Seemed like he just had some real bad luck. If anyone watched the match on stream his opponent drew literally the Magical Christmas Land God Hand against him. Turn 3naturalTron, with double Karns, Relic of Progenitus, and Surgical Extraction... I mean seriously, it doesn't get any more absurd than that. Tron isn't even a bad match up for Hulk..
Yeah I watched that and it was painful. There really wasn't much he could do against a draw like that. I did see that there was a hulk combo deck listed in the day 2 meta breakdown and I was wondering who it was and what their list was like.
You can afford to mull aggressively. A mull to 4 or 5 can win on turn 3 relatively easily, even through countermagic if you're lucky. Ideally, your hand will have a combo piece (or both) some land, and some draw/dig spells. 1-landers are keepable if you have a couple of 1 mana dig spells. Better hands might have 2 lands in them, along with some dig.
For funsies, let's draw a few sample hands from Zac Elsik's GP list, since it's a good baseline. We'll assume it's game 1 and you don't know what you're up against to make things easier.
Hand 2: Pact of Negation, Pact of Negation, Izzet Charm, Polluted Delta, Sleight of Hand, Viscera Seer, Island
It's not terrible but I think I'd mull. It's a bit hard to put into words why this seems sketchy to me. It has some dig power and some interaction, but no combo piece, and the seer and the pacts are basically dead card early on. Seer can chump block but I don't think that's good enough. Other's may disagree about this hand.
Hand 4: Polluted Delta, Pact of Negation, Viscera Seer, Reveillark, Simian Spirit Guide, Faithless Looting, Protean Hulk
This is a bit sketchy but I might keep it. Turn 1 Faithless Looting with a Hulk in hand to get rid of is pretty good. Slim chance of a turn 2 kill with Pact up. If you blank off the Looting it might be sketchy but I'm a gambling man so I'd keep. The reason I'd keep this but throw Hand 2 back is the potential speed, and the fact that one of the combo pieces is in position.
Everyone else, please chime in. I don't claim to be an expert.
I want to play this deck next week. My background is that I play tested a version of this probably about 2 years ago. I didn't like it because between 4 Gitaxian Probe and the need to fetch/shock the first 2 turns, I scrapped the idea because I knew I'd lose to Burn.
But now I'm back and here are my 2 questions.
1. If I Makeshift Mannequin the Hulk, how do I get it to die so I can go off? Is it usually done with our own Izzet Charm or Lightning Axe or is it usually a mistake by the opponent (it can't be?)? Or do you keep swinging for 6 because I can foresee many chump blockers and 6 damage not being enough?
2. How do you do the Thopter Engineer infinite Thopters to swing with Haste? (too lazy to use my brain )
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Legacy - Sneak Show, BR Reanimator, Miracles, UW Stoneblade
Premodern - Trix, RecSur, Enchantress, Reanimator, Elves https://www.facebook.com/groups/PremodernUSA/ Modern - Neobrand, Hogaak Vine, Elves
Standard - Mono Red (6-2 and 5-3 in 2 McQ)
Draft - (I wish I had more time for limited...)
Commander - Norin the Wary, Grimgrin, Adun Oakenshield (taking forever to build) (dead format for me)
So the primer I made is done. I have have it in the testing area right now, finishing it up.. I have a bit of coding left to do on it, but by sometime tomorrow it should be up.
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Not just the Tendo King, the power of the Galactic Leyline surpasses that of the Tempa Emperor, No!, It's magnificent power is even greater than that!
I want to play this deck next week. My background is that I play tested a version of this probably about 2 years ago. I didn't like it because between 4 Gitaxian Probe and the need to fetch/shock the first 2 turns, I scrapped the idea because I knew I'd lose to Burn.
But now I'm back and here are my 2 questions.
1. If I Makeshift Mannequin the Hulk, how do I get it to die so I can go off? Is it usually done with our own Izzet Charm or Lightning Axe or is it usually a mistake by the opponent (it can't be?)? Or do you keep swinging for 6 because I can foresee many chump blockers and 6 damage not being enough?
2. How do you do the Thopter Engineer infinite Thopters to swing with Haste? (too lazy to use my brain )
pretty much chump block with it, if you have nothing else to do with it.
Crack Protean Hulk -> Grab Seer and Body Double. Body Copies Hulk.
Crack Body/Hulk -> Fetch Seer and Body Double. Body Copies Hulk.
Crack Body/Hulk -> Grab Seer and Revelark.
Crack Revelark -> Bring back 2 Body Double. One Body Copies Hulk, One Body Copies Revelark.
Sac Body/Hulk -> Grab Grave Titan. get Zombie Tokens. Sac Titan.
Sac Body/Revelark -> Bring back Body and Revelark. Body Copies Titan and makes 2 tokens. Sac Body/Titan
Sac Revelark -> Bring back 2 Body Double. 1 copies Grave Titan and makes tokens, another copies Revelark.
From here you can keep looping this for infinite tokens. You can also use this loop, to keep looping Hulk copies and bring out every creature in the deck
This can be very useful against Leyline, or if Mogg Fanatic gets exiled somehow. The opponent gets 1 turn before you can swing, but you have infinite ground blockers, and some Revelarks to block with. As long as there is a Revelark, or Revelark copy out, the whole thing is immune to sweepers as well. So wait a turn, block what you have to, and swing in for the win.
in my list i replaced engineer with Kalastria Healer since it avoids combat step and serves the same purpose as engineer. I kind of like keeping titan around for those games where the combo is derailed.
Thopter Engineer may be a decent blocker in the burn matchup, but other than that, I can't see how any of the other choices is better than Venser, Shaper Savant
I want to play this deck next week. My background is that I play tested a version of this probably about 2 years ago. I didn't like it because between 4 Gitaxian Probe and the need to fetch/shock the first 2 turns, I scrapped the idea because I knew I'd lose to Burn.
But now I'm back and here are my 2 questions.
1. If I Makeshift Mannequin the Hulk, how do I get it to die so I can go off? Is it usually done with our own Izzet Charm or Lightning Axe or is it usually a mistake by the opponent (it can't be?)? Or do you keep swinging for 6 because I can foresee many chump blockers and 6 damage not being enough?
2. How do you do the Thopter Engineer infinite Thopters to swing with Haste? (too lazy to use my brain )
pretty much chump block with it, if you have nothing else to do with it.
Crack Protean Hulk -> Grab Seer and Body Double. Body Copies Hulk.
Crack Body/Hulk -> Fetch Seer and Body Double. Body Copies Hulk.
Crack Body/Hulk -> Grab Seer and Revelark.
Crack Revelark -> Bring back 2 Body Double. One Body Copies Hulk, One Body Copies Revelark.
Sac Body/Hulk -> Grab Grave Titan. get Zombie Tokens. Sac Titan.
Sac Body/Revelark -> Bring back Body and Revelark. Body Copies Titan and makes 2 tokens. Sac Body/Titan
Sac Revelark -> Bring back 2 Body Double. 1 copies Grave Titan and makes tokens, another copies Revelark.
From here you can keep looping this for infinite tokens. You can also use this loop, to keep looping Hulk copies and bring out every creature in the deck
This can be very useful against Leyline, or if Mogg Fanatic gets exiled somehow. The opponent gets 1 turn before you can swing, but you have infinite ground blockers, and some Revelarks to block with. As long as there is a Revelark, or Revelark copy out, the whole thing is immune to sweepers as well. So wait a turn, block what you have to, and swing in for the win.
in my list i replaced engineer with Kalastria Healer since it avoids combat step and serves the same purpose as engineer. I kind of like keeping titan around for those games where the combo is derailed.
you would want to use the cutthroat instead, since it is a dies trigger, no sense and opening yourself up to torpor orb, i know it is not very likely people will board it in, but i have seen it on multiple occasions
This would also be a strike against venser. I hadn't thought of that.
You can afford to mull aggressively. A mull to 4 or 5 can win on turn 3 relatively easily, even through countermagic if you're lucky. Ideally, your hand will have a combo piece (or both) some land, and some draw/dig spells. 1-landers are keepable if you have a couple of 1 mana dig spells. Better hands might have 2 lands in them, along with some dig.
For funsies, let's draw a few sample hands from Zac Elsik's GP list, since it's a good baseline. We'll assume it's game 1 and you don't know what you're up against to make things easier.
Hand 2: Pact of Negation, Pact of Negation, Izzet Charm, Polluted Delta, Sleight of Hand, Viscera Seer, Island
It's not terrible but I think I'd mull. It's a bit hard to put into words why this seems sketchy to me. It has some dig power and some interaction, but no combo piece, and the seer and the pacts are basically dead card early on. Seer can chump block but I don't think that's good enough. Other's may disagree about this hand.
Hand 4: Polluted Delta, Pact of Negation, Viscera Seer, Reveillark, Simian Spirit Guide, Faithless Looting, Protean Hulk
This is a bit sketchy but I might keep it. Turn 1 Faithless Looting with a Hulk in hand to get rid of is pretty good. Slim chance of a turn 2 kill with Pact up. If you blank off the Looting it might be sketchy but I'm a gambling man so I'd keep. The reason I'd keep this but throw Hand 2 back is the potential speed, and the fact that one of the combo pieces is in position.
Everyone else, please chime in. I don't claim to be an expert.
I think you pretty much covered it. I basically want to see one of the follow combinations:
1) Hulk + Footsteps + 2-3 land - Pretty much the ideal start and probably a snap keep depending on the deck you are up against. If you have discard on top of this, even better with the only other improvement being protection from Path to Exile and/or acceleration.
2) Hulk + Footsteps/Makeshift + 1 land + Faithless Looting/Serum Visions - Obviously the land should be able to cast the dig spell in hand. If it can't I would still almost consider keeping it depending on the opponent and what else is in the hand. The logic behind this is that we have much more land in the deck than we do Hulks or footsteps so I'd rather be looking for land than for either of those. If your land is off color and you have a Makeshift instead of a footsteps then you might want to consider mulling.
3) Hulk + Dig spells + enough land to cast the dig - Considering hulk is close to the most important card but is the card we have the least of, having it in opening hand is pretty good as long as we have enough dig to find either footsteps or more dig. He is the hardest thing in the deck to find.
4) Footsteps/Makeshift + Dig + Plenty of land - This isn't as good as having the Hulk but it is the next best thing.
5) Lots of dig (visions/taigam's) + land to cast + disruption - If you have some crazy dig going then you can probably try to run with it but make sure it is good. Keep in mind that Faithless Looting and Izzet Charm only go 2 cards deep. To keep an opening seven with only dig and land, I would want at least some 3 card combination of Taigam's Scheming and Serum Visions (I'd like to be able to go 10 deep by turn 3).
6) Body Double + Reveillark + Visera Seer + Mogg + Land + Dig - This one is possibly keep able vs slower decks since they probably won't be expecting the natural combo but only in a version running a few slaughter pacts. I probably wouldnt keep it without dig to find a kill spell. Overall it is a bit of a sketchy keep but possible in the right scenarios.
I would probably mull down to at least 5 looking for 1-5 or in certain cases 6. After that I would probably be a little bit less picky. There are obviously certain scenarios where I would keep something completely different such as if I had (Slaughter Pact, Izzet Charm, Izzet Charm, Faithless Looting, 3x Land) vs infect.
Most important non-land cards to see, ranked:
1)Hulk
2)Footsteps
3)Makeshift
4)Taigam's Scheming
5)Serum Visions/Faithless Looting (Serum is faster but looting allows discard and is reuse-able)
6)Izzet Charm(Higher vs some decks) / Anti Hate
7)Pact of Negation/Slaughter Pact/Lightning Axe
"I'm hard pressed to figure out a reason the Hulk Combo deck is better than Grishoalbrand, which plays pretty much the same game, except it doesn't have to play Taigam's Scheming, which may be the worst card I've ever seen in a Modern list"
saffron olive
Its funny how people hate this card so much. I can understand that they see it as "pure card disadvantage" in a non graveyard based deck. In a graveyard deck however, it allows you to virtually draw any graveyard cast-able cards from the top 5 and then scry the remainder...
To be fair it really only has a home in this deck. Bit it's one of the best dig spells in the deck. And it's utility against discard is not to be underestimated.
To be fair it really only has a home in this deck. Bit it's one of the best dig spells in the deck. And it's utility against discard is not to be underestimated.
I think it could do work in a modern dredge deck or a loam deck. Biggest problem being that most graveyard based decks don't play blue. Anything that gain's a lot of its card advantage from the graveyard could benefit from it. However I would agree that this deck is currently the only competitive build that can make great use of it. Maybe gifts but then they already have gifts itself for advantage and card selection...
It's funny that people get stuck on the fact that Scheming is 'strict card disadvantage' when the same is true of Faithless Looting & people have already recognized that Looting is arguably the best card in Grishoalbrand, this deck, and pretty much any deck that runs it (dredgevine, etc).
Before I started playing with it I was pretty skeptical of Scheming too though, on paper it seems pretty bad. In practice though, digging 5 cards deep just adds so much consistency; you have to see it to believe it.
Buy playset of protean hulk and footsteps of the goryo a week prior to try the deck out.
Flimsy, easily disrupted, whiffs often, etc.
Well I just wasted 6$...
Modern GP showcases this, this thread happens, prices spike 5$!!
JACKPOT!
Sell your stuff while you still can, it's a gimmick.
"I'm hard pressed to figure out a reason the Hulk Combo deck is better than Grishoalbrand, which plays pretty much the same game, except it doesn't have to play Taigam's Scheming, which may be the worst card I've ever seen in a Modern list"
saffron olive
Lol..
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Not just the Tendo King, the power of the Galactic Leyline surpasses that of the Tempa Emperor, No!, It's magnificent power is even greater than that!
I wouldn't call it a gimmick, but I also don't think this is going to be a tier 1 deck anytime soon, in its current configuration.
I'm a combo player at heart, and the core idea of Hulk combo has always intrigued me, and I've run it a few time before (the last time being about 5-6 months ago), and with the current noise I pulled it back out and ran it through a couple of FNMs.
Setting the Stage
My local meta is reasonably competitive (Mox Boarding House, in the Seattle area), and we've got a pretty good mix of deck types and the crowd is usually between 35 and 50 people for FNM and a smaller crowd of 15-30 for Thursday night modern, with a fixed 4 round format, with payout by record. I ran the deck for a few weeks, and all told I think I played around 15 matches with the deck.
Additionally, as with all combo decks, I tend to keep my cards on my desk and goldfish while I'm waiting for things to happen. I've probably goldfished a couple hundred hands by this point.
My experiences were not been all that great. It can win games. It can even win matches. But I've found it very inconsistent overall, even compared to decks like Goryo's with Shoals.
Deck Upsides
The pros of the deck seem very nice on paper.
The fact that it almost never fizzles once there's a hulk in play is a huge bonus compared to Grishoalbrand and similar. I think I failed to go off successfully twice in all my games, once through operator error (I sequenced triggers wrong in one of my first games back on the deck), and once through a having to run out a hulk into open white mana facing lethal on board and he did, in fact, have the Path. That's definitely better than my fizzle rate with Grishoalbrand, which is probably closer to 10-15%.
The fact that it can win at instant speed is great. It never came up, but the fact that you can win with a pact trigger on the stack let me be fairly aggressive with those, unlike many combo decks, where not being able to pay for pact is actually just game over.
Deck velocity is also fantastic; I routinely had seen a full 1/3rd to half my deck by turn 4 or five. Taigam's Scheming is not a card for most decks, but here it's extremely good. Basically an Ancient Stirrings with even more upsides. Enough so that I actually am considering a Grixis build of Goryo's with Scheming as a way to dump reanimation targets in the bin.
Mana was very easy to deal with. Not needing black mana until turn 3 or 4, I think I averaged about one game in about 20 that I had any mana issues at all, which is honestly better than most decks. The sheer amount of dig and looting helps make sure you get exactly enough.
The deck is nicely resilient to non-grave oriented hate. Hand disruption and even counterspells don't go that far with the amount of dig power and resiliency. I had no issues finding reanimation spells. I chose to run a 3rd Mannequin over a 4th Izzet Charm, and had maybe one game where I had everything else and failed to find a reanimation spell. Even being thoughtseized and countered rarely put me off more than a turn or two.
Unlike Grishoalbrand, this deck does not need a decent life total when going off. As long as you're not dead, the combo is going to succeed, and being at 1 life makes no difference than being at 20 as to your success rate.
Deck Downsides
However, it's clearly not all upsides, or everyone would be playing it.
First, the deck is very reliant on a few pieces. If it doesn't see a hulk, the chances to assemble the combo manually are abysmally low. I had probably a good half dozen games where by random chance, I simply didn't see any Hulks after multiple schemings, visions, lootings, and charms. With 2 each Body Doubles and Reveilarks, those aren't too hard to find, but with only 1 Mogg Fanatic, you can very easily dig for turns on end and not find it.
Another downside is that while resistant to non-graveyard hate, it's basically completely cold to persistent grave hate. You can fight through crypts and bogs and usually even Relics, but Grafdigger's Cage, Leyline of the Void and Rest In Peace require that you draw into your one or two of sideboard hate cards like Echoing Truth, or be lucky enough to be able to Swan Song or Steel Sabotage it on the way down, and only then can you start actually setting up your combo. And if they can win a counter fight over your answer? You're just done. Grave Titan beats are about your only plan B, and that's really more like plan F (and this, in fact, is one reason to keep Grave Titan over Thopter Engineer or Venser, as neither of those are going to win you a game if your combo is shut off by grave hate you can't remove)
Likewise, if they've got a Slaughter Games or Surgical and can hit Hulk, the game is almost certainly done. An extract effect on Body Double or Reveilark is usually game over, too.
Once your opponents know what's up, the deck is pretty easy to hate out.
Despite the compactness of the core combo, it doesn't have a ton of interaction either. Prior to going off, maybe 1 Lightning Axe if you're running it main and the Izzet Charms. Some of the linear aggro decks can easily match this combo for speed against a goldfish (which this deck basically is). Yeah, extremely rarely the deck gets the god hands that kill on T1. It can get T2 kills every so often (I think I had maybe 2 over about 35 games). T3 Hulk kills are pretty common. But infect, burn, and affinity can all kill on T3, too.
Some of the more common combo decks can also match it in speed. Bloom Titan and Grishoalbrand can kill Hulk on T2 more often than Hulk will kill them on the same, and probably have similar T3 kill rates, and they have at least some degree more interaction (Titan has lands which gain life, make blockers, etc, Grishoalbrand can gain 11 or more life at instant speed and some builds pack hand disruption). Storm is probably a half turn slower, and not much more interactive, but can win through some amount of grave hate.
Conclusion
All in all, my recent experience pretty much proved what I'd found during my previous outings with the deck. Taigam's Scheming is an improvement to the deck, but despite that, the reliance on Hulk to get things going and the graveyard to combo makes this deck more inconsistent and easier to hate out than many of the other top pure combo decks already in the format. Its advantages just don't balance out the problems with assembling the combo that has only 4 primary starter pieces. Barring the banning of cards out of either Bloom Titan or Grishoalbrand, I'd be unlikely to take Hulk Footsteps combo to any sort of event beyond an FNM.
Yeah I watched that and it was painful. There really wasn't much he could do against a draw like that. I did see that there was a hulk combo deck listed in the day 2 meta breakdown and I was wondering who it was and what their list was like.
For funsies, let's draw a few sample hands from Zac Elsik's GP list, since it's a good baseline. We'll assume it's game 1 and you don't know what you're up against to make things easier.
Hand 1: Simian Spirit Guide, Sleight of Hand, Blood Crypt, Protean Hulk, Faithless Looting, Reveillark, Gemstone Mine
It's not ideal, but it's good enough and represents a possible turn 2, if Turn 1 Faithless looting draws a Footsteps. If it doesn't it, has enough digging power to find some more action.
Hand 2: Pact of Negation, Pact of Negation, Izzet Charm, Polluted Delta, Sleight of Hand, Viscera Seer, Island
It's not terrible but I think I'd mull. It's a bit hard to put into words why this seems sketchy to me. It has some dig power and some interaction, but no combo piece, and the seer and the pacts are basically dead card early on. Seer can chump block but I don't think that's good enough. Other's may disagree about this hand.
Hand 3: Protean Hulk, Simian Spirit Guide and 5 lands.
This one is pretty obviously trash. Trash it.
Hand 4: Polluted Delta, Pact of Negation, Viscera Seer, Reveillark, Simian Spirit Guide, Faithless Looting, Protean Hulk
This is a bit sketchy but I might keep it. Turn 1 Faithless Looting with a Hulk in hand to get rid of is pretty good. Slim chance of a turn 2 kill with Pact up. If you blank off the Looting it might be sketchy but I'm a gambling man so I'd keep. The reason I'd keep this but throw Hand 2 back is the potential speed, and the fact that one of the combo pieces is in position.
Everyone else, please chime in. I don't claim to be an expert.
But now I'm back and here are my 2 questions.
1. If I Makeshift Mannequin the Hulk, how do I get it to die so I can go off? Is it usually done with our own Izzet Charm or Lightning Axe or is it usually a mistake by the opponent (it can't be?)? Or do you keep swinging for 6 because I can foresee many chump blockers and 6 damage not being enough?
2. How do you do the Thopter Engineer infinite Thopters to swing with Haste? (too lazy to use my brain
Premodern - Trix, RecSur, Enchantress, Reanimator, Elves https://www.facebook.com/groups/PremodernUSA/
Modern - Neobrand, Hogaak Vine, Elves
Standard - Mono Red (6-2 and 5-3 in 2 McQ)
Draft - (I wish I had more time for limited...)
Commander -
Norin the Wary, Grimgrin, Adun Oakenshield (taking forever to build)(dead format for me)pretty much chump block with it, if you have nothing else to do with it.
same as this, but replace titan with thopter engineer
in my list i replaced engineer with Kalastria Healer since it avoids combat step and serves the same purpose as engineer. I kind of like keeping titan around for those games where the combo is derailed.
This would also be a strike against venser. I hadn't thought of that.
I think you pretty much covered it. I basically want to see one of the follow combinations:
1) Hulk + Footsteps + 2-3 land - Pretty much the ideal start and probably a snap keep depending on the deck you are up against. If you have discard on top of this, even better with the only other improvement being protection from Path to Exile and/or acceleration.
2) Hulk + Footsteps/Makeshift + 1 land + Faithless Looting/Serum Visions - Obviously the land should be able to cast the dig spell in hand. If it can't I would still almost consider keeping it depending on the opponent and what else is in the hand. The logic behind this is that we have much more land in the deck than we do Hulks or footsteps so I'd rather be looking for land than for either of those. If your land is off color and you have a Makeshift instead of a footsteps then you might want to consider mulling.
3) Hulk + Dig spells + enough land to cast the dig - Considering hulk is close to the most important card but is the card we have the least of, having it in opening hand is pretty good as long as we have enough dig to find either footsteps or more dig. He is the hardest thing in the deck to find.
4) Footsteps/Makeshift + Dig + Plenty of land - This isn't as good as having the Hulk but it is the next best thing.
5) Lots of dig (visions/taigam's) + land to cast + disruption - If you have some crazy dig going then you can probably try to run with it but make sure it is good. Keep in mind that Faithless Looting and Izzet Charm only go 2 cards deep. To keep an opening seven with only dig and land, I would want at least some 3 card combination of Taigam's Scheming and Serum Visions (I'd like to be able to go 10 deep by turn 3).
6) Body Double + Reveillark + Visera Seer + Mogg + Land + Dig - This one is possibly keep able vs slower decks since they probably won't be expecting the natural combo but only in a version running a few slaughter pacts. I probably wouldnt keep it without dig to find a kill spell. Overall it is a bit of a sketchy keep but possible in the right scenarios.
I would probably mull down to at least 5 looking for 1-5 or in certain cases 6. After that I would probably be a little bit less picky. There are obviously certain scenarios where I would keep something completely different such as if I had (Slaughter Pact, Izzet Charm, Izzet Charm, Faithless Looting, 3x Land) vs infect.
Most important non-land cards to see, ranked:
1)Hulk
2)Footsteps
3)Makeshift
4)Taigam's Scheming
5)Serum Visions/Faithless Looting (Serum is faster but looting allows discard and is reuse-able)
6)Izzet Charm(Higher vs some decks) / Anti Hate
7)Pact of Negation/Slaughter Pact/Lightning Axe
Its funny how people hate this card so much. I can understand that they see it as "pure card disadvantage" in a non graveyard based deck. In a graveyard deck however, it allows you to virtually draw any graveyard cast-able cards from the top 5 and then scry the remainder...
I think it could do work in a modern dredge deck or a loam deck. Biggest problem being that most graveyard based decks don't play blue. Anything that gain's a lot of its card advantage from the graveyard could benefit from it. However I would agree that this deck is currently the only competitive build that can make great use of it. Maybe gifts but then they already have gifts itself for advantage and card selection...
Before I started playing with it I was pretty skeptical of Scheming too though, on paper it seems pretty bad. In practice though, digging 5 cards deep just adds so much consistency; you have to see it to believe it.
Flimsy, easily disrupted, whiffs often, etc.
Well I just wasted 6$...
Modern GP showcases this, this thread happens, prices spike 5$!!
JACKPOT!
Sell your stuff while you still can, it's a gimmick.
RETIRED - GAME SUCKS
Modern:
UUUMerfolksUUU
RGoblinsR
Ad Nauseam
BR 8 Racks RB
WUB Mill BUW
Legacy:
XOps! All splels! X
What I think of MaRo
Lol..
I'm a combo player at heart, and the core idea of Hulk combo has always intrigued me, and I've run it a few time before (the last time being about 5-6 months ago), and with the current noise I pulled it back out and ran it through a couple of FNMs.
Setting the Stage
My local meta is reasonably competitive (Mox Boarding House, in the Seattle area), and we've got a pretty good mix of deck types and the crowd is usually between 35 and 50 people for FNM and a smaller crowd of 15-30 for Thursday night modern, with a fixed 4 round format, with payout by record. I ran the deck for a few weeks, and all told I think I played around 15 matches with the deck.
Additionally, as with all combo decks, I tend to keep my cards on my desk and goldfish while I'm waiting for things to happen. I've probably goldfished a couple hundred hands by this point.
My experiences were not been all that great. It can win games. It can even win matches. But I've found it very inconsistent overall, even compared to decks like Goryo's with Shoals.
Deck Upsides
The pros of the deck seem very nice on paper.
The fact that it almost never fizzles once there's a hulk in play is a huge bonus compared to Grishoalbrand and similar. I think I failed to go off successfully twice in all my games, once through operator error (I sequenced triggers wrong in one of my first games back on the deck), and once through a having to run out a hulk into open white mana facing lethal on board and he did, in fact, have the Path. That's definitely better than my fizzle rate with Grishoalbrand, which is probably closer to 10-15%.
The fact that it can win at instant speed is great. It never came up, but the fact that you can win with a pact trigger on the stack let me be fairly aggressive with those, unlike many combo decks, where not being able to pay for pact is actually just game over.
Deck velocity is also fantastic; I routinely had seen a full 1/3rd to half my deck by turn 4 or five. Taigam's Scheming is not a card for most decks, but here it's extremely good. Basically an Ancient Stirrings with even more upsides. Enough so that I actually am considering a Grixis build of Goryo's with Scheming as a way to dump reanimation targets in the bin.
Mana was very easy to deal with. Not needing black mana until turn 3 or 4, I think I averaged about one game in about 20 that I had any mana issues at all, which is honestly better than most decks. The sheer amount of dig and looting helps make sure you get exactly enough.
The deck is nicely resilient to non-grave oriented hate. Hand disruption and even counterspells don't go that far with the amount of dig power and resiliency. I had no issues finding reanimation spells. I chose to run a 3rd Mannequin over a 4th Izzet Charm, and had maybe one game where I had everything else and failed to find a reanimation spell. Even being thoughtseized and countered rarely put me off more than a turn or two.
Unlike Grishoalbrand, this deck does not need a decent life total when going off. As long as you're not dead, the combo is going to succeed, and being at 1 life makes no difference than being at 20 as to your success rate.
Deck Downsides
However, it's clearly not all upsides, or everyone would be playing it.
First, the deck is very reliant on a few pieces. If it doesn't see a hulk, the chances to assemble the combo manually are abysmally low. I had probably a good half dozen games where by random chance, I simply didn't see any Hulks after multiple schemings, visions, lootings, and charms. With 2 each Body Doubles and Reveilarks, those aren't too hard to find, but with only 1 Mogg Fanatic, you can very easily dig for turns on end and not find it.
Another downside is that while resistant to non-graveyard hate, it's basically completely cold to persistent grave hate. You can fight through crypts and bogs and usually even Relics, but Grafdigger's Cage, Leyline of the Void and Rest In Peace require that you draw into your one or two of sideboard hate cards like Echoing Truth, or be lucky enough to be able to Swan Song or Steel Sabotage it on the way down, and only then can you start actually setting up your combo. And if they can win a counter fight over your answer? You're just done. Grave Titan beats are about your only plan B, and that's really more like plan F (and this, in fact, is one reason to keep Grave Titan over Thopter Engineer or Venser, as neither of those are going to win you a game if your combo is shut off by grave hate you can't remove)
Likewise, if they've got a Slaughter Games or Surgical and can hit Hulk, the game is almost certainly done. An extract effect on Body Double or Reveilark is usually game over, too.
Once your opponents know what's up, the deck is pretty easy to hate out.
Despite the compactness of the core combo, it doesn't have a ton of interaction either. Prior to going off, maybe 1 Lightning Axe if you're running it main and the Izzet Charms. Some of the linear aggro decks can easily match this combo for speed against a goldfish (which this deck basically is). Yeah, extremely rarely the deck gets the god hands that kill on T1. It can get T2 kills every so often (I think I had maybe 2 over about 35 games). T3 Hulk kills are pretty common. But infect, burn, and affinity can all kill on T3, too.
Some of the more common combo decks can also match it in speed. Bloom Titan and Grishoalbrand can kill Hulk on T2 more often than Hulk will kill them on the same, and probably have similar T3 kill rates, and they have at least some degree more interaction (Titan has lands which gain life, make blockers, etc, Grishoalbrand can gain 11 or more life at instant speed and some builds pack hand disruption). Storm is probably a half turn slower, and not much more interactive, but can win through some amount of grave hate.
Conclusion
All in all, my recent experience pretty much proved what I'd found during my previous outings with the deck. Taigam's Scheming is an improvement to the deck, but despite that, the reliance on Hulk to get things going and the graveyard to combo makes this deck more inconsistent and easier to hate out than many of the other top pure combo decks already in the format. Its advantages just don't balance out the problems with assembling the combo that has only 4 primary starter pieces. Barring the banning of cards out of either Bloom Titan or Grishoalbrand, I'd be unlikely to take Hulk Footsteps combo to any sort of event beyond an FNM.
http://www.mtgsalvation.com/forums/the-game/modern/developing-competitive-modern/649266-bubble-hulk
The mods should be archiving this one soon.