Ah yes, looks like a real issue - archon (through returning cowardice) enables cooperative bouncing interleaved with its death triggers. As the hyperstage transition didn't itself consume lower resources to create by flashing back souls, and instead relies on the recovery costing something, then this bouncing enables a self-contained transition that loops.
This fix looks decent. Even Floodchaser and Evidence Examiner become additional creatures that don't need to be drawn.
So for general milling, you would have Anikthea, Hand of Erebos and Riftsweeper in hand. Play anikthea, target Tymaret calls the dead in grave. In response to its chapter abilitiy, play Riftsweeper to reshuffle and mill it back.
I suppose as part of megastage transitions you need to hang out a saga trigger on the stack. Should be doable though.
I thought there was a potential loop involving anekthea targetting itself and dying due to legend rule, but it exiles and there's an additional cost required to reshuffling, so it's fine.
(btw, do you have prefered pronouns to refer to you in the writeup?)
Oh wait, the fact that Liberated Livestock doesn't target the auras it returns is an issue. It can be interleaved with Goblin boom keg triggers that, by killing an opponent's keg, end up killing the token the pious was attached to for the next livestock trigger to return it more times.
Edit: giving one boom keg lifelink through an aura could work. Many auras to do that, like Lifelink. However that limits us to a 3-life cost flashback sorcery like Acorn harvest, which all lock off a colour of mana to be used for a later stage.
But if we can do a black mana stage that's fine.
A lifelink granting Aura could work. We might use Flash of Defiance and something like Iron Myr instead of Metalworker for cheap red. That frees up black for the megastage, where the color switch is probably easier than for the additional stages where we need specific abilities.
Yep. Does make the start a bit more awkward though with not having red for Epic Experiment.
Also casts a card slot for a lifelinker to keep opponent alive from dropping K'irrk
Edit: wait no ofc that doesn't work you could still gain 3 life from a keg
you'd need something that deals 4 damage to opponent on death
Edit: oh Knight rampager
+ Revenge of the Rats to cost 4 life
getting an "enchant creature" aura back into hand is also something we need to avoid, as casting them can be used to bounce. Are there better ways we can recycle enchantments if we don't need to be so careful about the timing?
Oh, Academy Rector sounds good! Though we'd still have to be a bit careful, because we could still start a computation and bring back Cowardice to bounce High Fae Trickster back to hand. So we'd have to go back to Vedalken Orrery + Twinning Glass. Losing a precious card slot that we might not be able to afford right now.
I was thinking about Leyline of Anticipation so we could get flash back with Anikthea, Hand of Erebos triggers. But then Rector could just put in the Leyline directly and get an illegal computation even easier.
There's Kianne, Corrupted Memory who doesn't have flash herself. We could get her back via Bloodbond March triggers, which might be good enough? Would require some careful power management though.
Edit: Nah, I think Kianne doesn't work. If we recover flash after a hyperstage transition using Bloodbond March then it would be too expensive to create a token copy as well. But without a copy we lose flash when we try to bounce Kianne in order to create the Bloodbond March trigger for the next transition...
Oh, Kianne is interesting.
We can resolve a Martyr of Spores activation to get copies of her to different parities to not have to worry, but need to carefully consider how to get that set up in the first place.
Post spite transition stage could be
- Ensure odd number of coat of arms are in play with even number of illusions
- Resolve floating Anikthea, Hand or Erebos triggers to return omni, cowardice
- Resolve floating grip triggers to bounce nontoken foundry, martyr, other stuff
- Resolve down to BBM to put in kianne. Power=even to cast noncreatures. Flash in at least panharmonicon, foundry, which can imprint 2 things - martyr and riftsweeper; activate and shuffle these in (replenished catalyst for this batch of grips)
- Resolve floating tymmeret calls (setting this up required stranding tymmeret calls in the library until the hyperstage transition could fated it)
- Resolve down to BBM to put in nontoken riftsweeper and ankthea
- Resolve down to BBM to put in notken martyr
- Sac nontoken martyr to bounce foundry and riftsweeper
- Resolve another BBM to put in nontoken martyr
- Play foundry, in response to imprint, sac nontoken martyr to bounce Kianne imprint kianne and activate. Reveal riftsweeper for X=1. (power=even - noncreature flash)
- With grip triggers, bounce out an illusion to to set Kianne's power to odd to enable creature flash. This enables playing riftweeper in response to ankthea making a tymmeret calls to allow for safely milling cards. With this and bounces, mill kianne and cowardice
- Bounce out cowardice, resolve martyr X=1 activation to buff Kianne. Ensure this ends up on an odd power to enable creature flash
- Ankthea to put back in cowardice
- Resolve next BBM for nontoken martyr
- Resolve down the next batch of grip triggers. Can manage parity by bouncing illusions to ensure now we can foundry out another martyr token (replenishing catalyst for this batch) while unexiling and milling everything needed
- Resolve down to BBM to put in kianne. Both kiannes now have different parities so we now have full flash independent of creature count.
Assuming that does work, megastage transitions could look like
- Resolve floating tymeret calls (mill ankthea, tymeret calls, channex) (setting up stranded tymeret calls in library)
- BBMs for chanex, ankthea (milling kianne, rector, ?), BBM in those
- Floating Gatebreakers to draw artifacts (setup used martyr tokens; fine when an upcoming hyperstage transition is part of setup); play them (kianne power=2 for noncreature flash) (uses colourless mana befre omni in)
- Floating riftsweepers to reshuffle tymmeret calls
- Resolve floating wrong turn to donate channex
- Resolve through hyperstage transition casting spite, rector puts in pious
- Floating tymmeret calls (milling tymeret calls, ?, ?)
- BBM for kianne (power=2, noncreature flash)
- BBM for ankthea for tymmeret calls (milling ?, ?, ?)
- BBM for martyr, riftsweeper
- Floating martyr X=1 on kianne (power=3, creature flash enabled)
- Floating TYS-fated from hyoerstage transition, copy kianne (power=2, full flash enabled), tymmert calls (all needed milling done), anikthea (all needed enchantments back), martyrs - full stage power enabled
- Might need to do anther hyperstage transition to donate grips
Apparent possible issue: No easy way to recycled emblem of the warmind, until resolving a resurgent belief.
However, this might not be an issue. We do get access to haste upon a megastage transition. Above the top-level megastage transition we don't need to do the full hyperstage to scale, so can keep the emblem in play throught; and generate enough colourless mana such that there's enough to resolve through the megastage transition and then create a new one.
Issue 2: Startup.
Need to mill some cards, but playing the noncreature tymeret calls strands it in play with the only way to remove it being spite. Metalworker -> Millikin could work; milling tymmeret calls first to then be able to mill more cards with anikthea+fated
Cards to draw on startup:
Total from 7 openning and 9 IIs: 25
Startup required:
- Mox, Dig, Experiment, II - 4
- Worldfire, Abandon - 2
- Ghitu encampment, SSA - 2
- Non-drawable creatures: Martyr, Channex, Rector, Grazer, Firebrand ranger, Groundskeeper, Ruin Ghost, Wayfarer - 8
oh hang on, Tezzeret's Gatebreaker draws fated too cheaply, so it doesn't work. It can be in exile after a hyperstage transition.
-> we need another way to recycle volute
So I don't know how we'd recycle Volute without also recycling whatever aura helps us gain life. And recycling it without it and other aura's hitting the hand seems hard in general. So we can't really use creature auras. Looking at "enchant land" I didn't see anything useful. But "enchant artifact" has Viridian Harvest, which might be combined with Army of the Damned.
Edit: Ah, I thought Mox Ruby and Mana Crypt dying to March of the Machines would be fine since it takes the more expensive Worldfire to recycle them. But Worldfire is not allowed to let any life through, and now it does with the deaths of those 2 artifacts. So this doesn't quite work
This setup also recycles Embelem of the warmind too cheaply i think
other haste enablers are tricky - opponent mustn't have mana for martyr and even with metalworker haste still can sac ghitu encapment to brutal suppression which is bad
Would a second Academy Rector work? Loses a card but might be better than nothing. Rectors can bring back 2 enchantments, which have to be Spellweaver Volute and Pious Interdiction if we want to repeatedly trigger Volute. We'd play something like Barrier Breach instead of Tymaret calls the dead to get a chance to move Volute into the library in time. Go back to Chromescale Drake to recover Artifacts after Megastage transitions.
This doesn't have the option of recovering Emblem of the Warmind except by using Megastage transitions. You mentioned that might be often enough?
An alternative haste source could be Anger. But it needs an extra card for the mountain unless the green stage can still produce batches of blue when we run a Snow Mountain instead of a Snow Island. (Maybe providing a second target for the Floodchaser ability is enough, I wouldn't rule it out.) It also has the same problem of needing a Megastage transition to recover the mountain back into play. So it's probably just worse.
I considered second rector, but wasn't sure how to get the timing working. looks like an enchantment removal spell does work though. (thought there would be an issue with getting the correct LKI of floating volute triggers to point to spite, but it is sufficient to remove it while it's on spite).
(is cycling on barrier breach specifically ok? looks like it is if there isn't a way to copy the cycling ability or draw it cheaply)
If cycling isn't fine there are plenty of alternatives without. In some former versions of the deck cycling cards could help with the start by turning the batches of 2 draws into functionally batches of 1. Not sure if that's gonna matter here, I just picked a variant with a possible upside
Yeah seems like it should be fine.
In fact it could be a cheap way to give Kianne +1 power during startup for creature flash
Now, if we have to cut a card, i suppose it has to be Smoke spirit's aid? Worth 2 layers, like evidnce examiner; but the latter also seems necessary for drawing all the creatures in the first place now
then each draw is worth a white by substituting a wayfarer and drawing dig i suppose
Yeah, Smoke Spirits' Aid is the only possible cut I see. unfortunately without it it's more like every clue is worth a white. Cracking a clue gives us X copies of "draw a card" which we use for Archaeological Dig. In the same way that each use of white to activate Weathered Wayfarer gives us X copies of abilities that give us dig.
At that point we might as well us Sky Crier for the white stage and get rid of Ghitu Encampment. Which saves a card and allows the opponent to get haste because they have no lands to sacrifice and make use of Metalworker haste. Should make plays a bit easier.
But if we do that I'm not sure what to do with the extra card slot since SSA would very much go infinite...
hm, with grip of chaos for scaling martyr value, Ashnod the uncaring + Brutal Suppression + Search for glory -> Dynaheir, Invoker Adept + Oppressive rays seems to save a card slot (rays can't go on foundry cheaply enough to cause issues there) + provides haste saving another slot
provides opponent haste as well, but without the ghitu encampment sac outlet that seems fine
it doesn't scale clues however
edit: hm might not work; iirc if foundry exiles multiple cards due to panharmonicon it uses the total mana value
which can be more than 4 and thus copies too many martyrs
Haha, it's kinda crazy how many infinites were found much later to have existed for a long long time. A bit embarrassing, but it goes to show just how complicated and delicate this deck construction is!
But yeah, really amazing work guys, just like always.
But now 2nd Rector goes infinite: After triggering Volute sacrifice 1 Rector with Flash to bring back lifelink. Then cast 2nd Rector to bring both Rectors back with Bloodbond March. Sacrifice both Rectors to Spite, grab Cowardice and Volute. Use the Cowardice for delayed bouncing to go infinite.
Using just a single Rector is not powerful enough: If we sacrifice it with flash it is stuck in gy/exile/library and can't be brought back before we cast Spite, so we only get a single aura back per transition. Not good enough.
My attempt was to replace 2nd Rector with Divergent Transformations. Alternating Flash and DT we can bring back any auras we like before casting Spite, which brings lifelink back in time. But Spite itself can only bring back 1 aura, which has to be Volute if we want to repeat anything. DT doesn't allow us to leak ressources through the hyperstage transition because Volutes get locked into casting Spite. It can't leak through megastage transitions, because after Worldfire there are no targets.
This seems to work fine when going through a single hyperstage transition over and over. The problem is that we can't leave multiple of these transitions on the stack. We'd want both Flash and DT as floating spells. For just the hyperstage we could maybe around that: Use the Spite aura recovery to bring back Lifelink when we want to consume more transitions. Only bring back Volute when we need to put a new transition on the stack afterwards. How to get Rampagers into play to receive those Lifelinks would be another challenge.
But I don't see how to make is work after a megastage transition has exiled everything. Before we resolve the next partial hyperstage transition we need to resolve Flash to get back Lifelink, DT to get Rector ready, as well as Wrong Turn and Arcbond to give the opponent the chance to get some life back before our Rampager hits them. But we only have 1 floating spell, so no way that works out.
Independent from the use of Flash that problem seems to arise from just using Rampager + Lifelink already. The combo would need some way for the opponent to gain life without requiring multiple different instants after Worldfire if we want to use them.
I was wondering if there could be a way to have animating artifacts be done through Titania's Song rather than March of the machines. That way, a goblin boom keg wouldn't be able to both be a creature to take damage from another keg, and have its death trigger to target other things upon death; thereby making cowardice safe to return through Archon of falling stars.
However, then it seems there would no way to donate a useful Coat of arms for use during a computation.
However, Sliver legion provides a similar effect to coat of arms; perhaps it could substitute it? Ratadrabik of urborg if it's safe can give copies of it a second creature type to keep them alive.
The way I read it Titania's Song bricks all our artifacts forever, even the ones we play after getting rid of it. That makes it kinda unusable.
If I'm wrong about that and the effect persists only for artifacts that were in play at the same time as Titania's Song, then yes, this sounds like a great way to save the Archon version of the deck.
Ah yes, that's probably right, so it doesn't work
Edit: Apparently this is a rules question that has doesn't have a clear official answer. The interpretation that it does shut off future artifacts is more intuitive to me, however.
Is there a way we can avoid needing to animate our artifacts altogether? Coat of arms->Sliver legion eliminates the need to donate coat of arms. Goblin boom keg only needs to be recycled through megastage transitions to have one computation per top level megastage transition which is enough.
Orrery we've already substituted for trickster or kianne.
So then the other question is Soul foundry; which needs to be bounced or otherwise recycled during stage stuff.
A card that just bounces artifacts is probably sufficient; but perhaps only recycling it through megastage transitions is enough on its own? At the top level you don't get full stages, but underneath the first megastage transition we may still be able to recycle foundry in time to sustain the stage.
However, if recoving from a megastage transition or hyperstage requires using the foundry multiple times to recover martyr spent in setup, then that might not work.
Ah, but also a card like Dispersal technician also doesn't work by reusing Mox ruby too much.
Edit: Was wondering how far you could get with just multiple copies of foundry, but I don't think that works.
At the "top level" hyperstage transition, which can create megastage transitions above it, you're spending a few martyr triggers to do that hyperstage/megastage transition.
When the batch of martyr triggers gets low, you use a soul foundry and some triggers from the next batch down to replanish the martyr token and recreate a bigger batch.
But you could then need to resolve through arbitrarily many low batches like this needing a foundry for each one; without an opportunity to do a hyperstage transition in between to recycle the foundrys, as you need to convert in play martyrs into batches of triggers first to not lose them.
Nightmare shepherd comes somewhat close to an alternative for foundry; but it doesn't work due to allowing necromancers in play while starting computations.
Creatures with an abilitiy to discard themselves that also target (e.g. Shinen of Fear's Chill) i believe form a stage with gtip of chaos + bloodbond march; but all cut off a colour of mana.
The problem there is that Chromescale Drake could get Replica out of the library without using Bloodbond March. For the hyperstage we preserve artifacts via donation + bounce anyway. So we can afford the recovery for the megastage to be more expensive. work with an instant instead? Only recover noncreatue artifacts? Somehow I can't find anything that works :/
So we have room for 3 cards to make upkeep happen. Starting in our actual upkeep without even a land drop seems unlikely. We'll want Sphinx of the Second Sun or something similar to get additional upkeeps later in the turn. Unfortunately all such effects seem to add the upkeep after combat. So we need to make combat safe. Let's try and remove haste, so nothing can attack to cause any combat damage.
This gives us the part of haste we actually want. Tyvar isn't donatable. Aid the Fallen brings this "haste" back on top of the highest megastage transition to create a sufficient amount of colorless. Aid does nothing after resolving Worldfire since the graveyard got exiled, so the megastage doesn't leak. We can pay a red to have Tyvar around for the additional stages. If that is too expensive for the blue stage we can try Call the Gatewatch, which would leak Tyvar activations below the megastage transition. But I think those can't be turned into active resources? Aid seems safer if it works.
(Edit: Obscura Charm looks like a non-leaking alternative that only costs life to be there for the blue stage.)
We can run an infinite computation stopped by deathtouch Arcbond to give the opponent an arbitrary amount of life. So the only limit on Harvest is the power of our creatures. That will be buffed from the normal computations creature output via Coat of Arms.
I think that covers everything? So after adding Sphinx we still have 1 slot left. We probably want to swap out Evidence Examiner for 2 cards that get us layers of draws at the beginning of upkeep.
Hm, looks good. Gravitic punch is an alternative finisher over Abandon the post; if golem + grip works for post-computation scaling and worth an ending layer.
Edit: actually punch is itself post-computation scaling as well through lifelink
Tamiyo's Journal or Morska, Undersea Sleuth are possible ways to go for ending layers. The Ninth Doctor almost gets a layer from 1 untap step = many upkeep steps, but haste makes it unworkable World at war is a layer from first postcombat main -> many postcombat mains (to each trigger many sphinxes)
Search for glory already recycles tyvar without need for aid the fallen or similar. It can do so under a megastage transition, but in order to leak anything out of its activations, you'd need to resolve the stack all the way down to an empty stack without resolving hyperstage transitions. Not sure you can get full worldfire recovery from this, but seems like you would have to lose resources.
Tyvar activations then get you about as much power as an augur token (ig they can untap foundry).
Oh and in fact they only work if you're in a main phase and not an upkeep anyway so the full power of the combo is severely hampered.
So it seems safe.
Then there's a question of how much of the combo is possible outside of an upkeep to maximise number of Sphinx of the second sun or World at war before moving to postcombat main phase.
Heh, I forgot about Search for Glory. I agree that with the sorcery speed restriction the Tyvar activations seem safe. Untapping Ghitu Encampment could create a red, but also costs a red to animate (and w layer stuff to get into play) after Worldfire so that's fine.
Without Cowardice I don't see how Precursor Golem + Grip of Chaos would scale us from computation. We would only get Fated Infatuation copies for our own golems. Our other 1 target instants/sorceries don't really create scaling ressources.
Edit: Hm, scaling from Gravitic Punch itself could work. Suddenly that's 2 more cards for ending layers than I expected
This fix looks decent. Even Floodchaser and Evidence Examiner become additional creatures that don't need to be drawn.
So for general milling, you would have Anikthea, Hand of Erebos and Riftsweeper in hand. Play anikthea, target Tymaret calls the dead in grave. In response to its chapter abilitiy, play Riftsweeper to reshuffle and mill it back.
I suppose as part of megastage transitions you need to hang out a saga trigger on the stack. Should be doable though.
I thought there was a potential loop involving anekthea targetting itself and dying due to legend rule, but it exiles and there's an additional cost required to reshuffling, so it's fine.
(btw, do you have prefered pronouns to refer to you in the writeup?)
Oh wait, the fact that Liberated Livestock doesn't target the auras it returns is an issue. It can be interleaved with Goblin boom keg triggers that, by killing an opponent's keg, end up killing the token the pious was attached to for the next livestock trigger to return it more times.
Edit: Hm, Cass, hand of vengeance could work? or nope, legendary so its easy to die
Edit: giving one boom keg lifelink through an aura could work. Many auras to do that, like Lifelink. However that limits us to a 3-life cost flashback sorcery like Acorn harvest, which all lock off a colour of mana to be used for a later stage.
But if we can do a black mana stage that's fine.
Yes, Liberated Livestock not targeting is an issue.
A lifelink granting Aura could work. We might use Flash of Defiance and something like Iron Myr instead of Metalworker for cheap red. That frees up black for the megastage, where the color switch is probably easier than for the additional stages where we need specific abilities.
Also casts a card slot for a lifelinker to keep opponent alive from dropping K'irrk
There's also Judith, Carnage Connoisseur which can make tokens for which one can provide 2 life from lifelink aura
switching Liberated Livestock+Pious Indictation for judith+Staggering Insight could work and not lose any card slots; staggering insight can be drawn by Tezzeret's Gatebreaker
Edit: wait no ofc that doesn't work you could still gain 3 life from a keg
you'd need something that deals 4 damage to opponent on death
Edit: oh Knight rampager
+ Revenge of the Rats to cost 4 life
Hm, could Academy Rector work? Like archon but you can only get one trigger from the nontoken. If you don't get pious then you've lost resources.
I was thinking about Leyline of Anticipation so we could get flash back with Anikthea, Hand of Erebos triggers. But then Rector could just put in the Leyline directly and get an illegal computation even easier.
There's Kianne, Corrupted Memory who doesn't have flash herself. We could get her back via Bloodbond March triggers, which might be good enough? Would require some careful power management though.
Edit: Nah, I think Kianne doesn't work. If we recover flash after a hyperstage transition using Bloodbond March then it would be too expensive to create a token copy as well. But without a copy we lose flash when we try to bounce Kianne in order to create the Bloodbond March trigger for the next transition...
We can resolve a Martyr of Spores activation to get copies of her to different parities to not have to worry, but need to carefully consider how to get that set up in the first place.
Post spite transition stage could be
- Ensure odd number of coat of arms are in play with even number of illusions
- Resolve floating Anikthea, Hand or Erebos triggers to return omni, cowardice
- Resolve floating grip triggers to bounce nontoken foundry, martyr, other stuff
- Resolve down to BBM to put in kianne. Power=even to cast noncreatures. Flash in at least panharmonicon, foundry, which can imprint 2 things - martyr and riftsweeper; activate and shuffle these in (replenished catalyst for this batch of grips)
- Resolve floating tymmeret calls (setting this up required stranding tymmeret calls in the library until the hyperstage transition could fated it)
- Resolve down to BBM to put in nontoken riftsweeper and ankthea
- Resolve down to BBM to put in notken martyr
- Sac nontoken martyr to bounce foundry and riftsweeper
- Resolve another BBM to put in nontoken martyr
- Play foundry, in response to imprint, sac nontoken martyr to bounce Kianne imprint kianne and activate. Reveal riftsweeper for X=1. (power=even - noncreature flash)
- With grip triggers, bounce out an illusion to to set Kianne's power to odd to enable creature flash. This enables playing riftweeper in response to ankthea making a tymmeret calls to allow for safely milling cards. With this and bounces, mill kianne and cowardice
- Bounce out cowardice, resolve martyr X=1 activation to buff Kianne. Ensure this ends up on an odd power to enable creature flash
- Ankthea to put back in cowardice
- Resolve next BBM for nontoken martyr
- Resolve down the next batch of grip triggers. Can manage parity by bouncing illusions to ensure now we can foundry out another martyr token (replenishing catalyst for this batch) while unexiling and milling everything needed
- Resolve down to BBM to put in kianne. Both kiannes now have different parities so we now have full flash independent of creature count.
- Resolve floating tymeret calls (mill ankthea, tymeret calls, channex) (setting up stranded tymeret calls in library)
- BBMs for chanex, ankthea (milling kianne, rector, ?), BBM in those
- Floating Gatebreakers to draw artifacts (setup used martyr tokens; fine when an upcoming hyperstage transition is part of setup); play them (kianne power=2 for noncreature flash) (uses colourless mana befre omni in)
- Floating riftsweepers to reshuffle tymmeret calls
- Resolve floating wrong turn to donate channex
- Resolve through hyperstage transition casting spite, rector puts in pious
- Floating tymmeret calls (milling tymeret calls, ?, ?)
- BBM for kianne (power=2, noncreature flash)
- BBM for ankthea for tymmeret calls (milling ?, ?, ?)
- BBM for martyr, riftsweeper
- Floating martyr X=1 on kianne (power=3, creature flash enabled)
- Floating TYS-fated from hyoerstage transition, copy kianne (power=2, full flash enabled), tymmert calls (all needed milling done), anikthea (all needed enchantments back), martyrs - full stage power enabled
- Might need to do anther hyperstage transition to donate grips
Apparent possible issue: No easy way to recycled emblem of the warmind, until resolving a resurgent belief.
However, this might not be an issue. We do get access to haste upon a megastage transition. Above the top-level megastage transition we don't need to do the full hyperstage to scale, so can keep the emblem in play throught; and generate enough colourless mana such that there's enough to resolve through the megastage transition and then create a new one.
Issue 2: Startup.
Need to mill some cards, but playing the noncreature tymeret calls strands it in play with the only way to remove it being spite.
Metalworker -> Millikin could work; milling tymmeret calls first to then be able to mill more cards with anikthea+fated
Cards to draw on startup:
Total from 7 openning and 9 IIs: 25
Startup required:
- Mox, Dig, Experiment, II - 4
- Worldfire, Abandon - 2
- Ghitu encampment, SSA - 2
- Non-drawable creatures: Martyr, Channex, Rector, Grazer, Firebrand ranger, Groundskeeper, Ruin Ghost, Wayfarer - 8
oh hang on, Tezzeret's Gatebreaker draws fated too cheaply, so it doesn't work. It can be in exile after a hyperstage transition.
-> we need another way to recycle volute
Somehow I totally missed Tezzeret's Gatebreaker returning instants. Sorry!
So I don't know how we'd recycle Volute without also recycling whatever aura helps us gain life. And recycling it without it and other aura's hitting the hand seems hard in general. So we can't really use creature auras. Looking at "enchant land" I didn't see anything useful. But "enchant artifact" has Viridian Harvest, which might be combined with Army of the Damned.
The obvious problem would be that Kaervek's Spite needs to be the only way that any artifacts can die. Which is not true if we have access to any artifact creatures with a creature type. But I think that is actually avoidable.
- replace Metalworker with Deranged Assistant
- replace Master Transmuter with Muzzio, Visionary Architect
- replace Precursor Golem with Starlight. Be sad about loss of a layer.
We can use Rosecot Knight instead of Tezzeret's Gatebreaker to get artifacts and enchantments in hand.
Am I missing something again?
Edit: Ah, I thought Mox Ruby and Mana Crypt dying to March of the Machines would be fine since it takes the more expensive Worldfire to recycle them. But Worldfire is not allowed to let any life through, and now it does with the deaths of those 2 artifacts. So this doesn't quite work
other haste enablers are tricky - opponent mustn't have mana for martyr and even with metalworker haste still can sac ghitu encapment to brutal suppression which is bad
Would a second Academy Rector work? Loses a card but might be better than nothing. Rectors can bring back 2 enchantments, which have to be Spellweaver Volute and Pious Interdiction if we want to repeatedly trigger Volute. We'd play something like Barrier Breach instead of Tymaret calls the dead to get a chance to move Volute into the library in time. Go back to Chromescale Drake to recover Artifacts after Megastage transitions.
This doesn't have the option of recovering Emblem of the Warmind except by using Megastage transitions. You mentioned that might be often enough?
An alternative haste source could be Anger. But it needs an extra card for the mountain unless the green stage can still produce batches of blue when we run a Snow Mountain instead of a Snow Island. (Maybe providing a second target for the Floodchaser ability is enough, I wouldn't rule it out.) It also has the same problem of needing a Megastage transition to recover the mountain back into play. So it's probably just worse.
(is cycling on barrier breach specifically ok? looks like it is if there isn't a way to copy the cycling ability or draw it cheaply)
In fact it could be a cheap way to give Kianne +1 power during startup for creature flash
Now, if we have to cut a card, i suppose it has to be Smoke spirit's aid? Worth 2 layers, like evidnce examiner; but the latter also seems necessary for drawing all the creatures in the first place now
then each draw is worth a white by substituting a wayfarer and drawing dig i suppose
At that point we might as well us Sky Crier for the white stage and get rid of Ghitu Encampment. Which saves a card and allows the opponent to get haste because they have no lands to sacrifice and make use of Metalworker haste. Should make plays a bit easier.
But if we do that I'm not sure what to do with the extra card slot since SSA would very much go infinite...
provides opponent haste as well, but without the ghitu encampment sac outlet that seems fine
it doesn't scale clues however
edit: hm might not work; iirc if foundry exiles multiple cards due to panharmonicon it uses the total mana value
which can be more than 4 and thus copies too many martyrs
But yeah, really amazing work guys, just like always.
First problem is that Flash can be used instead of Kaervek's Spite to get the Rector death after a Spellweaver Volute trigger. So we can get back the life from Pious Interdiction and repeat without ever sacrificing our board. We'd have to use Knight Rampager + Lifelink instead.
But now 2nd Rector goes infinite: After triggering Volute sacrifice 1 Rector with Flash to bring back lifelink. Then cast 2nd Rector to bring both Rectors back with Bloodbond March. Sacrifice both Rectors to Spite, grab Cowardice and Volute. Use the Cowardice for delayed bouncing to go infinite.
Using just a single Rector is not powerful enough: If we sacrifice it with flash it is stuck in gy/exile/library and can't be brought back before we cast Spite, so we only get a single aura back per transition. Not good enough.
My attempt was to replace 2nd Rector with Divergent Transformations. Alternating Flash and DT we can bring back any auras we like before casting Spite, which brings lifelink back in time. But Spite itself can only bring back 1 aura, which has to be Volute if we want to repeat anything. DT doesn't allow us to leak ressources through the hyperstage transition because Volutes get locked into casting Spite. It can't leak through megastage transitions, because after Worldfire there are no targets.
This seems to work fine when going through a single hyperstage transition over and over. The problem is that we can't leave multiple of these transitions on the stack. We'd want both Flash and DT as floating spells. For just the hyperstage we could maybe around that: Use the Spite aura recovery to bring back Lifelink when we want to consume more transitions. Only bring back Volute when we need to put a new transition on the stack afterwards. How to get Rampagers into play to receive those Lifelinks would be another challenge.
But I don't see how to make is work after a megastage transition has exiled everything. Before we resolve the next partial hyperstage transition we need to resolve Flash to get back Lifelink, DT to get Rector ready, as well as Wrong Turn and Arcbond to give the opponent the chance to get some life back before our Rampager hits them. But we only have 1 floating spell, so no way that works out.
Independent from the use of Flash that problem seems to arise from just using Rampager + Lifelink already. The combo would need some way for the opponent to gain life without requiring multiple different instants after Worldfire if we want to use them.
However, then it seems there would no way to donate a useful Coat of arms for use during a computation.
However, Sliver legion provides a similar effect to coat of arms; perhaps it could substitute it? Ratadrabik of urborg if it's safe can give copies of it a second creature type to keep them alive.
If this is functional and makes archon safe, then the writeup decklist with March of the machines+Coat of arms -> Titania's song+Sliver legion would seem to work
and then the further optimisations Vedalken orrery+Twinning glass->Kianne, Corrupted memory (or just High fae trickster for simplicity, if bouncing before computations is no longer a concern. however, kianne would still probably be optimal for being drawable by Search for glory) and Opalesence+second Bloodbond march/Ondu spiritdancer -> Anikthea, Hand of Erebos seem to independently function for +2 card slots (for probably Precursor golem + Drivnod, Carnage Dominus
If I'm wrong about that and the effect persists only for artifacts that were in play at the same time as Titania's Song, then yes, this sounds like a great way to save the Archon version of the deck.
Edit: Apparently this is a rules question that has doesn't have a clear official answer. The interpretation that it does shut off future artifacts is more intuitive to me, however.
Is there a way we can avoid needing to animate our artifacts altogether?
Coat of arms->Sliver legion eliminates the need to donate coat of arms.
Goblin boom keg only needs to be recycled through megastage transitions to have one computation per top level megastage transition which is enough.
Orrery we've already substituted for trickster or kianne.
So then the other question is Soul foundry; which needs to be bounced or otherwise recycled during stage stuff.
A card that just bounces artifacts is probably sufficient; but perhaps only recycling it through megastage transitions is enough on its own? At the top level you don't get full stages, but underneath the first megastage transition we may still be able to recycle foundry in time to sustain the stage.
However, if recoving from a megastage transition or hyperstage requires using the foundry multiple times to recover martyr spent in setup, then that might not work.
Ah, but also a card like Dispersal technician also doesn't work by reusing Mox ruby too much.
Edit: Was wondering how far you could get with just multiple copies of foundry, but I don't think that works.
At the "top level" hyperstage transition, which can create megastage transitions above it, you're spending a few martyr triggers to do that hyperstage/megastage transition.
When the batch of martyr triggers gets low, you use a soul foundry and some triggers from the next batch down to replanish the martyr token and recreate a bigger batch.
But you could then need to resolve through arbitrarily many low batches like this needing a foundry for each one; without an opportunity to do a hyperstage transition in between to recycle the foundrys, as you need to convert in play martyrs into batches of triggers first to not lose them.
Nightmare shepherd comes somewhat close to an alternative for foundry; but it doesn't work due to allowing necromancers in play while starting computations.
Creatures with an abilitiy to discard themselves that also target (e.g. Shinen of Fear's Chill) i believe form a stage with gtip of chaos + bloodbond march; but all cut off a colour of mana.
Aven Augur would be nice if we could get started in our upkeep, but that seems tough.
More promising is Neurok Replica. We could use it without losing blue mana for stages by adding Oaken Siren. (replace Master Transmuter with Muzzio, Visionary Architect)
The problem there is that Chromescale Drake could get Replica out of the library without using Bloodbond March. For the hyperstage we preserve artifacts via donation + bounce anyway. So we can afford the recovery for the megastage to be more expensive. work with an instant instead? Only recover noncreatue artifacts? Somehow I can't find anything that works :/
Starting from the Archon of Falling Stars version in the write-up we can replace:
Cowardice, Martyr of Spores -> Aven Augur
Opalescence, 2nd Bloodbond March -> Anikthea, Hand of Erebos
Vedalken Orrery, Twinning Glass -> High Fae Trickster
So we have room for 3 cards to make upkeep happen. Starting in our actual upkeep without even a land drop seems unlikely. We'll want Sphinx of the Second Sun or something similar to get additional upkeeps later in the turn. Unfortunately all such effects seem to add the upkeep after combat. So we need to make combat safe. Let's try and remove haste, so nothing can attack to cause any combat damage.
Emblem of the Warmind -> Tyvar, Jubilant Brawler, Aid the Fallen
This gives us the part of haste we actually want. Tyvar isn't donatable. Aid the Fallen brings this "haste" back on top of the highest megastage transition to create a sufficient amount of colorless. Aid does nothing after resolving Worldfire since the graveyard got exiled, so the megastage doesn't leak. We can pay a red to have Tyvar around for the additional stages. If that is too expensive for the blue stage we can try Call the Gatewatch, which would leak Tyvar activations below the megastage transition. But I think those can't be turned into active resources? Aid seems safer if it works.
(Edit: Obscura Charm looks like a non-leaking alternative that only costs life to be there for the blue stage.)
Without dealing damage in combat we need a finisher:
Starlight -> Essence Harvest
We can run an infinite computation stopped by deathtouch Arcbond to give the opponent an arbitrary amount of life. So the only limit on Harvest is the power of our creatures. That will be buffed from the normal computations creature output via Coat of Arms.
I think that covers everything? So after adding Sphinx we still have 1 slot left. We probably want to swap out Evidence Examiner for 2 cards that get us layers of draws at the beginning of upkeep.
This actually looks pretty good.
Gravitic punch is an alternative finisher over Abandon the post; if golem + grip works for post-computation scaling and worth an ending layer.
Edit: actually punch is itself post-computation scaling as well through lifelink
Tamiyo's Journal or Morska, Undersea Sleuth are possible ways to go for ending layers.
The Ninth Doctor almost gets a layer from 1 untap step = many upkeep steps, but haste makes it unworkable
World at war is a layer from first postcombat main -> many postcombat mains (to each trigger many sphinxes)
Search for glory already recycles tyvar without need for aid the fallen or similar. It can do so under a megastage transition, but in order to leak anything out of its activations, you'd need to resolve the stack all the way down to an empty stack without resolving hyperstage transitions. Not sure you can get full worldfire recovery from this, but seems like you would have to lose resources.
Tyvar activations then get you about as much power as an augur token (ig they can untap foundry).
Oh and in fact they only work if you're in a main phase and not an upkeep anyway so the full power of the combo is severely hampered.
So it seems safe.
Then there's a question of how much of the combo is possible outside of an upkeep to maximise number of Sphinx of the second sun or World at war before moving to postcombat main phase.
Without Cowardice I don't see how Precursor Golem + Grip of Chaos would scale us from computation. We would only get Fated Infatuation copies for our own golems. Our other 1 target instants/sorceries don't really create scaling ressources.
Edit: Hm, scaling from Gravitic Punch itself could work. Suddenly that's 2 more cards for ending layers than I expected