dig Serum Vision- The best 1 mana cantrip we have access to in Modern
Sleight of Hand- 2nd best cantrip we have access to in Modern.
Faithless Looting- Amazing card in this deck. Lets you get your combo pieces into the yard, and also has flashback, which gives you even more value. Just be careful when playing Looting because you’re not actually gaining any card advantage.
Izzet Charm- A great versatile card in the deck. Acts as a instant speed Faithless Looting, a Shock, or a Spell Pierce. Definitely run 3 or 4.
Taigam’s Scheming- The real reason this deck runs so consistent. You have to try it to believe it, but this card is amazing in this deck. Digs 5 for whatever you need, and more often than you would think actually puts Hulk in the grave while setting up Goryo, or Pact of Negation on top.
Peer through Depths- A decent option, but not perfect. Can dig deep for Goryo, or whatever other spell you may need, but can’t actually find Hulk.
Ideas Unbound- Another good option for the deck, but not quite perfect. The catch here is that discard at the end of turn can actually be problematic, as it can just take to long to get things going. You’re also at risk of just Looting yourself into oblivion when running this alongside Faithless Looting, and Izzet Charm.
Summoner’s Pact- Can find Hulk right away, but is better in Through the breach versions, as things can get awkward trying to Pact, get Hulk in the grave, and Reanimate all in the same turn.
-Disruption Thoughtseize- A great choice for the deck as it can discard whatever you want from the opponent, but you can also use it as a discard outlet for Hulk. The catch is, in a Grixis shell the life loss can just be a bit too much.
Pact of Negation- The best choice of disruption for the deck. We are trying to combo off as fast as possible and this really lets us go all in. Whether its stopping an opposing counterspell, or a Path to Exile, Pact of Negation is amazing here.
Swan Song- Another really good option for disruption as it stop pretty much everything we’re worried about for just 1 mana.
Lightning Axe- A good choice for creature removal in this deck as it also acts as a discard outlet for Hulk. Kills all sorts of things on top of it, and gives you another spell to shoot at Mannequin.
Izzet Charm- A great versatile card in the deck. Acts as a instant speed Faithless Looting, a Shock, or a Spell Pierce. Definitely run 3 or 4.
-Sideboard
When sideboarding with Bubble Hulk we really want to focus on making our combo happen. We don’t necessarily want to side in things that are going to stop our opponent, we want to side in things that are going to shut down the hate they bring in.
Leyline of Sanctity- A great card for the deck. It protects us from discard, and also can come in to hurt Burn.
Pithing Needle- One of the best tools for battling grave hate. Most grave hate needs to be activated and Pithing Needle shuts it all down, whether its Scavenging Ooze, or Relic of Progenitus.
Echoing Truth- A super versatile option to bring in, in almost every game 2. You never know exactly what the opponent is going to bring in against you, and Echoing Truth is a great catch against whatever that happens to be.
Wipe Away- Another decent catch all bounce option. Split Second can be awesome here against things like Relic of Progenitus. Can also stop Twin from comboing off.
Steel Sabatage- Sabotage is good to bring in when you know the opponent is bring in something like Relic of Progenitus.
Murderous Cut- Can generally be cast for just 1 in this deck, so this provides a powerful sideboard removal option.
Slaughter Pact- Another very powerful removal option for the board.
Pyroclasm- IMO the best sweeper for the sideboard. Almost all of the creatures people will bring in against you are going to be killed by Pyroclasm. It’s only 2 mana, and is very versatile. Great against Elves, and Infect also.
Thoughtseize- A great choice for the deck as it can discard whatever you want from the opponent, but you can also use it as a discard outlet for Hulk. The catch is, in a Grixis shell the life loss can just be a bit too much.
Inquisition of Kozilek- Another good options for sideboard disruption. Can hit things like Rest in Peace, as well as stuff like Thalia, Guardian of Thraben,.
Pact of Negation- The best choice of disruption for the deck. We are trying to combo off as fast as possible and this really lets us go all in. Whether its stopping an opposing counterspell, or a Path to Exile, Pact of Negation is amazing here.
Swan Song- Another really good option for disruption as it stop pretty much everything we’re worried about for just 1 mana.
Through the Breach- Often found in sideboards paired with Emrakul, the Aons Torn, and or Grave Titan. Breach can be sided in to help play around graveyard hate.
Emrakul, the Aons Torn- Often found in sideboards paired with Through the Breach. Can be sided in to help play around graveyard hate.
Grave Titan- Titan is a great option because it can provide an alternate way to win if something goes wrong with the combo. It can also create infinite Zombie Tokens when looped with the combo to beat Leyline of Sanctity.
Thopter Engineer- A great option for beating Leyline of Sanctity. You can loop this to make infinite Haste Tokens. It’s also decent outside the combo just acting as a way to stall the board, Giving you a 1/3 body, and a 1/1 token to block with. Note- That while the tokens do have haste, in most cases they will be created in the end step, and you won't actually be able to attack with them until next turn.
Venser, Shaper Savant- Another good option to beat Leyline. Looping Venser can allow you bounce everything, or anything you want. Venser is incredibly versatile outside the combo as well, allowing you to counter spells, or bounce hate. Whether you're bouncing something, countering something, blocking a guy. It always has a use. If you're opponents only threat is something like a single Goyf, or Angler, then you can play Venser when they attack, bounce their guy, next turn they have to cast it again, and another turn before they can attack again, which then gets chump blocked. When sequenced like that, Venser can stall for 3-4 turns.
Matchups
This section is taken straight from Clinton Whitehrst’s article; Breaking Turn Three with Bubble Hulk. He wrote it way to perfectly to try and recreate. Plus he knows what he’s talking about, taking Hulk to multiple PPTQ, and RPTG top 8s with Modern Bubble Hulk. Breaking Turn 3 With Bubble Hulk
There aren’t really bad matchups for this deck, but there are powerful cards you have to watch out for. Recognizing what deck you are playing against is crucial to determining what cards you should expect and play around. You need to do this by turn two at the latest in order to play correctly. Try not to get distracted by everything your opponent is doing. All those Wild Nacatls, Tasigurs, Tarmogoyfs, etc. are nice and all, but they are irrelevant and don’t interact with you outside of your life total.
These are some of the important cards to know and what decks play them.
That’s about it. Keep in mind that this is only some of the maindeck hate you will see in Modern. Much more dangerous hate is waiting in the boards of some decks, but that comes with the territory of playing combo. Here are a few cards out of sideboards that just shut you down and why Breach/Emrakul can be better than Mannequinn.
I’ll go over a couple of common popular decks for what to bring in, but remember, it is up to you to study current lists to get a feel for what graveyard hate each deck is playing or what they could be playing. Boarding incorrectly can easily cost you a match. As some general notes, Echoing Truth and Grave Titan should be coming in for almost every post-board game (Truth moreso than Titan due to its catch-all nature). In the interest of space, I won’t be listing these two additions below, so keep them in mind. Finally, the Emrakul and extra Breaches are best boarded in against decks like Jund, Abzan, Tron, and Scapeshift.
So I’m not a master with the deck or anything, but I have been playing various Bubble Hulk decks for a few years now in Modern, and feel like a have a strong grasp of the deck. I also have been playing combo in general almost exclusively in Magic for a very long time, and have written primers for Ritual Gifts in Modern, and Doomsday Tendrils in Legacy. Shout out to Zac Elsik, Clinton Whitehurst, Justin Maguire for proving the deck can actually be a contender. If there’s anything I can improve on in the primer feel free to let me know.
I posted this in the previous thread just before it was locked, so I'll repost it here with a few expanded thoughts, where new eyes will see it.
I'm a combo player at heart, and the core idea of Hulk combo has always intrigued me, and I've run it a few time before (the last time being about 5-6 months ago), and with the recent noise, I pulled it back out and ran it through a couple of FNMs. The list I ran was a pretty standard Makeshift Mannequin build, with the only major change being a 3rd Mannequin over a 4th Izzet Charm, as my experience with Grishoalbrand is that there's a balance needed between dig and things to dig to.
Setting the Stage
My local meta is reasonably competitive (Mox Boarding House, in the Seattle area), and we've got a pretty good mix of deck types and the crowd is usually between 35 and 50 people for FNM and a smaller crowd of 15-30 for Thursday night Modern, with a fixed 4 round format, with payout by record. I ran the deck for a few weeks, and all told I think I played around 15 matches with the deck.
Additionally, as with all combo decks, I tend to keep my cards on my desk and goldfish while I'm waiting for things to happen. I've probably goldfished a couple hundred hands by this point.
My experiences were not been all that great. It can win games. It can even win matches. But I've found it very inconsistent overall, even compared to decks like Goryo's with Shoals.
Deck Upsides
The pros of the deck seem very nice on paper.
The fact that it almost never fizzles once there's a hulk in play is a huge bonus compared to Grishoalbrand and similar. I think I failed to go off successfully twice in all my games, once through operator error (I sequenced triggers wrong in one of my first games back on the deck), and once through a having to run out a hulk into open white mana facing lethal on board and he did, in fact, have the Path. That's definitely better than my fizzle rate with Grishoalbrand, which is probably closer to 10-15%.
The fact that it can win at instant speed is great. It never came up, but the fact that you can win with a pact trigger on the stack let me be fairly aggressive with those, unlike many combo decks, where not being able to pay for pact is actually just game over.
Deck velocity is also fantastic; I routinely had seen a full 1/3rd to half my deck by turn 4 or five. Taigam's Scheming is not a card for most decks, but here it's extremely good. Basically an Ancient Stirrings with even more upsides. Enough so that I actually am considering a Grixis build of Goryo's with Scheming as a way to dump reanimation targets in the bin.
Mana was very easy to deal with. Not needing black mana until turn 3 or 4, I think I averaged about one game in about 20 that I had any mana issues at all, which is honestly better than most decks. The sheer amount of dig and looting helps make sure you get exactly enough.
The deck is nicely resilient to non-grave oriented hate. Hand disruption and even counterspells don't go that far with the amount of dig power and resiliency. I had no issues finding reanimation spells. Since I chose to run a 3rd Mannequin over a 4th Izzet Charm, I had maybe one game where I had everything else and failed to find a reanimation spell. Even being thoughtseized and countered rarely put me off more than a turn or two.
Unlike Grishoalbrand, this deck does not need a decent life total when going off. As long as you're not dead, the combo is going to succeed, and being at 1 life makes no difference than being at 20 as to your success rate.
Deck Downsides
However, it's clearly not all upsides, or everyone would be playing it.
First, the deck is very reliant on a few pieces. If it doesn't see a hulk, the chances to assemble the combo manually are abysmally low. I had probably a good half dozen games where by random chance, I simply didn't see any Hulks after multiple schemings, visions, lootings, and charms. With 2 each Body Doubles and Reveilarks, those aren't too hard to find, but with only 1 Mogg Fanatic, you can very easily dig for turns on end and not find it.
Another downside is that while resistant to non-graveyard hate, it's basically completely cold to persistent grave hate. You can fight through crypts and bogs and usually even Relics, but Grafdigger's Cage, Leyline of the Void and Rest In Peace require that you draw into your one or two of sideboard hate cards like Echoing Truth, or be lucky enough to be able to Swan Song or Steel Sabotage it on the way down, and only then can you start actually setting up your combo. And if they can win a counter fight over your answer? You're just done. Grave Titan beats are about your only plan B, and that's really more like plan F (and this, in fact, is one reason to keep Grave Titan over Thopter Engineer or Venser, as neither of those are going to win you a game if your combo is shut off by grave hate you can't remove)
Likewise, if they've got a Slaughter Games or Surgical and can hit Hulk, the game is almost certainly done. An extract effect on Body Double or Reveilark is usually game over, too.
Once your opponents know what's up, the deck is pretty easy to hate out.
Despite the compactness of the core combo, it doesn't have a ton of interaction either. Prior to going off, maybe 1 Lightning Axe if you're running it main and the Izzet Charms. Some of the linear aggro decks can easily match this combo for speed against a goldfish (which this deck basically is). Yeah, extremely rarely the deck gets the god hands that kill on T1. It can get T2 kills every so often (I think I had maybe 2 over about 35 games). T3 Hulk kills are pretty common. But infect, burn, and affinity can all kill on T3, too.
Some of the more common combo decks can also match it in speed. Bloom Titan and Grishoalbrand can kill Hulk on T2 more often than Hulk will kill them on the same, and probably have similar T3 kill rates, and they have at least some degree more interaction (Titan has lands which gain life, make blockers, etc, Grishoalbrand can gain 11 or more life at instant speed and some builds pack hand disruption). Storm is probably a half turn slower, and not much more interactive, but can win through some amount of grave hate.
Conclusion
All in all, my recent experience pretty much proved what I'd found during my previous outings with the deck. Taigam's Scheming is an improvement to the deck, but despite that, the reliance on Hulk to get things going and needing the graveyard to combo makes this deck more inconsistent and easier to hate out than many of the other top pure combo decks already in the format. Its advantages just don't balance out the problems with assembling the combo that has only 4 primary starter pieces. Barring the banning of cards out of either Bloom Titan or Grishoalbrand, I'd be unlikely to take Hulk Footsteps combo to any sort of event beyond an FNM.
Things this deck needs to be a tier one contender, in my opinion:
A way to guarantee that if all your Protean Hulks are in the bottom quarter of your library that you can fetch them out. Summoner's Pact might do this, but would require some mana base changes so that you don't immediately die to your own pacts in the Mannequin build. Unfortunately there aren't a lot of good answers for this in Modern. Dark Petition might work, as might Congregation at Dawn, but those are both relatively expensive, and in the latter case, requires mana colors not normally used.
Better answers to grave hate. Rest in Peace and Leyline of the Void in particular are very difficult to deal with in the deck's current form. 1 or 2 Echoing Truth and a Wear//Tear will probably not dig you out from under one unless you've got them in your opening hand.
Alternately to the above: a way to go off, or least have game, if the graveyard is shut off. Possibly via transformational sideboard. Grave Titan is not the worst answer here. Breach-based builds have better options, as they can at least bring in Emrakuls or other game-enders.
Possibly some better early game interaction. Izzet Charm is nice as all three modes are relevant. Maybe Dimir Charm is playable? The mini-schemings mode is useful, while the mini-smother mode also answers early threats like Goblin Guides, Eidolons, Glistener Elves, etc, and the counter mode is not completely dead in a format with Summer Bloom, Scapeshift and similar.
The old thread doesn't work. That's a shame because there was good content. Can we instead merge your new thread with the old? That is what we did with the lantern deck. Change OP to yours and it keeps all old posts. I'm disappointed I can't go read old discussion.
Are you going to do a write-up for the GP? I know it didn't go fantastic for you (I got to watch the Tron god-hand) but I'd be curious on your thoughts.
Private Mod Note
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Semi-retired Lantern Player. I try to get out to play every once in awhile!
Please mention in your "how to avoid creature removal" how to correctly avoid creature removal. Your steps do not stop infinite o stone activations for example. When lark dies Always target both body doubles. There's never a reason to ever target anything else. In my primer I specifically pointed out that even if your board gets wiped you'll always end up with a lark plus seer.
That is the whole purpose of the deck. It was never to combo with mogg fanatic but rather create an infinite board state. Once you do you literally can't be stopped. The red creature is a trap and should not be included in a serious set of steps for combing off until the very end.
And could you correct my name from Zak to Zac in your primer list.
Are you going to do a write-up for the GP? I know it didn't go fantastic for you (I got to watch the Tron god-hand) but I'd be curious on your thoughts.
R1 bye
R2 bye
R3 - Lost to jund. Drew four hulks g1. No discard spells. G2 he plays 3 discard spells into Ooze I die.
R4 - Lost to tron. G1 he plays relic into relic. G2 he plays relic which i alrrady named with needke but he then surgical on hulk. Couldn't do much
R5 - beat affinity. This is an easy matchup imo idk why listed as hard. I was running 2 clasm in the board as well but didn't need.
R6 - I don't remember, I think another affinity player. Won here as well.
R7 - twin. He had all the remands and cobmo g1 couldn't do much. G2 I never drew a discard spell and died, started with hulk in hand too.
I dropped after third loss. I don't think the games against my three losses are the norm. That was my first time losing to twin or tron ever.
i think that you are just listing weakneses of any combo deck
True, to some extent, but more so for Hulk Combo than others.
Grishoalbrand, for instance, has backup routes to victory. Through the Breach a Griselbrand or even Worldspine Wurm is usually good for a win, if they have grave hate you can't get around. Goryo's Vengeance on a naked Borborygmos Enraged isn't ideal, but if you've sculpted your hand it can still win if they've extracted your Griselbrand. And in the face of a fast linear deck like Burn or Affinity, you can still Shoal a Wurm outside the combo to stay alive.
Living End's cyclers are both combo enablers and part of the payoff for the combo, so just the act of digging for the cascade combo improves its strength when it goes off. Likewise, utility creatures and answers to hate like Ingot Chewer, Wispmare, and Fulminator Mage also end up improving the combo or generating extra value.
Scapeshift is called a "one card combo", and like Hulk combo usually just wins if its namesake resolves. But the actual other parts of the combo are just lands, and you can play them out of hand if you draw them without needing an enabler like a looting spell. And one of the primary ramp spells is Sakura Tribe Elder, which works as a blocker without impacting its function, unlike Viscera Seer. Even its mainboard counter suite both works as protection and anti-hate, as Cryptics can bounce Leylines, one of the few useful hate cards.
One of my take aways was that nothing in the Hulk combo except Izzet Charm (and maybe Lightning Axe if you mainboard one) does much of anything except in the context of the combo, and none of the enablers are really good for anything except digging for the combo.
I don't have any concrete suggestions, but my first thought is to see if there's a way we can modify the dig or combo suite so that they have a greater cross-functionality, or maybe add some cards that take advantage of the game state we set up even if we're not in combo-mode.
Off the top of my head:
I mentioned Dimir Charm. It's not great at anything, but all 3 modes are at least somewhat relevant in this deck. Stops early aggression and hate bear creatures, counters hand disruption and some ramp and combo cards, and can function as a mini-schemings.
Snapcaster Mage. We're putting a ton of cards in the graveyard with schemings and lootings and charms. Flashing back reanimation spells, Pact of Negations, or even just more dig spells all see good.
Electrolyze and Thought Scour don't dig as much as some options, but the former is interaction and the latter is a combo enabler, and both pair especially well with the previously mentioned Snapcasters. Maybe turn into more of a Twin-like deck, with burn and counters and stalling until the combo is ready and closes the game?
Delve spells. Again, putting a ton of cards in bin is normal for the deck. Some of the games where it took a long time to find a Hulk I could easily have cast a Empty the Pits for 20 or 30 power worth of zombies. Likewise, Turn 2 or 3 Tasigur, the Golden Fang or Gurmag Angler is well within the realm of possibility to give us a clock or defense while we dig. Delve counters or bounces like Logic Knot or Set Adrift might be playable.
Could the manabase be tuned to support Cryptic Command? Counter, dig, stall, and anti-hate bounce all-in-one make this pretty attractive if we don't have a turn 3 sort of hand.
Jarad's Orders is slow, but it does guarantee that we get both a Seer in hand to cast and a Hulk in bin to reanimate to ensure we go off with protection against removal. Might be an alternative to Summoner's Pact. Likewise Congregation at Dawn can ensure that your whole combo is on top of your deck (end step stack Seer then Hulk then Body Double or Reveilark, then draw and cast Seer, cast a looting or scheming to put the Hulk in bin and reanimate, for instance).
There's also some other kill combo packages that could be explored. The Disciple of the Vault and Hangarback Walker one seems to take up too many slots while still being not too hard to disrupt. But it seems like there could be other Hulk packages that either win on the spot or guarantee a near win.
I don't really know what the right path is, but my experience is definitely that the current state of the deck is probably not going to propel it into Tier 1 or even Tier 2 status. Even if the other combo alternatives get bans, this deck is just too easy to hate out if it gets remotely popular.
All those ideas you mention slow down and dilute the deck, or are just outright bad
That is the point of the cards in the deck to dig for the combo
Agreed on all points.
In turn, my point is that as the deck stands, with almost nothing but land, dig spells and combo pieces that don't do anything outside of an actively going off combo, it's not really a very viable deck. It can get hot and win matches and even maybe a smaller events or once in a great while a bigger event. But over time, in most bigger events, or over multiple smaller events, variance (or pairings, or the meta) will catch up, and this deck does not have sufficient tools to deal with in the current configuration.
It's not faster on average than Amulet Bloom or Grishoalbrand. It's more consistent than either if it can go off, but feels marginally less consistent than either in terms of being able to get to that combo.
It doesn't have the interaction of Scapeshift. Half its defensive tools are only good to protect an active combo attempt. It's ability to dodge hate is very limited and some hate is nearly impossible, especially if that hate is backed by counters or other protection.
It has no protection at all against linear aggro decks if it doesn't have an early combo already in hand.
My personal feeling is that if you want to use the very nice and incredibly hard to disrupt Hulk->Body Double+Reveilark combo, then something in the deck has to change to help ensure that you can:
Reliably hit the combo (dig spells help, but as I said, it's still too easy to simply not ever see a hulk or all the combo pieces on their own)
Have time to hit the combo. (this requires some form of interaction; hand disruption, counters, kill spells, etc)
Still do something in the face of an active hate card (Leyline, RIP, Cage, Relic, Scooze) that shuts off your graveyard.
Have at least some possible (even if unlikely) way to win if one or more of the combo pieces is extracted etc.
Twin decks evolved from 8 untappers and 4 splinter twins and some number of Kiki-Jiki to their current form with often only 4-6 untappers and a smaller number of copiers, plus more interaction. Scapeshift likewise went from mostly RG Ramp into a more RUG oriented control deck with a combo finish. Even Grishoalbrand was originally a straight glass cannon combo deck that had to evolve a more complicated combo to help it play around hate and disruption. I feel that Hulk Combo is probably going to have to do the same, as its not inherently and consistently fast enough to overcome that hate and disruption reliably as a pure combo deck.
constructing the deck with 4 ashen riders helps it along since reliably getting protean hulk can be hit or miss. plus ashen rider plays with a through the breach back up plan reliably.
It's not faster on average than Amulet Bloom or Grishoalbrand. It's more consistent than either if it can go off, but feels marginally less consistent than either in terms of being able to get to that combo.
I don't think this is particularly the case. It may be true that our nut draw is slower than Amulet's or Grishoalbrand's nut draws, but in my experience our deck goldfish faster on average. Amulet and Grishoalbrand consistently achieve their "pseudokill" turn 3. A turn 2/3 titan does not kill you on the spot. Griselbrand can draw a bunch of cards and discard to set up a hand of 2x Goryo's Vengeance+5 lands+Borborygmos Enraged in the yard to kill you next untap step. Through the BreachWorldspine Wurm leaves you almost dead, but not if you can combo kill before their next combat.
One of the upside of Hulk over Griselbrand is that we can afford to play maindeck Pact of Negation, whereas Grishoalbrand is quite reliant on the combat step. This gives us a huge equity in game 1. That being said, I agree that we are weaker in sideboarded games whereas Grishoalbrand is more difficult to hate.
2.
Hulk needs to address two problems:
A. Ways to find Protean Hulk. If we have only 4 Hulks, 5.6% of the time (2.5 games out of a 15 round GP) all 4 Hulks are at the bottom half of our library. While the deck is possible to win without Hulk, that is still a little too much for us to bear.
Solutions: Dig deeper (where is Dig Through Time?), Tutor effects (Summoner's Pact, Dark Petition, Gifts Ungiven), a more control-ish game plan to stall the game.
B. Resilience to hate. Grishoalbrand utilizes Through the Breach a lot better. Even if they got Rest in Peaceed, they can still Breach Griselbrand, draw a bunch, and untap Breach Borborygmos for the kill.
Solutions: Alternate win conditions, protection spells
3.
I'm quite disappointed with Taigam's Scheming in sideboarded games as its sorcery speed requires you to tap out on turn 2 and leave up a window for opponent to land Relic, RIP or Scavenging Ooze. I board them out a lot as I cannot afford to play the "all-in dig for combo" game plan. I also prefer Thoughtseize and Spell Pierce (techs from Affinity to battle Stony Silence) over something like Swan Song.
What decks play Leyline of Sanctity in their sideboard? In what situation is pinging their whole board repeatedly at any time not good enough (and you should have all creatures on board)? I can think of only Bogles (which is very very bad with Suppression Field, Rest in Peace, Leyline of Sanctity). The sideboard is so tight that we shouldn't play unnecessary sideboard cards that relies on the graveyard loop.
Like already stated, I've had games were you just can't find Hulk and you just endlessly draw into nothing. Is the answer to this more draw spells? I've kicked around the idea of adding Visions of Beyond because of how easy it is to fill up the graveyard with this deck. With all the fetch lands, cantrips, and discard spells, it seems like getting to 20 isn't that difficult.
History of Bubble Hulk
Flash Hulk in Legacy was easily one of the most dominant decks the format had ever seen. For just 2 mana, Flash would put Protean Hulk into play at instant speed, and immediately pop the Hulk, initiating the game winning sequence. Back then they were initially running quite a different selection of creatures to pull off the combo win, usually consisting of Carrion Feeder, Body Snatcher, Karmic Guide, and Kiki-Jiki, Mirror Breaker to make infinite 2/2 bodies. This incredibly cheap, and easy to assemble combo, backed up with Legacy’s amazing card selection, tutors, and protection like Force of Will, gives you a seriously powerful and consistent deck. The deck proved to be so oppressive Wizards actually needed to ban Flash on June 1st, 2007.
Here are some fun articles that touch on Legacy Flash Hulk-
The Five Best Legacy Decks
Sickest Combo Decks of All Time
-Extended Bubble Hulk
Of course after the tremendous success Flash Hulk combo had, players want to translate that without Flash. The team On The Bubble, which consisted of Daniel Ackland, Hugh Rayner, Kuan-Kuan Tian, Had been working fiercely on the deck for a while, but initially didn’t find a while lot of success. They had Footsteps of the Goryo, and Through the Breach to start the combo, but couldn’t find a great way to get the win. They were trying all sorts of combinations to find a combo win, but nothing was really working, until eventually they made a major breakthrough: Carrion Feeder, Body Double, Reveillark, and Mogg Fanatic, which lets you loop for infinite damage.
A cool article about Extended Hulk can be found here-
http://magic.tcgplayer.com/db/article.asp?ID=7953
-Early Modern Bubble Hulk
After so much past success with breaking Hulks, players immediately began brewing Bubble Hulk decks for Modern. There has been all sorts of different brews, and lists to come up, but nothing really took off. There just didn’t seem to be the right selection of cards to make the deck as efficient as it had been in the past. There was a brief time when Dig Through Time was released where it seemed like there may be some Bubble Hulk revival, but nothing serious ended up materializing, and before we knew it, Dig Through Time was gone. For a long time no body was really playing or brewing on Hulk after that.
-Modern Bubble Hulk
While there wasn’t any major results for a while, slowly in the background a few players were still brewing on the deck. Eventually with the printing of things like Taigam’s Scheming, and revelations like playing Makeshift Mannequin, it seemed like a new life had been breathed into the deck. Players Zac Elsik, Clinton Whitehurst, Justin Maguire all recently proving the deck has some serious potential topping some major events. Which brings us to where we are now. An exciting moment in the decks life. The potential is there, and right now is the perfect time to hop on that Hulk train, and ride it straight to combo town.
Why play Bubble Hulk
Bubble Hulk is capable of turn 2-3 wins, and actually even t1 with a perfect hand. More reasonably though, Bubble Hulk is going to be consistently giving you t3-4 wins. The combo utilizes the grave, but essentially only needs 2 cards to go off. Get Protean Hulk in the grave, cast Footsteps of the Goryo, and win.
Unlike the other reanimation decks in the format, like the various Goryo's Vengeance-Griselbrand combo decks, once you reanimate Hulk, you win. Period. The other reanimation combo decks generally need to pay life with Griselbrand to draw into more combo/engine pieces, to enable an almost storm like win, and can often fizzle out if not drawing into the right cards. They also have to manage their life total, and if they lose to much life before comboing, they may not be able to actually combo off anymore. That’s not the case here though. Just reanimate Hulk, let him die, and win. This is a major advantage over the other reanimation decks in the format.
How it works
When Hulk dies we can go and search for a Viscera Seer, and a Body Double. The Body Double actually copies Protean Hulk, setting up another Hulk trigger once we sacrifice it with Seer. Now we can go and search up some more creatures, so this time we find a Mogg Fanatic and a Reveillark. This now initiates the actual infinite damage loop. From here we can sacrifice Mogg to deal 1 damage to the opponent. Now we sacrifice Reveillark with Viscera Seer, which lets us bring back Mogg Fanatic and Body Double. Body Double is going to come in copying Reveillark, and now we’re back to where we started with the infinite damage loop. Now you can just keep looping Mogg for the win.
So how do we get Hulk into play, get it do die, and trigger it’s ability? Well it’s actually pretty easy. By utilizing cards like Through the Breach, and Footsteps of the Goryo, we can both get Hulk into play, and get Hulk to sacrifice itself and initiate the combo. A lot like the original Flash Hulk decks that were playing Flash to break the Hulk.
Essentially the entire deck is split up into just 3 sections. Combo pieces, Deck manipulation, and Disruption. By keeping the deck so streamlined, it enables a surprising amount of consistency. And while the combo sounds a bit convoluted at first look, it’s actually pretty easy to sequence once you know what’s going on.
Deck Lists
GP Pittsburg -
3 Simian Spirit Guide
3 Viscera Seer
2 Reveillark
2 Body Double
1 Mogg Fanatic
4 Footsteps of the Goryo
2 Makeshift Mannequin
4 Serum Visions
4 Faithless Looting
3 Taigam's Scheming
2 Sleight of Hand
3 Izzet Charm
1 Lightning Axe
4 Scalding Tarn
4 Polluted Delta
2 Steam Vents
2 Watery Grave
1 Blood Crypt
1 Island
1 Swamp
1 Mountain
3 Gemstone Mine
3 Leyline of Sanctity
3 Swan Song
2 Pyroclasm
2 Pithing Needle
1 Murderous Cut
1 Echoing Truth
1 Steel Sabotage
1 Wear // Tear
1 Thopter Engineer
Clinton Whitehurst
1st at Dallas PPTQ, and RPTQ Top 8s -
4 Protean Hulk
3 Viscera Seer
2 Reveillark
2 Body Double
1 Mogg Fanatic
4 Footsteps of the Goryo
3 Makeshift Mannequin
4 Faithless Looting
4 Serum Visions
3 Taigam’s Scheming
3 Pact of Negation
3 Izzet Charm
1 Lightning Axe
3 Scalding Tarn
1 Bloodstained Mire
3 Gemstone Mine
2 Steam Vents
2 Watery Grave
1 Blood Crypt
1 Island
1 Mountain
1 Swamp
3 Leyline of Sanctity
3 Swan Song
2 Pithing Needle
1 Pyroclasm
1 Murderous Cut
1 Steel Sabotage
1 Lightning Axe
1 Slaughter Pact
1 Echoing Truth
1 Grave Titan
Justin Maguire
12th Place at StarCityGames.com Modern Open on 10/31/2015 -
4 Protean Hulk
2 Reveillark
2 Body Double
2 Viscera Seer
1 Mogg Fanatic
4 Footsteps of the Goryo
2 Through the Breach
4 Serum Visions
4 Faithless Looting
3 Sleight of Hand
2 Taigam's Scheming
1 Gitaxian Probe
1 Summoner's Pact
3 Pact of Negation
4 Polluted Delta
4 Scalding Tarn
3 Gemstone Mine
2 Steam Vents
1 Watery Grave
2 Island
1 Mountain
1 Swamp
4 Leyline of Sanctity
1 Pithing Needle
1 Grave Titan
1 Echoing Truth
1 Hurkyl's Recall
2 Lightning Axe
1 Swan Song
1 Through the Breach
2 Emrakul, the Aeons Torn
1 Boseiju, Who Shelters All
Some more top 8 lists-
http://www.mtgdecks.net/decks/viewByArchetype/2124
Through the Breach vs Makeshift Mannequin
Here we have 2 major options: Through the Breach, and Makeshift Mannequin. Both of these options have various pros and cons. Both are playable, and neither is really a wrong choice.
Through the Breach is generally paired with Pentad Prism as a way to boost your mana into an early Breach. Running the Prisms has other utility as well; being able to let you actually hard cast your combo pieces, occasionally giving you chances to combo off without Goryo, or like combo enabler. Breach has some added advantages elsewhere as well. Its instant speed which can let you cast it on you’re opp EOT, which can bait out counters if you have access to another enabler on your upcoming turn. It can somewhat play around grave hate, but mostly by sideboarding Emrakul, the Aeons Torn along side it, as the actual combo with Hulk involves looping creatures through the grave no matter what.
Makeshift Mannequin has a few great advantages. For 1 its only 4 mana rather than 5, which let’s us run Simian Spirit Guide along side it rather than Pentad Prism. Spirit Guides can be more effective for mana boosts in some cases because you don’t need to spend a turn casting it to set it up, like you do with Prism. Mannequin also lets you play around Path to Exile, which can be a big issue for Hulk. The other major advantage for Mannequin is the fact that it lets you put all combo creatures right into the grave. With Breach versions, you have to decide whether to hold Hulk in your hand to use with Breach, or put it in the bin to use with Footsteps. With Mannequin everything goes in the bin, because you’re always looking to reanimate. This really lets the deck take great advantage of Taigam’s Scheming as well, which is an amazing set up, and search spell for the deck.
Winning with Bubble Hulk
-Combo Sequencing
So obviously the combo starts once Protean Hulk dies, but what happens then?
1. Protean Hulk dies, triggering its ability. Search for Viscera Seer, and Body Double. Body Double comes into play as a copy of Protean Hulk.
2. Use Viscera Seer to sacrifice the Body Double(Protean Hulk). Search for Mogg Fanatic, and Reveillark.
3. Sacrifce Mogg Fanatic to deal 1 damage to the opponent. Use Seer to sacrifice Reveillark to bring back Mogg Fanatic, and Body Double. Body Double comes into play as a copy of Reveillark.
4. Sacrifice Mogg Fanatic to deal 1 damage to the opponent. Use Seer to sacrifice Body Double(Reveillark) to bring back Mogg Fanatic and Body Double. Body Double comes into play as a copy of Reveillark.
5. Repeat steps 3 & 4 for infinite damage.
-Playing around creature kill
A common misconception that comes up when discussing this deck, is the idea that it’s soft to creature removal. As a matter of fact, if properly sequenced the deck can actually play around any amount of creature disruption(outside Path to Exile). How it’s done is actually pretty simple. It’s just a few extra steps in the combo sequence, and the opponent will be left with no time to be able to stop you. Here’s how it’s done.
1. Protean Hulk dies, triggering its ability. Search for Viscera Seer, and Body Double. Body Double comes into play as a copy of Protean Hulk.
2. Use Viscera Seer to sacrifice the Body Double(Protean Hulk). Search for another Viscera Seer, and another Body Double. Body Double comes into play as a copy of Protean Hulk.
3. Use Viscera Seer to sacrifice the Body Double(Protean Hulk). Search for another Viscera Seer, and Reveillark.
4. Use Viscera Seer to sacrifice Reveillark, which will bring back both Body Doubles. 1 comes in as a copy of Hulk, and the other as a copy of Reveillark.
5. Use Seer to sacrifice Body Double(Protean Hulk). Search for Mogg Fanatic and Reveillark.
6. Sacrifce Mogg Fanatic to deal 1 damage to the opponent. Use Seer to sacrifice Reveillark to bring back Mogg Fanatic, and Body Double. Body Double comes into play as a copy of Reveillark.
7. Sacrifice Mogg Fanatic to deal 1 damage to the opponent. Use Seer to sacrifice Body Double(Reveillark) to bring back Mogg Fanatic and Body Double. Body Double comes into play as a copy of Reveillark.
8. Repeat steps 6 & 7 for infinite damage.
If 1 Seer ends up in the grave you can still play around creature kill, but bringing out all Seers will let you play around any amount of creature hate your opponent could possibly have.
-Playing around Leyline of Sanctity
Another common argument that comes up against this deck, is that Leyline of Sanctity shuts down the combo, as we can no longer target the opponent with Mogg Fanatic. Well actually, if sidebaorded properly, we can bypass Leyline of Sanctity with some tricky tech mid combo. There are a few options that seem to be the best. Grave Titan can loop for infinite Zombie Tokens, Thopter Engineer and loop for infinite haste Tokens, and Venser, Shaper Savant can loop to bounce Leyline, and anything else in play. Again, it may seem complex at first, but it’s really pretty straight forward. Just a few extra steps in the combo. Here’s how it’s done. We’ll use Grave Titan as the example.
1. Protean Hulk dies, triggering its ability. Search for Viscera Seer, and Body Double. Body Double comes into play as a copy of Protean Hulk.
2. Use Viscera Seer to sacrifice the Body Double(Protean Hulk). Search for another Viscera Seer, and another Body Double. Body Double comes into play as a copy of Protean Hulk.
3. Use Viscera Seer to sacrifice the Body Double(Protean Hulk). Search for another Viscera Seer, and Reveillark.
4. Use Viscera Seer to sacrifice Reveillark, which will bring back both Body Doubles. 1 comes in as a copy of Hulk, and the other as a copy of Reveillark.
5. Use Seer to sacrifice Body Double(Protean Hulk). Search for Grave Titan, which makes 2 Zombie Tokens when it comes into play.
6. Use Seer to sacrifice Grave Titan. Use Seer to sacrifice Body Double(Reveillark), which will bring back both Body Doubles. One copies Grave Titan, which makes 2 more tokens when it comes into play, and the other Body copies Reveillark.
7. Repeat step 6 for infinite tokens.
If you’re using Thopter Engineer, you can reanimate with Makeshift Mannequin in the main phase, make infinite tokens, and attack right away for the win. You can also use Viscera Seer, or Slaughter Pact, etc, to sacrifice a Hulk in your main phase, when reanimated with Footsteps of the Goryo. This way you can attack with the haste tokens. Keep this in mind when using Thopter Engineer. When reanimating with Footsteps of the Goryo alone, Hulk will die in your end step, so you won't be able to attack with the haste tokens.
If you’re playing Venser, then you can just bounce Leyline, and then continue with the regular combo with Mogg Fanatic.
It’s worth mentioning you can use this loop to continuously copy Hulks with the Body Doubles and bring out every creature from your deck. So if you get caught g2 against a Leyline, and you forgot to side it Titan/Engineer/Venser, you can still just bring out all your creatures and go on the beat down plan.
It’s also worth mentioning, if you bring out everything like we did in the sequence with the infinite Zombie Tokens, you are also immune to sweepers, as the Reveillarks can just bring back Seers and Body Doubles and rebuild the board.
Tips and Tricks
Beating Auriok Champion- Auriok Champion has protection from red and black and has the Soul Sister effect. Beating this card requires nothing extra, or special. Remember that your combo is done at instant speed. Every time Champ triggers for Lark and Mogg Fanatic coming into play just respond by sacrificing the Mogg, let damage resolve, sac Lark again and repeat. Your opponent will be dead with 40+ “gain 1 life” triggers on the stack.
Draw – Discard- Sometimes you can actually use your discard step as a way to get Hulk in the graveyard. Depending on what kind of hand your looking at, it can be completely reasonable to use your first turn to draw to 8, end your turn and use your discard step to discard Hulk. Usually you want to do this if you have access to Simian Spirit Guide so you can then combo off right away turn 2 or 3.
Winning without Hulk- You don’t actually need to pop off Hulk to combo off. The real combo is done with Body Double, Reveillark, Mogg Fanatic, and Viscera Seer. In some cases you can hard cast pieces into play and go off, and other times you’ll end up milling everything but Hulk and can go off reanimating Reveillark to start the loop.
Winning without Footsteps/ Mannequin/ Breach- you don’t actually need an enabler to combo off. Let’s say you end up with Hulk in the grave, and a Seer in play. You can hard cast a Body Double as a Protean Hulk clone, and sac it with Seer to initiate the combo. Sometimes Evoking Reveillark can be a great way to kick things off as well. There’s all sorts of weird lines you need to keep your eyes open for. The more you play the deck, the more often you'll be able to spot all the odd options available.
Infinite Scry- If you don’t have Mogg, but have Seer, Body, Reveillark in play/ grave, you can loop the Reveillark/ Body for infinite scry to get Mogg on Top of your library, and then combo off for the win next turn when you draw it. It's super simple, just use Seer to sac off Reveillark, or a Body Double copying Reveillark. This will give you a scry, and bring back Body Double right into play, which copies Reveillark, and there you go. Loop for infinite scry.
Body Double Tech- Body Double can actually copy creatures from you’re opponents graveyard also, which is worth remembering. In some corner cases you can use Makeshift Mannequin to Reanimate a Body Double with an opponent’s Emrakul grave trigger on the stack, and get a permanent Emrakul clone.
Comboing at instant speed- Makeshift Mannequin, if you have a Seer in play, or removal in hand, will actually let you combo off entirely at instant speed. Even with a Pact of Negation trigger on the stack.
Card Choices
Protean Hulk- The namesake of the deck. This card provides the incredibly powerful ability to both tutor for creatures, and get them directly into play. By abusing this ability, this is how we initiate our combo sequence.
Body Double- One of the main combo pieces. This really lets us break Reveillark, as its power is technically 0 when it’s in the grave.
Reveillark- Another main combo piece. Lets us loop various creatures from the grave yard.
Viscera Seer- A main piece of the combo sequence. This is our sacrifice outlet which lets us sacrifice off Hulks/ Body Doubles/ and Reveillarks. We play 2-3 to allow sequencing around creature hate. Extra Seers if drawn before comboing can be played early to play around Path to Exile, or even just to block, and sac for the scry.
Mogg Fanatic- This is the card that actually wins us the game. The combo sequence lets us loop this card for infinite damage. There are a few other options for things you could use here, but Mogg is hands down the best. He provides outside utility beyond the combo by being able to ping off problem creatures as well.
-Combo Bolts
Footsteps of the Goryo- The other namesake of the deck. In past formats they once had access to Flash, but now in Modern our main source of breaking Hulk is Footsteps. For just 3 mana it gets Hulk into play, and pops it to start the combo.
Through the Breach- A common option for Footsteps 5-7. It costs 5 mana so it is usually paired with Pentad Prism as a way to ramp into it. You will often see extra copies of Breach and Emrakul in the board in these versions as well, as a way to play around graveyard hate.
Makeshift Mannequin- A newer option being played in recent lists as extra copies of Footsteps. Makeshift has a few great advantages like comboing instant speed, and playing around Path to Exile, but requires and extra combo card which can then target Hulk. Rather than pair with Pentad Prism, when playing Makeshift Mannequin most play Simian Spirit Guide along side it instead.
Dark Petition- A theoretical option you could play, but hasn’t really been fully tested. You can use this card to grab Footsteps of the Goryo, which essentially make it function as Goryo 5-7. You would probably want to play this with Pentad Prism. The main advantage here would be a similar option to Mannequin, that doesn’t need an extra card, but still lets you play all creatures right into the yard. With Breach you have to decide whether to hold Hulk in hand or put it in the grave, but with Mannequin, and Petition, Hulk is always going to the grave.
-Dig
Serum Vision- The best 1 mana cantrip we have access to in Modern
Sleight of Hand- 2nd best cantrip we have access to in Modern.
Faithless Looting- Amazing card in this deck. Lets you get your combo pieces into the yard, and also has flashback, which gives you even more value. Just be careful when playing Looting because you’re not actually gaining any card advantage.
Izzet Charm- A great versatile card in the deck. Acts as a instant speed Faithless Looting, a Shock, or a Spell Pierce. Definitely run 3 or 4.
Taigam’s Scheming- The real reason this deck runs so consistent. You have to try it to believe it, but this card is amazing in this deck. Digs 5 for whatever you need, and more often than you would think actually puts Hulk in the grave while setting up Goryo, or Pact of Negation on top.
Peer through Depths- A decent option, but not perfect. Can dig deep for Goryo, or whatever other spell you may need, but can’t actually find Hulk.
Ideas Unbound- Another good option for the deck, but not quite perfect. The catch here is that discard at the end of turn can actually be problematic, as it can just take to long to get things going. You’re also at risk of just Looting yourself into oblivion when running this alongside Faithless Looting, and Izzet Charm.
Summoner’s Pact- Can find Hulk right away, but is better in Through the breach versions, as things can get awkward trying to Pact, get Hulk in the grave, and Reanimate all in the same turn.
-Disruption
Thoughtseize- A great choice for the deck as it can discard whatever you want from the opponent, but you can also use it as a discard outlet for Hulk. The catch is, in a Grixis shell the life loss can just be a bit too much.
Pact of Negation- The best choice of disruption for the deck. We are trying to combo off as fast as possible and this really lets us go all in. Whether its stopping an opposing counterspell, or a Path to Exile, Pact of Negation is amazing here.
Swan Song- Another really good option for disruption as it stop pretty much everything we’re worried about for just 1 mana.
Lightning Axe- A good choice for creature removal in this deck as it also acts as a discard outlet for Hulk. Kills all sorts of things on top of it, and gives you another spell to shoot at Mannequin.
Izzet Charm- A great versatile card in the deck. Acts as a instant speed Faithless Looting, a Shock, or a Spell Pierce. Definitely run 3 or 4.
-Sideboard
When sideboarding with Bubble Hulk we really want to focus on making our combo happen. We don’t necessarily want to side in things that are going to stop our opponent, we want to side in things that are going to shut down the hate they bring in.
Leyline of Sanctity- A great card for the deck. It protects us from discard, and also can come in to hurt Burn.
Pithing Needle- One of the best tools for battling grave hate. Most grave hate needs to be activated and Pithing Needle shuts it all down, whether its Scavenging Ooze, or Relic of Progenitus.
Echoing Truth- A super versatile option to bring in, in almost every game 2. You never know exactly what the opponent is going to bring in against you, and Echoing Truth is a great catch against whatever that happens to be.
Wipe Away- Another decent catch all bounce option. Split Second can be awesome here against things like Relic of Progenitus. Can also stop Twin from comboing off.
Steel Sabatage- Sabotage is good to bring in when you know the opponent is bring in something like Relic of Progenitus.
Lightning Axe- Decent removal option to bring in.
Murderous Cut- Can generally be cast for just 1 in this deck, so this provides a powerful sideboard removal option.
Slaughter Pact- Another very powerful removal option for the board.
Pyroclasm- IMO the best sweeper for the sideboard. Almost all of the creatures people will bring in against you are going to be killed by Pyroclasm. It’s only 2 mana, and is very versatile. Great against Elves, and Infect also.
Thoughtseize- A great choice for the deck as it can discard whatever you want from the opponent, but you can also use it as a discard outlet for Hulk. The catch is, in a Grixis shell the life loss can just be a bit too much.
Inquisition of Kozilek- Another good options for sideboard disruption. Can hit things like Rest in Peace, as well as stuff like Thalia, Guardian of Thraben,.
Pact of Negation- The best choice of disruption for the deck. We are trying to combo off as fast as possible and this really lets us go all in. Whether its stopping an opposing counterspell, or a Path to Exile, Pact of Negation is amazing here.
Swan Song- Another really good option for disruption as it stop pretty much everything we’re worried about for just 1 mana.
Through the Breach- Often found in sideboards paired with Emrakul, the Aons Torn, and or Grave Titan. Breach can be sided in to help play around graveyard hate.
Emrakul, the Aons Torn- Often found in sideboards paired with Through the Breach. Can be sided in to help play around graveyard hate.
Grave Titan- Titan is a great option because it can provide an alternate way to win if something goes wrong with the combo. It can also create infinite Zombie Tokens when looped with the combo to beat Leyline of Sanctity.
Thopter Engineer- A great option for beating Leyline of Sanctity. You can loop this to make infinite Haste Tokens. It’s also decent outside the combo just acting as a way to stall the board, Giving you a 1/3 body, and a 1/1 token to block with. Note- That while the tokens do have haste, in most cases they will be created in the end step, and you won't actually be able to attack with them until next turn.
Venser, Shaper Savant- Another good option to beat Leyline. Looping Venser can allow you bounce everything, or anything you want. Venser is incredibly versatile outside the combo as well, allowing you to counter spells, or bounce hate. Whether you're bouncing something, countering something, blocking a guy. It always has a use. If you're opponents only threat is something like a single Goyf, or Angler, then you can play Venser when they attack, bounce their guy, next turn they have to cast it again, and another turn before they can attack again, which then gets chump blocked. When sequenced like that, Venser can stall for 3-4 turns.
Matchups
There aren’t really bad matchups for this deck, but there are powerful cards you have to watch out for. Recognizing what deck you are playing against is crucial to determining what cards you should expect and play around. You need to do this by turn two at the latest in order to play correctly. Try not to get distracted by everything your opponent is doing. All those Wild Nacatls, Tasigurs, Tarmogoyfs, etc. are nice and all, but they are irrelevant and don’t interact with you outside of your life total.
These are some of the important cards to know and what decks play them.
Thoughtseize (try to contain your excitement if they ever Thoughtseize a Hulk), Inquisition: Jund/Junk
Path to Exile: Abzan, UWR Delver, UWR Control, Naya Company, Bogles
Scavenging Ooze: Zoo, Jund/Junk, Abzan Company, Elves, RUG Twin
Thalia, Guardian of Thraben: Hatebears, Zoo
Aven Mindcensor: Junk, Hatebears, Abzan Company
Shadow of Doubt: Twin, UWR, Grixis
Vapor Snag: Merfolk, Delver
Eidolon of the Great Revel: Burn
Faerie Macabre: Living End
Suppression Field: Bogles
Relic of Progenitus: Tron, Merfolk (this is not the end all be all: treat it like Standstill. Get them to crack it then move on or get lucky and have them tap out)
That’s about it. Keep in mind that this is only some of the maindeck hate you will see in Modern. Much more dangerous hate is waiting in the boards of some decks, but that comes with the territory of playing combo. Here are a few cards out of sideboards that just shut you down and why Breach/Emrakul can be better than Mannequinn.
Rest in Peace: Bogles, UWR
Grafdigger’s Cage: Affinity, Scapeshift, Hatebears
Surgical Extraction: Lantern Control (it can be countered but not really played around)
Counterflux: Twin, UWR
Leyline of the Void: Living end, Jund
Night of Souls’ Betrayal: Jund
Slaughter Games: Jund, Tron
Anafenza, the Foremost: Abzan Company (A new one to watch out for)
I’ll go over a couple of common popular decks for what to bring in, but remember, it is up to you to study current lists to get a feel for what graveyard hate each deck is playing or what they could be playing. Boarding incorrectly can easily cost you a match. As some general notes, Echoing Truth and Grave Titan should be coming in for almost every post-board game (Truth moreso than Titan due to its catch-all nature). In the interest of space, I won’t be listing these two additions below, so keep them in mind. Finally, the Emrakul and extra Breaches are best boarded in against decks like Jund, Abzan, Tron, and Scapeshift.
Twin Variants
1-2 Pithing Needle
2-3 removal spells
2-3 Swan Song
Jund/Abzan/Abzan Company
2-3 removal spells (for Ooze only
3-4 Leyline (not against Company)
1-2 Pithing Needle
Burn
2-3 Swan Song
1 Pyroclasm
2-3 removal spells
3-4 Leyline
Infect
3 removal spells
2-3 Swan Song
1-2 Pithing Needle
1 Pyroclasm
Affinity
1-2 removal spells
2-3 artifact hate
1-2 Pithing Needle
1 Pyroclasm
Living End
2-3 Swan Song
1-2 Pithing Needle
Elves
2-3 removal spells
1 Pyroclasm
1-2 Pithing Needle
Tron
2-3 artifact hate
1-2 Pithing Needle
Grixis Control/Grixis Midrange
2-3 Swan Song
Merfolk
2-3 artifact hate
1-2 Swan Song
Bogles
2-3 Swan Song
2-3 discard
1 Pyroclasm on the play
References
Primer by Zac Elsik -
Primer by Clinton Whitehurst -
Modern Hulk Flash by Drake Builta -
Becoming a Modern Man – Hulk Flash by Oliver Law -
Deck Tech: Protean Hulk Combo by Corbin Hosler -
Modern Monday – Hulk Footsteps by Frank Lepore -
-Videos
Footsteps Hulk Deck Tech - w/ AJ Sacher -
Footsteps Hulk round 1 - w/ AJ Sacher -
Footsteps Hulk round 2 - w/ AJ Sacher -
Footsteps Hulk round 3 - w/ AJ Sacher -
Footsteps Hulk round 4 - w/ AJ Sacher -
Footsteps Hulk round 5 - w/ AJ Sacher -
Modern Hulk Smash Deck Tech-
Modern Hulk Smash vs Collected Elves -
Modern Hulk Smash vs UR Artifacts -
Modern Hulk Smash vs UR Splinter Twin -
Modern Hulk Smash vs UW Tron -
Modern Hulk Smash vs Mono U Tron -
Footsteps Hulk Combo - KillerSOS -
Modern Hulk Flash vs Grixis Twin -
Modern Hulk Flash vs Stompy -
Modern Hulk Flash vs Skred Red -
-Old MTGS threads
Old MTGS Bubble Hulk thread -
Old MTGS Hulk Combo thread -
Old MTGS Footsteps Hulk thread -
I'm a combo player at heart, and the core idea of Hulk combo has always intrigued me, and I've run it a few time before (the last time being about 5-6 months ago), and with the recent noise, I pulled it back out and ran it through a couple of FNMs. The list I ran was a pretty standard Makeshift Mannequin build, with the only major change being a 3rd Mannequin over a 4th Izzet Charm, as my experience with Grishoalbrand is that there's a balance needed between dig and things to dig to.
Setting the Stage
My local meta is reasonably competitive (Mox Boarding House, in the Seattle area), and we've got a pretty good mix of deck types and the crowd is usually between 35 and 50 people for FNM and a smaller crowd of 15-30 for Thursday night Modern, with a fixed 4 round format, with payout by record. I ran the deck for a few weeks, and all told I think I played around 15 matches with the deck.
Additionally, as with all combo decks, I tend to keep my cards on my desk and goldfish while I'm waiting for things to happen. I've probably goldfished a couple hundred hands by this point.
My experiences were not been all that great. It can win games. It can even win matches. But I've found it very inconsistent overall, even compared to decks like Goryo's with Shoals.
Deck Upsides
The pros of the deck seem very nice on paper.
The fact that it almost never fizzles once there's a hulk in play is a huge bonus compared to Grishoalbrand and similar. I think I failed to go off successfully twice in all my games, once through operator error (I sequenced triggers wrong in one of my first games back on the deck), and once through a having to run out a hulk into open white mana facing lethal on board and he did, in fact, have the Path. That's definitely better than my fizzle rate with Grishoalbrand, which is probably closer to 10-15%.
The fact that it can win at instant speed is great. It never came up, but the fact that you can win with a pact trigger on the stack let me be fairly aggressive with those, unlike many combo decks, where not being able to pay for pact is actually just game over.
Deck velocity is also fantastic; I routinely had seen a full 1/3rd to half my deck by turn 4 or five. Taigam's Scheming is not a card for most decks, but here it's extremely good. Basically an Ancient Stirrings with even more upsides. Enough so that I actually am considering a Grixis build of Goryo's with Scheming as a way to dump reanimation targets in the bin.
Mana was very easy to deal with. Not needing black mana until turn 3 or 4, I think I averaged about one game in about 20 that I had any mana issues at all, which is honestly better than most decks. The sheer amount of dig and looting helps make sure you get exactly enough.
The deck is nicely resilient to non-grave oriented hate. Hand disruption and even counterspells don't go that far with the amount of dig power and resiliency. I had no issues finding reanimation spells. Since I chose to run a 3rd Mannequin over a 4th Izzet Charm, I had maybe one game where I had everything else and failed to find a reanimation spell. Even being thoughtseized and countered rarely put me off more than a turn or two.
Unlike Grishoalbrand, this deck does not need a decent life total when going off. As long as you're not dead, the combo is going to succeed, and being at 1 life makes no difference than being at 20 as to your success rate.
Deck Downsides
However, it's clearly not all upsides, or everyone would be playing it.
First, the deck is very reliant on a few pieces. If it doesn't see a hulk, the chances to assemble the combo manually are abysmally low. I had probably a good half dozen games where by random chance, I simply didn't see any Hulks after multiple schemings, visions, lootings, and charms. With 2 each Body Doubles and Reveilarks, those aren't too hard to find, but with only 1 Mogg Fanatic, you can very easily dig for turns on end and not find it.
Another downside is that while resistant to non-graveyard hate, it's basically completely cold to persistent grave hate. You can fight through crypts and bogs and usually even Relics, but Grafdigger's Cage, Leyline of the Void and Rest In Peace require that you draw into your one or two of sideboard hate cards like Echoing Truth, or be lucky enough to be able to Swan Song or Steel Sabotage it on the way down, and only then can you start actually setting up your combo. And if they can win a counter fight over your answer? You're just done. Grave Titan beats are about your only plan B, and that's really more like plan F (and this, in fact, is one reason to keep Grave Titan over Thopter Engineer or Venser, as neither of those are going to win you a game if your combo is shut off by grave hate you can't remove)
Likewise, if they've got a Slaughter Games or Surgical and can hit Hulk, the game is almost certainly done. An extract effect on Body Double or Reveilark is usually game over, too.
Once your opponents know what's up, the deck is pretty easy to hate out.
Despite the compactness of the core combo, it doesn't have a ton of interaction either. Prior to going off, maybe 1 Lightning Axe if you're running it main and the Izzet Charms. Some of the linear aggro decks can easily match this combo for speed against a goldfish (which this deck basically is). Yeah, extremely rarely the deck gets the god hands that kill on T1. It can get T2 kills every so often (I think I had maybe 2 over about 35 games). T3 Hulk kills are pretty common. But infect, burn, and affinity can all kill on T3, too.
Some of the more common combo decks can also match it in speed. Bloom Titan and Grishoalbrand can kill Hulk on T2 more often than Hulk will kill them on the same, and probably have similar T3 kill rates, and they have at least some degree more interaction (Titan has lands which gain life, make blockers, etc, Grishoalbrand can gain 11 or more life at instant speed and some builds pack hand disruption). Storm is probably a half turn slower, and not much more interactive, but can win through some amount of grave hate.
Conclusion
All in all, my recent experience pretty much proved what I'd found during my previous outings with the deck. Taigam's Scheming is an improvement to the deck, but despite that, the reliance on Hulk to get things going and needing the graveyard to combo makes this deck more inconsistent and easier to hate out than many of the other top pure combo decks already in the format. Its advantages just don't balance out the problems with assembling the combo that has only 4 primary starter pieces. Barring the banning of cards out of either Bloom Titan or Grishoalbrand, I'd be unlikely to take Hulk Footsteps combo to any sort of event beyond an FNM.
Things this deck needs to be a tier one contender, in my opinion:
I'd love to get some of those posts moved over, they were great.
*edit*
i think that you are just listing weakneses of any combo deck
Please mention in your "how to avoid creature removal" how to correctly avoid creature removal. Your steps do not stop infinite o stone activations for example. When lark dies Always target both body doubles. There's never a reason to ever target anything else. In my primer I specifically pointed out that even if your board gets wiped you'll always end up with a lark plus seer.
That is the whole purpose of the deck. It was never to combo with mogg fanatic but rather create an infinite board state. Once you do you literally can't be stopped. The red creature is a trap and should not be included in a serious set of steps for combing off until the very end.
And could you correct my name from Zak to Zac in your primer list.
R1 bye
R2 bye
R3 - Lost to jund. Drew four hulks g1. No discard spells. G2 he plays 3 discard spells into Ooze I die.
R4 - Lost to tron. G1 he plays relic into relic. G2 he plays relic which i alrrady named with needke but he then surgical on hulk. Couldn't do much
R5 - beat affinity. This is an easy matchup imo idk why listed as hard. I was running 2 clasm in the board as well but didn't need.
R6 - I don't remember, I think another affinity player. Won here as well.
R7 - twin. He had all the remands and cobmo g1 couldn't do much. G2 I never drew a discard spell and died, started with hulk in hand too.
I dropped after third loss. I don't think the games against my three losses are the norm. That was my first time losing to twin or tron ever.
True, to some extent, but more so for Hulk Combo than others.
Grishoalbrand, for instance, has backup routes to victory. Through the Breach a Griselbrand or even Worldspine Wurm is usually good for a win, if they have grave hate you can't get around. Goryo's Vengeance on a naked Borborygmos Enraged isn't ideal, but if you've sculpted your hand it can still win if they've extracted your Griselbrand. And in the face of a fast linear deck like Burn or Affinity, you can still Shoal a Wurm outside the combo to stay alive.
Living End's cyclers are both combo enablers and part of the payoff for the combo, so just the act of digging for the cascade combo improves its strength when it goes off. Likewise, utility creatures and answers to hate like Ingot Chewer, Wispmare, and Fulminator Mage also end up improving the combo or generating extra value.
Scapeshift is called a "one card combo", and like Hulk combo usually just wins if its namesake resolves. But the actual other parts of the combo are just lands, and you can play them out of hand if you draw them without needing an enabler like a looting spell. And one of the primary ramp spells is Sakura Tribe Elder, which works as a blocker without impacting its function, unlike Viscera Seer. Even its mainboard counter suite both works as protection and anti-hate, as Cryptics can bounce Leylines, one of the few useful hate cards.
One of my take aways was that nothing in the Hulk combo except Izzet Charm (and maybe Lightning Axe if you mainboard one) does much of anything except in the context of the combo, and none of the enablers are really good for anything except digging for the combo.
I don't have any concrete suggestions, but my first thought is to see if there's a way we can modify the dig or combo suite so that they have a greater cross-functionality, or maybe add some cards that take advantage of the game state we set up even if we're not in combo-mode.
Off the top of my head:
There's also some other kill combo packages that could be explored. The Disciple of the Vault and Hangarback Walker one seems to take up too many slots while still being not too hard to disrupt. But it seems like there could be other Hulk packages that either win on the spot or guarantee a near win.
Some of the Abzan Company deck combos are fetchable with a single Hulk activation for instance. Melira, Sylvok Outcast or Anafenza, Kin-Tree Spirit and Murderous Redcap to win on the spot if you've got a Seer, or a Kitchen Finks and Viscera Seer to give you infinite health and scry if you don't.
I don't really know what the right path is, but my experience is definitely that the current state of the deck is probably not going to propel it into Tier 1 or even Tier 2 status. Even if the other combo alternatives get bans, this deck is just too easy to hate out if it gets remotely popular.
Agreed on all points.
In turn, my point is that as the deck stands, with almost nothing but land, dig spells and combo pieces that don't do anything outside of an actively going off combo, it's not really a very viable deck. It can get hot and win matches and even maybe a smaller events or once in a great while a bigger event. But over time, in most bigger events, or over multiple smaller events, variance (or pairings, or the meta) will catch up, and this deck does not have sufficient tools to deal with in the current configuration.
It's not faster on average than Amulet Bloom or Grishoalbrand. It's more consistent than either if it can go off, but feels marginally less consistent than either in terms of being able to get to that combo.
It doesn't have the interaction of Scapeshift. Half its defensive tools are only good to protect an active combo attempt. It's ability to dodge hate is very limited and some hate is nearly impossible, especially if that hate is backed by counters or other protection.
It has no protection at all against linear aggro decks if it doesn't have an early combo already in hand.
My personal feeling is that if you want to use the very nice and incredibly hard to disrupt Hulk->Body Double+Reveilark combo, then something in the deck has to change to help ensure that you can:
Twin decks evolved from 8 untappers and 4 splinter twins and some number of Kiki-Jiki to their current form with often only 4-6 untappers and a smaller number of copiers, plus more interaction. Scapeshift likewise went from mostly RG Ramp into a more RUG oriented control deck with a combo finish. Even Grishoalbrand was originally a straight glass cannon combo deck that had to evolve a more complicated combo to help it play around hate and disruption. I feel that Hulk Combo is probably going to have to do the same, as its not inherently and consistently fast enough to overcome that hate and disruption reliably as a pure combo deck.
while that works, finding an emrakul, the aeons torn reliably is an issue in an of itself.
constructing the deck with 4 ashen riders helps it along since reliably getting protean hulk can be hit or miss. plus ashen rider plays with a through the breach back up plan reliably.
Torpf
-Seems as though the spam filter found it and marked it as spam. I have un-spamified it and you should be able to access it in the archives now.
I don't think this is particularly the case. It may be true that our nut draw is slower than Amulet's or Grishoalbrand's nut draws, but in my experience our deck goldfish faster on average. Amulet and Grishoalbrand consistently achieve their "pseudokill" turn 3. A turn 2/3 titan does not kill you on the spot. Griselbrand can draw a bunch of cards and discard to set up a hand of 2x Goryo's Vengeance+5 lands+Borborygmos Enraged in the yard to kill you next untap step. Through the Breach Worldspine Wurm leaves you almost dead, but not if you can combo kill before their next combat.
One of the upside of Hulk over Griselbrand is that we can afford to play maindeck Pact of Negation, whereas Grishoalbrand is quite reliant on the combat step. This gives us a huge equity in game 1. That being said, I agree that we are weaker in sideboarded games whereas Grishoalbrand is more difficult to hate.
2.
Hulk needs to address two problems:
A. Ways to find Protean Hulk. If we have only 4 Hulks, 5.6% of the time (2.5 games out of a 15 round GP) all 4 Hulks are at the bottom half of our library. While the deck is possible to win without Hulk, that is still a little too much for us to bear.
Solutions: Dig deeper (where is Dig Through Time?), Tutor effects (Summoner's Pact, Dark Petition, Gifts Ungiven), a more control-ish game plan to stall the game.
B. Resilience to hate. Grishoalbrand utilizes Through the Breach a lot better. Even if they got Rest in Peaceed, they can still Breach Griselbrand, draw a bunch, and untap Breach Borborygmos for the kill.
Solutions: Alternate win conditions, protection spells
3.
I'm quite disappointed with Taigam's Scheming in sideboarded games as its sorcery speed requires you to tap out on turn 2 and leave up a window for opponent to land Relic, RIP or Scavenging Ooze. I board them out a lot as I cannot afford to play the "all-in dig for combo" game plan. I also prefer Thoughtseize and Spell Pierce (techs from Affinity to battle Stony Silence) over something like Swan Song.
What decks play Leyline of Sanctity in their sideboard? In what situation is pinging their whole board repeatedly at any time not good enough (and you should have all creatures on board)? I can think of only Bogles (which is very very bad with Suppression Field, Rest in Peace, Leyline of Sanctity). The sideboard is so tight that we shouldn't play unnecessary sideboard cards that relies on the graveyard loop.
Also, an unearthed Corpse Connoisseur might be a way to search out a Hulk. Or is Gifts Ungiven basically the same thing?
Edit: Also, thinking about trying out Plunge into Darkness as kind of a Demonic Consultation, plus the sac outlet could be useful in a pinch.
BUWGRChilds PlayGRWUB
BUWGR Highlander GRWUB
UBSquee's Shapeshifting PetBU
BW Multiplayer Control WB
RG Changeling GR
UR Mana FlareRU
UMerfolkU
B MBMC B