Well with Hedron Crab I wouldnt play him until the turn I go off and then still use the combo to just mill them. That way if they kill the crab worst that can happen is I continue going through my library.
and like I said before, he doesn't do anything till the end of your deck, which is pretty much the only strike against him. But it's a pretty important one. It means you have to minimize dead draws elsewhere in the deck to compensate.
I've looked at hedron crab, and I've always had an issue with those kind of wincons that definitely need a 2nd slot to actually kill. Plus it targets, which is what we don't want. Labman doesn't, which is why he gets the nod over hedron crab, among other things.
OT: I've renamed my labman build "Egg Asylum" =D
Also, finishing the vanilla build explanation and list. It'll be up soon.
I like current block formats the most.
Its so limited to its power scale against other formats.
Block constructed should be a more competitive format like it was back in Champions or Ravnica.
My meta is very Combo/Control heavy so my sideboard is:
1 Pithing Needle
1 Disciple of the Vault
4 Pact of Negation
4 Silence
4 Wipe Away
1 Grapeshot
This is with Lab Maniac and Pyrite main as my win cons. Any comments? I don't worry too much about Zoo or Affinity with this deck. Also would a Sideboard card options section be worthwhile for this primer?
EDIT: I saw someone running Sunny Side with the 2 Spirit Guides as extra mana accel? Weird but kind of intriguing. I guess it could help go off a turn earlier but they would be completely dead draws while you're going off.
I was playing today and got shut out by chalice of the void set to 1 (game 1), and chalice of the voids set to 1 and 3 game 2. Is thee anything at all we can do about chalice? It seems to positively wreck us.
As for temple bell/laboratory maniac, if they have the extirpate, aren't they just going to use it on second sunrise and just kill us?
^ first of all, chalice we can deal with if we have enough bounce. This is why i split the bounce. Granted, it depends on how easily they can obtain chalice, and how aggressively we mulligan. Chalice at 1 is in fact devastating for this deck though, so there isn't a simple solution to this, especially with how our curve is extremely narrow. Perhaps what we need is bounce that is tutorable with reshape if that's what you are coming up against.
Chalice is in the format for good, but it's not easy for fast decks to play since this format doesn't have lands that tap for 2 mana outside of the easily disrupted tron, and they'll be shutting themselves off most likely if the bulk of their deck is 1 and 2 cost spells. It's the same deal with us and blood moon. It invalidates the opponents deck at the cost of slowing us down by a few turns.
As for extirpate, extirpate won't stop lab man if he comes down when you zero cards in your library, as it will be a simple case of their being nothing in your graveyard that can be hit and matter. Sunrise? Don't need it anymore, just play labman and draw. It WILL stop temple bell pretty convincingly unless you had cast silence at some point before letting them draw, though. I'd say temple bell requires it be a 1/3 split MD/SB on the silence just to atleast cast it before letting them draw anything.
Asheroth: simian spirit guide is probably useful to run across when you are really low on mana during your combo, because unlike the other sources we use, this can add mana right there and then. However, I wouldn't personally play it as this deck cannot really afford to lose much consistency over such a minor boost.
still zero. CMC is the printed cost right corner, that doesn't change just because you put mana into the (X)(X)'s. If it's set at 2 or 3, repeal hits it. Set at 1, echoing truth and wipeaway both hit it.
Then I guess I don't see it as a big threat, esp if we have Echoing Truth. They wouldn't benifit from setting it as 2 at any point, unless they are just confused at what we're playing.
Well you can Reshape for Engineered Explosives. Then pop it immediately to get ride of the chalice and combo off, but it sucks to waste a reshape, but that is what its for...unless you had trinket mage :). You can also use engineered explosives to battle leylines too.
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Rollback Post to RevisionRollBack
I like current block formats the most.
Its so limited to its power scale against other formats.
Block constructed should be a more competitive format like it was back in Champions or Ravnica.
Well you can Reshape for Engineered Explosives. Then pop it immediately to get ride of the chalice and combo off, but it sucks to waste a reshape, but that is what its for...unless you had trinket mage :). You can also use engineered explosives to battle leylines too.
This. Bringing in 1 Engineered Explosives from the sideboard is basically a guaranteed way of being able to deal with a Chalice. Repeal and Wipe Away will work temporarily, but what if they drop it before you found what you need to go off? You need the Chalice to stay off the field so you can drop your eggs and find the rest of your combo.
Don't get me wrong; I'm not saying you shouldn't be running Repeal or Wipe Away. What I am saying is that EE works incredibly well in conjunction with both of those spells and provides a solid, long-term answer to the Chalice.
Setting it at 1 or 3 is our only worry. I don't think most players wait for enough mana to set the chalice at 3...so Spell Snare can stop it too. We have many tools against Chalice of the Void.
I like current block formats the most.
Its so limited to its power scale against other formats.
Block constructed should be a more competitive format like it was back in Champions or Ravnica.
^Trinket mage seems rather weak here. Wargate does just as good of a job, and also gets you both ghost quarter and lotus bloom, which trinket mage does not. However, engineered explosives is definitely a great idea! I wonder what else it'll stop...
tormod will get hit if you do an eot reshape/wargate for explosives, but that's a 4-5 mana investment and the loss of a reshape/wargate AND an artifact, though I guess that might be worth it. I'm not sure, does it also hit our blooms? I remember reading somewhere that blooms are now considered to have "no mana cost" as opposed to "zero", but I'm not sure.
The only way I see trinket mage as being of any use would be in a build which can sac things at will, which is exactly the kind of builds which tend to give up too much consistency for a more garanteed recursion plan. You might as well just play sunforger and never have to dig for sunrise again, which is also ludicrously expensive (10 mana).
When you start fiddling with the deck out of frustration from making play mistakes, you'll end up just making it combo out easier at the cost that it'll have the right pieces to do so less often. Kills our chances of mulliganing into a hand that can go off. You need to trust the statistical nature of the deck and get a feel for what is and is not keepable.
That being said, I'm not sure explosives should be MD unless you do see everyone playing or SBing chalice. Chalice destroys so many decks that it's unlikely a majority of the field is running them, as they'd be shut down themselves.
edit - doh, you are right, it is a non-issue. Whoops.
unfortuantely, retrace is "discard a land" not "sacrifice a land", so i don't think it works like you want it to. Also, if chalices get reanimated, they'll come back into play with 0 counters, which makes them a non-issue.
1-of could be useful as a discard outlet/alt wincon in one, but you are right and the power level isn't enough for this deck without seriously flooding us on mana just to make it work (something like 20-22 lands/land fetch/ramp), and even then, it runs into the same consistency issues as trinket mage or ichor. Basically just a bad riddlesmith.
Giving up on gargadon for now as well, it's too situational and underpowered without ichor and mox opal to want to see it mid-combo.
Still working on a cobra list to post in the OP. Should be up in a couple days.
tormod will get hit if you do an eot reshape/wargate for explosives, but that's a 4-5 mana investment and the loss of a reshape/wargate AND an artifact, though I guess that might be worth it. I'm not sure, does it also hit our blooms? I remember reading somewhere that blooms are now considered to have "no mana cost" as opposed to "zero", but I'm not sure.
Tormod's Crypt is our worst enemy because it can be sacced in response to most bounce, killing our small graveyard, and it gets brought back by Second Sunrise, killing our chances of comboing off with proper timing. You basically need Wipe Away, Pithing Needle, or well-timed graveyard hate or you will die to this card. Engineered Explosives will not solve a Crypt problem, and will kill Lotus Blooms to boot, as their cmc is 0 (though we can crack them in response).
No lotus bloom has no casting cost according to magiccards.info so could it be destroyed by EE?
Private Mod Note
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Rollback Post to RevisionRollBack
I like current block formats the most.
Its so limited to its power scale against other formats.
Block constructed should be a more competitive format like it was back in Champions or Ravnica.
, Sacrifice Engineered Explosives: Destroy each nonland permanent with converted mana cost equal to the number of charge counters on Engineered Explosives.
This is in the Comprehensive Rules:
Quote from Comprehensive Rules »
202.3a The converted mana cost of an object with no mana cost is 0.
So yes, Lotus Bloom is 0 cmc, which means EE will indiscriminately blast it when you use it foolishly on Tormod's Crypt. At least you can pop the Blooms in response.
Tormod's Crypt is our worst enemy because it can be sacced in response to most bounce, killing our small graveyard, and it gets brought back by Second Sunrise, killing our chances of comboing off with proper timing. You basically need Wipe Away, Pithing Needle, or well-timed graveyard hate or you will die to this card. Engineered Explosives will not solve a Crypt problem, and will kill Lotus Blooms to boot, as their cmc is 0 (though we can crack them in response).
Well, apparently you got one part right. However, if this is a case of tormod coming back, just blow it up the turn before you go off. It might slow us down a turn or two depending on what you have in hand and on the board, but it's manageable to an extent. And after SB, we should have wipeaway and friends to help us out. Maybe some SB graveyard removal could be useful to us, like scrabbling claws, which carries well as we could play just one, it's an egg itself, and it doesn't hose our own graveyard like relic would if we wanted to draw off of it. It happens to be tech from legacy eggs, so I used to use it there against much of the graveyard hate legacy would play.
But this all seems a moot point as we just reshape into a pithing needle. It can come back but it can't active.
edit - not a serious suggestion, but I thought it was hilarious as a wincon: Psychosis crawler.
edit - Example decklist section completed. Again, any comments or suggestions or if you see some glaring error or simply disagree with anything, let me know by private message.
RIP Eggs
My Trade Thread
I've looked at hedron crab, and I've always had an issue with those kind of wincons that definitely need a 2nd slot to actually kill. Plus it targets, which is what we don't want. Labman doesn't, which is why he gets the nod over hedron crab, among other things.
OT: I've renamed my labman build "Egg Asylum" =D
Also, finishing the vanilla build explanation and list. It'll be up soon.
http://officeofstrategicinfluence.com/spam/ <---- kills spam, fyi.
I like current block formats the most.
Its so limited to its power scale against other formats.
Block constructed should be a more competitive format like it was back in Champions or Ravnica.
Sig by DD Awie by CC
http://officeofstrategicinfluence.com/spam/ <---- kills spam, fyi.
1 Disciple of the Vault
4 Pact of Negation
4 Silence
4 Wipe Away
1 Grapeshot
This is with Lab Maniac and Pyrite main as my win cons. Any comments? I don't worry too much about Zoo or Affinity with this deck. Also would a Sideboard card options section be worthwhile for this primer?
EDIT: I saw someone running Sunny Side with the 2 Spirit Guides as extra mana accel? Weird but kind of intriguing. I guess it could help go off a turn earlier but they would be completely dead draws while you're going off.
RIP Eggs
My Trade Thread
As for temple bell/laboratory maniac, if they have the extirpate, aren't they just going to use it on second sunrise and just kill us?
UR Storm WUBRG Sunnyside Up W Death+Taxes BR 7->0:60 Discard
EDH
GU Vig RWU Zedruu BR Olivia
Play Magic online free with GCCG!
Download it here -- (My Username is ShinkyP)
Trade Thread: Here!
Chalice is in the format for good, but it's not easy for fast decks to play since this format doesn't have lands that tap for 2 mana outside of the easily disrupted tron, and they'll be shutting themselves off most likely if the bulk of their deck is 1 and 2 cost spells. It's the same deal with us and blood moon. It invalidates the opponents deck at the cost of slowing us down by a few turns.
As for extirpate, extirpate won't stop lab man if he comes down when you zero cards in your library, as it will be a simple case of their being nothing in your graveyard that can be hit and matter. Sunrise? Don't need it anymore, just play labman and draw. It WILL stop temple bell pretty convincingly unless you had cast silence at some point before letting them draw, though. I'd say temple bell requires it be a 1/3 split MD/SB on the silence just to atleast cast it before letting them draw anything.
Asheroth: simian spirit guide is probably useful to run across when you are really low on mana during your combo, because unlike the other sources we use, this can add mana right there and then. However, I wouldn't personally play it as this deck cannot really afford to lose much consistency over such a minor boost.
http://officeofstrategicinfluence.com/spam/ <---- kills spam, fyi.
http://officeofstrategicinfluence.com/spam/ <---- kills spam, fyi.
I like current block formats the most.
Its so limited to its power scale against other formats.
Block constructed should be a more competitive format like it was back in Champions or Ravnica.
Sig by DD Awie by CC
This. Bringing in 1 Engineered Explosives from the sideboard is basically a guaranteed way of being able to deal with a Chalice. Repeal and Wipe Away will work temporarily, but what if they drop it before you found what you need to go off? You need the Chalice to stay off the field so you can drop your eggs and find the rest of your combo.
Don't get me wrong; I'm not saying you shouldn't be running Repeal or Wipe Away. What I am saying is that EE works incredibly well in conjunction with both of those spells and provides a solid, long-term answer to the Chalice.
Basing it off the Riddlesmith engine
8 Island
4 Ghost Quarter
4 Misty Rainforest
Creatures
3 Riddlesmith
1 Trinket Mage
1 Laboratory Maniac
Spells
4 Second Sunrise
4 Noxious Revival
1 Reclaim
4 Reshape
4 Edge of Autumn
1 Locket of Yesterdays
4 Conjurer's Bauble
4 Chromatic Sphere
4 Chromatic Star
3 Lotus Bloom
4 Elsewhere Flask
1 Pyrite Spellbomb
MB just in case
1 Engineered Explosives
4 Mindbreak Trap
1 Grapeshot
1 Sunbeam Spellbomb
1 Pithing Needle
1 Disciple of the Vault
2 Silence
3 Wipe Away
2 Blasphemous Act
I like current block formats the most.
Its so limited to its power scale against other formats.
Block constructed should be a more competitive format like it was back in Champions or Ravnica.
Sig by DD Awie by CC
tormod will get hit if you do an eot reshape/wargate for explosives, but that's a 4-5 mana investment and the loss of a reshape/wargate AND an artifact, though I guess that might be worth it. I'm not sure, does it also hit our blooms? I remember reading somewhere that blooms are now considered to have "no mana cost" as opposed to "zero", but I'm not sure.
The only way I see trinket mage as being of any use would be in a build which can sac things at will, which is exactly the kind of builds which tend to give up too much consistency for a more garanteed recursion plan. You might as well just play sunforger and never have to dig for sunrise again, which is also ludicrously expensive (10 mana).
When you start fiddling with the deck out of frustration from making play mistakes, you'll end up just making it combo out easier at the cost that it'll have the right pieces to do so less often. Kills our chances of mulliganing into a hand that can go off. You need to trust the statistical nature of the deck and get a feel for what is and is not keepable.
That being said, I'm not sure explosives should be MD unless you do see everyone playing or SBing chalice. Chalice destroys so many decks that it's unlikely a majority of the field is running them, as they'd be shut down themselves.
edit - doh, you are right, it is a non-issue. Whoops.
edit - doh, not reading the card properly ftw.
http://officeofstrategicinfluence.com/spam/ <---- kills spam, fyi.
UR Storm WUBRG Sunnyside Up W Death+Taxes BR 7->0:60 Discard
EDH
GU Vig RWU Zedruu BR Olivia
Play Magic online free with GCCG!
Download it here -- (My Username is ShinkyP)
Trade Thread: Here!
Giving up on gargadon for now as well, it's too situational and underpowered without ichor and mox opal to want to see it mid-combo.
Still working on a cobra list to post in the OP. Should be up in a couple days.
Sorry it's been so slow going, been really busy.
http://officeofstrategicinfluence.com/spam/ <---- kills spam, fyi.
Tormod's Crypt is our worst enemy because it can be sacced in response to most bounce, killing our small graveyard, and it gets brought back by Second Sunrise, killing our chances of comboing off with proper timing. You basically need Wipe Away, Pithing Needle, or well-timed graveyard hate or you will die to this card. Engineered Explosives will not solve a Crypt problem, and will kill Lotus Blooms to boot, as their cmc is 0 (though we can crack them in response).
I like current block formats the most.
Its so limited to its power scale against other formats.
Block constructed should be a more competitive format like it was back in Champions or Ravnica.
Sig by DD Awie by CC
This is in the Comprehensive Rules:
So yes, Lotus Bloom is 0 cmc, which means EE will indiscriminately blast it when you use it foolishly on Tormod's Crypt. At least you can pop the Blooms in response.
Well, apparently you got one part right. However, if this is a case of tormod coming back, just blow it up the turn before you go off. It might slow us down a turn or two depending on what you have in hand and on the board, but it's manageable to an extent. And after SB, we should have wipeaway and friends to help us out. Maybe some SB graveyard removal could be useful to us, like scrabbling claws, which carries well as we could play just one, it's an egg itself, and it doesn't hose our own graveyard like relic would if we wanted to draw off of it. It happens to be tech from legacy eggs, so I used to use it there against much of the graveyard hate legacy would play.
But this all seems a moot point as we just reshape into a pithing needle. It can come back but it can't active.
edit - not a serious suggestion, but I thought it was hilarious as a wincon: Psychosis crawler.
edit - Example decklist section completed. Again, any comments or suggestions or if you see some glaring error or simply disagree with anything, let me know by private message.
http://officeofstrategicinfluence.com/spam/ <---- kills spam, fyi.