[Deck] Reanimator

[Clark Kant]

Now that Thoughtseize and Inquisition have mostly replaced Duress (target player vs target opponent), Misdirection does a fantastic job as FoW 5-8. Something to consider if Mystical Tutor gets unbanned and the deck thus has more open slots while still going 12/12/12.

[Sturtzilla]

I am trying to work a third Misdirection into my sideboard at the moment. As Clark Kant stated, it helps with a lot of discard issues. This falls right in line with what I was considering it for. My thought process was, board it in against Team America, Junk, monoblack discard to turn Hymn to Tourach back at its caster. Sure it is a 2 for 3 but it is far better than using a Force of Will in that situation. I would rather ditch my two cards and make my opponent lose two at random rather than just counter their spell. It is also great against all of Junk's creature and permanent removal. Sure Vindicate? I will Misdirect that to your dual land (or KotR, Goyf, etc). I suppose it has other great targets like that example in lots of other match ups as well.

[Mr.Dieth]

I like how attacking with Xantid and then reanimating Jin garantees you to at least draw 7, as they can't play their removal until the end of the turn.

You are right! even more uses for the xantid swarm! I thought of it as a nice protection against counters / extirpate surgical extraction and stuff, but it is also awesome against removal ! Wow I am really starting to like the idea of xantid swarm ^^.


On misdirection: Yess, he is awesome. Also letting you misdirect a STP On their dudes. I have had 2 in the board for a while now, and I Really Really like them. If I find room for one more I will go up to 3. ( misdirecting a Hymm is just brutal and is easily a Win on its own. )


On the 16 land build: really dislike it, It's seems I often fail to hit 2 lands when I have an exhume / animate dead in hand. And I don't think cutting the one land for an extra 'reanimate-card' is worth the extra percentage of screw you give yourself.

[Sturtzilla]

You are right! even more uses for the xantid swarm! I thought of it as a nice protection against counters / extirpate surgical extraction and stuff, but it is also awesome against removal ! Wow I am really starting to like the idea of xantid swarm ^^.

I am not sure it is worth splashing into green for this inclusion. I mean it makes it even harder to play around Wasteland and or difficult to get the color you need. I guess you could try to reanimate him and then reanimate Jin, but this sounds really slow. It also seems unnecessary when you consider that the deck runs Force of Will, Daze, and some extra counter magic like Mental Misstep. Also as long as you reanimate on turn 2-3 most decks will have tapped out against you anyway. This means you will almost always get your draw seven. After the draw seven you should have a fist for of counters and reanimation spells complemented by a bin full of dudes and land.

On misdirection: Yess, he is awesome. Also letting you misdirect a STP On their dudes. I have had 2 in the board for a while now, and I Really Really like them. If I find room for one more I will go up to 3. ( misdirecting a Hymm is just brutal and is easily a Win on its own. )

I have been arguing for quite some time with my friends/playgroup that it is great against decks that run Hymn and decent against any type of removal. A 3 for 2 exchange is great in the case of Hymn. Especially if you were going to just have to pitch one to FoW anyway. I have done this and it can just blow out Junk/Rock. Furthermore the 2 for 2 exchange is pretty good for us as well in the case of removal. We play Misdirection pitching a post reanimation Careful Study of Hapless Researcher and get their spell and scariest creature while saving our dude. Seems like a win to me in all respects. This card can also help in counter wars.

On the 16 land build: really dislike it, It's seems I often fail to hit 2 lands when I have an exhume / animate dead in hand. And I don't think cutting the one land for an extra 'reanimate-card' is worth the extra percentage of screw you give yourself.

Honestly I haven't tested extensively yet. But keeping one land openers is bad, unless you have a fetch or undergound sea + a discard outlet and dude in hand or entomb + a reanimate. Otherwise you need to go back and try for two lands.

[JonBarber]

I got 6th place at the JupiterGames Invitational tournament with Reanimator. My feelings are the deck were that the nuts hands are nuts, but if your not reanimating on turn 1 or 2, you're probably not winning the game.

[Sturtzilla]

I got 6th place at the JupiterGames Invitational tournament with Reanimator. My feelings are the deck were that the nuts hands are nuts, but if your not reanimating on turn 1 or 2, you're probably not winning the game.

I agree that you really need to be fast with this deck, but many of our threats are so good that even a turn three dude is often times good enough to win a game or match. I am really interested in what you list was, how you sideboarded, and your match ups. Anyway I looked up your list. If anyone else is interested, it can be found here:

http://sales.jupitergamesonline.com/...ecklists-61111

If you wouldn't mind, I would love to read a tournament report. Furthermore I have a few questions regarding your list. First how do you feel about the Darkslick Shores as opposed to running more fetch lands? Also could you speak to your sideboarding a bit? I notice you have some Null Rods, presumably to keep your graveyard safe in games 2 and 3 and potentially to combat affinity and or mono artifact decks. Is that correct? Lastly could you speak to the reasoning to your 11/10/11 configuration? This setup just seems a little different to me; however, I am sure that it can work. Congrats on the finish.

[JonBarber]

I agree that you really need to be fast with this deck, but many of our threats are so good that even a turn three dude is often times good enough to win a game or match. I am really interested in what you list was, how you sideboarded, and your match ups. Anyway I looked up your list. If anyone else is interested, it can be found here:

http://sales.jupitergamesonline.com/...ecklists-61111

If you wouldn't mind, I would love to read a tournament report. Furthermore I have a few questions regarding your list. First how do you feel about the Darkslick Shores as opposed to running more fetch lands? Also could you speak to your sideboarding a bit? I notice you have some Null Rods, presumably to keep your graveyard safe in games 2 and 3 and potentially to combat affinity and or mono artifact decks. Is that correct? Lastly could you speak to the reasoning to your 11/10/11 configuration? This setup just seems a little different to me; however, I am sure that it can work. Congrats on the finish.

Null rods were there mainly to combat relics/t-crypts, but had the splash effect of being generally good vs a variety of decks. Echoing truths dealt with humility's and ensaring bridges, needles for karakas and maze of ith, and the other creatures to shore up harder matchups. I decided to run darkslick shores to make sure I wasn't bringing my life total too low (especially since you lose 10 off a reanimated Jin), and it virtually never comes into play tapped (and if it does its rarely relevant).

I came to that split after a lot of testing. Typically you only need 1-2 ways to put a creature in the yard, but you needed more ways to bring them back/protect them, hence the 11 protection, 11 reanimate effects, and 10 discard.

[Clark Kant]

I got 6th place at the JupiterGames Invitational tournament with Reanimator. My feelings are the deck were that the nuts hands are nuts, but if your not reanimating on turn 1 or 2, you're probably not winning the game.

I really love your list. Well done. Seeing as how you agree that Reanimator absolutely needs to go off early, I don't understand why you didn't cut the 17th land to add the 3rd Hapless Researcher.

Otherwise, your list looks absolutely perfect and I wouldn't change a thing.

[JonBarber]

I really love your list. Well done. Seeing as how you agree that Reanimator absolutely needs to go off early, I don't understand why you didn't cut the 17th land to add the 3rd Hapless Researcher.

Otherwise, your list looks absolutely perfect and I wouldn't change a thing.

I ran 17 lands to ensure as few mulligans as possible. Being on the draw and having the ability to move to your end step and discard a creature is so powerful against blue decks. Mulliganing takes away that ability, therefore taking that risk to add another discard outlet didn't seem worth it to me.

[alderon666]

After playing with the deck I felt like I needed a big fat hasted creature to end the game really fast after Jin hit the table.

Sure you can grind them out reanimating several creature locking them out of spells, combat step and etc. But something I felt pressed to win before I decked myself, especially if the they had blockers/Maze of Ith and such shenanigans.

I can even see some scenarios where a 8/8 haste trample flying creature could be useful... with some protection it can put a loadcrap of pressure on decks that try to race you.

I know it sounds bad, but exploring "bad ideas" is a part of optmizing a deck.

[JonBarber]

After playing with the deck I felt like I needed a big fat hasted creature to end the game really fast after Jin hit the table.

Sure you can grind them out reanimating several creature locking them out of spells, combat step and etc. But something I felt pressed to win before I decked myself, especially if the they had blockers/Maze of Ith and such shenanigans.

I can even see some scenarios where a 8/8 haste trample flying creature could be useful... with some protection it can put a loadcrap of pressure on decks that try to race you.

I know it sounds bad, but exploring "bad ideas" is a part of optmizing a deck.

If you're worried about decking just animate dead or exhume another Jin-Gitaxias and they'll legend rule each other.

[Garobidou]

I ran 17 lands to ensure as few mulligans as possible. Being on the draw and having the ability to move to your end step and discard a creature is so powerful against blue decks. Mulliganing takes away that ability, therefore taking that risk to add another discard outlet didn't seem worth it to me.

Thanks for sharing your feedback on the deck.

I. About the Draw-discard strategy

The draw-discard strategy is very powerful indeed. However this is not that good against any deck packing T1 discard or T1 must-counters (including post board graveyard hate).

About optimizing the mulligans, I did the maths between the 3rd hapless and the 17th land. So the core setup is 11 creatures / 11 reanimate effects / 10 discards / 11 permission spells / 16 Lands. Here are the numbers :

1. Initial On the Draw hands allowing Draw - Discard strategy (I did include the one with Exhume/Animate Dead i.e the one reanimating only on T3)

a. With a 17 Lands build (2 islands + 2 swamps) : 31,19%
b. With a 16 Lands build (1 island + 1 swamp) : 30,31%

As a sidenote, a 16 Lands build with only 10 reanimate effects and 12 permission spells has 28,99% such initial hands.

2. Same as 1. but including this times the other "god" hands (such as entomb+reanimate effect)

a. With a 17 Lands build (2 islands + 2 swamps) : 46,10%
b. With a 16 Lands build (1 island + 1 swamp) : 45,58%

(43,36% for a 16 Lands build with only 10 reanimate effects and 12 permission spells)

As a conclusion : the difference is very small. This is mainly due to :
- the fact you're running 4 basic lands (especially 2 islands)
- the "other nuts hands"

Moreover, please be careful that these are initial hands on the draw. 16 Lands build is better at getting nuts initial hands on the play (see previous posts). But here again the difference is small and it is up to personal preference.

II. About optimization

If we want to go through optimization, I suggest we should list the different kinds of initial hands (on G1 as the information we gathered on the opponent might introduce some more subjectivity on G2-G3) and whether we would keep them or not.

That way we would know exactly which build is the best at having good initial hands (and optimizing mulligans).

Please note that the hands we will discuss haven't to be mutually independant (I won't count twice the same hand)

1. Principle

This is how I work : I have 12 categories.
- Entomb
- Exhume (including Exhume and Animate Dead)
- Reanimate
- Careful study
- Hapless Researcher. There is a difference because one draws 1 and the other 2. But 1 is better on T1 if you don't have the whole combo in hand (see Part 2). I will note "Careful Like" if the statement is true for Careful Study or Hapless Researcher.
- Creature
- Brainstorm
- Permission spells
- Swamps
- Islands
- Other lands (all of them give U and B)
NB : "U-Land" = Island or Other land. "B-land" = Swamp or Other land. "X-Land" = any land
- Other

2. God hands

God hands are hands in which we have all the combo elements. Whatever we will draw we will combo out before T3 (we are in goldfish mode, we don't take into account any opponent action as we are in G1 and don't know what he plays)

a. On the play

#1
1+ Entomb
1+ Reanimate
1+ B-Land

#2
1+ Entomb
1+ Exhume
1+ B-Land
1+ X-Land

#3
1+ Reanimate
1+ Careful Like
1+ Creature
1+ U-Land
1+ B-Land (might be the same land)

#4
1+ Exhume
1+ Careful Like
1+ Creature
1+ U-Land
1+ B-Land

#5
1+ Reanimate
1+ Creature
1+ B-Land

b. On the draw

Same as on the play : #1 to #5

#6
1+ Exhume
1+ Creature
1+ B-Land
1+ X-Land

3. Other keepable hands

This is where I think we should discuss a lot. If we want to reach the most optimized build we should throw away any subjectivity in deciding whether we keep a hand or not.

Here are some hands I would keep (I will add some later). Feel free to comment and add yours (and the reasons why you would keep it) :

a. On the play

#7 : missing the 2nd land
1+ Exhume
1+ Careful Like
1+ Creature
1+ U-Land

Reason : T1 Careful + Creature. With regular, on T2 you drew 2 to 3 cards (depending if it's Careful of Hapless). Between 64% and 75% chances of success.

#8 : missing the creature
1+ Reanimate
1+ Hapless
1+ Brainstorm
1+ U-Land
1+ B-Land (might be the same land)

Reason : T1 Hapless. T2 draw creature => Exhume. If not, T2 Brainstorm. You see 4 cards, you have 62% chances of success.

#9 : missing the creature
1+ Exhume
1+ Hapless
1+ Brainstorm
1+ U-Land
1+ B-Land

#10
To be continued

b. On the draw

#11
1+ Exhume
1+ Creature
1+ Brainstorm
1+ U-Land

Reason : Draw+Discard T1. Draw + cast BS T2 (if no land on the draw). You saw 5 cards and were looking for a land. You have more than 80% chances of success.

#12
To be continued

[alderon666]

If you're worried about decking just animate dead or exhume another Jin-Gitaxias and they'll legend rule each other.

On a second thought, Terastodon kinda does that. You can get up to 18 power by trashing your own lands and easily rebuild, because of Jin draws.

[Clark Kant]

Yep, and Terastadon also deals with random cards like Ensnaring Bridge and such that could screw you over. But mainly, being able to get 18 power on the board with one reanimate seems solid.

If your opponent is light on land/missed a land drop on turn 3 or so, that's your cue to knock out 2-3 lands from their board and lock them out of the game completely (This is assuming you also have a 5/4 Jin Gitaxis on the board to serve as a blocker).

It's nice to have atleast one card in the deck that can deal with resolved permanents.

[Alsan]

I don't really care about permanents in G1, no one plays things that are unwinnable (no one plays Ensnaring Bridge maindeck, Jin wins Energy field, leyline of void maindeck is GG... etc) to us.

Based on the statistics of Garobidou, maybe the list should be something like this:

// Lands
4 [A] Underground Sea
4 [ON] Polluted Delta
3 [ZEN] Verdant Catacombs
3 [ZEN] Misty Rainforest
1 [UNH] Island
1 [UNH] Swamp

// Creatures
4 [NPH] Jin-Gitaxias, Core Augur
1 [ZEN] Iona, Shield of Emeria
1 [ARB] Sphinx of the Steel Wind
1 [CNF] Inkwell Leviathan
1 [RAV] Blazing Archon
3 [JU] Hapless Researcher

// Spells
4 [FNM] Reanimate
4 [US] Exhume
2 [B] Animate Dead
4 [OD] Entomb
4 [AL] Force of Will
4 [NPH] Mental Misstep
3 [NE] Daze
4 [OD] Careful Study
4 [FNM] Brainstorm

I don't know how to fit 11 creatures / 16 lands / 11 permission spells / 10 Discards / 11 Reanimate effects.

11 Creatures: 4x Jin, 1x Iona, 1x Sphinx, 1x Leviathan, 1x Blazing Archon, 3x Hapless
11 Permission: 4x Fow, 4x Mental misstep, 3x Daze
11 Discards: 4x Careful, 4x Entomb, 3x Hapless
11 Reanimate effects: 4x Reanimate, 4x Exhume, 3x Animate dead
16 Lands.

Has to be a mistake somewhere :/. I prefer cutting 11th reanimate spell than 11th discard, because the only way to play 11+11+11+11+16 it cutting one Brainstorm (and my religion says NO xD). The fact is, that most players will counter Careful study, stopping us discarding a fattie and (most important) digging into the deck. Usually we only need ONE reanimate spell, but well protected.

Am I wrong?

BTW, we played for fun the white version and was very bad xD.

[Garobidou]

I don't know how to fit 11 creatures / 16 lands / 11 permission spells / 10 Discards / 11 Reanimate effects.

11 Creatures: 4x Jin, 1x Iona, 1x Sphinx, 1x Leviathan, 1x Blazing Archon, 3x Hapless
11 Permission: 4x Fow, 4x Mental misstep, 3x Daze
11 Discards: 4x Careful, 4x Entomb, 3x Hapless
11 Reanimate effects: 4x Reanimate, 4x Exhume, 3x Animate dead
16 Lands.

Has to be a mistake somewhere :/

Yeah, Hapless doesn't belong to creatures. Entomb does ;)
So with 7 creatures you're at 11 creatures (out of context this could be a great quote :p)

[Alsan]

Ah, nnnnnnnnnnnnnnnnice xD (I figured the mistake was mine).

I'll test the day after tomorrow the new list and share results.

(BTW great quote xD)

[Clark Kant]

Alsan, I would cut a Jin-Gitaxis or the Inkwell Leviathan from your list to either play the 3rd Animate Dead or the 4th Daze.

The former brings you to a...

11/11/11/11 configuration of creatures/reanimates/discard/permission. This is my preference as I think it feels more even and I seem to frequently face opponents that counter my reanimate spell.

The latter takes you to a...

11/10/11/12 configuration of the same. This is Garobidou's preference as he frequently faces opponents that counter his discard spell.

You are currently playing a...

12/10/11/11 configuration which I don't think is optimal.

If you're confused, Entomb counts as both a creature and a discard spell. Hapless Researcher counts as a discard spell, not a creature. Brainstorm doesn't count as anything, but it's too damn good not to play as a 4x of.

[Kaslan]

my configuration is : 11creatures/ 8reanimates/ 8discard/ 11permission +4 Lim-Dûl's Vault (18 lands)

yes it is about a turn slower ( going off on turn 3 ) but i think its more consistent.

Lim-Dûl's Vault helps in game 2 and 3 to find side board cards.

did anyone else try out the vault? if so why did you like or not like it ?

[Clark Kant]

I think Vault slows down the day way too much to be viable, and the current 11/11/11/11 configurations are actually extremely consistent as demonstrated by the recent top 8s.

If I were to play Lim Dul's Vault however, I would definately play a 9/9/9/12 17 land configuration + 4 Vault. That seems a lot more consistent.

This list is what I would play...

// Lands
4 [A] Underground Sea
4 [ON] Polluted Delta
4 [ZEN] Verdant Catacombs
3 [ZEN] Misty Rainforest
1 [UNH] Island
1 [UNH] Swamp

// Creatures
2 [NPH] Jin-Gitaxias, Core Augur
1 [ZEN] Iona, Shield of Emeria
1 [ARB] Sphinx of the Steel Wind
1 [RAV] Blazing Archon
1 [JU] Hapless Researcher

// Spells
4 [FNM] Reanimate
4 [US] Exhume
1 [B] Animate Dead
4 [OD] Entomb
4 [AL] Force of Will
4 [NPH] Mental Misstep
4 [NE] Daze
4 [OD] Careful Study
4 [FNM] Brainstorm
4 [AL] Lim Dul's Vault