Not a lot of hate. One of my opponents was maining jotun Grunts, but more on that with the tourney report. And sorry if I don't remember every opener or mulligan, as the day was kinda a blur.
Private Mod Note
():
Rollback Post to RevisionRollBack
Karn is all like "I WANT UR BELLIEZZ!" and that troll thing is like: "Nooz my poptartz!" -Wharoftheguiltleaf
Thanks a lot for your feedback Zero_Chaos. Its good to see Dredge placing so well despite the amount of hate people give us.
Personally I'm seeing that 4 Chain, 4 Claim is good coverage. Ancient Grudge/Ray is starting to be less useful than patience or getting back Primus/Terrastrodon.
Thanks a lot for your feedback Zero_Chaos. Its good to see Dredge placing so well despite the amount of hate people give us.
Personally I'm seeing that 4 Chain, 4 Claim is good coverage. Ancient Grudge/Ray is starting to be less useful than patience or getting back Primus/Terrastrodon.
what do you take out to get in 4 claims and 4 chains. i've always been iffy when figuring out what to sideboard out for anti hate, but what do you board out for 8 pieces of anti hate and anything else
Currently Taking altered art Comissions. www.nf96alters.webs.com
Quick and Cheap Alters (looking to fill up some slots so some special pricing currently)
what do you take out to get in 4 claims and 4 chains. i've always been iffy when figuring out what to sideboard out for anti hate, but what do you board out for 8 pieces of anti hate and anything else
Well think about it this way, if you board in 3 Claim and an Ancient Grudge, then you would have the same plan as before. I already want to go up to 4 Chain tbh since it's so powerful. Its hard to know what to board out since unfortunately, every card is good:
You can remove 1 of your DR targets if it is not helpful.
Troll is a win condition and dredges too much.
Imp and Thug can get on the field and help make the game easier.
Therapy is too powerful, especially with hate game 2.
Really I only see Breakthrough, Careful Study and Dorks as possibilities in general. We have redundancy, so its not wrong, just makes the plan a little less reliable.
@Zero Chaos, thanks for coming here to talk about your deck! I'll have to try Pithing Needle (nice insurance against Cephalid Breakfast, as you said), maybe I didn't give it a fair shake. I love that it shuts down Ravager before they can play him and blow your Bridges up.
I agree with your thoughts on Therapy, I've been happy with 3 main 1 side. I still can't wrap my head around 13 lands, though. I've mulliganed 0-landers about 6 times in 5 matches today, and that's with 15 land. Sure, I'd love to squeeze in more gas, but if you can't play Pimp on turn one, you're going to Paris.
I'll also try Undiscovered Paradise, which has the upside of being Wasteland-proof on the play, so you can play your outlet turn one AND your careful study turn two.
Here are some more results from MTGO testing...
After going 14-0 in matches in the MTGO 2-man queues, I finally hit a wall of variance. My final tally at the end of 25 matches is 18-7.
My losses were to: Enchantress, Cephalid Breakfast, Fish, Goblins, RUG Threshold, Team America, and U/W control with Moat, Ensnaring Bridge, and Peacekeeper. It's worth noting that I've beaten all of those decks except Cephalid and Fish, and that's because I've only played them once. Cephalid is legitimately a bad matchup, but Fish is slightly favorable.
Yesterday was the day my luck ran out, and I went 4-7. I played against decks I had never seen in action before (enchantress, cephalid, u/w Moat), so I sideboarded and played horribly. For example, I would have beaten the Moat deck (and I did, the following match), had I just sided in a Darkblast to kill Peacekeeper after I flipped my deck into the 'yard. One of my losses yesterday came in game three when I punted by skipping a lethal Ichorid trigger because my fiancee was talking to me about strollers. I also mulliganed far, far more than on the previous two days (I clearly was unreal lucky during my 14-0 streak). I lost the Goblins match because he had his 1-of Goblin Prospector in his opening hand game one, which delayed me just long enough.
The opening of Force of Will, Wasteland contributed to several game losses. I still need to learn to DDD instead of "hoping he doesn't have it" when I have the nuts (Pimp, Dredge, Study). DDD makes both Force of Will and Wasteland irrelevant - though against RUG, his Tarmogoyfs would have made the slow-Dredge plan painful.
I'll also try Undiscovered Paradise, which has the upside of being Wasteland-proof on the play, so you can play your outlet turn one AND your careful study turn two.
After going 14-0 in matches in the MTGO 2-man queues, I finally hit a wall of variance. My final tally at the end of 25 matches is 18-7.
That's not how Undiscovered Paradise works.
You beat me last night, but I'm not playing Dredge hate right now, just splash hate for Loam / tribal.
It is wasteland proof on the play. It goes back to your hand at the end of your turn which means even if they drop the wasteland Paradise is no longer there for them to target...
So yes, that's how it works.
Private Mod Note
():
Rollback Post to RevisionRollBack
Asking people to remove quotes in their signatures is tyranny! If I can't say something just because someone's feelings are hurt then no one would ever be able to say anything! Political correctness is stupid.
Undiscovered Paradise
Land
{T}: Add one mana of any color to your mana pool. During your next untap step, as you untap your permanents, return Undiscovered Paradise to its owner's hand.
Paradise is not Wasteland proof. I would only recommend it over Citadel in non-Bloodghast build IF AND ONLY IF you expect a lot of aggro where you care about your life total. Having that land in play is a big deal since you can set off your Coliseum.
Totally called it on the Firestorm/Cephalid Breakfast play! Nice job on the 3rd place dude. Like I said before, I've been running the Paradises in place of Citadels for a while since I didn't have the latter; I just now picked them up and will try them, but the Paradises haven't really backfired yet. Just having a painless rainbow land is nice. That said, it would suck if my hand was like PImp, UP, Coliseum and three dredgers or something, where all I can do until turn 3 is discard to the PImp and draw the dredger, whereas if the UP was a Citadel I could crack Coliseum on turn 2 and probably win on the spot with that hand.
Private Mod Note
():
Rollback Post to RevisionRollBack
Legacy Decks I'm Currently Running:
U Merfolk U UGW NO Bant UGW UGWRB Dredge! UGWRB
Other Legacy Decks I Own:
RGW Zoo! RGW BGW Junk BGW RGWB Aggro Loam RGWB BW Deadguy BW W Death & Taxes (almost!) W GW Green & Taxes GW BGW Junk & Taxes BGW
Another big bonus of the Undiscovered Paradise, is that against blue decks, if they counter your first turn discard outlet Undiscovered Paradise will return to your hand next turn and allow you to get to an end of turn discard step sooner than a Citadel that stays in play.
Tarnished only lets you play around Daze if you have a second land, which often you do not have. And if you do have a second land and are playing around Daze, then just not using your Undiscovered Paradise until turn two with a second land plays around Daze just as well as Tarnished Citadel. If you are on the draw, Paradise let's you end step discard on the second turn, even after playing a spell on the first.
Tarnished Citadel isn't good. I'd even consider playing Tendo Ice Bridge or Forsaken City before a Citdel. 3 damage is a lot to take, especially more than once, considering many of your other lands are painful too.
I've just never been happy with it the times I have run it. Though I've been running a Bloodghast version since Zendikar so I haven't much needed to consider another rainbow land in awhile.
BTW I'm Kyle, who ran the 14th place list. If I ran it again, I'd cut the Deep Analysis for the fourth Cabal Therapy. Of the eight rounds, I only used Deep Analysis once, and I'm certain I would have won that game without it. It has been useful for me in the past, but Cabal Therapy is just so much more important in your bad matchups.
Regarding the question earlier about what to take out when I bring in 8 anti-hate cards. The Dread Return package is usually the first thing to go if I am expecting graveyard hate. If they have hate, attempting to Dread Return could get you blown out and is your plan which their hate is likely to be most effective against anyway.
Other than that, it really comes down to what sort of hate you expect. Planar/Leyline of the Void, Yixid Jailer are really the only things that concerned me a great deal (and Ravenous Trap, though no one has been playing it, and you can avoid the trap by dredging a Dakmor Salvage or just drawing a card for the turn when you're ahead). Expecting Extirpate or Crypt-like effects will change my play decisions, but a single one of those is unlikely to do more than slow me down by a turn or two. By having both Bloodghasts (which tend to stay in play and out of the graveyard) and also having access to a pair of Ichorid, it isn't difficult to provide a sufficient threat without needing to dredge too much of your library.
I'll post some more coherent thoughts on my list sometime later tonight when I get home as well as a report detailing some of my play in the event.
Will be awaiting your report, and congrats on the high finish. Is Deep Analysis probably better when you have Citadels than when you're running UP? Cit can use the colorless and you're slightly more likely to have two lands out than with UP. I feel like DA could be good in the right build, with at least 15 lands though, almost as an alternative to a Sphinx or something... but I know that's what the build started off running and moved away from as two mana became less and less important to have.
Private Mod Note
():
Rollback Post to RevisionRollBack
Legacy Decks I'm Currently Running:
U Merfolk U UGW NO Bant UGW UGWRB Dredge! UGWRB
Other Legacy Decks I Own:
RGW Zoo! RGW BGW Junk BGW RGWB Aggro Loam RGWB BW Deadguy BW W Death & Taxes (almost!) W GW Green & Taxes GW BGW Junk & Taxes BGW
The 3 damage is also the reason why I dropped the Citadels in my list. IMO Citadel is only good if it's your second gold land during post board games since you would be casting more spells (anti-hate cards) in addition to the discard/draw spells you'll still play in order to get the engine running (which translates to more damage from Citadel if it's your only gold land). UP doesn't have the same drawback if it's your only gold land during postboard games. And if you have multiple lands in your opening hand, just play the other lands first so you could get around Daze.
The problem is when your other land is Coliseum and your discard outlets are not blue. Then playing Coliseum first doesn't work, and playing it second doesn't let you play around Daze or activate it.
Private Mod Note
():
Rollback Post to RevisionRollBack
Legacy Decks I'm Currently Running:
U Merfolk U UGW NO Bant UGW UGWRB Dredge! UGWRB
Other Legacy Decks I Own:
RGW Zoo! RGW BGW Junk BGW RGWB Aggro Loam RGWB BW Deadguy BW W Death & Taxes (almost!) W GW Green & Taxes GW BGW Junk & Taxes BGW
I really like the comparison between the pros/cons of Ichorid and Bloodghast in the opening post, as I feel they fit most of my reasoning for choosing a Bloddghast build. With the weaker matchups generally being fast combo, I feel the small speed the Bloodghast can bring helps close the gap in those matchups. I also like that after sideboarding Bloodghast doesn't sit in the graveyard.
As I mentioned, I would cut Deep Analysis for a fourth Cabal Therapy. Having two mana isn't the issue behind choosing to omit Deep Analysis. It's more along the lines of rarely being needed to close out a game, even when it's there.
Rather than do a report recounting each game, I'm mostly going to recap my mistakes (the ones I caught either by reflection or upon discussing the games afterward with my opponent). Learning from my mistakes helps improve my play and hopefully by seeing the mistakes I make, you will be less likely to make the same errors that I did.
Round One - Goblins
I made a mistake in the first round that cost me the second game against a Goblins player. He got a turn two Goblin Sharpshooter off of a Lackey trigger which was pinging his own guys to remove my bridges and would then easily dispatch any Narcomoabas, Bloodghasts or Ichorids that came into play. I was tunnel-visioned on getting creatures into play that could survive the Sharpshooter and my plan was to dredge back my two Dakmor Salvages, then to start playing Stinkweed Imps to sacrifice and dread return a huge Grave-Troll. What I should have done was dredge to a Darkblast, remove the threat and then proceed as normal. By the time I realized this it was too late, I had lost all my bridges and had to rely on drawing a land for my Bloodghasts since I'd already dredged back the two salavges to get to three mana.
For this matchup I only board in the second Darkblast. If they have Crypts or something similar, I prefer to just play around them rather than weaken my deck. Unless two Crypt effects happen, you still have a very good chance to win as the Dredge player.
I was also counting on sideboards being light on graveyard hate for this event due to recent results. Expect this to change for a while and to have to sideboard more aggressively in certain matchups.
Round Two - Zoo
The mistake from the previous round really kicked me into gear here and I think I played much better. In game one he got a Gaddok Teeg out, but masses of graveyard guys and sacing them to therapy away his hand was more than enough.
When I see or expect Teeg, I board out the Dread Return Package. You can't cast it with Teeg in play anyway, so it essentially limits his effectiveness to just being a 2/2 dork. Since it stops Breakthough I board one of those out as well and bring in the Chains of Vapor.
Chain of Vapor usually comes in for the second game when I'm not sure what to expect, as it covers the most bases. Against Zoo it's also good because if they try to bolt one of their guys to remove your bridges you can bounce their guy in response which is good tempo for you.
Round Three - 1-Land Belcher
In game one when he mulled to five on the play and did nothing I put him on combo. I played accordingly and won a close game.
I boarded in Force of Wills. Take out the slow stuff, for me that's Ichorid, Deep Analysis and the like. Second game I kept a decent hand, but without Force, and got hit for 80+ before I had a turn. For the third game I kept a solid hand with a first turn Therapy and able to flash it back the following turn. This is where I make another mistake, and this time it costs me the game. I Therapy, and name Charbelcher. I knew it was the wrong choice almost immediately. At the beginning of the game my opponent took a bit longer to decide upon keeping and made a comment on the fact (while he could have been bluffing, I still should have at least though to consider his actions). I didn't take this into consideration and miss, seeing an Empty the Warrens hand about to go off. He empties for 16 Goblins on his turn and I don't recover.
In hindsight it's easy to tell myself that I miscalled on my Therapy, but I still think I could have taken my opponent into consideration prior to naming a card.
Round Four - Ad Nauseam
In this round I make another mistake. He made Top 4 so you can find his list there. Game one I lose a very close game, and two I win fairly easily after mulling to six for a decent hand with Force of Will, which I use to counter his early attempt to go off.I'm pretty sure this is how the two first games went, my notes are a little chaotic.
My sideboarding here was both the forces, as well as a couple Chains of Vapor, keeping the Dread Return package in. I boarded in the Chains because after seeing both Silence and Orim's chant I figured there was a possibility he could bring some cards in against me since there are cards he could side out.
Game Three is where I make my mistake. I keep a good hand. 2x Cephalid Coliseum, Grave-Troll, Stinkweed Imp, Narcomoeba, Force of Will and some other non-land card. If he doesn't go off first turn I have a discard step to bin my Troll, and ifhe does go off first turn, which is unlikely, I'll need the Force anyway. First turn he plays Underground Sea, casts Dark Ritual, two Lion's Eye Diamonds and Infernal Tutor, sacrificing his LED's. I Force of will the Tutor. I should have waited to counter the impending Ad Nauseam. I was far ahead anyway, but I knew I wasn't completely out of it.
Four turns later he casts Dark Ritual, two LED's and another Tutor to get Ad Nauseam and win. Yes, I got unlucky that he got the four exact cards he needed (he also cast a Brainstorm), but I shouldn't have given myself the chance to get unlucky by holding back on my Force of Will just a little bit longer, effectively removing his Ad Nauseam from the deck.
Even things that seem like bad luck can often be linked back to mistakes.
Round Five - BRW Discard
Seems like a pretty good matchup for me.
I boarded in Chains of Vapor as I was pretty cure such a deck would need to be prepared against matches where the opponent wants to discard. I took out the Dread Return package as it appeared to be a slower matchup and I could grind it out easily enough without it.
Game Two he gets an early Nether Void out. I have to bounce it with a Chain of Vapor and Therapy it away, only to see a Jotun Grunt in his hand that I don't have a means to get rid of right away. He plays it, but there are only five total cards in the graveyards, the rest of his action in hand all required red mana and he doesn't have any, as I noticed when I therapied him. I wait for the Jotun Grunt to go away and then win.
Round Six Through Eight - Team America
This was the matchup I was planning/hoping to hit a lot due to recent success/popularity. It's a very good matchup for Dredge, their only real threat for you is Terravore and they have little means of positively interacting with you beyond Force of Will (and Pernicious Deed). For boarding I take out the Flame-Kin Zealot, and brought in the Angel of Despair. The fast win is often unnecessary in this matchup and Angel answers Terravore, which is the greatest threat they can throw at you and their best chance of winning in my opinion.
I dropped one game in the last three rounds, though I made a few errors, none of which lost me any games, but could have as it prolonged each game the errors were made in.
In one game my Bridges were all gone and my opponent low on life due to some Ichorid bashing. I don't remember his position exactly but I had four Bloodghasts in the yard, two Ichorids and a Golgari Thug. I remove the Thug to one Ichorid, and dredge a Dakmor Salvage to get my Bloodghasts back. It took me awhile to decide upon this play as I had considered removing the fourth Bloodghast to get a second Ichorid (potentially one more damage) weighde again there being less creatures in the graveyard when I planned to Dread Return a Grave-Troll that turn after attacking.
My reasoning for keeping the extra Ichorid in my graveyard was to ensure that my Troll was large enough to not be outdone by a Terravore. I had the regeneration mana for it should I need it as well. What actually happened is my Bloodghasts got Extirpated when the Landfall triggers went on the stack and I was unable to Dread Return my Troll at all due to only having an Ichorid and a Narcomoeba. The Ichorids and the lone Narcomoeba got there as my opponent didn't draw any answers, but I still gave my opponent more chance that I should have.
In another match I missed a Bloodghast trigger. It was the same turn that I received a warning and was a little flustered from making a dumb mistake. I "looked at extra cards" by accidentally dredging from the bottom of my deck. I don't know why I did this, it was the last round and, mentally, I was exhausted. I realized what I had done as soon as I pulled the first card into my graveyard and called a judge on myself immediately. Later that turn I missed the Bloodghast coming into play. Tormod's Crypt hit me before my following turn, and the Bloodghast that should have been in play was removed forever. His presence on the battlefield would have likely reduced the length of game by at least a turn and possibly even two or three turns. I won regardless, but it could have gone the other way had my opponent gotten different draws or especially if it was a less favorable matchup.
I also forgot to therapy once when I had the extra creature to do so. He was empty and drew and kept a card, but it could have been relevant and I should have either forced him to play it then or seen what it was before alpha striking. I was in complete control and it turned out to be irrelevant, but it could have made a difference.
So those are my mistakes. I finished 6-2, with my two losses coming from Belcher and Ad Nauseam, both made the top 8. I feel that both matches were winnable. I'm a bit disappointed by my performance, though I believe I made the correct deck choice for the event.
Sideboarding with Dredge
In sideboarded games you shouldn't need to be dredging a whole lot. Your Breakthroughs are an over-extension (there's a whole lot else I don't like about Breakthough as well, but it is a powerful card) and Coliseum activations aren't as powerful as they are in game one. These often serve to make you more vulnerable to the hate. Dredging 15-18 cards should be plenty to put on some pressure while making them blow their hate on a smaller graveyard. Don't lose all four bridges at once; lose them one or two at a time if you can. Drawing a card can be the right play a lot of the time in games two and three. Don't overextend with your graveyard. Keep backup in your hand in case your graveyard does get blown away.
If you only lose 15-18 cards to each Crypt, it will take three Crypts to fully take you out of the game! This is another reason I like taking out the Dread Return package. Often, 15 cards isn't enough to utilize your Dread Return effectively.
I don't like bringing in 8 cards when I can avoid it. It clunks up your machine too much. I count on people thinking that drawing a single crypt or other card is enough to stop you when in reality one hate card isn't enough a majority of the time. Add on top of that most people don't seem to know how to play against dredge effectively, using hate at the wrong times and making suboptimal plays. People are too premature with most of their graveyard hate (and I love it).
It isn't enough to throw four Tormod's Crypt or 4 Leyline of the void in the board and consider your Dredge matchup done. I am more than happy to board in less than eight cards and fight through their insufficient amount of hate.
The fewer cards you bring in, the better your Machine runs and the fewer cards you need to dredge and expose to run it.
The problem is when your other land is Coliseum and your discard outlets are not blue. Then playing Coliseum first doesn't work, and playing it second doesn't let you play around Daze or activate it.
True, but that shouldn't happen too often since you only run 2-3 UP (this would be replacing Citadels in the traditional 5 color Ichorid lists).
Game one vs. Unknown deck (to be discovered after my mulligans that it was Canadian Thresh) I have to mulligan away to *two* cards. Those two cards are Breakthrough and Grave troll
top deck: Polluted delta.
I proceeded to win.
Private Mod Note
():
Rollback Post to RevisionRollBack
Asking people to remove quotes in their signatures is tyranny! If I can't say something just because someone's feelings are hurt then no one would ever be able to say anything! Political correctness is stupid.
Does anyone have any thoughts on choosing to draw instead of play with this deck? I seem to be getting a lot of 7 card hands that would be playable on the draw that I have to mull away. Especially after adding in hate cards on game 2 and 3.
Does anyone have any thoughts on choosing to draw instead of play with this deck? I seem to be getting a lot of 7 card hands that would be playable on the draw that I have to mull away. Especially after adding in hate cards on game 2 and 3.
Against tempo decks, it is usually correct to go on the draw since you will want to get a free dredge off first and if your hand is playable, it is better to just pitch a card the first turn and put something in your yard in case you think your opponent has answers (turn 1 Wasteland T_T).
I don't like drawing first when I can help it. Most decks have access to something that can hurt you a lot if you keep a hand that relies heavily on using the discard step turn one.
Thoughtsize and Duress really hurt as there are plenty of cards they can take which hurt you if you have to discard them on the draw, taking away the discard step.
A first or second turn Relic of Progenitus by the opponent screws up your end step discard plan as well.
Since you don't know your seven beforehand you might not be able to keep your first seven and have to rely on resolving an outlet anyway, in which case by going second you have activated even more cards to be relevant against you like Daze as well as given up the speed of having the first turn.
This in addition to a lot of smaller things like letting a Goblin Lackey get a hit in.
There are matchups where it might help, but most of the time I'd advise against it. First game is different, if you know what you going against there are a decent amount of decks it's okay to draw first against. After boarding, it's almost always good to go first when you can.
This is another reason I like Darkblast, it's good against plenty of early plays, even if it doesn't kill a guy or resolve. It's a dredger that discards itself. I've cast a fair amount of upkeep Darkblasts that get me into a game faster than I would have otherwise been able to.
I played Dredge at a local tourny last night. I went 3-0 in matches and 6-0 in games against belcher, merfolk, and death and taxes. Here is my list for reference.
I felt like I was cheating most of the night. My Belcher opponent says, "oh, your on dredge. I guess I win." in response to my turn one pimp. He then makes 10 goblins and passes. I discard 3 gravetrolls on is end step and on my turn I breakthrough, dredge my whole deck and attack of infinite lols.
I never used deep analysis. It is going to become a third thug or a darkblast. I think I need another dredger.
In the merfolk match up, I played underground sea into EOT brainstorm. My opponent though I was on team america (another deck I play on occasion). He dazed it and did not have the force the next turn when I careful studied into dredgers then dropped colossium and brokethrough to set up an impossible amount of zombies to deal with the next turn.
Death and taxes is a bye. I board in 4x null rod. He boarded in 3x relic and 2x grunt. Grunt is not good removal against dredge.
I lent my deck to a local ringer for a GPT this weekend. I will let you know how it works out for him.
The lands in my list are not typical to dredge. Only 3 colossium was due to availability as was running watery grave. Darkslick shore is awesome in a two colour build try it out. It is not an island, so no islandwalking merfolk. No one wants to wasteland a scars duel when they know you have underground sea. I think it is an ego/bad player thing.
Anyway, I had a blast with this deck and will play it next Wednesday with some tweaks. Happy to share the free rolls.
Personally I'm seeing that 4 Chain, 4 Claim is good coverage. Ancient Grudge/Ray is starting to be less useful than patience or getting back Primus/Terrastrodon.
what do you take out to get in 4 claims and 4 chains. i've always been iffy when figuring out what to sideboard out for anti hate, but what do you board out for 8 pieces of anti hate and anything else
Currently Taking altered art Comissions. www.nf96alters.webs.com
Quick and Cheap Alters (looking to fill up some slots so some special pricing currently)
Ebay Stuff
Well think about it this way, if you board in 3 Claim and an Ancient Grudge, then you would have the same plan as before. I already want to go up to 4 Chain tbh since it's so powerful. Its hard to know what to board out since unfortunately, every card is good:
You can remove 1 of your DR targets if it is not helpful.
Troll is a win condition and dredges too much.
Imp and Thug can get on the field and help make the game easier.
Therapy is too powerful, especially with hate game 2.
Really I only see Breakthrough, Careful Study and Dorks as possibilities in general. We have redundancy, so its not wrong, just makes the plan a little less reliable.
I agree with your thoughts on Therapy, I've been happy with 3 main 1 side. I still can't wrap my head around 13 lands, though. I've mulliganed 0-landers about 6 times in 5 matches today, and that's with 15 land. Sure, I'd love to squeeze in more gas, but if you can't play Pimp on turn one, you're going to Paris.
I'll also try Undiscovered Paradise, which has the upside of being Wasteland-proof on the play, so you can play your outlet turn one AND your careful study turn two.
Here are some more results from MTGO testing...
After going 14-0 in matches in the MTGO 2-man queues, I finally hit a wall of variance. My final tally at the end of 25 matches is 18-7.
My losses were to: Enchantress, Cephalid Breakfast, Fish, Goblins, RUG Threshold, Team America, and U/W control with Moat, Ensnaring Bridge, and Peacekeeper. It's worth noting that I've beaten all of those decks except Cephalid and Fish, and that's because I've only played them once. Cephalid is legitimately a bad matchup, but Fish is slightly favorable.
Yesterday was the day my luck ran out, and I went 4-7. I played against decks I had never seen in action before (enchantress, cephalid, u/w Moat), so I sideboarded and played horribly. For example, I would have beaten the Moat deck (and I did, the following match), had I just sided in a Darkblast to kill Peacekeeper after I flipped my deck into the 'yard. One of my losses yesterday came in game three when I punted by skipping a lethal Ichorid trigger because my fiancee was talking to me about strollers. I also mulliganed far, far more than on the previous two days (I clearly was unreal lucky during my 14-0 streak). I lost the Goblins match because he had his 1-of Goblin Prospector in his opening hand game one, which delayed me just long enough.
The opening of Force of Will, Wasteland contributed to several game losses. I still need to learn to DDD instead of "hoping he doesn't have it" when I have the nuts (Pimp, Dredge, Study). DDD makes both Force of Will and Wasteland irrelevant - though against RUG, his Tarmogoyfs would have made the slow-Dredge plan painful.
More results in another 10 games or so.
That's not how Undiscovered Paradise works.
You beat me last night, but I'm not playing Dredge hate right now, just splash hate for Loam / tribal.
So yes, that's how it works.
Guess I should read the cards, eh? Thanks! If you ever want to test against Dredge, shoot me a PM.
Land
{T}: Add one mana of any color to your mana pool. During your next untap step, as you untap your permanents, return Undiscovered Paradise to its owner's hand.
Paradise is not Wasteland proof. I would only recommend it over Citadel in non-Bloodghast build IF AND ONLY IF you expect a lot of aggro where you care about your life total. Having that land in play is a big deal since you can set off your Coliseum.
U G W NO Bant U G W
U G W R B Dredge! U G W R B
B G W Junk B G W
R G W B Aggro Loam R G W B
B W Deadguy B W
W Death & Taxes (almost!) W
G W Green & Taxes G W
B G W Junk & Taxes B G W
Momir Vig
Brion Stoutarm
Drana, Kalastria Bloodchief
Arcum Daggson
Tarnished Citadel isn't good. I'd even consider playing Tendo Ice Bridge or Forsaken City before a Citdel. 3 damage is a lot to take, especially more than once, considering many of your other lands are painful too.
BTW I'm Kyle, who ran the 14th place list. If I ran it again, I'd cut the Deep Analysis for the fourth Cabal Therapy. Of the eight rounds, I only used Deep Analysis once, and I'm certain I would have won that game without it. It has been useful for me in the past, but Cabal Therapy is just so much more important in your bad matchups.
Regarding the question earlier about what to take out when I bring in 8 anti-hate cards. The Dread Return package is usually the first thing to go if I am expecting graveyard hate. If they have hate, attempting to Dread Return could get you blown out and is your plan which their hate is likely to be most effective against anyway.
Other than that, it really comes down to what sort of hate you expect. Planar/Leyline of the Void, Yixid Jailer are really the only things that concerned me a great deal (and Ravenous Trap, though no one has been playing it, and you can avoid the trap by dredging a Dakmor Salvage or just drawing a card for the turn when you're ahead). Expecting Extirpate or Crypt-like effects will change my play decisions, but a single one of those is unlikely to do more than slow me down by a turn or two. By having both Bloodghasts (which tend to stay in play and out of the graveyard) and also having access to a pair of Ichorid, it isn't difficult to provide a sufficient threat without needing to dredge too much of your library.
I'll post some more coherent thoughts on my list sometime later tonight when I get home as well as a report detailing some of my play in the event.
You have to run UP in Bloodghast builds. I think we are more focusing on if it's better with Ichorid.
U G W NO Bant U G W
U G W R B Dredge! U G W R B
B G W Junk B G W
R G W B Aggro Loam R G W B
B W Deadguy B W
W Death & Taxes (almost!) W
G W Green & Taxes G W
B G W Junk & Taxes B G W
Momir Vig
Brion Stoutarm
Drana, Kalastria Bloodchief
Arcum Daggson
U G W NO Bant U G W
U G W R B Dredge! U G W R B
B G W Junk B G W
R G W B Aggro Loam R G W B
B W Deadguy B W
W Death & Taxes (almost!) W
G W Green & Taxes G W
B G W Junk & Taxes B G W
Momir Vig
Brion Stoutarm
Drana, Kalastria Bloodchief
Arcum Daggson
1 Flame-Kin Zealot
4 Golgari Grave-Troll
1 Golgari Thug
2 Ichorid
4 Narcomoeba
4 Putrid Imp
4 Stinkweed Imp
2 Tireless Tribe
4 Bridge from Below
1 Brainstorm
1 Darkblast
3 Breakthrough
3 Cabal Therapy
4 Careful Study
1 Deep Analysis
2 Dread Return
2 City of Brass
2 Dakmor Salvage
3 Gemstone Mine
4 Undiscovered Paradise
1 Angel of Despair
1 Woodfall Primus
4 Chain of Vapor
1 Darkblast
4 Force of Will
4 Nature's Claim
Deck Construction and Changes
I really like the comparison between the pros/cons of Ichorid and Bloodghast in the opening post, as I feel they fit most of my reasoning for choosing a Bloddghast build. With the weaker matchups generally being fast combo, I feel the small speed the Bloodghast can bring helps close the gap in those matchups. I also like that after sideboarding Bloodghast doesn't sit in the graveyard.
As I mentioned, I would cut Deep Analysis for a fourth Cabal Therapy. Having two mana isn't the issue behind choosing to omit Deep Analysis. It's more along the lines of rarely being needed to close out a game, even when it's there.
Rather than do a report recounting each game, I'm mostly going to recap my mistakes (the ones I caught either by reflection or upon discussing the games afterward with my opponent). Learning from my mistakes helps improve my play and hopefully by seeing the mistakes I make, you will be less likely to make the same errors that I did.
Round One - Goblins
I made a mistake in the first round that cost me the second game against a Goblins player. He got a turn two Goblin Sharpshooter off of a Lackey trigger which was pinging his own guys to remove my bridges and would then easily dispatch any Narcomoabas, Bloodghasts or Ichorids that came into play. I was tunnel-visioned on getting creatures into play that could survive the Sharpshooter and my plan was to dredge back my two Dakmor Salvages, then to start playing Stinkweed Imps to sacrifice and dread return a huge Grave-Troll. What I should have done was dredge to a Darkblast, remove the threat and then proceed as normal. By the time I realized this it was too late, I had lost all my bridges and had to rely on drawing a land for my Bloodghasts since I'd already dredged back the two salavges to get to three mana.
For this matchup I only board in the second Darkblast. If they have Crypts or something similar, I prefer to just play around them rather than weaken my deck. Unless two Crypt effects happen, you still have a very good chance to win as the Dredge player.
I was also counting on sideboards being light on graveyard hate for this event due to recent results. Expect this to change for a while and to have to sideboard more aggressively in certain matchups.
Round Two - Zoo
The mistake from the previous round really kicked me into gear here and I think I played much better. In game one he got a Gaddok Teeg out, but masses of graveyard guys and sacing them to therapy away his hand was more than enough.
When I see or expect Teeg, I board out the Dread Return Package. You can't cast it with Teeg in play anyway, so it essentially limits his effectiveness to just being a 2/2 dork. Since it stops Breakthough I board one of those out as well and bring in the Chains of Vapor.
Chain of Vapor usually comes in for the second game when I'm not sure what to expect, as it covers the most bases. Against Zoo it's also good because if they try to bolt one of their guys to remove your bridges you can bounce their guy in response which is good tempo for you.
Round Three - 1-Land Belcher
In game one when he mulled to five on the play and did nothing I put him on combo. I played accordingly and won a close game.
I boarded in Force of Wills. Take out the slow stuff, for me that's Ichorid, Deep Analysis and the like. Second game I kept a decent hand, but without Force, and got hit for 80+ before I had a turn. For the third game I kept a solid hand with a first turn Therapy and able to flash it back the following turn. This is where I make another mistake, and this time it costs me the game. I Therapy, and name Charbelcher. I knew it was the wrong choice almost immediately. At the beginning of the game my opponent took a bit longer to decide upon keeping and made a comment on the fact (while he could have been bluffing, I still should have at least though to consider his actions). I didn't take this into consideration and miss, seeing an Empty the Warrens hand about to go off. He empties for 16 Goblins on his turn and I don't recover.
In hindsight it's easy to tell myself that I miscalled on my Therapy, but I still think I could have taken my opponent into consideration prior to naming a card.
Round Four - Ad Nauseam
In this round I make another mistake. He made Top 4 so you can find his list there. Game one I lose a very close game, and two I win fairly easily after mulling to six for a decent hand with Force of Will, which I use to counter his early attempt to go off.I'm pretty sure this is how the two first games went, my notes are a little chaotic.
My sideboarding here was both the forces, as well as a couple Chains of Vapor, keeping the Dread Return package in. I boarded in the Chains because after seeing both Silence and Orim's chant I figured there was a possibility he could bring some cards in against me since there are cards he could side out.
Game Three is where I make my mistake. I keep a good hand. 2x Cephalid Coliseum, Grave-Troll, Stinkweed Imp, Narcomoeba, Force of Will and some other non-land card. If he doesn't go off first turn I have a discard step to bin my Troll, and ifhe does go off first turn, which is unlikely, I'll need the Force anyway. First turn he plays Underground Sea, casts Dark Ritual, two Lion's Eye Diamonds and Infernal Tutor, sacrificing his LED's. I Force of will the Tutor. I should have waited to counter the impending Ad Nauseam. I was far ahead anyway, but I knew I wasn't completely out of it.
Four turns later he casts Dark Ritual, two LED's and another Tutor to get Ad Nauseam and win. Yes, I got unlucky that he got the four exact cards he needed (he also cast a Brainstorm), but I shouldn't have given myself the chance to get unlucky by holding back on my Force of Will just a little bit longer, effectively removing his Ad Nauseam from the deck.
Even things that seem like bad luck can often be linked back to mistakes.
Round Five - BRW Discard
Seems like a pretty good matchup for me.
I boarded in Chains of Vapor as I was pretty cure such a deck would need to be prepared against matches where the opponent wants to discard. I took out the Dread Return package as it appeared to be a slower matchup and I could grind it out easily enough without it.
Game Two he gets an early Nether Void out. I have to bounce it with a Chain of Vapor and Therapy it away, only to see a Jotun Grunt in his hand that I don't have a means to get rid of right away. He plays it, but there are only five total cards in the graveyards, the rest of his action in hand all required red mana and he doesn't have any, as I noticed when I therapied him. I wait for the Jotun Grunt to go away and then win.
Round Six Through Eight - Team America
This was the matchup I was planning/hoping to hit a lot due to recent success/popularity. It's a very good matchup for Dredge, their only real threat for you is Terravore and they have little means of positively interacting with you beyond Force of Will (and Pernicious Deed). For boarding I take out the Flame-Kin Zealot, and brought in the Angel of Despair. The fast win is often unnecessary in this matchup and Angel answers Terravore, which is the greatest threat they can throw at you and their best chance of winning in my opinion.
I dropped one game in the last three rounds, though I made a few errors, none of which lost me any games, but could have as it prolonged each game the errors were made in.
In one game my Bridges were all gone and my opponent low on life due to some Ichorid bashing. I don't remember his position exactly but I had four Bloodghasts in the yard, two Ichorids and a Golgari Thug. I remove the Thug to one Ichorid, and dredge a Dakmor Salvage to get my Bloodghasts back. It took me awhile to decide upon this play as I had considered removing the fourth Bloodghast to get a second Ichorid (potentially one more damage) weighde again there being less creatures in the graveyard when I planned to Dread Return a Grave-Troll that turn after attacking.
My reasoning for keeping the extra Ichorid in my graveyard was to ensure that my Troll was large enough to not be outdone by a Terravore. I had the regeneration mana for it should I need it as well. What actually happened is my Bloodghasts got Extirpated when the Landfall triggers went on the stack and I was unable to Dread Return my Troll at all due to only having an Ichorid and a Narcomoeba. The Ichorids and the lone Narcomoeba got there as my opponent didn't draw any answers, but I still gave my opponent more chance that I should have.
In another match I missed a Bloodghast trigger. It was the same turn that I received a warning and was a little flustered from making a dumb mistake. I "looked at extra cards" by accidentally dredging from the bottom of my deck. I don't know why I did this, it was the last round and, mentally, I was exhausted. I realized what I had done as soon as I pulled the first card into my graveyard and called a judge on myself immediately. Later that turn I missed the Bloodghast coming into play. Tormod's Crypt hit me before my following turn, and the Bloodghast that should have been in play was removed forever. His presence on the battlefield would have likely reduced the length of game by at least a turn and possibly even two or three turns. I won regardless, but it could have gone the other way had my opponent gotten different draws or especially if it was a less favorable matchup.
I also forgot to therapy once when I had the extra creature to do so. He was empty and drew and kept a card, but it could have been relevant and I should have either forced him to play it then or seen what it was before alpha striking. I was in complete control and it turned out to be irrelevant, but it could have made a difference.
So those are my mistakes. I finished 6-2, with my two losses coming from Belcher and Ad Nauseam, both made the top 8. I feel that both matches were winnable. I'm a bit disappointed by my performance, though I believe I made the correct deck choice for the event.
Sideboarding with Dredge
In sideboarded games you shouldn't need to be dredging a whole lot. Your Breakthroughs are an over-extension (there's a whole lot else I don't like about Breakthough as well, but it is a powerful card) and Coliseum activations aren't as powerful as they are in game one. These often serve to make you more vulnerable to the hate. Dredging 15-18 cards should be plenty to put on some pressure while making them blow their hate on a smaller graveyard. Don't lose all four bridges at once; lose them one or two at a time if you can. Drawing a card can be the right play a lot of the time in games two and three. Don't overextend with your graveyard. Keep backup in your hand in case your graveyard does get blown away.
If you only lose 15-18 cards to each Crypt, it will take three Crypts to fully take you out of the game! This is another reason I like taking out the Dread Return package. Often, 15 cards isn't enough to utilize your Dread Return effectively.
I don't like bringing in 8 cards when I can avoid it. It clunks up your machine too much. I count on people thinking that drawing a single crypt or other card is enough to stop you when in reality one hate card isn't enough a majority of the time. Add on top of that most people don't seem to know how to play against dredge effectively, using hate at the wrong times and making suboptimal plays. People are too premature with most of their graveyard hate (and I love it).
It isn't enough to throw four Tormod's Crypt or 4 Leyline of the void in the board and consider your Dredge matchup done. I am more than happy to board in less than eight cards and fight through their insufficient amount of hate.
The fewer cards you bring in, the better your Machine runs and the fewer cards you need to dredge and expose to run it.
Game one vs. Unknown deck (to be discovered after my mulligans that it was Canadian Thresh) I have to mulligan away to *two* cards. Those two cards are Breakthrough and Grave troll
top deck: Polluted delta.
I proceeded to win.
Against tempo decks, it is usually correct to go on the draw since you will want to get a free dredge off first and if your hand is playable, it is better to just pitch a card the first turn and put something in your yard in case you think your opponent has answers (turn 1 Wasteland T_T).
Thoughtsize and Duress really hurt as there are plenty of cards they can take which hurt you if you have to discard them on the draw, taking away the discard step.
A first or second turn Relic of Progenitus by the opponent screws up your end step discard plan as well.
Since you don't know your seven beforehand you might not be able to keep your first seven and have to rely on resolving an outlet anyway, in which case by going second you have activated even more cards to be relevant against you like Daze as well as given up the speed of having the first turn.
This in addition to a lot of smaller things like letting a Goblin Lackey get a hit in.
There are matchups where it might help, but most of the time I'd advise against it. First game is different, if you know what you going against there are a decent amount of decks it's okay to draw first against. After boarding, it's almost always good to go first when you can.
This is another reason I like Darkblast, it's good against plenty of early plays, even if it doesn't kill a guy or resolve. It's a dredger that discards itself. I've cast a fair amount of upkeep Darkblasts that get me into a game faster than I would have otherwise been able to.
4 Stinkweed imp
2 Golgari thug
4 Ichorid
4 Narcomeoba
4 Putrid Imp
1 Flame-Kin Zealot
1 Sphinx of Lost Truth
1 Deep Analysis
2 Brainstorm
4 Cabal Therapy
4 Breakthrough
4 Careful Study
3 Dread Return
4 Bridge from Below
2 Underground Sea
1 Watery Grave
3 Cephelid Colossium
4 Gemstone Mine
4 null rod
3 echoing truth
1 chain of vapors
1 iona, shield of emeria
1 Terastodon
3 Reanimate
1 Ancestor Chosen
1 can't remember, errr...
I felt like I was cheating most of the night. My Belcher opponent says, "oh, your on dredge. I guess I win." in response to my turn one pimp. He then makes 10 goblins and passes. I discard 3 gravetrolls on is end step and on my turn I breakthrough, dredge my whole deck and attack of infinite lols.
I never used deep analysis. It is going to become a third thug or a darkblast. I think I need another dredger.
In the merfolk match up, I played underground sea into EOT brainstorm. My opponent though I was on team america (another deck I play on occasion). He dazed it and did not have the force the next turn when I careful studied into dredgers then dropped colossium and brokethrough to set up an impossible amount of zombies to deal with the next turn.
Death and taxes is a bye. I board in 4x null rod. He boarded in 3x relic and 2x grunt. Grunt is not good removal against dredge.
I lent my deck to a local ringer for a GPT this weekend. I will let you know how it works out for him.
The lands in my list are not typical to dredge. Only 3 colossium was due to availability as was running watery grave. Darkslick shore is awesome in a two colour build try it out. It is not an island, so no islandwalking merfolk. No one wants to wasteland a scars duel when they know you have underground sea. I think it is an ego/bad player thing.
Anyway, I had a blast with this deck and will play it next Wednesday with some tweaks. Happy to share the free rolls.