[Deck] Imperial Painter

[Malchar]

Lightning bolts help a lot against stoneforge, delver, and maverick since you can hit their small guys. I think that the matchups are reasonably favorable. Delver has trouble with the large amount of red blasts, and batterskull and knight of the reliquary can both be chump blocked for many turns as you assemble the combo. This deck also has basically the highest possible chance of laying a turn 1 blood moon, which is very good against control/aggro-control decks and some storm decks as well.

The key is that you will always win before they do, so you just have to protect your combo. I rarely want to play a painter if I don't already have red blast for protection. The deck can win in 2 or 3 turns, but this isn't necessary unless you're against another combo deck. Just play carefully and make sure that nothing important ever gets countered or swordsed.

Personally I think that burn, storm, and perhaps zoo are the most troublesome matchups. It usually comes down to racing. Burn is great at killing painters, and storm always has artifact hate in their sideboard. Meanwhile, you can't do much to stop them at all. My current plan is 4x leyline of sanctity plus some amount of chalice of the void to slow them down. Spellskite should probably be in the sideboard (or maindeck), and it will help a lot against burn and zoo.

At least punishing fire doesn't kill painter in one shot.

[ChargedUp]

I have been testing a mono-red version of the deck similar to one that recently placed top sixteen at an SCG event. But, trying out my own sideboard plan. After round 1, if i find that i am playing burn, storm, or zoo. I side out combo cards and other appropriate cards for side into mono-red stax-like build. cards like lodestone golem, chalice of the void, and trinisphere; along with a pair of wurmcoil engine. Testing has proven especially favorable in the aforementioned matchups. looking for thoughts on this plan from everyone. thanks

[Malchar]

The transformational sideboard seems like a good idea. You can use the recruiters to find maguses and welders, which are good in stax (although not so much against burn). You could also get glowrider or magus of the tabernacle if you had a white splash.

[ChargedUp]

like your thoughts but would rather stay mono-red. Would rather use thorn of amethyst over glowrider and tabernacle at pendrell vale over magus of the tabernacle. I realize neither option is tutorable with imperial recruiter but both allow the deck to stay mono-red. Adding these to the other stax cards seems good though. I have found that adding a second color and increasing the number of lands contributes greatly to mana flood even with top in play.

[Vicar in a tutu]

Is R/U "Intuition-painter" better in the current meta? As I mentioned in my post above, I'm considering making Imperial Painter, but it sucks spending hundreds of dollars for a playset of Imperial Recruiters if the Intuition-version is a better deck.

[Malchar]

Is R/U "Intuition-painter" better in the current meta? As I mentioned in my post above, I'm considering making Imperial Painter, but it sucks spending hundreds of dollars for a playset of Imperial Recruiters if the Intuition-version is a better deck.

People say that r/u is better, and it probably looks that way on paper. However, monored is the only version that has made recent top8's (to my knowledge). I think that the combination of dodging graveyard hate, mitigating the damage from wasteland, and having a high chance of a turn 1 moon makes the deck mysteriously powerful, especially in certain metas. I think that if the deck catches on, then the r/u version will get better since it is more well-rounded. In one of the recent Channel Fireball videos, Luis Scott-Vargas commented that he thinks the r/u version is the best (although he also said that the entire archetype isn't very good anyway, but we can ignore that part). I would actually be testing it right now, but I don't have any intuitions.

Getting imperial recruiters is kind of a pain, but it's a very unique and powerful card in its own right. I've also been experimenting with a separate deck using recruiter, stoneforge, and dark confidant. Suffice it to say that the card isn't going out of style any time soon. Hopefully (for me) they won't reprint it, either.

[jvmauck]

Here's a random card that was brought up by some friend of mine. Magnetic Mountain. I have no idea if it would actually be good or not, but it seems ok, especially alongside ensnaring bridge against delver decks without a painter, then with a painter, your opponent is slowed down to a crawl...

What do you guys think?

[slayjay]

I played this deck last weekend and ended up 5-2, 16th place in a 127 man tournament.

I ran a mono red list.

Matchups were:

white weenie 2-0
threshold 2-1
bw aggro 1-2
maverick 0-2
reanimator 2-0
reanimator 2-0
stoneblade 2-1

Overall, I lost nearly every match to jitte! Against maverick, it was awful! Anybody an idea how to improve this matchup?
And I play 1 phyrexian revoker MD and 2 SB, this was still not enough!

[sroncor1]

B/W aggro and any rock style decks are tough. Maverick on the other hand I haven't had any real problems against. Against those decks early moon effects and go for the combo and forget the beat down plan. Pridemages can be tough but you should be able to play around them.

If Jitte is heavily played and giving you problems I suggest Phyrexian Metamorph. It's tutorable and fits jitte the best way possible essentially giving you your own copies of the card or other artifacts you need.

Seth

[DrewliusMaximus]

Overall, I lost nearly every match to jitte! Against maverick, it was awful! Anybody an idea how to improve this matchup?
And I play 1 phyrexian revoker MD and 2 SB, this was still not enough!

Ensnaring Bridge!

[slayjay]

Thanks for the anwers!

I already play a phyrexian metamorph in my sideboard, I like him very much. But it was not enough.
The pridemage is really tough.

Ensnaring bridge is a good idea, but I have no way to tutor it. Maybe I will try the white splash for enlithened tutor.

[sroncor1]

Has anyone been playing this. I am have been swamped with finishing Medical school, but I was wondering if anyone has tried the new 2 mana planeswalker in a goblin welder shell. Seems like it could have potential.

Seth

[Rath]

I could see the new planeswalker either playing in a heavy goblin welder / faithless looting shell... but potentially more as a koth-esque option for sideboarding?

Pros:
- Another planeswalker, cheap and easy to cast (potentially turn 1)
- synergy with goblin welder

Cons:
- doesn't really do that much to help the deck
- not a win condition in himself, unlike Koth

Example deck:

4 x imperial recruiters
4 x painter's servant
4 x Grindstone
3 x SSG
3 x Chrome Mox
4 x REB
3 x Magus of the Moon
3 x Blood Moon
3 x Faithless Looting
3 x Sensei's Divining Top
1 x Jaya
1 x Koth
2 x Tibalt
3 x Welder
2 x Pyroblast

4 x Ancient Tomb
4 x City of Traitors
2 x red fetches
5 x mountains
2 x great furnace

----------------------
That list isn't tuned at all, but you can basically see the issues. Including him turns you into a red based looting deck. Koth was a great planeswalker as he was a total win-condition by himself with moons. He added to the "must answer this NOW" spells you played.

You could go pure blood moon + planeswalkers + goblin welder and forget about the servant/grindstone plan, otherwise you run out of slots. If you do the looting route, you can run 1cc artifacts and trinket mage with 2 x servant and 1 x grindstone.

Example (again, bad deck, but you get the idea):

4 x imperial recruiters
2 x Trinket mage
2 x painter's servant
1 x Grindstone
3 x SSG
3 x Chrome Mox
4 x Magus of the Moon
4 x Blood Moon
4 x Faithless Looting
3 x Sensei's Divining Top
1 x Jaya
2 x Tibalt
4 x Welder
1 x meekstone
1 x grafdigger's cage / relic of progenitus

4 x Ancient Tomb
2 x City of Traitors
3 x red/blue fetches
5 x mountains
1 x island
1 x Volcanic island
2 x desolate lighthouse
1 x great furnace

-------------------
Sideboard:
2 x painter's servant
4 x REB
2 x pyroblast
4 x lightning bolt
graveyard hate?

[sroncor1]

@Rath- Yeah I wasn't sure what to make of the card. A two mana planeswalker just felt like it should be tried. And to be honest I have alternated on loveing and hating Faithless Looting. The card is very meta dependant, and I think decks are two fast know to be hoping you can grind out an advantage over a couple turns and with Goblin welder activations.

It is bc of this that I switched back to the E tutor build. The lose of a card hurts, but finding the answer is huge. That and I feel like I need to be able to increase the number of crypts in the deck. It also allows for things like Absolute Law, which def helps your bad matchups.

Rock style decks are still played, although I can not fathom trying to pilot one of them with sneak and show decks and delver decks everywhere. But they are bad for us and I love bolt against them. I will try to get a new list posted, with sideboard with these thoughts in mind.

Seth

[Rath]

Definitely would love to see an updated list.
I am still playing mono-red, loving it. My area has a ton of reanimator, RUG, and stone-blade decks. With Grieselbrand printed, I don't see reanimator dying down anytime soon... but at least those decks do not include Eldrazi!

Overall, I still lose to blue decks with random includes (e.g. 1 spell pierce, 1 spellstutter sprite) as I have no way to see their hand and know what randomness they are running, but generally I can take the U/W or U/B control, most junk decks, and RUG are all fairly easy, except when RUG is running lots of creature hate and kills my painters.

Any thoughts on ways to improve a mono-red build against reanimator?

[sroncor1]

I recomended 7 hate cards. For me it is 4 Tormods Crypt as it is still the best. Then probably Fairie Macabre as I doubt you have room for 3 Ensnaring bridges in your board. But that us a good start for sure. Currently I run 4 crypts, 1 Fairie, 1 ensnaring bridge, and 3 enlightened tutors. The button line is you about 7-8 cards that directly interact with their strategy and that is the graveyard and attacking. You can mix and match to suit your taste and meta. Although bridge does nothing for Iona.

Seth

[Kap'n Kook]

So I know there has been much discussion on a "budget" list (meaning mainly without recruiters) so I wanted to know what people's thoughts about mine were. I have been playing this for a while now to semi-decent results. I play with a full set of welders out of necessity to rescue destroyed or countered combo pieces as well as a decent number of spellskites to harass removal for welders and painters as well as act as a decent blocker. It is obviously not as consistent without recruiters, but still holds up well.

Lands:
4x Ancient Tomb
2x City of Traitors
4x Great Furnace
4x Red Fetches
6x Mountains

Creatures:
4x Goblin Welder
4x Painter's Servant
3x Spellskite

Spells:
4x Sensei's Divining Top
4x Grindstone
4x Faithless Looting
4x Blood Moon
4x Lotus Petal
2x Gamble
4x Red Elemental Blast
3x Pyroblast

SB
4x Tormod's Crypt
3x Ensnaring Bridge
3x Pithing Needle
3x Shattering Spree
1x Pyroblast
1x Sphinx of the Steel Wind


Notes about the deck. I know that some people hate and some people love Faithless Looting in conjunction with SDT. I have found that it is amazing at discarding redundant lands or tops (and then forming a mini draw engine with welder). I maximized the number of artifacts for Goblin Welder and he truly shines in this type of deck. Faithless looting also helps draw into sideboarded cards early and can be welded back in. Any dredge player knows that an active welder with a tormod's crypt in the yard is insane. The Sphinx in the sideboard might be considered 'cute', but with 2 gambles, 4 tops and fetches as well as 4 lootings he ends up in your graveyard much more than you would think. He singlehandedly handles burn and RUG Delver. This might be a 'poor man's' intuition painter, but I still really like the blood moon plan since it wrecks so many decks. Blasts are standard and dominate blue decks. Anyways I would appreciate any and all comments.

[sroncor1]

@Kapnkook-SSG should probably be run over lotus petal, even though the petal has synergy with Welder. I would say 3/3 split would be best for you, but also try Chrome Mox. 6 plus fast red sources is really a must if you want to ride the Moon plan. With respect to Gamble it is a card I have liked in thought but never had great success. Overall I have liked Faithless Looting, but I think it is a meta choice anymore. In faster metas, like now with Delver, Show and Tell, and Lightning Bolts everywhere it loses power as Goblin Welders should be dying and I have often times found it hard to be dicking around spending all my mana and tempo on hoping to draw the correct card. But it stoneblade decks and Maverick are a large part of your meta then I think the situation changes and it becomes much stronger. I do however recommend Lightning Bolt in the 75. It always is the weakest card I know, but when you need it, nothing else is close. Hope this helps


Seth

[sroncor1]

So I was able to top 4 today at the GPT. I didn't drop a match going into a top 4 then took a prize split for a Juzzam Djinn. I ran the white splash with Enlightened Tutor. Loved the tutor, and will get a deck list and short report up soon. Overall, I was able to beat two decks packing Eldrazi, and to be honest I am currently not worried about them.

Seth

[Kap'n Kook]

@sroncor thanks for the input. I will definitely test it out in the coming weeks at my local legacy tournament.

Also on a side note I have a few questions about investing in recruiters. Recently I was offered the opportunity to buy 4 recruiters so I was wondering what a fair price for a full playset would be. Secondly, it is probably everyone's fear who decides to invest in the deck, but what are do you guys think are the chances of a possible reprint of recruiter?

[sroncor1]

I would say less than 225 or so for them is good. English is worth more but for playing they are all the same. I doubt the card would see a reprint in red. A functional reprint in white maybe, but the ability is not in red anymore. Maybe a judge foil but I doubt the price would suffer. Proxy and play the deck is my advice. I would get the cards, but I also have basically all playables and many pimp versions so on that front I am not the best. I think they will be solid moving forward

Seth

[Cacks]

Hey Sroncor1, congrats on the GPT result! Care to post your list and any thoughts on IP in the current meta?

[sroncor1]

The deck isn't in a bad place at all in the meta. A decision on how to handle decks with Eldrazi is the key really. Otherwise your unfavorable matches like burn and rock style(nic fit) are all not good right now. I've been away from a real computer for a but but I will try to get a list and some strategy up Thursday in the am.

Seth

[Cacks]

Look forward to it, thanks.

[Kap'n Cook]

Yo so I have had a couple of musings. I have recruiters now so I can finally join in the discussion about the deck in general. My current list is as follows (i still need 2x city of traitors which is awkward since i have the recruiters) but whatever.

4x Ancient Tomb
2x City of Traitors
4x Great Furnace
6x Mountain
2x fetch

4x Imperial Recruiter
4x Painter's Servant
4x Simian Spirit Guide
3x Goblin Welder
1x Magus of the Moon

4x Blood Moon
4x Faithless Looting
4x Grindstone
4x Red Elemental Blast
2x Pyroblast
3x Lightning Bolt
3x Sensei's Divining Top
1x Spellskite
1x Gamble

SB
4x Tormod's Crypt
4x Ensnaring Bridge
2x Pyroblast
1x Phyrexian Metamorph
1x Magus of the Moon
1x Manic Vandal
1x Spellskite
1x Sphinx of the Steel Wind


So here is what I was wondering. With 4 faithless lootings, do you guys feel that Chrome mox is a better choice over lotus petal? both are synergistic with welder who really shines with 4 lootings as well. Also, how many petals or mox would be an ideal number (assume that i have 4 cities as well)? And what to cut? I know the first choice many would say would be Gamble, but there are some times you just really need to find a grindstone and a random gamble works wonders. I dont feel that cutting a looting is the correct choice because it really helps your draws once you are under a moon lock and just need more pressure or just to finish out your combo quicker. It also pitches your extra unneeded lands, moons, etc. Regarding cuts, is spellskite necessary in the main?

[Rath]

If you want the chrome moxen in (which you kind of do), I would suggest the following:
OUT
1 x gamble
1 x faithless looting
1 x lightning bolt

IN
3 x chrome mox

They give you coloured mana, provide another artifact to weld, and offer the explosive starts you want to drop a moon turn 1. Just an FYI, moon is AMAZING right now. Maverick is generally running 3 basics at most, RUG often runs 0... having a moon out turn 1 can be back-breaking. Even running it out turn 2 with blast back up is reasonable.

Against RUG, you basically want to play the "I win" cards. You cannot apply pressure, or play control, you need to play out every card as if it HAS to be countered. However, you only really have blood moon and the servant/grindstone combo as the "must counter" spells against them. Ensnaring bridge is also pretty good if you can board it. This is also where spellskite is great as it can take lightning bolt / forked bolt hits for your other guys (especially if you land a magus of the moon). Of course, you also have the sphinx plan... which is kind of cool, let me know how effective that is?

[sroncor1]

In the current meta I suggest moving away from Faithless Looting. With Dredge, RUG delver, and Sneak and Show everywhere, the card is to slow and random to win out. It is best when you have time and can grind out the card to give you maximum selection over an extended period of time. In my experience you do not have the ability to do so. Right now if you are committing mana and a card you need to know what value you are getting. That is why I recommend Enlightened Tutor.

My list

4 Imperial Recruiters
4 painter's Servant
4 Grindstone
3 SSG
3 Chrome Mox
7 Blast effects( mix and match anyway you like)
3 magus of the MOon
3 Blood Moon
3 SDT
3 Enlightened Tutor
2 Goblin Welder
1 Jaya Ballard
1 Figure of Destiny
4 City of Traitors
4 Ancient Tomb
4 Bloodstained Mire
2 Plateau
5 Mountains

Side
3 Ensnaring Bridge
2 Faerie Macabre
4 Tormod's Crypt
1 Spinal Villian
1 Blast effect
1 Phyrexian Metamorph
2 Koth
1 Goblin Welder

About the choices- The sideboard has been tuned to fight elves, Eldrazi in general, and Sneak and Show decks. The maindeck is actually really strong against Maverick, High Tide, Delver lists, Stone Blade and MUD lists. Dredge is favorable, and more so after siding, but you have to keep fast aggressive hands. Those are the decks I see in my area. The biggest issue being Sneak and Show decks.

So in the fight against Eldrazi you have a few things to do here. With elves and other ramp decks you just side out the Moon package, bring in the graveyard hate when on the draw everytime. Depending on the builds, and the type of ramp used, Moons are still strong on the play and instead just side out the Welders, Figure, and 3 blast effects if the Moons seem like they can work. Remember you want to always have white available bc they can still be fast and E tutor allows you to consistently get the three pieces you need for the combo in a timely fashion.

Sneak and SHow is another beast entirely. Some people may have had decent results with Moon here. It does serve as a slow down but it is really a bad lock. I would bring out the Moons, in the second game. That will give you 6 cards to bring in. Ensnaring Bridges( thanks Drew), Koths and Spinal Villian come in. Here is where you get a choice. Some would side out Grindstone as they should be bringing in Hydras that make the mill impossible to do anything but draw with. I think most of the better list should do this to increase threat density. What I would do is remove Figure and bring in Metamorph. The key should be to resolve Bridge and then a secondary win condition in the form of Koth or Jaya Ballard. The Spinal Villian is important bc with Jaya and Painter, they will need 3 creatures to attack if you were not able to land a bridge. I like to keep the mill package in for two reasons. One it serves as a fail safe if shit goes wrong and you may be able to constantly threaten a draw. Two it is important to see if they brought in the HYdra. If not, game three will see you bring in the Crypts in place of the Koth. That way you will know if you can try for the combo for the win. The Metamorph gives you many options and coupled with Welder you can really slow shit down.

Sneak and Show isn't easy, but it is beatable even though unfavorable. The good news is since it is the hot deck a bunch of bad players will be playing it so you can outplay them. With the current list I have found elves and other Eldrazi to not be a problem. The most recent GPT saw my play and beat 3 of these decks and the match ups weren't that close.

I will concede without Lightning Bolt the Rock matchup is worst, but that deck is poorly positioned right now and sometimes you need to pick your poison. I hope this helps and would be happy to elaborate more. Although I will say this my testing will be limited till the next big event since at my biweekly local Legacy event I play joke decks with cards like Baulduvian Horde and Juzam.

Seth

[sroncor1]

I wanted to add that my list is essentially 59cards. You can swap out that FoD for just about anything and you are correct on that choice. I just wanted another option for turning dudes sideways and it imprints as white for added value.

But I do want to stress again that right now I feel like Faithless Looting is not currently strong and I would be very hesitant in running it.

Seth

[Phelix]

I borrowed this deck from a friend, then altered it some.

http://www.mtgpulse.com/event/8645#118532

and won a small trial for GP Ghent.

Some previous poster said to consider cutting fateless looting, and I strongly disagree. Its a sweet way to speed up welder, search for pieces, and trade unwanted cards for gas.

The top 8 was full of control, even with counterbalance, yet this deck still performed quite well.

I was very happy with the 6 anti dredge/reanimator cards in my sideboard, and would probably not remove them. If anything, id try to find a spot for that last combo hate card.

[sroncor1]

Great job on the win. I was the previous poster hat said cut looting, but I did say if control was big in your meta then it was the right call. Clearly for what you played against it was the right call. Over here in the states I haven't seen that much control in a very long time. As such I still think with elves,sneak and show, dredge, and delver (which make up nearly 75 percent of the decks I play against anymore) that Faithless looting is too slow and Enlightened Tutor is he way to go.

In your dredge match did you mulligan to the Leyline? I would reLly be interested in a short report. How many people played in the event?

[Phelix]

Hi.

Actually, I havent seen alot of control for the last 3 months, either. In fact I cut Koth for this event because of that (in the sb)

i think it was 22 persons, it says the number of players if u click link to mtgpulse.com.

I played vs dredge to a draw in the swiss, making top 8 w. 3-0-2 (last round ID to get food)

Tournament had roughly 21 top tier decks, only 1 random (girl w. monogreen w. cc 6 ect)


Im sorry i kinda forget the swiss rounds.


In the top 8 i played twice against stoneblade, in relatively tight games. I found all the moon effects to be quite good, but sideboarded out 1-2 moon guys to dodge swords.

More/bigger dorks would have been good here, as they really dont have much counteroffense and are forced to defend.

Against dredge in the swiss, i did try to mulligan for leylines, but never found them. I won the game vs dredge by mulliganing to 5. He then discards 2 cards w. looting and I remove then, stopping his dredge, then winning. I discarded 3 leylines w. looting. Drawing them later sucks.

The matchup didnt feel easy, but getting bloodmoon+leyline is pretty much GG, since firestorm ends up being their only removal.

Id possibly add 1 artifact graveyard hate.

[Ecstatic_Conch]

I'm mainly a Maverick player, but I've done a significant amount of testing with this deck online, and my main gripe is how susceptible it is to wasteland. It gets even worse with the version I'm running, which splashes white for enlightened tutor. Even with three chrome mox and a singleton mox opal, certain decks can absolutely murder your landbase. I've considered running crucible; one sounds O.K. with enlightened tutor (maybe in the sideboard after game 1 if they wasted you out of the game). I'm trying a build that is very welder centric, and since my meta is littered with combo decks light on removal, usually players are forced to.... force of will it.

Another gripe I have with the deck is how vunerable it can be to black in particular. Innocent blood, snuff out, etc. are death for this deck. In addition, discard effects like cabal therapy, duress, thoughtseize, hymn, etc. can shut off the deck pretty quick, hymn especially. Welder helps, but the little guy can only do so much.

Here's my list:

4 Painter's Servant
3 Enlightened Tutor
4 Grindstone
4 Faithless Looting
4 Goblin Welder
1 Wurmcoil Engine
3 Sensei's Divining Top
4 Pyroblast
3 Red Elemental Blast
3 Chrome Mox
1 Mox Opal
4 Blood Moon
2 Trinisphere
1 Ensnaring Bridge
1 Tormod's Crypt

2 Plateau
4 Arid Mesa
2 Plains
2 Mountain
4 Ancient Tomb
3 City of Traitors
1 Great Furnace

SB: 3 Stoneforge Mystic
SB: 2 Batterskull
SB: 1 Lightning Greaves
SB: 2 Pithing Needle
SB: 3 Tormod's Crypt
SB: 1 Phyrexian Metamorph
SB: 2 Faerie Macabre
SB: 1 Ensnaring Bridge

You'll notice the lack of imperial recruiters, I (and I'm sure many others), don't wish to spend 1000$ or so on a playset. In place of them, Enlightened tutor and faithless looting allows the deck to maintain a fair amount of consistency. The slots are really tight, and it's hard to fit in the welder and friends, but it has additional synergy with greaves (combo protection) and batterskull (beats in place of moon or trinisphere when the hate isn't working). I'd also like to find room in my sideboard for hate against chalice, probably shattering spree.

The trinisphere main deck inclusion is absolutely a meta call, but I'm all for it. It handily takes care of storm, belcher, and enchantress-- which my meta is full of. I ran 3 at first over the magus of the moon and cut it down to 2 at the moment.

Here's a couple other cards that I'm considering:
Sword of Light and Shadow to get back welder, painter with stoneforge package.
Lotus petal in place of Chrome mox
Story circle: hilarious with painter but double white is very hard to come by.
Oblivion ring or similar white removal as a catch-all (could be unnecessary)
Revoker in place of pithing needle as an additional beater. Shutting off Griselbrand is important, and he is indeed real.
Fourth Enlightened Tutor.

Always looking for suggestions to improve my build. Cheers.

[rancOr_]

Without recruiters u should not play this deck-as stupid as it may sound. I'm back on the 2 koths main with 4moon,2magus which I think is best. I never had any problems vs wasteland..in fact most of the times they waste me they are the ones loosing tempo. But I'm not playing with welder/furnace or e tutor. No cute tricks just simply control the game with moons/ reb+painter. I like having enough gy hate in side as its also needed for s&t etc..

[Kap'n Cook]

@phelix

regarding your graveyard hate, 4x Tormod's Crypt are vastly superior to 4x Leyline of Sanctity, especially since you run both 3 goblin welders and 3 faithless lootings. Looting allows the crypt to be in the top couple cards of your library as you loot for it and an active welder with a crypt is basically game over against graveyard decks.

@conch

Wasteland should never be a problem against this deck. If it is then you should be playing more early moon effects

[sroncor1]

I have to agree that without Recruiters the deck is a totally different beast. And I have almost always splashed a color and wasteland has never really been a problem. To be honest without Recruiters you should probably run blue instead. It really will be better and it will give you more answers to combo.

Not to pump myself up, but I hope you guys give my newest list a try. I really feel like it is well positioned. It is fast, resilient, and consistent. I'm still working on the board and I will update the sideboard plan accordingly.

Seth

[Michael Keller]

I miss this deck so much.

[Phelix]

@Rancor I dont play Leyline of sanctity?

[Kap'n Cook]

So after looking at the results from the previous SCG Open, it looks like elves are cutting emrakul, even in the sideboard. It also helps out that there were 2 decks in the top 8 so hopefully more people jump on the bandwagon. Just wanted to share this little tidbit with all of you

[Kap'n Cook]

Whaddup fellas

So this is what im doin currently and my testing results (cockatrice and random small tourneys) have been extremely positive. My only real concern has been losing the die roll against fast decks. Everything else is money. Storm i mainly mull to a hand that has extreme gas or painter plus blast backup. But im more concerned with smashing RUG and maverick so ill take my chances and hopefully let blue decks beat up on them. the current build

7 sol land (working on getting the 8th)
7 mountain
2 fetch
2 furnace

2 lotus petal
3 sdt
4 gstone

4 recruiter
4 servant
4 spirit guide
3 welder
2 magus
1 metamorph

4 moon
6 blast
3 bolt
2 looting

board:
4 tormod
3 e. bridge
3 shattering spree
2 blast
1 thorn
1 vandal
1 sphinx of the steel wind


Id encourage players to try out this version. I really dont want to lose to burn so thats why i still have the sphinx. My main goal is obviously try to combo, but otherwise protect welder at all costs because once the sphinx is there its game over.
ive been going back and forth on 2 petals or 2 chrome mox with mixed results. the sprees are just so i dont lose to a chalice or affinity but i can cut one for another relevant piece of hate. Id appreciate some critique of my build which is mainly geared towards the most popular current decks (meaning rug, maverick, cheat fatties.dec, affinity and burn, with the last two mainly because of budget)

@sroncor

I know you have been an advocate of the white splash for a faster meta. Have you been affected at all with the minor card disadvantage? Has the splash ever come back to bite you? And lastly if you were to play tomorrow would you still run white over mono-red?

@anyone else

awfully quiet in both painter threads. This deck is infinitely better positioned than intuition painter so im wondering where all the players have gone. new information is always helpful. for example, ive found that when playing elves game 1, its worth it to try to combo out and hope they are the mirror entity version. they are too fast and basic heavy anyways so dont bother trying to be a bad board control deck and beat down whereas a few months ago the latter game plan was the better play. post board still bring in the grave-hate as emrakul could be sideboarded.

[sroncor1]

The card disadvantage is acceptable for he speed and flexibility. Right now I wouldn't play the deck without E tutor. I have personally been swamped at work but I did play in an event a few weeks ago. I am on call at the hospital Friday night so if I get a break I will post some Thoughts. And yes I still can not seem to beat burn in case anyone is asking.

Seth

[sroncor1]

So it has been a while since I posted. But since it is a slow night on the NICU I figured I would put some thoughts out.

The deck is still solid right now. I still think E. tutor is better than Faithless Looting as the format is still fairly fast. The right answer is also most likely the most important thing to make the tough match ups better. Moon effects may be better now than they have been for over a year. My most recent list with 7 plus graveyard hate in the board with white splash is very solid against maverick, Reanimator, Stoneblade, and Goblins. The Combo match up is as good as it ever has been. I still go back and forth if anything should be added. Right now I say no. Belcher is straight up faster but you can race other storm decks. Dredge is dredge and sometimes it does crazy things.

I recently went 3-3 in an event. My two loses were to Burn twice. It happens and I almost won. My draws were a little rough but I still think that is a tough match up. You have to fear it but planning for it is a waste as the deck is garbage, and I would rather beat goods decks with good pilots. In that event I did beat two Maverick pretty handily and Ben Friemen playing his Stoneblade deck. Koth was huge here and I love having 3 to bring in out of the board.

I will most likely be playing this weekend. I will post something if I do.

Seth

[Kap'n Cook]

Some minor changes Id like some input about if anyone is still here. My list is a couple posts above. Ive since changed the two lotus petals to 2 chrome mox, i just like the ability to keep a one land hand, 3 mana turn two etc.

I know many are an advocate of Jaya, but I just really don't want to play her. I feel using her is just way too slow. Maybe I am biased because I don't want to run her, but would running a one of beat stick like kargan make more sense? I would appreciate pros and cons from anyone who has run one or both.

About my sideboard, I'm thinking 2 sprees. the 3 shattering sprees have been for the possibility of chalice on 1 since i dont have a main board solution besides countering. I think I'm going to abandon my reanimation plan against burn since its so situational anyways (sphinx/wurmcoil) as well as spellskite. a lot of times i think i would just get another painter or a welder instead. So that's 3 slots open. Is 3 thorns the best option here? chalice play seems very low at the moment. the only other real thing i could imagine would be a one of phyrexian revoker somewhere


also I know Seth likes his splashes and whatnot but I'm just gonna stay mono red. I'm not trying to spend any more at the moment and I am very comfortable with a 2 of faithless looting and testing has been strong across almost all matchups. Stoneblade has been ridiculously easy and RUG has a hard time dealing with a bridge. I like looting into artifact sideboard pieces and using 3 welders so using thorns certainly fit into this plan.

Anyways, I appreciate all insights.

[StefN]

Hello everyone.

Last weekend at the GP Gent I had the chance to get a playset of Recruiters in a trade, so now I finally have the chance to try this deck at turnaments :cool:
A few things I found out while testing this deck.
Goblin Welder is very strong in theory, but when I'm actually playing the deck, most of the time he does nothing. Also the situations, where I discard stuff with Loothing, mostly I discard unimportant cards that are not usefull for the Welder. He is only good against Discard or Counter when he is in play allready, to get your Combopieces.
Wouldn't it be usefull to just play 1 copy??
Also the point about splashing a colour. I tried to splash blue for trinket mage, but the Manabase really sucks when you try to support a second colour. I thinck this is one of the biggest strength of the deck to be able to be a monocoloured deck.
The only trouble I had sometimes is to find the Grindstone. Faithles looting is the first step to solve this problem, but I thinck the right way to go is a split of Looting and Sens.DT. Atm I try 3/2 and it seems to work well so far.

Well I have to play a few tournaments until I can evaluate every single card in the MD and SB. This weekend is a big tournament in Hamburg so maybe I will give it a try.

Would be nice if everyone would post their lates list. I need more input :tongue:

Greetings..........

[rancOr_]

1) Faithless looting is not worth it, u can better play other cards and/or more tops.
2 )This deck should play atleast 3tops, they are mvp in this deck (with a few fetches)
3) I prefer monored- I've also tested the splash versions and didnt like them at all.
4) Play 4 blood moon
Hope this helps,

rancOr_

[sroncor1]

All good questions. I know some people haven't loved he splash but I play the deck as a mono red deck. That is why white splash is ok. You decide early to go that way or ride out the mono red. I totally get why people don't go that way but I think it has merit. So does a mono red list though and I understand both arguments.

@faithless looting-I do not think it fits with the deck. It makes welder marginally better but overall I don't love it. If the format slows then the card becomes strong again. SDT should be a 3 of though. It smooths stuff out, interacts great with welder, recruiter, and fetches.

@jaya-she is slow, but she is a catch all. You don't use her often but it is nice to have the versatility. A beater doesn't serve the same role. She is never dead. But if you want a beater use FoD or Wildfire Emissary. Either are better than the dragonlord.

The sideboard is something that I have continued to work on. I would love to start a discussion on sideboarding cards and strategies. What do people think.

Seth

[Kap'n Cook]

@stefn

I think I'm one of the bigger proponents of goblin welder so I'll try to explain why he is good in almost all situations rather than only counter or discard. For starters, when playin against a deck possibly packing surgical extraction sideboard, welder is usually my go to play. While beat down is certainly a realistic goal, I feel that the combo is most players number one victory path and a surgicaled piece is rough. It at least forces them to have 2. I look at welder like the intuition lists look at welder. He rescues destroyed/countered pieces and almost always draws removal out of fear so that's one less piece for painter. The same cant be said for recruiter on the field. It's a nice blocker but stone blade wont waste a swords on him. Welder is just general utility and protection.

Im also running a high number of sideboard artifacts so that's another plus for welder if they get countered or you discard them etc. I've beaten many rug players under a moon lock simply because they can't flash back ancient grudge and destroy my ensnaring bridge twice. As Seth mentioned, I think it's a good idea to start discussing sideboard options. Most of the time if it's not obvious (bolts out against high tide for example) I find myself shaving one ofs to accommodate my board pieces and who knows if it's the right choice.

Lastly, I think looting is all about personal preference and level of comfort with the deck. E. tutor could be way better or it may not. Again it's the issue of so few people to test out this deck. I personally don't think I could use enlightened tutor correctly atm but am very knowledgable about when and what to pitch to looting. So stefn I would advise you to try out both if youre so inclined and judge for yourself

[sroncor1]

@Kap-Your thoughts on Welder are spot on. He is a great card one in which I could squeeze a third in. I think the thing you left out is hat a lot of his strength are subtle, adding depth and many lines of play that I think most people that haven't played the deck a lot miss.

You are correct that splashes are a preference. I have pretty much plays some version of painter at every Bmore event for over four years now. In he end I feel very comfortable with knowing when and how to use E tutor. I'm not saying that I am a great player but I have used he card so much that often times I don't even have o really think about it. For me it comes down to he fact that in my meta I need it's speed and consistency at a loss of the ability and power to go long with Looting. If you can afford to have your games go long than Looting is the right choice. It seems like Bmore has sped up enough that I can't anymore.

When I get home today I will post my sideboard and some quick thoughts and sideboarding plans

Seth

[StefN]

@sroncor1
Isn't hard to support the E.Tutor with just 4x Bloodst. Mire and 2x Plateau + the possibility to imprint a tutor in a Mox?
Otherwise, I like the idea of E.Tutor Main. The main Problem is the lack of white Mana but I will give it a try.

[sroncor1]

To be honest I haven't really had a problem. Occasionally it is a deadcard that sits in your hand but more often than not it serves as the perfect compliment for Imperial Recruiter.

The problem is it might take a while to get use to. It does make the deck much harder to play I think, but it gives it more reach and versatility and I feel more consistency.

Seth

[Kap'n Cook]

Regarding e. tutor, he did also mention that you decide from your opening hand which route (fast combo or moon plan) that you want to take.

One aspect of the combination of welder and looting I've found to be good is the 'blind' activation of grindstone on yourself. What I mean by this are the situations without top on the field as well or without an active welder, excluding circumstances like growing a goyf or opening up to post board surgical. What I'm trying to say is that any given turn you could mill looting and flash it back. You can't look at it like 'oh I would have just drawn painter this turn if I didn't do that'. You could mill away dead cards or draw into a welder with a painter or bridge or crypt in the yard. I hope you all understand what I'm trying to say but if it is unclear I can try to explain differently

[Kap'n Cook]

6-3 at Starcity DC open this past weekend. Ill post my rounds and whatnot later on but in short I won every matchup this deck is supposed to and lost to the ones that are hard.

@seth did you end up playing painter? I did see your name on the pairings but every time i went over to your table to watch/introduce myself no one was there. Most of my matches only took 20-30 minutes but I guess yours were even faster. there was one other player I watched briefly playing Imperial Painter but he said it was his first time playing the deck.

on another note, English Recruiters are up to $350 now on starcity

[sroncor1]

Great job. Yeah I was 2-1 and got paired against a friend second round an since I had to leave at six I was cool with him winning and me dropping. I was hoping to run into you at the event. I'll be at thanks for playing this weekend I think. ( that is if I wam correct on the date this time).

In other news I talked with Hollywood and I might take over the thread and update the opening. What are peoples thoughts on the subject?


Seth

[Kap'n Cook]

Okay so here is my DC recap. This was my first ever big tournament so I didn't know entirely what I was supposed to do to sign up and after rounds, but I felt confident partly because I knew my deck inside and out, but also because I had done my research (this comes up later on).

My deck:

4 Ancient Tomb
2 City of Traitors
2 Great Furnace
10 Mountains

4 Imperial Recruiter
4 Painter's Servant
4 Simian Spirit Guide
3 Goblin Welder
2 Magus of the Moon
1 Phyrexian Metamorph

4 Grindstone
4 Bloodmoon
3 Sensei Tops
2 Chrome Mox
3 Pyroblast
3 REB
3 Lightning Bolt
2 Faithless looting

SB
4 Tormod's Crypt
3 Ensnaring Bridge
1 Pyroblast
1 REB
1 Manic Vandal
3 Shattering Spree?
2 Spellskite

Sideboard pretty much composed of what I had on hand. Ill discuss my sideboard thoughts after my recap. On to the rounds

Round 1 vs Edgar Flores with U/R Delver

Game 1 he leads off with a Goblin Guide off of a Volcanic Island, so my fears of playing against Burn are slightly alleviated. I have a top in play and end up drawing 3-4 lands off of the goblin guide and later get a moon into play after he dazes my first one. At 7 life I grind him with blast backup.

Game 2 I grind him while at 10 life without protection. He flips his top card and reveals lightning bolt.

After the match I ask him how I am supposed to report the results with the slip of paper they give you because its my first time. He says 'really? that sucks' or something like that. Oh well. First win on the day.

1-0
(2-0)

Round 2 against Brandon with Death and Taxes

Game 1 Im pretty sure he leads off with Plains into Aether Vial. I hadn't played against this deck in a while so I was a little confused about why Maverick would run Vial. I then remember D and T and start planning out my strategy. He gets out Mother of Runes, Thalia, and Phyrexian Revoker on Grindstone while I am chilling with a Goblin Welder and a Grindstone on my side. At some point I get out a Painter and blast his Vial. End of his turn I weld vial for revoker and he gives protection from red. I think he goes to swords painter and I blast in response. I untap and grind out. If he had swords in response I wouldnt have had enough mana to blast.

Game 2 I am mana screwed after getting two tombs wasted so im using 2 chrome moxen and a mountain. Same situation with Welder and Revoker arises this game as well. I blasted wheel of sun and moon and won. I might be mixing up some of the details of each game but all in all it was pretty tight. Brandon was really fun to play against and all in all a nice guy. Round 9 of the tourney he matched up next to me in the D and T mirror and we asked how we had done that day. Really nice.

2-0
(4-0)

Round 3 against Andrew playing Goblins

Game 1 he plays turn one vial and turn two shiny piledriver off of cavern. My turn one was mountain, grindstone. Turn 2 play ancient tomb, chrome mox, exile ssg for the turn two win.

Game 2 he mulls and starts out turn one lackey (pretty sure) and I start with Grindstone. His turn two was chalice of the void. he attacks and connects, but doesnt have another goblin. I actually had manic vandal in my hand to start and play it turn 2 for chalice as well as blocker. turn 3 recruiter, turn 4 win.

3-0
(6-0)

At this point I'm pretty excited that it's my first event and I haven't even lost a game. I remember thinking that I had waded through the first 3 rounds of randomness and was hoping for nonstop matchups against stoneblade and BUG control.

Round 4 against Jay playing.... Burn.

3-1
(6-2)

Round 5 against David McDarby playing Sneaky

Game 1 he leads off with lotus petal cantrip but doesnt play a land. I immediately assume show and tell and go aggro. I end up beating down with 3 painters on black and a simian spirit guide with 2 lightning bolts to finish it off. He cantripped all game.

Game 2 is where my 'prior research' came into play. He cantrips and i lay turn one top.
he turn two show and tells and I let it resolve. He drops emrakul and i drop Ensnaring Bridge!! Im so excited on the inside that I am going to beat sneak and show 2-0. The next few turns consist of me dropping grindstone, painter, crypt. He calls for a judge to ask a question away from me. I go for the grind and he shows me the two progenitus he sided in :( I will admit that I played hastily and maybe should have gone for a recruiter into metamorph beatdown plan to remove his emrakul, but I had looked at a lot of show and tell decks and saw very little and mostly no progenitus between main or sideboard. Thoughts on this situation? He was really nice and complimented me on knowing my deck and all the random graveyard interactions. He said the only reason he sides 2 prog is that his good friend was Jonathan Suarez who always plays IP. Bummer for me.

Game 3 he turn 2 show and tells an emrakul with force backup
Game 4 I counter the first show and tell on turn 2. Next turn he plays sneak attack and emrakuls. He shows me the progenitus coming in next turn and I concede.

3-2
(7-4-1)

Round 6 against Vin with Loam Pox, B/G loam whatever

Game 1 I pretty calmly combo off at 17 life. The only real disruption was a discard spell turn one or something. Lots of loaming for him.

Game 2 I get discard spell and turn 2 hymn. There wasnt any real pressure though so I slowly just started going for beats. He spends the majority of his turns and mana loaming and dredging. I wasn't very familiar with the deck but last turn he dredged up a worm harvest. Magus at that point had shut off a majority of his mana. I win with beats and end with 3 blasts in hand for protection.

4-2
(9-4-1)

Round 7 against Jesse with Maverick

Game 1 I recruit for painter and combo out with ssg + blast backup

Game 2 I have a grindstone out and am laying out spirit guides and anything to block, just waiting for a recruiter or painter. Goes on for a while as he swings with knights, moms, thalia, teeg every turn and i can bolt for a little. rec and painter never show up

Game 3 he mulls to 4 looking for a basic land trying to play around turn 1 blood moon. He keeps double waste and other stuff. I lay turn 2 moon and its over.

5-2
(11-5-1)

Round 8 against Darian with Belcher

Game 1 I keep a really loose and slow hand hoping that this late in the tournament I might finally play against Stoneblade or some control deck. His belcher list has probes and street wraiths and no sideboard. he ends up charbelchering on turn 3 or something, one turn before I would have painter with blast set up.

Game 2 I mull and keep a really good hand. Tomb, Mox, Recruiter, Grindstone, Blast, Lightning Bolt. Turn one recruiter for painter and pray he doesnt turn one me. Turn 2 painter with blast backup just in case. I combo out next turn.

Game 3 I end up mulling to 4 looking for anything. 2 spellskites i sided in for charbelcher, fast painter with blast etc. Nothing. He ends up probing and the card he draws allows him to turn one me.

He was really cool to talk to and 'play' against haha. We had a pretty big crowd watching and shuffling and mulliganing easily took 3/4 of the match time. Still finished in 15 minutes.

5-3
(12-7-1)

Round 9 against Martin with RUG

Game 1 he plays delver turn one. I go to bolt and he dazes. I have found that getting them to daze and return their land is critical to your success because it prevents tarmogoyf for another turn and we have so much removal to kill off delvers and gives us more time to get a game ending moon down. he forced a blood moon at some point and i end up with a grindstone and painter in play with 4 lands and a hand of blast and ssg facing lethal goyf and mongoose next turn. I go to grind, he stifles, I blast, he spell pierces. I look at my ssg and concede. one mana short.

Game 2 I combo off on turn 3 through disruption using blast while still holding ssg and blast in hand

Game 3 I play mountain, he leads delver. I go to bolt on his end step hoping he dazes. He does and I play a turn 2 blood moon against his board of delver. He doesnt have force. I then play an ensnaring bridge and just wait for cards to win. He admits he doesnt have any outs to blood moon

6-3
(14-8-1)

So there you have it. Like I said in my post above, I beat every deck that isn't burn or packing Eldrazi or belching on turn one. I would have much rather played against ANT or TES or better yet doomsday but it wasn't meant to be. I was a little upset with my matchups because I didn't get to play Merfolk, Stoneblade, or BUG once all day and I feel that those are the best matchups for painter. It was definitely a good first event.

As far as deck choices go, I am going to begin testing out a jaya in the metamorph slot maindeck. Regarding sideboard, i think this is what I will be using for a while:

4 Tormod's crypt
3 Ensnaring Bridge
2 Shattering Spree
1 Pyroblast
1 REB
1 Manic Vandal
1 Spellskite
1 Phyrexian Metamorph
1 Phyrexian Revoker

As always, input on the tourney or questions about my matchups or anything else is appreciated.

[Esper3k]

Well done! Sad you didn't get to run into any Merfolk - from the sounds of it, those guys were all over the place at DC.

[DrewliusMaximus]

Not a bad first SCG Kap'n Cook! Your list looks good.

Not sure I agree about Blasting into Daze against RUG, especially if you have a Top/Looting to search for Bridge. But it's been a while for me, and I expect my understanding of the meta is rusty. With that said, I will also say I have generally maintained either 3Sphere or (more recently) Thorns in the SB. They can come in handy against Storm, Burn and possibly Sneak and Show.

I was on an involuntary mtg break for a couple of months until last week. Unfortunately Esper3k is playing Chalice in our meta now so I have to watch my 1cc stuff. Can't wait to play more Painter though!

[Dark Zero]

Hey guys...after taking a pretty long break I'm back into some mtg action and of course Imperial Painter ist the deck to play. ;D I visited a tournament organized by magickartenmarkt.de in Magdeburg (58 participants) last saturday. My list looked like this:

4 Ancient Tomb
4 City of Traitors
3 Great Furnace
2 Wooded Foothills
5 Mountains
4 Imperial Recruiter
4 Painter's Servant
4 Simian Spirit Guide
3 Goblin Welder
2 Magus of the Moon
1 Phyrexian Metamorph
4 Grindstone
4 Bloodmoon
3 Sensei ‘s Divining Top
2 Chrome Mox
3 Pyroblast
3 REB
3 Lightning Bolt
2 Faithless looting

SB
4 Tormod's Crypt
3 Ensnaring Bridge
1 Pyroblast
1 REB
1 Viashino Heretic
2 Shattering Spree
1 Spellskite
1 Jaya Ballard, Task Mage
1 Lightning Bolt

Pretty standard except for the 2 Faithless Looting I wanted to give a chance and the Metamorph main instead of Sideboard. I just tried a version which abuses Welder a little more. The Sideboard is self-explanatory. Next time I would switch the Viashino Heretic for a Manic Vandal and the Lightning Bolt/Spellskite/Pyroblast for 3 Thorn of Amethyst. Just forgot these cards at home so I had to grab this replacements.

Round 1 vs. Sebastian with Bant 2:0, 1-0-0
Game 1 I lock him out with a second turn Moon and he loses without any resistance.
Game 2 he leads off with fetching a Forest and playing Noble Hierarch. I bolt the Hierarch and get some time to establish the combo with Blast backup with him only resolving two Knight of Reliquary and beating me twice.

Round 2 vs. Jens with NicFit 1-2, 1-1-0
Game 1 I mill him on turn two.
Game 2 I land the early Blood Moon but he has more than enough basics. Pernicious Deed clears the board, Ooze and Tarmogoyf beats me to death.
Game 3 he resolves too much Therapys aiming for my combo pieces so I have a hard time and just survive with an Ensnaring Bridge. He has the Maelstrom Pulse and the Eternal Witness into Pulse for the second Bridge and beats me down.

Round 3 vs. Ole with Esperblade 2-0, 2-1-0
Game 1 he attacks me with discard on turn one and two but my early Top could get the combo together while keeping two Jaces off the table with Blasts.
Game 2 he has another discard at turn one and takes away my Moon, but I simply rip another one from the top and lock him out of the game. Two Recruiters beat him to death from 18 life.

Round 4 vs. Chris with RUG 2-1, 3-1-0
Game 1 I managed to chain Recruiter->Metamorph (Recruiter)-> Welder into play and win due to the Metamorph/Welder shenanigans.
Game 2 he starts with a Delver which I blast but he goes on with another two and a Mongoose in the following turns. Pressure's on, he forces my Servant (pitching the 4th Delver) and reaching treshhold. He swings for 9 twice.
Game 3 I keep a really good hand consisting of Ancient Tomb, Blood Moon, Painters Servant, Goblin welder, Grindstone, Bolt and Mox. He forces the Moon but then looses to the combo with Welder backup.

Round 5 vs. Chu Sneak Show 1-1-1, 3-1-1
Game 1 easy going for him as he lands Sneak Attack->Griselbrand into Emrakul.
Game 2 I’m able to stick down the combo + Crypt in turn one but am one mana short to activate Grindstone for the next turns. He builds up playing Sneak Attack but meanwhile I found the land to activate my combo and clear his graveyard with the Crypt.
Game 3 he begins with a Leyline of Sanctity. I lay down Bridge on turn one and he couldn’t win anymore. We play draw go for quite a while and he counters my Jaya Ballard and all attempts to blast his Leyline and so we get into time.

Round 6 vs. Carlos with Dreadstill 1-1-1, 3-1-2
Round 1 I mull down to 5 but go for the Welder protected combo after blasting two Stifles and keeping Dreadnought of the table.
Round 2 I had to mull again. He grudges away my Servant and get Counterbalance online. After hitting blind twice with CB I’m not able to win any more. A Dreadnought beats me down.
Round 3 I had to mull again. He leads with Torpor Orb and follows with an early Dreadnought so I have to use my Recruiters/Servants as blockers to get it over the time. Draw.

3-1-2 as the day ends.

I'm pretty comfortable with this list and it felt good even I didn't play for a long time. I need to test looting a little more to give a statement about it. But as I remember it was never bad. It didn't felt tutorable artifact hate and the extra Blasts in the SB were needed. Ensnaring Bridge was the mvp card all day and gave me a chance to win epecially against the hard Matchups. Definately worth their slots!

Also I don't think a splash is worth it, the deck runs smoothly with those SDT and Lootings. I never was in a situation were I thought about having Tutor for Grindstone. I don't agree about blasting into Daze against RUG, I would rather save the Blasts to force Bridge/Moon through as Drew already mentioned. That's done deal in most cases.

[Kap'n Cook]

I think I need to clarify what I meant when I said 'blast into daze'. Obviously everything is very hand dependent. What I meant is this. Lets say your starting hand is REB, Grindstone, Top, Mountain, Ancient Tomb/City, Blood Moon, Goblin Welder/Recruiter and you are on the play. There isn't access to a third mana on turn one or fourth mana on turn two for blast backup. Also, this type of opening hand is actually quite common. You drop turn one mountain. If you play top, welder, grindstone or whatever and they do have a daze in hand, then you can be sure as hell that your blood moon will be dazed turn 2. For me, I have preferred that they daze in this situation not only because it makes blood moon more likely, it also slows down their clock by another turn or two even. If Tarmogoyf hits play turn two then your only shot is to try to blast it with an active painter or block it forever. If they force your blood moon well they are on like 4 cards or something with one land in play. Again, very situational, but I like it when RUG can't cast any spells besides bolts.

Obviously if your hand is Blast, Blast, Mountain, Mountain, Recruiter, Painter, Blood Moon or something like that it isn't correct to just randomly blast their delver turn one. I only meant that if you have hopes of laying down an unmolested moon on turn two without backup, you might as well try to remove their delver. Either it gets countered and thats one less counter for moon, or their delver dies. I can live with that. Hope this answers any questions

[jandax]

Like I said in my post above, I beat every deck that isn't burn or packing Eldrazi or belching on turn one

My experience in Ghent summed up right there

[Dresden]

Dark Zero, KapnCook or anybody else with some insight - how did you side with those decklists you posted against UW Miracle and RUG? Do you keep in the bolts vs rug? What to side out then? Also, keep welder in?

[GoblinZ]

I donnot have ensnaring bridge in SB, so I keep lightning bolt in after game one against rug and just board out task mage for a single spellskite.

Against uw miracle, I board out bolt for some revokers, blast and vexing shusher.

[Kap'n Cook]

My normal sideboarding against rug has been something like -phyrexian metamorph, -faithless looting, -lightning bolt, and -great furnace(wasteland insurance) for a blast and 3 bridges. Bolts only hit delver and the smallest of goyfs but I do like keeping 2 in for now. Maybe I'll test out dropping all of them.

[Julian23]

Your insurance against Wasteland is not having the land in the first place? Awkward :confused:

[Kap'n Cook]

it helps mulligan decisions. Against a lot of decks I'll side out a mini welder package (one each of welder, looting, and furnace)

I haven't found siding out a furnace awkward.

[Julian23]

If having that Great Furnace in your starting7 is really that bad that it actually pushes you close to mulliganing, siding it out can be borderline-ok. But only because of that.

Otherwise, siding out lands is pretty bad; especially against Canadian. If you're still running several nonbasics (say 5+) after siding out Great Furnace, you shouldn't side it out in the first place.

[Kap'n Cook]

@julian what does your list look like? If I fan a good 7 and it's one land furnace vs one land mountain I'll mull the furnace. What are your findings?

[Julian23]

So no matter whether you side out the Great Furnace, the hand will be a mulligan..in which case you are better off just maximizing your landcount against decks that attack your manabase.

Having [double non-basic] in your hand is still better than having [nonbasic, spell] against a deck that attacks your manabase. Also, I don't have a list, just trying to help out with general theory as I stumbled across your boarding plan. Also, I like seeing people doing well against Canadian Threshold ;-)

[Kap'n Cook]

I'll admit that I don't know much magic theory. Hell, I wouldnt even know how to really play another deck without making numerous mistakes. The only thing I know is that what I've been siding in and siding out has been working. I will try your idea out. I just don't know what to cut. Maybe jaya.

For others, I played in an event and went 2-3, beating black/white stoneforge and death and taxes while losing to burn, elves, and enchantress. Im really annoyed with losing to burn and especially belcher so what are people's thoughts on packing leyline of sanctity? Besides those two, it would also help against random decks like pox or something but mainly burn and to force the goblin plan for belcher.

My proposed new sideboard could be something like this:
4 crypts
4 leyline
3 e bridge
1 metamorph
1 vandal
1 revoker
1 blast

I have liked spellskite but many times I'll just fetch another painter or a welder for protection. Spellskite has been really nice when ive drawn it but not as a recruiter target Has anyone tried something like this before? Is thorn of amethyst preferred? With this new proposed sideboard affinity is harder but the bigger problem would be chalice of the void.

[Malchar]

Leyline of Sanctity - The best choice against storm, belcher, and burn. You can also add some number of chalice of the void and/or phyrexian revoker if you need additional slots. Leyline of sanctity has the advantage of being the hardest to bounce with repeal, it dodges rebuild, and it dodges all the red shatter effects, which are the most common things that those decks will side in. I figure that if you don't need to mulligan into your sideboard cards, then they aren't worth bringing in anyway, so leylines are perfectly fine.

Leyline of the Void - Similarly, I prefer leyline of the void over tormod's crypt. Leyline of the void has the advantage that it allows you to win through progenitus and wheel of sun and moon. I don't think that you should bring in any graveyard hate against "threshold" or snapcaster decks because those interactions aren't strong enough to race your combo. For that reason, I figure that it's best to just have a card that's very strong for the matchups where you need to mulligan into it.

Ensnaring Bridge - I don't really like this card here, but I haven't tested it very much. You shouldn't really need this against aggro because your deck is faster. If you're losing to aggro because they have creature removal, then you probably need to play differently and wait until you have a blast for protection. Against Emrakul or other fatties, there are much better options. The bridge doesn't stop them from going to town with Griselbrand or omniscience, so it's not really useful anymore in those matchups. Against dredge, you should be fine with just using graveyard hate.

As for the tutor targets:

Phyrexian Metamorph - Very versatile, but not particularly strong overall unless you have goblin welder. If you aren't running this maindeck, I don't think it's worth it in the sideboard either because there's no match where you really want to bring this in. Against show and tell, you already have to worry about bringing in graveyard hate for the Emrakul. If you can deal with that, then you should be fine because you have an equally fast combo and a bunch of red blasts. This card is just not proactive enough to warrant use in the deck.

Spellskite - In my opinion, this is the strongest of all the one-of tutor targets. It is amazing against decks that use lightning bolt, which tend to be very hard to beat otherwise. It's also a solid blocker against aggro decks, which tend to have convenient overlap with lightning bolt. If the opponent isn't using lightning bolt, then you probably don't want to side this in though, because like you said, it's not particularly efficient at stopping other removal spells like swords to plowshares.

Phyrexian Revoker - This is probably better than phyrexian metamorph against Griselbrand since they never get a chance to draw seven, and it also hits Jace TMS which has a lot of overlap with Griselbrand these days. It's also good against storm because you can hit lion's eye diamond, goblin charbelcher, and other stuff. This is a good choice for the sideboard because it works against show and tell, storm, and even some dredge decks. I don't think it's worth it if all they have is stoneforge mystic, batterskull, and/or Jace TMS though, because you already have a good matchup there, and you really just want to maximize your combo pieces and protection spells against control decks.

Jaya Ballard - In monored, grindstone isn't tutorable, but this is a tutorable target that sets up a nice combo with painter. This lets you keep hands with two imperial recruiters and no grindstone. It should probably be maindecked or not used at all. Besides being tutorable, the only utility it serves is being able to destroy blue permanents or deal three damage, and those things can be better accomplished with red blasts or lightning bolt.

Manic Vandal and/or Viashino Heretic - If you're worried about batterskull, you should try using lightning bolt or magma jet instead since they take out stoneforge mystic, delver, and most creatures in tribal or affinity decks. I don't think that the artifacts in stax are worth worrying about because your mana base already gives you a huge advantage in that match. You really only need to bring this in against someone who you think is going to use chalice of the void, since it wrecks you at X=1. You can also use Jaya Ballard for this purpose of course.

Here's how I setup my sideboard. I have the leyline of sanctity against storm/belcher and burn. Against storm/belcher, I also bring in the revokers. Against burn, I bring in the spellskites. I think it's actually fine to have more than 1 of each of the spellskites and revokers since they're so good, and in the matchups that you want it, you want it fast.

Against reanimator, dredge, or show and tell, you need leyline of the void. You can also bring in surgical extraction since it's equally good, and it gives you more chances to find something in time. Using multiple hate sources, as in the storm matchup, makes it less likely that they will be able to answer everything. You might also want to bring in phyrexian revoker here depending on the specific decklist that you're facing.

You probably also want to be able to side into the full amount of moon effects and red blast effects. If you don't have these in the maindeck, you can put the rest in the sideboard. This means you get less of the other stuff. You can also use Lightning Bolt/Magma Jet in the maindeck, sideboard, or both, and that can take up a few slots as well.

X spellskite
4 leyline of sanctity
X phyrexian revoker
4 leyline of the void
X surgical extraction
X extra moons/blasts/bolts

I have a Jaya Ballard and/or some equipment in the maindeck to serve as an alternate win condition in case the opponent has something where I can't mill them out in game 1 or an unexpected chalice of the void at X=1. The Jaya and/or equipment is versatile enough that there's no specific matchup where I would want to bring it in, but I still need it in case there's an unforeseen problem, so I have them maindeck until I know that it's safe to side them out for more specific answers.

[Dresden]

Thanks for the SB advice guys, it really helped. I played mono-R painter at Gencon but dropped playing (and losing to) goblins, goblins, burn...

[Kap'n Cook]

http://media.wizards.com/images/magic/tcg/products/rtr/oq2qdcai68_en.jpg

Who knows if any deck will want to pick this up over Progenitus since it doesn't protect itself against Swords to Plowshares. Still, I could see some Natural Order Decks playing with this dude. Just a thought.

On another note, I have been doing well with the sideboard I mentioned above. Leylines have been doing work against burn, combo, and discard oriented decks.


The new omniscience tell deck or whatever matchup is pretty rough. It is fast. Very fast. Game 1 is nearly impossible unless you get a blast heavy hand while providing a clock. That's still a challenge because of burning wish for pyroclasm even under moon lock. My board plan if anyone cares has been drastic, but its been working so far. I bring in every single card except vandal. Out goes 6 moons, 3 bolts, 1 jaya, 1 looting, 1 welder, 1 top, 1 chrome mox.

[Malchar]

The wurm doesn't change anything. It's just a worse version of Emrakul.

I think that the red/blue version of painter might be stronger right now. You get a ton of extra counters to combat show and tell, and you still get red blasts on top of that. The moon effects are a bit weak right now, since they do nothing against our worst matchups: show and tell, burn, r/u delver.

[jandax]

Yet without Moon effects, allllll the other matchups get supposedly worse to a degree, no? Also, I'd add Belcher to that list, as it is pretty hard to beat if they go nuts in the first couple of turns.

[Malchar]

Yea, but you don't have to cut the moons completely. You just lose the chance of a turn 1 or turn 2 moon.

[Pdf]

In the current meta I suggest moving away from Faithless Looting. With Dredge, RUG delver, and Sneak and Show everywhere, the card is to slow and random to win out. It is best when you have time and can grind out the card to give you maximum selection over an extended period of time. In my experience you do not have the ability to do so. Right now if you are committing mana and a card you need to know what value you are getting. That is why I recommend Enlightened Tutor.

My list

4 Imperial Recruiters
4 painter's Servant
4 Grindstone
3 SSG
3 Chrome Mox
7 Blast effects( mix and match anyway you like)
3 magus of the MOon
3 Blood Moon
3 SDT
3 Enlightened Tutor
2 Goblin Welder
1 Jaya Ballard
1 Figure of Destiny
4 City of Traitors
4 Ancient Tomb
4 Bloodstained Mire
2 Plateau
5 Mountains

Side
3 Ensnaring Bridge
2 Faerie Macabre
4 Tormod's Crypt
1 Spinal Villian
1 Blast effect
1 Phyrexian Metamorph
2 Koth
1 Goblin Welder


Seth

Hey Seth. Sounds interesting I was thinking the same thing about trying tutors so good to hear you had some success. Seems like you can imperial for the painter but then you're digging for grindstone and if you have more grindstones you can just go. On the other hand if you have the stone, you can grab whatever in your board and along with a top can have it the same turn.

I was playing with the idea of vial as well to get more mana and be even more uncounter able and for the surprise factor. Then the option of trinket Mage may be viable instead of the tutors. Unfortunately I think it's vials or tutor package and the tutor may be more powerful as much as I love vialing in anything and having more 3 cc creatures will slow things down.

Seth I'm assuming bloodstained more is due to missing cards or misdirection rather than for another reason of not choosing arid Mesa or am I missing something here?

Also thanks to cap'n for his tip on self stoning :-) hadn't thought of an emergency stone with welder in play to go off. Would love to pull this trick off!

[vennie]

In this list i do not think there is a difference between mire and mesa because all fetchable lands are mountains!

[Kap'n Cook]

Vial isn't what this deck wants to be doing. It'll be turn 4 by the time you can start putting recruiter or magus into play, and you'll have had to play vial turn 1. If you're worried about counterspells just run the full 8 blasts or some goblin welders like my list.

The leylines have been amazing on another note

[Michael Keller]

Have you guys thought about Rest in Peace with Enlightened Tutor?

[jandax]

You mean like the Helm/Line combo?

[Malchar]

Have you guys thought about Rest in Peace with Enlightened Tutor?

I was running leyline of the void before I could even cast it. I'll definitely be checking this out, although at some point I wish I were just running the helm of obedience combo instead. I think that using faerie macabre is still very justified as well, since you can recruit it.

[Michael Keller]

You mean like the Helm/Line combo?

Well I suppose you could go with Helm, but I was thinking just Rest against Emrakul or other similar troublesome decks. It's not a bad one-of in the main and it's incredibly versatile against a lot of other decks in the format.

[sroncor1]

Yeah the fetch land you use doesn't matter as they are all mountains. I just like the old card frame better really. Sorry I've been away for a while. Applying for residencies has been killing me. Rest in Peace is a card that def needs to be looked at. Although I'm not sure the helm package is needed it is worth looking at.

Seth

[Michael Keller]

Because Rest in Peace actually gives you game against Eldrazi decks, you could (if you wanted to) board in to a single Helm in the board. Helming into Emrakul or Griselbrand seems like a solid play, too.

[Malchar]

They just announced that they're reprinting loyal retainers in the commander's arsenal product:
http://www.wizards.com/magic/magazine/article.aspx?x=mtg/daily/feature/218b

Perhaps there will be a reprint of imperial recruiter in the near future as well? I hope that this doesn't hurt their value too much.

[jandax]

Forget value, I just don't wanna play the mirror

EDIT:

@Hollywood: I tested the Enlightened Tutor splash and it just clunks the deck up. After a long session we concluded that it's better to play to the deck's strengths (combo out fast or turn 1 blood moon) and have your good sideboard cards for the bad matchups.

Right now I see Dredge and other fast combo decks, Red decks like burn and goblins and Zoo to an extent and decks with inevitability like dedicated control to be the worst matchups. At least that was my experience back in Ghent, only lost to two red decks and Show and Know that day. If anything I'd like to start some chatter about effective yet narrow sideboard options to combat these strategies

[Kap'n Cook]

Even if they reprint recruiter, the price for the original probably won't fall. If anything, there will be new players of the deck who want to 'pimp' their recruiters with the old ones.

Also, I spoke with Hollywood about creating a new thread and creating a new primer so I'm working on that currently. If anyone wants to help out let me know

[jandax]

Gonna register the following this Sunday, should be a 200+ event:

8 Sol Land
4 Mountain
4 Red Fetchlands
3 Great Furnace
3 Chrome Mox
3 SSG
4 Imperial Recruiter
4 Painter's Servant
4 Grindstone
2 Sensei's Divining Top
3 Gamble
4 Red Elemental Blast
3 Pyroblast
2 Goblin Welder
1 Wurmcoil Engine
4 Blood Moon
3 Magus of the Moon
1 Jaya Ballard, Task Mage

SB:
4 Leyline of Sanctity (matchups I consider bad are Burn, goblins, zoo, and other dedicated beatdown or highly disruptive deck. Uncommon but enough to put you in the losers bracket)
3 Tormod's Crypt (Could also be Faerie Macabre because Recruiter tutors it up, or Surgical Extraction or something)
3 Ensnaring Bridge (Show and Tell is a bad matchup, Jace and Omniscience you can handle with blasts and Jaya. Otherwise it holds back the beats)
2 Pyroclasm (trades with lots of cards that would otherwise beat you down. have thought about sulfuric vortex in this slot as another read on a potential metagame)
1 Pyroblast
1 Phyrexian Metamorph
1 Manic Vandal (Recruitable, and sometimes you just need to destroy an artifact. Would potentially sub this for Anarchy on a sick read)

The thing is I can't really be talked out of much, it's pretty consistent, and has won off mulligans to four. If anyone has experience or input they'd like to share, it'd be helpful

[KobeBryan]

Gonna register the following this Sunday, should be a 200+ event:

8 Sol Land
4 Mountain
4 Red Fetchlands
3 Great Furnace
3 Chrome Mox
3 SSG
4 Imperial Recruiter
4 Painter's Servant
4 Grindstone
2 Sensei's Divining Top
3 Gamble
4 Red Elemental Blast
3 Pyroblast
2 Goblin Welder
1 Wurmcoil Engine
4 Blood Moon
3 Magus of the Moon
1 Jaya Ballard, Task Mage

SB:
4 Leyline of Sanctity (matchups I consider bad are Burn, goblins, zoo, and other dedicated beatdown or highly disruptive deck. Uncommon but enough to put you in the losers bracket)
3 Tormod's Crypt (Could also be Faerie Macabre because Recruiter tutors it up, or Surgical Extraction or something)
3 Ensnaring Bridge (Show and Tell is a bad matchup, Jace and Omniscience you can handle with blasts and Jaya. Otherwise it holds back the beats)
2 Pyroclasm (trades with lots of cards that would otherwise beat you down. have thought about sulfuric vortex in this slot as another read on a potential metagame)
1 Pyroblast
1 Phyrexian Metamorph
1 Manic Vandal (Recruitable, and sometimes you just need to destroy an artifact. Would potentially sub this for Anarchy on a sick read)

The thing is I can't really be talked out of much, it's pretty consistent, and has won off mulligans to four. If anyone has experience or input they'd like to share, it'd be helpful

You are a brave soul...with so many show and tell decks, you want to play a mill deck in a meta like this?

[jandax]

You are a brave soul...with so many show and tell decks, you want to play a mill deck in a meta like this?

Yes. Yes I do.

Gotta lucksack with the deck anyway, why not extend that luck to pairings?

[Malchar]

Gonna register the following this Sunday, should be a 200+ event:

[decklist]

Why not try rest in peace instead of tormod's crypt in the sideboard splashed off of a plateau and the fetchlands? It seems like you'd be able to win a turn sooner against show and tell, and the only disadvantage is that it costs 2. In my experience, I find that I usually have extra mana in the early turns while I'm assembling the combo, so it should be easy enough to cast. Otherwise, I think that faerie macabre is actually better because it's searchable. When you need it, you need it.

[Koby]

Why not try rest in peace instead of tormod's crypt in the sideboard splashed off of a plateau and the fetchlands? It seems like you'd be able to win a turn sooner against show and tell, and the only disadvantage is that it costs 2. In my experience, I find that I usually have extra mana in the early turns while I'm assembling the combo, so it should be easy enough to cast. Otherwise, I think that faerie macabre is actually better because it's searchable. When you need it, you need it.

I'm not sure I follow your logic.
2 mana utilizing a splash color (requiring fixing) with RIP
0 mana utilizing no color with Tormod's Crypt

Either way it requires an additional card to win. Once you fire off the combo, both cards will ensure no library shuffle occurs.

Faerie Macabre gets rid of the offenders (up to 2), but the reshuffle still occurs. I don't think this one is useful for the purpose of circumventing Emrakul/Eldrazi.

[Malchar]

Oh yea, I forgot that the problem only occurs with Progenitus, not the Eldrazi. (The whole "turn sooner" thing doesn't even make sense except with respect to faerie macabre.) Without leyline of the void or rest in peace, the combo will only give you a draw game against a deck using 2 or more Progenitus. Since this particular fatty isn't as popular anymore, it might be worth the risk. You can always use the aggro backup plan.

[Kap'n Cook]

Jandax are you hoping to use Gamble to reliably get Wurmcoil into the graveyard for Welder? 6 mana is kinda steep when you take Blood Moon into consideration.

And please do not board Leyline of Sanctity in against Goblins

[jandax]

Well, Gamble is there as a bit of card filtering, and it's just fun to cast to be honest. Tactically it could be something else, but so far it has been good and fun. And yes, with a Welder out and a topdecked Gamble you can put a Wurmcoil in the yard. Not part of the design, just a little residue of good luck.

Tonight I had a testing session against Goblins (splashing black for sets of TS/Therapy, and Virtue's Ruin/Perish) and UR Omni-Show, two bad matchups. I had replaced the welder package with two Koth and an extra Top and Koth did not so badly. The reason I wanna play this deck is to slam a blood moon down, so with that in mind, it seemed natural that Koth and his relatively easily to obtain ultimate would give some reach to a deck full of 1/1's and 2/2's. In testing he performed as a win-con in one card, and not another fragile combo that is Goblin Welder. I'm keenly aware of the interactions of Welder in this deck, and am willing to sacrifice it as a win-more slot for something that actually helps when it counts.

And I didn't mean to imply that Leyline of Sanctity would come in against an archetype like Goblins. It's up to discretion as to whether or not they'd be good. I will say this, against any deck packing a lot of discard Leyline is pretty good. There's no SOP with Imperial Painter. Mono Red only affords so many options to all the threats Legacy format can throw at you. So long as Blood Moon is good, we're sitting on the right side of the table metinks.

[sroncor1]

@jandax- I do believe there is a SOP with the deck. Now that does depend on the color you are playing, but some cards really should and shouldn't be played. I think you need more graveyard hate to be honest. Somewhere around 7 is the correct number, although I'm not sure what they should be anymore. Rest in Peace is a really strong card that allows the deck to get around one way that the deck was traditionally hosed. No leylines should ever be used in the deck. The reason for this is simple, if you were to use one you would have to play the mulligan to it. I can't think of a deck in legacy that they would improve so much and which was so bad to start that I would play that gamble. Just run the regular crypts and other spells you can actually cast as drawn.

About Koth in general, I do think he deserves a place in the 75. However the list is very tight and I do not think control decks are so popular to justify this at the expense of cards like Welder. Against BUG and Jace control decks he is a complete house, but a total dog in other match ups. And to be honest you aren't that bad against Jace to start with.

Blood moon is good in about half of your match ups. The other ones it is so so to actually hurtful as it will slow us down. I often times side it out game two if I am on the draw almost always if I played it game one. If your opponent knows you have the Moon effects then they will mulligan and or play around it. Making it far worse on the second or fourth turn of the game. I still keep it in if I am on the play as it can still fuck up someone's world.

I do not think Gamble belongs in the deck. It has never proven itself in testing. The randomness is a bad thing in a deck that has no ways to fix its draws. If you aren't playing white for E tutor, then I do think another tutor adds to the deck. SDT would be a much stronger card. It fuels your welder, allows your grinding of yourself to be stronger and with fetches helps get rid of deck cards, which unfortunately does happen with the way the deck is designed. My version of the deck hasn't changed much, except I am working on Rest in Peace in the board. The Helm combo is not a terrible idea and something that I am playing with in the board right now. I am sticking to the E tutor package as I think having what you need is too important still.

Seth

[jandax]

@jandax- I do believe there is a SOP with the deck. Now that does depend on the color you are playing, but some cards really should and shouldn't be played. I think you need more graveyard hate to be honest. Somewhere around 7 is the correct number, although I'm not sure what they should be anymore. Rest in Peace is a really strong card that allows the deck to get around one way that the deck was traditionally hosed. No leylines should ever be used in the deck. The reason for this is simple, if you were to use one you would have to play the mulligan to it. I can't think of a deck in legacy that they would improve so much and which was so bad to start that I would play that gamble. Just run the regular crypts and other spells you can actually cast as drawn.

About Koth in general, I do think he deserves a place in the 75. However the list is very tight and I do not think control decks are so popular to justify this at the expense of cards like Welder. Against BUG and Jace control decks he is a complete house, but a total dog in other match ups. And to be honest you aren't that bad against Jace to start with.

Blood moon is good in about half of your match ups. The other ones it is so so to actually hurtful as it will slow us down. I often times side it out game two if I am on the draw almost always if I played it game one. If your opponent knows you have the Moon effects then they will mulligan and or play around it. Making it far worse on the second or fourth turn of the game. I still keep it in if I am on the play as it can still fuck up someone's world.

I do not think Gamble belongs in the deck. It has never proven itself in testing. The randomness is a bad thing in a deck that has no ways to fix its draws. If you aren't playing white for E tutor, then I do think another tutor adds to the deck. SDT would be a much stronger card. It fuels your welder, allows your grinding of yourself to be stronger and with fetches helps get rid of deck cards, which unfortunately does happen with the way the deck is designed. My version of the deck hasn't changed much, except I am working on Rest in Peace in the board. The Helm combo is not a terrible idea and something that I am playing with in the board right now. I am sticking to the E tutor package as I think having what you need is too important still.

Seth

I ran the deck yesterday but dropped after going 2-2 to draft with the rest of the folks in the car. Beat Goblins and Burn the first two rounds, then lost to a new U/W Miracles variant running Helm/RiP in the main deck. Interesting interaction, couldn't be a bad sideboard package as a part of graveyard hate dedicated slots already existing in the board. Then I lost a die-roll matchup in TES. To be honest I was just playtesting the deck.

About the white splash, I can get behind it. I tested some and it was just lacking ummph, but will likely go back to it for a little more stability. And I meant to type "a" instead of "no" SOP, dunno about that slip.

[Kap'n Cook]

Jandax how was the wurmcoil? There was an scg list that used one along with a solemn simulacrum a while ago so I am curious how helpful it was over something like metamorph.

[Kap'n Cook]

Has anyone tried sideboarding a Martyr of Ashes? I searched the thread but only found two brief mentions. My extreme hatred of Belcher led me to search for a tutorable sweeper. It doubles as a wrath against Goblins, Maverick, or other Storm decks even. The only other cards that I found that would be somewhat similar are Subterranean Shambler, Krark-Clan Shaman, Bloodfire Dwarf, or Fire Ants. It's too bad Goblin Swine-Rider isn't better or else I would sideboard him in a second.

[jandax]

Wurmcoil can get pretty filthy if you are going the Welder route. Originally I had Metamorph in the sideboard, but when I dropped the Welder package I moved it to the main simply for outs to bad matchups.

Focusing on Welder; If you get this engine going, you're doing a lot to achieve inevitability. I could run out a list of sweet interactions but they all revolve around Goblin Welder, who protects the main combo, generates tons of advantage with Wurmcoil, and can even disrupt opponents (Sensei's Divining Top, artifact mana, etc) Wurmcoil is pretty boss when using Welder and Gamble. It turns every topdeck'd gamble into a Welder target. I mean, it's just pretty nuts when it's not clunking up an opening hand.

[Kap'n Cook]

Holla at Yowell getting 18th

http://sales.starcitygames.com//deckdatabase/displaydeck.php?DeckID=50667

[jandax]

Witchbane orb....

Maybe that's the replacement for Leyline of Sanctity this deck needs/could use....forgotten about that crap rare.

[Kap'n Cook]

I went to Xanadu in Baltimore, MD this past weekend and ended up winning the tourney without dropping a match.

I'll post my list again.

4 Ancient Tomb
3 City of Traitors
2 Great Furnace
1 Arid Mesa
8 Mountain

4 Recruiter
4 Painter
4 Simian Guide
3 Welder
2 Magus Moon
1 Phyrexian Metamorph

4 Blood Moon
4 Grindstone
3 Sensei Top
2 Chrome Mox

2 Faithless Looting
3 Lightning bolt
6 blast (3/3 split)

The board
4 Leyline of Sanctity
4 Tormod's Crypt
3 Ensnaring Bridge
1 Pyroblast
1 Jaya
1 Manic Vandal
1 Martyr of Ashes


Round 1 Miracles
I applied pressure by trying to drop a blood moon on him in the early turns but it got countered. I ended up getting the combo out and the pivotal turn was he flipped a terminus during his draw step, i activated stone, he played swords, I countered, he countered back. I was out of gas and he dropped a counterbalance and eventually found a rest in peace followed by helm
The second game I just had too many recruiters and painters to deal with and milled him out. Game 3 Blood Moon kept him off of white mana for his hand full of swords, terminus, enlightened tutor etc. He only had a scroll rack out and the blood moon prevented any shuffling. I began jaya blasting his islands and beating for 1 or 2 until I drew a grindstone.
2-1

Round 2 was against a friend playing RUG

Game 1 he fetched, brainstormed turn 1 followed by goyf turn 2. I had played 2 basic mountains at that point and bolted the goyf endstep. My turn I played my ancient tomb and played blood moon with blast backup. From there I had to wait about 15 turns until I could combo out. Game 2 I was getting beatdown until I stabilized with an ensnaring bridge at around 6 life. A few turns later I combo.
2-0

Round 3 against manaless dredge
He wins the roll and announces he will draw so I instantly assume manaless. I open my 7 of painter, stone, ancient tomb, lightning bolt, metamorph, welder, something else. So if I draw a land turn 3 is guaranteed. I go turn one painter, turn 2 stone off of the tomb, and turn 3 draw the land. Game 2 I open up ancient tomb, city of traitors, painter, stone and 3 other cards. I made a pretty big mistake here. I play painter turn 1 and he asks 'do you have it?'. I say yes and he discards and I activate stone turn 2, but he says since I didn't name a color grindstone will only work normally. I was pretty flustered from my error and ended up calling a judge when he went to dredge his turn after we resolved grinstone. The judge said it was mandatory to choose a color so I asked if my opponent would just scoop. He agreed so I dodged a bullet but still felt like an ass for missing that.
2-0

Round 4 Regular Dredge

Game 1 the crucial turn ends up being when I have 3 mountains with Painter, stone, and blast in hand. I play painter but not the grindstone thinking that I would just lose if i couldn't counter what he did on his turn. I probably overestimated the flayer kill he was rockin and ended up losing the game. Game 2 went crazy long with natures claiming my great furnace and whatnot. I never found a crypt but was close to comboing out. I needed to get a grindstone so I could play it and activate the next turn. Another claim ruined that plan. Faithless looting came up clutch the next turn. I drew a mountain, flashbacked looting drawing bolt and grindstone. Discard the land and bolt and play grindstone. Next turn combo. He said that I drew so lucky but that's just how painter does I guess. Game 3 I kept a baller hand of Welder, Crypt, Chrome Mox, SSG, great furnace, sensei top, blast. Basically the nuts. So I played Welder, furnace, crypt and mox without imprint so I could weld if needed and keep the ssg for the blast.
2-1

Round 5 ID with death and taxes
Round 6 ID with Dragon Stompy

Top 8 vs Goblins

Both games involved really good hands on my part with super fast combo. Game 2 I was slowed by a vialed stingscourger on Painter and then having it incinerated the next turn. The turn I won my board was grindstone, city of traitors, mountain, chrome mox and I had painter, looting, blood moon and ensnaring bridge in hand. If I drew a land I won. I didnt draw a land but said screw it, I've been lucky all day I'll just loot into a 2 mana land. So I did and I was rewarded. Lucky break
2-0

Top 4 vs Maverick.

I lay turn one blood moon but he has forest into heirarch. It was downhill from there. He was able to green sun for pridemages followed by a jitte. Game 2 I had another turn one moon. That slowed him more since he only had white mana. I ended up getting jaya out with painter to begin going to town on his mana. Game 3 he mulled to 5 looking for a fetch, basic or land+heirarch. Ended up being Horizon canopy into green sun for dryad arbor. I had yet another turn one Blood moon and I just beat down with some dorks for the win.
2-1

finals vs regular dredge again.
Game 1 was long again. We both mulled to 5. There were a few turns where if i drew a grindstone or looting and then looted into one I could weld it back and win. Didn't happen so I got beat down. Games 2 and 3 were wars of attrition where I got nature's claimed, firestormed, therapied but just topdecked what I needed. He kept a hand game 3 without dredgers and couldn't find one in the top 20 cards of his library. I ended up winning with grindstoning myself and then welding in painter the following turn.
2-1

All my opponents were nice to play against. I managed to dodge show and tell and burn but my sideboard is certainly capable of dealing with both of those. As far as the card choices I am very happy with my current list. Welder has been amazing as usual and have loved 3 maindeck. The amount of removal and counters he attracts turn one allow the backbreaking plays of turn 2 blood moon with blast backup or unmolested castings of combo pieces. Metamorph has been doing work too. I played some games against Death and Taxes during our ID and I recruited metamorph to kill thalia, then welded it in to kill jitte. Next turn I welded it in to copy batterskull and go to town. Welder then welded out his batterskull. In a game the other week against Omni-tell I had welder on the field and cast metamorph copying his lotus petal. that gave me instant speed welder shenanigans if he were to try getting emrakul or griselbrand into play. With Rug being so popular blood moon is better than magus. Blood moon wins the game against them. Magus doesn't. Lootings have still been awesome for me and I am going to take this to Starcity Baltimore in a few weeks. I'll answer any questions about boarding or whatever else if anyone is interested.

[Parcher]

113


Congtats on your win Mr. Lucksacky McLucksackerson.


EDIT: In all seriousness, you played well, and deserved the win. Outside of letting me Therapy your Grindstone in one game, which I understand was a judgement call considering you had no idea if I could combo out the next turn. I can't be upset about your nut draw in our first match in game three. I would have done the same had I been on the play. And I can't be upset about resolving four cantrips before you countered the 5th in game three of the finals, without hitting a dredger. I know the risks of keeping that hand. But that rip in game two of our first match when I had already destroyed or discarded most of your relevant cards was pretty fortunate.

[jandax]

I got a question for you, what Mountains do you use?

[Kap'n Cook]

http://gatherer.wizards.com/pages/card/Details.aspx?multiverseid=10643, and click on version 1

[jandax]

Been testing the white splash and it's more of a burden than a help. Gonna get on the Welder plan and have fun with the deck again.

[Kap'n Cook]

At Baltimore I ended up crashing and burning after a 4-0 and 5-1 start. Ended at 5-4 but still made the money due to baller tiebreakers.

R1: UR Burn
R2 Jund
R3: Burn (whaaaaaat I beat burn) leyline was the shit
R4: Crazy games against Dredge (rematch against Parcher with 2 memory's journey side)
R5: Lost to Rug never really had a shot
R6: Miracles

R7: Lost to Rug again. Game 1 was a war of counterspells on my grindstones, painters, and recruiters. The ultimate turn came down to me having 2 welders in hand with chrome mox and 2 mountains in play. I ran out both since it was a win next turn. He topdecks his 1 of fire and ice to blow me out. Game 2 I pulled off the classic blood moon turn 2 pay for daze with ssg move and somehow raced a flipped delver with beats. Game 3 went long and I thought I had this one. After another war on combo pieces he tapped out for a goyf. The turn before I had recruited for a painter, and since he was tapped out I recruited for a magus and dropped it. No responses so the next turn I drew grindstone and played my painter. Force of willed. I can only assume it was topdecked since my magus wasn't bolted on his turn and it wasn't countered either. I played my grindstone and aggressively milled myself looking for a looting or ensnaring bridge or anything. Only drew lands and ended up losing after 6 swings of his 5/6 goyf. Maybe I should have waited for protection? I don't know.

R8: Goblins (misplayed a bunch on top of 5 total mulligans in all 3 games)
R9: Esper

So anyways I went on tilt after that Rug match and cost myself top 16 or top 32. The Rug match for mono-red is very very close and it is really hard to deal with if they win the die roll. This is certainly one place where the white splash for Rest in Peace just dominates Rug. You do lose Welder shenanigans but then 8 of their creatures don't do anything.

[Kap'n Cook]

Starcity has a 20 percent off foreign cards so grab your recruiters and pick up this deck

[Pdf]

I went to Xanadu in Baltimore, MD this past weekend and ended up winning the tourney without dropping a match.

All my opponents were nice to play against. I managed to dodge show and tell and burn but my sideboard is certainly capable of dealing with both of those. As far as the card choices I am very happy with my current list. Welder has been amazing as usual and have loved 3 maindeck. The amount of removal and counters he attracts turn one allow the backbreaking plays of turn 2 blood moon with blast backup or unmolested castings of combo pieces. Metamorph has been doing work too. I played some games against Death and Taxes during our ID and I recruited metamorph to kill thalia, then welded it in to kill jitte. Next turn I welded it in to copy batterskull and go to town. Welder then welded out his batterskull. In a game the other week against Omni-tell I had welder on the field and cast metamorph copying his lotus petal. that gave me instant speed welder shenanigans if he were to try getting emrakul or griselbrand into play. With Rug being so popular blood moon is better than magus. Blood moon wins the game against them. Magus doesn't. Lootings have still been awesome for me and I am going to take this to Starcity Baltimore in a few weeks. I'll answer any questions about boarding or whatever else if anyone is interested.

As always, was great reading your reports. Keep winning and posting!

I would love to hear about some of your sideboarding strategies against the weaker matchups as I'm still learning this deck (and how to play it against the others in the format). Got caught boarding completely the wrong stuff against hive mind and one of the show and tell variants the other day :eek:

[Kap'n Cook]

As always, was great reading your reports. Keep winning and posting!

I would love to hear about some of your sideboarding strategies against the weaker matchups as I'm still learning this deck (and how to play it against the others in the format). Got caught boarding completely the wrong stuff against hive mind and one of the show and tell variants the other day :eek:

What does your list look like? And what matchups are you having trouble with?

[Kap'n Cook]

I've been playing some matches against the new variations of BUG. I'm pretty happy that they're pushing rug back down since its a lot harder. The midrange shardless build doesn't have enough counters for moons and magus won't randomly die to a bolt. It's certainly a good time to be painting.

[Kap'n Cook]

I am going to try out 2 maindeck ensnaring bridges. I feel like they could help out against most of the top decks at the moment, maybe in the place of 1 magus (so now 5 main, 1 magus side) and 1 land or something? This makes Welder even more of a boss. My question is has anyone had success maindecking bridges? The other question is has anyone used the Grove of the Burnwillows tech? It was mentioned a while ago in this thread when a player top 8d with 4 groves and 4 fires. Has there been any testing? Would it even be something you would want in the current meta?

[The Duressed]

This deck has been popping up in Magic-League trials recently with some consistency, so that's kind of exciting. The deck list, with shockingly little variation, is this:

Creatures [19]
1 Goblin Welder
1 Jaya Ballard, Task Mage
1 Kargan Dragonlord
1 Phyrexian Metamorph
1 Spellskite
2 Magus of the Moon
4 Imperial Recruiter
4 Painter's Servant
4 Simian Spirit Guide

Instants [10]
3 Pyroblast
3 Red Elemental Blast
4 Lightning Bolt

Enchantments [4]
4 Blood Moon

Artifacts [9]
2 Chrome Mox
3 Sensei's Divining Top
4 Grindstone

Lands [18]
2 Scalding Tarn
4 Ancient Tomb
4 City of Traitors
8 Mountain

Sideboard [15]
1 Pyroblast
1 Red Elemental Blast
4 Leyline of Sanctity
1 Phyrexian Revoker
1 Koth of the Hammer
1 Manic Vandal
2 Ratchet Bomb
2 Thorn of Amethyst
2 Vexing Shusher

A couple things I notice about this list in particular are:
(1) The relatively large Recruiter toolbox. I've seen a fair number of other lists that only play 2 or 3 one-ofs to search for with the recruiter, and I have to wonder if this is going to lead to some consistency issues. I've always been skeptical of Kargan Dragonlord in particular.
(2) 6 Moons maindeck. I think that Moons are getting better and better recently with the rise of BUG decks (which play generally atrocious mana bases).

I'm also puzzled by the people who play Goblin Welder but no Great Furnaces. It seems like Furnace should be the best artifact to weld away since you can put it onto the battlefield in a way which is completely un-counterable and gives no opportunities for the opponent to respond (I'm looking at you, Counterbalance). I understand that it makes you more susceptible to Wasteland, but I have to wonder how bad this trade-off really is.

I'm also relatively new to this deck, so I have one more question: Is there any consensus on the situations in which Faithless Looting is the better filter spell to play and in which Sensei's Divining Top is better?

[Kap'n Cook]

First off I want to thank someone else for responding. Regarding the varied recruiter targets, it gives you more non grindstone combo options game 1. Chalice at 1, sneak show beat down, completely random shit. Against the current decks to beat (pretty much lacking stp) I prefer welder to bring back anything destroyed or countered. If you play welder, I feel that great furnace is a necessity. I've been raped by wasteland for it, but won far more games having it as an artifact to weld back. For faithless, I like it as a situational filterer. Just discard extra copies of whatever you have in play.

My main advice is keep playing and practicing. You learn when to play looting and what to discard to it. We always need more IP pilots

[Megadeus]

Any deck that plays Kargan Dragonlord is a deck that I can get behind.

[phoenix4]

Anyone, who have tried gitaxian probe instead of lightning bolts?
In this fairly non-emmy/proggy meta, I am going to try this, both for the extra card from the probe, but also information from the opponents hand, to combo earlier? :)

[Kap'n Cook]

I actually tried probes one time in mono-red a few months ago. You definitely do not want them. I could see blue-red painter using them since they are faster and more combo oriented and want to know if they can go all in on LED.

Also, ancient tomb adds up. Probe makes opening hand strategies much harder. And bolt is such a crucial card destroying deathrite before they can decay your blood moon.


Speaking of deathrite, I'm re-adding phyrexian revoker to the main over 1 magus and moving the 2nd to the board over the 7th blast. Revoker is another member in the welder frat house plus I'm tired of going in on magus game 1 early and having it bolted, fire/iced, fork bolted, burning wish into pyroclasm etc.

[The Duressed]

I think that this is currently the best Blood Moon deck, and that's an excellent reason to be playing it right now. I'm with you in trying Phyrexian Revoker in the main again as an end to making your Moons a harder lock. Therefore, I think that it doesn't quite make sense to cut Moon effects as a way to get Revoker into the main. If I were you, I'd do what I could to stay at 6 Moons in the main while also preserving at least 6 Blasts. Personally, I'll toy with shifting either Phyrexian Metamorph or a Faithless Looting.

[Kap'n Cook]

I'm not adding revoker because I'm worried about deathrite, although it certainly helps. I'm adding it because of all the crazy shit that can go down game 1 against non-bug decks. I want serious game against all decks at all times and revoker accomplishes that goal better. For decks where you want the 6th moon it can still come in games 2 and 3

[phoenix4]

Personally, i would never cut to 6 moon effects...
I've always played 7 in the main...

3x Great Furnace
2x Arid Mesa
4x City of Traitors
4x Ancient Tomb
5x Mountains

3x Chrome Mox
4x Painter's Servant
4x Grindstone
3x Sensei's Divining Top
1x Phyrexian Revoker
4x Imperial Recruiter
4x Blood Moon
3x Magus of the Moon
4x Simian Spirit Guide
3x Pyroblast
3x Red Elemental Blast
4x Lightning Bolt
1x Jaya Ballard, Task Mage
1x Goblin Welder

SB
3x Faerie Macabre
1x Phyrexian Metamorph
4x Thorn of Amethyst
1x Pyroblast
2x Koth of the Hammer
4x Leyline of the Void

While BUG is on the rise, i still see a lot of Maverick and RUG Delver, so i'd never cut the 3rd Magus... As always in the meta, there's a lot of spotremoval, and while A-Decay is a bad ass against our beloved deck, i really wanna test G-Probe against those beforementioned decks... Seing if they have that FoW in their opening hand or not, can be game, for either of the players..

Most of the players i play against, play suck greedy manabases, that i'm considering playing the 4th Magus... Whether in the main or on the side, i don't know yet, but, getting that moon effect, turn 1...... i love it :D

Is there anyone, playing iPainter, who's going to GP Denver? If so, a tournament rapport after the gp, would be much obliged ;)

[Kap'n Cook]

Judge foil recruiter exists

[Rampart]

Judge foil recruiter exists

I know, are you going to move your recruiters and focus on Breakfast now? I don't think the price on recruiters will drop that much.

Also why don't your run Trinisphere in your sideboard instead of leyline. Its seems like a strict upgrade over Leyline. 3Sphere breaks storms back and slows down burn which is the two major match-ups you use Leyline in. Am I wrong?

[The Duressed]

Judge foil Imperial Recruiters are extremely exciting to me. Hoorah and all that.

Anyway, I'm surprised you're focusing so much on Trinisphere and Leyline and forgetting altogether about Thorn of Amethyst. The benefit there is that you can cast it much more reliably on turn 1, which we definitely cannot say about Trinisphere. I've also never really liked the mulligan to Leyline plan, personally, so my vote is definitely for Thorn.

[DrewliusMaximus]

It's been a while, but I've been playing again recently. And wow, a Recruiter reprint! I like this move - a few more Recruiters in circulation is a good thing.

In the last two local tournaments, I've had good results with this list:

Land - 22
4 Tomb
3 City
3 Fetch
12 Mountain

Creatures - 17
4 SSG
4 Recruiter
4 Servant
2 Revoker
1 Magus
1 Jaya
1 Welder

Servant Cards - 10
6 Blast
4 Grindstone

Utility and Moon -11
4 Moon
4 Top
3 Magma Jet

SB - 15
4 Thorn
4 Ensnaring Bridge
2 Ratchet Bomb
2 Crypt
1 Faerie Macabre
1 Jaya
1 Blast

I've always liked IP as the best Moon deck. It straight up hates on two entire pillars of the general Lecay meta: nonbasic lands and the color blue. And over the years I feel like the deck remained competitive even as the meta made temporary shifts away from Moon and Blast vulnerability because you can still sub in Burn and Welder cards if needed.

After Eldrazi were released, I eventually decided a Bridge-based strategy out of the sideboard was necessary, and I think that led me replace aggro options like Dragonlord because of the bad interaction. Against Eldrazi decks, I almost always abandon Grindstone completely, replacing all four with Bridges.

Right now Moons seem better than they've been in while, and BUG's presence makes more Magus enticing but I would never want more Magus against RUG. I have liked a "default setting" of 4 Moons and 1 Magus for recruiting in the past and I agree with the pro-Revoker posts for sure.

I play a lot of lands with more card filtering than most builds because I have found it to be more stable over time. After the last five or six tournaments, I like the list above but want to fit a Metamorph back into the 75. I'm considering cutting the 2 Crypts for a Metamorph and either a Heap Doll or a second Macabre. My thanks to Deathrite Shaman for reducing the need for graveyard hate.

If anyone is playing IP at the GP, good luck.

[Kap'n Cook]

22 lands does seem quite high. Is the lack of chrome mox so you can run ratchet bomb in the board for tokens?

[Amon Amarth]

It's been a while, but I've been playing again recently. And wow, a Recruiter reprint! I like this move - a few more Recruiters in circulation is a good thing.

In the last two local tournaments, I've had good results with this list:

Land - 22
4 Tomb
3 City
3 Fetch
12 Mountain

Creatures - 17
4 SSG
4 Recruiter
4 Servant
2 Revoker
1 Magus
1 Jaya
1 Welder

Servant Cards - 10
6 Blast
4 Grindstone

Utility and Moon -11
4 Moon
4 Top
3 Magma Jet

SB - 15
4 Thorn
4 Ensnaring Bridge
2 Ratchet Bomb
2 Crypt
1 Faerie Macabre
1 Jaya
1 Blast

I've always liked IP as the best Moon deck. It straight up hates on two entire pillars of the general Lecay meta: nonbasic lands and the color blue. And over the years I feel like the deck remained competitive even as the meta made temporary shifts away from Moon and Blast vulnerability because you can still sub in Burn and Welder cards if needed.

After Eldrazi were released, I eventually decided a Bridge-based strategy out of the sideboard was necessary, and I think that led me replace aggro options like Dragonlord because of the bad interaction. Against Eldrazi decks, I almost always abandon Grindstone completely, replacing all four with Bridges.

Right now Moons seem better than they've been in while, and BUG's presence makes more Magus enticing but I would never want more Magus against RUG. I have liked a "default setting" of 4 Moons and 1 Magus for recruiting in the past and I agree with the pro-Revoker posts for sure.

I play a lot of lands with more card filtering than most builds because I have found it to be more stable over time. After the last five or six tournaments, I like the list above but want to fit a Metamorph back into the 75. I'm considering cutting the 2 Crypts for a Metamorph and either a Heap Doll or a second Macabre. My thanks to Deathrite Shaman for reducing the need for graveyard hate.

If anyone is playing IP at the GP, good luck.

Your deck looks good. A couple of questions. Why no Great Furnace for Welding? A pair in place of Mountains doesn't seem like it should make you that much more vulnerable to Wasteland. However, I am a big believer in playing more lands. There is real value in not auto-losing to Wasteland so I can see the value in playing more basics. I really like Magma Jet. That card is awesome. How has it performed for you? How do you win postboard against the decks where you take out Grindstone? Dork beatdown? Am I missing something?

[DrewliusMaximus]

Is the lack of chrome mox so you can run ratchet bomb in the board for tokens?

I would use Mox in an all-out Stompy deck that needs at least two mana to play anything. But I think Imperial Painter can function perfectly well starting with one mana, and then usually ramping to three. Mox is card-disadvantage, puts constraints on the number of artifacts you should play, and is one of those cards that can occasionally cost you a game/match. I just don't think the risk is worth the reward if I am not going all-in on a first-turn Moon effect, and I'm not really doing that.


Your deck looks good. A couple of questions. Why no Great Furnace for Welding? A pair in place of Mountains doesn't seem like it should make you that much more vulnerable to Wasteland. However, I am a big believer in playing more lands. There is real value in not auto-losing to Wasteland so I can see the value in playing more basics. I really like Magma Jet. That card is awesome. How has it performed for you? How do you win postboard against the decks where you take out Grindstone? Dork beatdown? Am I missing something?

Thanks. The Furnace question is fair and it might be worth it, but the singleton Welder is really just a backup option right now. So I don't feel too compelled to support the welding beyond what comes naturally from at least 14+ artifacts and the potential to Grind your own deck. Nonetheless, I don't know whether it would help or hurt more often.

I like playing more lands with at least a full set of Tops to counteract exactly what you mention - "auto-losing". After playing Faerie Stompy, Dragon Stompy and Stax, the appeal of the Imperial Painter strategy to me was that it lets you play 1cc spells but still gives you acceleration (and the potential first turn Moon). A major consequence of this is that you can play Top and completely take control of your draws, not to mention that Sol lands let you play and use Top on turn one. I know Imperial Painter can be played several different ways competitively, but I guess I just really hate losing to my own deck, so I'll sacrifice some explosiveness and opt for more deck manipulation than others might to reduce self-destruction.

Magma Jet does what it needs to, although I wish it did three damage. The scrying fits with the "many lands + card filtering" strategy so I play it over Bolt right now (although there have been times, like when Zoo was the dominant deck, when you had to do three damage).

For the Eldrazi matchups, I bring in the second Jaya along with the Bridges. So you can slow burn for the win along with the dork beatdown plan, which isn't a swift kill but it works under a fairly stable lock.

[Amon Amarth]

Awesome. Thanks for responding. I've won enough times beating down with random dorks but I didn't know how feasible it was here. Maybe I'll pick this deck up since Recruiter is getting reprinted.

[phoenix4]

Awesome. Thanks for responding. I've won enough times beating down with random dorks but I didn't know how feasible it was here. Maybe I'll pick this deck up since Recruiter is getting reprinted.

Well, being the only one - at this point - playing the deck, or being able to play the deck in our local meta, I hope that the reprinting of iRecruiter, will open up for more players, making a scene with the deck, the mirror match is AWESOME! :D

[Kap'n Cook]

Well, being the only one - at this point - playing the deck, or being able to play the deck in our local meta, I hope that the reprinting of iRecruiter, will open up for more players, making a scene with the deck, the mirror match is AWESOME! :D

Haha the mirror match is one the craziest games of magic you can have.

I played in a small tourney (only 16 people) and split the finals over the weekend. I beat 4c zombies, zoo, miracle control, and bug. I definitely liked the 2nd magus side.

@Drew

good to see you back playing IP. Have you tried playing lootings at all? I understand your reasoning behind playing 22 lands but even for me playing 18 lands 2 moxes I sometimes hit little pockets of lands and Sensei top only allows you to see one new card a turn. Plus looting opens up one of my favorite plays of grindstoning yourself to flashback a looting. Lastly, sometimes you just need to ditch cards for ensnaring bridge.

edit: forgot you played magma jet as I was posting. Pretty much the same type of thing as looting away two lands

[DrewliusMaximus]

When I was playing with a more committed Welder strategy, I loved Looting, and it always deserves consideration. I keep coming back to Magma Jet for card filtering because the burn is so useful too, but I'm also consciously abandoning most of the graveyard tricks because of Deathrite Shaman.

Also, if you play the mirror, remember to board out a couple of Servants.

[The Duressed]

http://www.starcitygames.com/article/25486_Eternal-Europe-ndash-Week-One-Of-2013-Legacy.html

I'm pretty happy about the call-out, and the validation that one of the format's major weak points right now is the mana base. Especially if that 12-post deck is actually a thing, Moon effects are the place to be right now.

[Aberosh1819]

http://www.starcitygames.com/article/25486_Eternal-Europe-ndash-Week-One-Of-2013-Legacy.html

I'm pretty happy about the call-out, and the validation that one of the format's major weak points right now is the mana base. Especially if that 12-post deck is actually a thing, Moon effects are the place to be right now.

It's a thing, and it's a blast to play! (http://www.mtgthesource.com/forums/showthread.php?24848-Deck-Turbo-Eldrazi)

[Kap'n Cook]

Good luck to Drew and anyone else tomorrow. From what I recall Texas has a good number of IP

[Kap'n Cook]

Drew represent the camera lets go

[DrewliusMaximus]

Thanks Kap'n.

Just got back to Houston after winning $750. The deck was awesome but I totally fucked up the second game (and match) in the Top 8. At least I'm back home and can sleep now.

[Richard Cheese]

Way to go Drew! Good to see you're still rocking painter.

[The Duressed]

To save everyone the trouble, here's the deck list:

Creatures (18)

4 Painter's Servant
1 Phyrexian Metamorph
2 Phyrexian Revoker
1 Goblin Welder
4 Imperial Recruiter
1 Magus of the Moon
4 Simian Spirit Guide
1 Jaya Ballard, Task Mage

Lands (21)

11 Mountain
4 Ancient Tomb
3 City of Traitors
3 Scalding Tarn

Spells (21)

4 Grindstone
1 Lotus Petal
4 Sensei's Divining Top
4 Blood Moon
3 Magma Jet
4 Pyroblast
1 Red Elemental Blast

Sideboard

4 Ensnaring Bridge
2 Ratchet Bomb
4 Thorn of Amethyst
1 Tormod's Crypt
1 Faerie Macabre
2 Red Elemental Blast
1 Jaya Ballard, Task Mage

Drew, I feel like you made a couple of interesting decisions, all of which go together:
3 Magma Jet instead of Lightning Bolts
4 Sensei's Divining Tops instead of any number of Faithless Looting
3 Fetchlands instead of any Great Furnaces
22 Mana sources instead of just 20 (not counting Simian Spirit Guides), none of which are Chrome Mox, but with one Lotus Petal(?)

How did you like Magma Jet? I'm always happier with Lightning Bolt's CMC of 1, but I can see Magma Jet being better if you expect games to go very long. Basically it seems like your whole deck is expecting to play a longer game, as opposed to one is decided in the earlier turns. Is that correct?

Also, if there's one thing I noticed from watching you play, it's the insane power of Ensnaring Bridge. Would you say that those games are representative of the power of the Bridge in general?

I also notice a second Jaya Ballard in the board and no Spellskites. Any comments there?

[DrewliusMaximus]

Way to go Drew! Good to see you're still rocking painter.

Yep, still playing this. It's hard not to take to big tournament...people don't test much against it and I hate mirror matches.


Drew, I feel like you made a couple of interesting decisions, all of which go together:
3 Magma Jet instead of Lightning Bolts
4 Sensei's Divining Tops instead of any number of Faithless Looting
3 Fetchlands instead of any Great Furnaces
22 Mana sources instead of just 20 (not counting Simian Spirit Guides), none of which are Chrome Mox, but with one Lotus Petal(?)

So the one Lotus Petal was a last minute revision after playing in the Legacy Challenge on Saturday. I replaced a Mountain to act like a fifth Spirit Guide, plus it would potentially feed Welder. I do not like the extra card-disadvantage and potential deadness of Chrome Mox. That one Petal saved the match against the 15th place Four-Color Cascade deck in normal rounds. I won the first game and lost the second with like five minutes left for the last game. My opening hand on the play had a Mountain, SSG, Petal, Moon, and other nonland stuff. That first-turn Moon shut him down allowing me to win quickly even after missing a couple of land drops.


How did you like Magma Jet? I'm always happier with Lightning Bolt's CMC of 1, but I can see Magma Jet being better if you expect games to go very long. Basically it seems like your whole deck is expecting to play a longer game, as opposed to one is decided in the earlier turns. Is that correct?

Generally, I wouldn't say I'm "expecting" to play a longer game but I am sacrificing some speed to control my draws throughout the game, although after boarding against an Eldrazi deck, expecting to play longer is exactly what I'm doing. What I really want to do is get as much of the deck's essence as I can (Stompy+Moon and Painter/Stone+Blue Hate) while minimizing the chance of losing to myself. As you said, Jet helps that cause along with Tops and Fetches, and right now 2 damage is enough to kill many of the targets I care about. I'm not too worried about the 2 CC either in the current meta.


Also, if there's one thing I noticed from watching you play, it's the insane power of Ensnaring Bridge. Would you say that those games are representative of the power of the Bridge in general?

I also notice a second Jaya Ballard in the board and no Spellskites. Any comments there?

Ensnaring Bridge, specifically in a deck that can play out it's hand quickly and control its topdecks, is definitely amazing. It perfectly addresses Eldrazi decks and helps against aggro in general, which are some of IP's biggest problems.

The second Jaya is supposed to help play from behind a Bridge, be an extra answer to Counterbalance, etc. But I'm considering a single Koth instead since anti-creature cards (and Abrupt Decay) don't interact with him. Although I beat the 3rd place Merfolk deck in rounds and punted game 2 to it in the Top 8, Scott Barrentine's Cursed Totem out of the board reminded me again that diversifying the kill conditions under a Bridge lock is probably a good idea.

I'd love to have Spellskite somewhere in the 75 but I can't justify replacing anything with it right now.

[Kap'n Cook]

Drew what were your matchups throughout the day? Care to do some sort of report?

[.dk]

Also, if there's one thing I noticed from watching you play, it's the insane power of Ensnaring Bridge. Would you say that those games are representative of the power of the Bridge in general?



You haven't lived until you've resolved both Ensnaring Bridge and Bottled Cloister

[Richard Cheese]

The second Jaya is supposed to help play from behind a Bridge, be an extra answer to Counterbalance, etc. But I'm considering a single Koth instead since anti-creature cards (and Abrupt Decay) don't interact with him. Although I beat the 3rd place Merfolk deck in rounds and punted game 2 to it in the Top 8, Scott Barrentine's Cursed Totem out of the board reminded me again that diversifying the kill conditions under a Bridge lock is probably a good idea.

Yes! more Koth in Legacy!

[DrewliusMaximus]

Yeah, I'll get a report up tonight after work or as soon as I can.

[DrewliusMaximus]

I had a good run at SCG Fort Worth last weekend and here’s a report.

Match 1 - Rock: This Rock build had Mox Diamond, so the Moons were not as effective as they could have been, but I did win in two games. The first game was a fairly quick combo after using a Jet for Bob, and the second lasted longer, but Top allowed me to control the game under a Bridge after dropping to 3 life.

Win 2-0

Match 2 - Belcher: In the first game, he Gitaxian Probes twice on turn 1 and creates 14 Goblin tokens on turn 2, but I am able to Top into the combo on my third turn before the second round of attacks, having taken 4 damage from Tomb - so close. In the second game I answered 10 Goblin tokens with Ratchet Bomb and locked the game out with Thorn of Amethyst.

Win 2-0

Match 3 - Four Color Cascade: This was the 15th place deck, which confused the hell out of me because I saw all the RUG cards and Batterskull, but I never saw Mystic in the three games we played. In the first game we traded threats and answers and a late Moon did nothing since he had his basics, but I Topped into the combo when I was at 9 life and he was at 13. In the second game my Moon came too late again to shut down his mana but Bridges gave me time to Top. His Cascade card advantage was too much though and he was able to Grip the combo the two times I tried it. By the time we started shuffling for game 3, there were 5 minutes left to play. I was on the play and opened with Mountain, SSG, Petal, Moon, Top, Blast, and Recruiter. The first turn Moon was not met with FOW, and that won the game. I missed a land drop before finding Top, playing it, using it at the beginning of upkeep 4, and then finding the combo.

Win 2-1

Match 4 - Merfolk: This was the 3rd place deck, and I’ve played Scott before. In game 1, I drew a strong Moon hand with Magma Jet. I thought it might be possible that Scott wasn’t playing Merfolk and Moon could be an ok start, but I should have known better. He won the first game and didn’t really have a chance. In game 2 I had Top, Blast and Bridge and was able to play out my hand slowly, going down to 5 live before locking the game under Bridge with multiple Blast available. Game 3 was similar to the previous one, and I went down to 7 life but won under Bridge.

Win 2-1

Match 5 - UB Tempo: This was the 29th place deck piloted by my fried Will. Not knowing what he was playing, I put him on BUG after seeing Bob and blue land in the first turns of game 1. But when he Dazed a Recruiter and Sinkholed a land I realized this was not BUG. He beat me down with a Stifled Naught about four or five turns after gaining advantage with Bob. In game 2, we fought it out until I was down to 6 when Bridge stabilized things and I was able to combo. For game 3 on the draw I kept a hand with Tomb, SSG, Top, Revoker, Bridge and some other nonland stuff. I figured I could not ask for much more than 2 mana sources and a Top in my opening hand and was hoping he would not have the perfect Thoughtsieze followed by land destruction. But he did, so Top was discarded, I played Tomb and Revoker, and then he Wasted the Tomb. After I’m left with no land and a Revoker against Bob I’m totally ready to lose, but we trade Revoker for Bob attacks for a few turns while I draw another SSG and Bob deals him a bit of damage too. Finally, I’m able to draw a Mountain and play Bridge, which stabilizes my life loss. From there, Will is forced to Edict his own Bob after going down to 4 life, and I Jet him down to 2. A few more turns later I am able to combo to win a game I had no business still playing in.

Win 2-1

Match 6 - Esper Stoneblade: This was the 5th place deck. Unfortunately for Jason (really nice guy), he was given a game 1 loss for some deckcheck reason (list mistake or sleeves?). So he begins game 2 on the play, but I have a pretty amazing hand with Tomb, SSG, Moutain, Servant, Blast, Top, and something else. He does not have Thoughtsieze, so my first turn Servant with Blast for his spell (can’t remember what) followed by Top let me take the game pretty quickly.

Win 2-0

Match 7 - Dredge: I expected that at 6-0 I could just draw in, but there were only 3 undefeated decks and David Thomas was paired up to me at 5-1. It was weird because I had the best tie-breakers but David had already played one of the other 6-0’s. I agreed to concede to David’s Dredge deck after looking at the other tie-breakers.

Concession 1-2

Match 8 - Reanimator: I finally sat at table 1 and drew with Gus Landt.

Draw

6-1-1 and into the Top 8. Unfortunately, after the top 8 deckcheck, the judges recommended that I replace my sleeves because they were worn and some of them had marks on them. So I got new ones but of course the cards were damn slippery and shuffling was a bitch.

Top 8 - Merfolk: Jackpot! I get paired with the best possible matchup and I’m playing Scott again. In game 1 I have to mulligan to 5 and keep a hand with a Mountain as the only mana source with Top, Blast, and other stuff. That was not enough to keep up with a decent 7-card start for Scott. In game 2, I knew the goal – answer his threats when necessary, get down the Bridge, and protect it from Hurkyl’s Recall. I kept my opening 7 and played out the strategy as planned, but Scott had landed Cursed Totem and Pithing Needle on Grindstone as we both continued to drop permanents. For some reason (I can come up with lots of excuses but it was really just stupidity on my part), I got impatient later in the game and tried to use Blasts to destroy Totem, free up my Jaya and Welder, and be able to combo for the win. The problem was that I only had two blasts and a single Servant out, and he was able to hard cast FOW and Dismember the Servant. That left me on tilt and I misplayed my way out of a third game as Scott was able to Recall eventually with enough counter backup and attack for the win.

Kind of sucks to choke in the Top 8, but we had agreed to split the prize and I had to drive back to Houston for work on Monday so I was not too disappointed about the self-induced early exit.

The deck was awesome, as usual, and I liked this build’s balance of fast Moon plays and topdeck control. As I mentioned in a recent post, I would consider a Koth instead of the second Jaya in the board, but most of the other stuff all seemed necessary.

When I have a chance, I’ll try to write up what I board in/out with this build against most decks.

[Kap'n Cook]

In your round 5 match on camera (I forget which game, 2 or 3 under your bridge?), the commentators and everyone else (me included) were wondering why you didn't activate grindstone with your last 3 mana. Your opponent was tapped out and you had goblin welder in play. The various twitter folk and commentator consensus was playing around snuff out, but even that doesn't make sense because you just weld painter back in.

[Richard Cheese]

Drew,

With all that Top action, why only run 3 fetches? Is it a lifeloss issue with Tomb?

[Kap'n Cook]

Drew,

With all that Top action, why only run 3 fetches? Is it a lifeloss issue with Tomb?

Blood Moon and there isn't a splash color

[jandax]

What Mountains do you guys use?

[Richard Cheese]

Blood Moon and there isn't a splash color

But it's mono-red, so who cares if your fetches become mountians? Pre-moon you get more shuffle effects, post-moon there's no difference right?

[Koby]

What Mountains do you guys use?

http://magiccards.info/scans/en/an/91.jpg

[DrewliusMaximus]

In your round 5 match on camera (I forget which game, 2 or 3 under your bridge?), the commentators and everyone else (me included) were wondering why you didn't activate grindstone with your last 3 mana. Your opponent was tapped out and you had goblin welder in play. The various twitter folk and commentator consensus was playing around snuff out, but even that doesn't make sense because you just weld painter back in.

Hmm. If he was tapped out, then I misplayed. But I remember playing around Stifle and I believe the time you're referring to included an SSG in hand, which I wanted to save to go off with a red mana left over to Blast. I tried a few google searches for it but couldn't find archived coverage, but I'm happy to comment on it if it's available.


Drew,

With all that Top action, why only run 3 fetches? Is it a lifeloss issue with Tomb?

That's the biggest reason. Life loss becomes an issue a significant number of times, and I managed to win at 4 life or under at least twice last weekend. Another thing I've noticed is that, especially with other filter cards available (not just Jet and Top, but also Grindstone with Top or Welder), there are more than a few times I actually want to keep the cards I see with Top but still have access to all my mana...in other words I'd rather have a Mountain than the Fetch. Of course there are plenty of other times that Fetching keeps me from stalling out, but life loss is a big enough deal to avoid overdoing the Fetches.


jandax
What Mountains do you guys use?

I've been ridin' dirty with some beat up Shadowmoor lands, but I'm going to replace them with Zendikar. I don't like foils (financially lucky for me).


But it's mono-red, so who cares if your fetches become mountians? Pre-moon you get more shuffle effects, post-moon there's no difference right?

About the only time it does matter is for Price of Progress.

[Kap'n Cook]

http://blip.tv/scglive/scgdal-lgc-rnd-5-william-lo-vs-drew-feder-6510435?utm_source=feedburner&utm_medium=feed&utm_campaign=Feed%3A+TSRS7+(TransistorSisterRadioShow%237)

19:30

I am still in shock that you won game 3. Just unbelievable

[DrewliusMaximus]

http://blip.tv/scglive/scgdal-lgc-rnd-5-william-lo-vs-drew-feder-6510435?utm_source=feedburner&utm_medium=feed&utm_campaign=Feed%3A+TSRS7+(TransistorSisterRadioShow%237)

19:30

I am still in shock that you won game 3. Just unbelievable

Ok, so that was a misplay. I was playing around Snuff Out with cards like Daze in mind and I had the next turn planned out with sac'ing Metamorph and having Blast backup, not realizing that Welder had me totally covered that turn...for some reason I was even thinking that I needed an artifact in the yard. No matter what, I should have combo'd.

EDIT: I just finished watching that last game...it was absurd. But worth mentioning is: although the commentators thought Jaya might be better Recruiter target, Welder was the right play because it protected Bridge. Since there was a second Bridge in the yard, Welder could even keep a Bridge out against bounce.

[ivanpei]

Imperial recruiter judge foil! This will make this deck extremely accessible to legacy players. Thoughts now that this might be a highly played deck?

[TerribleTim68]

Imperial recruiter judge foil! This will make this deck extremely accessible to legacy players. Thoughts now that this might be a highly played deck?

You really think the $250 price tag on them Judge promos makes it any more "accessible"? :confused:

[ivanpei]

You really think the $250 price tag on them Judge promos makes it any more "accessible"? :confused:

They'll definitely drop. Look at xiahou dun as an example. The demand for these will be much less than the supply. They're going to print a ton of these for judges.

[Schembo]

They'll definitely drop. Look at xiahou dun as an example. The demand for these will be much less than the supply. They're going to print a ton of these for judges.

You really compare EDH general for legacy staple?? I think better example might be karakas.

[ivanpei]

You really compare EDH general for legacy staple?? I think better example might be karakas.

First of all, this is not a staple. It's played in painter and aluren, that's about it. These 2 are fringe decks and can. Hardly be called staples. Karakas is played in anything that has white.

I used xiahou dun as an example because it's a low print run p3k rare. Even the loyal retainers reprint is much cheaper than the p3k ones. The question is how much cheaper will imperial recruiter be? I think 50 dollars each might be a good estimate as both edh and legacy decks will want it.

[TerribleTim68]

. . . The question is how much cheaper will imperial recruiter be? I think 50 dollars each might be a good estimate as both edh and legacy decks will want it.

If both EDH and Legacy decks want it, the price will stay up.

[The Duressed]

Would you guys mind posting your sideboarding strategies against various decks? I'm trying to get it all worked out, but I'm struggling to make cuts (particularly against Stoneblade, Miracles and aggro decks).

[DrewliusMaximus]

Imperial recruiter judge foil! This will make this deck extremely accessible to legacy players. Thoughts now that this might be a highly played deck?

I don't know that Imperial Painter will be "extremely" accessible but definitely more so than before. Starcity has the new Recruiters listed as "out of stock" now at $199.00 and my guess is that the they will settle well above $100, probably closer to the $200 mark or more. Even then the increased availability might shave $400+ off the price of the deck, and just a few more Imperial Painter players is significant growth.


Would you guys mind posting your sideboarding strategies against various decks? I'm trying to get it all worked out, but I'm struggling to make cuts (particularly against Stoneblade, Miracles and aggro decks).

At some point, I'll write up something more comprehensive but here's how I might sb against Stoneblade and Miracles (based on last posted list, Jaya and Koth are competing for last sb slot) -

Esper Stoneblade: +4 Bridge, +1 Jaya/Koth and -3 Jet, -1 Metamorph, -1 Revoker (if on the draw, possibly also +1 Blast, -1 Moon)
UW Miracles: +2 Bomb, +2 Blast, +1 Jaya/Koth and -3 Jet, -1 Metamorph, -1 Moon

[lambert101]

trying to get into this arch-type when foil recruiter comes out. What would be a good starting list. The op seems outdated. Also, saw Drew's list he did well with at an scg. I was wondering what a more streamlined list would look like. I was toying with a list that goes like the following:

4 x Painter's Servant
4 x Simian Spirit Guide
2 x Magus Of The Moon
4 x Imperial Recruiter
3 x Pyroblast
3 x Red Elemental Blast
4 x Lightning Bolt
4 x Grindstone
3 x Magma Jet
1 x Jaya Ballard, Task Mage
3 x Sensei's Divining Top
3 x Faithless Looting
1 x Lotus Petal

11 x Mountain
4 x Ancient Tomb
3 x City Of Traitors
3 x Red Fetch

Board:
4 x Ensnaring Bridge
1 x Jaya Ballard, Task Mage
1 X Pyroblast
1 X Red Elemental Blast
4 X Thorn of Amethyst ( not sure what other combo hate)
3 x Tormod's Crypt
2 X Rachet Bomb (seems like there could be a better option)

[Kap'n Cook]

trying to get into this arch-type when foil recruiter comes out. What would be a good starting list. The op seems outdated. Also, saw Drew's list he did well with at an scg. I was wondering what a more streamlined list would look like. I was toying with a list that goes like the following:

4 x Painter's Servant
4 x Simian Spirit Guide
2 x Magus Of The Moon
4 x Imperial Recruiter
3 x Pyroblast
3 x Red Elemental Blast
4 x Lightning Bolt
4 x Grindstone
3 x Magma Jet
1 x Jaya Ballard, Task Mage
3 x Sensei's Divining Top
3 x Faithless Looting
1 x Lotus Petal

11 x Mountain
4 x Ancient Tomb
3 x City Of Traitors
3 x Red Fetch

Board:
4 x Ensnaring Bridge
1 x Jaya Ballard, Task Mage
1 X Pyroblast
1 X Red Elemental Blast
4 X Thorn of Amethyst ( not sure what other combo hate)
3 x Tormod's Crypt
2 X Rachet Bomb (seems like there could be a better option)


Most of our updated lists are in the last few pages of this thread.

The general skeleton most maindecks follow is

18-21 lands with 7-8 being sol

4 Painter
4 Recruiter
4 Grindstone

4-6 acceleration in Simian, lotus petal, chrome mox
4-6 moon effects
~4 filter effects in sensei top, faithless
~6 red blasts
~4 removal spells in bolt, magma jet(plus scry for filter)

and then any number of toolbox creatures for recruiter or other specialty cards like koth, goblin welder, the phryexian bros, jaya, vexing shusher, kargan, norin the wary (lol) etc.



Regarding your list, I don't think you should play faithless looting without goblin welders and you'll definitely want the full 4 blood moons in there. The biggest thing is test out different things and build according to your playstyle. Drew likes more lands, I like 3 welders, etc.

[jandax]

I know I have posted in this thread for a little while, but yesterday at a Legacy local I picked up my first two Recruiters for quite a fair price. Nothing new regarding innovation. Just satisfaction in being that much closer to not having to borrow the cards to play the deck.

And I hope they reprint Jace as a Judge foil so we never have to play the mirror. That alone is worth price of entry.

[phoenix4]

As preparation for the upcoming GP Strasbourg, i started playing iPainter again, 'cause I believe it has a ridiculous chance of raping the current meta in Europe..

I will post my current decklist later today for evaluation purposes, but I can - for starters - tell you, that I'm trying gitaxian probes instead of lightning bolts. To some people it may seem stupid, but the benefit - in my opinion - is a greater chance to protect the combo or the turn 1 moon effect.

Now as for the first 6 round tournament with G-probes, I didn't really get the chance to see the probe do what I wanted it to, but it seems to me, that almost any other deck, can't protect itself against turn 1 moon.

Now, I don't know what you guys think, but with the right pilot at GP Strasbourg, I would put my money on painter. :)

BTW: sorry for the spelling if wrong, I'm writing from a phone, and I'm extremely tired... Take care y'all ;)

[jandax]

^^That was my philosophy for Ghent last year. It worked, I only lost to bad matchups and easily won the others because of Blood Moon. Practice practice practice verses a varied gauntlet!

[slayjay]

I am the same opinion and will go for ImperialPainter in Strassbourg. Moon effects are just too strong in this meta with low or no basic lands.

[GoblinZ]

[QUOTE=phoenix4;702645]As preparation for the upcoming GP Strasbourg, i started playing iPainter again, 'cause I believe it has a ridiculous chance of raping the current meta in Europe..

I will post my current decklist later today for evaluation purposes, but I can - for starters - tell you, that I'm trying gitaxian probes instead of lightning bolts. To some people it may seem stupid, but the benefit - in my opinion - is a greater chance to protect the combo or the turn 1 moon effect.

Now as for the first 6 round tournament with G-probes, I didn't really get the chance to see the probe do what I wanted it to, but it seems to me, that almost any other deck, can't protect itself against turn 1 moon.

Now, I don't know what you guys think, but with the right pilot at GP Strasbourg, I would put my money on painter. :)

I personally think lightning bolt is still necessary, for it can be crucial to kill the shaman, lackey or mystics.

I tested against jund and deadguy ale yesterday, it turned out that both of these mu are favorable to some extent. As for TA, blade or thresh, I consider all of them as a bye.

sneak show and goblin are really annoying, so I prepare multiple revokers for the former. And I know nearly everyone here run ensnaring bridge in the sb, but I prefer pyroclasm for it can handle goblin and elves, which are not favorable for us.

I once topped 3 with IP at the largest event ever before in my country(actually the other two of the top 4 are my teammates, so we split the rewards) and I still remembered that exciting night. If I had the chance to a GP, I would definitely choose Imperial painter. Good luck to you all.

[phoenix4]

Well, the bolts are strong, no questions asked, but i really want to try out the probe situation, to ensure the turn 1 moon effect :)

But i have an idea: let's meet in strassbourg, prior to the start and share strategies, for the tournament?
It could be fun, to share knowledge, and hopefully, let 2 iPainter decks, meet in the final :D

[Tylert]

I personally think lightning bolt is still necessary, for it can be crucial to kill the shaman, lackey or mystics.

I tested against jund and deadguy ale yesterday, it turned out that both of these mu are favorable to some extent. As for TA, blade or thresh, I consider all of them as a bye.

sneak show and goblin are really annoying, so I prepare multiple revokers for the former. And I know nearly everyone here run ensnaring bridge in the sb, but I prefer pyroclasm for it can handle goblin and elves, which are not favorable for us.

I once topped 3 with IP at the largest event ever before in my country(actually the other two of the top 4 are my teammates, so we split the rewards) and I still remembered that exciting night. If I had the chance to a GP, I would definitely choose Imperial painter. Good luck to you all.

How's jund an easy match-up for Ipainter? (Not saying that it isn't, but i want some insight).
Abrupt decay for grindstone or painter, lightning bolt for Painter, Targeted and random discard. seems like a good match-up for them... :)

[phoenix4]

How's jund an easy match-up for Ipainter? (Not saying that it isn't, but i want some insight).
Abrupt decay for grindstone or painter, lightning bolt for Painter, Targeted and random discard. seems like a good match-up for them... :)

Throw down a blood moon on your first turn, lucksack your way through or slam the painter with blast backup, then you're in control :)

I'm not saying that it's the easiest MU, But you have a decent chance against Them :)

[jandax]

Well, Jund is just like Zoo and other three color beatdown decks. They have spot removal for Painter making it either a priority of or cumbersome to protect the combo. For red decks in general, I'd have some sort of sweeper in the side and a plan B win condition as well. Spellskite picks up slack by eating Lightning Bolts and stuff. Pyroclasm kills damn near anything that isn't a Tarmogoyf or Wild Nacatl. Ratchet Bomb does the same effect as Pyroclasm but is an artifact. I'd proxy the deck up and get to testing, it's sure to be a relevant match up

[GoblinZ]

How's jund an easy match-up for Ipainter? (Not saying that it isn't, but i want some insight).
Abrupt decay for grindstone or painter, lightning bolt for Painter, Targeted and random discard. seems like a good match-up for them... :)
my teammate plays very tightly, but I win nearly all the games when I go first, and win many when he goes fist.
decay is annoying, I add a spellskite in the main deck which is really helpful in this mu. And even sometimes I cannot shut him down totally with blood moon, I can still prevent him from casting abrupt decay. Jund is much slower than zoo sometimes so I have time to recover from discard with help of top.

[Malchar]

I used to play umezawa's jitte or sword of light and shadow as a backup plan against zoo style decks. I'm not sure it's that great since they can just remove your guys in response to the equip. However, it turns every single creature in your deck into a potential threat, and with recruiters and spirit guides in addition to the real threats, I figure that they won't be able to remove everything. Once you land an equipment, you can start chaining recruiters to get a ton of value, especially if you use sword of light and shadow and get to start returning creatures from your graveyard as well.

I really like magma jet over lightning bolt. I don't think that paying the extra mana is too bad because the deck usually has extra mana during the early game when you're setting up the combo. Also, only dealing 2 damage isn't a huge disadvantage either. I don't know of any creatures where the extra 1 damage matters except something like wild nacatl or sometimes tarmogoyf.

[ceustice]

Is there any reason why the decks that run Bolt don't run Galvanic Blast it just seems better that one point of damage different could kill Goyfs more often.

[Malchar]

You usually don't have 3 or more artifacts unless you have the combo assembled. In that case, you can just win immediately. I really prefer the scry effect from the magma jet anyway and the damage is just a little bonus.

[GoblinZ]

I really like magma jet over lightning bolt. I don't think that paying the extra mana is too bad because the deck usually has extra mana during the early game when you're setting up the combo. Also, only dealing 2 damage isn't a huge disadvantage either. I don't know of any creatures where the extra 1 damage matters except something like wild nacatl or sometimes tarmogoyf.

scry effect is great. the only difference between bolt and jet in my opinion is that lightning bolt can kill the turn one lackey, hierarch, llanowar elves or shaman to slow down your opponent when he or she goes first. I think sometimes it is crucial, but it is no doubt that jet is better in other situation, so now I have both lightning bolt and magma jet(2/2).

[Malchar]

With simian spirit guide, lotus petal, and other effects like those, you still have a chance of killing a turn 1 lackey or mana elf. It's not as efficient, but the scrying can almost be as good as card draw in a deck like this which has so much chaff. It probably comes down to a meta choice though. I've used bolt for a number of months as well and it is very nice. It's sweet to attack with a bunch of recruiters and then finish them with a couple bolts to the dome. You can also surprise an ad nauseam player who got too greedy.

[lambert101]

@drew or Kap'n Cook
Any sideboard updates with boarding strategies? I am still looking at this deck and wanted to know any new list ideas?
Thanks.

[Kap'n Cook]

@drew or Kap'n Cook
Any sideboard updates with boarding strategies? I am still looking at this deck and wanted to know any new list ideas?
Thanks.

What matchups do you want to know board plans for?

[r3dd09]

Almost bought the playset on ebay that sold for around 750. I've always been interested in the deck, but pimp>recruiters

[lambert101]

@Kap'n Cook

I do not have a particular match-up in mind. Was just interested in general boarding philosophy. The main looks very tight in most lists and I have no idea what to cut without making the deck stumble.

Thanks for the help.

[phoenix4]

So, how many painters are going to GP Strasbourg? :)

[DrewliusMaximus]

I haven't had time yet to write up my full sideboard strategy, but I'll try to soon. Right now, I only feel like one sb slot is up for grabs and everything else seems necessary.


^^That was my philosophy for Ghent last year. It worked, I only lost to bad matchups and easily won the others because of Blood Moon. Practice practice practice verses a varied gauntlet!

I like this comment. You can't expect Moon to auto-win every game. It'll win some games for sure but your deck needs answers to a variety of problems to win consistently.

Kap'n Cook wrote a pretty good skeleton list of Imperial Painter cards a few posts ago.


The general skeleton most maindecks follow is

18-21 lands with 7-8 being sol

4 Painter
4 Recruiter
4 Grindstone

4-6 acceleration in Simian, lotus petal, chrome mox
4-6 moon effects
~4 filter effects in sensei top, faithless
~6 red blasts
~4 removal spells in bolt, magma jet(plus scry for filter)

and then any number of toolbox creatures for recruiter or other specialty cards like koth, goblin welder, the phryexian bros, jaya, vexing shusher, kargan, norin the wary (lol) etc.

Regarding your list, I don't think you should play faithless looting without goblin welders and you'll definitely want the full 4 blood moons in there. The biggest thing is test out different things and build according to your playstyle. Drew likes more lands, I like 3 welders, etc.

This looks generally accurate as a baseline for iPainter. From the skeleton, you can consider things like:

Go all-in on Moon effects and acceleration or not?
Go all-in on Blasts or not?
How to use burn spells to complement the plan?
What other targets for Recruiter toolbox?
Embrace Welder strategy more or less?


It might be time for a new primer for this deck. Unless someone else wants to, I'd be willing to write one up.

[Kap'n Cook]

Just finished scrubbing out of Edison after starting decent. Ill write more tomorrow. In short I beat bad matchups, lost the two good ones thrown my way, then lost to u/r burn and omniscience.

Round 5 I got a camera feature for game 2. I didn't know that welding metamorph in yard for revoker in play apparently allows you to choose revoker. Never knew or even thought about it before a judge commented on it after the game.

Drew I have a primer written without matchups that is decent. Pm me your email.

[Kap'n Cook]

Alright so here we go (Spoiler: I suck). List is the same as my previous posts (2 looting 3 welder etc)

Round 1: Zoo (win 2-1)

Game 1 and 2 he had a bunch of creatures that were bearing down. When I activated stone, game 1 he didn't have removal, game 2 he did. That's pretty much all the matchup comes down to. Game 3 I led off turn 1 Martyr of Ashes to his nacatl. He didn't want to commit more creatures to the board so I took a hit and then recruiter for recruiter to buy time. 2nd recruiter got welder. in response to painter he ancient grudged my grindstone. in ended up coming down to facing lethal and i have painter, welder in play with 4 mountain + ancient tomb with hand of ssg ssg blast and i know about a sensei top on my library. i played top. tap to draw a card in response weld for grindstone. basically i can beat the ancient grudge in his yard but nothing else. so i now have 3 mountains and a dead tomb untapped and drew looting. i played it with my 3rd mountain trying to bait 2 removal if he had it. i pitched the 2 cards i drew and passed my turn hoping he would play removal on painter end of my turn. he didnt so i had to try during his upkeep. he grudged, i blasted and was holding two lands.

board: in 3 ensnaring bridge, 1 martyr.......out 1 magus, 1 metamorph, 1 revoker, 1 blood moon on the draw. on play in 2 bridge, 1 martyr, out 3 rec targets.



Round 2 against wur delver (loss 2-1) this guy top 4d, beating the dredge guy I came up with. If I had just won this match maybe he would won his top 8 match.

Game 1 I had planned on dropping a turn 2 daze protected moon with chrome mox, mountain mountain, ssg in hand. He stifled the mox trigger so i just dropped it next turn and attacked for the win. Classic blood moon win.
Game 2 I kept Ancient Tomb, Top, Grindstone, Painter, Blood Moon, Recruiter, Blast or Bolt. Drew non land so i led Turn 1 top intending to spin it. It got pierced so I played grindstone. Then i got wastelanded and didn't draw a land until i died to delvers and mr. traft.
Game 3 I finally stabilized at 6 life after some lavamancer activations, a traft hit and some tomb damage with a blood moon and ensnaring bridge with a painter and welder in play and no hand. The cantripping in his earlier turns found him his 2 bolts to kill me.

Board: in 3 bridge, out 1 magus, 1 metamorph, 1 revoker



Round 3 vs Scapewish (win 2-0)

Game 1 I think he did nothing turn 1 and turn 2 green sun for veteran explorer. I played painter with a tomb and blasted the burning wish that was going to get cabal therapy I assume. Next turn I just rip grindstone and combo.
Game 2 I kept Leyline, tomb, ssg, blood moon, mountain, top, recruiter. Basically stopped all interaction whatsoever. He never found a green source and I eventually just combo.

Board: in 4 leyline, 2 bridge, 1 jaya....out 3 lightning bolt, 2 chrome mox, 1 metamorph, 1 great furnace. I knew that scapewish brought in slaughter games and most likely additional discard and i went moon plan meaning you do not want to set off their explorer with bolt. The rest of the siding is in case they somehow get deed out and try to wipe out all your mana.



Round 4 vs Burn (win 2-1)
Game 1 I dropped a turn 1 blood moon to see see him lead fetch into lavamancer. I played a top and just started topping away into lands and a grindstone. he was beating with 2 lavamancers with no food in the yard and i topped and saw 5th land and painter. drew both and won while he was tapped out at 2 fetches figuring i would die anyways next turn if he had fireblast.
Game 2 I kept a leyline hand on 6 and he proceeded to draw a lot of non-targeted burn plus a goblin guide. I couldn't stabilize in time.
Game 3 I kept a 7 something along the lines of double painter, mountain, mountain, welder, blast, looting figuring it could gum up the ground and play some welder control against smash to smithereens. I actually lay beats with painters for a few turns when he drops a pyrostatic pillar when we are both at 10 and he has no board presence to my 2 land, 2 painter, 1 welder board state. I keep the beats coming and I know that there isn't a way for him to win through his pillar so I beat down for the win.

board: out 1 magus, 4 blood moon, 1 metamorph, 1 revoker, 2 ancient tomb...in 4 leyline 3 bridge, 1 martyr, 1 jaya



Round 5 vs esper (loss 2-0)

this was the off camera feature while that graverobber turn one jank was the main one.
Game 1 I never saw a moon which would have shut down all his lands and was taking beats from a batterskull. I got a painter into play with a grindstone but had no protection whatsoever while he had like 4 lands untapped. I topped into a second grindstone and cast it with mana to activate both ready. I figured I had to go for it or just die to batterskull in a turn or two and he had double swords.
Game 2 we were put on camera and I kept 2 mountain, welder, revoker, metamorph, blast, looting? maybe. Turn one welder to his ponder. Turn 2 I drew city of t and played revoker naming stoneforge. he turn 2 played stoneforge fetching sword of fire/ice. Then I ripped moon and played it with blast backup if necessary. resolves. he played sword. I then cast metamorph with my 3 lands and he forced which was completely unexpected. I then announced welder targeting metamorph and revoker and basically fucked myself over because I thought I could name revoker on sword with the metamorph but then assumed I couldn't because it would be in the yard. I also assumed at that point that it was too late to go back so I just named welder. After the match I learned that the metamorph thing apparetnly does work and I could have chosen to copy revoker. If I wasn't stupid either I could have looped blockers for the mystic with sword (weld revoker for metamorph, copy welder. my turn use the metamorphed welder to weld itself for revoker and repeat) but I am dumb and it cost me the game when he had a basic plains to swords my painter and then force my blast.

Yea, I suck. I maybe could have even tried blasting the plains to see if my opponent would screw up and not force that.

Board: In 1 manic vandal, 1 jaya...out 2 chrome mox. I like having no zero-artifacts to destroy when I sometimes weld out batterskull/jitte for their engineered explosives.



Round 6 Jund (win 2-0)

Game 1 I play turn 1 top and he hymns turn 2 and hits an ancient tomb and painter. luckily he didn't hit the other ancient tomb I had or the blood moon and I won from there.
Game 2 I keep a leyline hand with welder and top and grindstone and just manipulate my way to victory while a liliana of his keeps ticking up doing nothing.

board: in 4 leyline 2 bridge...out 1 magus, 1 metamorph, 1 revoker, 2 chrome mox, i forget the last one.



Round 7 vs Death and Taxes (win 2-0)

Game 1 I keep double great furnace, ssg, recruiter, grindstone, 2 others. He played flagstones turn 1 (i thought white stax maybe?) I played grindstone. He played port and thalia so I played turn 2 rec to get painter. He wasted a furnace. then ported the other on my upkeep. I draw a city like a champion and play painter. He scoops.
Game 2 he plays vial and I play a painter off a city and a mox and have a blast for anything. he plays revoker on grindstone so i play welder and play grindstone and sac my city. I blast the vial and then draw third land, weld out revoker for his vial and win.

board: out 4 blood moon...in 1 magus, 1 jaya, 1 manic vandal, 1 martyr

So feeling pretty pumped to be at 5-2 at this point. Around 40th or so.



Round 8 vs U/R delver (lose 0-2) (where the hell was all the bug, storm, and show and tell lol)

Games 1 and 2 I basically just get beat down really quick by guides and delvers and burn spells on my painter and dazes on my recruiters and everything as I keep searching for anything to do.

board: in 4 leyline, 3 ensnaring bridge...out 1 magus, 1 metamorph, 1 revoker, 2 blood moon, 1 ancient tomb, 1 other card



Round 9 vs Omni (aka oh shit) (lost 1-2)

I keep a hand of city, mox, welder, recruiter, blast, blast, metamorph figuring I have no idea what I am playing against. I go get a turn one painter so i can have blast protection turn two. he volcanics into ponder or something so its still up in the air. I play painter and he forces pitching flusterstorm. i force back after i assume he is playing sneak and show and i want to be able to blast his sneak attack. he dazes. I begin the beats with recruiter. over the next few turns he starts trying to rebuild and burning wishes for a show and tell. end step I blast his basic island since i had drawn another painter. he doesnt have anything to show and tell so i blast his lotus petal leaving two volcanics. i play a blood moon and keep beating for two. he plays ancient tomb and burning wishes for pyroclasm. i beat for 3 then cast my metamorph targeting painter. he pyroclasms away and i beat for 2 a turn over the next 3 turns while he doesn't find a blue source to pull it out.
Game 2 is over so fast with turn 2 grapeshot lol
Game 3 I keep leyline, grindstone, mountain, tomb, ssg on a mull to 5. not too shabby. over a few turns he forces a jaya and plays a griselbrand. I basically need a bridge or i die. so i recruit for a welder and play it, thinking that grindstone will allow me to mill myself and see more cards the next turn instead of just getting metamorph and watching it get countered. he attacked with grisel and drew 7 and played a needle on grindstone. i drew for my turn and it was a city of traitors. next card: ensnaring bridge which he said he had no bounce in his 75 for. oh well. this matchup sucks anyways

board: in 4 leyline, 3 bridge, 2 crypt, 1 jaya, 1 magus...out 2 grindstone, 4 blood moon, 3 lightning bolt, 1 sensei top, 1 painter.


If i had known I was going to have these matchups I would have put 2 spellskites main but oh well. Crazy that I didn't face fast combo, rug, bug or tribal.


Comment and dissect as you please.

[jandax]

Have you tried Witchbane Orb instead of Leyline? I mean, you're already running three Welders and Looting. Ever find yourself shipping an otherwise good hand for a Leyline hand?

[phoenix4]

Have you tried Witchbane Orb instead of Leyline? I mean, you're already running three Welders and Looting. Ever find yourself shipping an otherwise good hand for a Leyline hand?

I have thought about witchbane orb before, But that would require that i play the welder/looting version If painter, and allthough it's a hood version of the deck, i personally don't wanna take the risk, in this gy gate meta, that there is present at the time :)

But i'm guessing some of you Are taking the risk? ;)

[Kap'n Cook]

Have you tried Witchbane Orb instead of Leyline? I mean, you're already running three Welders and Looting. Ever find yourself shipping an otherwise good hand for a Leyline hand?

If the hand is good without leyline, I have no problem keeping it. Yea it sucks drawing it during your very first draw step, but sensei helps out after that and pitching one to looting always feels nice. I've actually hardcast a leyline (only one time though) by naming white with Painter and welding in metamorph to copy a chrome mox and imprint some random red card. Extremely rare, but hey it's nice knowing it could happen.

My burn match the only game I actually lost was the one with leyline in the starter. The main reason I actually began playing leyline (and not witchbane orb) was after I lost to belcher one too many times and was tired of losing turn 1. I think if Orb was one or two mana less I would sub out leyline's for them. But as it stands 4 mana is just too difficult for turn 1 protection.

[Kap'n Cook]

Another minor update. Played in a weekend tourney where I went 4-2 for 10th place (Seth snuck into 8th like a bastard at 4-2 but I'll let him comment on that)

Beat Maverick 2-1, 5-color slivers 2-1, uw stoneforge 2-1, Omnitell 2-1 (experimented siding out grindstones and other stuff for bridges+leylines plus jaya+magus to basically morph into red death and taxes and won via beatdown both times. Leyline is still good even if it isn't in your opener since you can drop it via show and tell and stop the petals loop)
Lost to Dan Signorini's (nitewolf) Bug 1-2 with fucking null rod sideboard lol. It was close but I couldn't pull off the W. Lost to Jund 0-2 one game because of Jitte the other was just a smackdown.

Anyways, the important part: thoughts.

Jitte is a total bitch to deal with. Metamorph and revoker help but it is still annoying. There were a couple games where I was short on mana so I might try copying everyone else and adding a 19th land and a lotus petal over the chrome moxen. Everything else felt good as usual. Lightning bolt over Magma Jet came up twice, once sniping a jace after a brainstorm and once against a buffed 3/3 winged sliver that staved off lethal and allowed me to block and drop a grindstone off my 2nd land and topdeck the 3rd mana source to win. The scry on magma jet would have helped against Maverick or Jund drawing me into a moon/grindstone quicker.

[phoenix4]

Well, regarding the jitte...
Yeah, it is a total bitch to battle against, That's why i've included 2 in my sb for tonights 35+ tournament....
I Like to start out with the combo and turning into beat.dec for games 2 and 3.

I'm also back to lightning bolts over probes, gonna win tonight :)

If you had the chance to design a card especially for painter, what would that card do? :)

[Kap'n Cook]

Well, regarding the jitte...
Yeah, it is a total bitch to battle against, That's why i've included 2 in my sb for tonights 35+ tournament....
I Like to start out with the combo and turning into beat.dec for games 2 and 3.

I'm also back to lightning bolts over probes, gonna win tonight :)

If you had the chance to design a card especially for painter, what would that card do? :)


How was your probe experiment?

A card? I don't know. Maybe a red/colorless artifact fog bank style wall that prevents all damage instead of just combat that also lets you exile it from your library/gy/hand in response to eldrazi shuffle triggers to exile them haha. I don't see how it could comply with the rules of the game but hey, that's the type of card I would want off the top of my head.

[phoenix4]

How was your probe experiment?

A card? I don't know. Maybe a red/colorless artifact fog bank style wall that prevents all damage instead of just combat that also lets you exile it from your library/gy/hand in response to eldrazi shuffle triggers to exile them haha. I don't see how it could comply with the rules of the game but hey, that's the type of card I would want off the top of my head.

The probe experiment went okay, not that great, but i will try it again, you just need to up the red card count, to compensate for the added non-red cards in the deck :)

As i said, i'm back to L-bolts for a period... It's versatility vs. Probe is something not to be trifled with. :)

I'm testing towards the upcoming GP Strasbourg, so i have nightmares about the SB, though :P

I want cards against Storm, Sneak'n'Show, Jund, Junk and so on, but to boil 'em down to 15 cards..... That's a bitch :D

Any advice is much appreciated. :)

[Malchar]

If you had the chance to design a card especially for painter, what would that card do? :)

Magus of the Grindstone

[sroncor1]

Yes I did sort of luck into the top 8. I beat tendrils, esper stone blade, affinity(wtfuck?) and a graveyard deck. I lost to b/w bob and hive mind ( again wtfuck? Who plays this shit. Although the kid had two summer islands and he kept fetching them. He wanted people to comment. All I thought was hell I have had sex so I win. Although he did win the match). I then beat Dan in the top eight and split with the top four. I used my standard white splash although with the exception of rest in peace in the board I only E tutor once the whole day. Mana stability was never a problem though and I could live with the dead cards for sure.

Ill get a better post/list/report up in a bit. I will say this, I didn't play it but dredge was everywhere. I really like at least seven graveyard hate cards are a must these days. 4 blood Moon feel right to me. With respect to jitte I like metamorph but jack is right the card is a monster. I know you questioned me in the game where I was playing around jitte and lost, but metamorph was the only way for me to beat jitte as I accidentally sided out Jaya. Not sure where it would take my sideboard but I think something like this is where I would go:

7-8 grave hate
2 Koth
3 ensnaring bridge
1 metamorph
1 viashino heretic/goblin settler/moon effect

The point I want to make is I have made concessions with the deck and use no targeted removal in favor of E tutor main decked Koth, and jaya. I am not saying it is correct but they suit the way I like to play the deck and allow for some adaptability after turns 2-3 as you have to pick a game plan very early with this deck for success.

@jack. Yes I was sort of a bastard, but you saw how unlucky I was against your buddy. Mull to four and brick on lands for three turns. Then my first turn moon met basics.

Seth

[GoblinZ]

Is there anyone considering cutting jaya from the main?I think jaya is lesser and lesser useful these days and I usually side it out after game one.

[sroncor1]

I personally think cutting her is a huge mistake. I almost always really like seeing her and her random ability to get out of sticky situations is nice. Maximizing your tool box is one of the really nice parts of Receuiters. I know Jack doesn't like her much in the main but I would never play without her. What would you play in her place?

Seth

[Malchar]

Since you can't recruit grindstone, I like being able to recruit Jaya to combo with a painter. She's fine on her own since you can shoot down annoying creatures, jaces, or other blue permanents. Once you land a painter, you can take out any random things that might be causing trouble like null rod. She is the ultimate silver bullet to find with imperial recruiter.

[GoblinZ]

I personally think cutting her is a huge mistake. I almost always really like seeing her and her random ability to get out of sticky situations is nice. Maximizing your tool box is one of the really nice parts of Receuiters. I know Jack doesn't like her much in the main but I would never play without her. What would you play in her place?

Seth

I have not made the decision to cut it yet. Last time I tutored for jaya was when I play against UW miracle for destroying the counterbalance. I believe it is good against maverick, but maverick tend to disappear and it is okay against deadguy ale, but I sided it out for pyroclasm. it seems jaya is really useless against canadian or jund, too slow against elves if you donnot have it in your opening hand and is helpful only in some occasional situation against show and tell. I am considering to replace it with a metamorphe( I don't have metamorphe in the main right now).

I think I need to test, but really have no time now.

[GoblinZ]

Since you can't recruit grindstone, I like being able to recruit Jaya to combo with a painter. She's fine on her own since you can shoot down annoying creatures, jaces, or other blue permanents. Once you land a painter, you can take out any random things that might be causing trouble like null rod. She is the ultimate silver bullet to find with imperial recruiter.

I agree. I even considered adding one spinal villain in the sideboard years ago, which can be fun, but now I just fear jaya is a bit slow for current meta.

[Kap'n Cook]

My biggest problem with Jaya main is she is just too damn slow. A) We are assuming she resolves and B) We are assuming that she lives a full turn. Revoker and Metamorph answer 90% of the same problems as soon as they enter play plus they can be recurred via Welder if they do get countered/destroyed. I guess I just love Welder so much that I want to abuse him as much as possible.

I understand that I am losing percentage points against counterbalance and that chalice at 1 without a welder or grindstone already in play is basically game, but those two cards conveniently don't do shit against abrupt decay decks. And fine, I will concede that Enchantress with Emrakul is very hard game 1 without Jaya. If the meta was full of counterbalance, control, and tribal and way fewer lightning bolts then I would swap Jaya back main.

[jandax]

Magus of the Grindstone

Such a card would bump Recruiter up another bill or two.

[Kap'n Cook]

Magus of the Grindstone

Let's be real though. If Wizards did end up printing this they would make it blue just so they could fuck over Red some more.

[Michael Keller]

I gave Imperial Painter some old-school respect (http://jupitergames.info/articles/2013/53039/the-cutting-room-floor-imperial-march) this week.

[phoenix4]

I gave Imperial Painter some old-school respect (http://jupitergames.info/articles/2013/53039/the-cutting-room-floor-imperial-march) this week.

How so? :)

[GoblinZ]

I gave Imperial Painter some old-school respect (http://jupitergames.info/articles/2013/53039/the-cutting-room-floor-imperial-march) this week.

I always enjoy reading your article. Blue still dominates the meta and I guess jund may be not that popular in the following days like maverick before. Show and tell is not unwinnable especially for Omnitell. Actually only in the mm era I feel a little disappointed with this deck, it is still a good choice for current meta.

[sroncor1]

@Hollywood- I enjoyed the article very much although I have to say the deck you picked was a bad choice. I remember watching some of those matches and it wasn't pretty. I think top 4 at an event in upstate new York or virginia is far better than 18th as some bum fuck SCG open. But it was a treat to dragon whelp mentioned. If only he was playable anymore.

It's funny I thought the deck was awesome in the MM era. Moving forward I think this deck is really well positioned. There are a few variants out there and I will not try to advocate for one over the other. But the deck has huge potential and I know I'll be playing it at the starcity open in march.

I'm going to ask this to the general forum, has anyone tried the equipment heavy build that Hollywood mentioned and if so did you have solid results in an event. I run rest in peace in my board with 4 crypts so sideboard space os limited but I love the idea of it. Haven't really ever used swords in the deck. Just Jitte. Any thoughts?

Seth

[GoblinZ]

yeah, in mm era blue nearly wiped out all the non-blue decks, therefore painter is well situated without problem. however with mm, blue players can counter REB or grindstone very easily, I may be so greedy that I only wish to crush them rather just to beat them.

[lambert101]

@ Hollywood

Do you have a current list for today's meta?

@ Everyone else
Been brewing the following (used abreviations)

Main:

4 Ancient tombs
3 City of Traitors
9 Mountains
5 Red Fetchs

21

4 S. Spirtguide
4 Recruiter
2 Magus of the Moon
4 Painter
1 Welder
1 Spellskite
1 P metamorph

4 grindstone
3 Top
3 Magma Jet
3 Pyroblast
3 ReB
4 Blood Moon
2 ensnaring bridge

Board:
4 T. Crypt
2 ensnaring bridge
3 Surgical extraction
2 Witchbane Orb
4 chalice of the void

[Kap'n Cook]

@ Hollywood

Do you have a current list for today's meta?

@ Everyone else
Been brewing the following (used abreviations)

Main:

4 Ancient tombs
3 City of Traitors
9 Mountains
5 Red Fetchs

21

4 S. Spirtguide
4 Recruiter
2 Magus of the Moon
4 Painter
1 Welder
1 Spellskite
1 P metamorph

4 grindstone
3 Top
3 Magma Jet
3 Pyroblast
3 ReB
4 Blood Moon
2 ensnaring bridge

Board:
4 T. Crypt
2 ensnaring bridge
3 Surgical extraction
2 Witchbane Orb
4 chalice of the void

Everything looks fine except for the chalices in the board (I am assuming combo hate?)
The only reliable setting for them is x=0 since x=1 messes with you just as much. If you only want to use them to counter artifact mana then by all means play them. Otherwise thorn is probably the card you want in this case

[Michael Keller]

I don't really have a current or updated list of my own at the moment, but rest assured I'll be picking it up again soon.

[GoblinZ]

@ Hollywood

Do you have a current list for today's meta?

@ Everyone else
Been brewing the following (used abreviations)

Main:

4 Ancient tombs
3 City of Traitors
9 Mountains
5 Red Fetchs

21

4 S. Spirtguide
4 Recruiter
2 Magus of the Moon
4 Painter
1 Welder
1 Spellskite
1 P metamorph

4 grindstone
3 Top
3 Magma Jet
3 Pyroblast
3 ReB
4 Blood Moon
2 ensnaring bridge

Board:
4 T. Crypt
2 ensnaring bridge
3 Surgical extraction
2 Witchbane Orb
4 chalice of the void


I donnot like chalice either, and Witchbane Orb is for the combo? it seems your meta is full of dredge

[sroncor1]

I think 7 cards that hit the graveyard is entirely reasonable. It's not so much that dredge is good( it isn't) or that it is played that often( mainly played by bad pilots or people that think entirely too highly of themselves), but it is a deck that you should be able to handle all the time. The graveyard hate is really important for other decks though and gives you fighting chances against show and tell and other Eldrazi decks. These cards allow you to win, while ensnaring bridge allows you to live. Both are important aspects but totally different. I think the real question is should you run ensnaring bridges or something to fight faster combos like trinisphere. Nobody on this board has given a convincing argument or results for actually fighting Eldrazi consistently. I feel like tendrils is a toss up right now and I can live with that as trinisphere doesn't do too much to slide it in your favor. Belcher is a nightmare, jacks martyr deck not withstanding. For me bumping up random aggro and slowing show and tell down is where I want to take my board. Any thoughts?

Seth

[GoblinZ]

I think 7 cards that hit the graveyard is entirely reasonable. It's not so much that dredge is good( it isn't) or that it is played that often( mainly played by bad pilots or people that think entirely too highly of themselves), but it is a deck that you should be able to handle all the time. The graveyard hate is really important for other decks though and gives you fighting chances against show and tell and other Eldrazi decks. These cards allow you to win, while ensnaring bridge allows you to live. Both are important aspects but totally different. I think the real question is should you run ensnaring bridges or something to fight faster combos like trinisphere. Nobody on this board has given a convincing argument or results for actually fighting Eldrazi consistently. I feel like tendrils is a toss up right now and I can live with that as trinisphere doesn't do too much to slide it in your favor. Belcher is a nightmare, jacks martyr deck not withstanding. For me bumping up random aggro and slowing show and tell down is where I want to take my board. Any thoughts?

Seth

do you consider mindbreak trap? maybe add some mindbreak trap along with trinisphere or thorn? And what do you prepare for elves? I think it is really popular right now and the mu is unfavorable although most elves donnot have Eldrazi anymore.

[Kap'n Cook]

do you consider mindbreak trap? maybe add some mindbreak trap along with trinisphere or thorn? And what do you prepare for elves? I think it is really popular right now and the mu is unfavorable although most elves donnot have Eldrazi anymore.


If you were going to play mindbreak trap why not just play leyline which has applications against a much wider variety of decks? Storm isn't that terrible of a matchup for us, like Seth said.

Elves isn't terrible either (no emrakul versions obviously). They are splashing for 1-2 colors with minimal basics so Moon slows them down a ton. If they establish themselves with a few mana elves then you use Painter and blasts to stop their combo and survive as long as possible to find the grindstone. Jaya is sick. Or just add Martyr in addition to Jaya like I do and nuke all their creatures.

@Lambert
looking over your decklist again you will want some recruitable artifact destruction somewhere in your 75


Re: Show and tell
Sure there are a bunch of different show and tell decks but they all run at least Emrakul so you can overlap there. I think the only show and tell deck its really possible to be favorable against is sneak and show since bridge stops all their plans but I will leave that up for discussion. I think Koth is the best win-con against Show and Tell since you can take out the grindstones and just play the hard aggro-control route

[lambert101]

been brewing with my last list and keeping the main the same with the following board which I want to test sometime:
4 T Crypt
3 Surgical
4 Thorn
This package can come in against combo and the yard hate could be used against threshold/ snapcaster mage/ goyf/ and Knights



The last 4 spots I have no idea...I was even thinking 4 Bolts for against aggro

[sroncor1]

To be honest I would not board in graveyard hate against those decks. You don't need it as you are already strong against them and bridges or addition removal will serve you better. Graveyard hate is really only important against dredge, reanimator, and decks that abuse loam (although moon is just better there). The reason I stress 7-8 graveyard cards is that against those decks they are complete houses and they give you splash effect against eldrazi.

I personally haven't had much success using grave yard hate against combo. Maybe in the high tide match up but otherwise I fell like it dilutes your strategy, isn't as strong of disruption as you already have, and overall doesn't help much. I don't really think mind break trap should be here either.

About elves, it's a shitty deck. It pops up every once in a while though. It's hard to impossible to go the aggro root against them. You need to combo so treat them like any deck with eldrazi minus the fact that you shouldn't see them at the top tables and their combo is a lot softer.

I really stress this fact, you can't meta game against everything. Certain decks you just have to hope to dodge. Plan to adapt to a few key strategies and try to break every deck down into one of those strategies so you can attack it. Don't worry about shitty decks. Yes they can be really strong against us but most often bad players are playing them and they don't get far.

Seth

[lambert101]

Magma Jet is becoming more a pain than its worth...Also chrome mox seems to have too much disadvantage then what it is worth. Going to test the following tonight. Let me know your thoughts.

4 Blood Moon
1 Lotus Petal
4 Lightning Bolt
3 Sensei's Divining Top
4 Grindstone
3 Pyroblast
3 Red Elemental Blast
2 Ensnaring Bridge

4 Imperial Recruiter
2 Magus of the Moon
1 Goblin Welder
4 Painter's Servant
4 Simian Spirit Guide
1 Spellskite

3 City of Traitors
4 Ancient Tomb
1 Wooded Foothills
4 Bloodstained Mire
8 Mountain

Board:
4 Surgical Extraction
4 Thorn of Amethyst
1 Manic Vandal
2 Pyroclasm
2 Ratchet Bomb
2 Koth of the Hammer

[Malchar]

You can also think about bringing in some graveyard hate against storm decks. It depends largely on what cards you're packing in your maindeck and sideboard, but it's possible that graveyard hate can become more useful than certain other cards in your maindeck. The main cards that you can hit are cabal ritual, ill-gotten gains, and past in flames. This will turn off all of their card engines except for ad nauseam, which is the worst one, especially if you run lightning bolt. It should also work great against the new hybrid reanimator/storm decks using griselbrand.

I usually like to keep in the moon effects against storm, so it can be hard to find stuff to take out for graveyard hate. I also agree that you probably shouldn't bring in graveyard hate against snapcaster mage, knight of the reliquary, or stuff like that because you already have a good matchup against those cards. The only reason I consider bringing it in against storm is because it is one of the harder matchups and a lot of your other cards become dead.

[DrewliusMaximus]

Hey y'all, just a heads up - I'm going to start a new iPainter thread. I finally finished a primer that will hopefully consolidate some of the important deck info and encourage more discussion.

[The Duressed]

Be sure to post a link when it happens :)

[Michael Keller]

Hey y'all, just a heads up - I'm going to start a new iPainter thread. I finally finished a primer that will hopefully consolidate some of the important deck info and encourage more discussion.

Awesome!

[DrewliusMaximus]

Here's the link to the new thread (http://www.mtgthesource.com/forums/showthread.php?25661-iPainter-2-0-Imperial-Painter-Primer&p=708884#post708884).