[Deck] Dragon Stompy

[Nuke is Good]

Do you all board out Moon effects vs Miracles? I used to board them out because they regularly fetch basic Island against me, but I'm finding that I win the games where I have a Moon in play because it stops their fetches, making Brainstorm and JTMS a lot less powerful. Also, they help in cutting off the double-white they need for Entreat the Angels. What are your guys' sideboard plans against Miracles?

I don't play Dragon Stompy, but I play painter which has similar strategies with Blood Moon. I keep blood moons in but I sometimes cut Magus of the Moon. Shutting off fetches and their duals helps a bit, but you need to weigh your options. If you can throw down a turn 1 Trinisphere I'd probably do that first over a Blood Moon against a heavier basic deck like Miracles.

[LeoCop 90]

I found moons to be pretty good against miracles. They need double blue, double white and they need fetches to shuffle.
I can see cutting one moon to avoid getting flooded with them, and i wouldn't cut maguses because a disruptive threat is exactly what you want against a control deck.

[Zupponn]

I drop the Blood Moons for an overload of threats. I want Miracles to interact with me early and often as I play one must kill threat at a time until they run out of resources.

I remember one game where I turn 1 Rabblemaster, which makes a token and gets in for 1 damage. The Miracles player Swordsed the Rabblemaster, but that token stayed around for 5 or 6 turns, pinging for one damage the whole time. He eventually got Swordsed as well.

The point is, even if you drop a single Rabblemaster or Rakka Mar or Moggcatcher, they could be forced into using something like Terminus to basically 1 for 1 you. With cards like those, you don't need to drop anything else until they deal with your threat. Then you drop the next one and play the same game all over again. If they don't have an answer, then you win quickly.

I like Settler in this matchup and Koth is almost unbeatable vs them. Their only answer might be Council's Judgement and if so, they probably only run one.

[LeoCop 90]

My experience of moon being good comes from playing painter. Dragon stompy has more effective threats and for sure what zupponn said is right, but i just assure you that i won against miracles keeping terrible hands with a turn one moon that prevented them to develop their gameplan effectively. Sometimes they get completely locked, more often though they are just stuck with one blue mana and one white mana if they are lucky, and need to topdeck because they can't shuffle their library. Meanwhile they can't play jace, clique or entreat the angels which is basically all their win conditions. Sure, it might happen that you drop a moon and they have all the basics, but to be fair it happened to me once out of a lot of games.
I don't know, if you feel your threats are enough to seal the deal and nothing is worse than moon in your deck against miracles, then power to you. I didn't play this deck recently so i'm not in the position to convince anyone, but i'm just sharing my experience.

[Ace/Homebrew]

All the advice given is good! I want to point out that stopping Brainstorm and Jace, the Mind Sculptor usually isn't as important as stopping (or weakening the value of) Sensei's Divining Top. I will typically cut Trinisphere before Moons against Miracles (they're going to hit 3 mana by turn 3 every single game) although usually creature removal comes out first.

I am also very liberal with Ancient Tomb against Miracles. You're life is a great resource against that deck and I will willingly trade 2 life for every turn until they die.

[Lyle Hopkins]

I'm interested in what the Dragon Stompy community thinks of a more control oriented build, à la Michael Sommer and Zach Dobbin. I've been testing a similar list with some success and I would appreciate some feedback from anyone who has experience with this deck.

This is my current deck-list:

4 Simian Spirit Guide
3 Magus of the Moon
3 Jaya Ballard, Task Mage
4 Ensnaring Bridge
4 Chrome Mox
4 Chalice of the Void
4 Magma Jet
3 Bonfire of the Damned
4 Blood Moon
4 Koth of the Hammer
11 Mountain
4 Ancient Tomb
4 City of Traitors
2 Chandra, Pyromaster
2 Crystal Ball

SB: 4 Trinisphere
SB: 1 Bonfire of the Damned
SB: 3 Phyrexian Revoker
SB: 1 Magus of the Moon
SB: 3 Anarchy
SB: 3 ?


I'm not entirely sure what to include in the sideboard yet.

[Ace/Homebrew]

I'm interested in what the Dragon Stompy community thinks of a more control oriented build, à la Michael Sommer and Zach Dobbin.

Hah! Zach and I are Dragon Stompy buds.
I might see him tonight. I'll tell him to comment here.

I am a huge fan of a planeswalker control DS list. It's the sole reason I want a Forcefield.
Crystal Ball is always amazing (like scrying away a land and a Chrome Mox amazing), but drawing the 2nd one sucks.

Would you ever consider Sarkhan, the Dragonspeaker? It's a nonbo with Ensnaring Bridge, but no worse than Koth's +1 is...

It looks like you have an extra Mountain instead of the Forcefield (based on Sommer's list). Any reason you went with the extra Mountain over the 4th Magus? Forcefield costs a fortune, so I understand why that isn't in your list. Man, I want one so bad...

[ZTurgeon]

I don't play Dragon Stompy, but I play painter which has similar strategies with Blood Moon. I keep blood moons in but I sometimes cut Magus of the Moon. Shutting off fetches and their duals helps a bit, but you need to weigh your options. If you can throw down a turn 1 Trinisphere I'd probably do that first over a Blood Moon against a heavier basic deck like Miracles.

It is very play/draw dependant. If I'm on the play, I jam the blood moon 100% of the time. They can't afford to mulligan to basics because they lose the games where they run out of cards, regardless of if they have lands or not.

Plus them never getting to brainstorm or top with fetches is a huge deal. They frankly are a very bad deck if they can't shuffle every other turn.

[Lyle Hopkins]

Hah! Zach and I are Dragon Stompy buds.
I might see him tonight. I'll tell him to comment here.

I am a huge fan of a planeswalker control DS list. It's the sole reason I want a Forcefield.
Crystal Ball is always amazing (like scrying away a land and a Chrome Mox amazing), but drawing the 2nd one sucks.

Would you ever consider Sarkhan, the Dragonspeaker? It's a nonbo with Ensnaring Bridge, but no worse than Koth's +1 is...

It looks like you have an extra Mountain instead of the Forcefield (based on Sommer's list). Any reason you went with the extra Mountain over the 4th Magus? Forcefield costs a fortune, so I understand why that isn't in your list. Man, I want one so bad...

I feel like I want more land in the deck, but I could be mistaken. I'd be interested to hear Zach's opinion on the deck. Also, I found a more recent list from Michael Sommer. The Bottled Cloister seems neat to me. I'm not entirely sure if I would replace Crystal Ball with it, but Bottled Cloister definitely has some nice synergy with Ensnaring Bridge. It's terrible against Show and Tell though.

[PollePotDK]

I started playing the Mono Red Sneak Attack deck, which relies heavily on a combo finish, but have lately started looking into Dragon Stompy, since I like the idea of a board presence in a creature and not at two card combo (Sneak/Breach and fatty), plus more prison locks.

I play a DS build with Rabblemaster, Stormbreath Dragon and Hound of Griselbrand with Koth i SB, but I really like the idea of a Planeswalker build with Ensnaring bridge. However, I can't seem to figure out the PW setup.

Koth is an auto include, BUT I am split on which Chandra I want. Chandra Pyromaster pings and is card advantage, but the Ultimate are meeh ... or am I missing something?

Chandra Firebrand can a little of it all, but no card advantage.

Chandra Nalaar I don't know what I think about, and Chandra Ablaze is too expensive.

Sarkhan with Ensnaring Bridge is not so good. Koth can at least tick up to the useful Ultimate.

Tibal and Daretti is a no go or what?

/PollePotDK

[Gikkman]

Tibal and Daretti is a no go or what?

/PollePotDK

I don't know... I like the idea of playing Daretti somehow and switching a Chrome Mox or the similar for a discarded Wurmcoil (or the similar). I just can't seem to get it to work.

Tibalt... maybe he's playable. I know I often find myself top-decking with nothing but air in hand. His plus would at least increase the odds of finding something in that situation. The negative side is that almost none of his abilities do anything.

[Lyle Hopkins]

I started playing the Mono Red Sneak Attack deck, which relies heavily on a combo finish, but have lately started looking into Dragon Stompy, since I like the idea of a board presence in a creature and not at two card combo (Sneak/Breach and fatty), plus more prison locks.

I play a DS build with Rabblemaster, Stormbreath Dragon and Hound of Griselbrand with Koth i SB, but I really like the idea of a Planeswalker build with Ensnaring bridge. However, I can't seem to figure out the PW setup.

Koth is an auto include, BUT I am split on which Chandra I want. Chandra Pyromaster pings and is card advantage, but the Ultimate are meeh ... or am I missing something?

Chandra Firebrand can a little of it all, but no card advantage.

Chandra Nalaar I don't know what I think about, and Chandra Ablaze is too expensive.

Sarkhan with Ensnaring Bridge is not so good. Koth can at least tick up to the useful Ultimate.

Tibal and Daretti is a no go or what?

/PollePotDK

I've been testing 2 copies of Chandra, Pyromaster and it seems good. Daretti, Scrap Savant might be worth checking out too.

[Zupponn]

If you were to go a controling route, then I think only Daretti and Chandra, Pyromaster are even worth looking into. Sarkhan is maybe an option, but doesn't seem to fit too well with the others. Tibalt is garbage and Koth doesn't do much to really help a control strategy. The rest of the Chandras sort of suck also. You'd almost be better off splashing a color to give you access to stuff like Dack or Ajani Vengeant.

[Dziga Murnau]

I always loved to play Chandra Nalaar in red stompies. But that was in times when Seething Song was a must have. Fast Nalaar completely destroys creature decks, removing both attackers while we establish our lock and blockers when our finishers hit the board. Late Nalaar helps to clear the battlefield also - and if we managed to lock the opponent, she just beats face in three turns.
But five mana without Songs is something pretty unreachable and unneeded in the days of Moggcatchers...
I even called the deck Big Red Riding Hood with all the lock pieces viewed as cakes I feed to my opponent.

[LeoCop 90]

Well, it is true that koth is not a control card at all .... but i think the supporters of a "control build" here just want to play a deck that hiding behind ensnaring bridges and mass removal kills the opponent with planeswalker. With control build they basically mean a creatureless build, or build that win without attacking with creatures. Koth is ideal in this strategy because he close games so fast with his ultimate ; since we can't hope the ensnaring bridge lock to last forever (most decks have answers to it), we need things that win fast anyway.

I just think we miss one last planeswalker for such a build. Koth is good, chandra pyromaster is ok (not the best because winning by pinging for one every turn is very very slow, but she also provides card advantage. maybe she could be better in a build with some burn spells to make use of her ultimate? ). The last good red planeswalker is sarkhan, that unfortunately does nothing in a deck that wants ensnaring bridge .... and his ultimate does nothing to win the game. In the meantime jaya is a good alternative although she gets easily killed..... but we ca hope for the red planeswalker in magic origins to be good !

[Dziga Murnau]

Well, it is true that koth is not a control card at all .... but i think the supporters of a "control build" here just want to play a deck that hiding behind ensnaring bridges and mass removal kills the opponent with planeswalker. With control build they basically mean a creatureless build, or build that win without attacking with creatures. Koth is ideal in this strategy because he close games so fast with his ultimate ; since we can't hope the ensnaring bridge lock to last forever (most decks have answers to it), we need things that win fast anyway.

I just think we miss one last planeswalker for such a build. Koth is good, chandra pyromaster is ok (not the best because winning by pinging for one every turn is very very slow, but she also provides card advantage. maybe she could be better in a build with some burn spells to make use of her ultimate? ). The last good red planeswalker is sarkhan, that unfortunately does nothing in a deck that wants ensnaring bridge .... and his ultimate does nothing to win the game. In the meantime jaya is a good alternative although she gets easily killed..... but we ca hope for the red planeswalker in magic origins to be good !

So why not Chandra Nalaar? Bang-bang-bang 12 damage in the face! Koth helps to cast her, she protects Koth from creatures. What a pair!

[Gikkman]

Well, it is true that koth is not a control card at all .... but i think the supporters of a "control build" here just want to play a deck that hiding behind ensnaring bridges and mass removal kills the opponent with planeswalker. With control build they basically mean a creatureless build, or build that win without attacking with creatures.

Yes, this is my impression too. I want to say though that I support a good control build. A control build might be able to circumvent the main problems I've encountered:

I have tested a few Stompy lists by now (R/W, Dragons, Werewolves and Goblins) and the common there for them seem to be that 1) You have a hard time against an early threat (say a t1 Delver or Deathrite Shaman) or 2) You have a hard time against other "fair" decks (such as Maverik, Jund and possibly Nic-Fit) and lastly 3) Lilliana of the Veil wrecks you (planeswalkers in general is a huge problem).

Then again, I am kinda new to this so I might be wrong in my obersvations.

[Zupponn]

I have tested a few Stompy lists by now (R/W, Dragons, Werewolves and Goblins) and the common there for them seem to be that 1) You have a hard time against an early threat (say a t1 Delver or Deathrite Shaman) or 2) You have a hard time against other "fair" decks (such as Maverik, Jund and possibly Nic-Fit) and lastly 3) Lilliana of the Veil wrecks you (planeswalkers in general is a huge problem).

I have not noticed any of those issues with the Goblin version, especially Liliana since the deck is built to survive her. Honestly, I think that Punishing Fire is probably the most difficult card to play against.

[LeoCop 90]

Yeah, chandra nalaar could be a good option, at least she can act as a real removal spell that kills more than x/1's.

[TMPWDobs]

Hey Zach Dobbin here friend told me this thread was talking about my list ask away I'll try to answer any questions...