Veteran Explorer Doomsday

[Vacrix]

I've been trying to get this to work lately, specifically Veteran Explorer in storm combo. Against RUG, its free basics and against other decks, we exploit the lands better. Pact isn't as dangerous before turn 2 as you might think, having ported a lot of the acceleration structure of this deck from Pact Spanish Inquisition. Even if your entire hand gets stuffed by permission, often you will still have 4 lands to pay the upkeep.

Cabal Therapy is one of the better disruption spells in Legacy, but not how its been played in current versions of TES and ANT. Its a subpar protection spell that occasionally does work when you play it with another subpar protection spell, Gitaxian Probe. In this deck, though, Cabal Therapy is fully exploited because you can actually flashback it.

Currently the list is 62 cards. I'd appreciate some help in figuring out what to cut. The list is incredibly fun to play, though its obviously a little more challenging than whatever storm variant you're familiar with.


- VE Doomsday -
Pact-package - 12
4 Veteran Explorer
4 Summoner's Pact
2 Elvish Spirit Guide
1 Wild Dogs
1 Dryad Arbor

Acceleration - 14
4 Lion's Eye Diamond
1 Lotus Petal
4 Culling the Weak
4 Dark Ritual
1 Rain of Filth

Land - 13
1 Forest
1 Island
1 Mountain
1 Swamp
1 Bayou
1 Tropical Island
1 Underground Sea
2 Misty Rainforest
4 Verdant Catacombs

Cantrip - 8
4 Brainstorm
4 Sensei's Divining Top

Protection - 5
4 Cabal Therapy
1 Gitaxian Probe

Business - 10
1 Burning Wish
1 Idea's Unbound
1 Cruel Bargain
2 Doomsday
4 Infernal Tutor
1 Tendrils of Agony

62 cards


Some cards in the deck allow you to look like Nic fit by opening with cards like Therapy, Explorer, Top, Arbor, Bayou, Catacombs.


Note that Wild Dogs has cycling. Therefore, Pact allows you to cantrip into Doomsday in addition to being a powerful, color fixing mana source as Veteran Explorer, Dryad Arbor, and ESG. Eternal Witness is another card I'd consider to take further advantage of Summoner's Pact but its probably unnecessary.

I dropped Chrome Mox and Lotus Petals from my original build upon dropping Ad Nauseam. Probe is useful for some piles so I kept it in. I think that Idea's Unbound and Cruel Bargain allow for increased flexibility but I'm sure that more testing will narrow that slot to one or the other.

The absurd amounts of mana in this deck and cantrip chaining can lead to some incredible plays that have lead me to want the maindeck Tendrils quite often.

I haven't begun to work on a sideboard.


I've also worked on versions with Ad Nauseam. Those versions go off faster than ANT, a little slower than TES but better slow playing due to Therapy flashbacks, Explorers, Tops, etc.


EDIT:
Please note that a shit ton of mana, a couple Summoner's Pacts, and a Top are excellent and can actually stretch the deck's win potential because you can look at the top 3, Pact (shuffles), look at the top 3, play Explorer, crack explorer (shuffle), look... so you see double shuffling is extremely relevant at making your Tops and Brainstorms that much stronger.

[Umbranex]

this deck looks quite interesting. I really love the Nic Fit deck (I actually have four versions of it sleeved up that I play with currently ) and I think that using the veteran explorer core to speed up the deck is a great idea. I especially love how this makes Rain of Filth a viable option in the deck.

personally in this build i would cut one explorer (since you only have four exploreable lands and the pact can search it out if need be effectively giving you 7 copies) and either a petal or the probe. I would lean toward the probe as I think the mana from the petal is more vital but I can see how the probe can be useful for piles occasionally and without testing the deck Im not sure which is the proper card to cut. I usually prefer three tops but with the number of shuffle effects to which this deck has access top gets so absurdly good I have to admit four is probably the best number to have. (plus of course BS can always tuck other copies of top or just draw off them if need be to get rid of them)

as for the sideboard I would have to test this a lot to know the best way to side. I have not played much combo so I am not as knowledgeable on the way TES and AnT and old Doomsday decks would need to board for the current meta.

[Vacrix]

Indeed. I don't want to cut Tops because they are completely retarded. In my gold fishing, I usually find myself sitting on a shit ton of mana and Top + Pact. The double shuffle effect usually means I can see 6 cards with Top. Add another Shuffle effect into the mix and you can see 9 cards with Top, and then eventually grab one with the top. TES playing 11 shuffle effects and ANT somewhere around 12-16 usually means their cantrips are for set up. Top makes the rest of the deck incredibly flexible. I also don't want to cut Brainstorms because they help you throw back what you don't need.

Cutting a Veteran Explorer makes sense but I think its one of the best cards in the deck that you can draw naturally. You can't Spell Pierce it, playing first or leading with Land + Petal (or holding ESG) makes setting up a breeze. I wouldn't think about Pact and VE has interchangable. Rather, Pact is typically going to be played the turn you win, or on turn 2 that way you can sneak through a cantrip behind a Therapy (remember that on turn 2 you have 2 lands and if you crack Explorer then you can have 4 to pay for Pact).

I'd say I want to lead with Therapy, Top, or Explorer, and if Brainstorm or Drit in a faster hand. It might be better to cut acceleration. I'm going to experiment by cutting a Drit and/or a Culling.

[Namida]

Do you feel like you actually have enough blue mana to support Ideas Unbound? Of course, you can use Cantrip + LED mana to make it work too, but I feel like 4 sources of blue mana is cutting it close when it comes to trying to actually cast a spell that costs two blue mana. I don't know--It might be easy to play around Wasteland because you have one Island, but it seems like you would need to be very careful getting your second blue mana.

[Vacrix]

It depends on how you approach your hand. Ideas Unbound is something I've found is immensely difficult to cast, so I put Manamorphose in as a 1'of that way if you DD with XG floating, you can cantrip into your top card which cantrips into IU, which draws you the other 3 cards. I cut a Culling for MM, and I'm testing that variation today.

Yes the Island is for Wasteland but also to give you flexibility with Explorer. Having a single Island means you can Brainstorm after VE. Also, I think that in general Pact is the best card in this deck. Pact can be converted into XX, or G, or a creature, or a cantrip, and its an instant that costs 0. I'm trying to design the deck this way on purpose because people rarely counter Pact. This deck should be expected to be a Dark Horse since giving the opponent 2 free basics when you go off and playing Doomsday means WAY more thinking than your typical storm combo player wants to do. At the same time, you will confound opponents who have no idea how to out think you because the deck is not entirely straight forward like most storm combo. Notice how storm combo became much more stream lined, which means playing against it also became relatively stream lined. A lot of storm players still talk like Empty the Warrens and Xantid Swarm are super secret tech. The ideas I'm proposing are much more experimental, but it also means you can build a storm variant with lines of play in it that will out play opponents who think they have you figured out, this is especially the case when you consider how many control players are choosing to play with discard in BUG variants. Obviously they are, its easy to pick apart a storm deck nowadays because they don't have enough moving parts, and in general you can anticipate your opponents possible lines of play, even with storm players playing multiple cantrips. Doomsday is much harder to play against because Doomsday is more flexible. Pact is incredibly flexible, Veteran Explorer makes your mana base and long game more flexible, Burning Wish makes getting out of shitty situations easier. I was also thinking that because this deck doesn't play Ad Nauseam, it might make sense in the pre-board to just have the option of making a play like 'Probe, see no counter magic, see RUG? oh shit, see lightning bolts', all I have in hand is Summoner's Pact and a shit ton of mana because I was waiting, Pact into the right fat creature, go to town and pay the upkeep with a LED or the lands from my VEs. Anyone with ideas on what this creature might be, please shoot off ideas, and lets explore. Having one of these also gives the VE Doomsday player the option of just creating a situation where they blow up the board with Burning Wish --> Damnation and then just win with a fat dude thats part of the Pact-package.



Also, I'm thinking about IGG in the maindeck (another variation I'll be testing today), and a Dream Salvage. I know that sounds retarded at first glance, but my intuition tells me that this deck really wants to play IGG in the pre-board because this storm variant tends toward a shit ton of mana and it can do a lot with an IGG. In my goldfishing, I actually keep wishing I was playing one because its fairly easy to recycle your graveyard, for example a Summoner's Pact, Culling, IT. I'm speaking about drawing the IGG naturally here

If we aren't looking at storm with a pre-digested point of view, then you notice that IGG is still a pseudo-mind twist for 4. This deck recovers from that situation incredibly easy thanks to cantrips (SDT being huge here), basics, and multiple business spell options. Dream Salvage looks like it could be the missing link for figuring out how to make IT work in cases where you can't just play an IGG loop on auto-pilot. In these cases, Culling the Weak is likely cracking a Veteran Explorer, or you have the right acceleration, but you don't want to play the 2nd IGG maindeck, so you play a singleton Dream Salvage instead. The Dream Salvage follows the tail end of an early IGG where you IT with 5 floating, but you aren't able to produce enough storm for a kill, and you aren't able to go for Empty the Warrens (perhaps we've played Pact). This allows you to draw 6/7 new cards. Paying for Pact after that should be easy as you have a chance of hitting multiple Explorers. Dream Salvage will also randomly be a silver bullet against decks that discard a shit ton of cards like Dredge. I'm going to try these 2 singletons, and cut a Doomsday, still keeping it at 62 cards.

[Umbranex]

Yes thinking more on it I can see how V Explorer is much better to have naturally than to need to pact for it. Im coming from a Nic Fit line of thinking and im used to tutoring them with the GSZ. I would still recommend cutting down to 61 cards if you can though. I usually play 61 but going higher may throw off the numbers too much (although I have not actually worked out the difference in percentages between the 61 and 62 MD size so between the filtering and Doomsday it may be an moot point)

I can see this becoming more flexible and powerful than traditional storm if the deck is fine tuned enough since I agree wholeheartedly with your assessment of storm as it is. It is very straight forward and I am able to beat it with discard due to this very reason.

As for the creatures are you looking to try and find a finisher creature that is castable against pretty much the whole field or one specifically for RUG matchups? I am guessing the former. One possibility is Sigarda. Her double white makes her hard to cast but LEDs will help with that and she is all but unstoppable by most of the field. another one who is easier to cast but can be chumped much easier is Thrun. 4/4 beater that can regen and has the added bonus of being immune to Swords and counters could be a possibility. Out of these two I would still go with Sigarda though. Her toughness to cast and the chance of being countered is more than made up for by the fact that she is all but immortal against the meta. When I ran her in white Nic Fit she won me so many games it was sick. It was not very often that she would resolve and I would not end up winning shortly after.
Another crazy powerful creature is Obliterator. That dude is a straight truck to the face for any non white deck if he resolves. The downside of course is Swords and sacrifice effects but he is relatively low cost for such a powerhouse that also dodges decay if you run into a deck running it.

Do you have this deck built on MtGO? I would love to watch some games where you pilot it. (especially if it has commentary) That would allow me to get a better grasp on the finer workings of the deck that I may be missing and will help fuel ideas that I may be able to contribute since most of my experience of storm is playing AGAINST it lol

[Bed Decks Palyer]

I was also thinking that because this deck doesn't play Ad Nauseam, it might make sense in the pre-board to just have the option of making a play like 'Probe, see no counter magic, see RUG? oh shit, see lightning bolts', all I have in hand is Summoner's Pact and a shit ton of mana because I was waiting, Pact into the right fat creature, go to town and pay the upkeep with a LED or the lands from my VEs. Anyone with ideas on what this creature might be, please shoot off ideas, and lets explore.

One of the Spirit Avatars? Deity of Scars, Deus of Calamity.
Novablast Wurm? They lose all creatures once you tap it.
Phantom Nishoba? Lifegain is good, amirite?
Gleancrawler for moar Veteran fun?
Ruric Thar, the Unbowed makes their cantrips-for-Submerge unplayable.
Spiritmonger is stylish, big enough and doesn't cost much.