[Deck]BUx Reanimator

[Ancestral]

So ive been toying around with the grixis delver list for the past couple days, including fnm last night, and I am just not digging it. I feel like reanimator as it was, was already to mulligan probe, and having two more non basics just make my hands that much worse. Grabbing seven cards with five black spells and a trop and volcanic does not feel good. I also feel that izzet charm is not as good as it seems, but it had its shining moments for sure. Ive since went back to UBg, but ive left engineered explosives in my side cause I like that card and I've left two hapless researchers main cause that card rules.

Edit ; I also have not missed ponder at all.

after some tests to i agree that izzet charm is a bit underpower (and slow) so the red splash doesnt seem worth it, more often i get my mana base werid than profit of the splash, so i m gonna stick to UBg version, decay give us all e need to deal with hate, and other 11 slots can get pretty well covered over all.

about hapless i had the same thoughts but i m cutting it now for ponders, my argument is that in g1 we are often quick and eficient so ponder vs hapless doesnt have much difference here, but after board, ponder help us a lot more to digging for our sb options and doesn´t gets us card disadvantage if they have some kind of hate to our grave! so altough its a nice card and i can consider playing it in teh future if something change, i ll play with the ponders instead. but sokme doubts yet (not that many tests yet) about 3 or 4 ponder and 2 or 3 seizes main deck, and not sure if its even best run more seizes or the 4th daze, because g1 daze is ruthless!!

[PirateKing]

So I recently started playing reanimator, and my question is in the Death and Taxes match up what it the best reanimation target? Do i get Elesh to wipe their board, Iona to name white, or tidespout to bounce their stuff?

Typically your best card to get is Inkwell Leviathan. Can't be hit with Swords to Plowshares or Karakas, and can trample over the occasional relevant blocker, typically Serra Avenger. After that, Elesh Norn is second best to keep their board clear and avoid getting raced with something like Mirran Crusader holding a sword of some flavor. But that's a stopgap in most games, easily hit with Swords and Karakas, so they'd typically need to be drawing poorly to let themselves die with just Elesh Norn hitting them. Iona, Shield of Emeria naming white is a dangerously fragile lock. Their outs are Karakas and AEther Vial bringing in Flickerwisp to get her off a turn an develop a board to race you. I wouldn't even consider bringing Iona in from the side against D&T, it's just not effective. The only thing going for her is a 7/7 body, and we're better served by that with just Griselbrand.

[Nuke is Good]

Typically your best card to get is Inkwell Leviathan. Can't be hit with Swords to Plowshares or Karakas, and can trample over the occasional relevant blocker, typically Serra Avenger. After that, Elesh Norn is second best to keep their board clear and avoid getting raced with something like Mirran Crusader holding a sword of some flavor. But that's a stopgap in most games, easily hit with Swords and Karakas, so they'd typically need to be drawing poorly to let themselves die with just Elesh Norn hitting them. Iona, Shield of Emeria naming white is a dangerously fragile lock. Their outs are Karakas and AEther Vial bringing in Flickerwisp to get her off a turn an develop a board to race you. I wouldn't even consider bringing Iona in from the side against D&T, it's just not effective. The only thing going for her is a 7/7 body, and we're better served by that with just Griselbrand.

Yeah the shroud fatty like Inkwell is your best bet against DnT. Elesh Norn serves as a super massacre on a stick. I typically side out 2 out of 3 Griselbrands due to Karakas being a thing. I have a miserable DnT record due to the one DnT player at the shop lives and breathes that deck plus he knows my deck as well. Not enough Pro-White critters. I use Empyrial Archangel due to a heavy Burn presence as it helps stall while I search for answers.

Though if your decklist is capable of turn 1 reanimations consistently, Sire of Insanity is perfect to shit on DnT. It would take two turns at most to get rid of sire via STP and by then the damage has been done.

[Damaku]

So I recently started playing reanimator, and my question is in the Death and Taxes match up what it the best reanimation target? Do i get Elesh to wipe their board, Iona to name white, or tidespout to bounce their stuff?

My weapon of choice against D&T is the Inkwell Leviathan, the only answer for him is council and most of them dont run it mainboard

[owerbart]

Against Death and Taxes Inkwell Leviathan is a beast, I currently don't run it in my sideboard, but if your meta is full of DnT, Inkwell Leviathan is the way to go as it's really hard to for them to race it/get it out.

I've been trying a copy of Keranos, God Of Storms in the sideboard and it has been amazing, it dodges Karakas, StP, Liliana, and it also bypasses Containment Priest, because reanimate spells check that the card you are targeting is a creature while it's on the graveyard, but when a god enters the battlefield, if you don't have devotion, it won't enter as a creature but as an enchantment, so Containment Priest doesn't trigger. Keranos is great to wipe boards and even to bolt Containment Priest and keep the reanimation going.

I'll be rocking Reanimator at the Legacy side-events here in Grand Prix Buenos Aires. Maybe trying Goblins for one of the side events, but definitely will play reanimator in 4/5 of them.

[Ancestral]

Against Death and Taxes Inkwell Leviathan is a beast, I currently don't run it in my sideboard, but if your meta is full of DnT, Inkwell Leviathan is the way to go as it's really hard to for them to race it/get it out.

I've been trying a copy of Keranos, God Of Storms in the sideboard and it has been amazing, it dodges Karakas, StP, Liliana, and it also bypasses Containment Priest, because reanimate spells check that the card you are targeting is a creature while it's on the graveyard, but when a god enters the battlefield, if you don't have devotion, it won't enter as a creature but as an enchantment, so Containment Priest doesn't trigger. Keranos is great to wipe boards and even to bolt Containment Priest and keep the reanimation going.

I'll be rocking Reanimator at the Legacy side-events here in Buenos Aires. Maybe trying Goblins for one of the side events, but definitely will play reanimator in 4/5 of them.

keranos its deeeeep!! :p like it ahah

[sunlith42]

Has anyone ever tried Soulflayer or Cairn Wanderer as answers to graveyard removal such as contaiment priest and grafdiggers cage? It would let us continue to put things in the yard and play a relevant threat.

[clashed]

Has anyone ever tried Soulflayer or Cairn Wanderer as answers to graveyard removal such as contaiment priest and grafdiggers cage? It would let us continue to put things in the yard and play a relevant threat.

Problem with those cards imo, is that they die to swords which is what containment priest decks also have. If they already have board control, then those cards I think grafdigger's cage is less of a problem as every matchup demands abrupt decays and/or echoing truth. The card that has been most impressive in testing has been pernicious deed if running the green splash. It has been an absolute house against fair decks, and just randomly beats the niche decks as well as decks that run multiple ways of permanent based hate. The ONLY problem it doesn't solve is planeswalkers. It simultaneously hits hate and creatures that are clocking us at the same time, which is just crazy if you think about it. I was skeptical at first due to the mana cost, but give it a try and see if it's as good as I think it is (as a one-of).

If snapcaster mage wasn't so expensive, I would be down to try that as well.

[sunlith42]

Problem with those cards imo, is that they die to swords which is what containment priest decks also have.

If Inkwell is in the yard they would have shroud

[PirateKing]

Has anyone ever tried Soulflayer or Cairn Wanderer as answers to graveyard removal such as contaiment priest and grafdiggers cage? It would let us continue to put things in the yard and play a relevant threat.

If Soulflayer had Flash so we could bring him in response to a Surgical Extraction or a Crop Rotated Bojuka Bog or some such trickery then it might warrent more consideration. But either way it'd mostly amount to just having a flying Batterskull 4 out of 5 times. I'd say 5 mana is too much for us; while not impossible, and the fact that Cairn Wanderer counts all graveyards for it's abilities, realistically deploying him seems so unlikely I'm unwilling to dedicate a sideboard slot.

There are enough answers to Containment Priest in the green splash that also cover a host of other permanents, and any sideboard should include some measure of permanent bounce. And lastly, as those before have mentioned, decks utilizing Containment Priest have a tough time getting Keranos off the board.

[Kamus]

I'm currently trying this list:

Main deck:

4 Polluted Delta
3 Flooded Strand
2 Bloodstained Mire
4 Underground Sea
1 Island
1 Swamp

4 Lotus Petal

4 Griselbrand
1 Elesh Norn, Grand Cenobite
1 Tidespout Tyrant
1 Grave Titan

4 Brainstorm
3 Ponder
3 Daze
4 Force of Will
4 Careful Study
2 Show and Tell
2 Thoughtseize
4 Entomb
4 Reanimate
4 Exhume

Sideboard:

1 City of Traitors
1 Iona, Shield of Emeria
3 Pithing Needle
2 Thoughtseize
1 Misdirection
3 Engineered Explosives
2 Massacre
2 Show and Tell

[clashed]

I'm currently trying this list:

Main deck:

4 Polluted Delta
3 Flooded Strand
2 Bloodstained Mire
4 Underground Sea
1 Island
1 Swamp

4 Lotus Petal

4 Griselbrand
1 Elesh Norn, Grand Cenobite
1 Tidespout Tyrant
1 Grave Titan

4 Brainstorm
3 Ponder
3 Daze
4 Force of Will
4 Careful Study
2 Show and Tell
2 Thoughtseize
4 Entomb
4 Reanimate
4 Exhume

Sideboard:

1 City of Traitors
1 Iona, Shield of Emeria
3 Pithing Needle
2 Thoughtseize
1 Misdirection
3 Engineered Explosives
2 Massacre
2 Show and Tell

Show and Tell main is just a bad idea right now imo. It's dead against one of the most popular choices in the metagame in omnitell and way slower then other lines of play in the deck. Game 1, you are almost always going to reanimate, and with deathrite shaman becoming less popular, there is simply no reason to run it main deck anymore. Swap a Show and Tells for the misdirection and maybe a thoughtseize and/or pithing needle. Pithing needle main is something people almost never expect, and allows you to beat active Karakas and/or other problematic things like Jace (which are the only few things people can do against us g1). I would also have some number of echoing truths in the sideboard, possibly cutting an ee and a pithing needle, going down to 2 for all three. Echoing truth helps in matchups with leyline, and is fantastic against marit lage and other tokens based strategies, as well as bouncing grave hate in case you have to go that route.

[DoorDie]

@PirateKing,

Any chance you could do a new primer on the deck? Feline's works ok, but I see a lot of the same questions popping up in the thread. It would be helpful to have the main post updated with deeper analyses, deck variants, and metagame changes, which are rare but do happen (looking at you, Priest).

Also, nice work on the Izzet Charm build. I tried four-color and didn't like it, but amusingly the greed is totally justifiable.

[PirateKing]

@PirateKing,

Any chance you could do a new primer on the deck? Feline's works ok, but I see a lot of the same questions popping up in the thread. It would be helpful to have the main post updated with deeper analyses, deck variants, and metagame changes, which are rare but do happen (looking at you, Priest).

Also, nice work on the Izzet Charm build. I tried four-color and didn't like it, but amusingly the greed is totally justifiable.

Oh man oh jeez oh man oh jeez oh man oh jeez

Not sure if I'm qualified to write a primer for all of Reanimator, though it's an honor to even be considered. I can offer insights to my list and some of my historical builds, but as far as the BURG build, I need to send credit to Stryfo, he's the one who motivated me to drop Ponder and give Hapless Researcher a try along with the red splash. Did you have any specific questions or thoughts on my build? I haven't played a with a copy of Show & Tell for years, so I'm not qualified to say how that plays in the current meta.

I'll see if I can spend a few days to write something up of substance, but let's not set our expectations too high.

[owerbart]

Oh man oh jeez oh man oh jeez oh man oh jeez

Not sure if I'm qualified to write a primer for all of Reanimator, though it's an honor to even be considered. I can offer insights to my list and some of my historical builds, but as far as the BURG build, I need to send credit to Stryfo, he's the one who motivated me to drop Ponder and give Hapless Researcher a try along with the red splash. Did you have any specific questions or thoughts on my build? I haven't played a with a copy of Show & Tell for years, so I'm not qualified to say how that plays in the current meta.

I'll see if I can spend a few days to write something up of substance, but let's not set our expectations too high.

A new primer would be great.

I've been playing with Show and Tell in Reanimator and to be honest, I could never see them going away. It creates so many wins out of nowhere, and also punishes GY hate if that's the only thing they are banking on.

About it being weak against Omni-Tell, Reanimator (with or without Show and Tell) is already Omni-Tell nightmare. I've played against the deck quite a few times and it's terrible how in your favor it is. The fact that they MUST cast Show and Tell to win means that they always have to be worried about you cheating a creature for free. Post board I swap an Elesh Norn for an Ashen Rider, replace a copy of Show and Tell with Thoughtseize, and depending on what I see, I take a 2/3 cards for Serenity/Abrupt Decay (their GY hate is Cage most of the time). Still conceptually speaking even if you don't sideboard very well, you are still getting huge edges because their SnT will always be symetrical but your Exhumes and Reanimates won't.




A card I'm still considering at least in the sideboard is Loyal Retainers. It bypasses Spell Pierce, Flusterstorm, REB, Spell Snare, and the fact it costs 3 Mana may be great against Miracles since they run few cards with cost 3 (Vendilion Clique, Council's Judgment)

[DoorDie]

I'll see if I can spend a few days to write something up of substance, but let's not set our expectations too high.

Well, the bar isn't that high either honestly. It is Legacy Magic, but it's also a pretty simple combo in the format. I prodded you because you frequent the forums enough and have demonstrated a strong knowledge base and balanced perspective on card choices and strategies. I'm no real authority myself; best I've done is taking home a Liliana of the Veil in 8th place at a LGS.

Don't forget you can lean on the community. If anything's wrong or appears biased in your primer, we'll fix it! I'd be happy to pitch in, and I'm sure others like Stryfo would as well.

I think structuring the primer to focus on vanilla U/B is key, since that's really the core of the deck. Other variants can get honorable mention, particularly the wonders that Abrupt Decay does for us. I'd also suggest to inject some humor, keep it from being so dry.

In regards to your 4-color build: I like the 10x Reanimation spell redundancy, shaving a Griselbrand because 8 is too many, and 17 lands frees up a slot over 14 lands + 4 petals. I've come to the same conclusions on all those things, myself. The problem I have is the mana really sucks; you have a RU and BG spell in a U/B-based deck. It's not like just splashing Tarmogoyf and Young Pyro; these spells, powerful and flexible as they are, are very demanding. I almost wanted Taiga in the board to provide both off-colors (except that Delta can't fetch it). But that said, it is Legacy, and fetches + Brainstorm do a lot of work in making this double splash viable.

Hapless vs. Ponder has been a debate in the past, and I don't believe either one to be better than the other. I just personally prefer Ponder for smoother postboard games. I also think Show and Tell isn't great anymore, but it's currently in my sideboard (shhh, don't tell anyone).

[sunlith42]

I have a question about the interaction between Hapless and exhume. If my opponent has a deathrite shaman in play and I have a hapless researcher. Can I cast exhume with nothing in the graveyard then activate hapless without him being able to respond using deathrite to remove it? Or do I have to already have a creature in the yard for the hapless trick to work, having him remove that other creature?

[bryanzoll]

I have a question about the interaction between Hapless and exhume. If my opponent has a deathrite shaman in play and I have a hapless researcher. Can I cast exhume with nothing in the graveyard then activate hapless without him being able to respond using deathrite to remove it? Or do I have to already have a creature in the yard for the hapless trick to work, having him remove that other creature?

After the hapless researcher ability resolves (meaning you pitch a card) with Exhume still on the stack, your opponent would be able to exile whatever creature you discarded.

The reason for this is because after a spell on the stack resolves and another spell/trigger is on the stack, both players receive priority to respond with instants / abilities while the spell/trigger is on the stack.

[PirateKing]

That won't work how you hoped. As bryanzoll said, in order for anything to resolve, both players need to pass priority without adding anything onto the stack. So if you add Hapless Researcher's ability onto your own Exhume on the stack, it can resolve, but before Exhume does, both players need to pass priority without adding anything. Which is unlikely if they have out an active Deathrite Shaman and an open to spend. Since you're talking about Exhume here though, you could always just get back your Hapless Researcher as a consolation prize...

[sunlith42]

Did everyone see the Origins spoiler "Hallowed Moonlight" 1W, Instant, Until end of turn, if a creature would enter the battlefield and it wasn't cast, exile it instead. Draw a card.

This looks like it could be good in legacy against a lot of decks, as it doesn't say non-token. If this becomes a main deck card that could be annoying. It only happens once but its slightly worse for us than a counterspell and it seems like it could be main deck in white decks.