Legacy Deckbuilding Challenge - The B/R List

[(nameless one)]

We already know this,

I wanna see Frantic Search in 12-Post decks

[RaZe]

Forget 12Post. The name escapes me but Faerie-Stompy would wreck house.

[Darkenslight]

We already know this,

I wanna see Frantic Search in 12-Post decks

Screw Turbo Eldrazi, the card is nucking futs in Spiral Tide/Solidarity.

[MGB]

// Lands
4 [4E] Mishra's Factory
2 [MM] Dust Bowl
2 [M12] Buried Ruin
4 [AQ] Mishra's Workshop
4 [EX] City of Traitors
4 [TE] Ancient Tomb
4 [TE] Wasteland

// Creatures
4 [NPH] Phyrexian Metamorph
4 [SOM] Steel Hellkite
4 [SOM] Wurmcoil Engine
4 [WWK] Lodestone Golem

// Spells
4 [NE] Tangle Wire
4 [UL] Grim Monolith
4 [MR] Chalice of the Void
4 [BOK] Orb of Dreams
4 [DS] Trinisphere

Just a quick list. I don't think the format is quite ready for turn 1 3Sphere turn 2 Wurmcoil.

Unbanned Mishra's Workshop would make MUD the best deck in the format by a wide margin.

Not even all that much of a challenge to speculate about. Just pop 4 copies into the deck alongside the Sol-lands and reap the benefits of the most degenerate mana-engine of a land ever designed.

[joemauer]

I put together a high tide list for a Frantic Search unban:

//Lands
12 Island
3 Misty Rainforest
3 Scalding Tarn

//Instants
4 Frantic Search
4 Brainstorm
4 Force of Will
3 Cunning Wish
4 High Tide
3 Turnabout
1 Meditate
3 Flusterstorm

//Soceries
4 Ponder
4 Merchant Scroll
4 Time Spiral

//Artifacts
4 Candelabra of Tawnos

//Sideboard
1 Turnabout
1 Meditate
2 Wipe Away
1 Snap
3 Pact of Negation
2 Grafdigger's Cage
1 Surgical Extraction
1 Brain Freeze
1 Blue Sun's Zenith
1 Intuition
1 Hurkyl's Recall

The deck is essentially a turn 3 deck now instead of turn 4 but all the hate hits it the same. I would say Frantic Search is pretty safe to unban in regards to its impact to high tide. Maybe it would also make people stop complaining about the deck as well since comboing off doesn't seem to take as long now.

Hmmm. Let's take a powerful combo deck that is already difficult to disrupt and speed it up an entire turn?

I fail to see how this is healthy for Legacy.

[Megadeus]

Yeah I dont think High Tide is a weak deck by any means... It just requires a good pilot and a few 300 dollar artifacts...

[WorstBandNameEver]

Yeah I dont think High Tide is a weak deck by any means... It just requires a good pilot and a few 300 dollar artifacts...

Those artifacts make quiet a difference for a weak pilot like me. Having the extra untap is pretty killer sometimes and can really seem to move the combo along.

I plan to try frantic search doing some fish bowls soon.

Sould I drop some number of ponder or preordain for frantic search? I like preordains in this deck more than ponder.

[feline]

I've tested a "possible frantic search" unban and toyed with it in high tide, if it helps, it's nice, but there's the issue of "Card disadvantage" as in, it doesn't replace itself, and in a counterspell war, that part kinda sucks.

The opposite position on that, would be the 1st incarnations of people saying "I'm playing High Tide now, since I don't have candels but they unbanned Frantic Search"

[TheInfamousBearAssassin]

You would play Frantic Search in Solidarity, where it would be retarded by the by.

Something like:

9 Fetchlands
9 Island

4 Brainstorm
4 Opt
3 Intuition
3 Meditate
2 Flash of Insight
3 Snapcaster Mage

3 Force of Will
3 Flusterstorm

4 Frantic Search

4 Reset
2 Turnabout
4 High Tide

3 Cunning Wish

[DragoFireheart]

Bargain is much, much better than Ad Nauseam. Instead of trying to hit 7 mana and use a Tutor to get your bomb (Ad Nauseam itself limits the number of copies you can play of Ad Nauseam and Tendrils where Bargain doesn't set those kinds of ''rules''), you can either use Show and Tell or ramp to six mana. It has the same options (discard, draw/manipulation) ANT has but it also has the same speed Belcher has (consistently kills turns one and two).

I don't need to build this deck to see how ridiculously powerful Yawgmoth's Bargain is.

Funny, you could almost say the same thing about Griselbrand...

[Lemnear]

ANT has but it also has the same speed Belcher has (consistently kills turns one and two).

Excuse me? ANT is a deck that aims to win Turn 3 with threshold. It does BY FAR not have the Turn 1 kill ratio of Belcher. Please check the ANT thread

[Gheizen64]

This is the direction I would go with Academy. I'm kinda bored with facing idiots on MWS, so I might be willing to spend more time goldfishing and tweaking a list just for my personal enjoyment.

Testing Shawon list as it looked like the most promising of the Academy lists.

4 Tree of Tales
4 Tropical Island
4 Tolarian Academy
4 Seat of the Synod
4 Ancient Tomb
4 Cloud of Faeries
1 Emrakul, the Aeons Torn
4 Crop Rotation
4 Ponder
3 Mox Diamond
4 Brainstorm
4 Voltaic Key
4 Grim Monolith
4 Mox Opal
4 Time Spiral
4 Force of Will

Against RUG
Game 1 : Tolarian, Mox diamond, Mox opal, Brainstorm, 2 Monoliths, Time spiral

I keep hoping for draw + brainstorm to get me something, but i draw another Mox opal, Crop rotation and Force of Will. Meanwhile, RUG has a normal start, and have Daze + Force + Snare in hand available. I scoop. Bad decision by me to keep that hand probably.

Game 2: 2x Mox opal, Ancient Tomb, Seat of the Synod, Grim Monolith, Time spiral, Voltaic Key
RUG: Delver, Stifle, Fow, Volcanic, Fetch, Bolt, Goyf

I keep and go Seat-> Voltaic Key-> Opal. RUG draw another fetch, play fetch and pass. I draw another key, but i have nothing to pierce Countermagic, so i play tomb, Key, Monolith and pass. RUG play a 1/2 Goyf and draw a Dismember (yeah pretty old list). I draw a crop rotation, and pass. I don't need Tolarian right now anyway. RUG draw Brainstorm, play delver, attack. I draw Emrakul, and using crop rotation i could get 9 mana + Tolarian for 5 + 1 from a second Mox Opal from hand. I try to bait it, tap Seat, Opal and Tomb and cast Crop rotation. He BS in response and get Daze, Delver and a Fetch. Put dismember , fetch back. Force on Crop rotation, exiling Delver.
At this point i play another Opal, sacrifice the old one, and then tapping Monolith put me at 5UU, i play spiral. In response, Daze the Spiral in hope to bait out a Voltaic activation (into Stifle), but i just use the extra mana i had left to pay for it. Untap Seat and draw: Voltaic Key, Cloud of Faeries, 2 x force, crop rotation, Time Spiral, Ancient Tomb. RUG don't draw counters or stifle and scoop.
1-1

G3: Force, Monolith, Academy,Tomb, Tree of Tales, Cloud of Faeries, Time Spiral
RUG has: Daze, Volcanic, Stifle, Waste, Dismember, Delver, Force
RUG start with Delver. Draw Tree of Tales, Play tree pass. RUG draw force, flip Delver, attack. Play waste and waste my land. Draw Synod, play Synod, pass. RUG draw another dismember (y i know oldass list i never updates decks i don't play), attack with Delver pass. Draw another Synod. Play Synod, try to cast Monolith, but get Dazed. Delver draw another Daze, replay land, attack pass. I draw and cast brainstorm. Draw 2 Tolarian and a Tree of Tales. Nothing useful, so i put all back. Play Tolarian, and Pass. Delver draw another Delver, play it attack and pass. I draw a Tolarian. At this point i can try to go off either:

By tapping all, playing another Tolarian to get to 6 and cast spiral to have Force backup and hope he has no Daze or a second Force or:
By playing Tree of tales, casting cloud of faeries to untap a UUU producing tolarian and cast Spiral with no Force backup

Since he played nothing in all this turns and he's still on a single land, i conclude the odds of him not having double counters is basically next to nil (and he has 3 in hand, daze + 2 FoW + Stifle)
I decide to do neither, and simply play another tree and Pass hoping he doesn't reveal an instant / cast bolt. RUG draw Mongoose, attack for 4. Now i'm dead next turn and i have to go off. I draw the second tolarian i put on top with BS. Can't win, scoop.
Brainstorm with no fetches fucking sucks.

2-1 for RUG

Game 4: Draw 6 lands + a key, mull into: Tolarian, Voltaic Key, Brainstorm, Time Spiral,Force, Monolith. 0 mana on T1, Tolarian pretty good! Mull again for: tropical, BS, Force, Crop rotation, Seat of the Synod, a good 5 cards hand.
RUG draw: Waste, Volcanic, Delver, Mongoose, Spell Snare, Brainstorm, Flooded Strand

I play Seat of the Synod, pass. He draw waste, play Volc, Delver pass. I draw another BS, play trop and Pass. He draw and reveal Daze, attack with 3/2 (blue best creature color guise) , then play and waste my trop. In response i crop it into a Tolarian (don't BS to dodge Daze). EoT BS to see Tree of TAles, cloud of faeries and Monolith. I put Bs and Tree on top. Draw tree, play Monolith, pass. He draw Dismember, and Waste my Academy. I draw and play the BS, seeing 2 more Tolarian and a crop. I put a Tolarian and crop on Top, play a Tolarian and pass, but i have 0 gas. He draw a fetc, get a trop and play Geese. At this point i draw the crop rotation from before, and wish there were a land that could cast Braingeyser or some shit, i scoop. Brainstorm is useless in this deck.

3-1 for RUG

Game 5: I draw 3 monoliths, tree, Opal, Brainstorm, Ponder. I have no blue source but i just need to draw a land or a 1 cmc artifact to be able to do something with this hand. Looking at my decklist, that's a 23 on 53 cards odds. Not good, i mull into: no lands (Opal Spiral etc...), again mull into: 2 spiral, Trop, Tree of Tales, crop rotation. This shit sucks, i draw useless cards first turns while RUG has a slow start but still steamroll with fetches + BS for constant card quality.

RUG has not mulliganed once for now.

4-1 for RUG

Game 6: Trop, 2 BS, Cloud of faeries, Tree of Tales, Mox Opal, Ancient tomb.
RUGhas: fetch, Delver, Daze, Ponder, fetc, Volc, Spell snare

I play trop, opal, pass. RUG draw force, goes delver. EoT brainstorm into: another brainstorm, crop rotation and cloud of faeries. I put 2 brainstorm on top, and draw 1. I play tree of tales, and crop Trop after floating U. He force Crop pitching Ponder, and i cast BS with the floating U, draw brainstorm, another crop, and FoW. Cloud of faries and crop goes on top. RUG draw a fetch, attack with unflipped delver. I try again to crop, this time the ancient tomb after floating 2. It resolve and i get Academy with 2 in pool. Play brainstorm, draw Tree, Trop and Tree again. Put 2 lands on top, pass. He draw BS, flip delver, attack. Now my Academy give 2 mana, but again i have no gas, seems like there's just not enough space to put tutors for Academy, artifacts and cards to keep you on gas all together.

5-1 for RUG

From preliminary testing:

Sensei would be much better than brainstorm, as you have no ways to shuffle consistently and it gives a crucial artifact for Opal and Academy. Cloud of faeries is useless because you'd rather have a monolith or Key to give you extra mana, and chaining academies is more than good enough for it. Mox diamond also almost never get played, this play more like Spring tide than Belcher, better to build up than go all-in. Change the decklist into:

-4 Cloud of faeries
-4 Brainstorm
-1 Mox diamond
+4 SDT
+3 intuition
+2 meditate

Try again!

Draw: Meditate, Tropical, 2x Monoliths, Ponder, Force of Will, Mox Opal
RUG has: brainstorm,spell snare, 2 Trops,force, delver, goose

Play Trops, Opal and Ponder. See opal, Tree and Tomb. Opal third card, draw tree. RUG draw bolt, play Delver. Draw Tomb, play tree and cast monolith. Opal has metalcraft, pass. RUG draw fetch, attack with Delver, play land, play goose pass. I draw Opal, play Tomb, cast Monolith but get countered by Spell Snare, pass. RUG draw waste, play it and waste my trees (no more metalcraft). attack for 2 pass. Draw ponder, cast it, see intuition, Force and Emmy. Shuffle and draw voltaic key. Play Key with monolith, untap monolith, got metalcraft again, pass. RUG draw spell snare and Delver is a 3/2. Play trop, attack, pass. Draw ponder, play it, see Intuition, Force, Crop rotation. I get Crop rotation and pass, too risky to play it now (better wait EoT). RUG draw Dismember! It's 2012 all over again. He attack, and now i can't use meditate eot anymore (7 life). He pass and i have to win this turn. EoT crop sacrificing Tomb ( i need UU for spiral), and he brainstorm, draw 2 stifles and a land, pitch a stifle to force, put land and dismember on top. I untap and draw intuition. I have 8 mana, just 1 short for intuition->spiral, so i have to cast meditate and hope for some sick 4 cards. I draw: tomb, emrakul, Key, and Force. With the 1 floating mana (used opal + Monolith to cast meditate) i try to untap monolith but get stifle. I force the stifle pitching force to force. I am at 4 and he has a bolt in hand. Untap the monolith, tap, play Key, untap monolith, retap monolith, i now have 4 colorless, and no ways to win because i lack enough mana to intuition into Time Spiral.

RUG 1-0

Game 2:I see Tomb, Monolith, Key, Trop, Intuition, Opal, Crop ortation
RUG: BS, Goose, 2x Waste, Spell snare, Trop, Goose
I play Opal, Trop and Key, pass. He draw fetch, waste my land and pass. He has many lands in hand and only a goose for pressure, so he'd rather trade resources. I draw another trop. Play tomb, cast monolith. Got metalcraft now, and pass. He draw another fetch and try to waste my tomb, but i crop it away and get Academy. I untap, draw Diamond. Play diamond, discard Trop. Tap for 10, Intuition for Spiral, cast Spiral. RUG draw 0 forces, i draw crop, SDT, Voltaic Key, Force, Tomb, Key, Seat of the Synod. Play Synod, Tolarian give UUUU.
With 1 floating mana i cast SDT, then use Seat of the Synod to activate it. I see Voltaic Key, Trops and Opal. This is bad. Tap my tolarian for 6 blue mana, tap opal for G, crop my Tolarian for another Tolarian. I use SDT again and this time i see Emrakul and Spiral on Top. Game is over.

RUG 1-1

Game 3: draw 2x monoliths, 2xOpal, Tomb,Force, Spiral
RUG mull, draw into 2 bolt, force, 2 fethes, Dismember, shitty hand but keep.
Play Fetch, pass. I draw tomb, play Monolith and an Opal, pass. RUG draw delver.Play another fetch and pass. I draw another Time Spiral.. Play tomb. Cast monolith, get metalcraft, tap opal, play another opal, sacrifice old opal, tap Tomb, tap a Monolith play spiral. RUG force, but i force back pitching Spiral, and RUG then double bolt me and i'm at 7 with 1 mana floating. I untap and draw: Academy, Key, Monolith, Mox diamond, Crop ortationx2, and Ponder. RUG drew 0 forces. Play diamond discard academy (i already played a land). With diamond i crop my Tomb for an academy, i'm at 5 and 3 mana floating. I play monolith and Key with those 3 floating mana. Tap academy for 6 blue mana, ponder, i see a SDT, another ponder, and opal, draw Ponder and play it, see 2 opal and SDT. Draw and play SDT, look at 3 top cards, the third is a trop. I tap a monolith, untap Opal, get G and crop my academy into another academy. Now i have 16 mana and a SDT, but no cards in hand. Activate SDT, see Monolith, Opal, Trop, and pass. He topdeck and play a Mastery, play a land, and a goose. Then it's his turn again, and he draw another fetch. Tap volcanic for Brainstorm, see some cards. Play waste, bolt on me and i'm at 2, RUG has 4 cards in graveyard. He play Delver and Daze it, 6 cards in the graveyard. Play waste, waste Academy, 7 cards, Goose attack and gg.

RUG 2-1

Game 4: Description will be shorter now because this is getting annoying. Shitty hand into mull, keep bad 6 of Tomb, 2 Spiral, SDT, Synod, Trop. RUG has 2 BS, Lightning bolt,fetch, Delver, Volc island, Spell snare. I cast spiral on T3 with 1 colorless floating, he BS, find force and counter, then flip delver and attack. I crop my Trop and cast spiral. In response he waste my Academy. In the 7 i draw there's academy but i can't play it as i played already 3 lands. I draw 2 SDT, Meditate, Academy, Ponder, Force and Spiral. However i have no mana since i have no academy anymore. I use the floating mana to get SDT on top and draw an Opal. Ponder, shuffle and draw crop rotation, Opal for crop into Academy again, got only 3 artifacts tho and 2 floating mana. With 1 floating i play SDT and then with the other floating i look top 3, there's a Key. Tap Academy for UUU, tap SDT draw key, play Key i'm at UU, use key ability and untap monolith, play another SDT, and pass (i have 3U and i can't do shit). He untap, draw force attack me for 4, pass. I have to win this turn but he has mor counters in hand, chain academies for 10 mana, try spiral, he force, i force back with hardcast, he cast BS, find a bolt and bolt me, i'm at 1 and my hardcasted force just saved my life. However, in the new 7 he draw a bolt, has still a red mana source and bolt me, i intuition for force, but he force back and it's gg again.

RUG 3-1

Game 5: RUG mulls. Got a decent 7 with Academy and SDT. RUG ponder and pass, shitty hand. SDT don't see much first turns, and i just build up tons of mana. RUG in the meantime get a Delver, but still not flipped. He play a waste and waste the Academy, Ponder, attack. I ponder, see nothing to draw, shuffle back and draw, draw Emrakul. Play Academy. Tap all, crop my academy, but crop get Forced, and i'm stuck at 9 mana. Look top 3 with SDT, and there's another Crop and academy but i have no green to play it and pass. RUG flip the delver and attack. I draw tolarian, but have not enough mana even with tolarian chain so i just play it and pass. RUG just attack again and play fetch. Draw crop, now i can get up to 16 mana. He daze crop but it's not enough, i get exactly 15 for Emmy and win.

RUG 3-2

Game 6: RUG mulls, while academy has a good hand and keep. The first play is a voltaic key that get dazed. Then Delver, then SDT. Then Delver flip attack, then Monolith enter into play and pass. Double bolt at EoT to apply some pressure but RUG has only a land and a dead force in hand, draw another bolt pass. Play Spiral and float UU, RUG bolt again in response and Academy is at 5. RUG has 2 bolts and 2 open mana, as well as a force and a ponder to pitch, so he try to win on the spot. Academy drew no force, and try to dig with SDT, but there's no force in top 3 and gg.

RUG 4-2

Game 7: Both keeps. Academy has the legendary seat of the synod, opal, SDT, activate SDT opening. RUG play a delver T1 (is this list running 15 delvers or something?). Academy play Diamond and Academy T2, and now has fucking 7 mana already. Activate top, there's an emmy but no crop, so we'll tutor with intuition at EoT. Delver flip, play goose. EoT intuition, get spiral and play it. I have no spiral in the new 7, and only 7 available mana even after i play a tree of tales because moxens don't untap, so i pass with intuition and a bunch of mana in hand to tutor again at EoT. A Monolith get snared. RUG attack and now has 3 Stifles in hand+FoW+ Daze.EOT try intuition but RUG force, then activate top. I cast a meditate, another academy, then another meditate and get Spiral, Spiral. Chain spirals, intuition for meditate to dig for Emrakul, Meditate get Forced and Academy has no force of its own and no way to dig deeper. Double meditate mean that RUG take three turns in a row and it's gg.

RUG 5-2

Ok so i think the deck would need: more way to effectively win. 1 emrakul is nice and all but you can't tutor for it and chaining Spirals can be ass if your opponent draw Forces on forces and stifles, and counters, and burns and whatsnot when you only run 4 forces as protection. So a win condition that can be tutored by intuition or a way to dig deeper , a la flash of insight? You don't run a lot of blue cards however, so flash of insight flashback is pretty ass. I guess just running 3 Emrakuls could do the trick, but it's not easy to hardcast it before you get to turn 4 or 5 to be able to have a consistent number of artifacts + ability to chain crops, and it's a dead card before you go off. The RUG list was also pretty bad and outdated, with things like Dismember and Temporal Mastery instead of cards that would effectively help in the matchup. After side also RUG can run things like Ancient Grudge and ruin the Academy deck whenever it doesn't get a flash start by essentially 1-siding armaggedoning him. Side-hate for storm like Flusterstorm is also pretty good here.
I think BUG is slightly effective against Academy. Abrupt decay and discard (and the usual forces) are pretty effective against it pre-side, and after side it can run In the Eye of Chaos, Maelstrom pulse, Ratchet Bomb, Surgical Extraction and whatever people would be running, while academy could run choke i guess, and skip the Trops for UG Fastlands from scars.

Still nothing to convince me Academy is broken, if not for monetary reasons + reserved zzz list.

[HammafistRoob]

Excuse me? ANT is a deck that aims to win Turn 3 with threshold. It does BY FAR not have the Turn 1 kill ratio of Belcher. Please check the ANT thread

Reading is tech.

[Shawon]

Glaring omission from Academy list, just realized now: Candelabra of Tawnos.

[Gheizen64]

Glaring omission from Academy list, just realized now: Candelabra of Tawnos.

Right candelabra is just perfect for it. No time to test it now, will probably do some more tomorrow.

[Lemnear]

Reading is tech.

'cuse me?

[HammafistRoob]

I was just nitpicking, you misunderstood his post. He wasn't saying ANT had the speed of Belcher.

Bargain is much, much better than Ad Nauseam. Instead of trying to hit 7 mana and use a Tutor to get your bomb (Ad Nauseam itself limits the number of copies you can play of Ad Nauseam and Tendrils where Bargain doesn't set those kinds of ''rules''), you can either use Show and Tell or ramp to six mana. It has the same options (discard, draw/manipulation) ANT has but it also has the same speed Belcher has (consistently kills turns one and two).

I don't need to build this deck to see how ridiculously powerful Yawgmoth's Bargain is.