It certainly has its advantages. I've even heard of some people MDing Firestorm, but I can't condone that sort of thing. Street Wraith is OK, I guess. It certainly seems to be what people are playing these days. It doesn't really have a place in my deck, for various reasons.
I trimmed the Bloodghast fluff, and went back to a very old Dread Return list with absolutely nothing fancy in it. It's a Sphinx of Lost Truths build with two Gitaxian Probe. I've noticed several differences between it, the Quadlazer, and others.
First of all, with the Quadlazer we're getting 3rd and 4th turn kills. This is somewhat misleading, as it reflects merely the turn on which lethal damage enters the Red Zone. The effectively fatal turn is earlier, turn 2 or 3, and is that turn on which the Quadlazer fires off enough Cabal Therapies to snatch the opponent's entire hand.
By tuning the Tireless Tribe Sphinx list, I've pushed the turn 2 kill rate to the sunny side of 50%, but there's a catch. In order to Dread Return the Sphinx of Lost Truths, or directly kill with FKZ, much of the time there is only a single Cabal Therapy to spare, either because only one of them flipped or there's a body shortage. Hence it's far more important to be accurate with that first Therapy call.
Still, I like how it's working out. Two MD Dread Returns, one of them the Sphinx and the other the instant win (in this case, the MD FKZ) are remarkably efficient at getting that instant win card on to the battlefield, turn 2. Silver-bullet SB creatures are so much more threatening when they have an excellent shot of making it into play, no matter if they started in one's opening hand or flipped during a Dredge. Turn 2 is the perfect time to threaten them as well: it's Iona on white against a Rest In Peace deck just before they have 2 mana available.
It certainly has its advantages. I've even heard of some people MDing Firestorm, but I can't condone that sort of thing. Street Wraith is OK, I guess. It certainly seems to be what people are playing these days. It doesn't really have a place in my deck, for various reasons.
I trimmed the Bloodghast fluff, and went back to a very old Dread Return list with absolutely nothing fancy in it. It's a Sphinx of Lost Truths build with two Gitaxian Probe. I've noticed several differences between it, the Quadlazer, and others.
First of all, with the Quadlazer we're getting 3rd and 4th turn kills. This is somewhat misleading, as it reflects merely the turn on which lethal damage enters the Red Zone. The effectively fatal turn is earlier, turn 2 or 3, and is that turn on which the Quadlazer fires off enough Cabal Therapies to snatch the opponent's entire hand.
By tuning the Tireless Tribe Sphinx list, I've pushed the turn 2 kill rate to the sunny side of 50%, but there's a catch. In order to Dread Return the Sphinx of Lost Truths, or directly kill with FKZ, much of the time there is only a single Cabal Therapy to spare, either because only one of them flipped or there's a body shortage. Hence it's far more important to be accurate with that first Therapy call.
Still, I like how it's working out. Two MD Dread Returns, one of them the Sphinx and the other the instant win (in this case, the MD FKZ) are remarkably efficient at getting that instant win card on to the battlefield, turn 2. Silver-bullet SB creatures are so much more threatening when they have an excellent shot of making it into play, no matter if they started in one's opening hand or flipped during a Dredge. Turn 2 is the perfect time to threaten them as well: it's Iona on white against a Rest In Peace deck just before they have 2 mana available.
I do love those fatties.
Cool, I've been having similar results with my tt build I've been working on, my turn two isn't quite as good but thinking it's probably my lack of experience with dredge. Ive been running Griselbrand/FKZ as my md DR targets for goldfishing, no real testing yet because I don't have the deck actually built. do you find sphinx just as good as Griselbrand, or better in certain circumstances? I know I'd much rather pay the price of sphinx, I don't really wanna do much more goldfishing before I finish the deck so I thought I'd ask you hoping you have experience with both.
Edit - Something I've been contemplating as well is rather than running FKZ, trying out 2 griselbrand or sphinx, I've had a fair amount of times FKZ is in my graveyard where it wouldn't kill on DR but one of the other two would let me go deeper and disrupt more and still get the kill the next turn, it's happened enough times I think it's worth me considering the switch. What are your thoughts on this?
It just drops dread return and dread return targets to go for a full four (quad) of everything else for consistency. Kills a turn slower, but the general theory is that it hits enough disruption the turn before the kill that it doesn't matter.
Pretty much, sometimes it just beats down with Ichorids too. To me it looks like a more skill intensive version, being a turn slower would make it less forgiving with cabal therapy since a win against a lot of legacy decks could hinge on wether or not you hit with it. I'm pretty inexperienced with Dredge but that's my reason for avoiding Quadlaser, could be the better deck in certain metas though.
People generally started playing quadlazer because it is the most consistent version of dredge. You don't usually need to play Dread Return in game one because you are making a ton of creatures on turn 2 and tearing their hand apart with Cabal Therapy. "Mind Twisting" with Therapies is good enough to get there. A lot of the sideboards for quadlazer do play a Dread Return package so that it can get an instant win with Flame-Kin Zealot. I prefer quadlazer because it is full of all the business spells that you need.
Dredge takes some practice to learn the more intricate plays, but your game 1 is fairly straight forward. When you get to games 2 and 3, though, things become quite different. Playing against hate with Dredge is one of the most challenging and rewarding things you can do in this game. I once had a friend that was able to beat a Leyline of the Void, Relic of Progenitus AND a Tormod's Crypt in play. So just keep practicing and don't become discouraged. Dredge is like the Boogeyman; people always have to be prepared to play against you because if they aren't you will just roll them.
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It's widely considered to be the most consistent version, and the last in-house measurements do bear out a slight (but non-trivial) decrease in the number of mulligans the Quadlazer takes over other versions. A lot of these are going to be pretty all-in hands, cracking LED and flashing Faithless Looting on turn 1 for instance, but a win is a win. Who am I to judge? Plenty of Tireless Tribe wins look a little ugly too.
I prefer the Tireless Tribe deck myself, because there are specific plays I want to beat. The following situations are more easily handled with Tireless Tribe than Quadlazer:
Tormod's Crypt, stronger against LED than Tireless Tribe
Enlightened Tutor --> Rest In Peace / Batterskull
Surgical Extraction on Narcomebas while the first trigger is on the stack
Brainstorm in response to Therapy, hiding Rest In Peace
The way I look at it, the Quadlazer is more of an aggro deck with hand disruption. It's about disrupting your opponent, not missing triggers, doing combat math, and getting in there for 20 with whatever Ichorid, Putrid Imp, and zombie forces you can muster. It's not necessarily a faster kill than even a Burn deck would muster, there are a lot of turn 4 fatalities. (The opponent's hand is stripped along the way, of course.)
Tireless Tribe DR Dredge, with a FKZ and Sphinx of Lost Truths MD, plays out much more like a combo deck. Setting up a turn 2 accelerant allows a single Cabal Therapy to fire (two if you're really lucky), which makes enough creatures for DR ---> Sphinx, dredging the rest of the deck and killing with FKZ. Either that, or killing with FKZ directly after the first Therapy.
It sounds convoluted compared to the pure consistency of the Quadlazer, but hey. YMMV. It certainly works for me.
I wouldn't say either version is more skill-intensive than the other... the Quadlazer requires combat math much more often, but it's actually more forgiving on the Therapy calls. You almost always get to make 2 or 3 of them, and you don't need to be conservative about the number of bodies that will be available for future Dread Returns. With DR, conversely, you need to hit whatever card they have that could interact with the Dread Return. On the plus side, if you miss on the Therapy by calling Force while they have Pierce, no need to go all-in on the DR at that point.
Tireless Tribe DR Dredge, with a FKZ and Sphinx of Lost Truths MD, plays out much more like a combo deck. Setting up a turn 2 accelerant allows a single Cabal Therapy to fire (two if you're really lucky), which makes enough creatures for DR ---> Sphinx, dredging the rest of the deck and killing with FKZ. Either that, or killing with FKZ directly after the first Therapy.
It sounds convoluted compared to the pure consistency of the Quadlazer, but hey. YMMV. It certainly works for me.
I've been out of the Magic scene for a while but this Saturday I'll be heading to a tournament again for the first time in quite a while, and of course packing Dredge with Tireless Tribe and DR as well. I was never much a fan of Quadlazer builds myself, as I too prefer to play Dredge like a high speed combo deck and pulling out FKZ wins as quickly as possible. Game 1 at least, it doesn't usually go quite so smoothly in games 2 and 3 as I'm sure you all know. I'm going to be packing the same list I played 6 months or so ago when I last fielded it, but swapping Angel of Despair for Ashen Rider since it's an obvious new improvement.
Speaking of new improvements, I wanted to ask what the consensus is among those playing the main deck Dread Return package on Sphinx of Lost Truths versus Griselbrand? I've always played 3 Dread Return plus 1 Flame-Kin Zealot and 1 Iona as my main DR targets, but I'm starting to wonder if there might be some merit to running Sphinx or the big black demon along side Flame-Kin and moving Iona to the sideboard. I think Iona could easily replace Elesh Norn in the board, as they serve pretty much the same purpose. I have had more than a few circumstances where I had a Zealot plus a DR or two in the yard but not enough bridges or Narcomeobas in play to return the Zealot for lethal, and I'm wondering if maybe main decking a dredge accelerator target like Sphinx of Lost Truths or Griselbrand might be a good idea. Griselbrand seems to be the popular choice, but thinking back on how many last second Flame-Kin Zealot wins I've pulled off against aggro and Burn decks (and there is a LOT of Burn in my meta) the whole "pay 7 life" thing makes me really nervous. I can just imagine the response of "Okay. With the first trigger on the stack: Lightning Bolt you, sac two lands, Fireblast you." and that's game. Also, given how much life we sometimes end up paying to Tarnished Citadel and City of Brass (especially in games 2/3) I can imagine getting myself into lots of situations in which paying 7 life isn't going to be an option. I feel like if I was going to play one of these two guys in place of Iona that the Sphinx would be the better choice, but what do you guys who play a main deck Dread Return package think? Does a dredging accelerator like Sphinx of Lost Truths or Griselbrand help you pull out faster and more consistent wins? And if so, which of the two do you prefer?
I prefer Griselbrand. It ALWAYS wins the turn it comes down as long as you have another Dread Return to cast in there for your FKZ. I've never had the issue of not being able to use the ability (although I've never played against burn either in legacy so...)
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Modern Warp / UR Control / UR Storm / Naya Breachshift / ElectroBalance
Legacy
Solidarity / Lands / Sneak and Show / Grixis Delver / Reanimator / Belcher / Storm / Dredge
Sphinx of Lost Truths does a better impression than people generally give him credit for, but he does still whiff sometimes. I'd say about 5% of the time. Griseler is a better body all by himself, though he can be Needled and Revoked. We don't have the same weakness to Karakas that Reanimator has.
Oh yeah, the other benefit of Sphinx is that he lets us discard stuff from our hand... that possibly stranded Dread Return or FKZ.
The whole plan, quite generally, of FKZ + some fatty that flips the deck over is more solid than it sounds. The problem I'm running into is that if I'm pulling cards out to play against Crypt and friends, I'm taking out Breakthroughs most likely... and that without everyone's favorite accelerant (aka reason to play Dredge) out of the picture, my only bigtime accelerant left is Coliseum.
I'm looking to get into legacy and don't want to spend 800 dollars on 4 duals, and so I naturally gravitated toward dredge, a deck which can be built for under the cost of 4 mutvaults. What are your guys' opinions on the position of dredge compared to other legacy decks and how consistent it is. I'm also looking for a ledless build, and wondering about quadlazer vs. standard dread return packages. From some of the research on the last few pages it appears that the normal DR strategy is more consistent and in my opinion, looks more fun. I would just like some opinions on the deck and advice with it and legacy before I put money into building a deck.
Quadlazer is more consistent. That's why it is built. It grinds out games in a grindy-combo manner and typically has pieces that it needs where it needs them. I think DR is a far more entertaining and enjoyable deck since you're able to run answers and threats including being able to get your zombies AND win the same turn (with a FKZ or getting into the danger zone with an Iona).
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Current Decks:
Modern
Modern Warp / UR Control / UR Storm / Naya Breachshift / ElectroBalance
Legacy
Solidarity / Lands / Sneak and Show / Grixis Delver / Reanimator / Belcher / Storm / Dredge
Hey everyone! In the interest of finding out whether Dredge is a deck I should be playing this season or not, and if so what version of the deck I should play, I ran a total of 60 test games using 3 different variations of LED-less Dredge (20 games with each) and recorded the mulligan rate and kill speed data from each game. For the purpose of consistency and reducing variables I applied the following stipulations to every game.
• Every test game was goldfishing starting on the play. The opponent did absolutely nothing each turn.
• The deck was pile shuffled once then side shuffled 7 times between each game
• The deck was side shuffled 7 times between each mulligan
• I would mulligan any opening hand or Mull to 6 hand that did not contain a dredger, discard outlet (Cabal Therapy included), and dredging accelerant (Careful Study, Breakthrough, or Cephalid Coliseum)
• I would keep any Mull To 5 or less hand that included a dredger and a way to get it into the graveyard (Cabal Therapy included)
That said, here's the lists I tested and the statistics on each:
No Mulligan: 6 out of 20 games = 30% of the time
Mulligan to 6: 3 out of 20 games = 15% of the time
Mulligan to 5: 3 out of 20 games = 15% of the time
Mulligan to 4: 1 out of 20 games = 5% of the time
Mulligan to 3: 1 out of 20 games = 5% of the time
Mulligan to Oblivion: 6 out of 20 games = 30% of the time
Win on Turn 1: 0 out of 20 games = 0% of the time
Win on Turn 2: 1 out of 20 games = 5% of the time
Win on Turn 3: 4 out of 20 games = 20% of the time
Win on Turn 4: 7 out of 20 games = 35% of the time
Win on Turn 5: 2 out of 20 games = 10% of the time
No Win (mulligan to oblivion, automatic loss): 6 out of 20 games = 30% of the time
No Mulligan: 7 out of 20 games = 35% of the time
Mulligan to 6: 5 out of 20 games = 25% of the time
Mulligan to 5: 4 out of 20 games = 20% of the time
Mulligan to 4: 1 out of 20 games = 5% of the time
Mulligan to 3: 0 out of 20 games = 0% of the time
Mulligan to Oblivion: 3 out of 20 games = 15% of the time
Win on Turn 1: 0 out of 20 games = 0% of the time
Win on Turn 2: 1 out of 20 games = 5% of the time
Win on Turn 3: 4 out of 20 games = 20% of the time
Win on Turn 4: 5 out of 20 games = 25% of the time
Win on Turn 5: 4 out of 20 games = 20% of the time
Win on Turn 6: 2 out of 20 games = 10% of the time
Win on Turn 7: 1 out of 20 games = 5% of the time
No Win (mulligan to oblivion, automatic loss): 3 out of 20 games = 15% of the time
No Mulligan: 4 out of 20 games = 20% of the time
Mulligan to 6: 4 out of 20 games = 20% of the time
Mulligan to 5: 5 out of 20 games = 25% of the time
Mulligan to 4: 2 out of 20 games = 10% of the time
Mulligan to 3: 0 out of 20 games = 0% of the time
Mulligan to Oblivion: 5 out of 20 games = 25% of the time
Win on Turn 1: 0 out of 20 games = 0% of the time
Win on Turn 2: 0 out of 20 games = 0% of the time
Win on Turn 3: 3 out of 20 games = 15% of the time
Win on Turn 4: 4 out of 20 games = 20% of the time
Win on Turn 5: 3 out of 20 games = 15% of the time
Win on Turn 6: 2 out of 20 games = 10% of the time
Win on Turn 7: 2 out of 20 games = 10% of the time
Win on Turn 8: 1 out of 20 games = 5% of the time
No Win (mulligan to oblivion, automatic loss): 5 out of 20 games = 25% of the time
Whew! That was a lot of testing! So, what did I learn from all this? A couple interesting things. The first is that the number of Golgari Thugs you run has a big impact on consistency, both in terms of mulligan frequency and the speed at which the deck can kill the opponent. I was sure my 3rd variation of the deck that ran Griselbrand in place of one of the Golgari Thugs would have a faster win speed than the 2nd variation which ran a full set of 4 Thugs and only Flame-Kin Zealot as the lone Dread Return target, but that was not the case. Running 3 Thugs as opposed to 4 resulted in more frequent mulligans and a slower overall deck speed due to the tendency to occasionally whiff on a dredge attempt with Careful Study, Breakthrough, or Cephalid Coliseum.
The lesson to run no less than 4 Golgari Thugs for the best combination of consistency and speed was an important lesson for me, but I think what I really learned from these 60 test games is that I'm not going to be playing Dredge this season. Every variation of the deck lost to itself without the opponent ever having to do anything (by mulliganing itself to an automatic loss) anywhere from 15% to as much as 30% of the time. While deck variation 2, which employed a full set of 4 Thugs, was the most consistent with a "Mulligan to Oblivion" rate of only 15% I still think that's too high of a rate for me to want to field Dredge in a tournament.
I always knew that even the best Dredge builds were pretty inconsistent, but I was under the impression that the deck's typical kill speed was fast enough to offset it's lack of consistency. But my data shows that for every variation of the deck I tested the average kill turn was Turn 4, with Turn 5 kills occurring only slightly less often. In my humble opinion that is simply not fast enough to make a 15% automatic loss rate acceptable. Those kill speeds were also recorded in a goldfish scenario and would have certainly been much slower if there was an opponent interacting with you by putting up blockers. Also worth noting is Dredge's lack of resilience to counter magic. Of the 46 out of 60 games in which the decks did not mulligan themselves to an automatic loss, in 43 of them I was only able to get 1 discard outlet in my opening hand. If that discard outlet was countered I would have been left doing literally nothing for the rest of game. Another issue that should be considered is the deck's vulnerability to Wasteland. With only 14 lands in the deck and all of them being non-basic there is a very good chance that in many matchups your turn 1 land may get Wastelanded, preventing you from casting an accelerant spell or activating a Cephalid Coliseum for the rest of the game and increasing the likelihood of a game loss.
After taking all this into consideration I've concluded that I will be not be playing Dredge this season and will play Burn instead. It has an almost identical kill speed (Turn 4 the majority of the time, with Turn 5 and Turn 3 kills occurring only slightly less frequently), never mulligans itself to an automatic loss (which is something Dredge did 15% to 30% of the time), is unaffected by graveyard hate, has no vulnerability to Wasteland, and is much more resilient to counter magic due to the redundancy of 40 out of the 60 cards in Burn doing exactly the same thing (if they counter one of your burn spells then there's 39 more where that came from). I still love playing Dredge, it's a marvelously fun deck to play, but it's various weaknesses and consistency issues make it a deck that I wouldn't be able to feel confident in if I was to bring it to a tournament. That said, if anyone here would like to give Dredge a try but doesn't have a deck to play yet I will be selling my complete Dredge deck and sideboard for $200 shipped (all cards in near mint condition) to fund the purchase of Burn. Feel free to send me a PM about it if your interested! To the rest of you guys and gals, may your mulligans be few and your dredges productive.
Well, those criteria look pretty reasonable, though they aren't the ones I would use, and you're not the first person to test Dredge variations this way. The shuffling seems sufficient as well.
I can't really explain the discrepancy between your results and my own. They are vastly different. Where you found a deck that doesn't even kill as quickly as Burn half of the time, I found a reliable turn 2-3 combo deck. It doesn't mulligan much. There's little weakness to Wasteland.
I wish you all the best with Burn, of course, it's a deck that I love as well.
Well, those criteria look pretty reasonable, though they aren't the ones I would use, and you're not the first person to test Dredge variations this way. The shuffling seems sufficient as well.
I can't really explain the discrepancy between your results and my own. They are vastly different. Where you found a deck that doesn't even kill as quickly as Burn half of the time, I found a reliable turn 2-3 combo deck. It doesn't mulligan much. There's little weakness to Wasteland.
I wish you all the best with Burn, of course, it's a deck that I love as well.
Before I give up on Dredge as a competitive deck, think you could share your list with me Lomador? I wouldn't mind testing it out as well, and if I get better results than I'd be happy to field it. I'm in this odd spot where I love playing Dredge but have had horrible luck with it, whereas Burn treats me really well in tournaments but I honestly find it a little boring to play (probably because I've been playing it for the last 4 years and just want to play something different). If I could find a stable and consistent Dredge list I'd definitely field it, I'm just having trouble coming up with a list that suffers from less than a 15% "mull to oblivion" rate.
You should be able to not mull to death.
Put some duress (or thoughtseizeinquisition of kozilekunmask in sideboard in addition to artifact/enchantment hate and your dedicated Dread Return target for special matchup.
Well that was interesting. I was planning on dropping Dredge to play Burn this season instead, as I mentioned in my last post here, but a few nights ago I had the itch to play some Legacy and was a few cards short of the Burn deck I had been building so I took Dredge to play at my LGS. It was a non-tournament night so I ended up just playing 20 or so casual games with friends, who were playing Nic-Fit, U/W Stoneblade, Grixis Tempo, and T.E.S. Before the games I discussed the issues I was having with Dredge mulling itself to death with one of the pro players there (who's name I sadly cannot remember) and after sharing the results of my testing with him the conclusion he came to was "Your list is great, the problem is that you're being too strict with your opening hand requirements."
We talked over and examined some opening hand possibilities that I normally wouldn't keep (including some real oddballs like hands with a couple lands, 2x Breakthrough, and no dredgers) and his basic advice was to experiment more and try keeping more opening hands that I wouldn't normally keep and see how they went. His biggest piece of advice was to not mull opening hands that had a dredger and a way to get it in the yard but no dredging accelerant (Careful Study, Breakthrough, or Cephalid Coliseum), with the mindset that Dredge is pretty much self-accelerating and the majority of the time all you really need to do to win is to just get some dredgers in the yard and start dredging.
I took his advice to heart and played around 20 games, both pre and post board against Nic-Fit, U/W Stoneblade, Grixis Tempo, and T.E.S., keeping all sorts of hands I wouldn't normally keep... and you know what? The whole night I never once mulled to death and only lost 2 games, both of which were pre-board games against TES when they went off on turn 1 and turn 2 respectively. The deck played great and sometimes even the goofiest looking hands pulled out continual turn 2 and turn 3 wins. I don't think a single game all night ever ran past turn 4, and I often found myself looking for new and unusual ways to win that I normally wouldn't use. Say it was turn 2 and I had a yard full of cards and a Dread Return, enough critters in play to flash it back, but neither of my dedicated DR targets to bring back. In that case I'd try just DR'ing a Grave Troll! It may not be as flashy and fancy as assaulting the opponent with a horde of hasty zombie tokens and Flame-Kin Zealot, but a regenerating 14/14 Grave Troll is still going to get there in 2 turns and win just the same. Then there was a post board game when the Nic-Fit player Extirpated my Bridges before I got a single token out, but that didn't stop me from winning. I just beat down with Ichorids and DR'ed a Grave Troll again and that was plenty enough to get there.
I pretty much wiped the floor with just about every Legacy player at the LGS with my Dredge deck (with the exception of the T.E.S. pilot), and my faith in this deck has definitely been restored. It seems the problems I was having weren't due to my list being inconsistent, my list is fine. The problem was me being too strict with the kind of opening hands I would or wouldn't keep and not allowing the deck to be flexible and play out in more nonlinear ways, such as DR'ing a Grave Troll on turn 2 or just beating down with Ichorids rather than going for the spectacular combo win when needed. Mind you the vast majority of my wins were turn 2 or turn 3 wins that involved DR'ing Flame-Kin Zealot with a bunch of Bridges in the yard or DR'ing Sphinx of Lost Truths, flipping the rest of my deck into the yard, then bringing out Flame-Kin, but it was great getting to experiment with the deck in a dynamic environment with real opponents and learn to think about new lines of play that wouldn't come up in goldfishing.
This was the list I played last night, and once again I'm so happy to say that I never once mulled to death. It's really nice to know that the problems I was having weren't problems with the deck, just how I was playing it.
Glad to hear you're liking the deck. It definitely has some strange lines of play. I have a few minor suggestions for your list.
+1 Golgari Thug - I've played LED and LEDless versions with 3x and 4x Thug. The deck performs much more consistently with 4, so I think you should at least use 3. More Ichorid food as well.
-1 Ichorid - Ichorid is incredible, but to get value out of him you need expendable black creatures in the yard. I haven't tested extensively with 4 because I settled on 3 long ago. I remember it feeling clunky, especially without LED starts. I suppose having 4 could get you to DR quicker, but if this spot were to be a 3rd Thug vs a 4th Ichorid I'd definitely choose Thug. Some pilots run a 4th in the sideboard. Less Ichorid food, unfortunately.
-1 Sphinx of Lost Truths, +1 Griselbrand - If you stick a Griselbrand, you WILL be seeing the rest of your deck that turn, rather than the 18 maximum that Sphinx offers. A 7/7 Lifelink is pretty sweet after chaining several Cabal Therapies. More Ichorid food as well.
Other points...you have enough DRs maindeck to give Flayer of the Hatebound a try. FKZ is best in the early game. Every turn that goes by, he gets worse. The exception is when you expect sorcery speed token sweepers. Maybe test out a singleton Faithless looting since you have so many rainbow lands and you probably get to 3 lands fairly often. I consider your other possible flex spots to be -1 Tarnished Citadel and -1 Dread Return. Best of luck!
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CURRENTLY PLAYING
MODERN WUBRROBOTSRBUW BRGLIVING ENDGRB URSPLINTER TWINRU
LEGACY WUBRGTESGRBUW WUBRGDREDGEGRBUW
EDH BRGKRESH, THE BLOODBRAIDEDGRB WBGDORAN, THE SIEGE TOWERGBW UBSYGG, RIVER CUTTHROATBU
PAUPER EDH WUGRHOX WAR MONKGUW UBRDREADWINGRBU RGFERAL ANIMISTGR
I don't see many lists here with LED in them. Is it just not needed?
LEDs are very much needed in competitive Dredge. Many competitive players avoid this thread and use mtgthesource.com for LED-Dredge to avoid the clutter of nonled being the focus of this thread. Me included.
I have only found two NonLED decks that have performed in the top 8 within the last 4 months and one was only in a 37 man event and the other in a 15 man. Manaless actually has a better record than non-led dredge.
I love my LED deck so much I have started to have it altered.
I have only found two NonLED decks that have performed in the top 8 within the last 4 months and one was only in a 37 man event and the other in a 15 man. Manaless actually has a better record than non-led dredge.
Is that because LED list are the main go to list? Or is LEDless that much worst? I feel there is more to the LED vs. LEDless showing up.
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I trimmed the Bloodghast fluff, and went back to a very old Dread Return list with absolutely nothing fancy in it. It's a Sphinx of Lost Truths build with two Gitaxian Probe. I've noticed several differences between it, the Quadlazer, and others.
First of all, with the Quadlazer we're getting 3rd and 4th turn kills. This is somewhat misleading, as it reflects merely the turn on which lethal damage enters the Red Zone. The effectively fatal turn is earlier, turn 2 or 3, and is that turn on which the Quadlazer fires off enough Cabal Therapies to snatch the opponent's entire hand.
By tuning the Tireless Tribe Sphinx list, I've pushed the turn 2 kill rate to the sunny side of 50%, but there's a catch. In order to Dread Return the Sphinx of Lost Truths, or directly kill with FKZ, much of the time there is only a single Cabal Therapy to spare, either because only one of them flipped or there's a body shortage. Hence it's far more important to be accurate with that first Therapy call.
Still, I like how it's working out. Two MD Dread Returns, one of them the Sphinx and the other the instant win (in this case, the MD FKZ) are remarkably efficient at getting that instant win card on to the battlefield, turn 2. Silver-bullet SB creatures are so much more threatening when they have an excellent shot of making it into play, no matter if they started in one's opening hand or flipped during a Dredge. Turn 2 is the perfect time to threaten them as well: it's Iona on white against a Rest In Peace deck just before they have 2 mana available.
I do love those fatties.
Overall record: 139-98-15
Total number of matches: 252
Win percentage ignoring draws: 58.649789
Win percentage including draws: 55.158730
Cool, I've been having similar results with my tt build I've been working on, my turn two isn't quite as good but thinking it's probably my lack of experience with dredge. Ive been running Griselbrand/FKZ as my md DR targets for goldfishing, no real testing yet because I don't have the deck actually built. do you find sphinx just as good as Griselbrand, or better in certain circumstances? I know I'd much rather pay the price of sphinx, I don't really wanna do much more goldfishing before I finish the deck so I thought I'd ask you hoping you have experience with both.
Edit - Something I've been contemplating as well is rather than running FKZ, trying out 2 griselbrand or sphinx, I've had a fair amount of times FKZ is in my graveyard where it wouldn't kill on DR but one of the other two would let me go deeper and disrupt more and still get the kill the next turn, it's happened enough times I think it's worth me considering the switch. What are your thoughts on this?
[EDH Non-Primers] Newzuri | Breya
4 Cephalid Coliseum
4 City of Brass
4 Gemstone Mine
DREDGERS
4 Golgari Thug
4 Stinkweed Imp
4 Golgari Grave-Troll
4 Lion's Eye Diamond
4 Breakthrough
4 Cabal Therapy
4 Faithless Looting
4 Putrid Imp
4 Narcomoeba
4 Bridge from Below
4 Ichorid
4 Careful study
It just drops dread return and dread return targets to go for a full four (quad) of everything else for consistency. Kills a turn slower, but the general theory is that it hits enough disruption the turn before the kill that it doesn't matter.
[EDH Non-Primers] Newzuri | Breya
Pretty much, sometimes it just beats down with Ichorids too. To me it looks like a more skill intensive version, being a turn slower would make it less forgiving with cabal therapy since a win against a lot of legacy decks could hinge on wether or not you hit with it. I'm pretty inexperienced with Dredge but that's my reason for avoiding Quadlaser, could be the better deck in certain metas though.
Dredge takes some practice to learn the more intricate plays, but your game 1 is fairly straight forward. When you get to games 2 and 3, though, things become quite different. Playing against hate with Dredge is one of the most challenging and rewarding things you can do in this game. I once had a friend that was able to beat a Leyline of the Void, Relic of Progenitus AND a Tormod's Crypt in play. So just keep practicing and don't become discouraged. Dredge is like the Boogeyman; people always have to be prepared to play against you because if they aren't you will just roll them.
Avatar and Banner made by R&Doom of the Ye Olde Sig and Avatar Shoppe
On the topic of Moat:
It's widely considered to be the most consistent version, and the last in-house measurements do bear out a slight (but non-trivial) decrease in the number of mulligans the Quadlazer takes over other versions. A lot of these are going to be pretty all-in hands, cracking LED and flashing Faithless Looting on turn 1 for instance, but a win is a win. Who am I to judge? Plenty of Tireless Tribe wins look a little ugly too.
I prefer the Tireless Tribe deck myself, because there are specific plays I want to beat. The following situations are more easily handled with Tireless Tribe than Quadlazer:
The way I look at it, the Quadlazer is more of an aggro deck with hand disruption. It's about disrupting your opponent, not missing triggers, doing combat math, and getting in there for 20 with whatever Ichorid, Putrid Imp, and zombie forces you can muster. It's not necessarily a faster kill than even a Burn deck would muster, there are a lot of turn 4 fatalities. (The opponent's hand is stripped along the way, of course.)
Tireless Tribe DR Dredge, with a FKZ and Sphinx of Lost Truths MD, plays out much more like a combo deck. Setting up a turn 2 accelerant allows a single Cabal Therapy to fire (two if you're really lucky), which makes enough creatures for DR ---> Sphinx, dredging the rest of the deck and killing with FKZ. Either that, or killing with FKZ directly after the first Therapy.
It sounds convoluted compared to the pure consistency of the Quadlazer, but hey. YMMV. It certainly works for me.
I wouldn't say either version is more skill-intensive than the other... the Quadlazer requires combat math much more often, but it's actually more forgiving on the Therapy calls. You almost always get to make 2 or 3 of them, and you don't need to be conservative about the number of bodies that will be available for future Dread Returns. With DR, conversely, you need to hit whatever card they have that could interact with the Dread Return. On the plus side, if you miss on the Therapy by calling Force while they have Pierce, no need to go all-in on the DR at that point.
Overall record: 139-98-15
Total number of matches: 252
Win percentage ignoring draws: 58.649789
Win percentage including draws: 55.158730
WUBRROBOTSRBUW
BRGLIVING ENDGRB
URSPLINTER TWINRU
LEGACY
WUBRGTESGRBUW
WUBRGDREDGEGRBUW
EDH
BRGKRESH, THE BLOODBRAIDEDGRB
WBGDORAN, THE SIEGE TOWERGBW
UBSYGG, RIVER CUTTHROATBU
PAUPER EDH
WUGRHOX WAR MONKGUW
UBRDREADWINGRBU
RGFERAL ANIMISTGR
PAUPER
WUBRGALL OF ITGRBUW
I've been out of the Magic scene for a while but this Saturday I'll be heading to a tournament again for the first time in quite a while, and of course packing Dredge with Tireless Tribe and DR as well. I was never much a fan of Quadlazer builds myself, as I too prefer to play Dredge like a high speed combo deck and pulling out FKZ wins as quickly as possible. Game 1 at least, it doesn't usually go quite so smoothly in games 2 and 3 as I'm sure you all know. I'm going to be packing the same list I played 6 months or so ago when I last fielded it, but swapping Angel of Despair for Ashen Rider since it's an obvious new improvement.
4 Putrid Imp
3 Tireless Tribe
4 Narcomoeba
4 Ichorid
4 Golgari Grave-Troll
4 Stinkweed Imp
2 Golgari Thug
1 Flame-Kin Zealot
1 Iona, Shield of Emeria
4 Cabal Therapy
4 Careful Study
4 Breakthrough
3 Dread Return
[4 Enchantments]
4 Bridge From Below
[14 Lands]
4 Gemstone Mine
4 City of Brass
4 Cephalid Coliseum
2 Tarnished Citadel
3 Nature's Claim
2 Chain of Vapor
3 Firestorm
2 Ancient Grudge
3 Leyline of the Void
1 Elesh Norn, Grand Cenobite
1 Ashen Rider
Speaking of new improvements, I wanted to ask what the consensus is among those playing the main deck Dread Return package on Sphinx of Lost Truths versus Griselbrand? I've always played 3 Dread Return plus 1 Flame-Kin Zealot and 1 Iona as my main DR targets, but I'm starting to wonder if there might be some merit to running Sphinx or the big black demon along side Flame-Kin and moving Iona to the sideboard. I think Iona could easily replace Elesh Norn in the board, as they serve pretty much the same purpose. I have had more than a few circumstances where I had a Zealot plus a DR or two in the yard but not enough bridges or Narcomeobas in play to return the Zealot for lethal, and I'm wondering if maybe main decking a dredge accelerator target like Sphinx of Lost Truths or Griselbrand might be a good idea. Griselbrand seems to be the popular choice, but thinking back on how many last second Flame-Kin Zealot wins I've pulled off against aggro and Burn decks (and there is a LOT of Burn in my meta) the whole "pay 7 life" thing makes me really nervous. I can just imagine the response of "Okay. With the first trigger on the stack: Lightning Bolt you, sac two lands, Fireblast you." and that's game. Also, given how much life we sometimes end up paying to Tarnished Citadel and City of Brass (especially in games 2/3) I can imagine getting myself into lots of situations in which paying 7 life isn't going to be an option. I feel like if I was going to play one of these two guys in place of Iona that the Sphinx would be the better choice, but what do you guys who play a main deck Dread Return package think? Does a dredging accelerator like Sphinx of Lost Truths or Griselbrand help you pull out faster and more consistent wins? And if so, which of the two do you prefer?
Modern Warp / UR Control / UR Storm / Naya Breachshift / ElectroBalance
Solidarity / Lands / Sneak and Show / Grixis Delver / Reanimator / Belcher / Storm / Dredge
Sphinx of Lost Truths does a better impression than people generally give him credit for, but he does still whiff sometimes. I'd say about 5% of the time. Griseler is a better body all by himself, though he can be Needled and Revoked. We don't have the same weakness to Karakas that Reanimator has.
Oh yeah, the other benefit of Sphinx is that he lets us discard stuff from our hand... that possibly stranded Dread Return or FKZ.
The whole plan, quite generally, of FKZ + some fatty that flips the deck over is more solid than it sounds. The problem I'm running into is that if I'm pulling cards out to play against Crypt and friends, I'm taking out Breakthroughs most likely... and that without everyone's favorite accelerant (aka reason to play Dredge) out of the picture, my only bigtime accelerant left is Coliseum.
Overall record: 139-98-15
Total number of matches: 252
Win percentage ignoring draws: 58.649789
Win percentage including draws: 55.158730
Modern Warp / UR Control / UR Storm / Naya Breachshift / ElectroBalance
Solidarity / Lands / Sneak and Show / Grixis Delver / Reanimator / Belcher / Storm / Dredge
• Every test game was goldfishing starting on the play. The opponent did absolutely nothing each turn.
• The deck was pile shuffled once then side shuffled 7 times between each game
• The deck was side shuffled 7 times between each mulligan
• I would mulligan any opening hand or Mull to 6 hand that did not contain a dredger, discard outlet (Cabal Therapy included), and dredging accelerant (Careful Study, Breakthrough, or Cephalid Coliseum)
• I would keep any Mull To 5 or less hand that included a dredger and a way to get it into the graveyard (Cabal Therapy included)
That said, here's the lists I tested and the statistics on each:
4 Putrid Imp
3 Tireless Tribe
4 Narcomoeba
4 Ichorid
4 Golgari Grave-Troll
4 Stinkweed Imp
2 Golgari Thug
1 Flame-Kin Zealot
1 Sphinx of Lost Truths
4 Cabal Therapy
4 Careful Study
4 Breakthrough
3 Dread Return
[4 Enchantments]
4 Bridge From Below
[14 Lands]
4 Gemstone Mine
4 City of Brass
4 Cephalid Coliseum
2 Tarnished Citadel
3 Nature's Claim
2 Chain of Vapor
3 Firestorm
2 Ancient Grudge
3 Leyline of the Void
1 Ashen Rider
1 Iona, Shield of Emeria
No Mulligan: 6 out of 20 games = 30% of the time
Mulligan to 6: 3 out of 20 games = 15% of the time
Mulligan to 5: 3 out of 20 games = 15% of the time
Mulligan to 4: 1 out of 20 games = 5% of the time
Mulligan to 3: 1 out of 20 games = 5% of the time
Mulligan to Oblivion: 6 out of 20 games = 30% of the time
Win on Turn 1: 0 out of 20 games = 0% of the time
Win on Turn 2: 1 out of 20 games = 5% of the time
Win on Turn 3: 4 out of 20 games = 20% of the time
Win on Turn 4: 7 out of 20 games = 35% of the time
Win on Turn 5: 2 out of 20 games = 10% of the time
No Win (mulligan to oblivion, automatic loss): 6 out of 20 games = 30% of the time
4 Putrid Imp
3 Tireless Tribe
4 Narcomoeba
4 Ichorid
4 Golgari Grave-Troll
4 Stinkweed Imp
4 Golgari Thug
1 Flame-Kin Zealot
4 Cabal Therapy
4 Careful Study
4 Breakthrough
2 Dread Return
[4 Enchantments]
4 Bridge From Below
[14 Lands]
4 Gemstone Mine
4 City of Brass
4 Cephalid Coliseum
2 Tarnished Citadel
3 Nature's Claim
2 Chain of Vapor
3 Firestorm
2 Ancient Grudge
3 Leyline of the Void
1 Ashen Rider
1 Iona, Shield of Emeria
No Mulligan: 7 out of 20 games = 35% of the time
Mulligan to 6: 5 out of 20 games = 25% of the time
Mulligan to 5: 4 out of 20 games = 20% of the time
Mulligan to 4: 1 out of 20 games = 5% of the time
Mulligan to 3: 0 out of 20 games = 0% of the time
Mulligan to Oblivion: 3 out of 20 games = 15% of the time
Win on Turn 1: 0 out of 20 games = 0% of the time
Win on Turn 2: 1 out of 20 games = 5% of the time
Win on Turn 3: 4 out of 20 games = 20% of the time
Win on Turn 4: 5 out of 20 games = 25% of the time
Win on Turn 5: 4 out of 20 games = 20% of the time
Win on Turn 6: 2 out of 20 games = 10% of the time
Win on Turn 7: 1 out of 20 games = 5% of the time
No Win (mulligan to oblivion, automatic loss): 3 out of 20 games = 15% of the time
4 Putrid Imp
3 Tireless Tribe
4 Narcomoeba
4 Ichorid
4 Golgari Grave-Troll
4 Stinkweed Imp
3 Golgari Thug
1 Flame-Kin Zealot
1 Griselbrand
4 Cabal Therapy
4 Careful Study
4 Breakthrough
2 Dread Return
[4 Enchantments]
4 Bridge From Below
[14 Lands]
4 Gemstone Mine
4 City of Brass
4 Cephalid Coliseum
2 Tarnished Citadel
3 Nature's Claim
2 Chain of Vapor
3 Firestorm
2 Ancient Grudge
3 Leyline of the Void
1 Ashen Rider
1 Iona, Shield of Emeria
No Mulligan: 4 out of 20 games = 20% of the time
Mulligan to 6: 4 out of 20 games = 20% of the time
Mulligan to 5: 5 out of 20 games = 25% of the time
Mulligan to 4: 2 out of 20 games = 10% of the time
Mulligan to 3: 0 out of 20 games = 0% of the time
Mulligan to Oblivion: 5 out of 20 games = 25% of the time
Win on Turn 1: 0 out of 20 games = 0% of the time
Win on Turn 2: 0 out of 20 games = 0% of the time
Win on Turn 3: 3 out of 20 games = 15% of the time
Win on Turn 4: 4 out of 20 games = 20% of the time
Win on Turn 5: 3 out of 20 games = 15% of the time
Win on Turn 6: 2 out of 20 games = 10% of the time
Win on Turn 7: 2 out of 20 games = 10% of the time
Win on Turn 8: 1 out of 20 games = 5% of the time
No Win (mulligan to oblivion, automatic loss): 5 out of 20 games = 25% of the time
Whew! That was a lot of testing! So, what did I learn from all this? A couple interesting things. The first is that the number of Golgari Thugs you run has a big impact on consistency, both in terms of mulligan frequency and the speed at which the deck can kill the opponent. I was sure my 3rd variation of the deck that ran Griselbrand in place of one of the Golgari Thugs would have a faster win speed than the 2nd variation which ran a full set of 4 Thugs and only Flame-Kin Zealot as the lone Dread Return target, but that was not the case. Running 3 Thugs as opposed to 4 resulted in more frequent mulligans and a slower overall deck speed due to the tendency to occasionally whiff on a dredge attempt with Careful Study, Breakthrough, or Cephalid Coliseum.
The lesson to run no less than 4 Golgari Thugs for the best combination of consistency and speed was an important lesson for me, but I think what I really learned from these 60 test games is that I'm not going to be playing Dredge this season. Every variation of the deck lost to itself without the opponent ever having to do anything (by mulliganing itself to an automatic loss) anywhere from 15% to as much as 30% of the time. While deck variation 2, which employed a full set of 4 Thugs, was the most consistent with a "Mulligan to Oblivion" rate of only 15% I still think that's too high of a rate for me to want to field Dredge in a tournament.
I always knew that even the best Dredge builds were pretty inconsistent, but I was under the impression that the deck's typical kill speed was fast enough to offset it's lack of consistency. But my data shows that for every variation of the deck I tested the average kill turn was Turn 4, with Turn 5 kills occurring only slightly less often. In my humble opinion that is simply not fast enough to make a 15% automatic loss rate acceptable. Those kill speeds were also recorded in a goldfish scenario and would have certainly been much slower if there was an opponent interacting with you by putting up blockers. Also worth noting is Dredge's lack of resilience to counter magic. Of the 46 out of 60 games in which the decks did not mulligan themselves to an automatic loss, in 43 of them I was only able to get 1 discard outlet in my opening hand. If that discard outlet was countered I would have been left doing literally nothing for the rest of game. Another issue that should be considered is the deck's vulnerability to Wasteland. With only 14 lands in the deck and all of them being non-basic there is a very good chance that in many matchups your turn 1 land may get Wastelanded, preventing you from casting an accelerant spell or activating a Cephalid Coliseum for the rest of the game and increasing the likelihood of a game loss.
After taking all this into consideration I've concluded that I will be not be playing Dredge this season and will play Burn instead. It has an almost identical kill speed (Turn 4 the majority of the time, with Turn 5 and Turn 3 kills occurring only slightly less frequently), never mulligans itself to an automatic loss (which is something Dredge did 15% to 30% of the time), is unaffected by graveyard hate, has no vulnerability to Wasteland, and is much more resilient to counter magic due to the redundancy of 40 out of the 60 cards in Burn doing exactly the same thing (if they counter one of your burn spells then there's 39 more where that came from). I still love playing Dredge, it's a marvelously fun deck to play, but it's various weaknesses and consistency issues make it a deck that I wouldn't be able to feel confident in if I was to bring it to a tournament. That said, if anyone here would like to give Dredge a try but doesn't have a deck to play yet I will be selling my complete Dredge deck and sideboard for $200 shipped (all cards in near mint condition) to fund the purchase of Burn. Feel free to send me a PM about it if your interested! To the rest of you guys and gals, may your mulligans be few and your dredges productive.
I can't really explain the discrepancy between your results and my own. They are vastly different. Where you found a deck that doesn't even kill as quickly as Burn half of the time, I found a reliable turn 2-3 combo deck. It doesn't mulligan much. There's little weakness to Wasteland.
I wish you all the best with Burn, of course, it's a deck that I love as well.
Overall record: 139-98-15
Total number of matches: 252
Win percentage ignoring draws: 58.649789
Win percentage including draws: 55.158730
Before I give up on Dredge as a competitive deck, think you could share your list with me Lomador? I wouldn't mind testing it out as well, and if I get better results than I'd be happy to field it. I'm in this odd spot where I love playing Dredge but have had horrible luck with it, whereas Burn treats me really well in tournaments but I honestly find it a little boring to play (probably because I've been playing it for the last 4 years and just want to play something different). If I could find a stable and consistent Dredge list I'd definitely field it, I'm just having trouble coming up with a list that suffers from less than a 15% "mull to oblivion" rate.
Main
4 Putrid Imp
4 Tireless Tribe
4 Narcomoeba
3 Ichorid
4 Golgari Grave-Troll
4 Stinkweed Imp
4 Golgari Thug
4 Cabal Therapy
4 Careful Study
4 Breakthrough
2 Dread Return
4 Bridge from below
4 Gemstone Mine
4 City of Brass
4 Cephalid Coliseum
3 Tarnished Citadel
You should be able to not mull to death.
Put some duress (or thoughtseize inquisition of kozilek unmask in sideboard in addition to artifact/enchantment hate and your dedicated Dread Return target for special matchup.
We talked over and examined some opening hand possibilities that I normally wouldn't keep (including some real oddballs like hands with a couple lands, 2x Breakthrough, and no dredgers) and his basic advice was to experiment more and try keeping more opening hands that I wouldn't normally keep and see how they went. His biggest piece of advice was to not mull opening hands that had a dredger and a way to get it in the yard but no dredging accelerant (Careful Study, Breakthrough, or Cephalid Coliseum), with the mindset that Dredge is pretty much self-accelerating and the majority of the time all you really need to do to win is to just get some dredgers in the yard and start dredging.
I took his advice to heart and played around 20 games, both pre and post board against Nic-Fit, U/W Stoneblade, Grixis Tempo, and T.E.S., keeping all sorts of hands I wouldn't normally keep... and you know what? The whole night I never once mulled to death and only lost 2 games, both of which were pre-board games against TES when they went off on turn 1 and turn 2 respectively. The deck played great and sometimes even the goofiest looking hands pulled out continual turn 2 and turn 3 wins. I don't think a single game all night ever ran past turn 4, and I often found myself looking for new and unusual ways to win that I normally wouldn't use. Say it was turn 2 and I had a yard full of cards and a Dread Return, enough critters in play to flash it back, but neither of my dedicated DR targets to bring back. In that case I'd try just DR'ing a Grave Troll! It may not be as flashy and fancy as assaulting the opponent with a horde of hasty zombie tokens and Flame-Kin Zealot, but a regenerating 14/14 Grave Troll is still going to get there in 2 turns and win just the same. Then there was a post board game when the Nic-Fit player Extirpated my Bridges before I got a single token out, but that didn't stop me from winning. I just beat down with Ichorids and DR'ed a Grave Troll again and that was plenty enough to get there.
I pretty much wiped the floor with just about every Legacy player at the LGS with my Dredge deck (with the exception of the T.E.S. pilot), and my faith in this deck has definitely been restored. It seems the problems I was having weren't due to my list being inconsistent, my list is fine. The problem was me being too strict with the kind of opening hands I would or wouldn't keep and not allowing the deck to be flexible and play out in more nonlinear ways, such as DR'ing a Grave Troll on turn 2 or just beating down with Ichorids rather than going for the spectacular combo win when needed. Mind you the vast majority of my wins were turn 2 or turn 3 wins that involved DR'ing Flame-Kin Zealot with a bunch of Bridges in the yard or DR'ing Sphinx of Lost Truths, flipping the rest of my deck into the yard, then bringing out Flame-Kin, but it was great getting to experiment with the deck in a dynamic environment with real opponents and learn to think about new lines of play that wouldn't come up in goldfishing.
This was the list I played last night, and once again I'm so happy to say that I never once mulled to death. It's really nice to know that the problems I was having weren't problems with the deck, just how I was playing it.
4 Putrid Imp
3 Tireless Tribe
4 Narcomoeba
4 Ichorid
4 Golgari Grave-Troll
4 Stinkweed Imp
2 Golgari Thug
1 Flame-Kin Zealot
1 Sphinx of Lost Truths
4 Cabal Therapy
4 Careful Study
4 Breakthrough
3 Dread Return
[4 Enchantments]
4 Bridge From Below
[14 Lands]
4 Gemstone Mine
4 City of Brass
4 Cephalid Coliseum
2 Tarnished Citadel
3 Nature's Claim
2 Chain of Vapor
3 Firestorm
2 Ancient Grudge
3 Leyline of the Void
1 Ashen Rider
1 Iona, Shield of Emeria
+1 Golgari Thug - I've played LED and LEDless versions with 3x and 4x Thug. The deck performs much more consistently with 4, so I think you should at least use 3. More Ichorid food as well.
-1 Ichorid - Ichorid is incredible, but to get value out of him you need expendable black creatures in the yard. I haven't tested extensively with 4 because I settled on 3 long ago. I remember it feeling clunky, especially without LED starts. I suppose having 4 could get you to DR quicker, but if this spot were to be a 3rd Thug vs a 4th Ichorid I'd definitely choose Thug. Some pilots run a 4th in the sideboard. Less Ichorid food, unfortunately.
-1 Sphinx of Lost Truths, +1 Griselbrand - If you stick a Griselbrand, you WILL be seeing the rest of your deck that turn, rather than the 18 maximum that Sphinx offers. A 7/7 Lifelink is pretty sweet after chaining several Cabal Therapies. More Ichorid food as well.
Other points...you have enough DRs maindeck to give Flayer of the Hatebound a try. FKZ is best in the early game. Every turn that goes by, he gets worse. The exception is when you expect sorcery speed token sweepers. Maybe test out a singleton Faithless looting since you have so many rainbow lands and you probably get to 3 lands fairly often. I consider your other possible flex spots to be -1 Tarnished Citadel and -1 Dread Return. Best of luck!
WUBRROBOTSRBUW
BRGLIVING ENDGRB
URSPLINTER TWINRU
LEGACY
WUBRGTESGRBUW
WUBRGDREDGEGRBUW
EDH
BRGKRESH, THE BLOODBRAIDEDGRB
WBGDORAN, THE SIEGE TOWERGBW
UBSYGG, RIVER CUTTHROATBU
PAUPER EDH
WUGRHOX WAR MONKGUW
UBRDREADWINGRBU
RGFERAL ANIMISTGR
PAUPER
WUBRGALL OF ITGRBUW
Moreso people are going budget routes. The explosiveness of the LED list is not to be ignored.
Modern Warp / UR Control / UR Storm / Naya Breachshift / ElectroBalance
Solidarity / Lands / Sneak and Show / Grixis Delver / Reanimator / Belcher / Storm / Dredge
LEDs are very much needed in competitive Dredge. Many competitive players avoid this thread and use mtgthesource.com for LED-Dredge to avoid the clutter of nonled being the focus of this thread. Me included.
I have only found two NonLED decks that have performed in the top 8 within the last 4 months and one was only in a 37 man event and the other in a 15 man. Manaless actually has a better record than non-led dredge.
I love my LED deck so much I have started to have it altered.
I'll check out mtgthesource
Is that because LED list are the main go to list? Or is LEDless that much worst? I feel there is more to the LED vs. LEDless showing up.