On second glance at the triple "arrow iteration" deck, the Moggcatcher substitution won't do after all, because it's red: the perils of having to cut off so much space so early.
Looking into it further, Canal Dredger doesn't look safe either. Nothing in the artifact/enchantment block can be allowed to get Bloodbond March triggers, or we could discard that a few times for more black mana, at a lower level than Devout Chaplain. Even more problematic is Sleeper Agent, which can be bounced from any arriving creature and then discarded again.
Hmm, that means that any creature that can be donated is out of bounds. We can go back to Jinxed Idol, but as usual that requires Grand Abolisher to keep the opponent from sacrificing it. Measure of Wickedness should be okay; we don't care about Frontier Siege at the very bottom of the combo.
Is the Dredger/Reito Lantern function actually something we need at all? I don't see any obstacles in setup that require cards to get stuck in the grave, and once we get all the structure, anything that dies as a creature can go onto a Mimic Vat and be tucked back into the library from there. Any nonpermanent cards can be returned by Archaeomancer (although I'm not sure that will be able to stay in the deck after the Sleeper Agent revision--if it can, Wandering Mage fits over Ghosthelm Courier since we have no higher Clerics and no source of lifegain), and that leaves Elspeth who only has the one cameo responsibility early on and won't be going to the graveyard in any case.
The reason I was thinking we needed a Reito Lantern-like card was for Possessed Nomad shenanigans. Eventually we will run out of Possessed Nomad tappings, so we need to tap a token to bounce the original card. That means we need to get the graveyard to seven cards, activate the ability, then respond to that by reducing the graveyard to less than seven. Exiling to Mimic Vat can't be used as a response, and Archaeomancer is too high up to use.
The reason I was thinking we needed a Reito Lantern-like card was for Possessed Nomad shenanigans. Eventually we will run out of Possessed Nomad tappings, so we need to tap a token to bounce the original card. That means we need to get the graveyard to seven cards, activate the ability, then respond to that by reducing the graveyard to less than seven. Exiling to Mimic Vat can't be used as a response, and Archaeomancer is too high up to use.
Necrogenesis or Withered Wretch are less obtrusive still. If only there was a Treefolk with the Necrogenesis ability, just to have one...
Well, I figured that having Mana Crypt would prevent us from having to discard the Spirit Guides with no Bloodbond March triggers, requiring us to spend Words of Wisdom to draw them again. Even though making Mana Crypt requires more shenanigans, I don't think it is as expensive as needing another Words of Wisdom spell. So it's basically a choice between more complications / slightly higher damage versus less complications / slightly less damage. I lean towards the greater damage, but it doesn't matter to me much either way since the estimate is not affected.
I considered whether we even needed the Mana Crypt role at all any more, but after going over it, I guess something has to be available to pay for the Mimic Vat housing Devout Chaplain, and (less importantly) the Sinking Feeling and Rings of Brighthearth at that low level. But I figure that if the colorless mana generator is sturdy enough to stand up under its own weight, we could cut Elspeth entirely.
Now that red creatures are cast off en masse relatively early on, it doesn't hurt too much to go back to Gruul Ragebeast over Frontier Siege: the number of fights will stay static at the Devout Chaplain and Llanowar Dead levels, but everything else (including the last of the dominant operations) still keeps its layer. On top of that, there won't be a blanket grant of flying, so we could use it as a standout trait once again, perhaps by using the free slot to wedge Matsu-Tribe Sniper above Dream Thrush, or Arashi, the Sky Asunder above Baron Sengir. It's not quite that simple, as Noxious Dragon and Shadowborn Demon from later on will both interfere with that. But both of those cards use triggers, so finding ways to replace them with straightforward tappers stands to be a beneficial operation.
If I may be so bold, I'd like to say that you two are putting a lot of effort into preserving that shell from the original megacombo when it seems utterly obsolete to me. Finding an efficient operator and doing it as many times as possible is distinctly not the winning strategy here. Asking "how many time can I make Precursor Golem?" or "How many times can I Rite of Replication?" consistent leads to mediocre results. "How many times can I make something a target?" was entertainingly powerful, but if you cut the methods for rapid increase off of the unnecessary parts you're working around, you probably have deck space for another unrelated thing we haven't yet thought of.
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Zedruu: "This deck is not only able to go crazy - it also needs to do so."
The goal is to squeeze as many distinct steps as possible into the deck, giving preference to as many arrow iterates as can safely coexist, and once that limit has been reached, ordinary layers are the next-most-powerful operation available: by current understanding, a single card can be worth up to 15 of these layers, except that in the specific case of producing mana, certain effects may allow a card to reach as high as 18 (but then the immediately preceding step will necessarily be worth a lot less than that). Of course connecting several of those efficient cards into each other in a single prescribed order is more desirable than having 20-30 redundant cards with the exact same purpose, which is why the deck is full of singletons, and still wanting for deck space to hold even more of them.
What makes Cowardice so great is that it expands the breadth of usable effects that we can look for by a dramatic margin. Instead of being limited to things like "give target creature +1/+1" or "bounce target creature", we can look for abilities that are normally designed to be a minor or even destructive effect with a narrow targeting condition, and turn them into an avenue for replaying some other card to a fresh new maximum effect. The game only has finite search space, so the added options are simply better at allowing us to subdivide the classification of permanents into several discrete steps. Take Dwarven Demolition Team into Dwarven Pony, for instance. Those are generally considered narrow and bad cards, not suitable for much in the way of combos. But with a properly constructed Cowardice chain, they can take a supply of Walls and amplify their ranks by 30 layers, and the only snag they place on the rest of the deck is that later parts of the sequence can't contain Walls or Dwarves--hardly a hit at all. Now, that particular connection is obsolete and off-limits to the current working copy of the deck, but all three of the current "1 mana = X new layers" steps are in fact dependent on the Cowardice engine to do what they do as well.
That Psychic Battle and Grip of Chaos turn into full and distinct layers each, instead of merely a crutch to ensure the targeting can proceed as planned, is a nice bonus.
And I'm not suggesting you cut Cowardice or Psychic Chaos (TM), I'm just saying that if you look at the tentative decklist, only about a third of it is absolutely necessary for the 3 functions doing most of the work. Another third is an insanely complex setup that could easily be cut by half if it wasn't built to support the last third that is 20 singletons that are relatively underpowered. Even adding 18 layers per card isn't worth it when we've moved into functions that multiply the layers, much the same way that multiplying total output was nearly worthless once exponents got involved. If those 20 cards could be replaced with even one more layer of layers, it'd be a better list.
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Zedruu: "This deck is not only able to go crazy - it also needs to do so."
Those steps depend on a specific profile of card, one where the existing search space of cards makes clear that the prospects of getting more than 3 instances of it are bleak.
At the lowest level, we have Possessed Nomad bouncing white creatures for black mana, and Skirge Familiar allowing things to be perpetuated if given a buffer of spare mana, by discarding any card for a single additional black.In order to avoid getting stuck, this discarded card has to be something that can bring itself back from the graveyard somehow; here that somehow is Bloodbond March plus bounce, and in order to keep the black mana constrained, this step is required to be the first step that has any cards we can bring back in such a way. Notably, being able to discard any card for Skirge Familiar fits exactly the same profile as a spellshaper would. This means that Familiar and spellshaper cannot coexist as two separate iterations of the step that feed into each other: any card that could usefully be discarded in the "less important" step, could also be discarded in the "more important" (higher-level) step, and the lower step would allow the same card to be reused. That's the signature of an unbounded loop.
Instead, only the lowest step can accept discards of arbitrary cards as fuel, and above that we need to look for ways of enforcing "discard this specific card as the only way you can keep the fuel steady". Two options for these, of course, are Elvish and Simian Spirit Guide, which have already been integrated successfully: Possessed Nomad can't touch either of these, and there are cards purposed for touching both the spirit guide, which produces one mana at the same level, as well as the creature designated for producing lots of mana of the previous color. Other than that, the options for abilities that work from hand are:
Faerie Macabre - given what Possessed Nomad already requires to be in place, this isn't an effect we can take advantage of
The forecast ability - This works in upkeep, so we'd need an opening hand start like Leyline/SSG/Mana Crypt/Chaos Warp, but that's easily arranged. In addition to requiring additional costs of mana, which are always in the two colors that none of the mana-producing creatures give thus far, the fatal aspect is that Forecast doesn't actually use up the card, so you can reveal to forecast and then simply play the card in response to get some Bloodbond March on top of the ability.
The bloodrush ability - Attacking creatures are set in stone at one particular point in the turn, and bouncing them after that point can't perpetuate anything. Once they're used up, they're used up, and there's no further opportunity to declare more attackers.
The channel ability - Almost all of these use the broad "target creature" clause, which is no good in a Cowardice world because it cannot have a safe container for whatever resource it's trying to make. The sole interesting prospect here is Ghost-Lit Redeemer, which is white and has already been disqualified by Possessed Nomad.
So we find a loop that doesn't use creature targetting or colored mana. I'm pretty certain that with every card ever printed in magic as an option, there are going to be more of these loops than just things with bloodbond march and discard. We just haven't thought of them yet.
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Zedruu: "This deck is not only able to go crazy - it also needs to do so."
tstorm823, I completely agree that the first priority is to find more Ackermann stages that we can squeeze into the combo (or possibly even something better!), and only after that worry about adding individual recursive layers. It's just that I find that, for me, inspiration is hard to force, so I don't mind spending some extra effort working on the minor details; I don't really think that if I spent all that time concentrating on the next major idea then those ideas would come appreciably faster.
Having said that, I believe I have come up with another source of Ackermann combos: namely, landcycling. Landcycling is not a mana ability, so it can be copied by Rings of Brighthearth, which is no good. So we need to take that out. Also, with Nature's Revolt, we get many copies of any land, so that has to go as well. Mana Reflection is of course no good. But with those three cards removed, I believe one use of landcycling gets us one land and one mana, so it functions the same as our other combos.
A preliminary effort gets five Ackermann stages; however, at the very top I do use the general "target creature" ability, which kills off all the creatures above it, leaving us with just a spell section. Still worth it, of course.
I believe we can squeeze a sixth one in, using that tech.
First three stages as you have them. Then, stage 4:
needs a source of red mana, so Fire Sprites
landcycler: Shoreline Ranger which fetches Island
targeting step: Air Servant, another thing that needs Elspeth to leave
The challenge then moves on to trying to produce a ton of snow mana, topping that off. I thought Teferi, Temporal Archmage might be useful for this, activating once for the emblem and the rest of the times to untap some lands, but it can also be used to effectively draw cards. Since the plan would have been to use Chaos Warp to reset his identity for another ability, that can't be allowed. We do at least have the luxury of a ton of spare slots to rig something up, and shore up whatever doesn't work. Right away, I can tell Izzet Chronarch is going to be no good, for instance.
Unfortunately, Chartooth Cougar is red, and therefore excluded by Paragon of Fierce Defense. Also, Stage 5 exludes blue, black, and white creatures, leaving just green, and the only monogreen landcyclers I could find are both Elves.
However, Firebrand Ranger no longer works in this deck. How do we put the lands onto the battlefield? Patron of the Moon and Loam Dweller seem good, except they put lands onto the battlefield tapped, which wasn't a problem before, but it is now.
However, Firebrand Ranger no longer works in this deck. How do we put the lands onto the battlefield? Patron of the Moon and Loam Dweller seem good, except they put lands onto the battlefield tapped, which wasn't a problem before, but it is now.
The classic tech with Patron of the Moon is Amulet of Vigor. The questionable interaction is that multiple Amulets all trigger independently with the opportunity to tap for mana between. And I'm gonna take a stab in the dark that making a million mana with each land is a bad thing. The only way to make that safe would be to find away to clear out March of the Machines as well.
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Zedruu: "This deck is not only able to go crazy - it also needs to do so."
I feel like something with Pestilence Demon and that 0/2 from ravnica that puts a copy of its self whenever its dealt damage could be good. Maybe with avacyn?
Damnit! Guess I'll have to revise the deck somehow. With just 1 Chain Reaction and no Boros Charm that should fix it (just play another card that doubles creatures). I think the Charm was leftover from a draft where I had 4 Chain Reactions before realizing that the first one would be lethal. Turns out that wouldn't work anyway
If my stage 5 becomes Princess Lucrezia->Goryo's Vengeance->Hana Kami->Ranger of Eos with Icatian Lieutenant, then we won't have to cut so much and Twisted Abomination will still be available for stage 6.
Nicely done. I think my sequence is still a little better, as it requires fewer cards (23 versus 25). The March of the Machines cut doesn't remove any cards that add layers, so it's not really a disadvantage. But we should keep both sequences in mind for possible improvements.
Even if March of the Machines doesn't cost any layers directly, you're also cutting Sinking Feeling in order to make Break Through the Line behave, and that costs some layers (all of them?) on Elite Arcanist. Indeed, with that card gone, Rite of Passage and the whole fight setup don't accomplish a whole lot.
There are some decks that can benefit from an approach like that, generally those that end in a damage figure that uses just a single exponential expression. But for the most powerful builds, the multiplier this provides is too small to be noticeable, and using those deck slots on repetitions of the last card would be worth more still.
Death's Presence is incompatible with the Cowardice builds anyway, since it can target any creature, and the death of a low-level creature could be used to put +1/+1 counters on (or better yet, bounce) a more expressive creature higher up, and that's clearly infinite.
Even if March of the Machines doesn't cost any layers directly, you're also cutting Sinking Feeling in order to make Break Through the Line behave, and that costs some layers (all of them?) on Elite Arcanist. Indeed, with that card gone, Rite of Passage and the whole fight setup don't accomplish a whole lot.
Sinking Feeling should be okay. The only two cards that we are worried about Break Through the Line targeting are Morselhoarder and Igneous Pouncer, both of which cannot be taken down to a power of 2 without killing them. I notice that Sinking Feeling somehow got lost from the deck; added back in.
Any reason to prefer Rimehorn Aurochs as the snow sink instead of Rimescale Dragon? Aurochs has a two-target ability, so it doesn't get Grip of Chaos to trigger, only Psychic Battle.
In terms of cutting down on the transitional cards, I could get stage 5 to be Rattleclaw Mystic (making blue, because G and R are already accounted for)/Pale Recluse for plainscycling, and then Kelsinko Ranger to target them. But then I need a mass white producer, and excluding all the good green creatures doesn't do any favors. Helionaut has flying, Necra Disciple and Ceta Disciple both have distinct abilities that target any creature for regular mana, Smokebraider and Vedalken Engineer aren't feeding into their discriminatory tastes. Blood Celebrant into Silent Attendant will work, for a total of one transition card, though it cuts off life sinks that may be of some use later on. Such is...well, life.
If there was a life step lower down, or if the changeling was Cairn Wanderer with a card to give it lifelink, then Vesper Ghoul would link up nicely in one card. But life in the spell sequence would still be off limits, and none of the cards I see with lifelink are good for any other purpose besides being dummy cards, so it's pretty much the same difference either way.
Well, we only need one of Rings of Brighthearth, Grip of Chaos, and Psychic Battle to make the Ackermann combos work. Since creatures get excluded at the end, Grip of Chaos and Psychic Battle no longer add individual layers, so it's only really worth it to have one; I picked Psychic Battle to avoid requiring extreme luck. That makes Rimehorn Aurochs minutely better for having two targets instead of one.
We can add a seventh stage by using Horror of Horrors. This is a little different because we can't accumulate Swamps, but with a large number of Slimy Kavus (for example), we can build up a large stack by converting other lands to Swamps one at a time and sacrificing them to Horror of Horrors to repeatedly bounce Twisted Abomination. Once the Slimy Kavus are expended, we can proceed in the usual way by discarding Twisted Abomination to retrieve the actual Swamp.
The deck creates two different kinds of mana. The first kind comes from Smokebraider and Mana Reflection and can't be used for buyback, so it doesn't go infinite. The second kind comes from Channel. The life to pay said Channel comes from Words of Worship, which, thanks to Xenograft and Opalescence, is an elemental creature able to feed off Smokebraider. How convenient.
The main business is the interaction between Snow Hound, Drake Familiar and the enchantments. The hound has haste due to Kragma Warcaller. (Yes, that's a giant elemental minotaur golem hound we're talking about) and the mana comes from our friend Smokebraider. Who in turn gets recycled by Swift Warkite (Not targeting is a big plus here, since triggers going onto the stack simultaneously don't steal each other's targets), who gets recycled by Crypt Angel. (She targets, making her scale only off Dual Nature and Bloodbond March, but not so well off Doubling Season.)
The 3rd Disturbed Burial and the 2nd Crypt Angel: The former rots in the graveyard and ensures the new Pyromancer Ascensions are online asap. The latter is the target for the original Burial, which needs to resolve to return to the hand via Buyback.
+1 Silumgar Sorcerer Was initially against him because of his restricted timing. Then I realised I can just bounce him with Snow Hound.
+4 Time Reversal slightly, but strictly worse than Time Spiral, since I can't untap City of Traitors. However, the added redundancy is always welcome.
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Hmm, that means that any creature that can be donated is out of bounds. We can go back to Jinxed Idol, but as usual that requires Grand Abolisher to keep the opponent from sacrificing it. Measure of Wickedness should be okay; we don't care about Frontier Siege at the very bottom of the combo.
The reason I was thinking we needed a Reito Lantern-like card was for Possessed Nomad shenanigans. Eventually we will run out of Possessed Nomad tappings, so we need to tap a token to bounce the original card. That means we need to get the graveyard to seven cards, activate the ability, then respond to that by reducing the graveyard to less than seven. Exiling to Mimic Vat can't be used as a response, and Archaeomancer is too high up to use.
We can replace Canal Dredger rather clumsily with Feldon's Cane.
1 Skirge Familiar
1 Possessed Nomad
1 Llanowar Dead
1 Elvish Spirit Guide
1 Ezuri, Renegade Leader
1 Zhur-Taa Druid
1 Simian Spirit Guide
1 Paragon of Fierce Defiance
1 Snow-Covered Mountain
1 Scrying Sheets
1 Show and Tell
1 Archaeomancer
1 Ghosthelm Courier
1 Tropical Island
1 Everbark Shaman
1 Boggart Loggers
1 Goblin Burrows
1 Tidal Warrior
1 Seahunter
1 Cateran Enforcer
1 Cateran Slaver
1 Cateran Overlord
1 Mercenary Informer
1 Dream Thrush
1 Driver of the Dead
1 Baron Sengir
1 Willow Satyr
1 King Crab
1 Stronghold Assassin
1 Noxious Dragon
1 Shadowborn Demon
1 Minion of Leshrac
1 Five-Alarm Fire
1 Mimic Vat
1 Mirror of Fate
1 Dual Nature
1 Frontier Siege
1 Guilty Conscience
1 Rite of Passage
1 Rings of Brighthearth
1 Grip of Chaos
1 Psychic Battle
1 Cowardice
1 Leyline of Anticipation
1 Omniscience
1 March of the Machines
1 Nature's Revolt
1 Opalescence
1 Elspeth, Sun's Champion
1 Elvish Pioneer
1 Mana Crypt
1 Hair-Strung Koto
1 Measure of Wickedness
1 Armament of Nyx
1 Words of Wisdom
1 Feldon's Cane
1 Mana Reflection
1 Cephalid Shrine
Necrogenesis or Withered Wretch are less obtrusive still. If only there was a Treefolk with the Necrogenesis ability, just to have one...
I considered whether we even needed the Mana Crypt role at all any more, but after going over it, I guess something has to be available to pay for the Mimic Vat housing Devout Chaplain, and (less importantly) the Sinking Feeling and Rings of Brighthearth at that low level. But I figure that if the colorless mana generator is sturdy enough to stand up under its own weight, we could cut Elspeth entirely.
Now that red creatures are cast off en masse relatively early on, it doesn't hurt too much to go back to Gruul Ragebeast over Frontier Siege: the number of fights will stay static at the Devout Chaplain and Llanowar Dead levels, but everything else (including the last of the dominant operations) still keeps its layer. On top of that, there won't be a blanket grant of flying, so we could use it as a standout trait once again, perhaps by using the free slot to wedge Matsu-Tribe Sniper above Dream Thrush, or Arashi, the Sky Asunder above Baron Sengir. It's not quite that simple, as Noxious Dragon and Shadowborn Demon from later on will both interfere with that. But both of those cards use triggers, so finding ways to replace them with straightforward tappers stands to be a beneficial operation.
What makes Cowardice so great is that it expands the breadth of usable effects that we can look for by a dramatic margin. Instead of being limited to things like "give target creature +1/+1" or "bounce target creature", we can look for abilities that are normally designed to be a minor or even destructive effect with a narrow targeting condition, and turn them into an avenue for replaying some other card to a fresh new maximum effect. The game only has finite search space, so the added options are simply better at allowing us to subdivide the classification of permanents into several discrete steps. Take Dwarven Demolition Team into Dwarven Pony, for instance. Those are generally considered narrow and bad cards, not suitable for much in the way of combos. But with a properly constructed Cowardice chain, they can take a supply of Walls and amplify their ranks by 30 layers, and the only snag they place on the rest of the deck is that later parts of the sequence can't contain Walls or Dwarves--hardly a hit at all. Now, that particular connection is obsolete and off-limits to the current working copy of the deck, but all three of the current "1 mana = X new layers" steps are in fact dependent on the Cowardice engine to do what they do as well.
That Psychic Battle and Grip of Chaos turn into full and distinct layers each, instead of merely a crutch to ensure the targeting can proceed as planned, is a nice bonus.
At the lowest level, we have Possessed Nomad bouncing white creatures for black mana, and Skirge Familiar allowing things to be perpetuated if given a buffer of spare mana, by discarding any card for a single additional black.In order to avoid getting stuck, this discarded card has to be something that can bring itself back from the graveyard somehow; here that somehow is Bloodbond March plus bounce, and in order to keep the black mana constrained, this step is required to be the first step that has any cards we can bring back in such a way. Notably, being able to discard any card for Skirge Familiar fits exactly the same profile as a spellshaper would. This means that Familiar and spellshaper cannot coexist as two separate iterations of the step that feed into each other: any card that could usefully be discarded in the "less important" step, could also be discarded in the "more important" (higher-level) step, and the lower step would allow the same card to be reused. That's the signature of an unbounded loop.
Instead, only the lowest step can accept discards of arbitrary cards as fuel, and above that we need to look for ways of enforcing "discard this specific card as the only way you can keep the fuel steady". Two options for these, of course, are Elvish and Simian Spirit Guide, which have already been integrated successfully: Possessed Nomad can't touch either of these, and there are cards purposed for touching both the spirit guide, which produces one mana at the same level, as well as the creature designated for producing lots of mana of the previous color. Other than that, the options for abilities that work from hand are:
Having said that, I believe I have come up with another source of Ackermann combos: namely, landcycling. Landcycling is not a mana ability, so it can be copied by Rings of Brighthearth, which is no good. So we need to take that out. Also, with Nature's Revolt, we get many copies of any land, so that has to go as well. Mana Reflection is of course no good. But with those three cards removed, I believe one use of landcycling gets us one land and one mana, so it functions the same as our other combos.
A preliminary effort gets five Ackermann stages; however, at the very top I do use the general "target creature" ability, which kills off all the creatures above it, leaving us with just a spell section. Still worth it, of course.
1 Woodland Changeling
1 Black Poplar Shaman
1 Skirge Familar
1 Llanowar Dead
1 Elvish Spirit Guide
1 Ezuri, Renegade Leader
1 Zhur-Taa Druid
1 Simian Spirit Guide
1 Paragon of Fierce Defiance
1 Tinder Wall
1 Ranger of Eos
1 Plains
1 Noble Templar
1 Icatian Lieutenant
1 Axebane Guardian
1 Snow-Covered Island
1 Jhessian Zombies
1 Rimebound Aurochs
1 Spitting Image
1 Chaos Warp
1 Elite Arcanist
1 Firemind's Foresight
1 Supply // Demand
1 Psychic Trance
1 Merchant Scroll
1 Wild Ricochet
1 Night Dealings
1 Five-Alarm Fire
1 Gilder Bairn
1 World at War
1 Mimic Vat
1 Mirror of Fate
1 Dual Nature
1 Doubling Season
1 Frontier Siege
1 Guilty Conscience
1 Rite of Passage
1 Psychic Battle
1 Cowardice
1 Leyline of Anticipation
1 Omniscience
1 March of the Machines
1 Opalescence
1 Elspeth, Sun's Champion
1 Mana Crypt
1 Cellar Door
1 Copy Enchantment
1 Izzet Chronarch
1 Precursor Golem
1 Withered Wretch
1 Claws of Gix
1 Sleeper Agent
1 Firebrand Ranger
1 Armament of Nyx
1 Djinn Illuminatus
1 Words of Wisdom
1 Animate Land
1 Mountain
This should do more than 10 -> 10 -> 10 -> 10 -> 10 -> 10 -> 2 -> 38 damage.
First three stages as you have them. Then, stage 4:
needs a source of red mana, so Fire Sprites
landcycler: Shoreline Ranger which fetches Island
targeting step: Air Servant, another thing that needs Elspeth to leave
Stage 5:
needs a source of blue mana: Sea Scryer (there really isn't much in the way of alternatives, and Sygg, River Guide would almost be okay with this, but it needs another sparring partner)
transition: Norritt
transition: Devout Lightcaster
landcycler: Noble Templar fetching Plains
targeting step: Daughter of Autumn
Stage 6:
needs a source of white mana, and Harabaz Druid is the best bet
landcycler: Chartooth Cougar fetching Snow-Covered Mountain
targeting step: Rimescale Dragon
The challenge then moves on to trying to produce a ton of snow mana, topping that off. I thought Teferi, Temporal Archmage might be useful for this, activating once for the emblem and the rest of the times to untap some lands, but it can also be used to effectively draw cards. Since the plan would have been to use Chaos Warp to reset his identity for another ability, that can't be allowed. We do at least have the luxury of a ton of spare slots to rig something up, and shore up whatever doesn't work. Right away, I can tell Izzet Chronarch is going to be no good, for instance.
I was thinking of the following:
1 Woodland Changeling
1 Black Poplar Shaman
1 Skirge Familiar
1 Riven Turnbull
1 Island
1 Shoreline Ranger
1 Paragon of Gathering Mists
1 Dimir Guildgate
1 Greenside Watcher
1 Elvish Spirit Guide
1 Ezuri, Renegade Leader
1 Steward of Valeron
1 Plains
1 Noble Templar
1 Paragon of New Dawns
1 Avacyn's Pilgrim
1 Simian Spirit Guide
1 Break Through the Line
1 Morselhoarder
1 Snow-Covered Mountain
1 Igneous Pouncer
1 Rimebound Aurochs
1 Elite Arcanist
1 Firemind's Foresight
1 Supply // Demand
1 Psychic Trance
1 Merchant Scroll
1 Wild Ricochet
1 Angelheart Vial
1 Five-Alarm Fire
1 World at War
1 Sleeper Agent
1 Bloodbond March
1 Mirror of Fate
1 Dual Nature
1 Frontier Siege
1 Guilty Conscience
1 Rite of Passage
1 Psychic Battle
1 Cowardice
1 Leyline of Anticipation
1 Omniscience
1 March of the Machines
1 Opalescence
1 Elspeth, Sun's Champion
1 Mana Crypt
1 Cellar Door
1 Copy Enchantment
1 Wheel of Fortune
1 Mimic Vat
1 Doubling Season
1 Reito Lantern
1 Claws of Gix
1 Firebrand Ranger
1 Djinn Illuminatus
1 Donate
1 Invoke Prejudice
1 Precursor Golem
However, Firebrand Ranger no longer works in this deck. How do we put the lands onto the battlefield? Patron of the Moon and Loam Dweller seem good, except they put lands onto the battlefield tapped, which wasn't a problem before, but it is now.
The classic tech with Patron of the Moon is Amulet of Vigor. The questionable interaction is that multiple Amulets all trigger independently with the opportunity to tap for mana between. And I'm gonna take a stab in the dark that making a million mana with each land is a bad thing. The only way to make that safe would be to find away to clear out March of the Machines as well.
Mirror of Fate -> Riftsweeper
Mana Crypt -> Ashnod's Altar
Cellar Door -> Whetstone
Mimic Vat -> Minion Reflector (and with that, I think Dual Nature can be removed as well)
and I think we're in business.
1 Woodland Changeling
1 Black Poplar Shaman
1 Skirge Familiar
1 Riven Turnbull
1 Island
1 Shoreline Ranger
1 Paragon of Gathering Mists
1 Dimir Guildgate
1 Greenside Watcher
1 Elvish Spirit Guide
1 Ezuri, Renegade Leader
1 Steward of Valeron
1 Plains
1 Noble Templar
1 Paragon of New Dawns
1 Avacyn's Pilgram
1 Simian Spirit Guide
1 Break Through the Lines
1 Morselhoarder
1 Snow-Covered Mountain
1 Igneous Pouncer
1 Rimebound Aurochs
1 Elite Arcanist
1 Firemind's Foresight
1 Supply // Demand
1 Psychic Trance
1 Merchant Scroll
1 Wild Ricochet
1 Night Dealings
1 Five-Alarm Fire
1 Gilder Bairn
1 World at War
1 Measure of Wickedness
1 Bloodbond March
1 Riftsweeper
1 Minion Reflector
1 Frontier Siege
1 Guilty Conscience
1 Rite of Passage
1 Psychic Battle
1 Cowardice
1 Leyline of Anticipation
1 Omniscience
1 Opalescence
1 Elspeth, Sun's Champion
1 Ashnod's Altar
1 Whetstone
1 Copy Enchantment
1 Wheel of Fortune
1 Doubling Season
1 Reito Lantern
1 Claws of Gix
1 Patron of the Moon
1 Amulet of Vigor
1 Djinn Illuminatus
1 Donate
1 Invoke Prejudice
1 Sinking Feeling
Prospective damage: more than 10 -> 10 -> 10 -> 10 -> 10 -> 10 -> 10 -> 2 -> 35
Darn, I'm too slow. You got it all figured out before my brain got back around to "oh, Walking Atlas does exactly what we want, doesn't it."
Craterhoof Behomoth gives each creature more than 2^800 power, so the total damage goes to more than 2^1600. Overwhelming Stampede is another doubler.
Death's Presence is incompatible with the Cowardice builds anyway, since it can target any creature, and the death of a low-level creature could be used to put +1/+1 counters on (or better yet, bounce) a more expressive creature higher up, and that's clearly infinite.
Sinking Feeling should be okay. The only two cards that we are worried about Break Through the Line targeting are Morselhoarder and Igneous Pouncer, both of which cannot be taken down to a power of 2 without killing them. I notice that Sinking Feeling somehow got lost from the deck; added back in.
In terms of cutting down on the transitional cards, I could get stage 5 to be Rattleclaw Mystic (making blue, because G and R are already accounted for)/Pale Recluse for plainscycling, and then Kelsinko Ranger to target them. But then I need a mass white producer, and excluding all the good green creatures doesn't do any favors. Helionaut has flying, Necra Disciple and Ceta Disciple both have distinct abilities that target any creature for regular mana, Smokebraider and Vedalken Engineer aren't feeding into their discriminatory tastes. Blood Celebrant into Silent Attendant will work, for a total of one transition card, though it cuts off life sinks that may be of some use later on. Such is...well, life.
If there was a life step lower down, or if the changeling was Cairn Wanderer with a card to give it lifelink, then Vesper Ghoul would link up nicely in one card. But life in the spell sequence would still be off limits, and none of the cards I see with lifelink are good for any other purpose besides being dummy cards, so it's pretty much the same difference either way.
We can add a seventh stage by using Horror of Horrors. This is a little different because we can't accumulate Swamps, but with a large number of Slimy Kavus (for example), we can build up a large stack by converting other lands to Swamps one at a time and sacrificing them to Horror of Horrors to repeatedly bounce Twisted Abomination. Once the Slimy Kavus are expended, we can proceed in the usual way by discarding Twisted Abomination to retrieve the actual Swamp.
1 Woodland Changeling
1 Lim-Dul the Necromancer
1 Skirge Familiar
1 Riven Turnbull
1 Island
1 Shoreline Ranger
1 Paragon of Gathering Mists
1 Dimir Guildgate
1 Greenside Watcher
1 Elvish Spirit Guide
1 Ezuri, Renegade Leader
1 Overgrown Battlement
1 Driver of the Dead
1 Swamp
1 Twisted Abomination
1 Horror of Horrors
1 Slimy Kavu
1 Simian Spirit Guide
1 Paragon of Fierce Defiance
1 Plains
1 Noble Templar
1 Icatian Lieutenant
1 Axebane Guardian
1 Snow-Covered Forest
1 Pale Recluse
1 Rimehorn Aurochs
1 Chaos Warp
1 Elite Arcanist
1 Firemind's Foresight
1 Supply // Demand
1 Psychic Trance
1 Night Dealings
1 World at War
1 Bloodbond March
1 Riftsweeper
1 Minion Reflector
1 Gruul Ragebeast
1 Measure of Wickedness
1 Guilty Conscience
1 Rite of Passage
1 Psychic Battle
1 Cowardice
1 Leyline of Anticipation
1 Omniscience
1 Opalescence
1 Builder's Blessing
1 Ashnod's Altar
1 Whetstone
1 Copy Enchantment
1 Primal Surge
1 Doubling Season
1 Reito Lantern
1 Claws of Gix
1 Patron of the Moon
1 Amulet of Vigor
1 Djinn Illuminatus
1 Donate
1 Invoke Prejudice
Calculated damage: over 10 -> 10 -> 10 -> 10 -> 10 -> 10 -> 10 -> 10 -> 2 -> 25
1 City of Traitors
1 Mox Sapphire
1 Show and Tell
1 Omniscience
1 Enter the Infinite
1 Isochron Scepter
1 Crush Underfoot
1 Channel
1 Grip of Chaos
1 Psychic Battle
1 Vedalken Orrery
1 Memory Crystal
1 Spellweaver Helix
1 Twinflame
3 Disturbed Burial
Enchantments
1 Opalescence
1 Xenograft
1 Words of Worship
1 Doubling Season
1 Dual Nature
1 Cathars' Crusade
1 Furnace of Rath
1 Boon Reflection
1 Thought Reflection
1 Mana Reflection
1 Bloodbond March
1 Pyromancer Ascension
4 Copy Enchantment
1 Requiem Angel
1 Precursor Golem
1 Myr Battlesphere
1 Stronghold Biologist
1 Darksteel Relic
1 Rootwater Diver
1 Smokebraider
1 Drake Familiar
1 Kragma Warcaller
1 Maw of the Obzedat
1 Snow Hound
1 Kalonian Hydra
1 Swans of Bryn Argoll
1 Kalonian Hydra
1 Stern Proctor
1 Swift Warkite
1 Chancellor of the Forge
2 Crypt Angel
3 Twitch
1 Learn from the Past
4 Time Spiral
I will not go into full detail, instead I'll just briefly explain some key cards/interactions.
This deck uses Stronghold Biologist instead of Patron Wizard to utilize Bloodbond March since countering Time Spiral puts it into the graveyard and therefore goes infinite. The cards to dump into the Biologist are provided by Rootwater Diver, which is the reason I use City of Traitors and Mox Sapphire instead of Black Lotus.
This deck's heart is Isochron Scepter, providing mana everytime it untaps to repeatedly spam Disturbed Burial with Buyback, which causes Spellweaver Helix to spit out Twinflame, upping the creature count.
The deck creates two different kinds of mana. The first kind comes from Smokebraider and Mana Reflection and can't be used for buyback, so it doesn't go infinite. The second kind comes from Channel. The life to pay said Channel comes from Words of Worship, which, thanks to Xenograft and Opalescence, is an elemental creature able to feed off Smokebraider. How convenient.
Now the deck needs to have a finite, yet absurd amount of card draw. This is where Isochron Scepter shines! The spell imprinted is Crush Underfoot, which conveniently has only one target. Also, since all creatures are giants as well, I can choose as much power as the current amount of Smokebraiders will allow. The damage, amplified by Cathars' Crusade and Furnace of Rath goes straight for the Swans of Bryn Argoll and Thought Reflection and Boon Reflection do the rest.
The main business is the interaction between Snow Hound, Drake Familiar and the enchantments. The hound has haste due to Kragma Warcaller. (Yes, that's a giant elemental minotaur golem hound we're talking about) and the mana comes from our friend Smokebraider. Who in turn gets recycled by Swift Warkite (Not targeting is a big plus here, since triggers going onto the stack simultaneously don't steal each other's targets), who gets recycled by Crypt Angel. (She targets, making her scale only off Dual Nature and Bloodbond March, but not so well off Doubling Season.)
Other cards and their roles:
Precursor Golem: Gives Vanilla golems and more Isochron Scepter untaps via Twitch, Grip of Chaos and Psychic Battle.
Myr Battlesphere: Main target of Rootwater Diver. Batter than Precursor Golem at instantly dying to Dual Nature's triggers since it creates more tokens.
Maw of the Obzedat and Requiem Angel: The former is a sac outlet for redundant copies of enchantment creatures (Xenograft, Grip of Chaos and Psychic Battle), vanilla golems, tapped creatures, as well as for creatures that are going to be recycled or those who would perish due to Dual Nature anyway. The latter makes an insane amount of giant elemental minotaur golem spirits, hugely benefitting Doubling Season and Cathars' Crusade
Chancellor of the Forge: Gets recycled by those otherwise redundant copies of Crypt Angel and nicely boosts the creature count while he's at it.
Stern Proctor: Also here because of Crypt Angel. Bounces the Enchantments as well as Precursor Golem
Pyromancer Ascension: Instant online due to Doubling Season. Empowers Learn from the Past and Time Spiral. Also hugely beneficial to Disturbed Burial, since the copies are created one by one, so they don't snatch each others targets.
The 3rd Disturbed Burial and the 2nd Crypt Angel: The former rots in the graveyard and ensures the new Pyromancer Ascensions are online asap. The latter is the target for the original Burial, which needs to resolve to return to the hand via Buyback.
The deck basically works as follows: Smokebraider mana? -> Into Snow Hound or Words of Worship if card draw is imminent.
No Smokebraider mana? -> Use Channel mana to get Crypt Angel ... to get Smokebraider
No Channel mana? -> Use Twitch to untap Isochron Scepter ... lifegain happens.
No Twitch? -> Use Learn from the Past and its Pyromancer Ascension copies to get it.
No Learn from the Past? -> Use Time Spiral and its Pyromancer Ascension copies to get it.
No Time Spiral? -> Feed everything that is not Doubling Season, Dual Nature, Kragma Warcaller, Requiem Angel, Furnace of Rath or a spirit into the Maw of the Obzedat, cast Kalonian Hydra and attack.
See if you can get Soulsworn Jury or Silumgar Sorcerer to fit.
1 City of Traitors
1 Mox Sapphire
1 Show and Tell
1 Omniscience
1 Enter the Infinite
1 Isochron Scepter
1 Crush Underfoot
1 Channel
1 Grip of Chaos
1 Psychic Battle
1 Vedalken Orrery
1 Memory Crystal
1 Spellweaver Helix
1 Twinflame
3 Disturbed Burial
1 Opalescence
1 Xenograft
1 Words of Worship
1 Doubling Season
1 Dual Nature
1 Cathars' Crusade
1 Furnace of Rath
1 Boon Reflection
1 Thought Reflection
1 Mana Reflection
1 Bloodbond March
1 Pyromancer Ascension
4 Copy Enchantment
Creatures
1 Requiem Angel
1 Precursor Golem
1 Silumgar Sorcerer
1 Smokebraider
1 Drake Familiar
1 Kragma Warcaller
1 Maw of the Obzedat
1 Snow Hound
1 Swans of Bryn Argoll
1 Kalonian Hydra
1 Stern Proctor
1 Swift Warkite
1 Chancellor of the Forge
2 Crypt Angel
3 Twitch
1 Learn from the Past
4 Time Spiral
4 Time Reversal
-1 Stronghold Biologist, replaced by Silumgar Sorcerer
-1 Rootwater Diver no longer needed
-1 Myr Battlesphere no longer needed
-1 Darksteel Relic shouldn't have been here in the first place. I must have missed actually deleting it.
-1 Kalonian Hydra somehow appeared twice on the list.
+1 Silumgar Sorcerer Was initially against him because of his restricted timing. Then I realised I can just bounce him with Snow Hound.
+4 Time Reversal slightly, but strictly worse than Time Spiral, since I can't untap City of Traitors. However, the added redundancy is always welcome.