MTG Salvation

Check out the TMD archives for some idea of the crap we used to play back in the day: http://www.archive.themanadrain.com/index.php?PHPSESSID=l5ljt86c3bav1hobubbl6bi0s7&board=24.0. You can also try searching for the old beyond dominia (bdominia) forums, though they appear to be completely lost.

Before the first type 1 world championships at GenCon in 2003, there wasn't much creativity in the format. Keeper was the deck to beat. Basically, if you had the power 9, you played Keeper or something similar. Keeper circa 2002 is my favorite deck of all time, likely because it was the culmination of my years of collecting and scrapping together the pieces. Keeper was an adaptation of "The deck," but it used Morphling as the kill card. Damage used the stack back then, so you could attack with Morphling for 5, stack the damage, then pump his toughness up to 6 to survive a block. The untargetable ability made it possible to run concurrently with the Abyss. You could fly over your own Moat. Morphling was the best creature in Magic. I also played one Masticore to beat up on aggro decks. Keeper was so good that my teammate ran a version of the deck called "Blood Moon Keeper." He ran 4 Islands and a Swamp so he could board Blood Moons in for the Keeper mirror. People called him insane. He won a Black Lotus at a local tournament because his opponent in the finals (also playing Keeper) was too proud to run basic lands. He REFUSED to run basic lands. Those were the days. My team of three made several GenCon top 8s playing Keeper.

Keeper was soon outclassed, though. Patrick Chapin, a little known pro at the time, showed up to GenCon. He played a deck called Miracle Gro, which pumped Quirion Dryad with cheap spells and was more efficient than Keeper. We played until 6 am the next morning and I think Patrick won every game. That was the end of Keeper for me.

The next year, I nearly made top 8 at the first type 1 world championships with U/R Phid. I wish I could find the decklist. That was the first time I saw the Worldgorger Dragon deck. Psychatog was the best deck that day. The early Workshop decks (TNT) were also powerful. There were even decks that combined Chapin's Miracle Gro with Psychatog (Gro-A-Tog). Soon, fetch lands were printed, and this changed vintage forever.

Quote from lyonhaert »

I probably have both Infernal Tribute and Claws of Gix from when I used to run Spine of Ish Sah, but they serve another purpose aside from squeezing out an additional activation of Coffers/Nykthos with Crucible: getting rid of Necropotence if it becomes a liability or if I just want to activate it 20 times and not exile any of it.

A cool tech with Necropotence is that the exile is a trigger, not a replacement effect. What this means is that if you discard something you can put the exile on the stack then reanimate it with Chainer. Its oracle wording is similar to Planar Void rather than Rest in Peace.

Edit: I forgot Necro got reprinted with updated wording. I guess it's not as obscure a detail now.

Nice progress on your iterations, especially that last one. Disciple of Bolas is a good tutor target, even off of transmuting Dimir House Guard (as are a number of other 4 cmc cards in your list). And I usually have fun stealing somebody else's Solemn Simulacrum after they choose it for sacrifice or chump-blocking so they draw a card. Don't be afraid to spend some life and mana just before your turn animating and saccing him more than once or twice if you have the mana open and the life to spare.

At the moment I don't run Sol Ring in anything nor do I run Koko and/or Gary in my Chainer deck, but that just has to do with deckbuilding and piloting challenges I've set for myself. For example, one challenge is to win by combat rather than through leeching effects like the above two or Exsanguinate-style or Falkenrath Noble-style effects.

However, when I did run Sol Ring, a turn 1 Myriad Landscape followed by turn 2 Sol Ring happened more than once and can easily mean the game.

Regarding the comments on redundancy, there's an equilibrium to be struck between complementary effects, backups for important effects, and still having a wide assortment of answers. For example, the list I based mine off of ran Strands of Night, but because I'm trying to not depend on looping ETB effects as much I replaced it with Phyrexian Reclamation as an effect that is complementary to Chainer's -- as it does something slightly different -- rather than a backup. I have more options if they're both on the field. But that's my approach.

Some other card-specific commentary (that you've speculated on, added, or removed):

• Phyrexian Tower is definitely a nice card, but was hard to find anyway nevermind it being pricey.
• Songs of the Damned really depends on how many creatures you end up with in your graveyard typically. It usually wouldn't be much more than a Dark Ritual or two for me. Instead I'm trying out Bubbling Muck.
• Armillary Sphere is not ramp as the lands go to hand. Without an effect letting you land more than one per turn, you might as well have card draw to ensure you hit your land per turn as well as get other goodies. For ramp, I've found rocks to be decent support in Chainer. I do also run big mana effects like Crypt Ghast. That's one you might want redundancy for such as Caged Sun (I use Nirkana Revenant instead, but it's pricey and was harder to find).
• Phyrexian Altar works pretty good with any creature that creates at least two tokens when it enters. So it combos with Grave Titan and Blood Artist/Falkenrath Noble/Zulaport Cutthroat and Chainer's activated ability
• Infernal Tribute is a good inclusion. Claws of Gix is a similar sort of insurance policy for getting rid of a permanent that's become a liability (which Necropotence can sometimes become).
• Drana seems a bit out of place here.
• Sadistic Hypnotist, while a free sac outlet, has restricted timing on its activation, so I use other discards effects like Mindslicer, which makes a good rattlesnake.
• Altar of Dementia is not wrong to want. If there are big creatures in graveyards it can be an alternate wincon on its own or a way to dig in your own library for an answer.
• Expedition Map is a fine inclusion for now. You don't have much in the way of tutors and Coffers is important to find.

Some cards I run and my results with them:

• Noxious Gearhulk has been ridiculous. I probably use this guy too often, but it easily offsets the life cost of Chainer's activated ability while controlling the board.
• Some sort of graveyard hate can actually be important if you're facing off against another reanimation deck. Except Meren and the like. I had a game where myself and two friends put commander cards facedown and each chose a random one of the opponent to the right. The result was Chainer (me) vs Meren vs The Mimeoplasm. It did not go well for them.
• Graveborn Muse is Phyrexian Arena #3.
• Xiahou Dun, the One-Eyed is pricey (judge's foil less so) but really useful, especially with a free sac outlet and Living Death.
• Kagemaro, First to Suffer plays well in a couple of ways with Disciple of Bolas.
• Darkness is a little pricey, but a black fog tends to surprise people.
• Withering Boon black counterspells tend to surprise people, too.
• Skullclamp with all the stuff dying, why not?
• Fallen Ideal has actually been a really handy free sac outlet. It returns to hand more often than not, and is often pretty useful just on Chainer himself.
• Buried Ruin might be worth the slot to repeat Wayfarer's Bauble or Expedition Map.
• Terrain Generator is surprisingly good with enough card draw.
• Homeward Path is useful partially for meta reasons and partially for the occasional interesting politics/shenanigans with Chainer's first and third abilities. "Here, have this back, but it's a Nightmare and I can exile it."