Post by Ixos 2: the Sequel on Dec 29, 2013 17:38:53 GMT -6
So skaro talked me into going to a Vintage tournament on Jan 11. Before this, I'd actually been wanting to put a Legacy combo deck together, something cheap but effective that I could keep together for the random occasions I might need it (so it can't use cards I would want for EDH). I'm not normally a combo guy, but lately I've been wanting more and more to try out some combo action. I found a budget Legacy deck called Boo Berry that looks pretty fun, and meets the prereqs for what I was looking for (cheap Legacy combo that doesn't use a lot of cards I want to use for EDH). This MtGSal thread talks about the deck: forums.mtgsalvation.com/showthread.php?t=442634 (Two different versions: Basalt Monolith/Mesmeric Orb and Cephalid Illusionist/Shuko, but I think the latter is called Cephalid Breakfast.)
Now, what does this have to do with this Vintage tournament skaro wants me to go to? Glad you asked! I was just going to use the Boo Berry list for the tournament, but skaro reminded me that Vintage has a restricted list. Dang! Luckily, we can do the same thing (sort of) in Vintage, and it's just a one card combo. BWAH?! you say? Well, yeah, Hermit Druid is kind of a one card combo. Sorta. Almost.
My deck will be based on the list here: forums.mtgsalvation.com/showthread.php?t=442155
Here's that list, in case you don't want to read the thread:
4x Hermit Druid
4x Narcomoeba
1x Angel of Glory’s Rise
1x Azami, Lady of Scrolls
4x Green Sun’s Zenith (no have, so prolly replace with Worldly Tutor)
4x Cabal Therapy
1x Demonic Tutor
1x Imperial Seal (no have)
1x Dread Return
1x Time Walk (no have)
1x Ponder
4x Force of Will
4x Misdirection (have 2?)
4x Daze
1x Ancestral Recall (no have)
1x Brainstorm (restricted!?)
1x Mystical Tutor
1x Vampiric Tutor
1x Bayou
1x Underground Sea
3x Tropical Island
3x Misty Rainforest (no have)
4x Verdant Catacombs (no have)
1x Mana Crypt (why?) (oh, for turn one GSZ)
5x Moxies (no have)
1x Black Lotus (no have)
1x Lotus Petal
Now, since I’m missing a lot of that stuff, I will likely need to run more land and the moxes I do have (diamond and a chrome [not sure I have one]), also Elvish Spirit Guide. Pretty sure I want Mental Misstep in there too. I also do not have the designated fetch lands, so might have to use what I do have (UB and UW). I also only have a couple Misdirection, I think. Boo Berry runs 2x Dread Return, I think (in some configurations, at least), and many use Phantasmagorian, but Cabal Therapy should take care of that card's role.
Before I get to my (tentative) list, you might be wondering what's going on here. What is the basic idea behind the deck? Play Hermit Druid as early as possible and tap him next turn to win. In between playing him and tapping him, protect him (and keep bad guy from winning). The win is:
1. Tap Hermit Druid to mill deck
2. 4x Narcomoeba should be in the yard, so they come back into play
3. Pay flashback on Dread Return (sac 3 critters) to return Angel of Glory’s Rise to play
4. Angel brings back all humans (Laboratory Maniac and Azami, specifically, but also Hermit Druids, incidentally)
5. Tap Azami or Maniac to draw – no cards in library, so Maniac says I win!
5a. Tap Maniac or Azami in response to removal on the other one, if needed
In a perfect world (with my deck), this will happen regularly on turn 3. Sometimes turn 2. And I will hopefully be able to protect the win with counter magic.
For my list:
4x Hermit Druid
4x Narcomoeba
1x Angel of Glory’s Rise
1x Azami, Lady of Scrolls
4x Green Sun’s Zenith (or likely 4x Worldly Tutor)
4x Cabal Therapy
1x Demonic Tutor
1x Imperial Seal (no have)
1x Dread Return
1x Ponder
4x Force of Will
2x Misdirection
4x Mental Misstep (replaces 2x Misdirection, Ancestral Recall, and Time Walk)
4x Daze
1x Brainstorm
1x Mystical Tutor
1x Vampiric Tutor
1x Bayou
1x Underground Sea
4x Tropical Island (add one to replace 1x fetch I don’t have in above list)
6x U/B/W fetches (replaces 6x fetches I don’t have in above list)
1x Mana Crypt (if running GSZ)
4x Elvish Spirit Guide (replaces 4x moxes)
2x Mox Diamond (replaces Lotus and 5th mox)
1x Lotus Petal
Most of the non-power cards I’m missing are pretty cheap (besides the fetches, but I’ll replace those with alternates). Unfortunately, I can’t find my 4x Elvish Spirit Guides, dang it! Looked everywhere I have green cards together, so I assume they are hanging out in another color’s area. I know I own them, just have to find them. I was also pretty sure I had a Chrome Mox, but I can't find it if I do.
Obviously the list is very rough (I still list Imperial Seal, which I most assuredly do not have!). I haven't put it together or goldfished it or anything, so I don't know if this is anything close to what it needs to look like. I'm pretty unhappy with the listed mana base - only 12 real lands (half of which are fetches, for cripes sakes!). I will likely need to heavily tweak that - prolly go with some number of Breeding Pools and maybe another Underground Sea (or two).
I can probably go down to 2x Daze, or 3x each of Daze and Mental Misstep. That still leaves 12 counters, I would assume that's enough, but I'm not sure. Whatever I take out of the main deck could go in the sideboard I guess, just in case I find myself wanting more.
There are lots of tutors (I count 7 after I take out Imperial Seal and don't count the fetches), but I would like to squeeze in some more card draw. Nothing is going to replace Ancestral or Time Walk, but maybe I can fake it somehow? Maybe something cheap and blue (or something cheap and black) that could draw a couple random cards. Or maybe I don't need additional card draw. I mean, with 12+ counters, I would assume I'm likely to have 1 or 2 to protect the Druid until I can go off. Unfortunately, both FoW and Misdirection require me to discard a blue card to play them; I can see myself being blue card hungry if I need to counter more than one thing. (Hmm, that's something else I didn't think about; are there enough blue cards in the deck to support 6x "pitch a blue card to cast this" counters? I guess we'll see. Would be nice if I had some Pact of Negation, though.)
I was thinking about running a Living Wish package instead of either GSZ or Worldly Tutor. With the Tutor, I will have to wait to draw the Druid, but with Wish it comes to hand. Would be much easier to get the Druid out by turn 2 with the Tutor, not as easy with the Wish (Spirit Guides and Petal are both one-shots, and Wish costs 2). So I'm thinking Tutor would be the way to go here. With the limitations of my manabase, I doubt I'd regularly get GSZ to fetch a Druid up on turn 1, so I think the Tutor is the way to go for this deck. (If I power, on the other hand, GSZ would be the clear winner!) Then again, if I can come up with a good Wish package, that might change. I have no idea what to do with a sideboard, though, so I'll just shelve the Living Wish action for now (I would like to play with it, since I don't think I've ever cast one for real).
Speaking of the sideboard, well like I said, I have no idea. I like the idea of a transformational sideboard, but the only thing I can think of is some kind of Oath of Druids thing, and unfortunately, my Worldly Tutors would do absolutely nothing to help that. Or maybe a Show and Tell package? I don't have much to tutor up Show and Tell, but the Worldly Tutors could find me a big nasty to cheat out. Unfortunately, I don't have the biggest nasties that the cool kids like to use (Emrakul and Griselbrand), and both the Oath and SnT versions would use those guys.
So I guess I'll have to go with stuff that will help me go off against specific decks/themes. Maybe some anti-graveyard cards (Dredge is a thing), Pithing Needles, and Hydroblast/BEBs? Boseiju Who Shelters all might help a little, and I wish I had that land that does the same thing for creatures (can't remember the name, but it's pretty new). Maybe some bounce type stuff? Unfortunately, Emrakul has protection from colors, so that won't work on him (and he's a thing, from what I understand). I have no idea what the metagame will look like (I have no idea what any metagame looks like, honestly), so I guess I'll need to do some research into what's likely to show up. I assume it will be mostly unpowered (except for skaro), so should I expect Burn? I would think that Dredge and reanimator type decks might be big as they seem decent without power. I would also expect blue-based control type stuff, so maybe I should run some things that can deal with enemy FoWs. I don't think anything else would be fast enough to stop me (well, graveyard hate and Pithing Needle come immediately to mind...). Hmm, Storm might be a thing; it seems like it would be decent to great in an unpowered environment (and really good in a powered one!). I have a single lonely Flusterstorm, so that might be the only weapon I have against Storm. And other than that, I have no idea how to play against Storm. Do I just accept the fact that I might be weak against that deck and hope I either don't face it or get lucky? Eh, we'll see.
Anyway, I still have a couple weeks to get this bad boy together and finalized. Between now and then, what do you think? Does the deck look good? Bad? Ugly? Any ideas about a sideboard? Anything that the maindeck should change?
EDIT: Just realized I neglected to list Laboratory Maniac in either list. He's in there, somewhere...
Now, what does this have to do with this Vintage tournament skaro wants me to go to? Glad you asked! I was just going to use the Boo Berry list for the tournament, but skaro reminded me that Vintage has a restricted list. Dang! Luckily, we can do the same thing (sort of) in Vintage, and it's just a one card combo. BWAH?! you say? Well, yeah, Hermit Druid is kind of a one card combo. Sorta. Almost.
My deck will be based on the list here: forums.mtgsalvation.com/showthread.php?t=442155
Here's that list, in case you don't want to read the thread:
4x Hermit Druid
4x Narcomoeba
1x Angel of Glory’s Rise
1x Azami, Lady of Scrolls
4x Green Sun’s Zenith (no have, so prolly replace with Worldly Tutor)
4x Cabal Therapy
1x Demonic Tutor
1x Imperial Seal (no have)
1x Dread Return
1x Time Walk (no have)
1x Ponder
4x Force of Will
4x Misdirection (have 2?)
4x Daze
1x Ancestral Recall (no have)
1x Brainstorm (restricted!?)
1x Mystical Tutor
1x Vampiric Tutor
1x Bayou
1x Underground Sea
3x Tropical Island
3x Misty Rainforest (no have)
4x Verdant Catacombs (no have)
1x Mana Crypt (why?) (oh, for turn one GSZ)
5x Moxies (no have)
1x Black Lotus (no have)
1x Lotus Petal
Now, since I’m missing a lot of that stuff, I will likely need to run more land and the moxes I do have (diamond and a chrome [not sure I have one]), also Elvish Spirit Guide. Pretty sure I want Mental Misstep in there too. I also do not have the designated fetch lands, so might have to use what I do have (UB and UW). I also only have a couple Misdirection, I think. Boo Berry runs 2x Dread Return, I think (in some configurations, at least), and many use Phantasmagorian, but Cabal Therapy should take care of that card's role.
Before I get to my (tentative) list, you might be wondering what's going on here. What is the basic idea behind the deck? Play Hermit Druid as early as possible and tap him next turn to win. In between playing him and tapping him, protect him (and keep bad guy from winning). The win is:
1. Tap Hermit Druid to mill deck
2. 4x Narcomoeba should be in the yard, so they come back into play
3. Pay flashback on Dread Return (sac 3 critters) to return Angel of Glory’s Rise to play
4. Angel brings back all humans (Laboratory Maniac and Azami, specifically, but also Hermit Druids, incidentally)
5. Tap Azami or Maniac to draw – no cards in library, so Maniac says I win!
5a. Tap Maniac or Azami in response to removal on the other one, if needed
In a perfect world (with my deck), this will happen regularly on turn 3. Sometimes turn 2. And I will hopefully be able to protect the win with counter magic.
For my list:
4x Hermit Druid
4x Narcomoeba
1x Angel of Glory’s Rise
1x Azami, Lady of Scrolls
4x Green Sun’s Zenith (or likely 4x Worldly Tutor)
4x Cabal Therapy
1x Demonic Tutor
1x Imperial Seal (no have)
1x Dread Return
1x Ponder
4x Force of Will
2x Misdirection
4x Mental Misstep (replaces 2x Misdirection, Ancestral Recall, and Time Walk)
4x Daze
1x Brainstorm
1x Mystical Tutor
1x Vampiric Tutor
1x Bayou
1x Underground Sea
4x Tropical Island (add one to replace 1x fetch I don’t have in above list)
6x U/B/W fetches (replaces 6x fetches I don’t have in above list)
1x Mana Crypt (if running GSZ)
4x Elvish Spirit Guide (replaces 4x moxes)
2x Mox Diamond (replaces Lotus and 5th mox)
1x Lotus Petal
Most of the non-power cards I’m missing are pretty cheap (besides the fetches, but I’ll replace those with alternates). Unfortunately, I can’t find my 4x Elvish Spirit Guides, dang it! Looked everywhere I have green cards together, so I assume they are hanging out in another color’s area. I know I own them, just have to find them. I was also pretty sure I had a Chrome Mox, but I can't find it if I do.
Obviously the list is very rough (I still list Imperial Seal, which I most assuredly do not have!). I haven't put it together or goldfished it or anything, so I don't know if this is anything close to what it needs to look like. I'm pretty unhappy with the listed mana base - only 12 real lands (half of which are fetches, for cripes sakes!). I will likely need to heavily tweak that - prolly go with some number of Breeding Pools and maybe another Underground Sea (or two).
I can probably go down to 2x Daze, or 3x each of Daze and Mental Misstep. That still leaves 12 counters, I would assume that's enough, but I'm not sure. Whatever I take out of the main deck could go in the sideboard I guess, just in case I find myself wanting more.
There are lots of tutors (I count 7 after I take out Imperial Seal and don't count the fetches), but I would like to squeeze in some more card draw. Nothing is going to replace Ancestral or Time Walk, but maybe I can fake it somehow? Maybe something cheap and blue (or something cheap and black) that could draw a couple random cards. Or maybe I don't need additional card draw. I mean, with 12+ counters, I would assume I'm likely to have 1 or 2 to protect the Druid until I can go off. Unfortunately, both FoW and Misdirection require me to discard a blue card to play them; I can see myself being blue card hungry if I need to counter more than one thing. (Hmm, that's something else I didn't think about; are there enough blue cards in the deck to support 6x "pitch a blue card to cast this" counters? I guess we'll see. Would be nice if I had some Pact of Negation, though.)
I was thinking about running a Living Wish package instead of either GSZ or Worldly Tutor. With the Tutor, I will have to wait to draw the Druid, but with Wish it comes to hand. Would be much easier to get the Druid out by turn 2 with the Tutor, not as easy with the Wish (Spirit Guides and Petal are both one-shots, and Wish costs 2). So I'm thinking Tutor would be the way to go here. With the limitations of my manabase, I doubt I'd regularly get GSZ to fetch a Druid up on turn 1, so I think the Tutor is the way to go for this deck. (If I power, on the other hand, GSZ would be the clear winner!) Then again, if I can come up with a good Wish package, that might change. I have no idea what to do with a sideboard, though, so I'll just shelve the Living Wish action for now (I would like to play with it, since I don't think I've ever cast one for real).
Speaking of the sideboard, well like I said, I have no idea. I like the idea of a transformational sideboard, but the only thing I can think of is some kind of Oath of Druids thing, and unfortunately, my Worldly Tutors would do absolutely nothing to help that. Or maybe a Show and Tell package? I don't have much to tutor up Show and Tell, but the Worldly Tutors could find me a big nasty to cheat out. Unfortunately, I don't have the biggest nasties that the cool kids like to use (Emrakul and Griselbrand), and both the Oath and SnT versions would use those guys.
So I guess I'll have to go with stuff that will help me go off against specific decks/themes. Maybe some anti-graveyard cards (Dredge is a thing), Pithing Needles, and Hydroblast/BEBs? Boseiju Who Shelters all might help a little, and I wish I had that land that does the same thing for creatures (can't remember the name, but it's pretty new). Maybe some bounce type stuff? Unfortunately, Emrakul has protection from colors, so that won't work on him (and he's a thing, from what I understand). I have no idea what the metagame will look like (I have no idea what any metagame looks like, honestly), so I guess I'll need to do some research into what's likely to show up. I assume it will be mostly unpowered (except for skaro), so should I expect Burn? I would think that Dredge and reanimator type decks might be big as they seem decent without power. I would also expect blue-based control type stuff, so maybe I should run some things that can deal with enemy FoWs. I don't think anything else would be fast enough to stop me (well, graveyard hate and Pithing Needle come immediately to mind...). Hmm, Storm might be a thing; it seems like it would be decent to great in an unpowered environment (and really good in a powered one!). I have a single lonely Flusterstorm, so that might be the only weapon I have against Storm. And other than that, I have no idea how to play against Storm. Do I just accept the fact that I might be weak against that deck and hope I either don't face it or get lucky? Eh, we'll see.
Anyway, I still have a couple weeks to get this bad boy together and finalized. Between now and then, what do you think? Does the deck look good? Bad? Ugly? Any ideas about a sideboard? Anything that the maindeck should change?
EDIT: Just realized I neglected to list Laboratory Maniac in either list. He's in there, somewhere...