A land goes from battlefield to exile or library. This is done relatively easy by Worldfire.
A land goes from exile or library to battlefield. This needs an Ashnod trigger of Master Transmuter, along with a cheaper Chromescale Drake.
A land becomes island. This needs an Ashnod trigger of Floodchaser.
Now, if there is Guidelight Pathmaker, an Ashnod trigger of Master Transmuter will not be necessary in 2., and we can gain U per Ashnod trigger of Floodchaser. Too many U lead to infinity.
Ah, right, putting artifact lands into play has to stay difficult. So Guidelight Pathmaker goes infinite. Some possible alternatives for artifact recovery:
- Genesis Storm: recovers too much. Would allow us to repeat megastage transitions without consuming any external Martyr ability copies.
- United Battlefront: doesn't recover Soul Foundry.
So I don't see a way to make Echoes of Eternity work. Back to looking for other ways to gain a layer.
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 :/
Edit2: Hmm, Reality Heist can put Replica into our hand after a megastage transition consumption. That might go infinite if we can repeat without requiring external copies of the bounce ability.
One way that infinite doesn't work is if we also require a different instant below the worldfire, which doesn't work with an empty battlefield/graveyard. That would have to come from a lower hyperstage transition, which would then be the external cost.
Edit3: Nah, the Volute argument has holes. We can also get Volute back with Resurgent Belief or somewhere above the megastage transition. As long as it's there when resolving the last Helix trigger that's good enough.
Assuming there is an infinite that repeatedly triggers Helix for Worldfire without using any instants from below, then the only way to get Helix back for the next trigger is by resolving Heist after Worldfire. We then know 2 things:
1. Since there is no opportunity to get Helix out of exile between Worldfire and Heist originating from the same Abandon the Post cast we know that the Helix has to be put into the library somewhere above the Worldfire already.
2. We cannot cast Wrong Turn on Channex after resolving Worldfire before we cast Abandon the Post to trigger Helix again. So Abandon the Post is stuck on the stack the entire time we are above the Worldfire.
The only way to get Helix into the library is Riftsweeper and the only way to get it into exile is Worldfire. So 1 requires another Worldfire above the offending Worldfire transition. But 2 blocks us from triggering Helix another time above it. 1 and 2 cannot both be true, therefore such an infinite cannot exist.
To play artifacts (including Vedalken Orrery and Millikin), we need Gandalf the White on board.
To get Gandalf back, we need a Bloodbond March trigger of Gandalf (no problem, just prepare it lower on the stack) and a mill. The mill is a cost of Millikin's ability, so we cannot prepare it on the stack. We cannot mill Gandalf card.
So Gandalf locks out Millikin and Millikin locks out Gandalf.
Replacing Vedalken Orrery with High Fae Trickster doesn't help. We cannot mill High Fae Trickster, too.
By the way, about ruling of Tolarian Kraken. The "Whenever" at beginning is Kraken's triggered ability, and benifit from Clara Oswald if we hack the creature types. The "When" in middle is a delayed triggered ability, by 603.2e, it cannot duplicate from Clara Oswald.
603.2e Some effects refer to a triggered ability of an object. Such effects refer only to triggered abilities the object has, not any delayed triggered abilities (see rule 603.7) that may be created by abilities the object has.
Another thing about Tolarian Kraken. There is occurence of "target" in the middle "When". Not sure when should we choose target. If it's at the time the whole "Whenever you draw a card,..." ability put on stack, we would not have the layer from Kraken. If it's at the time the "When you do,..." delayed triggered ability put on stack, we will have the layer from Kraken.
To play artifacts (including Vedalken Orrery and Millikin), we need Gandalf the White on board.
To get Gandalf back, we need a Bloodbond March trigger of Gandalf (no problem, just prepare it lower on the stack) and a mill. The mill is a cost of Millikin's ability, so we cannot prepare it on the stack. We cannot mill Gandalf card.
So Gandalf locks out Millikin and Millikin locks out Gandalf.
Replacing Vedalken Orrery with High Fae Trickster doesn't help. We cannot mill High Fae Trickster, too.
By the way, about ruling of Tolarian Kraken. The "Whenever" at beginning is Kraken's triggered ability, and benifit from Clara Oswald if we hack the creature types. The "When" in middle is a delayed triggered ability, by 603.2e, it cannot duplicate from Clara Oswald.
603.2e Some effects refer to a triggered ability of an object. Such effects refer only to triggered abilities the object has, not any delayed triggered abilities (see rule 603.7) that may be created by abilities the object has.
Another thing about Tolarian Kraken. There is occurence of "target" in the middle "When". Not sure when should we choose target. If it's at the time the whole "Whenever you draw a card,..." ability put on stack, we would not have the layer from Kraken. If it's at the time the "When you do,..." delayed triggered ability put on stack, we will have the layer from Kraken.
Tolarian Kraken has a reflexive triggered ability, which does not choose its target until the first trigger resolves. But it seems that Clara Oswald not working on delayed triggers does indeed mean not applying here.
603.12. A resolving spell or ability may allow or instruct a player to take an action and create a triggered ability that triggers “when [a player] [does or doesn’t]” take that action or “when [something happens] this way.” These reflexive triggered abilities follow the rules for delayed
triggered abilities (see rule 603.7), except that they’re checked immediately after being created and trigger based on whether the trigger event or events occurred earlier during the resolution of the spell or ability that created them.
Example: Heart-Piercer Manticore has an ability that reads “When this creature enters, you may sacrifice another creature. When you do, this creature deals damage equal to that creature’s power to any target.” The reflexive triggered ability triggers only when you sacrifice another creature due to the original triggered ability, and not if you sacrifice a creature for any other reason.
603.12a Normally, if the trigger event or events occur multiple times during the resolution of the spell or ability that created it, the reflexive triggered ability will trigger once for each of those times. However, if a resolving spell or ability includes a choice to pay a cost “any number of times” and creates a triggered ability that triggers “when [a player] pays [that cost] one or more times,” paying that cost one or more times causes the reflexive triggered ability to trigger only once.
Yeah, we don't need Clara Oswald for the Tolarian Kraken layer: Everytime we draw a card we get X Kraken triggers that let us pay 1 mana. Clara could be used to get the scaling here, but we can just create more Krakens to witness the draw. When we pay 1 mana for such a trigger and get the reflexive trigger untapping a creature. No additional scaling there because Cara doesn't apply and this part targets, so more copies wouldn't be useful anyway.
Cara is useful to turn 1 Pain Seer untap into X "put card into hand" triggers. We can't just create more Pain Seers for that layer because only 1 will get untapped.
But the question about megastage recovery with Millikin stumps me. It looks to be impossible: The mill can't be waiting on the stack. Millikin needs haste before we can mill. Emblem of the Warmind needs to be milled before it can get back to the battlefield and give haste. We are stuck.
Shaun & Rebecca, Agents instead of Millikin almost works. There the mill part is a reflexive triggered ability, so it could be waiting on the stack. The problem is that it's a legendary creature with an activated ability. So we could get it into play during a computation via Ratadrabik, along with an animated Valgavoth's lair via Anikthea. Then affect the computation at an arbitrary point with a Brutal Supression sacrifice.
So this no-cowardice change-up of the combo doesn't actually work unless we find another source of mill.
Edit: Ooops, Muzzio, Visionary Architect is also a legendary with an activated ability, so the idea that we can simply swap it in to make Oaken Siren work with the blue mana stage is also wrong. Ratadrabik of Urborg enables copies of legendaries and keeps our progress through hyperstage transitions, so there wouldn't be a 1 card replacement for that to fix those problems.
As a disadvantage, although artifacts like Soul Foundry and Spellweaver Helix can keep at Kaervek's Spite sweeper by animating and giving them to opponent, they still don't survive computation damages.
So we can only do one useful computation for each cast of Abandon the Post/Wild Ride at topmost megastage.
But still with problem. After a computation we will lose the access to C (Thran Dynamo cannot survive computation damages). It seems that we don't have a way to extract the computation result into a TYS storm count before we meet the Worldfire sweeper at topmost megastage?
EDIT2: Tyvar may untap Valgavoth's Lair, which is a problem producing too much W. I haven't found any fix yet. Tezzeret is for final big damage since nothing can attack.
Titania's Song was brought up before and after asking in a rules discord we concluded that its effect doesn't "lock in" like a sorcery would. Instead it is the only card with a static effect that sticks around after its source is gone. So it would remove all abilities of all our artifacts forever (well, the one turn it matters.) Even if those artifacts are played after Titania's Song left the battlefield.
Without Fated Infatuation we can no longer produce token copies of noncreature artifacts. I'm not sure if we need multiple Coat of Arms for computations, but if we do we can just replace it with Sliver Legion. I think all other artifacts work fine without copies.
Fated was really good for the start, so we'll have to see what lines are available without it.
I don't see how Spawning Pool could replace Valgavoth's Lair for the "safe combats" alternative with Tyvar, Jubilant Brawler. How would we get a land to sacrifice to Brutal Suppression in the blue stage? We can't sacrifice Great Furnace there. But we'd need to save two more card slots before the extra combat layers are our only option. So we don't need to worry about it yet.
Layer 0: When a creature enchanted by a Smoke Blessing dies, the Smoke Blessing will trigger a bunch of times, allowing us to get a bunch of Treasure tokens that can get us a bunnch of wnite mana. This allows us to start s white mana stage.
Layer 1: Casting Smoke Spirits' Aid causes Thousand-Year Storm to trigger a bunch of times, allowing us to put Smoke Blessings on creatures a bunch of times.
Layer 2: When Pain Seer becomes untapped, its ability triggers a bunch of times, allowing us to draw Smoke Spirits' Aid a bunch of times.
Layer 3: When we draw a card, a bunch of Tolarian Kraken trigger, allowing us to untap Pain Seer a bunch of times.
Layer 4: When we Investigate, we create a Clue token via Evidence Examiner, which will allow us to draw a bunch of cards upon activation.
Layer 5: When we collect evidence, that triggers Evidence Examiners to Investigate a bunch of times.
Layer 6: At the beginning of combat, we trigger a bunch of Evidence Examiners to collect evidence.
So up to 6 layers?
It seems like we have several more easy one card for one layer options if only we had more card space, like Precursor Golem for Smoke Spirits' Aid, and a target redirector to give a second layer for Tolarian Kraken.
Is World at War okay now? Previously, we've had a problem with cards that gave us more combats, since we can use combats to attack deal damage to an enemy creature, allowing a computation to start with all the forbidden stuff still on the battlefield. If it becomes safe, World at War is generally a better top layer than most options, since we get one combat, followed by a bunch of combats, allowing us to get BB_{alpha + N} (BB_{alpha + N-1} (...)) at the start.
[EDIT] Ah, I just saw what IIjil wrote. So the idea is that with Tyvar, Jubilant Brawler we won't be able to attack, interesting. Are there other cards that have the same ability?
if we can make safe combats work, than we can improve the damage slightly but removing Clara Oswald, which I think is just getting us the one layer for Pain Seer, and add in World at War, which would allow us to go BB_{w^3 + w3 + 6} (BB_{w^3 + w3 + 5} (...)) on the outside. But I don't know if we need Clara Oswald in other places.
But Precursor Golem would not add a layer because we already scale "a copy of SSA resolving" via Gandalf the White in layer 0 and each TYS trigger gives us a fixed amount of copies. Precursor would need a target redirector to make use of the scaling amount of copies that each trigger provides: going through the combo on top of the copies makes them fizzle.
I don't see how target redirection would add a Tolarian Kraken layer. The reflexive trigger only triggers once when we pay the mana.
The only other 1 card layer I know is Jolene, Plunder Queen. Clara Oswald is not required for anything other than the end layers so we can swap those layers around.
Hmm, World at War as the final layer does sound juicy. But Valgavoth's Lair serves as sacrifice fodder and creature land and I don't see how to replace both functions with a single card. Urza's Saga produces too much blue with Floodchaser.
Using Call the Mountain Chocobo might help grabbing a mountain to sacrifice. There's a chance we can replace Island with Mountain and still produce a bunch of blue from the green stage by providing an extra Floodchaser target. But I am not able to actually find a line that works.
With Tyvar we'd have:
layer 0: Jolene on Blessing trigger
layer 1: Gandalf on SSA copy
layer 2: TYS on SSA cast
layer 3: Ashnod on Clue
layer 4: Examiner on Collect Evidence
layer 5: Examiner on Combat
layer 6: World at War on 2nd Main
Tezzeret, Master of Metal would use the -3 to deal a large amount of damage to the opponent in a single event when we are done with the combo. We must not be able to do that in our clean-up step, because the turn based discard there can start an illegal computation with Megrim. So we use a planeswalker which we can only activate in a main phase.
Bad news: we cannot keep our "large number" after Worldfire.
Previously there is Fated Infatuation, which has usage for multiple copies in one Thousand-year Storm trigger, so we use storm count as the large number we keep.
However, Archenemy's Charm cannot do more with more copies in one TYS trigger, and no other instant card can benifit from storm count.
Can we use a TYS trigger of Archenemy's Charm specifically to add large number of +1/+1 counters to a creature? That large number can then be converted to other resources with a computation.
But to extract computation result we need Divine Congregation, which is at very low place in the stack.
The stack looks like this:
Xathrid Necromancer triggers
one Arcbond trigger
hyperstage preparations
TYS/Divine Congregation
Helix triggers (this will later become a Worldfire sweeper) 1
megastage preparations
Ashnod/Martyr
BM/Martyr
...
Ashnod/Martyr
BM/Martyr
TYS/Wrong Turn
one Volute trigger
hyperstage preparations
Ashnod/Martyr
BM/Martyr
...
Ashnod/Martyr
BM/Martyr
TYS/Wrong Turn
one Volute trigger
hyperstage preparations
......
hyperstage preparations
TYS/Divine Congregation 2
TYS/Worldfire 3
megastage preparations
Ashnod/Martyr
BM/Martyr
...
Ashnod/Martyr
BM/Martyr
TYS/Wrong Turn
one Volute trigger
hyperstage preparations
......
hyperstage preparations
TYS/Divine Congregation 4
TYS/Worldfire
megastage preparations
......
...more megastages...
......
To get the number after Worldfire at 1, you need to resolve down to 2; to get the number after Worldfire at 3, you need to resolve down to 4. That will make the lower stages/hyperstages/megastages not work.
At a glance the hyperstage still works as before, even if we only use multiple Spellweaver Volute triggers to cast more copies of our spells. Similarly we can cast multiple copies of sorceries using multiple triggers of Spellweaver Helix. All thanks to Veyran, Voice of Duality. So aside from convenience the _only_ function TYS serves for the combo is preservation of progress through Worldfire. So that's the only thing a replacement has to be able to do.
If before consuming a megastage transition we convert our huge number into delayed triggers that copy the next spell, then we just need to make sure that the first spell we cast after the consumption is Archenemy's Charm. Each copy trigger would resolve and choose targets separately, so we can recover our huge number.
The problem is that we can't actually cast Archenemy's Charm as the first spell. We can only cast it using Volute. If we trigger that volute after the consumption, the spell that triggered it was the first thing we cast. If we prepare that trigger as part of putting the megastage transition on the stack, then the Volute trigger is part of a pseudo hyperstage transition. The spell that Volute casts gets locked in for all the triggers of that batch whenever the Volute left the battlefield. And if the locked in spell is Charm instead of Spite we won't get the life back. So these "copy next spell" effects don't work.
But Bonus Round might work. It's harder to increase the number of active "copy spell" effects than with Teach or Training Post, but they also don't go away after a single use. To turn the output of computations into more active Bonus Rounds we need an additional spare red mana. Then convert life into Veyran copies and go through a pseudo megastage transition with that many Helix triggers, each casting Bonus Round. That looks fine to me.
Nothing can attack, but Gravitic Punch also serves as final big damage.
Each 2 copies of Reality Heist can make one extra Neurok Replica token, and multiple copies within one TYS trigger have actual growth. Enough to cut Fated Infatuation off.
By the way, a ruling question about Comeuppance: if we resolve many copies of Comeuppance, what will happen next time an Arcbonded creature would deal damage to us?
By the way, a ruling question about Comeuppance: if we resolve many copies of Comeuppance, what will happen next time an Arcbonded creature would deal damage to us?
One of them applies, and then the rest have no more damage to prevent, so do nothing.
Oooh, I originally assumed combining Neurok Replica with Tyvar, Jubilant Brawler would go infinite, because Tyvar can untap Soul Foundry to get an additional Replica token. Combine that with Search for Glory putting Tyvar into hand after consuming a megastage transition and there's danger.
But that is actually just the same level of resource leak as Reality Heist putting Neurok Replica into hand after consuming the same megastage transition. And just a little while ago I convinced myself that this level of leak is safe if we play Chancellor of the Annex instead of Cephalid Shrine. So we should just do that!
Pretty much any creature land that doesn't produce white will be safe: an infinite involving the Tyvar untap needs to resolve Worldfire to reset Tyvar at some point. But at then the land is exiled as well and to get it back out of the library we need Weathered Wayfarer activations.
If we play Fated Infatuation we need to choose a creature land that enters tapped, otherwise we can create many untapped targets for Floodchaser and go infinite that way. I think entering untapped would be fine without Fated.
If Tyvar and the missing haste turns Muzzio, Visionary Architect safe, then the same argument should also work for Shaun & Rebecca, Agents. That means we can almost replace Metalworker + Flayed One, saving a card slot. But that would mean putting new mill triggers on the stack requires "haste". And Tyvar can't be around during all the middling Hypterstages, where we need to do that. So this doesn't quite work.
An option for ETB mill could be Gisa and Geralf. I don't think it goes infinite and the abilitie might help with the start.
We can build the stack with Helix trigger below TYS/Resurgent Belief, which is below TYS/Search for Glory, which is below TYS/Worldfire.
After a Worldfire sweeper, TYS/Search for Glory can fetch legendary creatures, including Gandalf the White, which enable us to play other legendary creatures, like Gisa and Geralf.
It can mill Spellweaver Volute and Reality Heist, then Resurgent Belief bring Volute back.
After that, the Helix trigger casting sorceries will trigger Volute, casting Reality Heist, fetching Vedalken Orrery and Mox Ruby to hand and play them (Gandalf the White also let us play artifacts). Then we can use the sorceries from Helix trigger to build some hyperstages, then spend the R to flashback Gravitic Punch.
(If I understand that earlier post correctly, this should be the way to go infinite?)
In the case of nonlegendary mill card, we cannot get it back with Search for Glory, and it stuck in library unless we resolve an ETB trigger of it in lower place of the stack, which must resolve down and clean all the extra Helix triggers. So it is safe. But a legendary mill card will not be so.
Or is it safe? Because we need Riftsweeper to get Vedalken Orrery and Mox Ruby into library. Riftsweeper is just a nonlegendary nonartifact creature, which needs Bloodbond March trigger to get back and has function (and we cannot prepare its ETB trigger on the stack) even if we have easy mill like Gisa and Geralf.
2.
Another thing about Gisa and Geralf: if we Artificial Evolution it with Zombie -> Wizard, then Artificial Evolution will become another card to make Neurok Replica tokens. We may prepare many copies of Gisa and Geralf before one TYS/Artificial Evolution, then each copy of Artificial Evolution (targetting different Gisas) can let us "cast Neurok Replica from graveyard" an additional time.
(I'm not sure about this. If there are many Gisas enter at the same time, how many times can we cast Zombie card from graveyard? Do we lose the ability to cast Zombie card from graveyard once they leave the battlefield?)
We cannot cut off Reality Heist because it is the only way to get noncreature artifacts back after Worldfire.
3.
We know that in this deck we can only duplicate cards with creature or enchantment (except Aura) types. We cannot duplicate a general artifact or a general land.
But is it safe for an animatable land card even if it enters untapped? Like Mutavault. Floodchaser can turn it into Island, then Tyvar, Jubilant Brawler untap it for U.
yeah, turning AE into more Neurok Replica tokens is what made me think Gisa and Geralf could help with the start. Without Fated and Cowardice we need any help we can get.
Gandalf flash does seem to make things complicated. Seperating stuff into "only during transitions", "never during transitions" and "durdling around" everything that Gandalf lets us do should end up in "durdling around". The important things for the catalyst resource are "exile Mox Ruby" which requires Worldfire and "unexile Mox Ruby" which requires Riftsweeper. Once we start consuming the transition by resolving a Worldfire we have no access to Riftsweeper until we resolve a BBM trigger for it, which can only happen after we are done with the transition.
The timing of when we fetch the Mox Ruby out of the library and play it is flexible and with Gandalf it can be moved in between Worldfires of a lower transition. But that stuff is outside of the key events, so I'd say its safe. That also applies to Spellweaver Helix and my "no-leaking" argument for Tyvar and Heist.
So what about mill? Usually we can cast any number of our sorceries and one instant in any order after the last Worldfire of a transition: We can use TYS and Volute triggers in any order we want, triggered by casting all the spells from a single Helix. And for the purpose of going infinite we can lock the Volute in on any instant we choose, Heist probably being the most dangerous. So I don't think milling and getting back Volute changes that part much.
But milling and getting back Pious Interdiction is a problem. If we do that a couple times below the Worldfire we can sneak life through the transition. That is certainly too powerful. So we must not be able to mill during transitions, which rules out legendary and artifact ETBs.
Edit: I see no problem with Mutavault. If Tyvar wants to untap it repeatedly we need to reset Tyvar in between, which requires Worldfire. Then we need to fetch Mutavault with the white stage abilities. Due to using one of those we are allowed to produce that blue.
That start sounds way better than what I was expecting. Nice!
The danger of an infinite with Cephalid Shrine comes from a line like this:
start with empty stack, Neurok Replica in hand everything we'd have access to during a megastage available in their usual zones, except Mox Ruby which is exiled and Volute which is in the graveyard.
1. Play Neurok Replica, use BBM triggers to set up a complete megastage recovery. We get access to enchantments with mill and Anikthea bounces, so Cephalid Shrine is among the stuff we get normal access to.
(this is the handwavey part where a reason this inifite doesn't work might be hiding)
2. Spend 1 red to put the transition on the stack. Make it look something like this:
TYS on Heist
TYS on Worldfire
n x Volute (still in play)
Megastage recovery
Note that Gravitic Punch isn't on the stack, because Cephalid Shrine countered it.
(To get the Volute triggers first resolve a Helix trigger including Belief to get it out of the graveyard. Then resolve a Helix trigger including the Worldfire cast. Counter the Worldfire you cast there.)
3. Spend some of the many resources you just got from Helix triggers to draw and play the Mox Ruby, getting that red back.
4. Put a mini recovery for Riftsweeper and Gandalf on the stack
5. Spend 1 red to put another transition on the stack:
Worldfire
Mini Recovery
TYS on Heist
TYS on Worldfire
n x Volute (still in play)
Megastage recovery
6. Move creatures and enchantments to whatever zone we need them in for recovery. Resolve Worldfire exiling all artifacts. Make sure LKI on that Volute is that it's enchanting Heist when Worldfire exiles it.
7. Use the mini Recovery to get Riftsweeper and Gandalf. Move all artifacts into the library. Resolve a Heist to grab Mox Ruby. Play it to get the red back.
8. Resolve Worldfire to exile Mox Ruby again. Resolve Volutes to cast Heists and get all other artifacts out of the library
9. Use the normal megastage recovery procedure to get back into the start position.
This infinite is impossible with Chancellor of the Annex because we can't donate it in 1, so Punch gets stuck on the stack in 2 and we can't do 5 at all.
Maybe there's some other detail that's impossible with Shrine as well. The recovery stuff is fiddly enough to hide problems. But unless there is some specific problematic aspect, I don't really want to work through more details. This is good enough for me to use Channex.
So... to flashback a sorcery we need both Vedalken Orrery and opponent's Chancellor of the Annex. To get Orrery back we need to resolve Volute on Reality Heist. To give Chancellor we need to resolve Volute on Wrong Turn. 2 different instants. In the infinite combo we only lock Volute on one instant card.
Or in another word, in the deck with Chancellor, the full megastage recovery should include a hyperstage recovery (in which we put TYS triggers of Wrong Turn above one Volute trigger).
And question: With Chancellor of the Annex, is it still safe to use an artifact Flayed One or a legendary Gisa and Geralf as ETB mill?
How about a normal combo? How to recover after Worldfire, getting both Reality Heist and Wrong Turn, then getting the number remembered by Thousand-Year Storm? Like, putting TYS triggers of Reality Heist and TYS triggers of Wrong Turn on 2 different hyperstage transitions (both have a Volute trigger in below, resolving to cast Kaervek's Spite)?
EDIT: This thing seems quite hard? Without noncreature artifacts, Riftsweeper can only enter once with its BM trigger. Even if we bounce it, we cannot play it (no Orrery, and no Foundry (Foundry is another way to make Riftsweeper's ETB work for multiple times)), before resolving a Reality Heist. One ETB of Riftsweeper can only unexile one of Vedalken Orrery, Mox Ruby, Spellweaver Helix or Soul Foundry.
So @Iijil the step 7 assuming Riftsweeper can unexile all artifacts might be not so easy.
Also, now I realized that Chancellor of the Annex on opponent's side is necessary to prepare Bloodbond March triggers. And Bloodbond March trigger is necessary to duplicate creatures (using Soul Foundry). It turns out that we cannot prepare Bloodbond March triggers of Chancellor of the Annex, so it cannot survive Worldfire. To make megastage work, we need to draw Chancellor of the Annex a second time.
So... start with Archaeological Dig, Mox Ruby, Mana Crypt, Epic Experiment, TYS, Infectious Inquiry, then have Gravitic Punch + Search for Glory + Reality Heist + Chancellor of the Annex + Archon of Falling Stars + Xathrid Necromancer + Floodchaser in hand.
Search for Glory: Tyvar, Jubilant Brawler + Gandalf the White + Veyran, Voice of Duality + Ashnod the Uncaring. Play the first three cards.
Reality Heist: getting all artifacts except Ruby and Crypt. Metalworker and Oaken make 16U, then play Vedalken Orrery.
Play Foundry for Ashnod + Neurok.
Important part: Tyvar -2 mill Gravitic Punch + Thassa's Devourer + Riftsweeper, return Riftsweeper to field, which unexiles Ashnod. (This is also first mill, so we have Thassa's mill usable later with Anikthea or Resurgent Belief)
Play Helix on Gravitic Punch + Resurgent Belief + Search for Glory + Infectious Inquiry.
Play Gravitic Punch. This should prepare things.
4 poisons we draw Chancellor of the Annex + Worldfire.
5 poisons we draw Mutavault + Smoke Spirits' Aid, reaching full combo.
Finally BB_{w^3+w*3+7}(BB_{w^3+w*3+6}(BB_{w^3+w*3+2}^5(some smaller number; I haven't calculate the detail yet))) damage.
EDIT: I have overestimated the power of Gisa and Geralf + Artificial Evolution. They cannot make extra Neurok Replica tokens. They can only make a batch of Bloodbond March triggers; worth one "layer".
Good point about Riftsweeper though. That is indeed a bottleneck. And unfortunately I think it is enough of a problem to make the combo we actually want completely impossible, even if we us Cephalid Shrine:
1. We have no way to keep Riftweeper activations on the stack. So if Riftsweeper ever gets exiled by Worldfire we can never get it back. Therefore it has to be in the library everytime we consume a transition.
2. The only way to get Riftweeper into the library is by exiling it with Soul Foundry and using the token Foundry creates on it. But the Foundry also can only go into the library via Riftsweeper. So until we get Riftsweeper back with a Bloodbond March trigger below the transition we can not avoid the Foundry getting exiled by Worldfire. Therefore the Foundry can not be in our hand after any megastage transition.
3. Every hyperstage transition below a megastage transition can only have a single "floating" instant.
4. We need to resolve both Reality Heist and Wrong Turn to donate Soul Foundry.
5. Once we resole the Heist of that pair we can not cast Kaervek's Spite before resolving Wrong Turn without putting Foundry into the Graveyard, where it is stuck until we resolve Worldfire again.
6. (3, 4 and 5) together mean that we need to trigger a new Spellweaver Volute to donate Foundry. We need to donate it in order to use it in the middling Foundry stages. Therefore we need to get Volute back without using Foundry.
7. Without Foundry we can only have a single Archon of Falling Stars. Therefore we can only bring back a single aura in each hyperstage transition.
8. That single aura has to be Pious Interdiction. Otherwise we don't get the life back to put the transition back on the stack later.
9. We can't get Volute back.
So yeah, this deck doesn't quite work after all.
Private Mod Note
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Previously, to gain U we need 3 actions:
- A land goes from battlefield to exile or library. This is done relatively easy by Worldfire.
- A land goes from exile or library to battlefield. This needs an Ashnod trigger of Master Transmuter, along with a cheaper Chromescale Drake.
- A land becomes island. This needs an Ashnod trigger of Floodchaser.
Now, if there is Guidelight Pathmaker, an Ashnod trigger of Master Transmuter will not be necessary in 2., and we can gain U per Ashnod trigger of Floodchaser. Too many U lead to infinity.- Genesis Storm: recovers too much. Would allow us to repeat megastage transitions without consuming any external Martyr ability copies.
- United Battlefront: doesn't recover Soul Foundry.
So I don't see a way to make Echoes of Eternity work. Back to looking for other ways to gain a layer.
Edit: Lets look at Neurok Replica again:
I think I missed Reality Heist last time around. That looks like it would work for artifact recovery. So replacing Martyr of Spores, Cowardice, Metalworker and Chromescale Drake with Neurok Replica, Oaken Siren, Millikin and Reality Heist gets us a combo setup without cowardice. That lets us switch Megrim and Gix's Command back to Goblin Boom Keg again, freeing up a card slot. We then have enough room for a 2 card layer:
1 Coat of Arms
2 Xathrid Necromancer
3 Artificial Evolution
4 Arcbond
5 Comeuppance
6 Wrong Turn
7 Kaervek's Spite
8 Goblin Boom Keg
9 March of the Machines
Utility
10 Vedalken Orrery
11 Omniscience
12 Emblem of the Warmind
13 Millikin
14 Thousand-Year Storm
15 Anikthea, Hand of Erebos
16 Ratadrabik of Urborg
Foundry Stage
17 Neurok Replica
18 Oaken Siren
19 Ashnod the Uncaring
20 Soul Foundry
21 Riftsweeper
22 Bloodbond March
23 Chancellor of the Annex
24 Spellweaver Volute
25 Veyran, Voice of Duality
26 Fated Infatuation
27 Lingering Souls
28 K'rrik, Son of Yawgmoth
29 Archon of Falling Stars
30 Pious Interdiction
Megastage
31 Spellweaver Helix
32 Gandalf the White
33 Abandon the Post
34 Abandon the Post
35 Mox Ruby
36 Worldfire
37 Reality Heist
38 Starlight
Blue Mana Stage
39 Muzzio, Visionary Architect
40 Floodchaser
41 Great Furnace
42 Brutal Suppression
43 Valgavoth's Lair
44 Island
45 Firebrand Ranger
46 Groundskeeper
47 Forest
White Mana Stage
48 Ruin Ghost
49 Weathered Wayfarer
50 Archaeological Dig
51 Arboreal Grazer
End Layers
52 Smoke Spirits' Aid
53 Pain Seer
54 Clara Oswald
55 Tolarian Kraken
56 Evidence Examiner
Start
57 Mana Crypt
58 Epic Experiment
59 Resurgent Belief
60 Infectious Inquiry
Edit2: Hmm, Reality Heist can put Replica into our hand after a megastage transition consumption. That might go infinite if we can repeat without requiring external copies of the bounce ability.
One way that infinite doesn't work is if we also require a different instant below the worldfire, which doesn't work with an empty battlefield/graveyard. That would have to come from a lower hyperstage transition, which would then be the external cost.
I think getting back Spellweaver Volute would be required to cast the Heist during transition and requires a Kaervek's Spite cast with Archon of Falling Stars in play and Volut in graveyard. So this should be fine.
Edit3: Nah, the Volute argument has holes. We can also get Volute back with Resurgent Belief or somewhere above the megastage transition. As long as it's there when resolving the last Helix trigger that's good enough.
But I think if we use Chancellor of the Annex instead of Cephalid Shrine we can make the argument that reusing Spellweaver Helix itself requires external instants from a hyperstage transition below:
Assuming there is an infinite that repeatedly triggers Helix for Worldfire without using any instants from below, then the only way to get Helix back for the next trigger is by resolving Heist after Worldfire. We then know 2 things:
1. Since there is no opportunity to get Helix out of exile between Worldfire and Heist originating from the same Abandon the Post cast we know that the Helix has to be put into the library somewhere above the Worldfire already.
2. We cannot cast Wrong Turn on Channex after resolving Worldfire before we cast Abandon the Post to trigger Helix again. So Abandon the Post is stuck on the stack the entire time we are above the Worldfire.
The only way to get Helix into the library is Riftsweeper and the only way to get it into exile is Worldfire. So 1 requires another Worldfire above the offending Worldfire transition. But 2 blocks us from triggering Helix another time above it. 1 and 2 cannot both be true, therefore such an infinite cannot exist.
To play artifacts (including Vedalken Orrery and Millikin), we need Gandalf the White on board.
To get Gandalf back, we need a Bloodbond March trigger of Gandalf (no problem, just prepare it lower on the stack) and a mill. The mill is a cost of Millikin's ability, so we cannot prepare it on the stack. We cannot mill Gandalf card.
So Gandalf locks out Millikin and Millikin locks out Gandalf.
Replacing Vedalken Orrery with High Fae Trickster doesn't help. We cannot mill High Fae Trickster, too.
By the way, about ruling of Tolarian Kraken. The "Whenever" at beginning is Kraken's triggered ability, and benifit from Clara Oswald if we hack the creature types. The "When" in middle is a delayed triggered ability, by 603.2e, it cannot duplicate from Clara Oswald.
Another thing about Tolarian Kraken. There is occurence of "target" in the middle "When". Not sure when should we choose target. If it's at the time the whole "Whenever you draw a card,..." ability put on stack, we would not have the layer from Kraken. If it's at the time the "When you do,..." delayed triggered ability put on stack, we will have the layer from Kraken.
Cara is useful to turn 1 Pain Seer untap into X "put card into hand" triggers. We can't just create more Pain Seers for that layer because only 1 will get untapped.
But the question about megastage recovery with Millikin stumps me. It looks to be impossible: The mill can't be waiting on the stack. Millikin needs haste before we can mill. Emblem of the Warmind needs to be milled before it can get back to the battlefield and give haste. We are stuck.
Shaun & Rebecca, Agents instead of Millikin almost works. There the mill part is a reflexive triggered ability, so it could be waiting on the stack. The problem is that it's a legendary creature with an activated ability. So we could get it into play during a computation via Ratadrabik, along with an animated Valgavoth's lair via Anikthea. Then affect the computation at an arbitrary point with a Brutal Supression sacrifice.
So this no-cowardice change-up of the combo doesn't actually work unless we find another source of mill.
Edit: Ooops, Muzzio, Visionary Architect is also a legendary with an activated ability, so the idea that we can simply swap it in to make Oaken Siren work with the blue mana stage is also wrong. Ratadrabik of Urborg enables copies of legendaries and keeps our progress through hyperstage transitions, so there wouldn't be a 1 card replacement for that to fix those problems.
Replace March of the Machines -> Titania's Song.
Replace Metalworker -> Thran Dynamo.
Replace Coat of Arms -> Sliver Legion.
Replace Vedalken Orrery -> High Fae Trickster.
Then opponent cannot activate any ability even with haste.
Finally we can free a card slot: Emblem of the Warmind+ 2xAbandon the Post -> 2xWild Ride.
As a disadvantage, although artifacts like Soul Foundry and Spellweaver Helix can keep at Kaervek's Spite sweeper by animating and giving them to opponent, they still don't survive computation damages.
So we can only do one useful computation for each cast of Abandon the Post/Wild Ride at topmost megastage.
But still with problem. After a computation we will lose the access to C (Thran Dynamo cannot survive computation damages). It seems that we don't have a way to extract the computation result into a TYS storm count before we meet the Worldfire sweeper at topmost megastage?
EDIT: Even worse, Wild Ride plus Tolarian Kraken can let oppponent activate Valgavoth's Lair to gain mana.
Update:
There is quite a new card, Archenemy's Charm. It seems useful?
- With 2 TYS triggers we can make one Martyr of Spores/Aven Augur token.
- Give lifelink to animated Megrim (before giving it to opponent) so opponent can survive first computation after Worldfire.
- Easier recovery of Tyvar, Jubilant Brawler.
So...1 Coat of Arms
2 Xathrid Necromancer
3 Artificial Evolution
4 Arcbond
5 Comeuppance
6 Wrong Turn
7 March of the Machines
8 Kaervek's Spite
9 Megrim
Utility
10 Vedalken Orrery
11 Omniscience
12 Metalworker
13 Emblem of the Warmind
14 Thousand-Year Storm
15 Anikthea, Hand of Erebos
16 Ratadrabik of Urborg
Foundry Stage
17 Martyr of Spores
18 Cowardice
19 Ashnod the Uncaring
20 Soul Foundry
21 Chromescale Drake
22 Riftsweeper
23 Bloodbond March
24 Cephalid Shrine
25 Spellweaver Volute
26 Veyran, Voice of Duality
27 Archenemy's Charm
28 Lingering Souls
29 K'rrik, Son of Yawgmoth
30 Archon of Falling Stars
31 Pious Interdiction
Megastage
32 Spellweaver Helix
33 Gandalf the White
34 Abandon the Post
35 Abandon the Post
36 Mox Ruby
37 Worldfire
38 Divine Congregation
Blue Mana Stage
39 Great Furnace
40 Master Transmuter
41 Floodchaser
42 Brutal Suppression
43 Valgavoth's Lair
Green Mana Stage
44 Island
45 Firebrand Ranger
46 Groundskeeper
47 Forest
48 Ruin Ghost
49 Weathered Wayfarer
50 Archaeological Dig
51 Arboreal Grazer
End Layers
52 Smoke Spirits' Aid
53 Pain Seer
54 Clara Oswald
55 Tolarian Kraken
56 Evidence Examiner
Start
57 Mana Crypt
58 Epic Experiment
59 Resurgent Belief
60 Infectious Inquiry
Alternatively replace Clara Oswald -> Harmonic Prodigy, whichever better at the start.
Alternatively replace Emblem of the Warmind+Pain Seer+Clara Oswald+Tolarian Kraken -> Tyvar, Jubilant Brawler+Tezzeret, Master of Metal+(two of World at War+Full Throttle+Jolene, Plunder Queen), whichever better at the start.
EDIT2: Tyvar may untap Valgavoth's Lair, which is a problem producing too much W. I haven't found any fix yet. Tezzeret is for final big damage since nothing can attack.
Archenemy's Charm is a fantastic find! I think that would work
Without Fated Infatuation we can no longer produce token copies of noncreature artifacts. I'm not sure if we need multiple Coat of Arms for computations, but if we do we can just replace it with Sliver Legion. I think all other artifacts work fine without copies.
Fated was really good for the start, so we'll have to see what lines are available without it.
With Archenemy's Charm we get access to new creatures cheaper than Pain Seer. So Jolene, Plunder Queen might still be a better layer for the start than either Clara Oswald or Harmonic Prodigy. Really depends on the specific starting line.
I don't see how Spawning Pool could replace Valgavoth's Lair for the "safe combats" alternative with Tyvar, Jubilant Brawler. How would we get a land to sacrifice to Brutal Suppression in the blue stage? We can't sacrifice Great Furnace there. But we'd need to save two more card slots before the extra combat layers are our only option. So we don't need to worry about it yet.
Layer 0: When a creature enchanted by a Smoke Blessing dies, the Smoke Blessing will trigger a bunch of times, allowing us to get a bunch of Treasure tokens that can get us a bunnch of wnite mana. This allows us to start s white mana stage.
Layer 1: Casting Smoke Spirits' Aid causes Thousand-Year Storm to trigger a bunch of times, allowing us to put Smoke Blessings on creatures a bunch of times.
Layer 2: When Pain Seer becomes untapped, its ability triggers a bunch of times, allowing us to draw Smoke Spirits' Aid a bunch of times.
Layer 3: When we draw a card, a bunch of Tolarian Kraken trigger, allowing us to untap Pain Seer a bunch of times.
Layer 4: When we Investigate, we create a Clue token via Evidence Examiner, which will allow us to draw a bunch of cards upon activation.
Layer 5: When we collect evidence, that triggers Evidence Examiners to Investigate a bunch of times.
Layer 6: At the beginning of combat, we trigger a bunch of Evidence Examiners to collect evidence.
So up to 6 layers?
It seems like we have several more easy one card for one layer options if only we had more card space, like Precursor Golem for Smoke Spirits' Aid, and a target redirector to give a second layer for Tolarian Kraken.
Is World at War okay now? Previously, we've had a problem with cards that gave us more combats, since we can use combats to attack deal damage to an enemy creature, allowing a computation to start with all the forbidden stuff still on the battlefield. If it becomes safe, World at War is generally a better top layer than most options, since we get one combat, followed by a bunch of combats, allowing us to get BB_{alpha + N} (BB_{alpha + N-1} (...)) at the start.
[EDIT] Ah, I just saw what IIjil wrote. So the idea is that with Tyvar, Jubilant Brawler we won't be able to attack, interesting. Are there other cards that have the same ability?
if we can make safe combats work, than we can improve the damage slightly but removing Clara Oswald, which I think is just getting us the one layer for Pain Seer, and add in World at War, which would allow us to go BB_{w^3 + w3 + 6} (BB_{w^3 + w3 + 5} (...)) on the outside. But I don't know if we need Clara Oswald in other places.
But Precursor Golem would not add a layer because we already scale "a copy of SSA resolving" via Gandalf the White in layer 0 and each TYS trigger gives us a fixed amount of copies. Precursor would need a target redirector to make use of the scaling amount of copies that each trigger provides: going through the combo on top of the copies makes them fizzle.
I don't see how target redirection would add a Tolarian Kraken layer. The reflexive trigger only triggers once when we pay the mana.
The only other 1 card layer I know is Jolene, Plunder Queen. Clara Oswald is not required for anything other than the end layers so we can swap those layers around.
Hmm, World at War as the final layer does sound juicy. But Valgavoth's Lair serves as sacrifice fodder and creature land and I don't see how to replace both functions with a single card. Urza's Saga produces too much blue with Floodchaser.
Using Call the Mountain Chocobo might help grabbing a mountain to sacrifice. There's a chance we can replace Island with Mountain and still produce a bunch of blue from the green stage by providing an extra Floodchaser target. But I am not able to actually find a line that works.
How is the alternate layer sequence with Tyvar, Jubilant Brawler supposed to work? I get that there are problem with Spawning Pool and Valgavoth's Lair, but we got everything to work out like it's supposed to, how would it work? I'm not sure what the function of Tezzeret, Master of Metal is.
layer 0: Jolene on Blessing trigger
layer 1: Gandalf on SSA copy
layer 2: TYS on SSA cast
layer 3: Ashnod on Clue
layer 4: Examiner on Collect Evidence
layer 5: Examiner on Combat
layer 6: World at War on 2nd Main
Tezzeret, Master of Metal would use the -3 to deal a large amount of damage to the opponent in a single event when we are done with the combo. We must not be able to do that in our clean-up step, because the turn based discard there can start an illegal computation with Megrim. So we use a planeswalker which we can only activate in a main phase.
Previously there is Fated Infatuation, which has usage for multiple copies in one Thousand-year Storm trigger, so we use storm count as the large number we keep.
However, Archenemy's Charm cannot do more with more copies in one TYS trigger, and no other instant card can benifit from storm count.
The stack looks like this:
- Xathrid Necromancer triggers
- one Arcbond trigger
- hyperstage preparations
- TYS/Divine Congregation
- Helix triggers (this will later become a Worldfire sweeper) 1
- megastage preparations
- Ashnod/Martyr
- BM/Martyr
- ...
- Ashnod/Martyr
- BM/Martyr
- TYS/Wrong Turn
- one Volute trigger
- hyperstage preparations
- Ashnod/Martyr
- BM/Martyr
- ...
- Ashnod/Martyr
- BM/Martyr
- TYS/Wrong Turn
- one Volute trigger
- hyperstage preparations
- ......
- hyperstage preparations
- TYS/Divine Congregation 2
- TYS/Worldfire 3
- megastage preparations
- Ashnod/Martyr
- BM/Martyr
- ...
- Ashnod/Martyr
- BM/Martyr
- TYS/Wrong Turn
- one Volute trigger
- hyperstage preparations
- ......
- hyperstage preparations
- TYS/Divine Congregation 4
- TYS/Worldfire
- megastage preparations
- ......
- ...more megastages...
- ......
To get the number after Worldfire at 1, you need to resolve down to 2; to get the number after Worldfire at 3, you need to resolve down to 4. That will make the lower stages/hyperstages/megastages not work.At a glance the hyperstage still works as before, even if we only use multiple Spellweaver Volute triggers to cast more copies of our spells. Similarly we can cast multiple copies of sorceries using multiple triggers of Spellweaver Helix. All thanks to Veyran, Voice of Duality. So aside from convenience the _only_ function TYS serves for the combo is preservation of progress through Worldfire. So that's the only thing a replacement has to be able to do.
If before consuming a megastage transition we convert our huge number into delayed triggers that copy the next spell, then we just need to make sure that the first spell we cast after the consumption is Archenemy's Charm. Each copy trigger would resolve and choose targets separately, so we can recover our huge number.
The problem is that we can't actually cast Archenemy's Charm as the first spell. We can only cast it using Volute. If we trigger that volute after the consumption, the spell that triggered it was the first thing we cast. If we prepare that trigger as part of putting the megastage transition on the stack, then the Volute trigger is part of a pseudo hyperstage transition. The spell that Volute casts gets locked in for all the triggers of that batch whenever the Volute left the battlefield. And if the locked in spell is Charm instead of Spite we won't get the life back. So these "copy next spell" effects don't work.
But Bonus Round might work. It's harder to increase the number of active "copy spell" effects than with Teach or Training Post, but they also don't go away after a single use. To turn the output of computations into more active Bonus Rounds we need an additional spare red mana. Then convert life into Veyran copies and go through a pseudo megastage transition with that many Helix triggers, each casting Bonus Round. That looks fine to me.
Getting started is beginning to look hard ^^'
1 Coat of Arms
2 Xathrid Necromancer
3 Artificial Evolution
4 Arcbond
5 Comeuppance
6 Wrong Turn
7 March of the Machines
8 Kaervek's Spite
9 Goblin Boom Keg
Utility
10 Vedalken Orrery
11 Omniscience
12 Metalworker
13 Tyvar, Jubilant Brawler
14 Thousand-Year Storm
15 Anikthea, Hand of Erebos
16 Ratadrabik of Urborg
Foundry Stage
17 Neurok Replica
18 Oaken Siren
19 Ashnod the Uncaring
20 Soul Foundry
21 Flayed One
22 Riftsweeper
23 Bloodbond March
24 Cephalid Shrine
25 Spellweaver Volute
26 Veyran, Voice of Duality
27 Reality Heist
28 Lingering Souls
29 K'rrik, Son of Yawgmoth
30 Archon of Falling Stars
31 Pious Interdiction
Megastage
32 Spellweaver Helix
33 Gandalf the White
34 Gravitic Punch
35 Gravitic Punch
36 Mox Ruby
37 Worldfire
38 Search for Glory
Blue Mana Stage
39 Great Furnace
40 Muzzio, Visionary Architect
41 Floodchaser
42 Brutal Suppression
43 Arboreal Grazer
Green Mana Stage
44 Snow-Covered Island
45 Firebrand Ranger
46 Groundskeeper
47 Forest
48 Ruin Ghost
49 Weathered Wayfarer
50 Archaeological Dig
51 Spawning Pool
End Layers
52 Jolene, Plunder Queen
53 Smoke Spirits' Aid
54 Evidence Examiner
55 Full Throttle
56 World at War
Start
57 Mana Crypt
58 Epic Experiment
59 Resurgent Belief
60 Infectious Inquiry
By the way, a ruling question about Comeuppance: if we resolve many copies of Comeuppance, what will happen next time an Arcbonded creature would deal damage to us?
But that is actually just the same level of resource leak as Reality Heist putting Neurok Replica into hand after consuming the same megastage transition. And just a little while ago I convinced myself that this level of leak is safe if we play Chancellor of the Annex instead of Cephalid Shrine. So we should just do that!
Spawning Pool in particular allows for an illegal computation: the opponent can activate its regenerate ability with K'rrik, Son of Yawgmoth and Brutal Suppression to sacrifice itself at an arbitrary time. Using Ghitu Encampment instead should work.
Pretty much any creature land that doesn't produce white will be safe: an infinite involving the Tyvar untap needs to resolve Worldfire to reset Tyvar at some point. But at then the land is exiled as well and to get it back out of the library we need Weathered Wayfarer activations.
If we play Fated Infatuation we need to choose a creature land that enters tapped, otherwise we can create many untapped targets for Floodchaser and go infinite that way. I think entering untapped would be fine without Fated.
If Tyvar and the missing haste turns Muzzio, Visionary Architect safe, then the same argument should also work for Shaun & Rebecca, Agents. That means we can almost replace Metalworker + Flayed One, saving a card slot. But that would mean putting new mill triggers on the stack requires "haste". And Tyvar can't be around during all the middling Hypterstages, where we need to do that. So this doesn't quite work.
An option for ETB mill could be Gisa and Geralf. I don't think it goes infinite and the abilitie might help with the start.
An ETB mill of legendary creature is dangerous.
We can build the stack with Helix trigger below TYS/Resurgent Belief, which is below TYS/Search for Glory, which is below TYS/Worldfire.
After a Worldfire sweeper, TYS/Search for Glory can fetch legendary creatures, including Gandalf the White, which enable us to play other legendary creatures, like Gisa and Geralf.
It can mill Spellweaver Volute and Reality Heist, then Resurgent Belief bring Volute back.
After that, the Helix trigger casting sorceries will trigger Volute, casting Reality Heist, fetching Vedalken Orrery and Mox Ruby to hand and play them (Gandalf the White also let us play artifacts). Then we can use the sorceries from Helix trigger to build some hyperstages, then spend the R to flashback Gravitic Punch.
(If I understand that earlier post correctly, this should be the way to go infinite?)
In the case of nonlegendary mill card, we cannot get it back with Search for Glory, and it stuck in library unless we resolve an ETB trigger of it in lower place of the stack, which must resolve down and clean all the extra Helix triggers. So it is safe. But a legendary mill card will not be so.
Or is it safe? Because we need Riftsweeper to get Vedalken Orrery and Mox Ruby into library. Riftsweeper is just a nonlegendary nonartifact creature, which needs Bloodbond March trigger to get back and has function (and we cannot prepare its ETB trigger on the stack) even if we have easy mill like Gisa and Geralf.
2.
Another thing about Gisa and Geralf: if we Artificial Evolution it with Zombie -> Wizard, then Artificial Evolution will become another card to make Neurok Replica tokens. We may prepare many copies of Gisa and Geralf before one TYS/Artificial Evolution, then each copy of Artificial Evolution (targetting different Gisas) can let us "cast Neurok Replica from graveyard" an additional time.
(I'm not sure about this. If there are many Gisas enter at the same time, how many times can we cast Zombie card from graveyard? Do we lose the ability to cast Zombie card from graveyard once they leave the battlefield?)
We cannot cut off Reality Heist because it is the only way to get noncreature artifacts back after Worldfire.
3.
We know that in this deck we can only duplicate cards with creature or enchantment (except Aura) types. We cannot duplicate a general artifact or a general land.
But is it safe for an animatable land card even if it enters untapped? Like Mutavault. Floodchaser can turn it into Island, then Tyvar, Jubilant Brawler untap it for U.
Gandalf flash does seem to make things complicated. Seperating stuff into "only during transitions", "never during transitions" and "durdling around" everything that Gandalf lets us do should end up in "durdling around". The important things for the catalyst resource are "exile Mox Ruby" which requires Worldfire and "unexile Mox Ruby" which requires Riftsweeper. Once we start consuming the transition by resolving a Worldfire we have no access to Riftsweeper until we resolve a BBM trigger for it, which can only happen after we are done with the transition.
The timing of when we fetch the Mox Ruby out of the library and play it is flexible and with Gandalf it can be moved in between Worldfires of a lower transition. But that stuff is outside of the key events, so I'd say its safe. That also applies to Spellweaver Helix and my "no-leaking" argument for Tyvar and Heist.
So what about mill? Usually we can cast any number of our sorceries and one instant in any order after the last Worldfire of a transition: We can use TYS and Volute triggers in any order we want, triggered by casting all the spells from a single Helix. And for the purpose of going infinite we can lock the Volute in on any instant we choose, Heist probably being the most dangerous. So I don't think milling and getting back Volute changes that part much.
But milling and getting back Pious Interdiction is a problem. If we do that a couple times below the Worldfire we can sneak life through the transition. That is certainly too powerful. So we must not be able to mill during transitions, which rules out legendary and artifact ETBs.
Edit: I see no problem with Mutavault. If Tyvar wants to untap it repeatedly we need to reset Tyvar in between, which requires Worldfire. Then we need to fetch Mutavault with the white stage abilities. Due to using one of those we are allowed to produce that blue.
1 Coat of Arms
2 Xathrid Necromancer
3 Artificial Evolution
4 Arcbond
5 Comeuppance
6 Wrong Turn
7 March of the Machines
8 Kaervek's Spite
9 Goblin Boom Keg
Utility
10 Vedalken Orrery
11 Omniscience
12 Metalworker
13 Tyvar, Jubilant Brawler
14 Thousand-Year Storm
15 Anikthea, Hand of Erebos
16 Ratadrabik of Urborg
Foundry Stage
17 Neurok Replica
18 Oaken Siren
19 Ashnod the Uncaring
20 Soul Foundry
21 Thassa's Devourer
22 Riftsweeper
23 Bloodbond March
24 Chancellor of the Annex
25 Spellweaver Volute
26 Veyran, Voice of Duality
27 Reality Heist
28 Lingering Souls
29 K'rrik, Son of Yawgmoth
30 Archon of Falling Stars
31 Pious Interdiction
Megastage
32 Spellweaver Helix
33 Gandalf the White
34 Gravitic Punch
35 Gravitic Punch
36 Mox Ruby
37 Worldfire
38 Search for Glory
Blue Mana Stage
39 Great Furnace
40 Muzzio, Visionary Architect
41 Floodchaser
42 Brutal Suppression
43 Arboreal Grazer
Green Mana Stage
44 Snow-Covered Island
45 Firebrand Ranger
46 Groundskeeper
47 Forest
48 Ruin Ghost
49 Weathered Wayfarer
50 Archaeological Dig
51 Mutavault
End Layers
52 Jolene, Plunder Queen
53 Smoke Spirits' Aid
54 Evidence Examiner
55 Full Throttle
56 World at War
Start
57 Mana Crypt
58 Epic Experiment
59 Resurgent Belief
60 Infectious Inquiry
Not sure about the necessarity of Chancellor of the Annex over Cephalid Shrine.
I have a start strategy that, after a TYSed Infectious Inquiry giving 3 poisons, we have Gravitic Punch + Search for Glory + Reality Heist + Chancellor of the Annex + Archon of Falling Stars + Xathrid Necromancer + Floodchaser in hand. 4 poisons get Chancellor of the Annex + Worldfire. 5 poisons get Mutavault + Smoke Spirits' Aid, reaching a full growth.
It turns out that Chancellor of the Annex is the slow-down part (it cannot be fetched by Tyvar; it needs draw). If Cephalid Shrine worked, then we have Gravitic Punch + Worldfire + Search for Glory + Reality Heist + Archon of Falling Stars + Xathrid Necromancer + Floodchaser with 3 poisons and then Mutavault + Smoke Spirits' Aid at 4 poisons, reaching full growth earlier.
After Worldfire, Thassa's Devourer will lock out itself. Even with Gandalf the White and Anikthea, Hand of Erebos, we still need to resolve an ETB trigger from Thassa to get any mill. Any unsafe part with Cephalid Shrine?
EDIT: it looks like we cannot prepare Bloodbond March triggers of Chancellor of the Annex itself, unless we draw this card a second time.
I know Iijil prefers safety whenever possible, so would probably prefer Chancellor of the Annex just on principle.
The danger of an infinite with Cephalid Shrine comes from a line like this:
start with empty stack, Neurok Replica in hand everything we'd have access to during a megastage available in their usual zones, except Mox Ruby which is exiled and Volute which is in the graveyard.
1. Play Neurok Replica, use BBM triggers to set up a complete megastage recovery. We get access to enchantments with mill and Anikthea bounces, so Cephalid Shrine is among the stuff we get normal access to.
(this is the handwavey part where a reason this inifite doesn't work might be hiding)
2. Spend 1 red to put the transition on the stack. Make it look something like this:
TYS on Heist
TYS on Worldfire
n x Volute (still in play)
Megastage recovery
Note that Gravitic Punch isn't on the stack, because Cephalid Shrine countered it.
(To get the Volute triggers first resolve a Helix trigger including Belief to get it out of the graveyard. Then resolve a Helix trigger including the Worldfire cast. Counter the Worldfire you cast there.)
3. Spend some of the many resources you just got from Helix triggers to draw and play the Mox Ruby, getting that red back.
4. Put a mini recovery for Riftsweeper and Gandalf on the stack
5. Spend 1 red to put another transition on the stack:
Worldfire
Mini Recovery
TYS on Heist
TYS on Worldfire
n x Volute (still in play)
Megastage recovery
6. Move creatures and enchantments to whatever zone we need them in for recovery. Resolve Worldfire exiling all artifacts. Make sure LKI on that Volute is that it's enchanting Heist when Worldfire exiles it.
7. Use the mini Recovery to get Riftsweeper and Gandalf. Move all artifacts into the library. Resolve a Heist to grab Mox Ruby. Play it to get the red back.
8. Resolve Worldfire to exile Mox Ruby again. Resolve Volutes to cast Heists and get all other artifacts out of the library
9. Use the normal megastage recovery procedure to get back into the start position.
This infinite is impossible with Chancellor of the Annex because we can't donate it in 1, so Punch gets stuck on the stack in 2 and we can't do 5 at all.
Maybe there's some other detail that's impossible with Shrine as well. The recovery stuff is fiddly enough to hide problems. But unless there is some specific problematic aspect, I don't really want to work through more details. This is good enough for me to use Channex.
Edit: added info about Volute recovery.
Or in another word, in the deck with Chancellor, the full megastage recovery should include a hyperstage recovery (in which we put TYS triggers of Wrong Turn above one Volute trigger).
And question: With Chancellor of the Annex, is it still safe to use an artifact Flayed One or a legendary Gisa and Geralf as ETB mill?
How about a normal combo? How to recover after Worldfire, getting both Reality Heist and Wrong Turn, then getting the number remembered by Thousand-Year Storm? Like, putting TYS triggers of Reality Heist and TYS triggers of Wrong Turn on 2 different hyperstage transitions (both have a Volute trigger in below, resolving to cast Kaervek's Spite)?
EDIT: This thing seems quite hard? Without noncreature artifacts, Riftsweeper can only enter once with its BM trigger. Even if we bounce it, we cannot play it (no Orrery, and no Foundry (Foundry is another way to make Riftsweeper's ETB work for multiple times)), before resolving a Reality Heist. One ETB of Riftsweeper can only unexile one of Vedalken Orrery, Mox Ruby, Spellweaver Helix or Soul Foundry.
So @Iijil the step 7 assuming Riftsweeper can unexile all artifacts might be not so easy.
Also, now I realized that Chancellor of the Annex on opponent's side is necessary to prepare Bloodbond March triggers. And Bloodbond March trigger is necessary to duplicate creatures (using Soul Foundry). It turns out that we cannot prepare Bloodbond March triggers of Chancellor of the Annex, so it cannot survive Worldfire. To make megastage work, we need to draw Chancellor of the Annex a second time.
So... start with Archaeological Dig, Mox Ruby, Mana Crypt, Epic Experiment, TYS, Infectious Inquiry, then have Gravitic Punch + Search for Glory + Reality Heist + Chancellor of the Annex + Archon of Falling Stars + Xathrid Necromancer + Floodchaser in hand.
Search for Glory: Tyvar, Jubilant Brawler + Gandalf the White + Veyran, Voice of Duality + Ashnod the Uncaring. Play the first three cards.
Reality Heist: getting all artifacts except Ruby and Crypt. Metalworker and Oaken make 16U, then play Vedalken Orrery.
Play Foundry for Ashnod + Neurok.
Important part: Tyvar -2 mill Gravitic Punch + Thassa's Devourer + Riftsweeper, return Riftsweeper to field, which unexiles Ashnod. (This is also first mill, so we have Thassa's mill usable later with Anikthea or Resurgent Belief)
Play Helix on Gravitic Punch + Resurgent Belief + Search for Glory + Infectious Inquiry.
Play Gravitic Punch. This should prepare things.
4 poisons we draw Chancellor of the Annex + Worldfire.
5 poisons we draw Mutavault + Smoke Spirits' Aid, reaching full combo.
Finally BB_{w^3+w*3+7}(BB_{w^3+w*3+6}(BB_{w^3+w*3+2}^5(some smaller number; I haven't calculate the detail yet))) damage.
EDIT: I have overestimated the power of Gisa and Geralf + Artificial Evolution. They cannot make extra Neurok Replica tokens. They can only make a batch of Bloodbond March triggers; worth one "layer".
Good point about Riftsweeper though. That is indeed a bottleneck. And unfortunately I think it is enough of a problem to make the combo we actually want completely impossible, even if we us Cephalid Shrine:
1. We have no way to keep Riftweeper activations on the stack. So if Riftsweeper ever gets exiled by Worldfire we can never get it back. Therefore it has to be in the library everytime we consume a transition.
2. The only way to get Riftweeper into the library is by exiling it with Soul Foundry and using the token Foundry creates on it. But the Foundry also can only go into the library via Riftsweeper. So until we get Riftsweeper back with a Bloodbond March trigger below the transition we can not avoid the Foundry getting exiled by Worldfire. Therefore the Foundry can not be in our hand after any megastage transition.
3. Every hyperstage transition below a megastage transition can only have a single "floating" instant.
4. We need to resolve both Reality Heist and Wrong Turn to donate Soul Foundry.
5. Once we resole the Heist of that pair we can not cast Kaervek's Spite before resolving Wrong Turn without putting Foundry into the Graveyard, where it is stuck until we resolve Worldfire again.
6. (3, 4 and 5) together mean that we need to trigger a new Spellweaver Volute to donate Foundry. We need to donate it in order to use it in the middling Foundry stages. Therefore we need to get Volute back without using Foundry.
7. Without Foundry we can only have a single Archon of Falling Stars. Therefore we can only bring back a single aura in each hyperstage transition.
8. That single aura has to be Pious Interdiction. Otherwise we don't get the life back to put the transition back on the stack later.
9. We can't get Volute back.
So yeah, this deck doesn't quite work after all.