Steel Stompy 2.0 / Ravager Shops

[ReAnimator]

@Reanimator

the skirges and revokers definitely do feel mediocre but necessary. Skirges can be played when you only have 1 land which is nice at times and the lifelink helps offset the damage you take with the ancient tombs. Revokers feel like crap until you manage to manascrew an opponent when you name mana dorks, moxes, spirit guides or even planeswalkers.

Fair seems very innocuous cause usually it's just there to gain 1 life but after a few turns it ends up gaining you a lot of life and I've even had opponents who underestimated it initially and ended up Wastelanding the Fair before my sol lands. The Karakas is just a hedge against lands and reanimator and saves sideboard slots I guess. I did have a couple of games against opponents where I didn't know what they were playing and game 1 I just played turn 1 Karakas and they slumped in their chairs cause they were on Sneak/Show and reanimator so I'll take any cards that gives me free wins on game 1.

Regarding the Mox Opal, I found that I've rarely needed it to generate mana for me on turn 1 as the usual turn 1 play is a Chalice or Thorn to disrupt the opponent and with 8 sol lands plus 3 petals, it's fairly easy to generate 2 mana on turn 1 without using the mox.

Regarding the Smuggler's Copter, I've never tried it myself but I was hesitent to try it because Thorn is a big reason why I win with the deck and the Copter will end up being too high casting with Thorns in play.

Those are fair points, i think Copters stock goes up if you have Foundry Inspectors as they off set the thorns.

Maybe it's just the matches i've played but Skirge takes a while to gain life and 90% of the time you are paying 2 life initially as well, so we are talking 3 turns till it starts gaining life. Sure sometimes you are going to Ravager it or have a Steel Overseer working, but in those situations you really never need the help, as you will be winning any race regardless. I just feel like sure in a vacuum it's a fine card but against most of the tier 1 decks it's not where you want to be. Miracles, 4C, Sneak, Storm, Lands, Reanimator, Red Stompy etc, i don't want any skirges at all. and i'm going to board them out, that's like 70% of the tier one meta decks at least.
I think it's a fine card in general but not very good vs the current meta.

[pocari79]

Those are fair points, i think Copters stock goes up if you have Foundry Inspectors as they off set the thorns.

Maybe it's just the matches i've played but Skirge takes a while to gain life and 90% of the time you are paying 2 life initially as well, so we are talking 3 turns till it starts gaining life. Sure sometimes you are going to Ravager it or have a Steel Overseer working, but in those situations you really never need the help, as you will be winning any race regardless. I just feel like sure in a vacuum it's a fine card but against most of the tier 1 decks it's not where you want to be. Miracles, 4C, Sneak, Storm, Lands, Reanimator, Red Stompy etc, i don't want any skirges at all. and i'm going to board them out, that's like 70% of the tier one meta decks at least.
I think it's a fine card in general but not very good vs the current meta.

totally agree with your points on the Skirge which is why I did cut it down from 4 to 3. The thing with Skirge is that it facilitates some busted opening hands which I've gotten before. For example, I had a hand where turn 1 I played a sol land, petal, mox, sacced the petal and tap sol land to play Inspector, then was able to pay 2 life for Skirge to turn on metalcraft for mox and then played a steel overseer. Now sure, that's very specific and requires a lot of cards but I think if you are playing this deck, you want to try to maximize the chances of you trying to get these starts. It's just one of those cards where the majority of the time it seems fairly bad but then when it's good it's amazing and I can't seem to find a replacement card that's a threat that I can play for 1 mana without it getting countered by my own chalice on 1.

[ReAnimator]

totally agree with your points on the Skirge which is why I did cut it down from 4 to 3. The thing with Skirge is that it facilitates some busted opening hands which I've gotten before. For example, I had a hand where turn 1 I played a sol land, petal, mox, sacced the petal and tap sol land to play Inspector, then was able to pay 2 life for Skirge to turn on metalcraft for mox and then played a steel overseer. Now sure, that's very specific and requires a lot of cards but I think if you are playing this deck, you want to try to maximize the chances of you trying to get these starts. It's just one of those cards where the majority of the time it seems fairly bad but then when it's good it's amazing and I can't seem to find a replacement card that's a threat that I can play for 1 mana without it getting countered by my own chalice on 1.

I guess that's really the problem is that there aren't any other castable 1 drops available. In your above scenario a zero cast artifact would have done the same thing, but it wouldn't have had power/toughness. This might be one of those cases where yeah it's not a great card but the synergies and corner cases allow it to be the best option. I'm going to try some configurations with more zero drops without them and see if i ever miss them at all.

[mistercakes]

you can try arcbound worker. it's not an amazing card, but it has a lot of great synergy with ravager and the rest of the +1+1 counter guys.

[Cave]

you can try arcbound worker. it's not an amazing card, but it has a lot of great synergy with ravager and the rest of the +1+1 counter guys.

Also great synergy with chalice of the void

[mistercakes]

Also great synergy with chalice of the void

sometimes you just gotta yolo.

[mambosong]

Skirge and revoker have felt mediocre to me, so has Fair and sometimes Karakas.

I've had the opposite experience, and it might be dependent on your overall list and mulligan experience. Both Skirge and Fair are great incidental MB cards against the delver match up where their deck's premise is to get just the right amount of damage in the right amount of turns. To be able to gain life every turn (especially with ravager/overseer + skirge) you can out pace them pretty easily after a turn 1 lock piece. That said, Skirge becomes even better if you have Foundry Inspector in play, effectively costing 2 Life to play it on the same turn you play foundry inspector, which then dodges removal because they'll likely try to kill Inspector first.

I agree that Karakas has felt subpar and it's the reason I switched over to sea gate wreckage for grinding potential. ghost quarters can also be great to use instead to attack the player's manabase.

I played with 4x foundry inspectors and 2 lodestone golems, 4 thorns and 4 chalice last week and went 3-1 against (one win being a bye):
1-2 vs Deadguy ale
*Bye*
2-0 vs Dimir Mill
2-0 vs 4c Pile

Highlighted play of the day was against Deadguy Ale. I start on the play with Tomb -> Steel Overseer, they go Scrubland -> DRS. Turn 2 I wasteland their scrubland, play ballista for 1 and tick it up with overseer to kill their DRS, and they concede after my 3rd turn play of 2nd overseer into 2nd ballista.

[Sisyphos]

My current list:

4 Wasteland
4 Ancient Tomb
4 City of Traitors
2 Cavern of Souls
2 Karakas
2 Mishra's Factory
3 Blinkmoth Nexus

2 Mox Opal
2 Lotus Petal
2 Mox Diamond
4 Chalice of the Void
3 Thorn of Amethyst
2 Smuggler's Copter

4 Walking Ballista
4 Foundry Inspector
4 Steel Overseer
4 Arcbound Ravager
3 Phyrexian Revoker
3 Hangarback Walker
2 Lodestone Golem

SB: 2 Sorcerous Spyglass
SB: 1 Thorn of Amethyst
SB: 4 Leyline of the Void
SB: 1 Hangarback Walker
SB: 1 Umezawa's Jitte
SB: 4 Ensnaring Bridge
SB: 2 Spellskite

Board is a bit all over the place and designed for my local meta. Went 3-0-1 yesterday, 2-1 against BUG Death's Shadow, 2-0 against Food Chain, 2-1 against Maverick and ID against Storm for guaranteed first. Played for fun and won pretty easily as expected.


Some notes on individual card choices:
Split Mishra/Blinkmoth: Without Skirges the extra flying blocker is a bit more relevant than the extra power I think.

Karakas: Wins games on its own. TurboDepth is putting up good results lately and is getting more play also. Obviously also great against Reanimator. Also offers utility against SnT, BUG etc.

Cavern of Souls: Every creature in the deck apart from Ravager/Revoker/Golem is a Construct. A lot of blue decks in Legacy means a lot of counterspells in Legacy.

Inventor's Fair: Never did anything for me. The cost to activate is too high unless you are absolutely flooded and the life gain was never relevant in testing.

Split Mox/Mox/Petal: All of the accelerants have in common that the second one is far worse than the first one. Splitting the numbers makes it less likely to draw superfluous extra copies.

Copter/Lodestone: Basically the slots in the deck that I use to try out stuff. The rest of the maindeck is pretty much mandatory I think. Currently I like the card selection/pseudo-haste of Copter and the combination of clock/disruption from Lodestone.

Foundry Inspector: Absolutely nuts. Can easily offer 3+ mana worth of acceleration in one turn. Games were you get two to stick are just bonkers.

Vault Skirge: I can see the good points of the card: “one” mana spell, flying blocker, lifelink. But in testing for me it just never worked out as well as it sounds on paper. Always was the weakest card, never pulled its weight.


Stuff I want to try after Dominaria is out:
Karn, Scion of Urza: Card advantage that can also provide a clock. It could provide a card that needs to be dealt with, is not a creature itself and neither an artifact. Artifact and/or creature removal is still good against it as it can kill the tokens, but it would give the deck a card that can not just be killed by Decay/Grudge/K.Command. Don't know if it's strong enough but maybe a sideboard option for grindfests.

Traxos, Scourge of Kroog: The deck is currently made up of small synergistic creatures. Depending on the matchup it can be difficult to get the synergies going or the clock you put up can be too slow as you need time too use the synergies. Traxos could be a card that offers a fast clock, more or less ignores tokens/TNN as blockers and is Decay/Bolt proof. Its disadvantage should be negligible in this type of deck. Have my doubts whether its strong enough, but testing will tell.

Voltaic Servant: Another synergistic small creature. Hangarback/Overseer are the most abusable, but even the pseudo vigilance it can provide by untapping an attacker or providing additional mana is sweet. The deck does not play any instants, but has plenty of activated abilities that you can spend the mana on during your opponents turn. Probably the most likely of the three to make the cut.

[ReAnimator]

@Sisyphos

My list is looking very similar to yours, and i came to a lot of the same conclusions that you did, though i like petals to the max. I was thinking about Blinkmoths over Mishras as well but haven't tried it yet. On paper having that extra evasion and being able to chump big flyers or trade with delvers seems great, especially without Skirge being there. Copters cover a lot of that ground too.

[Qernavak]

Recently 5-0'd a league (after back to back 4-1's) with Man of Steel. A few months back I tried the deck online, but the metagame was full of maindeck Kholagan's Command. It seems the online meta is a lot more suitable for MoS. My list is a minorly tweaked Ricci's list:



Played vs.

R1 BUG control
R2 BUG delver
R3 Esper Stoneblade
R4 Red Stompy
R5 Grixis Delver

[The_Spoonerman]

My current list:

4 Wasteland
4 Ancient Tomb
4 City of Traitors
2 Cavern of Souls
2 Karakas
2 Mishra's Factory
3 Blinkmoth Nexus

2 Mox Opal
2 Lotus Petal
2 Mox Diamond
4 Chalice of the Void
3 Thorn of Amethyst
2 Smuggler's Copter

4 Walking Ballista
4 Foundry Inspector
4 Steel Overseer
4 Arcbound Ravager
3 Phyrexian Revoker
3 Hangarback Walker
2 Lodestone Golem

SB: 2 Sorcerous Spyglass
SB: 1 Thorn of Amethyst
SB: 4 Leyline of the Void
SB: 1 Hangarback Walker
SB: 1 Umezawa's Jitte
SB: 4 Ensnaring Bridge
SB: 2 Spellskite

Board is a bit all over the place and designed for my local meta. Went 3-0-1 yesterday, 2-1 against BUG Death's Shadow, 2-0 against Food Chain, 2-1 against Maverick and ID against Storm for guaranteed first. Played for fun and won pretty easily as expected.


Some notes on individual card choices:
Split Mishra/Blinkmoth: Without Skirges the extra flying blocker is a bit more relevant than the extra power I think.

Karakas: Wins games on its own. TurboDepth is putting up good results lately and is getting more play also. Obviously also great against Reanimator. Also offers utility against SnT, BUG etc.

Cavern of Souls: Every creature in the deck apart from Ravager/Revoker/Golem is a Construct. A lot of blue decks in Legacy means a lot of counterspells in Legacy.

Inventor's Fair: Never did anything for me. The cost to activate is too high unless you are absolutely flooded and the life gain was never relevant in testing.

Split Mox/Mox/Petal: All of the accelerants have in common that the second one is far worse than the first one. Splitting the numbers makes it less likely to draw superfluous extra copies.

Copter/Lodestone: Basically the slots in the deck that I use to try out stuff. The rest of the maindeck is pretty much mandatory I think. Currently I like the card selection/pseudo-haste of Copter and the combination of clock/disruption from Lodestone.

Foundry Inspector: Absolutely nuts. Can easily offer 3+ mana worth of acceleration in one turn. Games were you get two to stick are just bonkers.

Vault Skirge: I can see the good points of the card: “one” mana spell, flying blocker, lifelink. But in testing for me it just never worked out as well as it sounds on paper. Always was the weakest card, never pulled its weight.


Stuff I want to try after Dominaria is out:
Karn, Scion of Urza: Card advantage that can also provide a clock. It could provide a card that needs to be dealt with, is not a creature itself and neither an artifact. Artifact and/or creature removal is still good against it as it can kill the tokens, but it would give the deck a card that can not just be killed by Decay/Grudge/K.Command. Don't know if it's strong enough but maybe a sideboard option for grindfests.

Traxos, Scourge of Kroog: The deck is currently made up of small synergistic creatures. Depending on the matchup it can be difficult to get the synergies going or the clock you put up can be too slow as you need time too use the synergies. Traxos could be a card that offers a fast clock, more or less ignores tokens/TNN as blockers and is Decay/Bolt proof. Its disadvantage should be negligible in this type of deck. Have my doubts whether its strong enough, but testing will tell.

Voltaic Servant: Another synergistic small creature. Hangarback/Overseer are the most abusable, but even the pseudo vigilance it can provide by untapping an attacker or providing additional mana is sweet. The deck does not play any instants, but has plenty of activated abilities that you can spend the mana on during your opponents turn. Probably the most likely of the three to make the cut.

Just as a general note, have you had any issues with a dead mox diamond with only 21 land?

[Dice_Box]

I was thinking, at the point after a deck list is put up on screen at a GP for discussion your more than likely an established deck.

[quadich]

So i have been wondering about the abyss in this deck. I know it has been mentioned earlier, but with the new karn coming up i am curious to hear opinions on the card in the deck/board.
I ask specifically since Karn is another 4 drop and overcrowding the 4 drop slot might not be the correct way going forward. I do however recognize the raw power that the abyss provides and most importantly
the importance of potentially having edict effects in the board. I am loking to test 2 Abyss in board but before i buy them i would be curious how the people that have tested it feel about the card.

[Anweeble]

I haven't tested Karn at all but I plan on playing at least 2 in my list somehow. After watching alot of videos the winner of the MKM event talks about the deck often wants to either be control or aggro. Karn is a perfect card for drawing cards for control and making large bodied constructs for beating down.

[Sisyphos]

Legacy Ravager Shops

**As the thread has now been moved to Established, I've written a primer for the deck. I'll leave it in here for the moment to get some feedback, fix some of the formatting and maybe add some stuff, before I open a new thread and ask a mod to close this one.**



Table of Contents

I.) Mana Base

1.) Core
2.) Flexible

II.) Creatures

1.) Core
2.) Flexible

III.) Non-creature Spells

1.) Core
2.) Flexible

IV.) Sideboard
V.) Other Resources
VI.) Sample Lists
VII.) Personal Current List

I.) Mana Base

The deck has one advantage over many other decks playing Chalice of the Void: It is completely colorless, not even including any cards that require colorless mana to cast them in its core. This allows the deck to use every slot spent on a land to cheat out additional utility. You don't need basic lands to protect you against Blood Moon or opposing Wastelands. You don't need to keep in mind the number of colored mana sources needed to cast your colored cards on the turn you want to cast them. Most lists play 20-22 lands, depending on the number of non-land mana acceleration (Mox Opal, Lotus Petal and Mox Diamond) played. The most common number of total mana sources among the lists I found was 27. I have played 21/6 and 22/5 versions and both versions have felt good to me.

1.) Core

4 Ancient Tomb
4 City of Traitors
In Legacy the namesake card of the Vintage version of the deck, Mishra's Workshop, is – correctly – banned. These two are the obvious albeit weaker replacements. They allow the deck to cheat on mana costs, speeding up your development to allow landing the crucial piece of disruption on the first turn. Chalice of the Void and Thorn of Amethyst are much stronger on the first turn than on the second. It's no surprise, that both are mainstays of nearly every Legacy deck playing Chalice of the Void and this one is no exception.

But that does not mean that playing them absolves you of thinking. Both have drawbacks. Be aware of them, plan ahead and play accordingly. Of course sometimes you don't have the option and the obvious play is the best (or only) one available to you. But it is a common mistake with Chalice decks to get too locked into the mindset of abusing the advantages provided by these cards recklessly in game play as well as when considering mulligan decisions.

There are a lot of hands that most novice players snap keep that I'd mulligan more often than not. When looking at your opening hand think about how your first turns will play out and consider possible interaction your opponent might have (the later one is of course more relevant after game one). Is the hand dead if the Chalice of the Void gets countered? Will you be manascrewed from the third turn onward because you only have City of Traitors to play the Chalice on the first turn and one additional land? Map out where you want and need to get to based on the other contents of your hand. One of the main advantages of this deck over other decks using Chalice of the Void and City of Traitors is the very low manacurve. Almost every card in the deck can be cast for two mana. This allows you to play your Citys more aggressively, as the risk of getting manascrewed by the drawback or an opposing Wasteland is reduced. Sometimes though it is the correct line to delay your game plan and allow your opponent a turn unhindered by playing another land first and holding City of Traitors until your second turn.

When you are in a damage race: do your calculations carefully. Is it worth to use an Ancient Tomb to cast Walking Ballista or Hangarback Walker with an extra counter or will it swing the race in your opponents' favor?

Some versions of the deck cut the fourth City of Traitors because multiple ones can lead to awkward sequencing. In my opinion, this is wrong. Yes, City of Traitors has the bigger disadvantage of the two cards. But the whole deck is created around the concept of abusing the mana advantage the deck can get by its acceleration. Learning to play with the card to minimize the drawback and possible adjusting the rest of the deck to this effect as well (see my points about the inclusion of Mox Diamonds) are the better ways to go. With time you will find the numbers of games in which you are screwed by drawing multiple City of Traitors to be significantly smaller than the expected value gained by maximizing the mana acceleration offered by playing the maximum number of legal lands providing two colorless mana. And no, Crystal Vein and Scorched Ruin do not count.

4 Wasteland
One of the most played cards in the format and for good reason. In an environment made up of manabases getting greedier and greedier as decks try to include powerful cards from three or four colors, Wasteland is probably the best utility land legal. The deck packs a serious amount of mana disruption between this and the taxing effects of Thorn of Amethyst and Lodestone Golem.

2-4 Mishra's Factory
0-4 Blinkmoth Nexus
0-4 Inkmoth Nexus
I'll address these three together as the reasons to include them are the same for all. They increase the number of creatures you have whilst the still providing a mana source. Additionally, they can dodge sorcery speed interaction/removal, can dodge sweeper effects, reduce the risk of mana flood by giving you something to do later on and they turn into artifact creatures, providing synergy with the core of the creature part of the deck: Arcbound Ravager and Steel Overseer.

Get used to the play patterns offered by them. Don't just all in and activate them every turn every game to deal the maximum amount of damage possible. Be aware of sweepers and other interaction your opponents' deck can include. Don't forget the possibility to activate them before using Steel Overseer to maximize the amount of counters you get.

The most typical lists include four manlands, but I've seen and played lists that include six or even seven of them.

Mishra's Factory is the most common one played, as it provides the most power and toughness whilst also having the most mana efficient pump ability. Nevertheless be aware of the advantages gained and lost by each of the three when building your deck. Mishra's Factory is the weakest against True-Name Nemesis and decks playing lots of creatures to gum up the ground. The other two are less efficient but have flying, which does not only come into play offensively, but also defensively. Blocking flipped Delver of Secrets, Griselbrand, Marit Lage tokens or even Emrakul, The Aeons Torn.

Inkmoth Nexus can allow you to steal games out of nowhere, especially when combined with Arcbound Ravager, or can be useful in some corner cases where normal damage can not kill your opponent. But as its damage does not stack with the other damage you deal and none of your other cards deal infect damage, it is (rightfully) the least played option.

2.) Flexible

0-4 Ghost Quarter

As written above in my comments about Wasteland, the deck includes manadenial as an angle to win. If you choose to do so, you can increase your capabilities to mana screw your opponents even further by adding this. In fact the first version of the deck I built had 4 Wastelands, 4 Ghost Quarters, 4 Lodestone Golems and even Sorcerous Spyglass maindeck with the plan and the reality being that fetchlands and Deathrite Shaman were by far the most commonly chosen options with Sorcerous Spyglass.

0-4 Cavern of Souls
Three of the four core creatures of the deck share the creature type Construct, with only Arcbound Ravager not fitting in. Amongst the other creatures sometimes played, Foundry Inspector and Scrap Trawler are constructs as well.

0-4 Darksteel Citadel
As written above, the deck has a very low mana curve, making it stronger against opposing mana denial than other decks based around Chalice of the Void. If you nonetheless feel the need to have a land that is immune to Wasteland, this one offers the most utility as it still has synergy with Arcbound Ravager and Mox Opal.

0-4 Vault of Whispers/Ancient Den/Tree of Tales/Seat of the Synod/Great Furnace
Should you want to splash a color, these are the among the first options to provide the required colored mana as – like Darksteel Citadel – they provide additional synergy with Arcbound Ravager and Mox Opal. The only color splash I have seen played or considered so far has been black, but I could see others working as well, especially white. Karakas offers additional white sources that are already played and white offers a lot of cards that the deck can utilize, amongst the common hatebears Ethersworn Canonist especially stands out as it is not only an additional piece of interaction but an artifact creature as well.

0-2 Karakas
There are a lot of legendary creatures currently being played in Legacy. From Griselbrand to Thalia, Guardian of Thraben, from Leovold, Emissary of Trest to Marit Lage tokens. Karakas provides an answer to all of them at a very cheap cost. It is at its strongest against decks like TurboDepths or Reanimator, but also usefull against Death and Taxes, Show and Tell or 4c Leovold. The amount of games the card wins single-handedly are well worth the risk of playing two copies of a land that is legendary itself. Playing a second copy only adds a 1% chance of drawing two in your opener whilst increasing the chance of drawing one in your opener from 11% to 21%.

0-2 Inventors' Fair
This is a card where my personal opinion differs from the consensus that is reflected in most of the lists you can find online.

I can see it's strong points. It provides a form of life gain that is much appreciated by a deck playing Ancient Tomb especially against aggressive decks where games can often come down to damage races. It also allows for late game utility and is a form of flood protection that can allow you to play one or two silver bullets because you have the ability to tutor for them when needed. Most commonly the card is found next to an equipment like Sword of Fire and Ice.

Maybe it's a difference in my playstyle compared to the playstyle of others, but when playing these points have never quite worked out like that for me. I'd constantly find myself in positions where I didn't have enough mana to use the tutor effect or if I did, I'd either be so flooded that tutoring for one relevant card was not enough to turn it around or the pressure put onto me meant that while I could tutor for the card that would allow me to survive, I did not have the mana or time to play it as well.

Much the same for the life gain aspect. Either it was not enough to safe me, or a manland would have allowed me to win the damage race as well, even if only for the ability to chump block. “Gaining” five life in one turn from blocking a Gurmag Angler can be more relevant than gaining five life over five turns from Inventors' Fair.

The utility from other cards in these slots has been more relevant for me, but if the card works for you, play it. It works well in the shell and it is supported by the shell, so it is not a wrong card to pick. Whether it is the optimal card to play or not is a different question that at this point of the decks age and development is probably not yet answerable definitively because there is not enough play data to compare versions with and without the card.

0-1 Phyrexian Tower
There have been times, where I have lost games because I couldn't find or resolve a way to sacrifice Hangarback Walker to make tokens. This gives you a card for these situations whilst also providing colored mana for a possible splash or an additional bit of mana acceleration if the need for it outweighs the loss of a creature. Are these advantages worth losing the utility other lands could provide in the slot? In my opinion probably not. The number of games the mentioned advantages come up is probably less than the times you will miss the additional manland.

?-? Zhalfirin Void
New card from Dominaria. So far I haven't gotten around to testing it, but as it can provide card selection for an archetype that is notoriously lacking it, it is something that at least should be considered. Once again, I think you probably lose more by playing this than the added effect is worth.

[Sisyphos]

II.) Creatures

1.) Core

4 Arcbound Ravager
4 Steel Overseer
4 Walking Ballista
2-4 Hangarback Walker

I try to limit the amount of cards discussed together, but in this case you have to look at the big picture to get the picture. Walking Ballista and Hangarback Walker like +1/+1 counters, Arcbound Ravager and Steel Overseer are great at providing +1/+1 counters. This core is what makes the deck possible. Previous artifact decks in Legacy have always had one of two problems. Either your creatures where cheap but lacked interaction (Affinity) or they were big and provided interaction but cost a ton of mana (MUD). The first is abysmal against removal heavy decks, whilst the second leads to awkward games of losing to yourself because it is easy to get mana screwed or flooded as you need just the right combination of mana and payoff. The core cards for this deck all provide relevant abilities that let you react or interact to things your opponent does, can be cast for two mana and when combined can quickly become bigger than most of the creatures played in the format.

Most of the interactions of the cards should be pretty obvious, but it takes some time getting used to the play patterns to identify the optimal lines. If you suspect that your opponent has a removal spell, think about the order in which you want to activate the abilities so that the counters end up exactly where you want them to be.

Another important point: remember your triggers! Arcbound Ravager and Hangarback Walker lose a lot of their power if you forget their triggers.

Also keep in mind, that even though the deck looks like it doesn't care about its own graveyard, both Arcbound Ravager and Hangarback Walker are quite weak against Leyline of the Void or Rest in Peace. Don't just blindly go all in on either one without remembering the card you didn't care about for the last ten turns.

You can find quite a number of lists that don't include four Hangarback Walkers. Personally I can see cutting one from the maindeck, but I always want four copies in my 75. It provides incredible synergy with Steel Overseer and Arcbound Ravager whilst being a form of card advantage in creature matchups and also against 4c Leovold. In fact against that deck I'd consider the card to be one of your best cards overall. 4c Leovold aims to play a card advantage game by constantly getting two-for-ones. Getting Hangarback Walker up to three counters makes up for multiple two-for-ones by itself. Their only clean answer is bouncing it with Jace, the Mind Sculptor.

Finally get used to doing damage calculations. It takes some time to get a feel for when it is right to pump Hangarback Walker and when to attack, when it is better to get another counter on Hangarback Walker by activating Steel Overseer first and when you'd rather have the additional counter on the Thopter tokens. You can even find yourself in spots where it is correct to not pump Hangarback Walker every opportunity you get, as you might have to rely on trading it with an opposing creature because you want to use the tokens as your win condition or as additional chump blockers over the next turns.

2.) Flexible

2-4 Phyrexian Revoker
Phyrexian Revoker is basically 50% creature and 50% disruption piece. Neither the body nor the ability (pseudo-Needle that cannot hit lands) are really worth two mana in a format as high powered as Legacy. But the combination is your own little Swiss army knife. Its stock increases as the metagame shifts more and more towards a 56 cards plus four Deathrite Shaman metagame, but even decks not playing the obiquitous one drop usually have tagets: Hazoret the Fervent and Chandra, Torch Defiant in Moon Stompy, Lion's Eye Diamond and Lotus Petal in Storm, Aether Vial, Stoneforge Mystic and Equipment in Death and Taxes, Griselbrand and Sneak Attack in Sneak Show, Jace, the Mind Sculptor in Miracles etc. Playing both Arcbound Ravager and Steel Overseer also means that sometimes Phyrexian Revoker can get really big.

0 or 4 Foundry Inspector
With most of the cards that are not automatic four-ofs, you can tweak the numbers a bit to your liking. Not with this one. If you want the effect, you play four, if you don't, you play zero. There is no argument for any other number being correct.

The body itself is nothing to write home about for three mana, making it a rather bad topdeck later on. The ability on the other hand is absurd in this deck. It may seem odd at first glance to play a mana acclerant that costs three mana in a deck that largely is made up of cards costing two mana, but the play pattern of the deck – aiming for two mana on the first turn with Ancient Tomb, City of Traitors, Lotus Petal, Mox Diamond – makes hitting three mana on turn two a very natural sequence that lets you dump your hand on turn three instead of wasting a mana on turn two by casting a two-drop and afterwards being limited on the things you can do.

The amount of advantage you can generate from landing one of these early puts it nearly in the same kill-on-sight-category for your opponent as Arcbound Ravager and Steel Overseer. If you ever manage to stick two, basically all cards in your deck can be played for zero. Even having only one can save you two to three mana per turn, thus allowing you to play multiple spells on each turn until you run out of cards and lets you ignore your Thorn of Amethysts when casting non-creature spells or keep up mana for manlands or Hangarback Walkers. One thing to note about sequencing: Sometimes it's best not to maximize the mana you can save with Foundry Inspector. The best example is Steel Overseer. Steel Overseer into Foundry Inspector is much stronger than the other way around even if it means wasting one mana.

Foundry Inspector also makes the disadvantage of City of Traitors less severe. Leading on City of Traitors to stick disruption on the first turn is more tolerable when you can go “land, Foundry Inspector” on the second turn. Even without another land this gives you the ability to cast spells on turn three. I have been very happy with their inclusion and urge everyone giving them a try when picking up the deck.

0-4 Lodestone Golem
Similar to Phyrexian Revoker, Lodestone Golem combines disruption piece and creature in one slot. The body is much better and gives the deck a much needed creature that threatens significant damage on its own, but still dies to Lightning Bolt and cannot get past Baleful Strix or True-Name Nemesis. The ability does stack very nicely with Thorn of Amethyst. Casting Brainstorm for three or four mana while being attacked by a 5/3 is not the place you want to be in Legacy. How many you play should be a reflection of the amount of combo you are expecting.

0-4 Vault Skirge
Phyrexian mana allows the deck to cast a spell for one mana while having Chalice of the Void out at the same time.

In a deck that is very heavy on even mana costs, it also allows for lines that are more mana efficient because you can more easily spend all your mana on turns where you have odd amounts of mana available.

The body in itself is not overwhelming, but servicable, especially with Arcbound Ravager and Steel Overseer in mind, but the abilities are both quite nice and where much of the value lies. Flying gets it past True-Name Nemesis and enables you to block flying attackers from flipped Delver of Secrets to Marit Lage tokens if you can't get Hangarback Walker to die in time.

Lifelink is also very relevant against aggressive decks or in damage races in general, especially in a deck built around Ancient Tomb.

On paper, it looks really enticing, doesn't it? But just like with Inventors' Fair, my personal experience with it has always felt lackluster. Yes, it can be clutch, but more often than not, it was subpar and easily the weakest card in the deck. For example the point of lifelink being good in damage races. Without an active Steel Overseer or Arcbound Ravager, Vault Skirge in the short term is bad in damage races as it will cost you life to play it more often than not. Even if you don't face the ultimate cringe induced by having to cast Vault Skirge with mana generated from Ancient Tomb. The two damage incurred by casting the card has meant that the lifelink several times was not enough to swing the damage race in my favor. For the point being, I have cut them and so far have not felt the need to put them back in.

0-4 Scrap Trawler
This is probably the card that gets played the least in the flex creature slots. On paper it can provide a form of staying power against decks relying on non-white creature removal, but as it requires the card to be returned to have a smaller converted mana cost and does nothing if it costs the same as the creature dying, it does nothing when Chalice of the Void, Hangarback Walker or Walking Ballista die and Thorn of Amethyst, Arcbound Ravager and Steel Overseer dying only provide you with any card advantage if a card from the first group has died previously. As most opponents will usually kill Arcbound Ravager and Steel Overseer before dealing with Hangarback Walker and Walking Ballista, this severely limits the amout of value you will gain from this card. I tried it and cut it again quite quickly.

?-? Voltaic Servant
Another new card from Dominaria that seems worth a try, but I have not found the time to test it so far. It is broken with Steel Overseer and provides additional utility with Hangarback Walker whilst also untapping mana artifacts and giving one of your creatures pseudo-vigilance. But if you manage to untap with Steel Overseer in play, you are in pretty good shape anyway usually, so I'm doubtful whether this provides enough utility on its own in the other cases to make it worth the slot.

?-? Traxos, Scourge of Kroog
And the final new card from Dominaria that could be worth a look, although I have to admit, that this one is probably a long shot to make the cut. As I pointed out in my comments on Lodestone Golem, the creatures the deck plays are very small on their own. Using Steel Overseer to grow them takes time as does casting Hangarback Walker or Walking Ballista for X>1. Traxos, Scourge of Kroog provides a huge body for the cost, has trample so you can get over True-Name Nemesis or other chump blockers (even against Baleful Strix it is still basically Ball Lightning) and the drawback should be negligible in a deck playing only lands and artifacts. On the other hand, the card does not provide additional synergy with the other parts of the deck and still dies to Fatal Push (albeit only with revolt). Maybe one or two copies between main and board for the matchups where you only want to deal as much damage as possible as fast as possible?

[Sisyphos]

III.) Non-creature spells

1.) Core

4 Chalice of the Void

The mana curve of the deck makes it obvious, that this is a Chalice of the Void deck. It gives up all the hyper efficient one mana spells legal in Legacy and instead aims to punish decks that play upwards of 20 cards costing one mana. There's really not much more to say about this card. One minor point: People don't value casting it for zero as much as they should. Especially on the draw against Lion's Eye Diamond combo decks. If you don't get to two mana on the first turn, it is often better to deny them their Lotus Petals and Lion's Eye Diamond than giving them their second turn without any disruption. You can also cast it for zero in other machtups to turn on metalcraft for Mox Opal or just to get another damage in through Arcbound Ravager.

3-4 Thorn of Amethyst

Probably the second best piece of disruption available to artifact/creature based decks in Legacy. Paired with Wastelands it can either prevent your opponent from casting spells at all or at least delay them long enough for you to develop your board and kill them. Just be wary of the interaction between Thorn of Amethyst and your own cards. Don't blindly stack multiple Thorn of Amethysts as they make any non-creature card you play yourself much worse when drawn. Also keep the effect in mind when planing your plays. It is very frustrating to find yourself one mana short because you didn't remember to account for your own Thorn of Amethyst. Recently I have experimented with dropping down from the usual four copies to three, moving the fourth to the sideboard for the matchups it is needed for. It drops the percentage to have a disruption piece in your opener from 65% to around 60% though.

2-4 Mox Opal
2-4 Lotus Petals
0-2 Mox Diamond

I'll also discuss these three together. They are the non-land accelerants the deck has available. Each of them has its distinct advantages and disadvantages. Lotus Petal provides mana on the first turn without anything else but the card required, but it is a one time use only. Mox Opal requires fulfilling a condition that makes it usable no earlier than the second turn (barring ridiculous opening hands) but it can be reused as long as the condition is met. Mox Diamond is straight card disadvantage, but if you have the extra land, it can be used on the first turn and reused for the rest of the game.

All three therefor fulfill slightly different roles. Mox Diamond and Lotus Petal increase the number of games where you will hit the crucial amount of two mana on your first turn. Mox Opal usually cannot do that, but provides the better late game.

All three also have in common that the second one of each you draw is usually not the best card to draw ever. The second Mox Opal is basically a Lotus Petal that sometimes grows an Arcbound Ravager, the second Lotus Petal is the same and most of the time in the late game you want reusable mana sources more than one time acceleration. And the second Mox Diamond is either a totally dead card or requires giving your opponent another free two-for-one.

Most decklists play six or seven of these cards with the most common being a split between Mox Opals and Lotus Petals. My personal preference is a 2/2/2 split between all three of them. Yes drawing a Mox Diamond late in the game without having a land to pitch is painful and does come up, but whilst the deck can function and in fact is built to function well at two or three mana, it is actually very rarely flooded. There is just so much to do: activating manlands, Hangarback Walkers, Walking Ballistas and casting the XX-spells for higher numerical values. In fact, I find myself bottlenecked on mana more often than flooded, which is why I prefer the additional continous mana source of Mox Diamond over the additional one shot mana sources provided by playing more Lotus Petals, whilst still retaining (nearly) the same amount of accelerants that can provide mana on the first turn.

2.) Flexible

0-3 Karn, Scion of Urza
The new toy from Dominaria I was most excited about and actually have gotten around to test. So far the verdict is definitively positive. It sits at the top of the mana curve but still at a point that is not too hard to achieve, even when considering Thorn of Amethyst. It gives the deck not only card selection, something decks with Chalice of the Voids have been desperately wanting for a long time, but also another thread that is able to play well against sweeper effects and that is itself not killed by artifact and/or creature removal. Removal is still good against the card as it does not offer a win condition that does not involve attacking with creatures, as for example Jace, the Mind Sculptor does. But much like Gideon, Ally of Zendikar in Death and Taxes, it does not just trade one-for-one with removal, making it very good in grindy matchups whilst still allowing you to close out the game very quickly as the tokens are quite large. Keep in mind that manlands (among other things) allow you to manipulate the size of the token at instant speed. This can throw of the damage math of your opponent and turn a chump block into a trade or even a straight up freebie.

0-2 Smugglers Copter
The other card selection option and probably the best one that was available before the printing of Karn, Scion or Urza. Not only does it provide card selection, it also gives your creatures pseudo-haste and has flying, allowing it to fly over blockers (especially True-Name Nemesis) or block flying attackers, which – as has been pointed out multiple times already – can be a problem for the deck. On the flip side, it can be dead if you get stuck without a creature.

0-1 Sword of Fire and Ice
Sometimes played as a singleton, most often in lists that also include Inventor's Fair in the mana base to provide for the ability to tutor for the card if needed. The card itself is obviously very very good, if you get it online. But that is exactly the reason why I'm personally not a fan of it. The deck has very little card selection, leaving the probability of drawing a singleton in the first three turns at just 16,67%. This percentage shrinks even further when taking into account the number of games included in this percentage where you don't have the mana to use it (especially relevant with Thorn of Amethyst), where it is too slow to be used (e.g. against fast combo) or where you lack a creature to use it with. Considering the interaction with Inventor's Fair at least lessens the impact of some of these points. You can more reliably find Sword of Fire and Ice in the situations you need it. But this comes at a very steep cost. You need to time walk yourself as the mana cost of Inventor's Fairs' ability makes it very unlikely that you can do anything else on the turn you use the tutoring ability. The amount of mana involved also makes it a late game only option, which in turn makes it significantly worse against True-Name Nemesis decks, because it is not unlikely that a fast True-Name Nemesis backed up by some removal or counters can win the damage race before you get the time to tutor for Sword of Fire and Ice, play, equip and attack with it.

0-1 Umezawa's Jitte
Mostly the same as Sword of Fire and Ice. When choosing between the two, I'd actually give the edge to Umezawa's Jitte, even tough Sword of Fire and Ice is found more often in lists posting good results. Umezawa's Jitte is a turn faster and although Sword of Fire and Ice is better than Umezawa's Jitte against decks playing True-Name Nemesis, there are several decks that basically cannot beat an active Umezawa's Jitte, where as the same can not really be said for Sword of Fire and Ice.

0-4 Sorcerous Spyglass
As already mentioned in my comments on the mana base, Sorcerous Spyglass might not look like it, but in a format where the mana bases are built around fetchlands and Deathrite Shaman, it is actually a very powerful mana denial card if you want to focus on that aspect of the deck. Against the right decks or even against the right opening hand of an opponent, Sorcerous Spyglass on turn one can provide disruption that can surpass that provided by Thorn of Amethyst or even Chalice of the Void. While the later cards are more stronger overall and therefor rightfully played as core cards, depending on your list, it is not outside of the reasonable to play Sorcerous Spyglass maindeck and relegate Thorn of Amethyst to the board as a pure hate card against combo decks.

0-3 The Abyss
Played in the first iteration of the deck that got public attention during the NA Legacy Championship 2017, but has since more or less disappeared. The advantages in the shell are obvious, it is completely one sided continous removal that can win games by itself as some decks are simply dead to it. But its disadvantages are nearly as obvious. It requires a color splash, making color screw a possibility and limiting the amount of utility lands you can play because you have to include enough black sources to cast The Abyss. At four mana it sits at the top of your mana curve which gets worse when you take into account that you want to use your Wastelands and also limits the usefulness of Thorn of Amethyst and Lodestone Golem to the point where the list actually cut Thorn of Amethysts for Sorcerous Spyglass.

0-0 Crucible of Worlds
IT'S A TRAP!!! No seriously, don't play this card or other cards that fall into the same category. When the deck was picking up steam, Crucible of Worlds had some advocates. Just think about locking out opponents with Wasteland or recurring manlands, City of Traitors and lands discarded to Mox Diamond!!

What these arguments have in common is that the situations come up too rarely, fall into the Magical Christmasland type of wishful thinking or provide too little advantage for the cost of including a Crucible of Worlds in the deck.

Crucible of Worlds is played in very few Legacy decks and for specific reasons. Some decks playing Wasteland play Crucible of Worlds, but not all decks playing Wasteland play Crucible of Worlds. That is because Crucible/Wasteland-locks are – as the word indicates – locks, which makes lock decks like Stax or Lands the correct type of deck to include both. Also take into account that Lands only uses it as a secondary option to support the main lock piece of Life from the Loam and not all Lands list even use Crucible of Worlds.

The reason why Crucible of Worlds is a bad card for this deck, gets even more obvious when looking at Ramunap Excavator. You basically never saw Crucible of Worlds in decks like Maverick or Aggro Loam, because whilst it gives you the possibility of locking someone out of playing, the cost of playing a card that does little to nothing outside of the lock was too high when compared to the probability to drawing a singleton card in a deck with little card selection. Playing Ramunap Excavator is much less of a cost for these decks as it can be searched for by Green Sun's Zenith and if you don't have the lock, it is still a creature that can attack or block.

This deck is not a lock deck. Your disruption can lock your opponent out of the game, but typically Chalice of the Void and Thorn of Amethyst function more like Force of Will and Daze function in Delver decks rather than how Counterbalance/Sensei's Divining Top used to function in Miracles. You want the cards to disrupt the opponent just long and hard enough for you to kill them. You don't want to disrupt your opponent to the point where it does not matter how you win the game, because even a 1/1 without any abilities would do the job. Games like this do happen, but they are not your main game plan.

[Sisyphos]

IV.) Sideboard

For the sideboard section I will not offer suggested numbers for the cards. Building your sideboard not only regarding the cards you include in it but also their numbers depends too much on the configuration you have settled on for your maindeck and the metagame you are expecting to play against. For some cards the numbers are pretty obvious. Unless your name is Sam Black, you are probably going to play four Leylines if you play Leyline. The sample deck lists in the following section offer some examples on how sideboard configurations can look. There is also an excellent three part video series on sideboarding with the deck on Youtube, I have included links to it among the list of other resources you might want to check out if you want to learn more about the deck below in section V.).

One thing to keep in mind when building a sideboard is: You are playing a deck that uses artifact creatures as your one and only way to win. With a card pool as large as Legacy, there are cards that you will have a hard time against: Null Rod, Hurkyl's Recall, Energy Flux, Rest in Peace/Energy Field etc. Don't go overboard in trying to build a board that has an out to each and every possible scenario. Figuring out the perfect eleven card boarding plan against niche cards like Null Rod and Energy Flux will lose you too much space to efficiently board against the other 99% of the field.

On another note, the deck is not a combo deck as Storm is, but it is a combo deck in the sense that it is built on synergies. It is easy to overboard. Unless you absolutely need all ten cards you want to board in, be cautious of taking out too many creatures for example.

Ensnaring Bridge
As your own creatures are rather small at the start and need time to grow, you need a form of defense against decks that rely on attacking with big creatures to win. You can empty out your own hand pretty easily, especially in a list with Foundry Inspector. And even if you can't empty out you whole hand, it is not difficult to get low enough to cross the threshold where Reality Smasher, Griselbrand, Craterhoof Behemoth (and friends), Emrakul or Marit Lage or even True-Name Nemesis can no longer attack. You can still win by sacrificing Ensnaring Bridge to an Arcbound Ravager once you have enough of a board to alphastrike or use Walking Ballista to shot them a bunch.

Leyline of the Void
Really not much to say here. There are a lot of decks relying on their graveyards running around these days, so you want some form of graveyard hate. Leyline has the obvious disadvantage of forcing you into some difficult mulligan decisions, but it's effect is much more powerful than Faerie Macabre or Tormod's Crypt. Relic of Progenitus and Surgical Extraction are nonstarters in a Chalice of the Void deck for obvious reasons.

Spellskite
Shines against decks that try to overload you with removal or need to remove your disruption pieces to be in the game at all. Also just wrecks Infect. Just don't get greedy with it. When your opponent attacks a one power creature into a Spellskite, take the possibility of Lightning Bolt into account. Sometimes you have to block, but sometimes it is worthwhile to take the damage and protect the Spellskite to make sure that it in turn can protect another artifact.

Ratchet Bomb
Colorless removal options for non-creature permanents are few and far between and this is probably the best one available at the moment. Also doubles as a sweeper against tokens or decks like Elves that rely on multiple permanents with the same casting cost.

Sorcerous Spyglass

A lot of activated abilities are running around in decks at the moment. Planeswalkers, Deathrite Shaman, Rishadan Port, Stoneforge Mystic, Aether Vial, Griselbrand, Sneak Attack, Thespian's Stage, Vampire Hexmage, the list goes on and on. Sorcerous Spyglass is preferred over additional copies of Phyrexian Revoker because some of the cards you want to needle are lands, making the trade off of this not being a creature worth it.

Mindbreak Trap

Hurkyl's Recall is actually quite a common sideboard card in Storm right now. Mindbreak Trap gives you turn zero interaction against fast combo decks and dodges any artifact hate cards that they will have after boarding. At some point adding more and more artifact hate cards will show some diminishing returns and it can be better to diversify your hate a bit.

Warping Wail

A good way to get a lot of utility in one slot. Does a lot of good things, but you pay the price of it not being the best at any of the things it does.

Dismember

Removal for medium big creatures but at a heavy price. You already lose quite a bit of life to Ancient Tomb and (possibly) Vault Skirge. With or without a black splash, your mana artifacts can produce black mana to mitigate the cost somewhat, but so far it hasn't made the cut for me.

Spine of Ish Sah

If your metagame has a lot of Sneak Show in it and you want more/other answers than Ensnaring Bridge. Synergises nicely with Arcbound Ravager to reuse it over and over for additional Show and Tells.

Sword of Fire and Ice/Umezawa's Jitte

Both found in lists that don't have any equipments maindeck and in lists that have. Either to open up the possibilities equipments provide or doubling down for the matchups where you really want the effects. Despite what I have said about the inclusion of an Inventor's Fair/Sword of Fire and Ice package in the maindeck, I have recently started playing an Umezawa's Jitte in the board. I think of it as more of a fifth Walking Ballista than anything else. I even contemplated Serrated Biskelion before a friend of mine was nice enough to tell me not to be stupid.

Toxic Deluge

Stand in for possibilities that open up when you decide to splash a color. It makes sense from a game design perspective to not have the best answers be colorless, but the result is, that sideboarding is probably the place where being straight up colorless hurts the most. It significantly reduces the available tools or forces you to play suboptimal answers. Still so far I have preferred the advantages of colorless lists to the upgrades provided by including a splash color.

Fill-Ups

Another valid sideboard option are cards that you cut from your maindeck. Can't find room for the fourth Hangarback Walker/Thorn of Amethyst/more copies of Lodestone Golem but still want them for specific matchups? Put them here.

V.) Other Resources

• Jeff Hoogland playing the deck - Link

• Andrea Mengucci playing the deck - Link

• Jarvis Yu playing the deck - Link

• Three part series about sideboarding with the deck by Amadeus Grün and Hedron.TV - Part 1, Part 2, Part 3

- more links to reports, videos, articles about the deck to be added later -

VI.) Sample Lists

1.) Greg Kraigher – 21.10.2017 NA Legacy Champs 56/711

4 Arcbound Ravager
4 Steel Overseer
4 Walking Ballista
4 Lodestone Golem
2 Phyrexian Revoker
4 Scrap Trawler
4 Chalice of the Void
4 Sorcerous Spyglass
3 The Abyss
3 Mox Opal
2 Mox Diamond
4 Ancient Tomb
4 City of Traitors
4 Wasteland
4 Inkmoth Nexus
1 Karakas
1 Swamp
4 Vault of Whispers

Sideboard
1 Coercive Portal
1 Crucible of Worlds
1 Diabolic Edict
4 Leyline of the Void
2 Spine of Ish Sah
1 The Abyss
2 Toxic Deluge
1 Umezawa's Jitte
2 Warping Wail

2.) Amadeus Grün – 07.01.2018 MKM Frankfurt 2/380

4 Arcbound Ravager
4 Steel Overseer
4 Walking Ballista
2 Hangarback Walker
2 Lodestone Golem
4 Phyrexian Revoker
4 Vault Skirge
1 Sword of Fire and Ice
4 Chalice of the Void
4 Thorn of Amethyst
4 Lotus Petal
3 Mox Opal
4 Ancient Tomb
4 City of Traitors
4 Wasteland
4 Mishra's Factory
2 Inventors' Fair
2 Karakas

Sideboard
2 Spellskite
4 Leyline of the Void
4 Ensnaring Bridge
1 Sword of Fire and Ice
2 Sorcerous Spyglass
2 Ratchet Bomb

3.) Noah Pardes – 28.01.2018 SCG Classic Philadelphia 16/176

4 Arcbound Ravager
4 Steel Overseer
4 Walking Ballista
2 Hangarback Walker
2 Lodestone Golem
4 Phyrexian Revoker
4 Vault Skirge
4 Chalice of the Void
4 Thorn of Amethyst
1 Sword of Fire and Ice
4 Lotus Petal
3 Mox Opal
4 Ancient Tomb
4 City of Traitors
4 Wasteland
4 Mishra's Factory
2 Inventors' Fair
2 Karakas

Sideboard
4 Ensnaring Bridge
2 Ratchet Bomb
2 Sorcerous Spyglass
2 Spellskite
4 Leyline of the Void
1 Umezawa's Jitte

4.) Antarctica – 19.03.2018 MTGO Legacy Challenge 14/85

4 Arcbound Ravager
4 Steel Overseer
4 Walking Ballista
4 Lodestone Golem
4 Phyrexian Revoker
4 Vault Skirge
4 Chalice of the Void
4 Thorn of Amethyst
1 Sword of Fire and Ice
4 Lotus Petal
3 Mox Opal
4 Ancient Tomb
4 City of Traitors
4 Wasteland
4 Mishra's Factory
2 Inventors' Fair
2 Karakas

Sideboard
3 Ensnaring Bridge
4 Leyline of the Void
2 Ratchet Bomb
2 Sorcerous Spyglass
2 Spellskite
1 Umezawa's Jitte
1 Warping Wail

5.) Joe Ricci – 06.04.2018 GP Seattle Trial 1/n.a.

4 Arcbound Ravager
4 Steel Overseer
4 Walking Ballista
4 Hangarback Walker
4 Lodestone Golem
3 Phyrexian Revoker
4 Vault Skirge
4 Chalice of the Void
4 Thorn of Amethyst
1 Umezawa's Jitte
2 Lotus Petal
2 Mox Opal
4 Ancient Tomb
4 City of Traitors
4 Wasteland
2 Mishra's Factory
2 Cavern of Souls
2 Inventors' Fair
1 Karakas
1 Phyrexian Tower

Sideboard
4 Ensnaring Bridge
1 Faerie Macabre
4 Leyline of the Void
1 Ratchet Bomb
2 Sorcerous Spyglass
1 Spellskite
1 Sword of Fire and Ice
1 Warping Wail

VII.) Personal Current List

4 Arcbound Ravager
4 Steel Overseer
4 Walking Ballista
4 Hangarback Walker
3 Phyrexian Revoker
4 Foundry Inspector
4 Chalice of the Void
3 Thorn of Amethyst
3 Karn, Scion of Urza
2 Lotus Petal
2 Mox Opal
2 Mox Diamond
4 Ancient Tomb
4 City of Traitors
4 Wasteland
3 Blinkmoth Nexus
2 Mishra's Factory
2 Karakas
2 Cavern of Souls

Sideboard
2 Sorcerous Spyglass
1 Thorn of Amethyst
2 Ratchet Bomb
4 Leyline of the Void
1 Umezawa's Jitte
3 Ensnaring Bridge
2 Spellskite

[Sisyphos]

*Reserved for possible stuff*

[quadich]

@sisyphos

well since you asked i might as well add my two cents. I will not touch on the parts that i mostly agree with thus this might sound pretty negative although it really isnt and i am happy you took the time to write a primer.

Foundry Inspector: i tested him a little myself and its definitely a cool card, i do however feel that getting to cheat on 2-3 mana a turn is too much magical chirstmasland. Sure there are hands where you have him 2 lands and 4 others threats to deploy but only then can he generate that much virutal mana. In the topdeck mode, where the deck usually ends up by turn 3-4 he does not really help with casting stuff since you have more than enough mana by that point anyways. Sure he can be great with the XX cards potentially getting us to the extra counter. The flipside is that he is a 3/2 that costs 3 to stick initially and dies to basically any form of removal and dies to any other creature and does nothing if he dies. I dont think your assessment of the card is incorrect but i think you are overselling him a little here.

Vault Skirge: I run them (in the slots you are running inspector in i think). I too think paying life to cast them sucks and on their own they are rarely relevant. I have however found the extra flying to be very relevant in order to push thorugh damage on an otherwise locked up board(i do also run 4 hangarbacks currently). You could have added here that not playing skirge means that one should heavily consider Blinkmoth as a manland of choice.
i do have to say that when it comes to Inspector vs. Skirge they both have their pros and cons. personally i have found skirge to be superior in the current midrange metagame. You evidently prefer Inspector which i respect but i think when it comes to a primer the pros/cons should be put more objectively. After all there is already enough personal bias in the thread e.g. people disliking card because they dont own them/want to buy them.

Moxen: I have personally disliked mox diamond because discarding a land is rarely where i want to be. I think you came to pretty much the same conclusion i just disagree with the 0-2 recommendation. I think we can agree that mox diamond its best between turns 0-2 and is really bad afterwards most of the time ( sometimes you get to turn another city/tomb into something less horrible which is nice). However playing only up to 2 makes this a lot less likely to happen and more of a random element where it is super great if you have them in hand but you can never ever rely on having them. I'd argue that you either want 3-4 and get them in your first 8-9 card consistently or you just dont run them at all. I get that the 2/2/2 split might have treated you well in the past but in my opnion its neither here or there you sometimes get the right mox effect for your hand, sometimes you dont but you can never rely on getting the right one. Larger samplesizes might prove either of us wrong here though.

The Abyss: I personally liked the card so far. I agree that it propably not that great as a 3-4 of in the maindeck. more likely its a 1-2 of and likely only a sideboard card. The splash is not that difficult to work with since you do have 6-7 effects that allow to cast it already and cutting some number of inventors fair for vault of whispers is easy and makes mox opal more reliable. Also while 4 mana is alot and it can get taxed by thorns if they are in play: the same is true for Karn which you heavily advocate for.

Crucible of Worlds: I get your arguement against it, but it has not been a trap for me so far. In fact it was heavily needed to stabilize vs lands and any other deck with wasteland heavy openers. I think this more of a sideboard than a maindeck card i cannot see more than 2 copies in the board( and only if the meta is lands ridden) however it is not as bad because you need to stay in the game vs. decks like Lands/loam that do exist and that will punish you if you didnt get to keep a leyline ( hell even a Deck with KotR can just wasteland loop you). I also disagree with you saying that the deck is not a lock deck. Against turbo depths/lands you sometimes have to be a lock deck to win in fact i think the strength of the deck lies in being able to be a lock deck when it needs to. Again i too think it is narrow but in the match ups where its good its actually great because you dont need to slam a creature every turn to win anyways. Also the argument with ramuna is not a good one since he is tutorable with GSZ which is why he is played. if it was a colorless creature maverick would likely not play it.

Overall i think you did a great job desciribing the deck, the cards in it and how they interact. As i already mentioned however too much of it is your personal opinion/experience with the deck. This is very much appearent with "maybe" cards. Again i dont think that you are 100% incorrect and that my opinion on those cards is the superior one but with a primer it should be more objective in my opinion. Other than tha. Great job :D