Page 2 of 2 FirstFirst 12
Results 21 to 36 of 36

Thread: Devil's Cake

  1. #21
    Member
    pettdan's Avatar
    Join Date

    Mar 2013
    Location

    Stockholm, Sweden
    Posts

    704

    Re: Devil's Cake

    @FTW: You're discussing plan A, which is great, we were discussing if plan B exists.

  2. #22
    Member

    Join Date

    Sep 2011
    Posts

    4,776

    Re: Devil's Cake

    Quote Originally Posted by pettdan View Post
    @FTW: You're discussing plan A, which is great, we were discussing if plan B exists.
    Yeah I got that. But Demonic Tutor + 5 mana lets you get any plan B, plan C, plan D... There's no need for an Entomb plan B when plan A is to play any card in your deck. I think you're underrating how flexible plan A is (and it uses 1 less card and 1 less mana too). If you need another plan, run a 1-of and tutor for it.

  3. #23
    Member
    pettdan's Avatar
    Join Date

    Mar 2013
    Location

    Stockholm, Sweden
    Posts

    704

    Re: Devil's Cake

    Quote Originally Posted by FTW View Post
    Yeah I got that. But Demonic Tutor + 5 mana lets you get any plan B, plan C, plan D... There's no need for an Entomb plan B when plan A is to play any card in your deck. I think you're underrating how flexible plan A is (and it uses 1 less card and 1 less mana too). If you need another plan, run a 1-of and tutor for it.
    Well, you don't get to play any card in your deck, only any card with CMC <= 3 (I think, maybe I got it wrong). Putting Sundering Titan into play in this scenario, using plan B, is already pretty good in comparison with plan A, and we were merely investigating if there was an even better option.

  4. #24
    Member

    Join Date

    Sep 2011
    Posts

    4,776

    Re: Devil's Cake

    Quote Originally Posted by pettdan View Post
    Well, you don't get to play any card in your deck, only any card with CMC <= 3 (I think, maybe I got it wrong).
    Any card with CMC <=5 (without using any lands). Your Entomb scenario needs 1 land to activate Wishclaw, so with that it would be CMC 6. Like I said, I think you're underrating how good plan A is.

    Tapped out with Welder, Talisman, and LED in play:
    1) Crack LED. Discard your hand. Add BBB.
    2) Activate Wishclaw Talisman (paying B). Hold priority.
    3) In response, activate Welder. Exchange Wishclaw Talisman for the LED in your GY.
    4) Crack LED again with tutor on the stack. Add RRR.
    5) Resolve the Wishclaw activation. Find any card in your deck. Nothing to give to opponent. RRRBB floating.

    With that 5 mana you could:
    - Cast Karn and play a 1 cmc artifact from the SB
    - Get Grindstone/Painter's Servant if you have the other, then immediately activate Grindstone FTW
    - Cast Daretti to kill something
    - Get Blood Moon to land lock them
    - Get Ensnaring Bridge with 0 cards in hand
    - Get any other corner case answer

    Unlike plan B, this works with either Goblin Welder or Goblin Engineer (4 mana floating instead).

    Putting Sundering Titan into play with plan B (and giving them Wishclaw) is much worse than plan A (and not giving them Wishclaw).

  5. #25
    Member
    pettdan's Avatar
    Join Date

    Mar 2013
    Location

    Stockholm, Sweden
    Posts

    704

    Re: Devil's Cake

    Quote Originally Posted by FTW View Post
    Putting Sundering Titan into play with plan B (and giving them Wishclaw) is much worse than plan A (and not giving them Wishclaw).
    Yes, I agree with this, and I think that was the premise for the discussion. Is there an alternative to Sundering Titan that would make plan B better than plan A (in cornercase scenarios)? That question couldn't be answered without checking which creatures exist.

    I think getting Sundering Titan into play will be the correct choice in some matchups, like in some scenarios vs RUG Delver perhaps, although plan A will generally be the way to go. I think you're right that it's a very good approach, but I never doubted that.
    Last edited by pettdan; 10-16-2019 at 10:38 AM.

  6. #26

    Re: Devil's Cake

    As the list moves more LED heavy it makes blast effects less useful. If you crack LED with a karn/talisman trigger on the stack, the blasts are useless for protection. This is the same issue I was having in the painter/bomberman hybrid list. This makes me lean to using some number of discard effects. LED forces you to be proactive vs reactive. Some numbers of blasts is still likely correct but less than a traditional shortcake/imperial list.

  7. #27
    Member
    drude1's Avatar
    Join Date

    Jul 2010
    Location

    Minneapolis, MN
    Posts

    670

    Re: Devil's Cake

    @FTW: Yeah, Titan is definitely more for the turn 1 welder, turn 2 engineer hands (or turn 1 welder, turn 2 titan in hand crack and LED sort of hand). I think it's a rarity that you are ever doing anything with Titan if you have wishclaw somehow in the mix. In fact, one could argue that Titan should just be a wurmcoil engine. If you knew you were going to be playing RUG delver all day that's probably what I would do. However, Titan has more game against control and combo decks (particularly something like miracles), so for now I'm staying on 1 x Sundering Titan in the main.

    @Punda: Yeah, I'll reiterate what I said in the discord, you are probably right. I have been trying 2 thoughtseize in to replace 2 REB. We'll see how that goes. I again will also say that if you have open mana up and combo + LED out, you can always blast opponent's lands to force a play from them and then combo off in response.

    Still messing around with the numbers for this deck. I'm still mostly concentrating on a 2 e.tutor/2 wishclaw deck now with 4 petal, 3 mox opal and 2 LED. Been pretty successful so far but not seeing much RUG delver yet, so vote's still not in. Speaking of which, if anyone has RUG delver built and wants to just jam a bunch of games sometime to test the match-up, let me know.

    PA

  8. #28

  9. #29
    Member
    drude1's Avatar
    Join Date

    Jul 2010
    Location

    Minneapolis, MN
    Posts

    670

    Re: Devil's Cake

    Pretty close to what most of us are playing. I'm personally on opals/petals over astrolabes but that's mostly a play style issue. Astrolabes are grindier and opals are more explosive. Depends on your flavor. I do admit that I sometimes feel like I am getting flooded with mana. But I also played astrolabes for quite a while as well and they often got stranded in hand. The biggest issue I have with this list is that he is playing a bunch of blood moons but basically can almost never play one on turn 1. Congrats on the 5-0 though. I'm glad the strategy has legs. Without actually measuring it, it feels like my win percentage is really high right now.
    I haven't actually played a league yet with this deck as I'm still tweaking it. Really the 2 slots I have open right now are either 2 thoughtseize, blasts 5-6, or blood moons 2-3. In the practice room I think the thoughtsiezes have been the best as people tend to play a lot of combo and/or basics. But in a league or IRL blood moons are probably better given how popular delver and 4-color control strategies are.
    Last edited by drude1; 10-20-2019 at 11:39 PM.

  10. #30
    Member

    Join Date

    Sep 2011
    Posts

    4,776

    Re: Devil's Cake

    Quote Originally Posted by drude1 View Post
    Pretty close to what most of us are playing. I'm personally on opals/petals over astrolabes but that's mostly a play style issue.
    I think it's actually a synergy issue more than a playstyle issue. Blood Moon is risky in your own manabase (shuts off white and black), but you only run it as a 1-of so you don't have to play it in games where it hurts you. He can use Astrolabe to filter into white and black post-Moon. A list that's heavy in Blood Moons probably needs the Astrolabes to have consistent mana.

    The drawback is he's not casting Moons turn 1, which reduces the win % of Moon hands. But he has only 3 Moons anyway.

  11. #31
    Member
    drude1's Avatar
    Join Date

    Jul 2010
    Location

    Minneapolis, MN
    Posts

    670

    Re: Devil's Cake

    Quote Originally Posted by FTW View Post
    I think it's actually a synergy issue more than a playstyle issue. Blood Moon is risky in your own manabase (shuts off white and black), but you only run it as a 1-of so you don't have to play it in games where it hurts you. He can use Astrolabe to filter into white and black post-Moon. A list that's heavy in Blood Moons probably needs the Astrolabes to have consistent mana.

    The drawback is he's not casting Moons turn 1, which reduces the win % of Moon hands. But he has only 3 Moons anyway.
    Well, with a basic swamp, 3 mox opal and 4 lotus petal, I haven't really had trouble finding my colors, even under a blood moon. He is running 4 astrolabe and 2 petals, so my chances of finding my colors under a blood moon are actually a little better than his. Having said that, the cantrip on the astrolabe is nothing to scoff at.

  12. #32

    Re: Devil's Cake

    The 5-0 in Scott's post was me. Just a few words on my view of Blood Moon in this deck:

    - The list is built to grind. I always had an issue with the all-in nature of shortcake (trading explosivity for mid-game power) and I really like what black brings to the table (Daretti, Wishclaw Talisman, Nihil Spellbomb). The basic idea is to have a high density of must-counter threats with few low-impact cards (the likes of Lotus Petal). Against certain decks (RUG Delver, Death's Shadow, Infect) Blood Moon is a must-counter threat. The idea is not to get free wins through turn 1 Blood Moon - we are not a prison deck but rather a combo-control deck with a prison element.
    - Blood Moon is very efficient against some of the unfair decks (at least game 1) like ANT, Depths, Hogaak. We typically have an issue with those as we are not fast enough, and Blood Moon on turns 2-3 while they are setting up for the combo can be quite good.
    - The deck generally wants the game to go long, and Blood Moon often "fixes" your own manabase in these cases - 7 sol lands can be quite awkward and in a game that does on for 10+ turns, it is typically better for you to have a Blood Moon out.
    - Blood Moon can be quite efficient against snow-control decks. What often happens is that you trade resources (they have a lot of removal for your painters and welders) and eventually stick a Karn. Karn turns off their Astrolabes and you can completely cut them off colored mana with Liquimetal Coating over 2-3 turns.
    - The 4 Astrolabes and 4 Goblin Engineers (and additionally Lotus Petals) give you enough access to color-fixing even under Blood Moon. In a long game you are almost certain to get an Astrolabe into play at some point. I would also point out that you only actually need to cast Daretti and Enlightened Tutor from your hand, the other cards (Wishclaw Talisman and Ethersworn Canonist) are more often welder targets. Also in case you are wondering, the whole white splash is there to give you access to shortcake-style fast wins in unfair matchups, but I often fully side it out in fair matchups.

  13. #33
    Member

    Join Date

    Dec 2017
    Location

    Paris, France
    Posts

    73

    Re: Devil's Cake

    Played at a local with the list yesterday, 32 players.

    https://deckbox.org/sets/2487055
    Round 1 UB Death Shadow: 2-1 (sort of)

    The matchup ends up being as rough as I first thought. Big creatures with Wasteland and Daze backup are hard to manage when your only way out is a bridge. The 6 blasts definitely helped in those 3 games. Lost the first match, won the second one with Lattice.
    The third one took longer and is a grindfest: preventive spellbomb for anglers was cracked and it's probably what won me the game. I have lattice out again, my opponent who allegedly took 80% of the clock refuses to concede. The next turn I drop Karn + Wishclaw, still refuses to concede. My next turn is the last additional turn, I can resolve my combo but the combo by itself doesn't win so the final score is a draw.

    Round 2 RUG Delver: 0-2

    I know by experience with this kind of decks that a one-land'er is a no-go and that the London mulligan is definitely a better route than a hopeful 7. Especially against an opponent known to play a Delver variant, not that it's actually relevant when I keep my hands. So I mulligan. Now presented a hand that does next to nothing, but has 2 lands and is slowly playable. Unsurprisingly, Wasteland takes care of my Sol land, which forces me to drop threats without being Daze-proof. Wrenn, behind a huge Tarmogoyf takes care of the rest by not allowing me to establish more mana.
    Second game goes a bit slower where they fail to find a quick threat. This indicates me that I should present my Daretti as soon as possible, pierce-proof that is, but even color requirement is tough to reach and the mulligan didn't help. I end up unable to re-establish my game plan with bolts taking care of the 2 goblins I resolved.

    Round 3 Eldrazi Aggro: 2-1

    I get roflstomped in game 1, hard. My opponent on the play goes T1 Chalice, T2 Smasher, T3 Wasteland. On my side of things, a miraculous bridge appears in my hand, but I'm unable to empty my hand fast enough.
    Second game is the complete opposite where I resolve a T1 Daretti. I proceed to ride that Daretti and its unhealthy ammount of generated CA to victory and putting 3 tokens of Painter's Servant into play.
    Third game is also easy, T2 Blood Moon in front of a Chalice and a Mimic. I have Daretti in hand but no black mana. "Draw go". I reach 6 lands and slam Chandra. I put 2 emblems while her 2 Ratchet Bombs slowly reach 3 counters. She explodes one to get rid of Blood Moon, resolve 2 smashers who go molest my Chandra. I take my turn, I have something like 10 mana myself and proceed to vomit my hand on the battlefield. Karn + Daretti, then -2 to reach for a bridge that I resolve. Chandra emblems are still ticking but they aren't enough so I make the risky play of destroying the Chalice instead of one of the smasher to kill the next turn off Painter's Servant + Grindstone. It pays off.

    Round 4 UB Death Shadow: 2-1

    I lose the first game after a slow mulligan that doesn't recover from a Wasteland on one of the 2 lands I drew that game. There actually would have been a (small) chance if I had a Great Furnace in my deck.
    Game 2 my opponents doesn't find a second land after I blast his 2 cantrips and the flipped Delver that was pressuring me, let's just call it a calculated risk. I finally find more mana myself but my opponent concedes as he knows my hand.
    Game 3 we both get our mana, sort of. A timely Wasteland prevents a Ballista for 2 supposedly taking care of the flipped Delver. I have LED, Tormod's Crypt, Astrolabe, Spellbomb, double Goblin Welder both active, Canonist and a Ballista on 1. Very nasty CA to come. I finally find a third land to resolve a Blood Moon, in response they Snuff Out targeting the Ballista which I think is a mistake, especially since they showed me the Snuff Out 3 turns earlier to flip the Delver. I make 9 mana with the 1 LED and they concede.
    Last edited by AngryBacon; 10-23-2019 at 11:10 AM.

  14. #34
    Member
    pettdan's Avatar
    Join Date

    Mar 2013
    Location

    Stockholm, Sweden
    Posts

    704

    Re: Devil's Cake

    Not much posting here, I'll add my short report from 2 weeks ago (Aug 23 [edit: err, too much stress, it's Oct 23 of course]):

    ---

    Here's a short report from the local weekly event. Had one bye and the following..

    Played this list:

    3 Great Furnace
    1 Lion's Eye Diamond
    1 Lotus Petal
    3 Mox Opal
    4 Ancient Tomb
    2 Badlands
    4 Bloodstained Mire
    2 City of Traitors
    2 Mountain
    1 Plateau
    1 Swamp
    1 Wooded Foothills
    1 Enlightened Tutor
    3 Goblin Welder
    4 Pyroblast
    3 Grindstone
    1 Nihil Spellbomb
    1 Ethersworn Canonist
    1 Wishclaw Talisman
    4 Goblin Engineer
    3 Painter's Servant
    1 Ichor Wellspring
    1 Recurring Nightmare
    2 Imperial Recruiter
    1 Blood Moon
    1 Ensnaring Bridge
    2 Daretti, Ingenious Iconoclast
    1 Auriok Salvagers
    4 Karn, the Great Creator
    1 Sundering Titan

    Sb:
    1 Walking Ballista
    1 Tormod's Crypt
    2 Thoughtseize
    1 Red Elemental Blast
    1 Grindstone
    1 Ethersworn Canonist
    1 Painter's Servant
    1 Umezawa's Jitte
    1 Plague Engineer
    1 Blood Moon
    1 Ensnaring Bridge
    2 Leyline of the Void
    1 Mycosynth Lattice

    R1: UW stoneblade
    G1: opponent mulligans to 6 and starts. Great hand with 2 welder, 2 engineer, 2 recruiter, furnace, plateau (after first draw, doubled up on a creature). I'm so glad, this will be Titan t2 or t3 most likely. But oh no, he fows t2 engineer, teferi bounces welder, then jitte connects and kills everything.
    G2: think I have Thoughtseize and Daretti in my starting hand and don't draw any black source until I'm at 4 life. Get some welders into play and forget what else but opponent gets Mystic into Sword of F&I and take my Welders while drawing extra cards..
    Results: 0-2

    R2: Goblins
    Get Trashmastered one game, manage to Weld Titan one game and combo out the third. Opponent misboarded, she's still a bit new to Legacy and thought Thorn and Chalice on zero were good vs me since I showed mox opals and the petal in game1.
    Results: 2-1

    R3: Lands
    G1: Early Loam + Wasteland lock me out.
    G2: I get out Karn and can go for combo or Bridge the same turn that opponent can make Marit Lage but opponent had Krosan Grip so it doesn't matter which route I go, die both ways..

    Too early to figure out if this motivates any changes. Maybe add basics and astrolabes, hmm..
    Last edited by pettdan; 11-04-2019 at 04:54 PM.

  15. #35
    Member
    drude1's Avatar
    Join Date

    Jul 2010
    Location

    Minneapolis, MN
    Posts

    670

    Re: Devil's Cake

    Well, things have changed quite a bit with the banning of Wrenn & Six in legacy. I think most people were starting to move away from welder a little because of that nasty Planeswalker, but with the recent banning, I really think 4 welder/4 engineer becomes a powerful plan once again. Looking at some ideas from discord (thanks to Petdan in particular), I've come up with two lists that abuse the power of the welder/engineer engine. The first concentrates on a more stable manabase and is a little grindier with the use of Arcum's Astrolabe, while the second is more aggressive and focuses more on early big-dumb-creature recursion on top of the more classic painter/grindstone combo. Here are this lists for comparison....

    Ice Cream Cake (name under review)

    4 x Goblin Welder
    4 x Goblin Engineer
    3 x Painter’s Servant

    1 x Lion’s Eye Diamond
    1 x Mox Opal
    3 x Lotus Petal
    3 x Grindstone
    4 x Arcum’s Astrolabe
    1 x Nihil Spellbomb
    4 x Pyroblast
    1 x Red Elemental Blast
    2 x Enlightened Tutor
    1 x Wishclaw Talisman
    2 x Ensnaring Bridge
    1 x Blood Moon
    2 x Daretti, Ingenious Iconoclast
    3 x Karn, the Great Creator
    1 x Bolas’s Citadel

    4 x Ancient Tomb
    2 x City of Traitors
    1 x Badlands
    1 x Plateau
    4 x Bloodstained Mire
    1 x Scaling Tarn
    1 x Great Furnace
    4 x Snow-covered Mountain
    1 x Snow-covered Swamp

    SB
    1 x Ethersworn Canonist
    1 x Glass Canon (probably getting cut)
    2 x Surgical Extraction
    1 x Plague Engineer
    2 x Angrath’s Rampage
    1 x Lion’s Eye Diamond
    1 x Tormod’s Crypt
    1 x Grindstone
    1 x Painter’s Servant
    1 x Liquimetal Coating
    1 x Ensnaring Bridge
    1 x Mycosynth Lattice
    1 x Wurmcoil Engine

    This list again is really focusing on the combo. The citadel really lets you power out a ton of cards and you often win the turn you play it. It does play a nihil spellbomb main so you can still combo out even with Emrakul in opponent's library. This list is more grindy and 4 x astrolabe offer good card draw if a couple goblins can stick.

    Devil’s Cake

    4 x Goblin Welder
    4 x Goblin Engineer
    3 x Painter’s Servant
    2 x Imperial Recruiter
    1 x Wurmcoil Engine
    1 x Sundering Titan

    1 x Lion’s Eye Diamond
    3 x Lotus Petal
    2 x Mox Opal
    3 x Grindstone
    4 x Pyroblast
    1 x Red Elemental Blast
    2 x Enlightened Tutor
    1 x Wishclaw Talisman
    1 x Ensnaring Bridge
    1 x Blood Moon
    1 x Recurring NIghtmare
    2 x Daretti, Ingenious Iconoclast
    3 x Karn, the Great Creator

    4 x Ancient Tomb
    2 x City of Traitors
    1 x Badlands
    1 x Plateau
    4 x Bloodstained Mire
    2 x Scaling Tarn
    2 x Great Furnace
    1 x Vault of Whispers
    2 x Snow-covered Mountain
    1 x Snow-covered Swamp



    SB
    1 x Ethersworn Canonist
    1 x Glass Casket
    2 x Surgical Extraction
    1 x Plague Engineer
    1 x Murderous Rider
    1 x Goblin Cratermaker
    1 x Lion’s Eye Diamond
    1 x Tormod’s Crypt
    1 x Grindstone
    1 x Painter’s Servant
    1 x Liquimetal Coating
    1 x Ensnaring Bridge
    1 x Mycosynth Lattice
    1 x Nihil Spellbomb

    This list again is more explosive. Not only can you go for early combo but you can also go after a titan or wurmcoil in the early turns as an alternative win con. This list is also playing 2 x Imperial Recruiter which helps find your goblins or some of the SB hate bears. It also interacts well with Recurring Nightmare. Nightmare also combos well with goblin engineer, letting you search for multiple artifacts to put in your graveyard.

    Still not sure which one I like better. Both are a lot of fun. Bolas's Citadel has been really fun to play with in particular. The one downside about the second list is that sometimes the large creatures are irrelevant, particularly against decks not playing traditional lands (eg bomberman, 12 post, some depths lists). Overall, I think the snow deck is better against these lists or control lists, whereas the more aggro build is better against delver and other more traditional fair decks.

    Give them a try and let me know what you think. Also looking forward to any other ideas that may be floating out there.

    PA
    Last edited by drude1; 11-19-2019 at 06:29 PM.

  16. #36
    Member
    drude1's Avatar
    Join Date

    Jul 2010
    Location

    Minneapolis, MN
    Posts

    670

    Re: Devil's Cake

    One other option for those of you who like the green splash...

    Moldy Cake

    4 x Goblin Welder
    4 x Goblin Engineer
    3 x Painter’s Servant
    1 x Wurmcoil Engine (could be Titan)

    1 x Lion’s Eye Diamond
    1 x Mox Opal
    3 x Lotus Petal
    3 x Grindstone
    4 x Arcum’s Astrolabe
    4 x Pyroblast
    2 x Veil of Summer
    1 x Wishclaw Talisman
    4 x Once Upon a Time
    1 x Ensnaring Bridge
    1 x Daretti, Ingenious Iconoclast
    3 x Karn, the Great Creator
    1 x Bolas’s Citadel

    4 x Ancient Tomb
    2 x City of Traitors
    1 x Badlands
    1 x Taiga
    4 x Wooded Foothills
    1 x Scaling Tarn
    1 x Great Furnace
    4 x Snow-covered Mountain
    1 x Snow-covered Forest

    SB
    2 x Surgical Extraction
    3 x Assassin’s Trophy
    2 x Plague Engineer
    1 x Lion’s Eye Diamond
    1 x Tormod’s Crypt
    1 x Nihil Spellbomb
    1 x Grindstone
    1 x Painter’s Servant
    1 x Liquimetal Coating
    1 x Ensnaring Bridge
    1 x Mycosynth Lattice


    No Blood Moons here. You could try to squeeze them in but they would have to be at least a 3 of probably since we don't have e.tutor to find them. The nice thing about this list is that the once upon a times allow you to find the goblins early and often...redundancy is key! Veil of Summer is obviously a good card as well. This version so far has the citadel and a copy of wurmcoil for the fair/aggro match-ups. Wurmcoil could also be a titan. It also runs 3 Assassin's trophy in the SB, which is a catch-all. This could be abrupt decay (or a split?) but right now I like the trophy as it hits lands in the depths match-up. Could also play Magus of the Moon in the SB if you wanted. It's good when it's good.

    This version has legs, and is fun. Just goes in a little bit different direction.

Thread Information

Users Browsing this Thread

There are currently 1 users browsing this thread. (0 members and 1 guests)