[Deck] Living Dead Girl

[Strono31]

Ok for starters this is awesome, glad I found this thread 'cuz Im just getting back into MTG and specifically Legacy and wanted to play LOL Troll, VV, Ghast and GC. I'll post my deck that I've been running and my take on it then comment B4nnar.

Im going the dredge approach with the deck to load up the GY, figured since the deck plays out of it, might as well take that route, plus the deck is synergistic with the dredge guys to pitch back to LOL Troll or trigger VV or return lands to get back Dryad Arbor for LOL Troll or to do Ghast shenanigans.


Discard Outlets
4 Putrid Imp
4 Lotleth Troll
4 Faithless Looting

Beats and Goodies
4 Vengevine
4 Cabal Therapy
3 Sylvan Library

Dredgers
3 Golgari Thug
3 Stinkweed Imp
1 Darkblast
1 Life from the Loam

Combo
4 Bloodghast
4 Gravecrawler
3 Goblin Bombardment

Lands
4 Bloodstained Mire
4 Verdant Catacombs
4 Bayou
4 Badlands
2 Dryad Arbor
2 Dakmor Salvage

I've had VV out as quickly as turn 2 with pitching him to either Looting or Imp and typically I have a slue of dudes by turn 4 after pitching and dredging a bit.

Easily the best addition I found for this deck is Sylvan Library, that, with Dredge stuff, is just nutty. You can dredge stuff with the draw replacement and not have to put them back on top, so you can still draw and return 2 dredgers to pitch to LOL Troll, have Thug trigger VV's, and bury another 8-15 cards, and considering you want access to everything in the GY, it works great.

I put the 3 copies of Bombardment in as well 'cuz you do have access to GC and Ghasts as well as VV's to pitch to it to get that last bit of reach, and acts as another win condition if your other routes are taken away. Arbor and Salvage are the utility-style lands where Arbor can be pitched to either LOL Troll or Bombardment, and if necessary, Salvage can come back and grab Ghasts.

My favorite thing about this particular deck is that it's sooo incredibly synergistic in ever aspect and have multiple ways to win. You've got your guys who recur via the GY, and if they take care of one of them, they've still got the others to deal with. LOL Troll is a fuckin' house with the Regenerate ability in and of itself, esp with the dredgers coming back turn after turn to make him bigger and bigger, and like I mentioned before, Bombardment is just good with this deck and the recursion, plus saves your guys from effects.

Like I stated before, I've found dredging to be the most effective way into getting the guys into the GY and going from there, I could be wrong, as I am aware the Buried Alive/Fauna Shaman/Intuition route is another avenue to venture on, but I feel considering the main dredgers are creatures, and LOL Troll is available as a pump every turn 'cuz of them, as well as having guys to trill VV again, it just made sense. What're ppls thoughts on that the best way to go about that?

B4nnar - I feel you and I have different approaches to the deck here, one thing being that you're not running Ghasts for the sake of comboing and recursion, and have more of a toolbox approach as well with the singletons. My only Q for you would be is how has it panned out thus far? I like the build, but I don't feel I/we can compare/relate our build whatsoever cuz mine functions in a different manner.

My personal experience is that Fauna Shaman has been relatively slow, but I wasn't running a toolbox approach with silver bullet style creatures, plus I wanted immediate interaction, not having to wait a turn and him being vulnerable to spot removal before you get to use him. Once he's online, he's a beast, just not entirely sold on him personally.

I think you could benefit from either Entomb or Buried Alive instead of Diabolic Intent as a tutor, BA can grab Genesis and some other dudes you need and you can start working from there. I like Deathrite Shaman too, he seems to function really way in the current Legacy meta and work ilke Lavamancer but better. I like Stronghold as well, seems like an auto include with the nature of the deck.

One problem I see is that the deck seems to a bit mana hungry with Genesis, Fauna Shaman, LOL Troll, Deathrite Shaman, and casting stuff like Decay and stuff you bring back with Genesis as well, and considering you're only running 20 lands, I see that as a potential problem, but I haven't playtested the deck, so I could be wrong.

[B4nnar]

I see you have completely differend approach for the deck. Splashing red converts this deck more towards Zombardment then classic VV machine. Life from the Loam & Dredge & Sylvan Library all in one deck? Don't get me wrong but I preffer mixing VV engine with Rock style rather than dregde one. Your decklist owns no hatebears and I'm afraid what tools you gonna use against problematic cards. 1 Darkblast and Cabal Therapy in my opinion is not enough.
Bloodghast does not trigger VV and it's nothing special in this type of deck. Gravecrawler replaces him nicely and his ability actually triggers VV. However, I understand that you put him (BG) because of his syrnergy with dredge. I like Golgari Thug though.

One problem I see is that the deck seems to a bit mana hungry with Genesis, Fauna Shaman, LOL Troll, Deathrite Shaman, and casting stuff like Decay and stuff you bring back with Genesis as well, and considering you're only running 20 lands, I see that as a potential problem, but I haven't playtested the deck, so I could be wrong.

Genesis is late game tool. For now, I'm running it, but if I feel witness is enough he will probably go out. After 3-5 turns when amount of cards in your hand drops down he enables to get back critters you need.
Fauna Shaman/Deathrite Shaman - 2nd one is more of a mana dork here (1st ability) and it isn't hard to pull 1 mana for fauna dude to trigger survival style. 20 lands is more than enough, I was even thinking about cutting 2 lands.

Hymn + Cabal therapy in bigger numbers are here for protection, so opponent has less tools to fight with you. Deed ability is sweet in any Rock style B/G - and here esspecially, since GC & VV can come back any turn. Thats why Diabolic Intent is here too. I'm still wondering which tutor gonna fit deck the most. Mini Vindicate is a must in any B/G, no questions about that. It's rising star of B/G legacy and any deck that can afford such colors should run it.

[B4nnar]

Sorry for double post, but editing older one after a day isn't best idea (what I did anyways ;-)).

I have been wondering (since the deck is concentrated on zombies anyway) if Ghoulcaller's Chant or Oversold Cemetery (second one especially) wouldn't be a nice option to bring back critters for cheap cost. To be honest, I don't like the LftL approach since our deck got more creatures than lands anyways, plus Burried Alive/Fauna Shaman and even Intuition in such deck tutor mostly for summons. Cementary has an egde here since our deck is low on Enchantments anyways and not many ppl bring enchhate just for few pieces of not-OP card. In my list it fight for a spot against Genesis and Witness.

Of course it synergises with dredge stuff..

[RBS]

I believe that with some work, this deck can become a major player in Legacy Scene.
After all, Zombardment started as a nice interaction with some cards.
Golgari stuff is pretty synergic with existing cards, we just must find the shell to integrate them.

My working list atm:

4 Gitaxian Probe
4 Cabal Therapy
3 Grisly Salvage
3 Abrupt Decay

4 Deathrite Shaman
4 Gravecrawler
2 Carrion Feeder
3 LOL Troll
3 Vengevine
3 Bloodghast
4 Dark Confidant

3 Mox Diamond
1 Undiscovered Paradise
3 Bayou
4 Verdant Catacombs
4 Polluted Delta
2 Swamp
1 Forest
1 Dakmor Salvage
4 Wasteland

As usual, an early turn Gitaxian Probe + Cabal Therapy = Win. Win more if you can sac a recurring critter.
Mox Diamond to start faster. Not sure if it must stay. Early drafts of this build had 1-2 Life from the Loam, now they are gone to make place for Grisly Salvage.

I think it's a bit short on critters, only 22.
Deathrite Shaman if very useful early, mid and lategame, even in multiples.
LOL Troll, you don't want that guy in multiple. He's good at discarding stuff, but you don't recur critters in and out your hand.

Grisly Salvage. Seems great on paper. This could be the BG Brainstorm fixer card for this deck.
It replaces it self, and get you answers.

[Strono31]

B4nnar - I have Oversold Cemetery on my list of cards to try out and ones that would go well with this type of deck, it does interact well with dredgers cuz you can just mill for weeks and get guys back you need.

I think you and I specifically are @ a point where we need to playtest the others deck and see the pros/cons of it, I like your approach in that it's midrange and and has answers and late-game lasting effects, VV comes out slower, as to where mine, I can get them ripping out muuch quicker and overwhelm them. Both plausible routes, just not sure which is more effective. Im gonna put your list together and test it on MTGdeckbuilder here soon.

LftL interacts well with Ghast and if you start getting hit with Wasteland, or if you want to dredge earlier on, you don't have to worry about lands going away, plus the interaction of Dryad Arbor and LOL Troll, and the more I think of that one, the more "cute" I find it rather than being overly beneficial. I may take it out and see how it runs, but I do like it as a 1-of in the deck if need be.

RBS: Your only reall way of getting the guys who cheat into play are 3 Salvage and 3 LOL Troll. The cheat guys are essentially useless if you're not making discard outlets more readily available.

EDIT -

Would Smallpox be a good thing for this deck? I assume with some of the variants it could be strong

[Kanti]

Some cards that should be considered for the sideboard; Ground Seal and Natural Order.

Order seems like a very craft way of dodging gy hate.

[Strono31]

Noted, thank you, I really like Ground Seal, fits the gist of the deck and definitely hates out lots of stuff. What else can I run for Anti-GY Hate? I think 8 in the SB would be bueno.

[B4nnar]

Ground seal is nothing special since crypt, RIP, relic do not "target", they exile all cards from yard. I prefer therapy/hymn/thoughtseize/IoK to cover my back. I hope Cockatrice gonna update thier program soon so deck can be tested online.

[Kanti]

Most decks run Extraction, though.

But yeah, this is pretty damn true, and it sucks landing a Ground Seal only to see them lay down a Relic. The more I think about it the more I can see this deck siding into NO+Prog, as it gets around gy hate completely.

this is the sb im using;


4 Leyline of the Void
4 Natural Order
1 Progenitus
3 Umezawa's Jitte
3 Krosan Grip


Leyline is to stop annoying combo decks. NO+Prog and Jitte comes in for our gy package making the deck a not so clunky aggro deck with a decent finish. Grips are there for Miracles and Blades.

I'm using the list from the opening btw, only I slapped in Study over Bstorm and Lotleth Troll over Putrid Imp. I feel that the manabase is atrocious and would love if someone to fix it for me ;D (I suck at making mana-bases).

[B4nnar]

I was testing mine verison a bit and it turned out that Fauna Shaman is not the card to relay on in such deck. She will probably end up as 1-of as most pros do in aggro decks.

Life from the Loam is excellent, even if LGD doesn't run KoR/whatever land tutor it still ends up being usefull, especially because you can even use it for 1 land and dredge out to speed things up. Putrid Imp + LOL troll == too much of discrard and PI won't get thresh quickly because of LofL/GC/BG/VV and so on.
LOL troll and Deathrite Shaman - it's baaaad to run 4-of each. None gives profit in multiple numbers on board, although even 2/1 troll can block 5/6 goyf all day long.

It sucks that Grisly Salvage is 2cc >.< If you could reduce it to let's say 2life and 1mana it would skyrock this deck. It's still going to be usefull though.

List I'm gonna be trying now =)
Creatures (26):
2 Deathrite Shaman
3 Lotleth Troll
1 Fauna Shaman
4 Vengevine
2 Squee, Goblin Nabob
4 Gravecrawler
3 Bloodghast
4 Dark Confidant
3 Golgari Thug

Spells (14):
4 Abrupt Decay
3 Cabal Therapy
3 Hymn to Tourach
2 Life from the Loam
2 Sensei's Divining Top

Lands (20):
1 Volrath's Stronghold
2 Dryad Arbor
4 Bayou
4 Verdant Catacomb
3 Additional fetches
2 Cavern of Souls
2 Swamp
2 Forest

[JanoschEausH]

If you wanna test the cards on Cockatrice i suggest you just edit your cards.xml file. You need to add an entry for Return to Ravnica in the beginning and then you can simply add any cards you want by copying the common formula. If you want pictures you should download them seperately and copy/paste them in you pics -> downloadedPics -> RTR folder. I have been testing with the new cards since the spoiler season began.

Also: be careful to create a backup if you edit the cards.xml!

[B4nnar]

Helpful link here.

Two days ago Bennie Smith posted article about LOL troll and his possible usage in legacy, might be interesting for some to read. His deck idea is similar to mine few posts ahead, although mr. Ooze can be great in combination with Griselbrand. As we can see, there are ton of versions for this kinda of style (Zombies/VV).

GSZ & Nightmare replace dredge stuff in his deck. I'm gonna test this version too. It's a little more comboish because of Ooze.

[Hanni]

So after much deliberation, I'm starting to heavily lean towards Goblin Bombardment as being the way to go.

I've had more than enough time away from the deck to be able to anaylyze it with an open mind, and evaluate the direction I think it should go in.

For starters, I've completed ruled out Life from the Loam as an option. The only synergy it provides is lands for triggering Bloodghasts and Dryad Arbors for triggering Lotleth Troll, but the deck is not built to take advantage of Loam enough at all, and it eats up way too many slots. Simply put, this deck runs too many creatures, and the dredge mechanic is mediocre.

I think moving away from the all in blue approach is also the right call. Careful Study, Entomb, and Dark Ritual increase the explosiveness of the deck, but they also take up alot of deck space to do so. The reanimation effect is not only good because it can cheat mana costs... it can also be good in a midrange strategy. The fact that it can be explosive should be a bonus, as opposed to the focus.

I think focusing on the aggro element is still the right approach, enough so that I think Shriekmaw is the best creature removal option. Being able to trigger Vengevines is good, being able to be discarded to Lotleth Troll when its unecessary is good, being able to come down in the midgame as a 3/2 evasive body is good, and being able to be sac'd to Carrion Feeder or Goblin Bombardment after being Evoked is also good. There's just an absurd amount of synergy with Shriekmaw that I believe it should be ran before considering other options.

What I like most about Goblin Bombardment is its ability to negate Exile effects. 4 Carrion Feeder alone is simply not enough instant speed sacrifice effects, and being able to play around Swords to Plowshares and company is absolutely critical for this deck to be viable in the metagame. The fact that it can suppliment Shriekmaw as creature removal and act as reach at the same time is nothing short of phenomenal. The obvious synergy between Crawler/Ghast/Vine (when able to recur them) puts this thing over the top, IMO. It's also the only way to cut Wonder and still be able to finish off an opponent in the midgame... because let's face it, 2/1's without evasion will rarely be able push damage through against most decks, and even 4/3's get outclassed by alot of the threats that see play these days.

Although, between Shriekmaw and Bombardment, it's possible that the 2/1's and 4/3's actually will be able to push damage through on the ground against most decks.

Abrupt Decay is good, but I'm not quite sure that it is maindeck material for this deck. It lacks the synergy of both Shriekmaw and Bombardment, and I'm not sure it needs an uncounterable mini-Vindicate in the maindeck. What artifacts/enchantments (that see significant maindeck play) is this deck worried about? Jitte and Batterskull? Those seem answerable with Shriekmaw and Bombardment.

My old list already runs 4 Cabal Therapy, but that list also cut the mana dorks for Dark Ritual. Cabal Therapy definitely lose alot of luster without the mana dorks, when Therapy is the only maindeck discard in that list. I'm thinking Cabal Therapy should be complimented with some additional discard. The discard helps resolve Buried Alive, clear out Exile effects, hit maindecked graveyard removal, etc. It also gives knowledge about the opponent's hand, which is never a bad thing. I'm thinking 6-8 discard spells would be a good amount. 2 Thoughtseize and 4 Cabal Therapy is where I'm going to start.

Here's a rough draft:

B/g/r Living Dead Girl

Lands (20)
4 Verdant Catacombs
4 Polluted Delta
4 Bloodstained Mire
4 Bayou
2 Badlands
2 Swamp

Creatures (28)
2 Deathrite Shaman
2 Lotleth Troll
4 Putrid Imp
4 Carrion Feeder
4 Gravecrawler
4 Bloodghast
4 Vengevine
4 Shriekmaw

Spells (12)
4 Buried Alive
4 Cabal Therapy
2 Thoughtseize
2 Goblin Bombardment

Sideboard (15)
3 Duress
3 Phyrexian Revoker
3 Dryad Militant
2 Nature's Claim
2 Abrupt Decay
2 Umezawa's Jitte

Maybe this belongs in the Zombardment thread?

EDIT: To justify some of the card choices...

I think 20 lands and 2 Deathrite Shamans is a good mix. The deck can avoid needing alot of mana by playing cheap 1cc creatures and cheating guys into play, but then again the deck can be mana hungry when it assembles Feeder/Crawler or Bombardment/Crawler, Buried Alive, or hardcast Vengevine/Shriekmaw. Deathrite Shaman isn't great in multiples, so 2 seems right. He's also the best mana dork for the deck, because he not only provides on color mana, he has tons of valuable utility. The deck doesn't need the mana accel every turn and runs more than enough fetchlands to support him.

I started off with 4 LOL Trolls and then dropped to 3 then 2. Lotleth is in a weird position here. He's too slow to enable the explosive starts, and there are only 12 creatures that he actually wants to discard. Without any sort of engine to keep putting guys in my hand, he's unreliable to pump. Like Shaman, Trolls are not great in multiples. It's still a strong card to warrant running 2. The discard is still nice to have, the pump ability can grow him nicely, the trample works well if he's large enough, and the built in regeneration clause is an awesome bonus tossed on top.

The rest of the package is standard. I like the 4/2 split on the Shriekmaw/Bombardment removal package. Bombardment is yet another card that is bad in multiples, and not actually a necessary effect. 6 sac outlets to dodge exile removal seems sufficient with 6 discard spells, and the 2/2 Shaman/Bombardment split should give the deck enough reach if the ground gets clogged.

Buried Alive is a given, as is Cabal Therapy. The 2 extra Thoughtseize may seem minimal, but 6 discard effects is more consistent than 4.

The sideboard is just thrown together for the moment.

I already explained why I cut Study and Entomb, which doubles over for why I'm not running Looting. Although, Looting + Squee would be a really nice draw engine that would make LOL Troll alot stronger, so I may move in that direction at a later time.

[Deckerator]

I read in a post survival thread that some of them tried a madness version with LED. Do you think it has potential because LED could speed it up a lot.


I try to build a Vengevine + Loyal Retainers Version.

[Esper3k]

No one is playing Abrupt Decay main? It would seem that having an answer to yard hate (especially now that RIP is coming) would be pretty critical given how heavily the deck depends on the graveyard?

[Hanni]

No one is playing Abrupt Decay main? It would seem that having an answer to yard hate (especially now that RIP is coming) would be pretty critical given how heavily the deck depends on the graveyard?

How many people are playing yard hate main to warrant Abrupt Decay main? 1 or 2 copies of Scavenging Ooze is about all I can think of, and you don't need Abrupt Decay to deal with Ooze. What else sees play? RIP might see a tiny bit of play in maindecks as people experiment with the card, but I don't expect decks with RIP maindeck to be very popular for any extended period of time.

[Esper3k]

How many people are playing yard hate main to warrant Abrupt Decay main? 1 or 2 copies of Scavenging Ooze is about all I can think of, and you don't need Abrupt Decay to deal with Ooze. What else sees play? RIP might see a tiny bit of play in maindecks as people experiment with the card, but I don't expect decks with RIP maindeck to be very popular for any extended period of time.

Don't most of the Uw Miracle decks play Trinket Mage + Relics main these days?

I just think Abrupt Decay is too versatile of a card for a BG deck to not play.

[Hanni]

Don't most of the Uw Miracle decks play Trinket Mage + Relics main these days?

Not that I'm aware of.

I just think Abrupt Decay is too versatile of a card for a BG deck to not play.

Abrupt Decay is an absolutely, rediculously, powerful card. There are tons of decks that are going to get a huge power boost from it. Tons of BGx Rock decks, decks like Team America, and probably a ton of decks already in green or black that will splash the other color just to play Abrupt Decay.

This deck isn't a typical deck though. I don't really feel like Abrupt Decay is a card that this deck wants to run in the main. I could be wrong, but I'm just not sure what 3cc (and less) permanents this deck needs to worry about that Shriekmaw and Goblin Bombardment cannot already deal with.

The construction of this deck is akward. The deck needs to run enough creatures to consistently trigger Vengevines, enough discard outlets for Bloodghasts and Vengevines (moreso Vengevines), enough sacrifice outlets to dodge exile-based removal and/or get extra value from its recursion engine, and some amount of enablers to get the engine started. After all that is said and done, there is very little space for anything else. 6 removal and 6 discard spells is about as far as this deck can stretch without weakening the core of its gameplan somewhere. The discard can help act as additional discard outlets in certain situations, so it can still help enable the core. The same goes for the removal, since Shriekmaw is a creature to either trigger Vines (when evoked) or discardable to Lotleth (if the removal is unnecessary), and Bombardment adds to the sac outlets.

This deck is full of mini-synergies all over the place, which is part of the reason why it's fun to play and it's effective at what it does. Stuff like being able to sac Shriekmaw to Bombardment, after it's evoked, is one of many synergies like that. Abrupt Decay doesn't bring much synergy to the deck, aside from hitting one of your own creatures to dodge an exile effect.

[Greenpoe]

Running red for literally a 2-of? Might as well just run Blasting Station. Sure, it's not as good, but it's almost as good and you can play Wonder or just have a rock-solid manabase.

[Hanni]

I'd rather run a light splash for the better spell. The difference between 2 mana and 3 mana is huge, and the fact that you have to recur something to use Station more than once a turn is another drawback.

If my opponent casts Terminus, I'd like to be able to sac my board, where Station cannot do that. With Bombardment instead of Station, not only do I get more value out of creatures that don't recur (by doing more damage to the opponent), it makes sure I'm getting all of my Vines/Ghasts/Crawlers into the graveyard instead of just one. I realize Buried Alive can bring back the guys that were sent to the bottom of the library, but I'd rather splash red and not have to do that as often.

The list I posted is also a rough list, and I may find myself cutting some other spells to fit in another 1-2 copies of Bombardment, depending on how frequently I want one vs how frequenlty I draw one vs how frequently it gets countered/destroyed/etc.

EDIT: I missed the point you made about splashing blue instead. That's a good suggestion, and I may consider that. Wonder does have some issues though, which is why I ultimately cut it. The fact that it requires an Island in play to give the flying requires the deck to commit to blue more heavily than just a light splash, and the fact that it needs to remain in the graveyard makes it extremely prone to graveyard hate. I realize that graveyard hate is already an issue, but Vines/Ghasts/Crawlers can sometimes avoid graveyard hate by returning to the battlefield before the opponent draws/resolves there hate, i.e they don't sit in the graveyard for very long.

The red splash for Bombardment is exactly that; a splash. 12 fetchlands + 2 red duals + 2 Shaman's give the deck access to 16 red sources to cast a spell with a single red in its cost, so getting the red mana when necessary is not an issue. The 12 fetchland manabase also makes it easier to get the basic Swamps into play, so splashing a 3rd color doesn't really impact the strength of the manabase all that much. I'd much rather splash a 3rd color than go straight black/green; there is a large amount of powerful cards available to this deck in the other colors.