I mean: On the stack, the activation of Gerrard's Hourglass Pendant is right below the massive Spellweaver Volute triggers. After the Kaervek's Spite sweeper and computation, the activation resolve, bring things back.
That's true. I think that's okay, in that we still need some bouncing to setup up the hyperstage transition again. But, Worldfire doesn't send things to the graveyard, so I don't think we can use Gerrard's Hourglass Pendant there. So we still need Mirrorworks for Vedalken Orrery, and some way of bringing Omniscience back.
So the idea would be to have a bunch of Mirror of Fate activations on the stack to move our cards to the library, followed by Tomb Robber activations to move them into the graveyard. Then, we can use Bloodbond March triggers to move creatures back to the battlefield. Then, for artifacts and enchantments... I was thinking we could resolve down to the next hyperstage transition, and resolve a bunch of Argivian Finds there.
How are these decks without Cowardice supposed to create enchantment copies? Adding Fated Infatuation to them would create cheap copies of the stage creatures for the additional stages. But setting up the computations and making progress without enchantment copies seems near impossible.
I haven't been able to find a way to create enchantment copies that isn't based on turning them into creatures first and copying those. Except for Astral Dragon, but that can also create copies of the lands we tend to use for the Tier 2/3 stages, so I don't think it is viable.
So, the problem is that additional stage creatures make copying creatures to powerful, but if we can't copy creatures, then we can't get enchantment copies. Obviously what we want is a way to make copies of strictly enchantments. I guess if anyone knew of one, it would have been mentioned by now. One way would be to turn enchantments into artifacts; but that also seems to be a creature thing.
If we can't make enchantment copies in the no-Cowardice deck, then we can table that version for now, until someone comes up with a new idea. In the Cowardice deck, I can still see two additional stages, one for basic lands, one for lands in general. The basic land one can be Groundskeeper / Firebrand Ranger, if we can save green until that point. The land one can be blue or white, but we are having trouble saving blue because of Omniscience and the white version doesn't currently work with our Worldfire setup.
Edit: Additional stage didn't work quite right, trying a fix.
Edit: Forgot about Omniscience. The cheap way would just be to add blue, e.g. replace Gold Myr with Azorius Signet. If we want to preserve blue for later... could Twinning Glass work? We wouldn't have cast Omniscience, but perhaps we can have cast a bunch of other spells before Omniscience goes away, and then we can use Twinning Glass from then on.
I think Twinning Glass would work. We can probably copy Omniscience sometime during the start and then bounce and replay the original, so 2 activations of Twinning Glass on the stack would get us Omniscience and Vedalken Orrery back after a transition.
That could mean we don't need Mirrorworks, unless I'm missing some other important use for that. Easy artifact copies certainly makes it easier to make progress, so maybe we need that after all.
I think we can play Master Skald instead of Argivian Find. That should allow us to remove Mirrormade, because we wouldn't need to lock in a second Spellweaver Volute for the transitions. But that also depends on that kind of complicated play actually working out.
For now I'd suggest being optimistic about the plays being possible, see what we can build with that.
Your decklist has Rally the Righteous, but I think that should be Fated Infatuation so we can create enchantment tokens. Otherwise it looks pretty good.
Some thoughts on getting more stages: I didn't see anything like Giver of Runes that had no colored mana cost and could target all creatures, but there are several cards like Anaba Ancestor that can target typed creatures with no mana cost. But, I don't see how to hack our creatures cheaply enough to allow the stage creature to continually bounce, say, Stern Proctor. But, maybe Goblin Smuggler? It couldn't target World Shaper and possibly other creatures further down the line, but since those creatures would be at higher tiers, we should be fine just bouncing those with our instants. We could use Stern Proctor to get enchantments and artifacts.
Edit: No, Goblin Smuggler comes with haste, so the opponent can use it.
That means we still have white, blue, and green or red after the megastage. It looks like we aren't going to do any better than World Shaper for returning our lifelands, since I don't think there are life gaining lands of a particular type that we could take advantage of. If we brought the lifeland onto the battlefield untapped, we could maybe use a Kavu to transform it into producing a megastage color, but bringing an arbitrary land from the graveyard to the battlefield untapped seems to moot everything.
So if we want two additional land stages, we have to find 3 ways to recycle lands. One restricted way is for basic lands, and then we have each basic land type; however some land types are worse than others, we would really like to move a Mountain from the graveyard or library to the battlefield untapped, but I didn't find an answer for that. Gem of Becoming does fetch a Mountain, and not a Forest or Plains, but then there's putting it onto the battlefield. The only restricted way of doing that that I found was to restrict it to basic lands, with something like Veteran Explorer; that only allows a basic Mountain to complete the loop, but being able to put a basic land onto the battlefield for basically free messes up my idea for a basic land stage. We could still possibly have a stage for a nonbasic Forest or Plains, but I didn't find cards with the appropriate costs.
Now, if we have the megastage be Forest, then we can put it in play using Quandrix Cultivator or Wood Elves. That still leaves basic lands available, but of course the plan was to use green mana for that. We can use white mana for basic landcycling, but then we need to spend white mana to put the basic Plains onto the battlefield. I didn't see how to do that.
We could also have the megastage use white or blue mana. Hmm, Quandrix Cultivator can put a basic Island onto the battlefield, and that leaves basic lands for the Groundskeeper / Firebrand Ranger combo. Success?
Well, not quite; we've used up blue and green, so we need to use either red or white as the color for the last stage. We do have Ruin Ghost, but it doesn't look like General's Enforcer is useful, since we can exile lands from the graveyard with Worldfire, and then bring them to the library with Mirror of Fate. If we try to keep things in the graveyard/exile by replacing Mirror of Fate with Pull from Eternity, then we won't be able to get the Island out from graveyard/exile to be fetched with Quandrix Cultivator.
Edit: Knight of the White Orchid could be the solution to our problems, but we need to insure that the opponent has more lands than we do. We can do this by sending them copies of Dryad Arbor.
We can't use Knight of the White Orchid because first strike lets us start an illegal computation in combat and still deal the normal combat damage afterwards.
Tinder Wall gives the opponent mana. Keldon Overseer gives haste to creatures that stays with them when we donate them. That means mana for the opponent with Silver Myr. Getting that second additional stage seems tough.
We can give up on that for now, and look for the one additional stage that leaves the most room. Getting the Groundskeeper extra stage would be really nice, but I don't see how to do that without Knight of the White Orchard. Otherwise, I don't see how to make an additional stage without something that untaps a land. And the only cards I know of that do that for a mana are Captain of the Mists and Elder Druid, both of which untap and untap way to much.
With tapping and untapping mooted, I haven't thought of anything better than
which gives us BB_{w^3 + w + 8} (12,985), a little less than what we had before.
Edit: Note that we can have red or white available at the end; if we use another card slot, we can have both white and blue available at the end. But I haven't figured out how to use mana to improve the end.
Making artifact recovery hard to use a mox for the megastage is a good idea. I guess Arcanists Owl should be listed under the megastage section, that had me confused for a bit.
The problem now is how to keep artifacts around through Kaervek's Spite. We can't get them back from the graveyard by design, so we'll have to donate them to the opponent. But currently we can't get them back from there cheap enough because Anaba Ancestor can't target them.
I think Roon of the Hidden Realm would work as the stage creature, but require Mirror Gallery. IIRC we can also use creatures that sacrifice themselves instead of the "target another" restriction. That would allow us to use for example Armor Thrull. That would allow us to recover the artifacts.
Ah, I see. So animating lands is problematic - we could use a land that comes in tapped, but then if we animate it, we could copy it and then whatever we use to untap the land can untap a bunch of them.
We could still conceivably use something like Captain of the Mists to untap. The problem is, that seems to be the only ability we need; once we sacrifice the land, we can bring it back via World Shaper to be untapped again. Similarly for Gretchen Titchwillow; after we sacrifice the land, we can use WOrldfire to exile it, and then bring it back to the library to be drawn again. Similarly for Ruin Ghost.
Perhaps World Shaper is the problem here. What else can we do for the hyperstage? My first thought was to use something like Fountain of Youth. But, we can kill it easily with March of the Machines, so I don't know how we would do better with [c]Kaervek's Spite[c].
It occurs to me that Harmonic Prodigy should work on both of Tolarian Kraken's triggered abilities, for a potential of 2 layers, although it requires Bolt Bend. So the above should get us to BB_{w^3 + w2 + 6}(14,700).
I suppose using Pious Interdiction means we need to make sure we can't get it into our hand, or we get an extra spell with targets to bounce our stuff. So Arcanist's Owl probably goes infinite.
We can use Chromescale Drake instead. I think that means we don't get our life back by resolving Worldfire, so we'd use Bump in the Night to start the megastage transition. To get the enchantments back we then need to resolve the next hyperstage transition from down on the stack, but that should be fine.
I don't think Harmonic Prodigy works like that for Tolarian Kraken's reflexive triggered ability. The Kraken itself only has one ability, so only that would be influenced by the Prodigy. The part with "when you do" works like a delayed triggered ability that is set up by the ability of the Kraken, but is not an ability of the Kraken itself.
Another possibility for the second additional stage is Captain of the Mists + Gretchen Titchwillow. That does free up a couple of card slots, and frees up either white mana or red mana as well (and possibly black mana, althouth we can pay costs with life). But, it moots card draw and tapping/untapping; I'm not seeing how we get to 6 layers, even with the advantages.
Edit: Oh no we can't; we don't have a way to refill the opponent's library. No layer additions for one card? If not, we can go for God-Pharaoh's Gift for BB_{w^3 + w2 + 6} (BB_{w^3 + w2 + 6} (14,700)).
Edit: Is Riftsweeper okay instead of Mirror of Fate? If so, we could refill the opponent's library, even up to 60. So we could add Psychic Possession, and go up to BB_{w^3 + w2 + 7}(14,700).
Riftsweeper should be okay. Actually, without Mirrorworks we don't have a good way to create Mirror of Fate tokens to sacrifice, so using Riftsweeper might our only option anyway.
Ah, silly me. It still makes sense to put in Psychic Possession, since it will help the opening, and the input stays at 14,700. I wonder which of Xorn or Precursor Golem we should drop... maybe Precursor Golem has some use in the opening?
Edit: While Anger is really nice, we can perhaps save a card by switching this out with Phabine. So:
Phabine, Boss's Confidant isn't compatible with Dryad Arbor because the opponent could use the hasty tokens to get mana. Also, Dega Disciple can bounce itself, but I assume we could find some other stage creature that the opponent can't activate if necessary.
Well, the nontoken Dega Disciple won't have haste, so it won't be able to bounce itself.
Instead of Dryad Arbor, we could use something like Celestial Colonnade, which comes into play tapped... except, once it becomes a creature we can untap it with Tolarian Kraken. I think it's okay without Tolarian Kraken though, so maybe if we take the Kraken out of the layer sequence, we can get an extra slot.
I mean: On the stack, the activation of Gerrard's Hourglass Pendant is right below the massive Spellweaver Volute triggers. After the Kaervek's Spite sweeper and computation, the activation resolve, bring things back.
And, without Psychic Battle, we cannot move targeting out of Precursor Golem. wait... all Repentant Vampire can be hacked into Golems.I haven't been able to find a way to create enchantment copies that isn't based on turning them into creatures first and copying those. Except for Astral Dragon, but that can also create copies of the lands we tend to use for the Tier 2/3 stages, so I don't think it is viable.
So, the problem is that additional stage creatures make copying creatures to powerful, but if we can't copy creatures, then we can't get enchantment copies. Obviously what we want is a way to make copies of strictly enchantments. I guess if anyone knew of one, it would have been mentioned by now. One way would be to turn enchantments into artifacts; but that also seems to be a creature thing.
If we can't make enchantment copies in the no-Cowardice deck, then we can table that version for now, until someone comes up with a new idea. In the Cowardice deck, I can still see two additional stages, one for basic lands, one for lands in general. The basic land one can be Groundskeeper / Firebrand Ranger, if we can save green until that point. The land one can be blue or white, but we are having trouble saving blue because of Omniscience and the white version doesn't currently work with our Worldfire setup.
1 Coat of Arms
2 Xathrid Necromancer
3 Artificial Evolution
4 Arcbond
5 Comeuppance
6 Dralnu's Crusade
Starting a Computation
7 Opalescence
8 Wrong Turn
9 Kaervek's Spite
10 Goblin Boom Keg
11 March of the Machines
Utility: Enchantments/Artifacts
12 Vedalken Orrery
13 Gold Myr
14 Mirrorworks
Utility: Spells
15 Thousand-Year Storm
Utility: Creatures
16 Bloodbond March
17 Cephalid Shrine
18 Angel of Condemnation
19 Soul Foundry
20 Anger
21 Cowardice
22 Illusionist's Bracers
23 Sigarda's Aid
24 Mirror of Fate
25 Shriekhorn
Volute Hyperstage
26 Spellweaver Volute
27 Mirrormade
28 Veyran, Voice of Duality
29 Mirror Box
30 Rally the Righteous
31 Argivian Find
32 Lingering Souls
33 Radiant Fountain
34 K'rrik, Son of Yawgmoth
35 World Shaper
36 Spellweaver Helix
37 Worldfire
38 Divine Congregatin
39 Hungry for More
40 Hungry for More
41 Mountain
42 Panharmonicon
43 Gem of Becoming
44 Walking Atlas
Green mana Stage
45 Auspicious Starrix
46 Elder Druid
47 Geothermal Crevice
Getting Started
48 Flash
49 Academy Rector
50 Omniscience
Edit: Additional stage didn't work quite right, trying a fix.
Edit: Forgot about Omniscience. The cheap way would just be to add blue, e.g. replace Gold Myr with Azorius Signet. If we want to preserve blue for later... could Twinning Glass work? We wouldn't have cast Omniscience, but perhaps we can have cast a bunch of other spells before Omniscience goes away, and then we can use Twinning Glass from then on.
That could mean we don't need Mirrorworks, unless I'm missing some other important use for that. Easy artifact copies certainly makes it easier to make progress, so maybe we need that after all.
I think we can play Master Skald instead of Argivian Find. That should allow us to remove Mirrormade, because we wouldn't need to lock in a second Spellweaver Volute for the transitions. But that also depends on that kind of complicated play actually working out.
For now I'd suggest being optimistic about the plays being possible, see what we can build with that.
Your decklist has Rally the Righteous, but I think that should be Fated Infatuation so we can create enchantment tokens. Otherwise it looks pretty good.
Some thoughts on getting more stages: I didn't see anything like Giver of Runes that had no colored mana cost and could target all creatures, but there are several cards like Anaba Ancestor that can target typed creatures with no mana cost. But, I don't see how to hack our creatures cheaply enough to allow the stage creature to continually bounce, say, Stern Proctor. But, maybe Goblin Smuggler? It couldn't target World Shaper and possibly other creatures further down the line, but since those creatures would be at higher tiers, we should be fine just bouncing those with our instants. We could use Stern Proctor to get enchantments and artifacts.
Edit: No, Goblin Smuggler comes with haste, so the opponent can use it.
That means we still have white, blue, and green or red after the megastage. It looks like we aren't going to do any better than World Shaper for returning our lifelands, since I don't think there are life gaining lands of a particular type that we could take advantage of. If we brought the lifeland onto the battlefield untapped, we could maybe use a Kavu to transform it into producing a megastage color, but bringing an arbitrary land from the graveyard to the battlefield untapped seems to moot everything.
So if we want two additional land stages, we have to find 3 ways to recycle lands. One restricted way is for basic lands, and then we have each basic land type; however some land types are worse than others, we would really like to move a Mountain from the graveyard or library to the battlefield untapped, but I didn't find an answer for that. Gem of Becoming does fetch a Mountain, and not a Forest or Plains, but then there's putting it onto the battlefield. The only restricted way of doing that that I found was to restrict it to basic lands, with something like Veteran Explorer; that only allows a basic Mountain to complete the loop, but being able to put a basic land onto the battlefield for basically free messes up my idea for a basic land stage. We could still possibly have a stage for a nonbasic Forest or Plains, but I didn't find cards with the appropriate costs.
Now, if we have the megastage be Forest, then we can put it in play using Quandrix Cultivator or Wood Elves. That still leaves basic lands available, but of course the plan was to use green mana for that. We can use white mana for basic landcycling, but then we need to spend white mana to put the basic Plains onto the battlefield. I didn't see how to do that.
We could also have the megastage use white or blue mana. Hmm, Quandrix Cultivator can put a basic Island onto the battlefield, and that leaves basic lands for the Groundskeeper / Firebrand Ranger combo. Success?
Well, not quite; we've used up blue and green, so we need to use either red or white as the color for the last stage. We do have Ruin Ghost, but it doesn't look like General's Enforcer is useful, since we can exile lands from the graveyard with Worldfire, and then bring them to the library with Mirror of Fate. If we try to keep things in the graveyard/exile by replacing Mirror of Fate with Pull from Eternity, then we won't be able to get the Island out from graveyard/exile to be fetched with Quandrix Cultivator.
So perhaps:
1 Coat of Arms
2 Xathrid Necromancer
3 Artificial Evolution
4 Arcbond
5 Comeuppance
6 Dralnu's Crusade
Starting a Computation
7 Opalescence
8 Wrong Turn
9 Kaervek's Spite
10 Goblin Boom Keg
11 March of the Machines
Utility: Enchantments/Artifacts
12 Vedalken Orrery
13 Gold Myr
14 Twinning Glass
Utility: Spells
15 Thousand-Year Storm
Utility: Creatures
16 Bloodbond March
17 Cephalid Shrine
18 Angel of Condemnation
19 Soul Foundry
20 Anger
21 Cowardice
22 Illusionist's Bracers
23 Sigarda's Aid
24 Mirror of Fate
25 Shriekhorn
Volute Hyperstage
26 Spellweaver Volute
27 Mirrormade
28 Veyran, Voice of Duality
29 Mirror Box
30 Fated Infatuation
31 Master Skald
32 Lingering Souls
33 Radiant Fountain
34 K'rrik, Son of Yawgmoth
35 World Shaper
36 Spellweaver Helix
37 Worldfire
38 Divine Congregatin
39 Siphon Insight
40 Siphon Insight
41 Island
42 Panharmonicon
43 Quandrix Cultivator
Green Mana Stage
44 Groundskeeper
45 Firebrand Ranger
46 Forest
Red Mana Stage
47 Ignition Team
48 Keldon Overlord
49 Tinder Farm
Getting Started
50 Flash
51 Academy Rector
52 Omniscience
Edit: Aw dagnabbit, Quandrix Cultivator can fetch the basic Forest.
Edit: Knight of the White Orchid could be the solution to our problems, but we need to insure that the opponent has more lands than we do. We can do this by sending them copies of Dryad Arbor.
Can we get by with two copies of Spellweaver Volute? For hyperstage transitions, we can just put them on Kaervek's Spite and Fated Infatuation. For computations, we can use Lingering Souls to cast Kaervek's Spite and one spell from Wrong Turn, Artificial Evolution, and Arcbond, until the computation is set up. We can fetch any lost enchantments with Master Skald, so it looks fine?
So:
1 Coat of Arms
2 Xathrid Necromancer
3 Artificial Evolution
4 Arcbond
5 Comeuppance
6 Dralnu's Crusade
Starting a Computation
7 Opalescence
8 Wrong Turn
9 Kaervek's Spite
10 Goblin Boom Keg
11 March of the Machines
Utility: Enchantments/Artifacts
12 Vedalken Orrery
13 Silver Myr
14 Twinning Glass
Utility: Spells
15 Thousand-Year Storm
Utility: Creatures
16 Bloodbond March
17 Cephalid Shrine
18 Paragon of Gathering Mists
19 Stern Proctor
20 Soul Foundry
21 Anger
22 Cowardice
23 Illusionist's Bracers
24 Sigarda's Aid
25 Mirror of Fate
26 Shriekhorn
Volute Hyperstage
27 Spellweaver Volute
28 Mirrormade
29 Fated Infatuation
30 Master Skald
31 Lingering Souls
32 Radiant Fountain
33 K'rrik, Son of Yawgmoth
34 World Shaper
35 Spellweaver Helix
36 Worldfire
37 Divine Congregation
38 Can't Stay Away
39 Can't Stay Away
40 Plains
41 Panharmonicon
42 Knight of the White Orchid
43 Dryad Arbor
Green Mana Stage
44 Groundskeeper
45 Firebrand Ranger
46 Forest
Red Mana Stage
47 Ignition Team
48 Keldon Overseer
49 Tinder Farm
Getting Started
50 Flash
51 Academy Rector
52 Omniscience
Tinder Wall gives the opponent mana. Keldon Overseer gives haste to creatures that stays with them when we donate them. That means mana for the opponent with Silver Myr. Getting that second additional stage seems tough.
We can give up on that for now, and look for the one additional stage that leaves the most room. Getting the Groundskeeper extra stage would be really nice, but I don't see how to do that without Knight of the White Orchard. Otherwise, I don't see how to make an additional stage without something that untaps a land. And the only cards I know of that do that for a mana are Captain of the Mists and Elder Druid, both of which untap and untap way to much.
With tapping and untapping mooted, I haven't thought of anything better than
1 Coat of Arms
2 Xathrid Necromancer
3 Artificial Evolution
4 Arcbond
5 Comeuppance
6 Dralnu's Crusade
Starting a Computation
7 Opalescence
8 Wrong Turn
9 Kaervek's Spite
10 Goblin Boom Keg
11 March of the Machines
Utility: Enchantments/Artifacts
12 Vedalken Orrery
13 Mana Crypt
14 Twinning Glass
Utility: Spells
15 Thousand-Year Storm
Utility: Creatures
16 Bloodbond March
17 Voracious Greatshark
Foundry Stage
18 Anaba Ancestor
19 Soul Foundry
20 Anger
21 Cowardice
22 Illusionist's Bracers
23 Sigarda's Aid
24 Mirror of Fate
25 Shriekhorn
26 Spellweaver Volute
27 Mirrormade
28 Fated Infatuation
29 Master Skald
30 Lingering Souls
31 Radiant Fountain
32 K'rrik, Son of Yawgmoth
33 World Shaper
34 Lifeforce
Helix Megastage
35 Spellweaver Helix
36 Worldfire
37 Divine Congregation
38 Siphon Insight
39 Siphon Insight
40 Island
41 Panharmonicon
42 Quandrix Cultivator
Green mana Stage
43 Auspicious Starrix
44 Elder Druid
45 Irrigation Ditch
46 Flash
47 Academy Rector
48 Omniscience
49 Sphinx of Enlightenment
Layers
50 Smoke Spirits' Aid
51 Commune with Lava
52 Gale, Waterdeep Prodigy
53 Psychic Possession
54 Floating Dream Zubera
55 Xorn
56 Harmonic Prodigy
57 Precursor Golem
58 Teysa Karlov
59 Mirror Box
60 Bolt Bend
which gives us BB_{w^3 + w + 8} (12,985), a little less than what we had before.
Edit: Note that we can have red or white available at the end; if we use another card slot, we can have both white and blue available at the end. But I haven't figured out how to use mana to improve the end.
1 Coat of Arms
2 Xathrid Necromancer
3 Artificial Evolution
4 Arcbond
5 Comeuppance
6 Dralnu's Crusade
Starting a Computation
7 Opalescence
8 Wrong Turn
9 Kaervek's Spite
10 Goblin Boom Keg
11 March of the Machines
Utility: Enchantments/Artifacts
12 Vedalken Orrery
13 Apprentice Wizard
14 Twinning Glass
Utility: Spells
15 Thousand-Year Storm
Utility: Creatures
16 Bloodbond March
17 Voracious Greatshark
Foundry Stage
18 Anaba Ancestor
19 Soul Foundry
20 Anger
21 Cowardice
22 Illusionist's Bracers
23 Sigarda's Aid
24 Mirror of Fate
25 Shriekhorn
26 Spellweaver Volute
27 Copy Enchantment
28 Fated Infatuation
29 Arcanist's Owl
30 Lingering Souls
31 Radiant Fountain
32 K'rrik, Son of Yawgmoth
33 Gerrard's Hourglass Pendant
34 Lifeforce
Helix Megastage
35 Spellweaver Helix
36 Worldfire
37 Divine Congregation
38 Siphon Insight
39 Siphon Insight
40 Mox Sapphire
41 Panharmonicon
Green Mana Stage
42 Groundskeeper
43 Firebrand Ranger
44 Forest
Red/White Mana Stage
45 Seedcradle Witch
46 Ignition Team
47 Archaeological Dig
48 Flash
49 Academy Rector
50 Omniscience
51 Sphinx of Enlightenment
Layers
52 Smoke Spirits' Aid
53 Commune with Lava
54 Gale, Waterdeep Prodigy
55 Psychic Possession
56 Floating Dream Zubera
57 Xorn
58 Harmonic Prodigy
59 Precursor Golem
60 Bolt Bend
Going for BB_{w^3 + w2 + 7}(12,985) damage.
Also Gerard's Hourglass Pendant won't work with Worldfire - probably better to go with World Shaper, and use Auramancer to fetch Spellweaver Volute. GHP allowed us to get tapped Pain Seers, so I think without it we can bring Pain Seer and Tolarian Kraken back for more layer efficiency.
1 Coat of Arms
2 Xathrid Necromancer
3 Artificial Evolution
4 Arcbond
5 Comeuppance
6 Dralnu's Crusade
Starting a Computation
7 Opalescence
8 Wrong Turn
9 Kaervek's Spite
10 Goblin Boom Keg
11 March of the Machines
Utility: Enchantments/Artifacts
12 Vedalken Orrery
13 Apprentice Wizard
14 Twinning Glass
Utility: Spells
15 Thousand-Year Storm
Utility: Creatures
16 Bloodbond March
17 Cephalid Shrine
Foundry Stage
18 Anaba Ancestor
19 Soul Foundry
20 Anger
21 Volcanic Island
22 Cowardice
23 Illusionist's Bracers
24 Sigarda's Aid
25 Mirror of Fate
26 Shriekhorn
27 Spellweaver Volute
28 Copy Enchantment
29 Fated Infatuation
30 Arcanist's Owl
31 Lingering Souls
32 Radiant Fountain
33 K'rrik, Son of Yawgmoth
34 World Shaper
35 Auramancer
Helix Megastage
36 Spellweaver Helix
37 Worldfire
38 Divine Congregation
39 Siphon Insight
40 Siphon Insight
41 Mox Sapphire
42 Panharmonicon
Green Mana Stage
43 Groundskeeper
44 Firebrand Ranger
45 Forest
Red/White Mana Stage
46 Seedcradle Witch
47 Ignition Team
48 Archaeological Dig
49 Flash
50 Academy Rector
51 Omniscience
52 Sphinx of Enlightenment
Layers
53 Smoke Spirits' Aid
54 Pain Seer
55 Tolarian Kraken
56 Psychic Possession
57 Floating Dream Zubera
58 Xorn
59 Harmonic Prodigy
60 Precursor Golem
Still BB_{w^3 + w2 + 7}(12,985) damage.
The problem now is how to keep artifacts around through Kaervek's Spite. We can't get them back from the graveyard by design, so we'll have to donate them to the opponent. But currently we can't get them back from there cheap enough because Anaba Ancestor can't target them.
I think Roon of the Hidden Realm would work as the stage creature, but require Mirror Gallery. IIRC we can also use creatures that sacrifice themselves instead of the "target another" restriction. That would allow us to use for example Armor Thrull. That would allow us to recover the artifacts.
Apprentice Wizard can't be used to generate mana without any cheap blue. But Palladium Myr is an easy replacement.
The second additional stage doesn't work as is because we can use Fated Infatuation to create copies of Archaeological Dig after it has been animated by Ignition Team
We could still conceivably use something like Captain of the Mists to untap. The problem is, that seems to be the only ability we need; once we sacrifice the land, we can bring it back via World Shaper to be untapped again. Similarly for Gretchen Titchwillow; after we sacrifice the land, we can use WOrldfire to exile it, and then bring it back to the library to be drawn again. Similarly for Ruin Ghost.
Perhaps World Shaper is the problem here. What else can we do for the hyperstage? My first thought was to use something like Fountain of Youth. But, we can kill it easily with March of the Machines, so I don't know how we would do better with [c]Kaervek's Spite[c].
So, let's try the following:
1 Coat of Arms
2 Xathrid Necromancer
3 Artificial Evolution
4 Arcbond
5 Comeuppance
6 Dralnu's Crusade
Starting a Computation
7 Opalescence
8 Wrong Turn
9 Kaervek's Spite
10 Goblin Boom Keg
11 March of the Machines
Utility: Enchantments/Artifacts
12 Vedalken Orrery
13 Palladium Myr
14 Twinning Glass
Utility: Spells
15 Thousand-Year Storm
Utility: Creatures
16 Bloodbond March
17 Cephalid Shrine
Foundry Stage
18 Armor Thrull
19 Soul Foundry
20 Anger
21 Badlands
22 Cowardice
23 Illusionist's Bracers
24 Sigarda's Aid
25 Mirror of Fate
26 Shriekhorn
27 Spellweaver Volute
28 Spellweaver Volute
29 Fated Infatuation
30 Lingering Souls
31 K'rrik, Son of Yawgmoth
32 Archon of Falling Stars
33 Pious Interdiction
Helix Megastage
34 Spellweaver Helix
35 Worldfire
36 Divine Congregation
37 Hungry for More
38 Hungry for More
39 Mox Ruby
40 Panharmonicon
41 Arcanist's Owl
Green Mana Stage
42 Groundskeeper
43 Firebrand Ranger
44 Forest
Blue Mana Stage
45 Ruin Ghost
46 Weathered Wayfarer
47 Archaeological Dig
48 Patron of the Moon
49 Dryad Arbor
50 Flash
51 Academy Rector
52 Omniscience
53 Words of Wisdom
Layers
54 Smoke Spirits' Aid
55 Gale, Waterdeep Prodigy
56 Pain Seer
57 Tolarian Kraken
58 Floating-Dream Zubera
59 Harmonic Prodigy
60 Bolt Bend
It occurs to me that Harmonic Prodigy should work on both of Tolarian Kraken's triggered abilities, for a potential of 2 layers, although it requires Bolt Bend. So the above should get us to BB_{w^3 + w2 + 6}(14,700).
We can use Chromescale Drake instead. I think that means we don't get our life back by resolving Worldfire, so we'd use Bump in the Night to start the megastage transition. To get the enchantments back we then need to resolve the next hyperstage transition from down on the stack, but that should be fine.
I don't think Harmonic Prodigy works like that for Tolarian Kraken's reflexive triggered ability. The Kraken itself only has one ability, so only that would be influenced by the Prodigy. The part with "when you do" works like a delayed triggered ability that is set up by the ability of the Kraken, but is not an ability of the Kraken itself.
Another possibility for the second additional stage is Captain of the Mists + Gretchen Titchwillow. That does free up a couple of card slots, and frees up either white mana or red mana as well (and possibly black mana, althouth we can pay costs with life). But, it moots card draw and tapping/untapping; I'm not seeing how we get to 6 layers, even with the advantages.
Edit: Landscaper Colos beats Weathered Wayfarer, allowing us to drop Dryad Arbor. So we can add Psychic Possession, bumping back up to BB_{w^3 + w2 + 7} (12,985).
Updated deck:
1 Coat of Arms
2 Xathrid Necromancer
3 Artificial Evolution
4 Arcbond
5 Comeuppance
6 Dralnu's Crusade
Starting a Computation
7 Opalescence
8 Wrong Turn
9 Kaervek's Spite
10 Goblin Boom Keg
11 March of the Machines
Utility: Enchantments/Artifacts
12 Vedalken Orrery
13 Palladium Myr
14 Twinning Glass
Utility: Spells
15 Thousand-Year Storm
Utility: Creatures
16 Bloodbond March
17 Cephalid Shrine
Foundry Stage
18 Armor Thrull
19 Soul Foundry
20 Anger
21 Badlands
22 Cowardice
23 Illusionist's Bracers
24 Sigarda's Aid
25 Mirror of Fate
26 Shriekhorn
27 Spellweaver Volute
28 Spellweaver Volute
29 Fated Infatuation
30 Lingering Souls
31 K'rrik, Son of Yawgmoth
32 Archon of Falling Stars
33 Pious Interdiction
Helix Megastage
34 Spellweaver Helix
35 Worldfire
36 Divine Congregation
37 Hungry for More
38 Hungry for More
39 Mox Ruby
40 Panharmonicon
41 Chromescale Drake
Green Mana Stage
42 Groundskeeper
43 Firebrand Ranger
44 Forest
Blue Mana Stage
45 Ruin Ghost
46 Landscaper Colos
47 Archaeological Dig
48 Patron of the Moon
49 Flash
50 Academy Rector
51 Omniscience
52 Words of Wisdom
Layers
53 Smoke Spirits' Aid
54 Pain Seer
55 Tolarian Kraken
56 Psychic Possession
57 Floating-Dream Zubera
58 Harmonic Prodigy
59 Precursor Golem
60 Xorn
Edit: Oh no we can't; we don't have a way to refill the opponent's library. No layer additions for one card? If not, we can go for God-Pharaoh's Gift for BB_{w^3 + w2 + 6} (BB_{w^3 + w2 + 6} (14,700)).
Edit: Is Riftsweeper okay instead of Mirror of Fate? If so, we could refill the opponent's library, even up to 60. So we could add Psychic Possession, and go up to BB_{w^3 + w2 + 7}(14,700).
But I don't think Landscaper Colos works. Archaeological Dig isn't a basic land. And we have no way to copy the cycling ability.
Edit: While Anger is really nice, we can perhaps save a card by switching this out with Phabine. So:
1 Coat of Arms
2 Xathrid Necromancer
3 Artificial Evolution
4 Arcbond
5 Comeuppance
6 Dralnu's Crusade
Starting a Computation
7 Opalescence
8 Wrong Turn
9 Kaervek's Spite
10 Goblin Boom Keg
11 March of the Machines
Utility: Enchantments/Artifacts
12 Vedalken Orrery
13 Akki Rockspeaker
14 Twinning Glass
Utility: Spells
15 Thousand-Year Storm
Utility: Creatures
16 Bloodbond March
17 Cephalid Shrine
Foundry Stage
18 Dega Disciple
19 Soul Foundry
20 Phabine, Boss's Confidant
21 Cowardice
22 Illusionist's Bracers
23 Sigarda's Aid
24 Riftsweeper
25 Shriekhorn
26 Spellweaver Volute
27 Spellweaver Volute
28 Fated Infatuation
29 Lingering Souls
30 K'rrik, Son of Yawgmoth
31 Archon of Falling Stars
32 Pious Interdiction
Helix Megastage
33 Spellweaver Helix
34 Worldfire
35 Divine Congregation
36 Siphon Insight
37 Siphon Insight
38 Mox Sapphire
39 Panharmonicon
40 Chromescale Drake
Green Mana Stage
41 Groundskeeper
42 Firebrand Ranger
43 Forest
Blue Mana Stage
44 Ruin Ghost
45 Weathered Wayfarer
46 Archaeological Dig
47 Patron of the Moon
48 Dryad Arbor
49 Flash
50 Academy Rector
51 Omniscience
52 Caress of Phyrexia
Layers
53 Smoke Spirits' Aid
54 Pain Seer
55 Tolarian Kraken
56 Psychic Possession
57 Floating-Dream Zubera
58 Harmonic Prodigy
59 Precursor Golem
60 Xorn
for BB_{w^3 + w2 + 7}(14,700).
Instead of Dryad Arbor, we could use something like Celestial Colonnade, which comes into play tapped... except, once it becomes a creature we can untap it with Tolarian Kraken. I think it's okay without Tolarian Kraken though, so maybe if we take the Kraken out of the layer sequence, we can get an extra slot.
So, how about:
1 Coat of Arms
2 Xathrid Necromancer
3 Artificial Evolution
4 Arcbond
5 Comeuppance
6 Dralnu's Crusade
Starting a Computation
7 Opalescence
8 Wrong Turn
9 Kaervek's Spite
10 Goblin Boom Keg
11 March of the Machines
Utility: Enchantments/Artifacts
12 Vedalken Orrery
13 Akki Rockspeaker
14 Twinning Glass
Utility: Spells
15 Thousand-Year Storm
Utility: Creatures
16 Bloodbond March
17 Cephalid Shrine
Foundry Stage
18 Dega Disciple
19 Soul Foundry
20 Phabine, Boss's Confidant
21 Cowardice
22 Illusionist's Bracers
23 Sigarda's Aid
24 Riftsweeper
25 Shriekhorn
26 Spellweaver Volute
27 Spellweaver Volute
28 Fated Infatuation
29 Lingering Souls
30 K'rrik, Son of Yawgmoth
31 Archon of Falling Stars
32 Pious Interdiction
Helix Megastage
33 Spellweaver Helix
34 Worldfire
35 Divine Congregation
36 Siphon Insight
37 Siphon Insight
38 Mox Sapphire
39 Panharmonicon
40 Chromescale Drake
Green Mana Stage
41 Groundskeeper
42 Firebrand Ranger
43 Forest
Blue Mana Stage
44 Ruin Ghost
45 Weathered Wayfarer
46 Archaeological Dig
47 Patron of the Moon
48 Celestial Colonnade
49 Flash
50 Academy Rector
51 Omniscience
52 Caress of Phyrexia
Layers
53 Smoke Spirits' Aid
54 Warden of the WOods
55 Entangling Trap
56 Sentry Oak
Misc Utility
57 Precursor Golem
58 Xorn
59 Psychic Battle
60 Grip of Chaos
How much damage can we get out of this deck? Can we replace Thousand-Year Storm with Repeated Reverberation, and/or replace Caress of Phyrexia with Garruk, Primal Hunter, to help with the start?