Vengevine Blitz (Jund and other G/x variations)

[Koby]

A while ago I got an idea when Bloodbraif Elf was banned that there was still room for a 4 drop hasty green creature for which to terrorize Modern. That led me to the old one-hit wonder Vengevine. I also remember that towards the end of the Shards/Zendikar Standard was a Dredge-o-vine deck that basically just cheated Vengevine in for value and was quite good at it too.

Taking that idea, and Modernizing it, with inspiration from one of MTGO's grinders (@grapplingfarang), here's a mock up of the idea:

Link (http://www.mtgtop8.com/event?e=4770&d=227557)

Creatures
4 Deathrite Shaman
4 Birds of Paradise
4 Gravecrawler
4 Lotleth Troll
4 Bloodghast
4 Vengevine

Spells
4 Lightning Bolt
4 Faithless Looting
2 Abrupt Decay
3 Domri Rade
2 Liliana of the Veil

Lands
3 Blood Crypt
2 Stomping Ground
4 Overgrown Tomb
2 Swamp
1 Forest
4 Verdant Catacombs
2 Arid mesa
2 Marsh Flats

In one aspect, this plays a lot like traditional Jund, but gains a lot from the blitz factor of Vengevine and has solid filtering into value g/y creatures with the likes of Gravecrawler and Bloodghast. Because of these creatures' inability to block, we want to be the aggressor.

Another variation involves cutting the black and going for more of an "all-in" approach using:

Link (http://www.mtgtop8.com/event?e=4515&d=226190)

Lands
4 Stomping Ground
4 Mountain
4 Arid Mesa
3 Verdant Catacombs
2 Forest
1 Scalding Tarn

Creatures
4 Burning-Tree Emissary
4 Tarmogoyf
4 Vengevine
4 Priest of Urabrask
4 Goblin Guide
4 Goblin Bushwhacker
4 Simian Spirit Guide
2 Storm Entity

Spells
4 Faithless Looting
4 Lightning Bolt
3 Manamorphose
1 Burst Lightning

Possibly adding the Bushwhacker into the Jund flavor could enabler the Gravecrawler and Bloodghast to crack in too. It might be a little greedy since the color requirement is steep and it's impact when you don't have the creatures on board is low. I can imagine that a sick turn 3 Bushwhacker/trigger Vengevine(s) would be too variant to rely on.

EDIT: Added card tags

[JDK]

The deck had some success in the last PTQ season. Lists are floating around on TC-Decks.net (search for Modern with Vengevine).

[Koby]

The deck had some success in the last PTQ season. Lists are floating around on TC-Decks.net (search for Modern with Vengevine).

Well that's what I'm trying to discuss -- does this strategy even need to use the dredge mechanic at all? Can we build a deck that uses Vengevine without having to load up on miserable overcosted graveyard creatures?

I concede that Vengevine and Gravecrawler are both graveyard creatures, but they themselves are aggressive P/T to cost ratio compared to Golgari Thug/Stinky.

I believe this deck to be competitive, so I'm tapping into the collective hive mind of The Source to see if we can make it better; or at the very least, offer new alternatives to players looking to get into Modern with something fun.

[Phoenix Ignition]

I've recently gotten crushed on MTGO by a similar list to the latter one you mention. I'm a huge fan of Goblin Bushwhacker in the lists with Vengevine since the haste and +1/+0 on the turn that you trigger Vengevine is pretty great.

I don't like Priest of Urabrask. He's unimpressive by himself and I think you need to go the middle road of these two.

Real quick mock-up of something I would try:

Creatures
4 Deathrite Shaman
4 Goblin Bushwhacker
4 Gravecrawler
4 Lotleth Troll
4 Bloodghast
4 Vengevine

Spells
4 Lightning Bolt
4 Faithless Looting
3 Abrupt Decay

Lands
4 Blood Crypt
3 Stomping Ground
1 Overgrown Tomb
1 Swamp
1 Forest
4 Verdant Catacombs
2 Arid mesa
4 Marsh Flats

As for dredging, I don't like it. I've played against decks that do it and it just seems like they waste their own time. I don't think the manabase is too greedy, right now you can get extremely greedy in modern (especially if your base color is red). Also, having a lot of fetchlands is great for the Bloodghasts.

[chlb]

I've played a list similar to the first one you posted right at the start when modern became FNM legal format. Been a while, so I can't remember the list exactly but I remember having couple of Grisly Salvages there.

Other card I was thinking about trying was Drown in Filth, but never got to testing it. Travis Woo has played them in his grindy dredge variation and they seemed to perform OK there at least. With this deck's desire to deliver the beats, sticking with just Lighting Bolts is probably wiser since they apply reach as well.

In addition to the explosive Lotleth Troll starts this deck can deliver, turn 2 Liliana discarding a Vengevine to be "reanimated" next turn can be such a beating against some decks. Definately a fun deck to play and it has an ability to catch some players by surprise if they are not familiar with the archetype.

[Kayradis]

I used to play Dredgevine in Modern. Did relatively well in the last modern PTQ I did (4-3 I think...)

The list was stupid good against Twins-type list, but had a really bad matchup against R/G Aggro.
I would really like to work more on the archetype tho.
Ill work on something this weekend and try to post something "decent" later.

Looking forward to this thread

[TheDarkshineKnight]

One of the guys over at the game store I play at as been running this deck for a while and has been having success with it. What ended up working really nicely inside the deck was Blood Scrivener, believe it or not. He burns through his hand really quickly and thus is almost always gaining value from Scrivener. Moreover, Scrivener's zombie subtype makes it a lot easier to recur Gravecrawlers.

[Koby]

One of the guys over at the game store I play at as been running this deck for a while and has been having success with it. What ended up working really nicely inside the deck was Blood Scrivener, believe it or not. He burns through his hand really quickly and thus is almost always gaining value from Scrivener. Moreover, Scrivener's zombie subtype makes it a lot easier to recur Gravecrawlers.

That's pretty cool interaction actually. And much better than Dark Confidant which may reveal Vengevine. I'll try it out and see how many prizes I win :smile:

[Phoenix Ignition]

Even cooler that it triggers off of Faithless if it's your last card when casting it (shouldn't be excessively difficult to do). Nice find!

[hamster]

I have tried a lot of different lists throughout the last 6 months (some net decks and some own brews, some with dredge, other more aggressive and finally some more controlling) and finally I just gave up.

There are times where you go T1: Looting (discard 2x Vengevines) into T2: 2x 1-drop and you feel like you're playing the most broken deck in the format. And then there are times where you spend your first 4 turns doing nothing and praying that your random 2/1 dorks will get there.

The problem I had with the deck is the fact that Vengevine and friends get outclassed by goyf etc. really quickly. Your window of opportunity is slim. Vengevine is pretty sick on T2 but is also underwhelming T4 when you're starring at a couple of 5/6 goyfs. Deathrite Shaman, Ooze and all that nonsense don't help either.

Maybe the deck is alright but just doesn't suit my playing style. As I under stand it has had a fair amount of succes so maybe it's not all that bad.

[GaronaDro]

I had success with my version during last ptq season top 8ing a ptq, winning a win and in in another, and going 5-0 in a GP before hitting gw hatebears 3 rounds in a row for consecutive losses. I'm just playing G/B and its less likely to get the nut draws, but I feel it has more answers to the decks in the format. Plus you get to play smallpox which is insane in the modern format full of t1 deathrite shaman. The initial version I made top 8 with can be found here:

http://www.wizards.com/magic/magazine/events.aspx?x=mtg/daily/eventcoverage/dragonsmaze13ptq/0302windsorheights

However, after playing the deck for a while I've moved on to this:

1 Forest
1 Ghost Quarter
3 Marsh Flats
4 Overgrown Tomb
4 Swamp
1 Treetop Village
4 Verdant Catacombs
4 Woodland Cemetery
22 lands

4 Bloodghast
4 Deathrite Shaman
4 Gravecrawler
4 Lotleth Troll
2 Blood Scrivener
4 Vengevine
22 creatures

2 Abrupt Decay
3 Grisly Salvage
1 Life from the Loam
3 Liliana of the Veil
4 Smallpox
3 Thoughtseize
16 other spells

Sideboard
2 Abrupt Decay
1 Batterskull
2 Creeping Corrosion
2 Obstinate Baloth
1 Raven's Crime
2 Spellskite
2 Surgical Extraction
2 Scavenging Ooze
1 Dismember

[riotstarter519]

Hey. I love dredgevine and started getting the cards together for a bg dredgevine with life from the Liam when I came across this:

http://www.starcitygames.com/article/25390_Brad-vs-Todd-Dredgevine-vs-Tribal-Zoo.html

What do you think about brad Nelson's list