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Thread: Whack A Mole

  1. #1

    Whack A Mole

    With assassins trophy spoiled I want to put it on an isochron scepter and blow something up every turn until the only permanent my opponent has is true name nemesis. If im running scepters then orim's chant seems good too. Ancient Tomb/exploration/mox diamond to get scepter online by turn two. Crucible/ramunap excavator to abuse exploration/mox diamond with ghost quarter/wasteland/horizon canopy. Then dueling grounds plus maze of ith as it's my favorite combo. Chalice in the sb would swap with chant g2/3 typically. Thoughts?


    4 isochron scepter
    4 assassins trophy
    4 orim's chant
    3 swords to plowshares

    2 exploration
    4 crucible of worlds
    1 dueling grounds
    1 sylvan library

    1 Magus of the Tabernacle
    2 dark confidant
    3 green Sun's Zenith
    1 Scavenging Ooze
    1 gaddock teeg
    1 tireless tracker
    1 dryad arbor
    1 ramunap excavator
    1 kalonian hydra

    3 mox diamond
    4 Ancient Tomb
    3 horizon canopy
    3 wasteland
    2 Ghost Quarter
    2 Bayou
    2 savannah
    1 badlands
    1 plains
    1 forest
    4 windswept heath
    1 riftstone portal
    2 Urborg, Tomb of Yawgmoth
    2 maze of Ith

    SB:
    4 Leyline of the Void
    4 chalice of the Void
    2 helm of obedience
    2 enlightened tutor
    1 ethersworn canonist
    1 wreck sage
    1 engineered plague

  2. #2
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    Re: Whack A Mole

    No love for Rhonas's Last Stand? I realize it's somewhat crappy (even if you do have Mox Diamond), but a neverending chain of 5/4s gotta be good for something :) Maybe wants more non-land mana, then.

  3. #3

    Re: Whack A Mole

    Quote Originally Posted by colo View Post
    No love for Rhonas's Last Stand? I realize it's somewhat crappy (even if you do have Mox Diamond), but a neverending chain of 5/4s gotta be good for something :) Maybe wants more non-land mana, then.
    It's a sorcery sadly.
    Quote Originally Posted by Laser Brains View Post
    With the printing of Gigantosaurus, Thrashing Brontodon and Steel Leaf Champion the deck has evolved from good to very competitive. Anyway, give it a few play tests if you are interested and let me know what you think.

    Winter Maze
    Quote Originally Posted by CptHaddock View Post
    With veteran explorer I know that I 100% will not enjoy a 30 minute grindfest against someone who can barely afford dual lands and believes that their deck can cast a 10 mana 8/8.

  4. #4
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    Re: Whack A Mole

    You'll win more games with turn 1 chalice for 1. I suggest moving them to the main board.

    Also a deck that can't cantrip is more suspectiple to perm destruction.
    -rob

  5. #5

    Re: Whack A Mole

    Looks fun, might have a tough time against combo though. I love Orim's Chant combo and Orim's Chant in general but I agree with Mistercakes. Mainboard Chalice in place of Chants and Abrupt Decay in place of StP. With 8 mainboard CoW and all the land recursion I feel like Braids, Cabal Minion might have a place giving the deck a bit more of Prison/Stax approach. Sinkhole could even have a place to get you ahead of the game as you establish your lock. Too bad it's a sorcery. Titania, Protector of Argoth seems not shitty here as well.

    Bob feels out of place as you have high cc cards. If you do keep Chants over Chalice Entomb seems like a decent tutor for your lands.
    "WaaaauuugghhhaaaauuugghhhaauuugghhhaaauuugghhhW" -Chewbacca

  6. #6
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    Re: Whack A Mole

    Given enough activations, Assassin's Trophy becomes a Sinkhole. 0-12 activations depending on the deck. So with Ghost Quarter pulling it's weight alongside Exploration, you should be locked in no time.
    Quote Originally Posted by GreatWhale View Post
    Gross, other formats. I puked in my mouth a little.

  7. #7
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    Re: Whack A Mole

    Quote Originally Posted by kinda View Post
    It's a sorcery sadly.
    Ugh... Never having played the card myself, I hadn't realized that Isochron Scepter had that limitation!

    Sorry for the noise :/

  8. #8

    Re: Whack A Mole

    Quote Originally Posted by PirateKing View Post
    Given enough activations, Assassin's Trophy becomes a Sinkhole. 0-12 activations depending on the deck. So with Ghost Quarter pulling it's weight alongside Exploration, you should be locked in no time.
    Precisely!

    Chalice is obviously one of the best cards in the format and hard to argue not maindecking it is optimal. That being said you do lose orim's chant/stp/exploration/entomb. A bg version could be good but the bg 2cc instants seems meh...decay and diabolic edict I suppose? Possiby:


    4 isochron scepter
    4 assassins trophy
    4 abrupt decay
    3 diabolic edict

    4 chalice of the Void
    4 crucible of worlds
    2 sylvan library
    1 Zuran Orb

    2 dark confidant
    3 green Sun's Zenith
    1 Scavenging Ooze
    1 tireless tracker
    1 dryad arbor
    1 ramunap excavator
    1 azusa
    1 Thrun
    1 titania

    4 mox diamond
    4 Ancient Tomb
    2 horizon canopy
    4 wasteland
    2 Ghost Quarter
    4 Bayou
    1 swamp
    1 forest
    4 verdant catacombs
    2 Urborg, Tomb of Yawgmoth

    SB:
    4 Leyline of the Void
    2 helm of obedience
    2 diabolic intent
    1 wreck sage
    4 unmask
    2 engineered plague
    Quote Originally Posted by Laser Brains View Post
    With the printing of Gigantosaurus, Thrashing Brontodon and Steel Leaf Champion the deck has evolved from good to very competitive. Anyway, give it a few play tests if you are interested and let me know what you think.

    Winter Maze
    Quote Originally Posted by CptHaddock View Post
    With veteran explorer I know that I 100% will not enjoy a 30 minute grindfest against someone who can barely afford dual lands and believes that their deck can cast a 10 mana 8/8.

  9. #9

    Re: Whack A Mole

    The Chalice build looks much better. You don't get the Chant lock but you do get a Chalice lock. Thrun is not great with GSZ as his "uncounterable" ability is moot. Bob + Ancient Tomb could cause problems.
    "WaaaauuugghhhaaaauuugghhhaauuugghhhaaauuugghhhW" -Chewbacca

  10. #10

    Re: Whack A Mole

    Quote Originally Posted by Laser Brains View Post
    The Chalice build looks much better. You don't get the Chant lock but you do get a Chalice lock. Thrun is not great with GSZ as his "uncounterable" ability is moot. Bob + Ancient Tomb could cause problems.
    Yes...but winning with Brainstorm, chalice, or thalia just feels hollow to me. It's no secret that complenting one of those 3 with synergestic legacy viable cards makes a competitive deck. At a big event where 90% of people run one of those in their 75 and you can win a trip to Cleveland i get it...but I'd be running this at our £20 proxy event. Last time I played against stasis and birthing pod (which ran a blue wizard which gets you a £5 deduction on entry cost).

    Cutting bob is a good shout. What's a good 4cc gsz target?
    Quote Originally Posted by Laser Brains View Post
    With the printing of Gigantosaurus, Thrashing Brontodon and Steel Leaf Champion the deck has evolved from good to very competitive. Anyway, give it a few play tests if you are interested and let me know what you think.

    Winter Maze
    Quote Originally Posted by CptHaddock View Post
    With veteran explorer I know that I 100% will not enjoy a 30 minute grindfest against someone who can barely afford dual lands and believes that their deck can cast a 10 mana 8/8.

  11. #11
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    Re: Whack A Mole

    If large swaths of the format forego Abrupt Decay for Assassin's Trophy then Scepter/Chant is a potentially good option. If Abrupt Decay numbers don't drop, it becomes a fairly difficult combo to pull off reliably. The blue decks will fight over the Scepter and the BGx decks will destroy it. I'm not sure it's worth the effort, and it definitely needs mana acceleration.

    Cool idea though. Curious to see how it goes without Force of Will/Spell Pierce to protect it.
    Brainstorm Realist

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  12. #12

    Re: Whack A Mole

    Quote Originally Posted by Mr. Safety View Post
    If large swaths of the format forego Abrupt Decay for Assassin's Trophy then Scepter/Chant is a potentially good option. If Abrupt Decay numbers don't drop, it becomes a fairly difficult combo to pull off reliably. The blue decks will fight over the Scepter and the BGx decks will destroy it. I'm not sure it's worth the effort, and it definitely needs mana acceleration.

    Cool idea though. Curious to see how it goes without Force of Will/Spell Pierce to protect it.
    I agree. If you don't have blue to protect it such as in the case of pre-ban Top Miracles you can still run disruption in the form of Thoughtseize and IoK. On that note Chant (way back in 2000's era) was commonly used to push spells in combo decks through. Casting Chant on the same turn before you cast your combo pieces has always been reliable way to get them online. Chant is a ridiculously underplayed card today. However I still like the Chalice build better as it serves the purpose to stop combo which should be this deck's worst match up. This deck probably won't go anywhere but I really like the idea of spot removing everything. I've even considered 1-3 Smallpox here to help get the game state into top deck mode. I haven't tested it yet but I like the ingenuity and out of the box thinking.
    "WaaaauuugghhhaaaauuugghhhaauuugghhhaaauuugghhhW" -Chewbacca

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