Obscure Cards with Latent Potential

[Nonex]

I brewed a RG Food Chain deck that combined 4 of them with 4 Sneak Attack (why tutor for Food Chain when you can simply have 8?). Both did the job of putting an attacking Emrakul in your opponent's face and clear his/her table, and didn't share any hate except Phyrexian Revoker and non-Decay removal. Bad thing is, I never got to win against Delver - and all this was like 1 year ago.

[TsumiBand]

I brewed a RG Food Chain deck that combined 4 of them with 4 Sneak Attack (why tutor for Food Chain when you can simply have 8?). Both did the job of putting an attacking Emrakul in your opponent's face and clear his/her table, and didn't share any hate except Phyrexian Revoker and non-Decay removal. Bad thing is, I never got to win against Delver - and all this was like 1 year ago.

See, this gets me thinking about Rune-Scarred Demon again. Rune-Scarred Demon is the biggest Squadron Hawk ever in a Sneak/Show deck. Sneak Attack for RSD, find RSD, repeat 3x, still get a different card from the last RSD or another beater or some dumb thing… it seems like fun, anyway.

Granted swinging once with Emmy is probably 'good enough' to lock down the game, but just actually ending the game by hitting for 24+ in the air seems good too.

It's probably much worse off a Show and Tell or at least infers a lot more moving parts than Griselbrand or Emrakul, so that may be one reason why it is not considered. Might be a funny budget alternative to those other guys though.

[DragoFireheart]

See, this gets me thinking about Rune-Scarred Demon again. Rune-Scarred Demon is the biggest Squadron Hawk ever in a Sneak/Show deck. Sneak Attack for RSD, find RSD, repeat 3x, still get a different card from the last RSD or another beater or some dumb thing… it seems like fun, anyway.

Granted swinging once with Emmy is probably 'good enough' to lock down the game, but just actually ending the game by hitting for 24+ in the air seems good too.

It's probably much worse off a Show and Tell or at least infers a lot more moving parts than Griselbrand or Emrakul, so that may be one reason why it is not considered. Might be a funny budget alternative to those other guys though.

Well with good Food Chain, Sneak Attack, and one Rune-Scarred Demon, you could do RSD, get three more, get a Griselbrand, discard one to Food Chain, draw with Griselbrand, and then just drop more creatures.

[TsumiBand]

Well with good Food Chain, Sneak Attack, and one Rune-Scarred Demon, you could do RSD, get three more, get a Griselbrand, discard one to Food Chain, draw with Griselbrand, and then just drop more creatures.

yous trollin' >:(

With Sneak Attack you get to pull the "Goryo's Vengeance in Modern" trick of chaining your fatties, dropping Emrakul, attacking, and then if the opponent somehow manages to do something dumb like Holy Day or Orim's Chant or whatever stymies your attack phase, Emrakul still hits the yard and shuffles all the things back in so you haven't completely tossed the combo out with the bath water. Food Chain would straight exile your creatures and they wouldn't be recycled with Emrakul. Sadness abound.

[Nonex]

I'm taking advantage of the spark of interest in the concept and put my last iteration I played with:

4 Wooded Foothills
2 Misty Rainforest
3 Taiga
4 Forest
1 Mountain
3 Ancient Tomb
2 Gaea's Cradle

4 Birds of Paradise
2 Noble Hierarch
4 Wall of Blossoms
4 Elvish Visionary
4 Imperial Recruiter
2 Fierce Empath
1 Ghitu Slinger
4 Bloodbraid Elf
1 Deranged Hermit
2 Kozilek, Butcher of Truth
1 Ulamog, the Infinite Gyre
1 Emrakul, the Aeons Torn

4 Food Chain
4 Sneak Attack
3 Sylvan Library

SB:
1 Phyrexian Metamorph
2 Sylvok Replica
4 Thorn of Amethyst
4 Heap Doll
4 Carpet of Flowers

You can clearly see why turn 1 protected Delver was problematic, especially in Canadian Threshold. Ghitu Slinger was the last silver bullet I tried against it (it started as a Phyrexian Metamorph, since Mental Misstep was still there and killing RUG's Progenitus was important). I'm not that fond of Sylvan Library, honestly; sometimes I won thanks to it, sometimes it costed me the game. If I had time to play anymore, I'd replace them with Xenagos the Reveler: he doesn't fuck up your cascades and all his abilities are relevant. There's always the option of splashing blue and run Shardless Agent.

However, what counts is that I never got a top 8 with this deck, despite getting close sometimes. That should indicate something.

[Benrobnu]

Any food chain list must include Misthollow Griffin

[FTW]

I'm taking advantage of the spark of interest in the concept and put my last iteration I played with:

4 Wooded Foothills
2 Misty Rainforest
3 Taiga
4 Forest
1 Mountain
3 Ancient Tomb
2 Gaea's Cradle

4 Birds of Paradise
2 Noble Hierarch
4 Wall of Blossoms
4 Elvish Visionary
4 Imperial Recruiter
2 Fierce Empath
1 Ghitu Slinger
4 Bloodbraid Elf
1 Deranged Hermit
2 Kozilek, Butcher of Truth
1 Ulamog, the Infinite Gyre
1 Emrakul, the Aeons Torn

4 Food Chain
4 Sneak Attack
3 Sylvan Library

SB:
1 Phyrexian Metamorph
2 Sylvok Replica
4 Thorn of Amethyst
4 Heap Doll
4 Carpet of Flowers

You can clearly see why turn 1 protected Delver was problematic, especially in Canadian Threshold. Ghitu Slinger was the last silver bullet I tried against it (it started as a Phyrexian Metamorph, since Mental Misstep was still there and killing RUG's Progenitus was important). I'm not that fond of Sylvan Library, honestly; sometimes I won thanks to it, sometimes it costed me the game. If I had time to play anymore, I'd replace them with Xenagos the Reveler: he doesn't fuck up your cascades and all his abilities are relevant. There's always the option of splashing blue and run Shardless Agent.

However, what counts is that I never got a top 8 with this deck, despite getting close sometimes. That should indicate something.

But how does that... i dont even..

I get that cascade is a cool ability but I don't get why a Food Chain deck needs to cascade. Are you trying to cascade into Food Chain? Why not just Ponder/Brainstorm into it instead? Are you trying to cascade into extra creatures to have more fodder to generate more mana? I'm guessing that's what Imperial Recruiter is for too (chain 4 recruiters into visionary or smth for +6 mana). Instead of paying 2RG for Bloodbraid, why not just pay 2UU for Misthollow Griffin instead and get +infinity mana?

There's already a thread under New/Developmental on Food Chain Griffin. Their lists look more polished. Maybe try there for ideas?

[Nonex]

The main reason is that I started tinkering with it far before Griffin was printed. When it got printed, I saw that it can't be fetched by Recruiter or Empath, getting mana for the fatties wasn't really a problem to begin with (Deranged Hermit feeds Kozilek alone, and Bloodbraid Elf into Recruiter -> Empath does as well), and Sneak Attack gets nothing from it, so why should I try it in this kind of list? Griffin demands a different list, and plenty of people are already testing it, so I don't have anything to contribute. As I said, I don't have any more time to play anyway, so it doesn't matter.

The thing is that Food Chain and Sneak Attack have a pretty decent synergy together, and they might spawn a new kind of deck. Food for thought and little else.

[DragoFireheart]

The thing is that Food Chain and Sneak Attack have a pretty decent synergy together, and they might spawn a new kind of deck. Food for thought and little else.

But you would still want Show and Tell somewhere in there.

[Benrobnu]

But you would still want Show and Tell somewhere in there.

I've been following the developing decks thread for Food Chain and have been pretty inspired to brew up a bant food-show decklist.

[TsumiBand]

Actually, for serious this time.

Insidious Dreams

Stack the top X cards of your library, cast a draw-7 (Reforge the Soul? Eh? Eh?), pop a LED in response, something something profit??

EDIT: Even if you're not trying to just cast a worse Doomsday, this is still Vampiric Tutor kind-of. Works okay with throwing stuff in the graveyard. I don't know exactly. I'm kind of a shitty deckbuilder if I can't maindeck Lightning Bolt or Serra Avenger. vOv

[FTW]

The thing is that Food Chain and Sneak Attack have a pretty decent synergy together, and they might spawn a new kind of deck. Food for thought and little else.

In theory. However, you're running 4 Sneak Attack in a deck with 0 Brainstorm, 0 Ponder and only 4 fatties (and only 2 Fierce Empath). So Sneak Attack seems significantly less effective than in SneakShow (and even in that deck with 12 cantrips, when facing disruption you can get stuck with fatties in hand and no way to play them or with Sneak Attack out but no fatties).

Yeah, in Magical XmasLand (or against Zoo), you can pay 3R: Sneak Attack, R: Imperial Recruiter for Empath, R: Empath, R: attack with fatty. But that still seems a bit awkward and less efficient than most SneakAttack decks. Meanwhile, Sneak Attack makes you sacrifice the creatures EOT so if your fatty gets killed, you don't still have those bodies next turn to pitch to a potential Food Chain. I guess there's some synergy (both are creature-based fatty decks), but there's also some anti-synergy.

And what if you draw a Sneak Attack + dorks + Bloodbraid Elf hand? Awkward. BBE is great with Food Chain, bad with Sneak Attack. What if you draw a hand with Empath, dorks and fatties and Food Chain but no Recruiters or BBE or Hermit? Can't generate enough mana to actually play out the fatties. This seems like one of those double 2-card combo decks where there's some synergy but if you draw the wrong combinations of combo pieces then you kind of flop. If there were cantrips, it might be easier to smooth that out.

I think there's potential but I would want more ways to smooth out my draws. Blue seems good even if not playing Griffin.

At the very least I would make one of your fatties Griselbrand so if you cheat something out and it gets answered, you have a way to draw into more gas.

[FTW]

Actually, for serious this time.

Insidious Dreams

Stack the top X cards of your library, cast a draw-7 (Reforge the Soul? Eh? Eh?), pop a LED in response, something something profit??

EDIT: Even if you're not trying to just cast a worse Doomsday, this is still Vampiric Tutor kind-of. Works okay with throwing stuff in the graveyard. I don't know exactly. I'm kind of a shitty deckbuilder if I can't maindeck Lightning Bolt or Serra Avenger. vOv

I really want to make that card work, but I don't see any reason why a combo deck would get into a situation where it would prefer to go:

3B, discard your hand: EOT mini-Doomsday

instead of

BBB: Doomsday
or
4B: EOT Ad Nauseam

Sadly it would often be mini-Doomsday because your hand size would shrink if you play rituals to get to 3B or if you float any cantrips or played Moxen/LEDs first or got hit by discard spells. (or if you actually wanted to keep some cards in hand, like rituals or draw spells or tutors or whatever, since most Doomsday piles involve having leftover resources)

I guess the benefit is you don't actually need black rituals to cast it so you could play a combo deck with like 20 mana sources, 4 dreams, 5-8 stackable combo pieces to make different winning piles, 4 LED, and then like 24 discard/protection/hate cards/cantrips. Since you're pitching your hand pre-combo anyway and then stacking your deck to combo, more than half the deck is completely irrelevant to comboing off. So you can run a metric ton of protection/disruption/cantrips. Seems like that opens up a lot of design space.

[rufus]

I really want to make that card work, but I don't see any reason why a combo deck would get into a situation where it would prefer to go:

3B, discard your hand: EOT mini-Doomsday
...

It discards rather than exiling, which opens up a bunch of possibilities with flashback, dredge, or reanimator. It's also got solid potential for cascade where you'd be stacking two cards - or if you're feeling demented Spellshift.

[Holiday]

OK, I've never seen Spellshift until today. I've read it a few times and I'm not exactly sure how it works. I'm assuming you want to counter your own spell for 4 mana and then play a free instant or sorcery? How do people use this card?

[FTW]

OK, I've never seen Spellshift until today. I've read it a few times and I'm not exactly sure how it works. I'm assuming you want to counter your own spell for 4 mana and then play a free instant or sorcery? How do people use this card?

Combo deck with Gitaxian Probe, Brainstorm, SDT, Lim-Dul's Vault, Spellshift, Personal Tutor and some flashy sorcery like Cruel Ultimatum or Worldfire or Biorhythm?

Using LDV, Personal Tutor, SDT and/or Brainstorm, stack the desired sorcery on top of your library. Then Probe/cantrip and Spellshift your own spell FTW

[rufus]

Combo deck with Gitaxian Probe, Brainstorm, SDT, Lim-Dul's Vault, Spellshift, Personal Tutor and some flashy sorcery like Cruel Ultimatum or Worldfire or Biorhythm?

Well, Dragonstorm or <Sigh> Enter the Infinite are probably better instant wins.

[FTW]

Well, Dragonstorm or <Sigh> Enter the Infinite are probably better instant wins.

Dragonstorm I guess since you'd have minimum storm 2.
2 Hellkites + Karrthus is pretty lethal.

[TsumiBand]

I really want to make that card work, but I don't see any reason why a combo deck would get into a situation where it would prefer to go:

3B, discard your hand: EOT mini-Doomsday

instead of

BBB: Doomsday
or
4B: EOT Ad Nauseam

Sadly it would often be mini-Doomsday because your hand size would shrink if you play rituals to get to 3B or if you float any cantrips or played Moxen/LEDs first or got hit by discard spells. (or if you actually wanted to keep some cards in hand, like rituals or draw spells or tutors or whatever, since most Doomsday piles involve having leftover resources)

I guess the benefit is you don't actually need black rituals to cast it so you could play a combo deck with like 20 mana sources, 4 dreams, 5-8 stackable combo pieces to make different winning piles, 4 LED, and then like 24 discard/protection/hate cards/cantrips. Since you're pitching your hand pre-combo anyway and then stacking your deck to combo, more than half the deck is completely irrelevant to comboing off. So you can run a metric ton of protection/disruption/cantrips. Seems like that opens up a lot of design space.

I'm not saying it would necessarily be Spring Tide or even a variant of it, but a deck that could take advantage of a spell like Ideas Unbound, or something something Memory Jar, but I suppose by the time you negate the cost of Memory Jar you have to ask yourself why you didn't pull the same trick with a robot that wins the game, right?

Is it necessarily bad if the card only reads like this:

3B
Instant

As an additional cost to play this, discard a card from your hand.

Search your library for a card, shuffle your library, and then put that card on top of your library.

I mean that seems… slightly better than Diabolic Tutor. Which doesn't mean much, but then I suppose it depends on what you're tossing in the bin.

EDIT - There's always this piece of shit to go with it I guess.

[rufus]

...EDIT - There's always this piece of shit to go with it I guess.
...

There are some other obscure options with hidden potential...
Salvage Titan
Call to the Netherworld
and a less obscure one...
Basking Rootwalla

If you're willing to go all-in EOT Insidious Dreams can set up miracles quite nicely. I'm not sure I can come up with a compelling 3 or 4 card pile though. (Insidious Dreams-> Reforge the Soul, Past in Flames, ...?)

I do wonder about: Insidious Dreams -> Violent Outburst,Living End
In something like this:
http://www.mtgthesource.com/forums/s...ck-Cascade-End

Stacking the deck as a game plan opens up the ability to play cantrips (Brainstorm) and acceleration (Dark Ritual and Song of the Damned), or even Fluctuator.