Seriously... What is it with your obsession of putting Crucible in these decks? You did the same in Thalia Stompy. I'm wondering how long it will take you this time to realize that this deck does not want this type of card either. There is a reason why the only deck that runs the card maindeck in any form of regularity is Stax.
While I agree we dont have many ways to pump Skirge, that with fair was the only way I beat a turn 1 flipped delver. the life gain that fair gives us as early as turn one is not to be underestimated. Also searching up SoFi is great. I wouldn't waste SB spots on Karakas but I do want to fit Blinkmoth in. Revokers I feel should be in the main since almost every single deck has a reasonable - great card to name. With how much pile is around I think 4 Hangars are reasonable. I guess it's just a matter of getting the numbers correct. Do we need for City? I want the answer to be no but I feel it is a yes. My opinion right now:
4x Ravager
4x Overseer
4x Ballista
4x Hangarback
4x Skirge
4x Revoker
4x Chalice
4x Thorn
3x Opal
4x Petal
1x SoFI
4x Tomb
3x City
1x Karakas
4x Wasteland
4x Factory
2x Fair
2x Blink
-------------
4x LoTV
4x Bridge
2x Lodestone
2x SpyGlass
2x Ratchet
1x SoFi
Lands plays a singleton Crucible because it can't run 5 Loams and because it is a Loam replacement that can be recurred with Academy Ruins. The point is that Lands and Stax are Prison decks that want to grind the opponent out and do not only use Crucible to mitigate City of Traitors/Mox Diamond disadvantages but to actively further their game plan, providing a permanent Smokestack lock or a recursion engine. Neither Thalia Stompy nor this deck has such an additional use for the card. Yes you will win random games because of Wasteland recursion with this deck if you include Crucible. But in the vast majority of games spending three mana and a turn simply to produce a couple of additional mana by bringing back sacrificed Citys or Lands discarded to Mox is just not worth the card slot and the card will either do nothing relevant or won't even be castable under multiple Thorns.
I really like maximizing the number of turn 1 Chalices. To that end, 4 Cities feels pretty obvious. This deck definitely wants to come out of the gates guns blazing anyways and to that end, City helps a lot. Of course, it tends to accelerate for a couple of turns and turn into net negative thereafter but if we're willing to play Lotus Petals, this feels natural.
One of the reasons I questioned Vault Skirge was actually Mox Opal. It seems to me like you'd want to again maximize your turn 1 Chalices and a 0-drop artifact like Ornithopter would activate Opal on turn 1 more consistently, which would in turn reinforce the Chalice plan. Vault Skirge needs to hit twice to make up for the lifeloss casting it accrued so barring cases where you cast it for 2, it takes 3 turns for it to gain 1 point of life. To offset one Delver hit, you need 5 turns. That just doesn't feel that amazing unless you get to dump counters on it. Though being able to fetch up SoFI is certainly nice and the lifegain from Fair is likely to not be entirely irrelevant in races either.
Are you sure you wouldn't want to try Inkmoth Nexus? Inkmoth + Ravager is a potent combo indeed. I think there's a chance that Blinkmoth + Inkmoth might be more powerful than Factory + Blinkmoth. Blinkmoth can pump Inkmoth and Inkmoth presents a fairly fast clock alone and threatens constant kill with Ravager around. Factory can be strong, but a 10/10 Infect creature is literally a one-hit kill and aside from Delver, flying blockers aren't very common in Legacy so they kinda have to save removal for it (or die trying, particularly with Chalice around).
Inkmoth is better when you have 8 ways to pump it. (Plating too) This deck has only four. Your better off having all your damage be the same then splitting it over two types with that hope it will sometimes work out.
I will answer it with some quotes first:
Crucible isnt the holy grail thats right and i currently play 0 copies at Thalia Stompy and i am fine with a cut of here too - but the card isnt bad in a Stompy Shell if paired with fast cheap beaters (check), wastelands (check), tax pieces (check), using Mox Diamond (check), getting. Starting with Turn 1 Chalice/Thorn and Turn 2 Beater + Wasteland is strong in most cases, getting Wastelands back should be the last nail in the coffin. Note i also included 2 Ghost Quarters in this build!
Getting Wasted out of the Game is also one of the biggest problems for Stompy shells since it aims to run higher cc cards than most other decks - even if steel stompy has a lot of cheap cc2 cards is still cc2 compared to DRS/Delver/Cantrips without any realy draw effect/manipulation. So having a backup (Crucible) isnt bad, especially with a Playset City of Traitors that tends to backfire sometimes.
But overall i can also see builds without Crucible and i still test different cards here. Cutting 2 Ghost Quarters for 2 Karakas (see MKM build) is also fine, running Lotus Petal over Mox Diamond and cutting Crucible for something like Smugglers Copter (good card especially with Revoker that more or less only attack if the opponent has no blockers).
TEAM MtG Berlin
Check the list a friend of mine has been playing on MKM Series Frankfurt (a fairly big tournament for german standards, 380 players just in Legacy ), that i have also contributed a tiny bit to ==>
Its somewhat hard to properly pilot, but really rewarding and just an overall blast to play :)
He went 4-0 in the qualifier and 8-0(-2, ID into T8) in the tournament, and overall the only game he lost was in the finals.
https://www.cardmarket.com/de/Magic/...6e0c4298281547
MAINBOARD
4 Arcbound Ravager
4 Phyrexian Revoker
4 Steel Overseer
4 Vault Skirge
4 Walking Ballista
2 Hangarback Walker
2 Lodestone Golem
1 Sword of Fire and Ice
4 Chalice of the Void
4 Thorn of Amethyst
3 Mox Opal
4 Lotus Petal
4 Ancient Tomb
4 City of Traitors
4 Mishra's Factory
4 Wasteland
2 Inventors' Fair
2 Karakas
SIDEBOARD
4 Ensnaring Bridge
4 Leyline of the Void
2 Ratchet Bomb
2 Sorcerous Spyglass
2 Spellskite
1 Sword of Fire and Ice
Played last night. 4/1 finish. I lost to a Nic Fit Enchantment deck, I won again Lands, Pile, Pox and DnT.
What I learnt was thus:
Mox Opal is a good card for getting to 4 mana on your second turn. That's what it's for. It let's me go Sol land into artifact into a second artifact, land Mox. That said, I didn't really care for it.
Steel Overseer is the decks secret MVP. I actually tapped man lands in the early stages of the game more just to activate themselves. Then in the late game they became really hard to deal with. A hand with Overseer in fairer matches is better than a hand with a lock piece.
The lock pieces don't really matter a ton. At least not as much as they do in other Stompy decks. Your out of the gate at such a clip that fair decks are going to have to keep up somehow or lose. A turn one Chalice might not even be right if you have a turn one Overseer into turn two Chalice, Ballista.
The deck needs the Copter, you need to hold a card. Don't play that turn five Petal unless you really need to feed Ravager. Hold it. You will want it when you draw a Thopter. Thopter and man lands did a lot against heavy removal games. Letting me claw back in after Pox did its thing. I think that's a good plan.
The Karakas are going to be a lifesaver against Reanimator, it's not a good match from the looks of it. But in other matches having the man lands is better, make your own call.
When you say “Thopter”, do you mean Hangarback Walker?
Can you post your decklist?
I have been jamming the MKM version of the deck on mtgo. It’s very very powerful and it fits right into the current online meta. With the testing I had so far, and having some experience with Workshop and Eldrazi Stompy, I am going to make the following modifications, with some of the suggestions previously posted here.
The most obvious change is SoFI for Jitte. Jitte is not only inherently more powerful, but it’s easier to cast and provides a more reliable supplemental form of removal.
Basically, Thorns are not maindeckable in the current metagame. I learned that a long time ago with Eldrazi decks. Current meta is dominated by creature decks. Ensnaring Bridge makes better sense, but I don’t see it as a 4x, since there isn’t really any pressure to drop it in early in the game.
Lodestone Golem, while powerful, it’s not easy to put into play, and even if it does eventually come into play, it no longer has a meaningful impact. Instead, I the card that I needed more frequently was hangarback walker, so I upped its count.
I understand that the 4x Petals complement the 3x Opals… but I think both of these are examples of cards you don’t want to draw multiples of, therefore reduced the Petal count to 3x.
Inventor’s Fair is OK. In locked out games, the life game is nice. But even when I have the mana available, I didn’t end up activating it because: a) I already need to do something more useful with the mana. b) the cards that I could bring are not that impactful, c) it takes another turn for the card to come down. I will keep an eye on this one, but for now I will follow the above suggestion to use Blinkmoth Nexus as manlands #1 and #2.
Many games got stalled and my flyers were the only way for me to do damage. I’m adding 2x Smugglers’ Copters for additional flying power.
I was surprisingly happy with Revoker in the main, and Spellskite in the SB. These two are key role players in winning games. Socerous Splyglass was another MVP.
My future decklist will look like this:
MAINBOARD
4 Arcbound Ravager
4 Phyrexian Revoker
4 Steel Overseer
4 Vault Skirge
4 Walking Ballista
2 4 Hangarback Walker
2 Lodestone Golem
1 Sword of Fire and Ice Umezawa’s Jitte
4 Chalice of the Void
4 Thorn of Amethyst 3 Ensnaring Bridge
3 Mox Opal
4 3 Lotus Petal
2 Smuggler’s Copter
4 Ancient Tomb
4 City of Traitors
4 Mishra's Factory
4 Wasteland
2 Inventors' Fair Blinkmoth Nexus
2 Karakas
SIDEBOARD
4 Ensnaring Bridge 4 Thorn of Amethyst
4 Leyline of the Void
2 Ratchet Bomb
2 Sorcerous Spyglass
2 Spellskite
1 Sword of Fire and Ice Umezawa’s Jitte
Sorry, meant Copter. My phone Auto corrected.
Totally agree on Spellskite, with a deck that works best with all its moving pieces left alone that card is very useful.
//Creatures:
4 Arcbound Ravager
4 Hangarback Walker
2 Lodestone Golem
4 Steel Overseer
4 Vault Skirge
4 Walking Ballista
//Artifacts:
4 Chalice of the Void
4 Lotus Petal
3 Mox Opal
3 Smuggler's Copter
4 Thorn of Amethyst
//Lands:
4 Ancient Tomb
4 Blinkmoth Nexus
4 City of Traitors
4 Mishra's Factory
4 Wasteland
//Sideboard:
2 Etched Champion
4 Faerie Macabre
3 Phyrexian Revoker
2 Sorcerous Spyglass
2 Spellskite
2 Umezawa's Jitte
How was vault skirge for either of you?
Is there something that can exist in that slot that is better than skirge, or is the 1 mana 1/1 lifelink flier that strong? I have not played the legacy version of this deck so I am totally in the dark. I just know in modern " affinity" its mostly good due to pest/ plating.
It's got a hidden mode, Turn on Metalcraft, that I find useful. Also Lifelink can do a ton. Is it the most likely card to get cut though? Yep.
This deck is siiick! I know it's not affinity, but what about a light blue splash for Thoughtcast and maybe Tezzeret's Gamble? Seat of synod would up the artifact count and maybe facilitate mox opals...
I played some games against a Grixis Control deck and the one card I always wanted was Hangarback Walker. I think with Kolaghan's Command as popular as it is it would IMHO be foolish not to play 3-4 of them here, where it has so many synergies.
Chalice on 1
I think, depending on the metagame, you can go up to 4 hangarback walker. But Cutting vault skirge is a mistake. I tested the deck all possible Numbers of Lodestone Golem from 0-4. In my opinion 2 is correct, but you can make an argument for 3. But every other number is incorrect unless you change the deck completly
If you are not maindecking thorns, play an other deck or at least a whole other version. I designed this deck to take advantage of playing 8 to 12 (12 if you count revoker) two mana lock pieces.
Steel overseer is not the secret mvp, he is the obvious MVP of the deck. He turns bad cards to good cards and so on
Sword of fire and ice is in the deck because of its strengh ageinst strix and TNN. Funny enough i started my testing with two copter then changed them to two jitte and ended with two sofi
For those of you who want to know more about the Frankfurt list, I had the pleasure to have the Man of Steel himself on my little show on YouTube.
I posted the video on the Format & Article Discussion section, right here:
http://www.mtgthesource.com/forums/s...94#post1034494
Is there any gameplan against mass artifact hate such as Null Rod and Hurkyl's Recall
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