MTG Salvation

So, working on the writeup at the last minute. It would be nice to have a sequence of play to gain white mana in the blue stage, like Iijil does with gaining green mana in the white stage in post #96. Can anyone supply one?

The simple line of play requires some green and black mana, and using Roiling Regrowth and Orvar triggers for Boseiju Reaches Skyward. It's the last one that is troublesome; for the previous ones, we can just keep some black and green mana from the previous white stage I think. But getting Boseiju Reaches Skyward triggers requires spending a white mana, which is what we are trying to build up.


Edit: Stages and Layers sections are written up, working on the Setup section now. But, I'm not sure what the most updated version of the setup is. Can someone type up the best version? (seems like it gets 35 Treasure tokens?)

Reposting the current deck, for everyone's convenience:



resulting in more than 10 -> 10 -> 10 -> 10 -> (10 -> 10 -> 10 -> 10 -> 10 -> 2^^^^29 -> 6) -> 19 -> 9 damage.

So if I'm reading the start right, casting Thieves' Tools just gets us more than 2^^^^29 treasure tokens, which we can use for the full combo to get more than F_{w4 + 5}(2^^^^29) Orvars, and then using our 18 highest layer things gets us to F_{w4 + 7}^18 (F_{w4 + 5}(2^^^^29)). This translates to Conway chained arrow notation as 10 -> 10 -> 10 -> 10 -> (10 -> 10 -> 10 -> 10 -> 10 -> 2^^^^29 -> 6) -> 19 -> 9. Should we use this expanded expression or just stick with 10 -> 10 -> 10 -> 10 -> 10 -> 19 -> 9?

Hmm, the purpose of Croaking Counterpart is to be able to target creatures with Vanquish the Weak; this isn't needed for Orvar since it has power 3, so I think we are fine?


Edit: Oh whoops, just read FortyTwo's point about that. I guess we have to retool the start to avoid Lorehold Command?

First Day of Class also pumps creatures' powers, so we need another way to give haste I suppose.


Edit: Or more simply, don't target Orvar with Vanquish the Weak. We can still target it with Choose Your Weapon, so that should be fine.

Thanks FortyTwo! I will try to contribute as well.

CaptainMarcia, plopfill, hyp_cos: if any of you want to take a look at our latest deck, and point out any problems that you see or improvements that can be made, that would be most welcome!

So, the write-up has languished for a while - which is a little worrying, since Standard rotates next month, and we would like to get the write-up published before then.

Of course, this is as much my fault as anyone; FortyTwo is the only one who has contributed so far to the doc. And, as I write this I am going on vacation soon. But, hopefully I can really go at this when I get back.

Updated deck:



for 10 -> 10 -> 10 -> 10 -> 10 -> 19 -> 9.

Nice! Updated deck:



for 10 -> 10 -> 10 -> 10 -> 10 -> 18 -> 9

Oh, interesting. Could Vanquish the Weak make Confront the Past unnecessary? If so we could still save a card... I don't really know at this point though.


Edit: Oh, what's the infinite?

I think we can! But, I don't know if we can implement the combo with just one copy of Choose Your Weapon, without having to add something somewhere else.

Iijil pointed out that Sea Gate Stormcaller adds a layer with Tibalt's Trickery. We start by putting a lot of spells (e.g. Plummet) on the stack. Then we spend a red mana to cast Tibalt's Trickery targeting a Plummet copy, get a bunch of triggers from kicked Sea Gate Stormcallers, and counter it. For each SGS or Jin-Gitaxias trigger, we use a Tibalt's Trickery to counter a Plummet copy, and cast Tibalt's Trickery again, getting SGS triggers again. For each of these SGS triggers, we use the first Tibalt's Trickery to counter the second, and cast Meeting of the Five.

A cast of Thraban Exorcism can target one enchantment, to target another you need to cast it again.

I think a cheaper version of Mammoth Growth is fine, we can probably switch for one I guess.

As for Brightclimb Pathway... hmmm, yeah. Why don't we just use the Plains instead?


Edit: I suppose one white mana is not enough, since we need to cast Thraban Exorcism to get it. So the Brightclimb Pathway is for the second white mana to profit each cycle.

Very nice!



Final daamge: more than 10 -> 10 -> 10 -> 10 -> 10 -> 17 -> 9.

Ooh nice, another layer! Extra card, so 10 -> 10 -> 10 -> 10 -> 10 -> 16 -> 9.

Yep yep, sorry I'm slow to catch on to some of these things. Edited the deck to remove the unnecessary Confront the Past.


Edit: Updated decklist. (sorry, my previous decklist had 61 cards)



Just to make sure: we exile 7 cards to start

Invoke the Winds
2x Turntimber Symbiosis
2x Tibalt's Trickery
Lorehold Command
Bloody Betrayal

We need to keep the following 8 instants/sorceries:

Behold the Mutiverse
Bury in Books
Mammoth Growth
Plummet
Roiling Regrowth
Thraben Exorcism
Tibalt's Trickery
Markov Retribution

so we can exile the remaining 15 instants/sorceries:
Double Major
FIrst Day of Class
Valakut Awakening
When We Were Young
Confront the Past
Shatterskull Smashing
4x For the Family
Lorehold Command
Tibalt's Trickery
3x Bloody Betrayal

so, combined with Lithoform Engine, we get 16 activations of Layer 7, for 10 -> 10 -> 10 -> 10 -> 10 -> 17 -> 8 damage.