This list might just be crazy enough to be institutionalized! I think I'll play around with it myself. Seems like it'll be fun if anything.Originally Posted by Stryfo
Any guidance on how this particular load out functions beyond the obvious?
I'm no expert on this deck, but playing less than 4 Griselbanned is just wrong.
Why does this deck need Hapless Researcher?
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@Adryan, 4 Griselbrand opens you up to at least: 1) having too many creatures, or 2) not having enough variety of creatures for your matchups. There are other problems as well, especially in post board matches agaisnt decks with cards like karakas and surgical extraction. What card would you cut from my 60 to add the 4th Griselbrand?
Regarding hapless researcher, I can go on forever about why it's great, but I'll try to condense the reasons below:
1) Hapless is a creature, it can attack (I have beaten so many people by just playing one or two and attacking over and over) and block, and it doesn't get hit by spell pierce, flusterstorm, or swan song.
2) Hapless can discard cards at instant speed, enabling Exhume tricks.
3) Hapless allows you to invest mana and cards before committing cards to the graveyard, extremely useful for beating hate cards.
4) Increasing the number of this effect increases the number of keepable sevens, therefore strengthening the deck.
@Pirate, My list plays a lot more deliberately than the current standard list, the game plan is obviously to get a guy into play on turn two, but the deck has the ability to go longer thanks to the increased land count and the variety of targets and anti-hate. It's not as explosive as standard reanimator, but I believe it is more consistent on turn two with more keepable sevens and less anti-synergy (Show and Tell has some anti-synergy with entomb and careful study, and ponder has some anti-synergy with lotus petal). I can go into more detail if you want, but I don't want to type out too much if that's not what you wanted.
The problem with Hapless Researcher is that it is the third-best card for putting creatures in the graveyard for UB, and this deck does not need that many discard outlets. If you substitute your Researchers for Ponder, you will be amazed at how much more consistent and better the deck is. You need to make sure that you run enough cantrips, because they will help you find the missing piece of your combo.
I see more than others do because I know where to look.
I've been playing this deck exclusively for ~7 years, I've played with ponder and found the opposite, when I upped the hapless count, my consistency improved. Also, I'd argue that hapless is better than careful study most of the time, making it the second best discard outlet in UB.
Seems unusual to have no Petals but Daze. Petals opens up super fast kills that need as many free counters as you can manage to make your turn 1/2 play stick. With no petals you're looking at turn 2/3, at which point Daze is just getting paid. Typically, the lists without Petals are hard into the Thoughtseize plan, since if your turn 1 play isn't Griz, it better be discard. What's your thinking on this?
Without Ponders, your only digging is the Brainstorms. Do you treat Careful Study as a search tool when digging? 10 grave effects is more than most lists, but still seend like you'll be stuck on 2/3 of what you need and now way to search for the third piece.
No Petals and lots of land supports the mana intensive base required to run Pack Rat, but what about the random other creatures? How effective is 1 Misthollow Griffin? 1 Vendillion Clique? If the sideboard is intended to be transformational, is it selective or do all creatures come in all the time?
What's your target for EE, since without Petals you're limited to 2? You have Needle and Echoing Truth, so what's left to hit? Of those things, why not Ratchet Bomb?
Thanks.
Back in 2011 Hapless researcher was the real thing, just look at page 122 of the old thread: http://www.mtgthesource.com/forums/s...l=1#post560159
Those were the time when playing less than 4 brainstorm was accepted for the sake of consistenly reanimate a creature on turn 2, but also at that stage deathrite and rip didn't exist and the decks in general were different... I miss those days a little :(
Ignorance is strength
In my experience, Daze has just been more effective than thoughtseize, thoughtseize slows you down even more than daze, since it's dangerous to cast it the turn before you go off, forcing the play to be made on the third turn if you're going for exhume or reanimate. The turn one thoughtseize in game ones seems somewhat suspect, it doesn't beat DRS on the draw, and doesn't even beat force of will very frequently because of the large amount of cantrips in the format.
If your opponent is durdling and giving you time to set up because they are afraid of daze, great, we have the tools to go long. If not, then they are forced to play into daze. Having your reanimation forced is not the worst outcome because we are running 10 of that effect, most other spells you can deal with using daze, or the opponent is not casting other spells.
The deck doesn't transform exactly very often (The only matchup I bring in every creature for is actually the mirror). The 1 Griffin has been exclusively for miracles. They are slow enough that if they run rest in peace out, you can entomb for it, and suddenly you have a very real threat. They board out their entreats because they are so clunky against us, and most of the time cut terminus as well. In my experience, the griffin has been great in that matchup.
The Clique is brought in against miracles and combo mirrors where I feel I can afford to bring it in.
The strixes are strictly road blocks for RUG delver, since they have only 12 threats and rely heavily on soft counters, killing their threats is pretty huge, and baleful strix enables that. It's possible that these could be something else, but they have always done exactly what I want them to against RUG, so I'll be keeping them until I find something better.
Most of the time the deck doesn't transform at all, usually the anti hate is enough.
EE is in because it is harder to counter with counterbalance than Echoing Truth or Ratchet Bomb, since you can pay an arbitrary X with sunburst remaining 1 or 2, it's also harder to abrupt decay since it doesn't always take extra turns to activate like ratchet bomb does. EE is also better against fish and elves than echoing truth, which is why I have the 1-1 split. There are no 3+ cmc permanents I worry about if I'm able to get guys into play, and if there were, I'd rather not use ratchet bomb to deal with them.
I don't use careful study frequently as a dig spell, but one of the skills to learn while playing even the standard version of UB Reanimator is when to fire off careful study as a dig spell. Going into specifics on this skill is very hard, because there are many variables.
I hope that is the information you were looking for from me.
It is not possible that your consistency improved when you took out Ponder for Hapless Researcher. If you think it did, it can only be because you do not know how to play Ponder properly. Did you know that you have the option of shuffling your deck and drawing a card off the top if you don't like your top three? By the way, how many Reanimator decks that finished in the top eight at a major tournament played hapless and not careful study? I cannot find a single example. How many played careful study and not hapless? Nearly all of them. I rest my case.
I see more than others do because I know where to look.
It is entirely possible that my consistency went up without ponder, there is no reason to belittle me by assuming I don't know how ponder works. It is also not proof that careful study is better because people use it and not hapless. Just like it was not proof that the world was flat because everyone thought it was. The number of people who copy lists and don't cut sacred cows is huge compared to the number of tinkerers, so it seems obvious that by sheer numbers you will see more careful studies than hapless researchers. How many lists other than my own have you actually seen play multiple researchers? not in top 8s, but anywhere? Do you actually think those people tested with Hapless vs. Careful Study? I bet you most of them thought, "it only draws one card rather than two, so it must be strictly worse," and never took a second look. I'm happy to have a pro/con argument with you, but if you think "the world is flat because I can't see the curvature, and therefore it can't be round," then there is no reason to argue with you.
Have you ever TRIED my version of the deck? Based solely on your "It is not possible" language I'd guess not. I've played the standard version, and it feels infinitely more clunky than the list I've arrived at after a lot of thinking and tinkering. I didn't just throw my list together because I saw someone doing it, I thought about what I wanted to be doing after every single tournament I played since I started playing the deck, arriving at a list that fits my playstyle.
Yes, I played your version of the deck around 2011, but I found the deck to be much better when I cut them and opted to add ponder. I stand by my statement that it is impossible for the deck to be more consistent with hapless than with ponder. Note that I said "consistent" and not "better." Ponder lets you look at three (or four if you shuffle) cards on top of your deck and helps you find your combo pieces so that you can reanimate a fatty onto the battlefield. Hapless puts one card off the top into your hand. So running Ponder will clearly 100% make your deck more consistent than if you run hapless. There is no debate about that. When you said that the deck was more "consistent" for you when you ran hapless over ponder, this cannot possibly be true. You might have meant to say that the deck was "better," which I admit is possible albeit very doubtful. The best advantage of running hapless over ponder is that it makes the deck faster. If you have a hapless and a fatty in hand, you can send it straight to the bin. However, nearly all reanimator players today prefer the consistency of ponder. Hapless is pretty bad when you don't have a fatty along with it and you will be wishing it was a ponder. Consistency is the key to a more successful reanimator deck.
I see more than others do because I know where to look.
You're talking as though you are playing the deck in a vaccuum and as though hapless was not itself a combo piece. Sure, if your opponent is not interacting with you, ponder allows you to find missing pieces better than hapless, though unlike hapless it is not a piece in itself. But the more turns you give your opponent to interact with you, the less likely you are to resolve your important spells and have them matter. The consistency I speak of is that I just have the whole combo more often than the standard list, meaning I have to mulligan less and I have to durdle around less, fewer mulligans and less durdling turns into more consistency. So yes, it is still entirely possible that hapless researcher increases consistency, but it is, I grant you, more of a big picture consistency. I admit that ponder digs further, but that is not the end all be all of consistency. Hapless also interacts with opponents much more favorably than ponder.
But the argument here isn't (wasn't at least) ponder vs. hapless, we were talking about careful study vs. hapless. Before you try to convince me to play ponder over hapless, you'll have to convince me that I should keep careful study over hapless.
As an aside, somewhat unrelated to what we have been saying, if hapless indeed does make the deck faster, why is the main list playing ponder and petal rather than hapless and petal or ponder and no petals? Playing petals is wildly inconsistent compared to playing without them (in this particular deck), but it also makes the deck faster. Why are people playing them if they care about consistency? Just something I never understood, maybe you can shed some light on this for me.
I spent some of this morning writing a Python script to see if I could numerically simulate what we have been talking about. The logic gets involved if I go beyond turn two, as is I'm sitting at ~250 lines and am taking a break. The following is not meant to be proof of any argument, I'm just sharing what I have done because I think it's cool and interesting.
the initial results are interesting however. The program follows these rules:
the only mulligans are hands with no lands, everything else is a keep, all lands are considered duals. We only mulligan down as far as 5. The used lists are the same: my list with a swap between hapless and ponder. We are always on the draw (Not sure why I did that, but as long as it's all the same, it shouldn't matter). Since we are worrying about going off on turn 2, ponder is always cast turn 1 (I know this has issues with careful study to dump turn one, but the logic I used is flawed, and so sometimes allows extra mana for the ponder player on turn two, which makes up for the turn 1 bad ponder, but it overcompensates a little). Also, ponder always shuffles if the hand+ponder doesn't have all necessary pieces.
I've had some trouble thinking of the some of the logic, specifically, what to do if ponder is cast turn one but the required combo is 3 mana, or if the combo is 2 mana but there is only one land available, also, I had some trouble thinking about how to deal with the card drawn on the second turn, which is a problem in both cases. Because of this, the numbers on both cases are slightly higher than they should be, with ponder being slightly higher still but that should be fine, we should still get a rough estimate.
Anyways, after running the numbers (repeated simulations of 10,000 trials), I am getting that with hapless, we get to go off turn 2 ~52% of the time, compared to ponder ~41%.
I am not saying this proves anything, the program is clearly flawed in multiple ways (which I will work on), but given the rules stated above I do think the results are interesting, it certainly points to (but does not prove) what Justin was saying regarding speed, though it obviously doesn't say anything about consistency as whole, only on turn 2, with very special rules. Magic is hard.
If anyone has any ideas on how to code this better or has done this already, I am genuinely curious of the outcome, any and all feedback is appreciated. Also, if this isn't the kind of thing that should be posted here, please tell me so I don't do it again.
Thanks for the update. Is 15 lands sufficient to hit a landfall reliabily for the Angel? What do you think of running Abrupt Decay sideboard along with a Bayou and a Tropical Island over the 2 Show and Tell + 2 City of Traitors? It is weak to Surgical Extraction though.
World,
How has 0 thought seize been?
What made you cut it?
this is exciting news, where we can actually see the potential of programming in calculating odds for this.. i remember nearly 1-2 years ago, someone came up with an excel spreadsheet to calculate brainstorm and ponder probabilities
this is impressive, but requires much input i believe on the plays and decisions to make
Legacy decks
The Reanimator
EDH decks
The Mimeoplasm || Toolbox Reanimation Combo
Olivia Voldaren || Aggro Control
Gaddock Teeg || Support Combo Aggro
Cromat || Hypergenesis Combo
New to the deck.
Why is City of Traitors often played in the SB? Do you just side it in when Show and Tell is sided in? What do you side out for it?
Went 3-1 in the 4:30PM Pacfiic time Legacy daily today. List is a bit weird because I originally planned to hop in the 8PM event instead, noticed this one was about to fire, and rushed to get in.
1 Elesh Norn, Grand Cenobite
1 Grave Titan
3 Griselbrand
1 Inkwell Leviathan
1 Sire of Insanity
4 Brainstorm
4 Careful Study
2 Gitaxian Probe
3 Ponder
1 Animate Dead
4 Entomb
3 Exhume
4 Reanimate
2 Show and Tell
4 Force of Will
3 Daze
3 Lotus Petal
4 Underground Sea
2 Island
2 Swamp
4 Polluted Delta
2 Misty Rainforest
2 Verdant Catacombs
Sideboard:
1 Ashen Rider
1 Blazing Archon
2 City of Traitors
2 Duress
2 Echoing Truth
2 Flusterstorm
1 Iona, Shield of Emeria
2 Pithing Needle
2 Show and Tell
Warm-up match before I realized a daily was about to start was against Elves. Game 1 had a turn-two Elesh Norn on the play. Game 2 answered his turn-one Deathrite with turn-one Iona. Apologized for being a horrible person.
Round 1: Burn
Game 1: Won the die roll, played a fetch and passed. He went Mountain, Goblin Guide. End of turn Entombed Griselbrand, untapped and Exhumed him. Griselbrand won that race.
Game 2: He had a triple Goblin Guide opener, I got no lands off it and went all the way down to 1 before I could Entomb/Exhume Griselbrand (Iona couldn't save me at that point). He was already tapped out from casting 3-point burn spells and sacrificed his only two Mountains to Fireblast in response to the Exhume, I had the Daze, and he didn't draw another land.
Round 2: Miracles
Game 1: He opened on basic Island so I pegged him as Miracles or combo. His second land was Karakas. I Reanimated Inkwell Leviathan and countered his Terminus.
Game 2: Had Inkwell + Careful Study in hand, so tried that one again. Got a Griselbrand a turn later and was able to counter both attempts at Terminus.
Round 3: Esper Stoneblade
Game 1: Got an early Griselbrand. It got there.
Game 2: Won a counter war over his Thoughtseize, then got to untap, Duress (seeing StP and Thoughtseize, taking StP) and Entomb/Reanimate Griselbrand. Then almost thought I'd thrown the game away when I had a gigantic hand and was discarding; I didn't scroll all the way and missed that I could have discarded a Sire and reanimated to seal the deal. Echoing Truth got me out of his topdecked Detention Sphere, I kept Jace off the board with countermagic, and that was that.
Round 4: Omnitell
Game 1: Thought he was on Sneak and Show and so played to keep him from having a spare red after resolving Show and Tell. Of course, he put in Omniscience, then Wished for the Petals of Insight and I conceded.
Game 2: We both just played lands and cantripped for a long time. Eventually he wished for Show and Tell and I let it resolve; I had Iona and Ashen Rider in hand. Chose Iona, naming blue. Was the wrong choice as he used Omniscience to cast the Emrakul he had in hand. Oops.
I'll be taking some derivative of this list to a paper event on Monday. Probably will keep the main unchanged. In the sideboard, I have been increasingly not a fan of trying to bring in Jaces and play control; I've kept the Cities for now to enable the Show and Tell plan, but might cut them in favor of more disruption. I feel like the deck is stronger when it just goes all-in on reanimation and packs whatever countermagic/disruption is necessary out of the board.
Though I usually don't play this version, I won a 50 man tournament earlier in the year with hapless instead of study, g probe over ponder, and cabal therapy over thoughtseize. Just figured I'd chime in, in support of non traditional brews
My LGS ran it's first Legacy FNM tonight (I know, my shop is awesome). I went 4-0 with Reanimator.
Played against 4C Loam (2-1), Affinity (2-0), Shardless BUG (2-0), and UR Delver (2-1), using a build with Daze, Petal, Careful Study, and Ponder. I am not against other builds, but I think this configuration allows us to play akin to a tempo deck, the only difference being we play Entomb/Reanimate instead of Delver of Secrets.
Legacy - all flavors of Delver, UB Shadow, Eldrazi Stompy, UBx Reanimator, some UBx midrange piles
Modern - Prowess, Traverse Shadow
Pioneer - UW Aggro
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