[Discussion] Skill Borrower in EPIC Painter shell

[freakish777]

//Disruption
4 Force of Will
4 Daze
4 Counterbalance
4 Thoughtseize

//Playing spells
4 Tropical Island
1 Island
3 Underground Sea
4 Flooded Strand
4 Polluted Delta
1 Swamp
1 Academy Ruins (Might be better as the 4th Underground Sea, kinda random)

//Killing
4 Skill Borrower
1 Kiki-Jiki, Mirror Breaker

//Going deeper than the Haitain (that's a Heroes reference if you missed it)
3 Dark Confidant
3 Ponder
4 Brainstorm
3 Sensei's Divining Top
4 Worldly Tutor
3 Lim-Dul's Vault

//Protection?
1 EE (This might be better as the fourth Ponder, it's kinda random?)

No sideboard as of yet (but it'll need around 4 or 5 Blue Elemental Blasts likely to survive GoyfSligh/DragonStompy). It'll also likely have EE & Tormod's Crypt. The obvious problem is you have to keep a 1/3 Artifact Creature alive with passing the turn and it costs 1 more mana to play than Painter. The obvious advantage is that it's 1 or 2 mana less than Painter combo (Borrower + Worldly/LDV), and your guy now potentially combos with up to 18 other cards in the deck (Brainstorm, Ponder, Top, Tutor, LDV) and can completely "Oops! I'm such a luck sack!" win without the other combo cards.

Thoughts?

[rockout]

Why the 1 of Kiki-Jiki?

[Jaynel]

...that's one of the combo pieces. You need Skill Borrower and KJ on top in order to win.

[Zork]

Its an infinite combo with borrower that wins you the game. For those that don't know, you get Kiki on top, and then at the end of your opponents turn, you tap Skill Borrower to make an arbitrary number of copies of itself (since its not legendary), untap, and swing.

I also tried to make a skill borrower combo deck, using most of the same cards but cutting confidant, a couple ponders, and a daze for trinket mage and a mage toolbox (also helps set up counterbalance). The biggest problem was that the deck relies on getting that one combination of cards and too many things can go wrong.

[Poron]

untap and swing? at the end of the turn you have to sacrifice the copies.

I would also consider to run Altar of Dementia so you can win instang speed and moreover you overtake any "creature stopping" effect and any Solitary Confiment/Moat/Worship etc.

this deck is really not bad... it counters it disrupts and it has a 2 cards combo

Anyway, CounterTop engine without Enlightned Tutor?
Since you already play Green wouldn't it be better to run a sort of Survival List? don't forget Skill Borrower copies just the activated ability...

Again, how do you intend to win with your list? They can't attack because they tap to create another copy. I considered Mobilize, Roar of the Kha, To Arms! or Vitalize to win

[Adan]

untap and swing? at the end of the turn you have to sacrifice the copies.

That's correct, but that's a delayed triggered ability that happens during the EOT Step, before the cleanup-step. In the cleanup step, you can still spawn multiple copies of Skill Borrower and untap and swing.

My explanation might be sloppy at some points, but that's how it works.

[Poron]

Adan are you sure of this mechanic??

[Adan]

Adan are you sure of this mechanic??

Yes.

[Maveric78f]

I tried this combo with fanatic, in order not to wait 2 turns to win (borrower does not have haste, so you need 1 turn for it to activate then another turn to combo at end of opponent's turn, then your turn to attack), but only 1 (waiting that burrower can activate, then make as many borrowers as possible with kiki on top and finally put fanatic on top library to sac everything for the win). And my build was so crappy that I eventually gave up.

[Mordenkaynen]

I think it would be better to change 1EE -> 1 echoing truth. 1 is not so random since you play vaults (3->4?; but it's better to play 2 truth if you don't want to lose 5 life to dig for it). It's purpose would be bounce those moats, propagandas; needles etc, and sometimes opposing threats (EtW tokens, dreadnought).

However only 1 way to win is not that good imo. And with vault+seize+fetches+confidant you'll most likely lose much life which is not good vs aggro.

[freakish777]

That's correct, but that's a delayed triggered ability that happens during the EOT Step, before the cleanup-step. In the cleanup step, you can still spawn multiple copies of Skill Borrower and untap and swing.

My explanation might be sloppy at some points, but that's how it works.

It's not actually in clean up, as no one can play abilities in clean up (and if they could you go back to end of turn). "At end of turn" means "At the beginning of the end of turn step." If you play Kiki-Jiki's ability (or any ability with "At end of turn" in it somewhere) after that time (still in end of turn step but after the beginning of it) the "At end of turn" doesn't happen until the next beginning of an end step (next turn).

Yes, we're 100% positive it works this way (and always has).

Worldly Tutor also gives you another way to set up Counterbalance in response to an opponent's spell (albiet your options are 2, 3, and 5, so you can't protect Skill Borrower from StP/Innocent Blood/Snuff Out/Wrath/Humility/etc).

[Merick]

I have a few questions.

Why do you run 4 counterbalance, and just run 3 top, I would suggest to fit in #4. You got confidant, cb and you want to random see a kiki and win. So I see no reason not to run it.

You run 4 trop and 3 sea, but the only use of trop is worldy tutor, EE @ 3 and postboard options (goyf). With the amount of fetchland you run, It should be no problem to get a green source when needed. I'd suggest to cut 2 tropical island for normal Islands, as you can set up your board position with just blue sources.

[Poron]

I have tested a little this combo and it's nice but sometime it happens not to be able to pass, to let him to end his turn and then to combo out.

so we need to have a way to win main phase.

I also think CounterTop is pretty useless here, really slows us down.

this is the list i'm testing (almost the same)

4 Underground Sea
4 Tropical Island
4 Flooded Strand
4 Polluted Delta
2 Island
1 Swamp

3 Dark Confidant
4 Skill Borrower
1 Kiki-Jiki Mirror Breaker

4 Brainstorm
4 Ponder
4 Lim-Dul's Vault
4 Worldly Tutor

4 Daze
4 FoW
3 Thoughtseize

now the core of the changes:
2 Vitalize
1 Altar of Dementia
3 Unearth

Vitalize and Altar are cards that allows us to win many more games, try to believe, they entirely give us the win 1 turn before.
Unearth is great to take back a Confidant or Skill Borrower, and anyway if useless can be Cycled.

[TheLion]

It's not actually in clean up, as no one can play abilities in clean up (and if they could you go back to end of turn). "At end of turn" means "At the beginning of the end of turn step." If you play Kiki-Jiki's ability (or any ability with "At end of turn" in it somewhere) after that time (still in end of turn step but after the beginning of it) the "At end of turn" doesn't happen until the next beginning of an end step (next turn).


Correctly. In cleanup step you can't play abilities. The game checks for all (delayed) triggered abilities which happen "At end of turn", and puts them onto the stack. After that, you may play activated abilities (Kiki), but newly created "At end of turn" abilities won't trigger until you next EOT.

It's same in the upkeep step actually. You cannot discard Squee in your upkeep step and get him directly back, since the game already let all "At the beginning of your upkeep."-triggers trigger.

[Poron]

I would also play Tarmogoyf as a second WC and as chump blocker since we're playing green

[Skeggi]

I would also play Tarmogoyf as a second WC and as chump blocker since we're playing green

Tarmogoyf seems to be an easy auto 4-of in any deck playing green, but i think in this case it's not; there is simply no room for Tarmogoyf in this deck: it fully concentrates on getting the combo out and protecting the combo until it's there. That's what the EPIC Painter shell does; adding Tarmogoyfs is very likely to be a mistake.

[Maveric78f]

In order to protect the borrower, top is the best since you can tap it to draw your card and borrower becomes a top, so that you can tap it also to get it on top (and draw your top). Obviously, it requires it to have haste once more.

Altar of demencia is awful compared to mogg fanatic, but at least it can be played and still be efficient, so why not...

Another trick is with that green guy that makes target creature untargettable if you sacrifice a land. It's a good protection that does not require haste.

[Adan]

It's not actually in clean up, as no one can play abilities in clean up (and if they could you go back to end of turn). "At end of turn" means "At the beginning of the end of turn step." If you play Kiki-Jiki's ability (or any ability with "At end of turn" in it somewhere) after that time (still in end of turn step but after the beginning of it) the "At end of turn" doesn't happen until the next beginning of an end step (next turn).

That's what I meant about being sloppy. Thank you for the exact explanation! :smile:

[Poron]

in my opinion, to protect the Borrower the best card is Unearth + Counters

Safekeeper has to be played, it can be target of anything and requires land to work (and we're playing 18-19), I don't really think it is going to be a house...

[Maveric78f]

Safekeeper has to be on topdeck. Not in play. I agree that safe keeper is a bit too "cute", but it's a nice protection for tarmos, confidants or dreadnoughts you might want to play aside borrowers (not all at the same time of course).

[Mayk0l]

So how does this deck really play?
Is the combo competitive? Does the deck have potential like EPIC Painter did? Do we see this going anywhere? Is the combo too fragile? Does it hold its own in a Tier 1 Meta?