[Deck] Dredge

[NQN]

@Rascal: Bloodghast beeing better than Ichorid is simply wrong.
1. No Haste
2. Doesn´t make bridgesex on his own
3. No Haste
4. Only good with a recurable land

I´m currently testing him but I´ll never cut Ichorid as he´s probably the sickest card in the deck. For now it looks like a 4/3 split of Icho/Ghast is fine, because I refuse to use such a bad land as Oboro just to make Bloodghast work.

[mercc]

I'm just gonna mumble from the top of my head, I may be horribly wrong or maybe I am on to something!

The beauty of this deck is the insane synergy between cards that play through the graveyard which nets you more cards than other "regular" decks that only draw cards in their draw step.

Why do we have to be so super-duper fast? At the cost of "g3: I mulliganed into oblivion"? As Parcher says, 11 lands is enough to give you 1 land in your starting hand.

1 land, 1 Pimp, 1 dredger, 1 drawspell. Perfect!
T1: Land, Pimp
Opponent: Wasteland

?!

Sure, you can pitch dredger and draw via draw step. But your plan to cast the draw spell and go bonanza just went to the bin.

Why not make the deck a little more reliable, aaah, reliable, thats a word I miss with this deck. Recently there have been decks that pack 15 lands and 2-3 life from the loam and playing bloodghast (i'm not saying he's good). But that deck can take wasteland hits and perhaps get better starting hands.

But the deck gets slower. But as i said, why have to be super-duper fast?
43 lands isn't fast, but it abuses the graveyard for cardadvantage and zoo and merfolk decks can't handle 2-5 land cards hitting play each turn. We abuse the yard in the same way.

Just.. something like that..

[Ozymandias]

Adding lands doesn't help the deck's speed or consistency, because you need to cut business to get the extra lands and Loams in, and they pretty much do nothing unless you're running the suboptimal Bloodghast. At this stage in the deck's development, there's pretty much nothing to cut for them. Also, getting the Loam engine active is by no means a fait accompli even on 15 lands. You have a 1/3 percent chance on opening up on the two lands you need to even cast a Loam, and god forbid your opponent should have a Waste to claim one. And then, assuming you get the two lands, dredger, discard outlet, possible draw spell hand you need to make a loam work by dredging into one, why would you even need it by that point? the 2-4 turns of dredging you've had by that point are more than enough to just, you know, win.

tldr version:
Game one is in the bag anyway, and you're falling into the "Danger of Cool Things" trap.

[mercc]

Not that I have any notes or testing behind this, and I wasn't promoting bloodghast.

But, once the dredgedeck gets going, it really gets going, it wins.

Why not try and get it consitently going instead of taking hazardous risks to get it going? I don't know how... but.... yeah you know! I'm thinking :)

[Dark Ritual]

If you're going for consistency, go talk in the LEDless ichorid thread. I hear they aim for consistency by not using LED and DA.

[Adan]

After I have seen Iona in action in some Reanimator-decks, I have been tickled a bit by it, is it possible to replace the 2 Hypnotists with 2 Ionas or play a 1/1 split? They both shut down the opponent's resources and I think she can fuck the crap out of Merfolks, Goblins, Mono Red Burn and especially Painter and Combo by herself.

And she is a hell of a beater unlike Hypnotist. But in exchange, she can't be pitched into Ichorids.

[jandax]

After I have seen Iona in action in some Reanimator-decks, I have been tickled a bit by it, is it possible to replace the 2 Hypnotists with 2 Ionas or play a 1/1 split? They both shut down the opponent's resources and I think she can fuck the crap out of Merfolks, Goblins, Mono Red Burn and especially Painter and Combo by herself.

And she is a hell of a beater unlike Hypnotist. But in exchange, she can't be pitched into Ichorids.

I run one Iona in the side, and even though you cant pitch it to things, a 7/7 flier is never irrelevant. And you're right, it does completely hose mono colored decks. Even with vials out you've won the game by DRing Iona. Definitely include one of her in the deck/sideboard.

[badjuju]

I run one Iona in the side, and even though you cant pitch it to things, a 7/7 flier is never irrelevant. And you're right, it does completely hose mono colored decks. Even with vials out you've won the game by DRing Iona. Definitely include one of her in the deck/sideboard.

She hoses mono colored decks but still gives multi-colored decks a hard time. If you name their removal color, they'll be hopping around on one leg trying to deal with a 7/7 while you have all the time in the world now to set up a lethal zombies. I've liked her a lot - a fatty actually worth MBing in dredge.

[Adan]

In theory a 1/1 split between Iona and Hypnotist also seems logical, Hypnotist can take the opponent's resources and Iona can back you up against topdecks (there are no real topdecks in Legcy, tho).

Or should ppl just play 2 Ionas maindeck instead of the Hypnotists? In that case I need to get a 2nd foil Iona...

[jandax]

Im moving towards a 1-1 split of Iona/Hypno. Either one is never errelevant, and is a game breaker. And as a split, you have a wee advantage of the opp not singling out a pair of hypnos or ionas when you dredge them. One shows up or the other, and you play from there. if both show up then lulz for someone.

And to the previous poster, there sure are topdecks in Legacy! It's just that a blind squirrel finds a nut every once in a while :cool:

[juzamjedi]

I am learning to play LED Ichorid for the first time. Is it reasonable to say the Unmasks + Firestorm from the first post are metagame slots that should be adjusted as needed? For example in a metagame that has a significant number of graveyard abusing opponents should those slots be switched out for Leyline of the Void main deck?

Also I have read through this thread and saw an interesting DR target that did not get discussed a lot: Furystoke Giant. In theory it seems decent as a sideboard 1x card to win through Propaganda, Elephant Grass, etc. Thoughts?

[THEchubbymuffin]

Furystoke Giant. In theory it seems decent as a sideboard 1x card to win through Propaganda, Elephant Grass, etc. Thoughts?

Woodfall Primus fills up the DR slot for problem artifacts and enchantments I believe.

[Dark Ritual]

Yeah woodfall primus seems to work just fine and better than furystoke giant...it can blow up almost everything that furystoke giant can except gaddock teeg which would not happen anyways because you couldn't cast DR then. And furystoke giant requires that you already have some creatures out without summoning sickness which seems unlikely so you'll have to take one extra turn to utilize it after you get a bunch of tokens but it's persist ability is nice for generating more tokens.

[badjuju]

In theory a 1/1 split between Iona and Hypnotist also seems logical, Hypnotist can take the opponent's resources and Iona can back you up against topdecks (there are no real topdecks in Legcy, tho).

Or should ppl just play 2 Ionas maindeck instead of the Hypnotists? In that case I need to get a 2nd foil Iona...

I usually play LED-less dredge, which does not opt for Hypno, but a 1/1 split sounds okay. 2x Iona is fine too because her main selling point is the zero-reliance on bridge strategy. Assuming the speed of LED versions, you can consistently power her out by turn 2 because you don't need to "combo off".

[NQN]

Since I didn´t really had the motivation to play real mtg all day long I decided to play ParcherDredge once more.
GP:Trial Hamburg 39 players, 6 rounds of swiss+top8

I played with 1 Iona instead of 1 Hypnotist in the MD and it was the sickness! It won me 4 games I wouldn´t have won with Hypno nor any other DR target!

R1: DDANT 0-2 Due to mulligan to 4 in g1 and bad dredges g2, probably shouldve discarded that DD :/

R2: LEDless Dredge 2-1

R3: Ugr Tempo with Noughts and Lavamancer 2-0 Unmask on FoW, Land,LED,Breakthrough. lol :D Didn´t find a dredger in the first six, but it obv was still enough to kill him some turns later. G2 I just slowdredged him to death, never had problems.

R4: Death and Taxes with Greensplash, 3 Gaddocks MD, 4 Tabernacles+Crypts SB 2-1
Lost g2 due to Gaddock and me not drawing a firestorm but 3! Breakthroughs. Won g3 against turn 1 Tabernacle+double Crypt+Gaddock. Hell I´m awesome.

R5: Merrows 2-0 ALmost lost g1 after Unmask taking Scratcher and him topdecking FoW for my Breakthrough but Iona > MonoColoured. G2 he opened with Relic+double Force backup for Tribe+P.Imp but as I already mentioned I´m awesome and just drew two more Pimps. I even used Grudge to nail a Vial because Relic was just too narrow.

R6 75 card Mirror and he´s a friend of mine, we ID
Top8:
Quarters: Sascha Thomsen with Intuition Lands 2-1
He´s probably the best land.dec player ever and I´m really afraid of 3 Tolaria West+Tabernacle/GLacial Chasm and Crypt out of the sideboard.
I mull down to 4 game one and still lead with Coliseum, Breakthrough. I dredge for some turns until I got no dredgers left but skillful as I am I topdeck a City and can activate Coliseum. Since he managed to hit 7 spells and zero relevant lands in 4 dredges with loam I can reanimate Iona on Green and seal the deal. phew :D
In g2 he starts with Crypt,Wasteland,Chalice@zero. I just kept a hand of DDD+BReakthrough because I knew he only had 1 Crypt. He has to use his crypt some turns later but I fail at finding a dredge card in 10 cards so BT just sits there and he finds the Tabernacle in time.
I Don´t remember much about g3 but he opened with land,exploration,Tabernacle >.<. I just beat him down with 1 Ichorid cause he didn´t have the Loam. Funny Sidenote: I Opened with Land,Therapy on Intuition and hit one despite the fact that he sided 3/4 out :D

5-1-1

Semi´s: BW Aggro, Extirpate in Side 2-0
G1: Just crushed him.
G2: Made 3 really big mistakes because I just wasn´t concentrated at all due to some good friends sitting around me. He did only had some guys and firestorm just nuked them all out.

6-1-1 12-5

Since we were >32 players the finals were split and we both got 3 Byes for Madrid. YaY !
The Deck was awesome as always, I´m seriously considering playing it at the GP. Allthough Hypnotist really sucks and Unmask is rarely good the whole 75 are just unstoppable.

Parcher, I´d like to thank you for the SB guide and the awesome decklist!
Allthough I made some changes to the guide and after the last three tournaments I don´t really need it anymore, it was a great help to get into the deck.

Some Notes on the deck:
-Land,P.Imp is always good game
-It´s not nearly as inconsistent as everybody tells, I´m 16-2-2 in the last 3 tournaments now
-We dont want Hypnotist, is there ANY good black reanimate target?
- Bloodghast makes the deck worse, even without LED


greetz,
NQN

[AcidFiend]

I don't think any of these are better than Iona/FKZ but...

Angel of Despair
Lacquatas' Champion
Broodmate Dragon
Ob Nixilis
Magister Sphinx
Malfegor

Zomg Magister Sphinx enables Bloodghasts :tongue:

[Eksem]

I placed 9 at a 36 man GPT tournament this weekend with a "classic"/old list, with FKZ/Sphinx of Lost Truths, no Bloodghast, no MD Unmask, yada yada.

R1: vs StifleNought of some ilk
First game he counters a discard outlet, but I have another so I can start racing him. He does get a Dreadnought out, but it only beats me one time before I smack him down.
Second game he is to busy using all his resources holding me back and never really play any spells that matter before I win.
1-0

R2: vs Goblins
First game he mulligans to 3 (!) and loses.
Second game I just race him and win.
2-0

R3: vs Zoo
In the first game he tries to race me, but I get there faster.
In the second game, he gets out a Lavamancer and starts messing with my bridges, combining that with a superfast clock and I loose the first duel of the day.
Third game I win on turn 2 with haste-zombies.
3-0

R4: vs Goblins
This was the first interesting round. Mainly because it went to time (!) and because I made this huuuuge playmistake.
The first game he blows up my bridges, my Narcs and my Ichorids while building his boardposition, and I loose.
In the second game i'm a little bit faster, even with Earwig Squads stealing bridges and DR-targets.
It's in the third game I make my huge mistake. I have sided in Firestorm, and have it in hand from the start. We trade some creatures, he removes bridges and we fight it out. Soon enough I have beaten him to the point where he is at 6 life, i'm at 12 and we have 2 creatures each on the board. In play I have a Gemstone Mine with counters left, and in hand I have 7 cards, one of which is Firestorm. It is the first time-round. The correct play at this moment is to win. For some reason, even though I have been building up to this position for the last three turns, I completly forget what I'm doing and instead of just winning, I attack in with my creatures UNPROFITABLY leaving me with an empty board and him with two creatures. Now I realise what I have done, and burn him for 4 and clearing his board, at least being able to finish him off the round after that with my Ichorid unless he topdecks something. And then he plays Ravenous Trap. Draw.
3-0-1

R5: Dragon Stompy
I have no experience of this matchup or the DS-deck at all. I thought it was a slow deck. Apparently not.
First game, a dragon smacks me for 36 round 2, or something like that.
Second game, I neuter his hand with Unmask, but fail to do anything for the four rounds it takes him to land another dragon and smack me down.
3-1-1

R6: Merfolk
Here I make my second mistake. The player i'm facing is a very good one and i'm not really confident about the Merfolk-matchup, but it doesn't seem that I can make it into top8 by intentional draw even though I have fantastic tie breakers, so I decide to play. Big mistake.
First game I keep a bit sketchy hand, and two counterspells later i'm out of discardoutlets and he bashes me down.
Second game I keep another sketchy hand, being somewhat on tilt, and I see no dredgers in 19 cards, and then I die.
3-2-1

After the last game i'm at 10 points, and in the standings I see that 11 points would have been enough to Top8 with the fantastic tie breakers I have. D'oh!

---

With those MU:s I really should have had better results, and i'm very disappointed at missing Top8. I am, however, not at all disappointed with the deck. It's fantastic to play, and it's great to be "that guy" with "that deck". I will probably play it again this weekend.

[ninja_attack]

Anyone try testing out Iona and E witness as the DR targets?

[mattbrownsound]

I think this deck may have a new DR target.

Terastodon 6gg
Creature - Elephant Rare
When Terastodon enters the battlefield, destroy up to three target noncreature permanents. For each permanent put into a graveyard this way, it's controller puts a 3/3 green Elephant creature token onto the battlefield. 9/9

The fact that he can destroy up to THREE noncreature permanents is huge. It ensures that we can attack freely by blowing up various enchantments that give us trouble. If nothing else, it can blow up lands and knock our opponent off a color. Additionally, he provides 18 power/toughness all by himself.

Edit: I am dumb and cannot read.

[Serbitar]

The way worded, he gives the 3/3s to the player, whose permanents you destroy, that is, your opponent...

[GoldenCid]

Anyone try testing out Iona and E witness as the DR targets?

I've tested EW. It's great. In G1 is strongly procombo and in G2 is a second chance to get dredged side. Its utility has been largely disscused here.
I don`t know how worked Sphinx of lost truths but for sure she has no the G2 advantage (compared to EW).

[slylie]

The way worded, he gives the 3/3s to the player, whose permanents you destroy, that is, your opponent...

you could always destroy your own lands and give yourself the 3/3's. :)

Edit: Woah woah woah... just re-read the card - "for each permanent put into a graveyard this way" interesting wording considering the interaction with leyline or void.

[kortero]

What DR targets do people play with the "Parcher's 75"? I've dropped one Hypnotist in favor of 1 Iona since many times when I've got Hypnotist to play I've already cast 1 or 2 Therapies and the "Mind Twisting" Hypnotist gives doesn't really feel that relevant at that point.

I'm pretty new with the deck so I haven't really tested yet any other targets than 2 Hypnotist and 1 Hypnotist & 1 Iona.

-kortero

[Parcher]

Running one Iona in place of a Hypnotist is probably a good idea right now in smaller metagames(6 rounds or less). For instance, in mine, I now run 1 FKZ instead of a Hypno due to the Reanimator and Lands/Loam decks everywhere. The Haste is just too important. If you are heavy on Combo/Control, stick with two Hypnos. If more Aggro/Tribal, Iona is better.

However, if in something larger like a SCG 5K, I would run something like:

4 Golgari, Grave Troll
4 Stinkweed Imp
3 Golgari Thug
4 Narcomeoba
4 Ichorid
4 Putrid Imp
1 Sadistic Hypnotist
4 Breakthrough
1 Iona
4 Cabal Therapy
4 Bridge from Below
3 Unmask
1 Deep Analysis
3 Dread Return
4 Lions Eye Diamond
4 Cephalid Coliseum
4 Gemstone Mine
4 City of Brass

sb
1 Wispmare
3 Tireless Tribe
3 Ancient Grudge
4 Leyline of the Void
4 Chain of Vapor

With 3 Tribes and Iona, you should be able to beat Burn/Zoo without Firestorm or Chosen. Iona is also a fair trade for Firestorm against Merfolk and Goblins obviously.

Too, too many GY decks around not to run Leyline now. And likewise, so many Leylines are around that you now want extra protection.

[GoldenCid]

Why FKZ has been displaced??

[kortero]

Thanks for the comments Parcher. I really like the proposed sideboard since I'm actually thinking of playing this (your) build in a BIG tournament, aka Madrid. I might keep 1 City of Brass on the side tho instead of the 1 Wispmare, and keep 2 DA's in main - I just feel like the MD is so good as it is, with 1 Iona and 1 Hypno as DR targets.

Or do you think that in a long tournament with many rounds, the "stabilitity" that 12 lands MD might give over 11 lands would be better than the cute little tricks that the 2nd DA might enable; if we forget the Wispmare vs City tradeoff from this particular question?

-kortero

[Parcher]

I can't predict how a tournament like Madrid is going to go, but I do know this. There will be a lot of really good players there, including Pros. Nothing scares Pros more than LED Ichorid since they may not get a chance to outplay their opponent.. They tend to pack Leyline against it, since for the slots, the risk vs. reward with Leyline is best in a deck that otherwise might have no shot a beating this deck.

In short, expect to see Leyline regularly in the later rounds, and do what you can to prepare accordingly. This means not cutting any answers, and maybe adding some. This is the only reason for the City's move to the main.

[kortero]

Okay, well said. I need to start looking at the sideboarding guide you've posted with the "new" sideboard in mind. As I said, I'll most likely play LED Ichorid in Madrid since the other deck I have sleeved is, as much as I love it, Dreadstill. And playing Dreadstill in the "current metagame" really feels like climbing uphill most of the time. :>

-kortero

[Maveric78f]

After discussing a bit in the LEDless thread, I came to the conclusion that the Sharuum combo fitted better the LED thread, since LED enables to continue the dredge (via DA or Cephalid Coliseum) when all the combo pieces are not gathered yet.

The Sharuum combo is: Dread Return Sharuum#1 that reanimate Sharuum#2. Legendary rules applies. Then Sharuum#2's triggered effect goes to the stack. Reanimate Sharuum#1 and repeat this process as much as you want. If you have 1 bridge in the yard it grants you as many zombies as you want. If you have Altar of Dementia in the yard, you can then proceed to mill your opponent. If you don't, then just wait 1 turn to win.

The Possessed Portal plan enables you to Stax the opponent (and prevent him from drawing) while you keep dredging and discarding at end of turn (or sacrifice if you prefer).

The list I propose is untested but I tried to keep the LED-Ichorid backbone and to fit in more DAs and more "combo" slots. I've mainly cut into the discard spells (Unmask and Putrid Imp) and cut at the most the non-blue mana requirements. Only Cabal Therapy remains as a non-blue mana requirement. Dakmor Salvage can hardly be considered as a mana source since it will only help from time to time to play DA or Breakthrough (even if I doubt it).


Dredgers: 11 (+2 Dakmor Savage)
4 Golgari Grave-Troll
4 Stinkweed Imp
3 Golgari Thug

Creature Food: 12
4 Narcomoeba
4 Ichorid
4 Bloodghast

Draw: 4 (+3 Deep Analysis +4 Cephalid Coliseum)
4 Breakthrough

GY stuff: 14
4 Cabal Therapy
4 Bridge from Below
3 Deep Analysis
3 Dread Return

Combo: 4
3 Sharuum the Hegemon
1 Altar of Dementia

Mana: 15
4 Lion's Eye Diamond
4 Cephalid Coliseum
4 Undiscovered Paradise
2 Dakmor Salvage
1 Lotus Petal

SB: 15
1 Possessed Portal
1 Iona, Shield of Emeria
1 Ancestor's Chosen
4 Unmask
4 Pithing Needle
4 Chain of Vapor

[pippo84]

I would never cut PImp. Better cutting Bloodghast.
Just my opinion.. Pimp is The discard enabler..

[Maveric78f]

I would never cut PImp. Better cutting Bloodghast.
Just my opinion.. Pimp is The discard enabler..

The problem is that with this list you don't have much ways of playing PImp. This is the reason why I cut it. Maybe this is the point that would make this list worst than the regular one. The discard enablers are Cabal, Breakthrough and LED. Once you have discarded a dredger then you can sacrifice coliseum.

[JonBarber]

Dredgers: 11 (+2 Dakmor Savage)
4 Golgari Grave-Troll
4 Stinkweed Imp
3 Golgari Thug

Creature Food: 12
4 Narcomoeba
4 Ichorid
4 Bloodghast

Draw: 4 (+3 Deep Analysis +4 Cephalid Coliseum)
4 Breakthrough

GY stuff: 14
4 Cabal Therapy
4 Bridge from Below
3 Deep Analysis
3 Dread Return

Combo: 4
3 Sharuum the Hegemon
1 Altar of Dementia

Mana: 15
4 Lion's Eye Diamond
4 Cephalid Coliseum
4 Undiscovered Paradise
2 Dakmor Salvage
1 Lotus Petal

SB: 15
1 Possessed Portal
1 Iona, Shield of Emeria
1 Ancestor's Chosen
4 Unmask
4 Pithing Needle
4 Chain of Vapor

I agree, cutting PImp is bad. Bloodghast is his own "mini combo" that requires a number of weak cards be put in the deck. Rather than try and shove two in, I'd say nix the Bloodghast stuff and focus on the original list. I might try and test something like this to see if its worth it:


Dredgers: 11
4 Golgari Grave-Troll
4 Stinkweed Imp
3 Golgari Thug

Creature Food: 12
4 Narcomoeba
4 Ichorid
4 Putrid Imp

Draw: 4
4 Breakthrough

GY stuff: 14
4 Cabal Therapy
4 Bridge from Below
3 Deep Analysis
3 Dread Return

Combo: 4
3 Sharuum the Hegemon
1 Altar of Dementia

Mana: 15
4 Lion's Eye Diamond
4 Cephalid Coliseum
4 City of Brass
3 Gemstone Mine

[Adan]

The Sharuum Engine is cool, but wastes far too many slots imho. The Vintage build can efford it because it's pretty stupid, it just needs Bazaar and then can Drede 3 times a turn consistently while Legacy Dredge may be able to blow out on Turn 1, but then just Dredges once per turn if you don't have another LED and DA to fuel things. It requires you to hit a fuckload of cards and DRing a GGT often has got the same result. I mean, yes, the fact that you just need to hit 1 single Bridge may compensate it a bit, but I'd really say that you should include the Sharrum Engine into a noLED Dredge.

At least in theory it sounds better since noLED Dredge has got a ton of 1mana discarders which can also be sacced for a early DR and you have 4 Study, 4 Coliseum and 4 Breakthrough to fuel your Dredges a bit more consistently. BUT as I said before, the Sharrum Engine consumes a lot of slots and it will be very difficult to include that into a solid noLED shell.

On a sidenote, Possessed Portal is pretty sick as a Sharuum target because the "Skip the Draw instead" is a replacement effect as is Dredge. If 2 replacement effects apply at the same time, you may choose 1 of them and do how it asks. So Possessed Portal doesn't really influence you in any way.

[GoldenCid]

I was checking out many list of ichorid combo and saw that hte majority runs tireless tribe in the side. In which matchups do you side in and instead of what??
On the other hand is unmask still really usefull right now??

[JonBarber]

I was checking out many list of ichorid combo and saw that hte majority runs tireless tribe in the side. In which matchups do you side in and instead of what??
On the other hand is unmask still really usefull right now??

Zoo among others. Unmask has great synergy with cabal therapy. Rav trap is sitll played, therefore I'm still going to run discard.

[ninja_attack]

Running one Iona in place of a Hypnotist is probably a good idea right now in smaller metagames(6 rounds or less). For instance, in mine, I now run 1 FKZ instead of a Hypno due to the Reanimator and Lands/Loam decks everywhere. The Haste is just too important. If you are heavy on Combo/Control, stick with two Hypnos. If more Aggro/Tribal, Iona is better.

However, if in something larger like a SCG 5K, I would run something like:

4 Golgari, Grave Troll
4 Stinkweed Imp
3 Golgari Thug
4 Narcomeoba
4 Ichorid
4 Putrid Imp
1 Sadistic Hypnotist
4 Breakthrough
1 Iona
4 Cabal Therapy
4 Bridge from Below
3 Unmask
1 Deep Analysis
3 Dread Return
4 Lions Eye Diamond
4 Cephalid Coliseum
4 Gemstone Mine
4 City of Brass

sb
1 Wispmare
3 Tireless Tribe
3 Ancient Grudge
4 Leyline of the Void
4 Chain of Vapor

With 3 Tribes and Iona, you should be able to beat Burn/Zoo without Firestorm or Chosen. Iona is also a fair trade for Firestorm against Merfolk and Goblins obviously.

Too, too many GY decks around not to run Leyline now. And likewise, so many Leylines are around that you now want extra protection.

So this is your new list as of now?

[GoldenCid]

Zoo among others. Unmask has great synergy with cabal therapy. Rav trap is sitll played, therefore I'm still going to run discard.

Zoo? Is it a so hard match up for sidiing spheciphical cards other than protection?

[Parcher]

So this is your new list as of now?

No. It's close, but this exact combination is untested. I wouldn't attest to everything working together as it should post-board like other versions I've posted. This is just in expectation of a meta with 12-14% Ichorid, and another 10% Loam and/or Reanimator decks. Along with all the expected hate to follow that meta.

[NQN]

As I´m going to play Ichorid at Madrid as well, I´m also afraid of LotV since it´s the best Hatecard against us. Nothing is worse than a Threshold deck packing 4 Leylines and dazing your Chains :/ I´m trying to figure whether I want to play with or without LED but for now, this list has been so damn consistent I can´t believe it myself^^ In fact, I don´t think I´d want Leylines as Mirrorhate in a 1500+ tournament because there are only a few people who realized how sick this deck really is.

EDIT: I´ve tested 1 Iona instead of 1 Hypno (since Hypno never did a great job apart from feeding Horrors) and it was great. I´m thinking about 2 Iona as well...

[ninja_attack]

In my DR target slots, I am using Iona and E Witness because of her utility in game 2 and the ability to go nuts in G1 it seems to be working really well as of now. Hopefully, I will be attending a small (15-20 person) legacy tourney this weekend and give some feedback on this configuration.

[Ozymandias]

I don't know that I would want to go below 2 Deep Analysis. Besides the broken stuff, it can actually get cast with lands in a more laborious struggle.

Right now I have 3 DR targets: Iona, Woodfall Primus, and FKZ. Iona has been really solid in that whenever I reanimated it I basically lock the opponent (I almost won through double leyline by having it Shown and Told in. Stupid Bogardan Hellkite). The same goes Woodfall Primus as well, because it is effectively Time Stretch or at the very least a great way to clear a path for a big swing through Propaganda, Moat, Ghostly Prison, or Glacial Chasm. I might slice the FKZ, though it is the quickest kill, because the stars for the kill align rarely, and if they have, you can probably just DR Grave-Troll and Therapy them a few times. It is really good at winning in tuns, though. All in all I think the last land will be more helpful.

[GoldenCid]

I think you could run 2 DA in a full combo version. Is this possible? What if we buid the deck just to go off as soon as possible? Cutting unmask in fovour of tireless tribe or careful study to almost wuarranty the victory in G1 and isde in the protection post board. Off course i'd include iona.

[Serbitar]

Unmask actually is as much a 'combo' enabling card as a protection spell. Unmasking yourself enables T1 Breakthrough, obv. If that doesn't feel 'combo' enough, I'd rather go back to Careful Study than run MD Tribe, just because of colour issues (you run 7 W sources, 11 U).

That said, I really wouldn't try to improve G1s. You should not have to worry about those. MD Tribe maybe would give you more room to board, I guess... But the only changes to the OP-List I would consider are +Land, -DA/Unmask, SB: -City, +Whispmare/Ray of Revelatiion

[GoldenCid]

Unmask actually is as much a 'combo' enabling card as a protection spell. Unmasking yourself enables T1 Breakthrough, obv. If that doesn't feel 'combo' enough, I'd rather go back to Careful Study than run MD Tribe, just because of colour issues (you run 7 W sources, 11 U).

That said, I really wouldn't try to improve G1s. You should not have to worry about those. MD Tribe maybe would give you more room to board, I guess... But the only changes to the OP-List I would consider are +Land, -DA/Unmask, SB: -City, +Whispmare/Ray of Revelatiion

Yeah i guess CS is better for that aim over tribe. However, i keep testing the "control" version. With good results. Despite that i think that i need actual suggestions:

Lands (11)

4 City of brass
3 Gemstone mine
1 undiscover paradise
3 Cephalid colisseum

Dredgers (11)

4 Golgari grave troll
4 Stinkweed imp
3 Golgari Thug

Other creatures (15)

4 Putrid imp
4 Ichorid
4 Narcomoeba
1 Eternal witnees
1 Iona shield of emeria
1 Flame kin zealot

Spells (23)

4 Bridge from below
4 Cabal therapy
4 Lion's eye diamond
1 Deep analysis
3 Unmask
3 Dread return
4 Breakthrough

Sideboard (15)

4 Greater gargadon
4 Firestorm
4 Chain of vapor
2 Tireless tribe
1 Ancestor's chosen

[Meister_Kai]

I am thinking about playing this deck this weekend at a local tourny, running Parcher's 75 but -1 Hypno +1 Iona. Since I've yet to test Iona against the field (and won't get the chance to until the tourny) I was wondering if anyone could post a list of what color to name against each relevant multicolor deck (zoo, bant etc).

Does the color change depending on when you DR' her? I'll be reading tournament reports and try to gain insight from there, but if anyone (including the people who wrote said reports of course) found better things to name after the fact please do tell.

[GoldenCid]

I am thinking about playing this deck this weekend at a local tourny, running Parcher's 75 but -1 Hypno +1 Iona. Since I've yet to test Iona against the field (and won't get the chance to until the tourny) I was wondering if anyone could post a list of what color to name against each relevant multicolor deck (zoo, bant etc).

Does the color change depending on when you DR' her? I'll be reading tournament reports and try to gain insight from there, but if anyone (including the people who wrote said reports of course) found better things to name after the fact please do tell.


Well...off course it's depending on the matchup. If you play agains burn it's irrelevant naming green. :P
If you ask me i think that iona in a win cond. So you should name a color to keep her in game. Besides monocolour decks i think that the most relevant colours are white, black and in the far thrird place blue (considering bouncers). The rest depends on your skills.

Suggestions for my list???

[ninja_attack]

What kind of matchups are you expecting Cid,because i know that since i added iona, most of the time thats all i need. Naming their removal color is awesome, and usually, when i get the point where i DR Iona, i have dredged a bunch and am ready to mount ichorid beats in the next turn with iona. My DR targets are Iona and E Witness..... Do you think FKZ in the main is necessary because sometimes it doesnt get there.... I can see how it can be good to just end the game there, but once you've dredged that much, it shouldnt matter anyways. On the SB, seems pretty good in the control meta, but do you need ancestors chosen if you are DR-ing Iona?

[NQN]

I´d NEVER cut Ancient Grudge! I know that it´s possible and I did it myself sometimes (g1 double relic was nasty, still won) but it still can be pretty hard to win through a Relic/Crypt without AG if they have any backup. Maybe your game against LotV is better now but srsly, how often do you face it?

On a second thought, why is your list "controlish" ? It´s pretty much Parchers MD, just a little worse because you added 1 more useless DR-Target :/

[ktkenshinx]

I have been testing this deck for a while now, and am only recently running into three consistently awful matchups. Whether this is a result of a subtle metagame shift or just bad luck, I do not know. But I am interested in discussing these matchups, strategies that Ichorid can use in these matchups, and cards that would be relevant.

1. Armageddon Stax
2. Enchantress
3. BG Survival/Eva Green

These matchups are, quite simply, nightmarish for the Dredge player. Each of the decks is essentially pre-sideboarded against the deck's fundamental strategy as a graveyard based aggro/combo deck. The decks hose BOTH the aggro and graveyard elements of Dredge, ensuring that we have an incredibly hard time in winning. The problematic cards are listed below:

Armageddon Stax
a. Trinisphere: completely shuts down all spell casting for a few turns. Drastically slows down Dredge even if you manage to get three lands.
b. Chalice of the Void: Set at 1, it neuters most of the deck. Tribe, PImp, Breakthrough, Study, Therapy, Chain, Needle, etc.
c. Ghostly Prison: Slows deck down to a crawl. Redundant Prisons can completely prevent all attacks.
d. Armageddon: Normally not a problem for Dredge, but when coupled with Prison and Trinisphere, essentially forces you to resign.
e. Wasteland: Once Crucible gets down, we can are forever locked out of mana.
f. Tormod's Crypt: If all of the above weren't bad enough, Crypt just makes it worse.
g. Magus of the Tabernacle: Not only do we have to pay more for spells and to attack. Now we need to pay for our creatures too.
h. Baneslayer/Exalted Angel: Impossible to outrace with Prisons in play. Completely turns around games that you were slowly winning (with PImp and Narcomoeba beatdown, for instance)

Enchantress
a. Elephant Grass: Like Ghostly Prison, except your Zombies, Ghasts, Ichorids, and Imps can't even attack at all. Absurdly undercosted spell.
b. Moat: If it hits in game 1, you probably autolose, unless Iona is lurking around. Even in games 2 and 3, can stall you for at least a few turns.
c. Solitary Confinement: Similar problem with Moat, except you can't even use Therapy to whittle away at their hand while waiting for enchantment removal.
d. Wheel of the Sun and Moon: No scarier than Crypt, Leyline, Relic, etc. Still needs to be immediately answered.
e. Sterling Grove: Ultra-problematic card. Getting one Wispmare/CoV is possible. Getting two is extremely unlikely. When Grove gets coupled with redundant Grass/Moat/Confinement/Wheel/etc. then you are essentially in scoop mode.

BG Survival/Eva Green
a. Faerie Macabre: Obnoxious, instant speed graveyard hate that can be recurred, tutored for, and can only be stopped with Unmask/Therapy.
b. Ravenous Trap: Easily dealt with using countermagic (Nix/FoW) or discard. When combined with redundant hatred, however, Trap becomes another instant speed "GG" bullet.
c. Withered Wretch: Not all builds use it, but when he hits play, rest assured that your opponent will just chill with mana untapped daring you to dump cards into the yard.
d. Relic/Crypt: Some builds run both. Even more hatred.
e. Leyline: Further, compounding hatred.

Now, I am not suggesting that these matchups are completely unwinnable. I am saying that they are abnormally difficult and unfavorable, in the grand scheme of the current metagame. These three decks have extremely redundant hatred beyond what most other decks use. It is common to see 3 Crypt/Relic and 2 Traps in a lot of sideboards. That's 5 cards worth of hatred. These decks run in excess of 12, in some cases. This virtually guarantees that your opponent draws answers in the opening turns of a game, irreparably stalling Dredge's game plan.

What are the answers to these cards and strategies? This is not a question that can just be answered with "Bounce and remove their threats" or "Just play more conservatively". For those that have tested this matchups, I believe it will go without saying that they are extremely difficult. It is not a question that can be answered with theorizing and hypotheticals. Are there any results that provide a solution, such as effective sideboards, critical cards, etc? Or are these necessarily "doomed" matchups?

-ktkenshinx

[badjuju]

I'm probably not the most qualified person to talk about this, but here are some observations from first-hand playtesting that I made about half a year or so ago. Also, Ichorid is one of the most streaky decks out there, and how much hate your opponent draws is a direct contributor to that factor as well. You slow roll your dredges, but unluckily hit three bridges in one dredge and he crypts the whole lot, etc etc. Be good at shuffling lol.

Of all the matchups you listed, I don't think Eva Green belongs. Game 1 should always be yours. Maelstrom Pulse might slow you down, but as a rule of thumb they have infinite dead cards against you. Game 2 totally depends on how heavy their anti-GY SB is. If you're running into an Eva Green deck that has ALL (or even more than two) of the cards you mentioned above, you probably will not win regardless.

Enchantress has always been a pretty terrible matchup, as almost every card they have is something you don't want to see. It is still possible game 1 to just flat out crush them before they even get a chance to develop. Game 2 rays come in and the same deal. It sucks that this deck is becoming more and more popular due to the SCG 5K @ LA, cause I honestly think it's one of our hardest matchups period.

I haven't played the Stax matchup much, but from my experience they have to aggressively mull for Ghostly Prison or Magus of the Tabernacle. I'm not really afraid of the other cards, since you can pretty much still DDD and not really give a crap about their Chalice/Sphere effects. They have a hard time finishing people off in a reasonable amount of time.

[johanessen]

Luckily those three are decks that doesn't see many participation in a given standard metagame. But yep, Armageddon Stacks and Enchantress are awful mu's (I don't see Eva Green like those two).

[badjuju]

Luckily those three are decks that doesn't see many participation in a given standard metagame. But yep, Armageddon Stacks and Enchantress are awful mu's (I don't see Eva Green like those two).

Really?
I see these decks all the time. Obviously not as popular as Zoo or Goblins or Merfolk, but the chances of running into one of these at any given tournament is very likely imo.

[Ozymandias]

So what do people think of the new Worldwake card Nature's Claim? I don't know whether it supplants or supplements Chain of Vapor, (I lean towards the latter), but it destroys most of the problem permanents for Ichorid for G. The only problem is that you can't cast it off of Cephalid Coliseum, though this is probably a corner case.

[GoldenCid]

What kind of matchups are you expecting Cid,because i know that since i added iona, most of the time thats all i need. Naming their removal color is awesome, and usually, when i get the point where i DR Iona, i have dredged a bunch and am ready to mount ichorid beats in the next turn with iona. My DR targets are Iona and E Witness..... Do you think FKZ in the main is necessary because sometimes it doesnt get there.... I can see how it can be good to just end the game there, but once you've dredged that much, it shouldnt matter anyways.

I expect any match up. I think that having iona or FKZ give the deck 2 solid win conditions. Maybe the weakness of iona is the lack of haste. In some matchs or circunstanses it's decisive. Of course surely you have good reasons for cutting FKZ but i'm comfortable with it in main deck. If i had to cut it it would be for another creature such as woodfall or the new elephant of WWK.



On the SB, seems pretty good in the control meta, but do you need ancestors chosen if you are DR-ing Iona?

That's right. Good reasaning. Go fast for iona could be a good alternative against burn where ancestor's is great.
Probably i'll cut it in favour of...primus? elephant?? Anything else??

[GreenHornet]

After looking at the WWK card list I couldn't help but notice the synergy with Admonition Angel and Undiscovered Paradise. Has anyone else considered running it over some of the other DR targets in a build with paradise?

[GoldenCid]

After looking at the WWK card list I couldn't help but notice the synergy with Admonition Angel and Undiscovered Paradise. Has anyone else considered running it over some of the other DR targets in a build with paradise?

Something like that came out with conflux and its child of alara. I destroys everything but lands. The conclussion was that this deck doesn't need massive destruction but specific. The angel could help with this aim but i don't like it's ability dependent on lands. Something like that occurs with bloodghast but it's another kind of creature. Angel needs to be reanimated which means that you have already dredged (not only discarded it) and have paradise on battlefield or a land in hand to make effect.

This land joins to the hate team:


http://i47.tinypic.com/o58fmf.jpg

And it's a fu**ing non discardable land.

[ktkenshinx]

Bojuka Bog is actually not as scary as it seems. Yes, it is non-discardable and essentially uncounterable, but it has to be played at sorcery speed. Yes, you can cheat it into play with Crop Rotation and similar cards, but those are themselves discardable threats. If you are worried about Bog, then you simply need to have a big Dredge turn to get a lot of Zombies and your DR targets, and then pass. Your yard might be gone, but you will still have a sizable force.
Even when coupled with Ravenous Trap and/or Crypt (or whatever else you want to put in the "insert graveyard hate here" slot), the Bog is not that terrifying. It is no worse than a Trap alone, or a Crypt alone, or whatever else. I see it being used only in Aggro Loam, Lands, and White Stax. White Stax you say? Absolutely. Recastable from the graveyard every turn, at least with a Stax in play and a Crucible to allow the play, Bog becomes yet another nail in the Armageddon Stax matchup.

-ktkenshinx-

[Eksem]

Agreed, I'm not more scared of this than Tormod's Crypt, Relic of Progenitus, Ravenous Trap, Leyline of the Void or Yixlid Jailer. In fact, to actually make me more worried about graveyard hate than I am today, they really would have to print nothing less than a strict upgrade to Leyline of the Void or Tormod's Crypt. This is just another, perhaps even suboptimal in the black deck, choice. You could build a 15 card sideboard against GY-strategies already (and no ones does, since there is no need to). This rather really feels like a pretty crappy set filler to finish off that rather awful cycle of spell lands.

---

And the Eva Green matchup? To me, that has always been goldfishing. Either they mulligan into oblivion trying to find their answer, or they don't get it and lose. I guess they can get it early and keep pressure up, but really, as much hate as they have access to, they have no way to dig for it, or for recovering from heavy mulligans. It really should be heavily in the Ichorid-players favour.

Also, while I don't like seeing Enchantress (to the point that I switched to AnT), it's still pretty winnable unless they get Solitary Confinement out. A large troll can walk through elephant grass, big flying DR-targets get past Moat; and all of these highly disruptive cards takes some setup on the Enchantress-players side to actually work.

I have no idea about Stax though, I have, however, gotten locked down by Trinisphere once. Ouch.

[jimirynk]

Bojuka Bog is actually not as scary as it seems. Yes, it is non-discardable and essentially uncounterable, but it has to be played at sorcery speed. Yes, you can cheat it into play with Crop Rotation and similar cards, but those are themselves discardable threats. If you are worried about Bog, then you simply need to have a big Dredge turn to get a lot of Zombies and your DR targets, and then pass. Your yard might be gone, but you will still have a sizable force.
Even when coupled with Ravenous Trap and/or Crypt (or whatever else you want to put in the "insert graveyard hate here" slot), the Bog is not that terrifying. It is no worse than a Trap alone, or a Crypt alone, or whatever else. I see it being used only in Aggro Loam, Lands, and White Stax. White Stax you say? Absolutely. Recastable from the graveyard every turn, at least with a Stax in play and a Crucible to allow the play, Bog becomes yet another nail in the Armageddon Stax matchup.

-ktkenshinx-

Untill they get Bog/living sunami lock on you. =P

[BackDr0p]

I <3 Prereleases.

http://gatherer.wizards.com/Handlers/Image.ashx?multiverseid=194003&type=card + http://gatherer.wizards.com/Handlers/Image.ashx?multiverseid=190407&type=card + http://gatherer.wizards.com/Handlers/Image.ashx?multiverseid=197786&type=card

It happened one game I swear.

[Adan]

That land is nothing to worry about, it might be a tool for Loambased decks as they can dredge into it or something, but to recurr it is a bit more difficult. Most of the time they have to deal with tokens and the discarders at the same time and that evens it out. It's like Tormod's Crypt in worse. And even Tormod's Crypt doesn't really hurt us.

[GoldenCid]

forgeting for a while this land...i was checking out some sides from the last events and i wondered: What happened with Gargadon??
I still use it in my side and, indeed, i side him in but to be honest not many times it came into play. Some experience?

[NQN]

Yes, he´s inferior to the other cards. Parchers 75 are perfect.

[GoldenCid]

Yes, he´s inferior to the other cards. Parchers 75 are perfect.


I had liked to read other explanation but it's ok. Could you help me to rebuild my side? Here's the actual:

4 Chain of vapor
4 Gargadon
4 Firestor
1 Woodfall primus
2 Tireless tribe

[Parcher]

Sideboards should always fluctuate with what you expect to face. Both in the popular decks, and in this case, what Hate you expect to see from these decks. List the top 4-5 decks you face in your meta regularly, and what GY hate they play, if any, and an accurate answer will be much easier to try and come up with.

[GoldenCid]

Sideboards should always fluctuate with what you expect to face. Both in the popular decks, and in this case, what Hate you expect to see from these decks. List the top 4-5 decks you face in your meta regularly, and what GY hate they play, if any, and an accurate answer will be much easier to try and come up with.

That's right. My meta is wide it includes:

Zoo
Goblins
Enchantress
Combo (storm based) + Belcher (minority)
Black control
Elves
Landstill

As the commonest.

I found this side probably usefull:

// Sideboard
SB: 1 [TSB] Gemstone Mine
SB: 4 [ON] Chain of Vapor (the most versatile card)
SB: 4 [WL] Firestorm (control)
SB: 3 [OD] Tireless Tribe (zoo)
SB: 1 [SHM] Woodfall Primus (enchantress, leyline, propaganda)
SB: 1 [OD] Sadistic Hypnotist (combo)
SB: 1 [10E] Ancestor's Chosen (circunstantial)

Suggestions are very welcomed.

[ninja_attack]

I would maybe cut the woodfall primus out for wispmare, cuz when brought in with chains, that provides a lot easier answer then woodfall, cuz if they have leyline in play, you arent going to be able to access your woodfall, and the same for propaganda, just chain or wispmare it away....Firestorm is also the HOUSE against goblins and to an extent zoo.. just if you didnt know.

[GoldenCid]

I would maybe cut the woodfall primus out for wispmare, cuz when brought in with chains, that provides a lot easier answer then woodfall, cuz if they have leyline in play, you arent going to be able to access your woodfall, and the same for propaganda, just chain or wispmare it away....Firestorm is also the HOUSE against goblins and to an extent zoo.. just if you didnt know.

You're right respect to firestorm. Considering tha "weakness" of primus we have to say that ray and grudge have the same problem. They act from graveyard. The utility is that if your opponent didn't play grave hate yet you can dredge and force him with AG / RoR / WP. That's why it's only 1 copy. Maybe Wispmare should be in at least 2 copies because you want to play it from hand mainly. The aim is the same but the strategy is different.

[kicks_422]

Considering tha "weakness" of primus we have to say that ray and grudge have the same problem. They act from graveyard.

Well, you can cast them from your hand.

[NQN]

Never go below 3 Grudges goddamnit! You can just win so easily through any artifact-based hate, why would you want to take away those easy wins? I´d go for -1 Hypno, -1 Tribe -1 Firestorm +3 AG.

nqn

Edit: Just realized that my last ~20 posts were like "play grudge!!". I don´t understand why so many people just ignore the best antihate to the most common hate...:eyebrow:

[Anusien]

A friend of mine points out that Realm Razer is terrible against 43land compared to Petrodon. They can easily just Barbarian Ring Realm Razer after the trigger resolves. If they have Mox Diamond or Exploration it's probably not hard for them to do. And by that logic, Primus is probably even better.

[Parcher]

Against Lands: If you have an early FKZ, then they can't set up. If you have Iona, and they don't have GY hate, then Ichorids will just race them. It's at worst a 50/50 matchup assuming you have access to both of these targets between main and SB, and you have answers to Leyliine.

If they play my build, then you're in a lot more trouble though.

[GoldenCid]

Well, you can cast them from your hand.

Yes...but you need to run more copies to warranty you get it in your hand.

@NQN: do you think that the best form to beat combo is going combo?? I mean, would you side something against ANT?
Is Iona such relevant in this match up??

Om the the hand...has anybody tested Sphix of the Lost truths OVER Witness??

[Ozymandias]

Hey, here's a discussion that doesn't revolve around 4 slots in the 75: How aggressively do people mulligan this deck? Personally, I look at 7 and 6 for land, discard outlet dredger, 5 for the same with more willingness to all-in it on a LED, Dredger, nothing hand. and 4 and 3 for a land. How about you guys?

[NQN]

I take mulligans as long as I´ve got anything to start with. I mull very aggressively because I know that the deck can compensate it. I´ve won somany games with 3 or 4 cards because Land+any outlet is usually enough g1.

@Goldencid: The matchup vs ANT isn´t that good but shits a lot with who is on the play/on the draw. I don´t think that we need anything more than what we already have MD so I only side the fourth Unmask. If we win the role, we are in a good shape. Otherwise, we have to hope that he keeps a slow hand or doesn´t get any Chant effects. And yes, Iona is usually GG because we apply enough pressure to prevent them from getting around it in time.

[GoldenCid]

And yes, Iona is usually GG because we apply enough pressure to prevent them from getting around it in time.

Do you mean in the ANT match?? In that case is hard to choose the appropiate colour, in think that black is the best choice to cut tendril, tutors, DR and so on. The problem is if they run a bouncer.

Any experience with the sphinx?

[badjuju]

Do you mean in the ANT match?? In that case is hard to choose the appropiate colour, in think that black is the best choice to cut tendril, tutors, DR and so on. The problem is if they run a bouncer.

Any experience with the sphinx?

Black is almost always the correct color to call, as it is ANT's path to victory. If you call blue, sure you may be insuring yourself against bounce, but then they'll just untap and drop 2 rituals -> nauseam.

[NQN]

Black is always the right colour as they don´t always need M.Tutor/BS etc.
My experience with Sphinx is that it´s not needed but probably better than Hypnotist. The only reason I still play Hypno is because he´s black and does something now and then.

[Adan]

Black is always the right colour as they don´t always need M.Tutor/BS etc.
My experience with Sphinx is that it´s not needed but probably better than Hypnotist. The only reason I still play Hypno is because he´s black and does something now and then.

Mind that some ANT builds don't play maindeck bounce (or just K.Grip), so a Iona set on Black is the best chance to steal a g1.
And in g2 she still can buy you a lot of time as the opponent will only have about 3 outs (Chain of Vapor and 2 Echo Truths average). Slaughter Pact and Deathmark don't work obv. ;-D

They will be forced to use Mysticals to tutor for utility. The carddisadvantage the Mystical generates will buy you time then.

And anyway, the stormdecks have 3 possibilities to fuck you over if you don't call black: LED+LED+Infernal, Rit+Rit+Ad Nauseam, Rit -> Doomsday (wins without a blue spell if they have SDT SDT. Or maybe you are unlucky and they have a Infernal Contract/Cruel Bargain instead of a Meditate, that would be hilarious).

[oRen]

I found this side probably usefull:

// Sideboard
SB: 1 [TSB] Gemstone Mine
SB: 4 [ON] Chain of Vapor (the most versatile card)
SB: 4 [WL] Firestorm (control)
SB: 3 [OD] Tireless Tribe (zoo)
SB: 1 [SHM] Woodfall Primus (enchantress, leyline, propaganda)
SB: 1 [OD] Sadistic Hypnotist (combo)
SB: 1 [10E] Ancestor's Chosen (circunstantial)

Suggestions are very welcomed.

you want to hardcast primus versus leyline or am i missing something ?


i played parchers 75 yesterday at a 50+ people event with 1 Tribe in the Main instead of 1 Thug and the following sb.

4 Chain of Vapor
3 Firestorm
3 Ancient Grudge
1 Tireless Tribe
1 Woodfall Primus
1 Ancestor's Chosen
1 Unmask
1 City of Brass

ending in 4-2. i won against loampox, no led dredge, goblins, ... . losing to belcher and bw suicide with grunts, leylines and so on ...

[NQN]

Going below 11 dredges is just wrong. You always want one in your opening hand, postboard usually two to fight the hate.

[Zappa]

Since we're talking about Iona a few posts back. Which one do you guys feel is the stronger dread return target, on games 2 and or 3, when it comes to the ANT match up? Iona or Ancestor's Chosen?

[Mayk0l]

I'd say Chosen. Tendrills for 40+ is too hard, even with Doomsday lists. That, and, Empty the Warrens isn't that great. I can imagine some Storm Combo lists still beating Iona through LEDs, Petals, Burning Wish into Empty the Warrens.
That said, Iona is better allround, Chosen tends to be mweh in non-aggro MUs.

[NQN]

Obvious it´s Iona since she´s always game and not dependent on the cards you have in your yard. Chosen CAN be gg but doesn´t locks the opponent down.

[Raptor]

I've been playing the LED list when I first started to play ichorid months ago, but I've been leaning toward the LED list recently because of the fast aggro, combo and lands starting to show their face

I've some questions for some people who played intensivly the list.
Don't playing unmask screw your hands often ? I've been running it in my LED-Less list and it seems often suboptimal because either I didn't have it in my opening hand or I had only one other black card that was so relevant that I couldn't pitch it.


Taking the most recent parcher's list I consider doing these changes :
4 Golgari, Grave Troll
4 Stinkweed Imp
3 Golgari Thug
4 Narcomeoba
4 Ichorid
4 Putrid Imp
1 Sadistic Hypnotist -> I'll probally change it for FKZ because if you're engine isn't fastrolling, Sadistic can often be bad. In a lot of match up, you are going to face lethal wether or not you discard their hand. Vs lands, FKZ will often be better. Although, it might save your ass agaisnt combo
4 Breakthrough
1 Iona
4 Cabal Therapy
4 Bridge from Below
3 Unmask ->I'll probally consider if I should keep it or not. Has any one tried the other way; 3xTireless tribe main and 3x unmask SB ?
1 Deep Analysis
3 Dread Return -> Probally going to put the number to two considering I've almost never wanted a Dread return and didn't get it when I needed it a LOT of games. Although, I'll playtest 2 and 3, and it pitches to unmask..
4 Lions Eye Diamond
4 Cephalid Coliseum
4 Gemstone Mine
4 City of Brass

sb
1 Wispmare, I'll probally gor for 3x and remove 4x Chain of vapor, considering that I know most of my metagame's hate. Nature's claim could also do the job. Maybe something like 3x Nature's Claim instead of 3 Wispmare.
3 Tireless Tribe or Unmask
3 Ancient Grudge
4 Leyline of the Void
-4 chain of vapor
+2 Firestorm / Careful Study
4 Chain of Vapor

[NQN]

Unmask is all the same time:a discard outlet as well as combo-protection and disruption. It rarely screws my hand and I love it to go "Unmask myself, Breakthrough" on turn 1. Hypno can screw combo the same way FKZ could do, but with less bridges.
A huge reason against the Tribes would be that we´ve only got 7-8 coloured sources which makes Unmask a more reliable t1 play.

[GoldenCid]

When i began to play this deck i didn't play unmask. Instead i played Careful study. I was good but i can't get information about my opponent's deck until a therapy. What i mean, you can find cheap self discard stuff but, get with that + disruption...it's very hard!!

[junkdiver]

Yes, he´s inferior to the other cards. Parchers 75 are perfect.


Never go below 3 Grudges goddamnit! You can just win so easily through any artifact-based hate, why would you want to take away those easy wins? I´d go for -1 Hypno, -1 Tribe -1 Firestorm +3 AG.

nqn

Edit: Just realized that my last ~20 posts were like "play grudge!!". I don´t understand why so many people just ignore the best antihate to the most common hate...:eyebrow:

Hey NQN, not trying to be a jerk I am just genuinely confused.You said parchers 75 are perfect, but then you are saying play grudge? If the list in the OP not current or am I missing something completely? Sorry if I am, I am not that source/legacy savvy yet ;) Just want to make sure I know what the current list is! Thanks! :)

[Mictlantecuhtli]

Hey NQN, not trying to be a jerk I am just genuinely confused.You said parchers 75 are perfect, but then you are saying play grudge? If the list in the OP not current or am I missing something completely? Sorry if I am, I am not that source/legacy savvy yet ;) Just want to make sure I know what the current list is! Thanks! :)

Parchers 75 looks more like this (http://www.deckcheck.net/deck.php?id=30402) rather than the list in the openning post, which is somewhat outdated.

[GoldenCid]

Parchers 75 looks more like this (http://www.deckcheck.net/deck.php?id=30402) rather than the list in the openning post, which is somewhat outdated.

i'm still trying to understand the efectiveness of SH. In that list is the ¿"finisher"?. It's alone, well i know iona could haven't existed yes, but FKZ has.

[NQN]

SH wins the game even with only 1 or 2 bridges, is black (ichorid) and is always gg when reanimated. But imho he sucks, I reanimated him one or two times in all the games I played...but since he´s black he stays until I find smth better.

[GoldenCid]

SH wins the game even with only 1 or 2 bridges, is black (ichorid) and is always gg when reanimated. But imho he sucks, I reanimated him one or two times in all the games I played...but since he´s black he stays until I find smth better.

That's my line of reasoning...it's black, sinergic with few bridges but feel that's not the best option. However reanimate it against combo is "la crem de la crem" i guess...

[GoldenCid]

Sorry for double posting. I went to a small local tournament with my led dredge and i get a poor 2-2. In a general way the deck worked but sometimes luck wasn't on my side. Off course my oponents did they thing but...

Here's the list and the brief report:

// Lands
4 [AN] City of Brass
3 [OD] Cephalid Coliseum
3 [TSB] Gemstone Mine
1 [VI] Undiscovered Paradise

// Creatures
4 [RAV] Stinkweed Imp
4 [TO] Ichorid
4 [TO] Putrid Imp
4 [RAV] Golgari Grave-Troll
4 [FUT] Narcomoeba
3 [RAV] Golgari Thug
1 [RAV] Flame-Kin Zealot
1 [FD] Eternal Witness
1 [ZEN] Iona, Shield of Emeria

// Spells
4 [FUT] Bridge from Below
4 [TO] Breakthrough
4 [JU] Cabal Therapy
3 [TSP] Dread Return
1 [TO] Deep Analysis
4 [MI] Lion's Eye Diamond
3 [MM] Unmask

// Sideboard
SB: 1 [TSB] Gemstone Mine
SB: 4 [ON] Chain of Vapor
SB: 3 [WL] Firestorm
SB: 2 [OD] Tireless Tribe
SB: 1 [SHM] Woodfall Primus
SB: 1 [OD] Sadistic Hypnotist
SB: 3 [TSP] Ancient Grudge

It's the typical list with a bit "experimental side".

R1: Zoo.

In g1 i smash him with a t2 combo. I side in 3 AG and TT + Mine. I don't rememder instead of what...i think unmask and 2 LED + 1 DA. He got relic and tormod with sylvan library and confidant...to much.
G3 was tight with a tribe on battlefield i stopped him some turns but nothing came to yard and he win for creature advantage. 0-0-1.

R2: Mono Black control.

No problem in g1. You'll see this is a pattern.
G2 side in CoV istead of BreakT and 2-3 LED + DA. i play therapy to extirparte...nothing. I don't remember well wt happenned then but he went confidant + top + jitte.
G3 What can i say?? Iona made it. 1-0-1.

R3: Reanimator.

I'm not get used to this deck and i didn't know what to expect. so i win the dice. Then PImp + LED that was all. The played Ritual + Entomb + Archon. I answer discarding iona but he didn't attack me and i 'll loose by autodeck.
G2 Sided out the LED pack in favour of CoV. Fortunately i got the combo for the win.
G3 luck was crappy again with me. He went slow and i was dredging well: i had a couple of ichorids, tokens but no dread return to finish him. 40 cards were in my yard and plays agian the fu/// archon with my 4 CoV in yard togher witness but no DR. Then he topdecks a leyline...ok. 1-0-2.


R4: Mono Black control.


G1 no problem.
G2 Iona made it after getting rid of powder keg.

2-0-2.

I don't know what to say. G2 is terrible for me. Specially when you know that it's probable that you won't to play against "netdecks". The hate options are wide.
What would you side in this match ups¿?

@Moderators: PLEASE ERASE THIS POST. THANKS AND SORRY.

[GoldenCid]

Sorry for double posting. I went to a small local tournament with my led dredge and i get a poor 2-2. In a general way the deck worked but sometimes luck wasn't on my side. Off course my oponents did they thing but...

Here's the list and the brief report:

// Lands
4 [AN] City of Brass
3 [OD] Cephalid Coliseum
3 [TSB] Gemstone Mine
1 [VI] Undiscovered Paradise

// Creatures
4 [RAV] Stinkweed Imp
4 [TO] Ichorid
4 [TO] Putrid Imp
4 [RAV] Golgari Grave-Troll
4 [FUT] Narcomoeba
3 [RAV] Golgari Thug
1 [RAV] Flame-Kin Zealot
1 [FD] Eternal Witness
1 [ZEN] Iona, Shield of Emeria

// Spells
4 [FUT] Bridge from Below
4 [TO] Breakthrough
4 [JU] Cabal Therapy
3 [TSP] Dread Return
1 [TO] Deep Analysis
4 [MI] Lion's Eye Diamond
3 [MM] Unmask

// Sideboard
SB: 1 [TSB] Gemstone Mine
SB: 4 [ON] Chain of Vapor
SB: 3 [WL] Firestorm
SB: 2 [OD] Tireless Tribe
SB: 1 [SHM] Woodfall Primus
SB: 1 [OD] Sadistic Hypnotist
SB: 3 [TSP] Ancient Grudge

It's the typical list with a bit "experimental side".

R1: Zoo.

In g1 i smash him with a t2 combo. I side in 3 AG and TT + Mine. I don't rememder instead of what...i think unmask and 2 LED + 1 DA. He got relic and tormod with sylvan library and confidant...to much.
G3 was tight with a tribe on battlefield i stopped him some turns but nothing came to yard and he win for creature advantage. 0-0-1.

R2: Mono Black control.

No problem in g1. You'll see this is a pattern.
G2 side in CoV istead of BreakT and 2-3 LED + DA. i play therapy to extirparte...nothing. I don't remember well wt happenned then but he went confidant + top + jitte.
G3 What can i say?? Iona made it. 1-0-1.

R3: Reanimator.

I'm not get used to this deck and i didn't know what to expect. so i win the dice. Then PImp + LED that was all. The played Ritual + Entomb + Archon. I answer discarding iona but he didn't attack me and i 'll loose by autodeck.
G2 Sided out the LED pack in favour of CoV. Fortunately i got the combo for the win.
G3 luck was crappy again with me. He went slow and i was dredging well: i had a couple of ichorids, tokens but no dread return to finish him. 40 cards were in my yard and plays agian the fu/// archon with my 4 CoV in yard togher witness but no DR. Then he topdecks a leyline...ok. 1-0-2.


R4: Mono Black control.


G1 no problem.
G2 Iona made it after getting rid of powder keg.

2-0-2.

I don't know what to say. G2 is terrible for me. Specially when you know that it's probable that you won't to play against "netdecks". The hate options are wide.
What would you side in these match ups¿?

[NecroYawgmoth]

@ Parcher

about your SB-suggestion... ...isn't Natures Claim better than the random Wispmare... or generally better than Wispmare?

imo Claim > Mare

what does the others think?

[Parcher]

Randomness of a single Wispmare aside......

Aggro Loam is perhaps the deck's easiest game one. However, Leyline, Mox, Chalice for one, is perhaps the most unbeatable opening. And they can do that to you. In fact, any Chalice deck can screw you, be it Claim or Chain. Wispmare gets through that.

With the huge upsurge in graveyard-based decks, even CounterTop decks are starting to run Leyline. Followed by Counterbalance, that again is a hard lock. Wispmare has at least a chance to get through.

Wispmare also can be Returned if you have him pre-Leyline, and can simply be Evoked for tokens. He can even fly over blockers, and poentially dodge anti-Black measures.

The fact that Claim is dual modal is rarely relevant, since you will want the Flashback ability of Grudge in some amount for any sideboard in almost any meta.

[junkdiver]

Theoretically if you were going to maindeck 4 Leylines, what 4 of parchers main 60 would you take out...?

PS Parcher thanks for the great primer, and answering all the questions through the thread and providing a great sideboard guide. It has made for some great reading, and hopefully for some fun games at the local tourneys in the coming months. Awesome stuff!

[NQN]

The Deck scrubbed out on me for the very first time on thursday, I went 0-2 drop after taking 11 mulligans and getting smashed by lots of hate. Not nice if everyone knows you´re the Ichoridguy. But I finally decided I want to play this at GP madrid and not the LEDLess list due to fact that we have a slightly better chance of beating ANT.
@Parcher: How important is that chosen for real? I like him very much but if I´m honest, he didn´t win that many matches at all...Maybe Primus could do a better job of fighting through a wide field? I think I´m gonna cut Firestorm as well, since I rarely even draw it, but why would you want it against Zoo?

[Parcher]

Theoretically if you were going to maindeck 4 Leylines, what 4 of parchers main 60 would you take out...?

PS Parcher thanks for the great primer, and answering all the questions through the thread and providing a great sideboard guide. It has made for some great reading, and hopefully for some fun games at the local tourneys in the coming months. Awesome stuff!

You're welcome.

This is the sideboard I recommend with the current trend toward grave-based decks:

1 Wispmare
3 Tireless Tribe
3 Ancient Grudge
4 Leyline of the Void
4 Chain of Vapor

@NQN: As you can see, I've cut Chosen. With the MD switch of 1 Iona for a Hypno, we have a more flexible answer that can stymie Aggro, as well as not being dead against Combo. Firestorm has beaten Zoo singlehandedly for me, and as such is the one reason I'd like to keep it; since Iona is not spectacular against Zoo. Iona however, is so good against Goblins and Merfolk, the other two main Firestorm targets, that I am comfortable with removing it to increase percentages against the mirror, ReAnimator, and decks packing Leyline.

[4zureSky]

I have a really nooby question.. does drawing one card trigger only one dredge card in the graveyard even if I have two?

[SlopeeJ]

you can replace one draw with one dredge. You dredge the dredge number on the card, for example Golgari Thug is dredge 4 so you put 4 cards in your graveyard for one draw.

[NQN]

Alright Parcher, that sounds just logical. But then I´ve got another one for you: Let´s say we side for g2 against Zoo. We do like:
-3 Unmask -1 DA -1 Hypnotist -1 LED +3 Tribe +3 Grudge. Now we´ve still got 3 LED left, would you side CoV to be on the "safe" side even if they have leyline or just keep the chance of "killing" t1 if they haven´t got the crypt? I´d say we keep some LEDs...
Against anything blue I guess we just keep Unmask in then? Apart from that, the sideboard plans pretty much stay the same I guess...

[Parcher]

I can't envision any Zoo deck running Leyline. And yes, I'd keep some LEDs against them. More for the ability to instantly combo off in conjunction with a Coliseum(they dn't run Wasteland), or a Breakthrough after they crack a Crypt, than on the 1st turn. I've had too many games where I dump half my deck and clear their hate in Game Three on turn one, only to have them top deck Crypt immediately. You rarely can afford to play around it, but landing a first turn Tribe or PImp against Zoo is usually better than going all-in post-board. Te deck just becomes too diluted after boarding to easily get the immediate win/lock.

[NQN]

How do we side against Enchantress? I´m not sure whether it´s better to just keep our MD as it is and opt for the fast kill or to try to get some answers with Chains/Wispmare. Imho it´s better to keep the MD and just hope because they have so many ways of getting us out of the game that it´s easier to therapy them and go for a t1-3 kill, isn´t it?

Parcher, are you sure that Wispmare is good enough to warrant a slot? I´d also like the fourth Unmask to fight ANT, but I haven´t enough time to test a 1-off-sbslot (means some weeks).

[Parcher]

In the NA Mid-Atlantic, GY based decks are at an all time high; and so is GY hate. That SB is based accordingly. I never have a problem with beating Combo, so my judgement might be off. And I do bring in Chain against Enchantress just because we are not fast enough if they can drop the turn one Sprawl, turn two Grass, and support it.

[NQN]

Alright, but what do we take out then? I like Unmask as well as LED, I´d probably take out 1 Ichorid 1 BfB 1 LED, but then it get´s difficult. Sorry for asking that much, but that is one of the matchups I haven´t tested and I want to be prepared for this weekend.
If I top8, you´ll get all the credit :tongue:

[Parcher]

Take out the one DA, the 12th land (a City, if you switched the City to the main for the 2nd DA like I suggested), since they have no LD, and you can both can't keep a no-lander post-board, and can cast Chain with anything; one LED, and one Bridge or Ichorid. You can't remove a DR even though you only need two, in case you have to pitch one to an early Unmask, and even though the tokens may speed a DR, you'll never be able to attack with them. So I'd probably go with Bridge as the fourth.

If they only have Grass/Confinement, and no Moat, I'd keep the LED though, since you can swing through Grass with a Troll+LED for the win. That and an early Chain have been how I usually get a quick win. Also, after Wheel (post-board, anyway),your first Therapy target should be Halo. Since not only can it shut off your other Therapies, it can nix an all-in with Troll or Iona if they have them in multiples.

[NQN]

DA speeds up our clock, but it sounds logical to keep as much DR-Enablers(Ichorid) as possible.
Allright, that´s all imho. I´m going to play your "new" 75 saturday with 3 Byes. Let´s see what happens :)
Thanks for everything!

[Nubiatem]

Thoughts on siding in leyline against zoo to counter the fact that they can kill off creatures pretty much on a whim?

[stacker]

Small local weekly tournament, 18 players, 5 rounds for a cut to top 4. Meta usually 30% BG rock, 20% folk, 20% zoo. Played pretty much Parcher's but with 1 iona and 1 hypnotist as DR targets and 3 studies instead of unmasks.

R1 Jeff playing BU CB-top fae
G1 (him 20 18 15, me 20 19 18): Therapy saw edict in his hand, 3rd turn Iona names black. He scoops never having played a creature or bitterblossom.
G2 (him 20 19 14 13 9 8 3 2, me 20): +2 grudge +3 firestorm +1 CoB. He has turn 1 crypt. I hardcast grudge it turn 2. He FoWs my first 2 attempts to therapy myself as I tried to get a dredger in the GY. I eventually do. Pretty sure he topped 50 times trying to find his 2 other crypts. He has no creatures on the board all game, and sets up CB+top the turn before my ichorids, narcs, and zombies finally get there.

1-0 (2-0)

R2 Sam playing ANT
G1 (him 20 14 13 2, me 20 17) - He's a friend but doesn't tell me what he's playing despite being apparently so quick with his match that he was able to watch me R1 and see I was playing dredge. I win the roll and elect to play because I smell combo. I get him down to 13 turn 3 with ichorids. At the end of that turn he decides for 5 minutes whether to crack his fetch and play a brainstorm, for which I give him a hard time and rightfully so. He plays petals, led, and a fetch. He plays ad naus with BBB floating at storm 6. He sees rituals, tutors, and a ponder at 3 life. He cracks his fetch and ponders, then scoops.
G2 (him 20 19, me 20) - +1 unmask +1 chosen. I unmask 1st turn, he brainstorms in response and I see petals and IGG and think oh nos. He has 2nd turn ad naus.
G3 (him 20, me 20) - I have therapy but elect to play imp 1st turn because have a dredger and the breakthrough, he has the 1st turn LED and inf tutor for ad naus, I don't feel as bad for not playing therapy.

1-1 (3-2)

R3 Randy playing pox
g1 (him 20 19 16, me 20 19 17 16) - Turn 2 he smallpoxes taking out his bloodghast and taking out my coliseum and 2 bridges. I have a couple zombies, a 17/17 troll, and ichorids in my GY by turn 4. His bloodghast chooses to stay in his GY where it belongs. I therapy him naming deed and goyf before realizing he took green out of his deck this week. Zombies get there.
g2 (him 20 19 18 17 16, me 20 19 18 17 16) - No SB because I know he only has GY hate in the form of 3 or so crypts and no leylines, but I forget about extirpates. He mulls to 4, has one land all game. I keep a hand of study, narc, land, coliseum, dredger, therapy, and sadistic. I therapy him turn 2 or 3 and see a hand of 2 abyssals, 2 nighthawks, 1 therapy. He extirpates my bridges some turn later but he really had no hope having never drawn a 2nd land. I ping him 5 turns with a hardcast narc before he scoops after my coliseum puts a bunch of goodies in my GY.

2-1 (5-2)

R4 Matt playing elfball
G1 (him 20, me 20) - I win the roll and have turn 2 Iona.
G2 (him 20, 18, 17, 15, 14, 7, me 20) - +2 grudge +3 firestorm +1 CoB. He mulls to 6. He has 5 elves on turn 2, then passes. On my turn I firestorm discarding 5, he's in disbelief. I later hardcast therapy successfully netting glimpse. By turn 6 or so I DR Iona and get 12 zombies.

3-1 (7-2)

R5 Jeff playing enchantress
G1 (him 20 19, me 20) - A friend who's playing Sam's deck, so I know the exact decklist which runs 1 halo 1 blood moon 1 sigil 1 moat maindeck. We're both 3-1, we have to play it out as I can draw into top 4 but he can't. He wins the roll and plays utopia sprawl, pass. I play land, LED, breakthrough, crack LED in response, put 20 cards in the GY but no narc, have to pass. He plays elephant grass. I dredge, unsuccessfully therapy him seeing moat, wild growth, elephant grass, lands. I DR Iona naming white knowing his only outs are o-rings, and therapy #2 and #3 him strips both green cards. He scoops.
G2 (him 20, me 20) - +1 ray of revelation. He bemoans how terrible Sam's deck's SB is and chooses to SB in 1 card which he shows me is ground seal, but I know sam also has a compost in there so I try to act nonchalantly. He mulls to 4, I show him a land of LED, study, land, coliseum, and dredgers. He scoops.

4-1 (9-2)

Sam was one of the best players in the tourney so I have no trouble knowing that my only two losses were to him. Top 4 was affinity, 43 lands w/scapeshift and treasure hunt, ANT, and me. It was midnight and we did not want to play till 2am (though our decks wouldn't take that long). We split and call it a night.

[Wargoos]

NQN is doing good at the GP right now.
He gathered 36 points so far!

[NQN]

Went 13-4 after loosing the last round for top16/maybe top8. Finished 26th, little report will follow after I´ve slept :=)

[NQN]

Here we go:
First of all I spent my Byes to get my luggage back which stayed in Amsterdam, then after ~6 hours we started Round 4

Day1
R4: Supreme Blue 2-0
R5: Uw Faeries Mulled to oblivion and didn´t cast 1 Spell g1, had the nuts hand after two mulligans g2 but he just layed down one of his three! Leylines+Force backup 0-2
R6: Merrows 2-0
R7: Rock e 2-0
R8: BantSurvival 1 3 Mulligans g2, 2 in g3 lost with Iona on green since he had 1 Trinket for the Crypt after topdecking a creature for the survival one turn before I could kill him 1-2
R9: UB Reanimator G1 he went for t2 Sphinx, g2&g3 neither of us managed to get a Leyline in play but I had the chain for Archon 2-1

7-2 9-5

Day2
R1: Uw Merrows Bad Player, nice hands 2-0
R2: MUC with Energy Field He Told me that he has no hate so I sided Chains, he went for Island, double Crypt. I had P.Imp so he obv had no chance 2-0
R3: Merrows g1 FTK, g2 He mulled to 3 FoW 1 Relic 1 Merfolk, I had therapy+Tribe.
R4: ANT Lucked pretty hard g2 after I mulled to 4 and still won via DDD :D 2-0
R5: BantProgenitus (Paulo..DaRosa) Surprised me with Wheel g2, I had the t2 kill with Unmask Backup, won g3 against Crypt+Relic 2-1
R6: Zoo 7 Mulligans+him having hatecards immediatly 1-2
R7: ANT Again, lucked my way through g2 and won g3 on the back of him keeping a slow hand 2-0
R8: CounterTop Kept 7 with LED+Land g1 because I wanted to go DDD against him, he just went Goyf,Goyf,Goyf and I dredged 1 Ichorid+lands in 18 cards. NExt dredge would´ve been 2 Narco 3 Bridge. G2 I emptied his hand, put my hand in the bin with Coliseum at the table. He drew BS, got the Crypt and beat me down after BT+Coliseum didnt find anything in 6 turns. 0-2

Day2
6-2 13-5

10-4 21-10 in total plus Byes.

To sum up, the deck was awesome again. The matches I lost were due to 7-8 Mulligans or just finding nothing. THerfor I lucked hard against the two ANT guys so I think it´s just fair enough. Every Opponent had 4+ Hatecards, two times Leylines, two times Trap. I did one FTK, some second rounders but most of the time I just went for the Ichorid route. LED was underperforming but was still alright. I played Parchers newest list with -1 Wispmare +1 Grudge.

Funny sidenote: I had aching muscles after the 16th round because I did most of the mulligans during the last 4 :D

Greetz,
NQN

[(nameless one)]

I just realized I have a playset of Bridges, Nacros, DReturns, PImps and Ghasts.

What is the current decklist for this deck?

Also, is there a build that doesnt utilize Ghasts? (I know I have them but Undiscovered Paradise is scarce in my area, and expensive online)

Any advises against hate? How good is this deck if you know know one runs grave hate? How do you get around Mogg Fanatics/Cursecatchers (I run both Goblin and Merfolks and this has always my tech against Dredge)

[Parcher]

Congrats Jan! I still would have run more Leyline removal, but that's a better result than I ever had with the deck in a tournament (outside of going 9-0 without dropping a game one time). So I can't argue with the results.

Always keep in mind, whether LED has an impact in the actual game, it does make your opponents play differently. Especially Combo. The fear they have of that extra speed the other versions can't obtain will often cause misplays and mulligans that you will never see from them otherwise. In addition to the brokeness it get when you actually use it, of course.

[junkdiver]

Great job NQN, glad to see you did well!

If you guys were using leyline in your sideboard, what matchups would you bring it in against? Obviously the mirror, but then what else?

[Adan]

Great job NQN, glad to see you did well!

If you guys were using leyline in your sideboard, what matchups would you bring it in against? Obviously the mirror, but then what else?

Reanimator and maybe Loam-engine decks.

[NQN]

Since Loam/x usually brings leyline as their hate, I prefer to just side chains and keep Unmasks in the main. Siding 8 cards really weakens the decks strategy.

[junkdiver]

Ok cool.

What about against maybe zoo? They have so many ways to kill bridges, and it would nerf their lavamancers, and potentially goyfs after they hate away your yard?

Just an idea, I hate playing against red because they keep me zombie free too easily games 2 and 3, but it is probably not worth the 4 spots.

Also what about crucible decks? Like against lands and stax even maybe. Stax would not be able to handle it's own smoke stack as well and the wasteland recursion gets shut down, but again I don't know if that enough to warrant four slots, just throwing around ideas.

[NQN]

You only want Leyline in matchups were it read "Win" because it weakens your opening hands. Against Ichorid f.e. you can keep Leyline+"not the best" because it´s worth it. You can´t do that against the decks you mentioned. Speaking of Zoo and R/x in generel: I don´t see them killing their creatures beeing a big problem for us. We can still beat them with Ichorids, DR huge Trolls/Iona or just empty their hand via therapys.
Remember that every creature they kill (lets say with L.Bolt) means -1 handcard, -1 attacker/blocker and -2 CA in total.
Staxx is already a horrible matchup, just side Chains and hope for the best/keep your MD and do the same on the play.

[junkdiver]

Cool, thanks NQN for the explanation that makes sense. Only part I didn't understand is what is "MD"? Sorry I am not 100% on the magic abbreviations yet :X

The stax matchup really does suck I have found in my limited experience with it. The only game I won was with mega Ichorids recurring dancing around the tabernacle magus.

It brings me to a question though, has anyone ever tried Nether Shadow in the deck? I see some of the vintage lists use him, and he dances around tabernacle effects with Ichorid. Also he is black unlike Nacro so he can be eaten by Ichorid, and often sees play more than once. Anyways just maybe as a Narco number 5 or 6 or something.:really:

Is there any way to tweak the deck to be better against stax? I feel like it's game over as soon as they land ghostly prison or humility. Not to mention their turn 1 drops are pretty strong against us. Is the best idea against them to just win faster?

[Parcher]

Troll beats Humility, and Troll+LED beats Prison. Prison is their only really relevant card, (for Geddon Stax, which is seems you are describing) so always aim for it with discard first.

[junkdiver]

That is definitely some good information about the troll against humility... I had no idea it worked that way... In general Humility interactions just confuse me.

Regarding Leyline one more time, would you guys bring it in against Thresh? My friend who plays Canadian says that he has won very few games where the opponent starts with a Leyline in place. Is it worth the spots in that matchup you think?

[Parcher]

To be blunt, any meta where Ichorid would board Leyline, is likely awful for Thrash. However, since they only can bring in Crypt as hate, I'd only bring Grudge. Yes, they can't win without a graveyard in most cases, but it's not worth the slot for such a favorable match.

[juzamjedi]

Did you all take a look at the result of the latest SCG $5K? I was quite surprised to see that Dredge is losing hard to Zoo. (http://www.starcitygames.com/magic/legacy/18925_Too_Much_Information_StarCityGamescom_Legacy_Open_Richmond.html) The results against Merfolk weren't very impressive either (i.e. the 2 most popular decks right now).

I realize this report isn't perfect since we don't know how many of the Dredge lists are LED Ichorid. That said: against a field full of Zoo and Merfolk what changes would you make? Should Tireless Tribe go maindeck now and put Unmask in the board? DR targets = Iona + FKZ?

[Parcher]

No.

I was there. The Ichorid players were both awful, and using LED-less. Merfolk is a joke, and Zoo isn't much more difficult.

[CephalidBreakfast]

What is the list you played at the GP, NQN? I went back a few pages and couldn't find it. Is this the same list you would continue to play? I'm planning on playing Ichorid at the SCG 5k this weekend, and don't have any experience with the LED version, but I thought I'd at least try my hand at goldfishing it a bit before dismissing it. Thanks.

[Wargoos]

According to his posts his list is exactly like parchers with the only difference being that he cut the wispmare in the sideboard for an ancient grudge.

Also what do you guys think awaits ichorid in the near future?
I am asking because people start to (over-)hype Reanimator which will result in more gy hate in peoples sideboards.
Is it still smart to play Ichorid or is it more a stubborn thing playing it?

I don't think that Ichorid will be affected all too much but I rather ask someone who really knows how to play this deck.

[Adan]

Also what do you guys think awaits ichorid in the near future?
I am asking because people start to (over-)hype Reanimator which will result in more gy hate in peoples sideboards.

Don't forget Loam-based decks. Yes. This is also what Parcher was worrying about in the last time, but somehow here in Germany, I don't feel any difference (at least I have not observed that the Meta has changed, there's still a lot of Zoo and a lot of Gayfolk).

It's pretty reversed here: Not Ichorid suffers splash damage from Reanimator-Hate, Reanimator suffers splash damage from Dredge-Hate!
And if you are a advanced Dredge-player, you won't have trouble to circumvent GY hate and win through multiple Crypt-effects. I only lost 2 games against GY hate in a total of 4 whole tournaments (one being Relic cycles into Relic and the other one was T0 double-Leyline which I'd also have won actually if he didn't StoP'd EVERY Ichorid I had and also had 3 Deeds total).

Reanimator - despite being a "normal" deck - has got a harder time to deal with stuff like Crypt and Relic. Good, they have Krosan Grips in their SB, but Reanimate costs them a huge amount of life and a Nacatl or soemthing similar can also be a pain in the ass (it's like Ad Nauseam, the less life you have, the more Reanimate sucks).


Is it still smart to play Ichorid or is it more a stubborn thing playing it?

It's a good deck per se which needs some practice, but if your metagame is full of GY hate, it's difficult. You should also keep an eye out for TempoThresh-players and how good they are. I've beaten Jaynel to oblivion with TempoThresh yesterday a few times, it can be a challenge.


I don't think that Ichorid will be affected all too much but I rather ask someone who really knows how to play this deck.

Well, no matter what hate you are facing, permadiscard is often the way to win against non-Jailer-hate (and no one plays such a narrow card as Jailer). Ancient Grudge is also excellent.

But what I am more afraid of are actually tempodecks like Canadian Thresh (or my black Tempo Thresh), Dreadstill and Merfolk with Stifle-Waste and maindeck Relics. Especially Dreadstill can set you onto a ridiculous clock. But if you play with LED, you can still blow them away pretty fast.

But against TempoThresh and Gayfolk, Tireless Tribe shines!

[NQN]

Yes, I played Parcher 75 with 1 more grudge.

@EaD: As long as people keep on playing Relic/Crypt and not Leyline(or a combination or hatecards) everything is fine. So far I´ve yet to loose against Artifacthate (not kidding) while Leyline is giving me headache whenever I see it. For me, I´ve played Ichorid too much in my area (top8ed every tournament because people weren´t prepared) and will change to ANT for some time.
But it´s still a very, VERY underrated and good deckchoice imho.

[Ozymandias]

I'd been doing fairly well in my meta with Ichorid, top 8ing four tournaments in a row at the store and t16ing the local SCG, but at the last tourney a month and a half ago, I got trounced, running into leylines in 2 matches, Dragon Stompy (albeit with bad mulligans on my part), GBW rock with 3 Extirpate+4 crypt, and Tempo Thresh, which I have personally found to be a tough matchup. I think that that is a pretty unfavorable field for Ichorid, and I am considering laying low with the deck and playing something else at the next tourney, especially now that Reanimator won Madrid. Is that meta actually unfavorbale, or do I just have the fear?

[stacker]

My meta is 50% rock, I'm not joking. I've topped 4 for the past 3 weeks, but lately everyone's putting in ravenous traps when they see me enter the store. I've still done ok and no one has leylines, but I'm thinking of switching to ANT too in the meantime and lying low.

[Parcher]

I literally have not run the deck in a tournament for over six months. First, it was due to it becoming more and more popular. Now, that it has been hated out by everyone imaginable to the point where it might be safe to play again, ReAnimator pops up to worry again. And people aren't going to switch hate just for that deck. They may eschew Trap, but everything else is still live. I'd probably wait to see what the meta moves towards to deal with the possible spike in ReAnimator showing before jumping back in. At anything large enough that you can't fully predict the meta, anyways.

[Meister_Kai]

Ok gents, some last minute questions about this deck before I (and I assume many others now, due to that damn Starcity article that went up an hour or so ago) play this deck at Indianapolis:

1. When returning Iona, what colors do you name against what decks? I assume the obvious "removal" colors but what do you do when playing against Zoo, who as we've seen in Madrid, can kill Archangel three fucking times with burn. What color do you name against Bant? Tendrils? etc.

2. How does the new SB go over with the old SB plans on page 17? I'm not asking to be spoon fed here (ok, maybe just a little) and most of it can be figured out easily, but what do you change now that you have stuff like Leyline and no Firestorm to board in/out?

3. How often does anyone actually DR Sadistic nowadays? When do you DR him and against whom? Is a turn 1 mind twist always better than turn 1 Iona (I guess yes?)

4. So the plan against Leyline is mull into bounce or Wispmare, but I assume if you are playing against the rouge thresh deck with SB'd Leylines you probably just roll over and die. How loose of a hand can you afford to keep just to be able to play the bounce?

5. I'm not sure about taking out Ancestor's Chosen. I think according to Parcher's SB that I will -1 Leyline +1 Chosen. I think he is just too much of a beating against both ANT and Zoo.

Lastly, I would just like to thank you Parcher, and others such as NQN and Adan for all the help you guys have given players like myself who wish to do well with this deck yet don't get many opportunities to do so. I will be registering this deck as "Parcher Dredge" on Sunday, wish me luck!

[Adan]

1. When returning Iona, what colors do you name against what decks? I assume the obvious "removal" colors but what do you do when playing against Zoo, who as we've seen in Madrid, can kill Archangel three fucking times with burn. What color do you name against Bant? Tendrils? etc.

Monocolored Decks: OBV!

Bant: I'd say white, it locsk down removal, War Monks, Rafiq in some cases and they if they play Survival, they can't legend-rule your Iona with Retainers into Iona. Then you just beat them down and spawn tokens with Ichorids. But needless to say that you usually barbecue bluebased decks per definition.

Tendrils: Black. They may have bounce, but they need to bounce her first before they can go off. And if you don't name black, they can still topdeck you out of nowhere. If you see Red, you should Therapy for Burning Wishes. But Iona on black also restrict Burning Wish's usefullness, so I'd always go for black.


2. How does the new SB go over with the old SB plans on page 17? I'm not asking to be spoon fed here (ok, maybe just a little) and most of it can be figured out easily, but what do you change now that you have stuff like Leyline and no Firestorm to board in/out?

You have more Tireless Tribe which are nice against Aggrodecks. The sideboard is still a kind of transformational: You switch to noLED Dredge postboard to dodge hate better, but reserve the ability to be fast via LED in matchups where that matters (Lands, Combo, Reanimator etc.).
Firestorm is not that necessary anymore as a lot of decks will have a hard time to kill a Tireless Tribe whose toughness goes infinite with just 2 cards. Zoo needs Path (some still don't play it), Merfolk needs Jitte (which you can and should Grudge if necessary) and Red Tempo Thresh can't actually do anything except EE'ing it maybe.


3. How often does anyone actually DR Sadistic nowadays? When do you DR him and against whom? Is a turn 1 mind twist always better than turn 1 Iona (I guess yes?)

If you can go off 1st Turn I always want Sadistic Hypnotist, but in the mid- and lategame, Iona is better. This split actually covers all moments.


4. So the plan against Leyline is mull into bounce or Wispmare, but I assume if you are playing against the rouge thresh deck with SB'd Leylines you probably just roll over and die. How loose of a hand can you afford to keep just to be able to play the bounce?

Uhm, you might die then, yes, but if they reveal you Leyline g2, you can still modify your deck to combat Leyline. But I would not be too worried about Treshdecks playing Leyline since mulligan into Leyline is strictly worse than playing Relics into which you can chain with your cantrips.

Cards you should be worried about when playing against Thresh are actually just Crypt, Relic and Ravenous Trap (which is still rather exotic and rarely seen).
But I think no one would dedicate more than 4 slots for the Ichorid matchup, so if you play against Line, the optimal hand would be Land, Discarder, Dredger, Leyline-Hate and 3 bla. Ooor if they mulligan down to 5 or something, you can also handle Leyline and DDD.
IMHO Leyline isn't as tragic as Jan is whining about :>. I usually lose to these lucksacks which always open 2 of them which is pretty stupid, but in Legacy you can do beatdown by hardcasting your little critters. It's more dramatic in Vintage.


5. I'm not sure about taking out Ancestor's Chosen. I think according to Parcher's SB that I will -1 Leyline +1 Chosen. I think he is just too much of a beating against both ANT and Zoo.

Iona basically has the same purpose against ANT and Zoo as Chosen, except that she's more obese than CHosen. Chosen is actually supposed to obsolete the opponent's resources by bringing your life total to a level where their resources are not enough. Iona cuts their resources directly, so the result is the same, except that Iona kills faster. And Tireless Tribes are still big against Aggro.

But Leyline is 0 or 4. Everything else irrational.


Lastly, I would just like to thank you Parcher, and others such as NQN and Adan for all the help you guys have given players like myself who wish to do well with this deck yet don't get many opportunities to do so. I will be registering this deck as "Parcher Dredge" on Sunday, wish me luck!

Credits actually go to Parcher, at least my knowledge about the deck is based on his contributions to the deck.

[Meister_Kai]

Credits actually go to Parcher, at least my knowledge about the deck is based on his contributions to the deck.

Every time you post something like this addressing all my questions it is a great help! Don't kid yourself, even though Parcher created its decklist, many people are involved with furthering the understanding of this deck!

Anyhow, thanks for answering all my questions! However, since I am a insatiable bastard, I have even more:

1. Hand goes like this: Gemstone, dredger, pimp, cabal therapy, 3 other cards. It's game one and I'm in the dark. If you honestly don't know what your opponent is playing, do you always blind therapy on force on the play? If you know you are playing against non blue game one, I'd assume you'd always play pimp first?

2. The mirror match. What's the SB plan? I can think of the obvious -4 LED, -1 DA, but do you bring in 9 cards for this matchup? Is Unmask the right card to SB out? If you know you are playing against the mirror game one on the play, and you have a choice of playing either pimp or therapy, which do you most often play? Do you hope to blind call a breakthrough if or when you therapy? I assume Sadistic is bad here, so the plan is to DR Iona if you have Leyline in play and call blue, but if you don't name black?

3. It appears to me that Dragon Stompy comes down to:

a. Winning the die roll
b. Resolving a discard outlet before they CoV (winning die roll)
c. DR Iona really quickly and before they explode with creatures (probably winning the die roll)

As DS loses to Reanimator without a resolved Arc Slogger for Archon, coupled with the fact that the deck frequently just craps out on people, I will assume that while the deck is a problem, its likely not one to be encountered. However, DS might be a good choice for Indianapolis.

Again, thanks for answering any or all of my questions.

[Ozymandias]

Do not forget that if they should turn 1 Moon you, and you are on the draw, then you can just go up to 8 cards and discard your dredger. Depending on how well you dredge, and if they drop a Trinisphere or not, you can actually expect to smack a Dread Return by turn 5 or so, and block almost everything with Narcomoeba/Zombies.

Your other 3 cards in that scenario are pretty important, but I would say that if you blind therapy for force, you risk giving your opponent not only access to basically a whole turn free of dredging, but also the ability to find an answer for your t2 Imp. I think you probably run the Imp out there, because the chances that a random opponent has force are roughly equal to 40% (there are mulligans into hands with force and unplayable 7-carders with force, etc to consider besides raw probability) times the percentage of FoW decks in the metagame.

In the mirror I would run Imp out there on the principle that if they have land, LED, breakthrough or some other hand that makes Breakthrough nuts on t1, you are going to lose anyway to time walking yourself if you therapy.If you miss then you've also time walked yourself I would board in Leylines if you have them, and Leyline removal, and then I would aggressively mulligan to Leyline. Unmask leaves if your're on the draw; on the play, you probably shave a thug, an Imp, and one other thing.

[Parcher]

1. Hand goes like this: Gemstone, dredger, pimp, cabal therapy, 3 other cards. It's game one and I'm in the dark. If you honestly don't know what your opponent is playing, do you always blind therapy on force on the play? If you know you are playing against non blue game one, I'd assume you'd always play pimp first?.

The three other cards are too important to discount. But, yes, you would lead with PImp if you know it's neither Combo, nor Control that you are playing against. You can always use Therapy as an outlet if they Force PImp.


2. The mirror match. What's the SB plan? I can think of the obvious -4 LED, -1 DA, but do you bring in 9 cards for this matchup? Is Unmask the right card to SB out? If you know you are playing against the mirror game one on the play, and you have a choice of playing either pimp or therapy, which do you most often play? Do you hope to blind call a breakthrough if or when you therapy? I assume Sadistic is bad here, so the plan is to DR Iona if you have Leyline in play and call blue, but if you don't name black?.

Never side out LED in the Mirror. You do side out Unmask, as well as 1 Ichorid, 1 Therapy, 1 DA, and 1 City for Chains and Leyline. Unless of course, you know they don't run Leyline. With this version, a hand with Dredger+LED+Breakthrough or Coliseum is almost as good as Leyline, so don't mulligan that type looking for one. You do Therapy if it is this same version, and you do name Breakthrough since it (and Coliseum) are the only un-raceable cards. Sadistic is actually very good, since he gives another permanent discard outlet that can be sac'ed to Ichorids, and he can also give you control of who wins the Bridge wars. And you are correct on the Iona calls.

[junkdiver]

How do you guys feel like the matchup is against Belcher? Any tips :\ ?

[juzamjedi]

Against Belcher your combo is racing theirs. With a blind Therapy I always name Charbelcher first because it's possible to race a resolved Empty the Warrens.

I played this deck at SGC Indy and didn't do well. For me FKZ was very good game 1 vs. Tabernacle (which I played twice) in most other matches it could have just been a grave troll. Apparently I am also one of those awful Ichorid players because I couldn't beat Merfolk or Zoo. Thinking back on my games I think my biggest error is I am trying to "combo out fast" with my dredging and exposing too many bridges. One of my merfolk opponents had Relic + Ravenous Trap; the Zoo player only had 1 crypt, but I couldn't reload fast enough and died to his Thoctar + Nacatls.

Could someone walk through a "normal" sequence of plays against these aggro deck since I am obviously misplaying?

[NQN]

I`m not 100% sure if thats what you mean, but it could be like:

They: Land,Creature,Crypt
You: Land, Tribe
They: Atk, block with tribe, discard dredger/Grudge if you have it
You: In the case of a dredger, dredge and lets say hit Bridge,Narco,THerapy+X. Therapy them, if they break crypt, win. if not, proceed until they crack it and win. Always try to create a situation where a topdeck crypt doesn´t safe them f.e. go for DR even if you only get 3 tokens and a 8/8 troll. Usually they won´t topdeck and you can proceed, but if they do you´re on the "safe" side.
Also note that if zoo has a quick keep but only goes for Nacatl t1 they´ll most likely slowrol a Crypt(Just faced Trap once, guess you just loose that). If thats not what you wanted, just call me back ;)

[junkdiver]

Thanks NQN for answers like that. I also struggle with the merfolk matchup.

Do you guys feel like DDD is a viable option against merfolk? When would you use this plan if ever?

Their clock can be fast sometimes, and back that with counters/hate it seems kinda rough. I believe you guys when you say it can be a good matchup, I just dunno how to make it that way...

[NQN]

I don´t like DDD against merfolk for two reasons: One is the mentioned potential to kill us turn ~5 backed up with daze. The other is that DDD easily looses to t1 relic which, in case you just kept 7 random cards, will most likely kill you.
The "key" basically is to draw 2-3 lands and 1-2 Pimp/Tribe. If you get one of those down it´s the same procedure as for zoo. Cursescratcher is no problem if you get some lands, but Jitte can get troublesome sometimes, so discarding it away can be good.
I usually side in 4 Grudges and Chosen for 1 Ichorid (they have zero removal) 4 Breakthrough.

Might be too obvious, but I´m not sure what your missing..:eyebrow:

[junkdiver]

I don´t like DDD against merfolk for two reasons: One is the mentioned potential to kill us turn ~5 backed up with daze. The other is that DDD easily looses to t1 relic which, in case you just kept 7 random cards, will most likely kill you.
The "key" basically is to draw 2-3 lands and 1-2 Pimp/Tribe. If you get one of those down it´s the same procedure as for zoo. Cursescratcher is no problem if you get some lands, but Jitte can get troublesome sometimes, so discarding it away can be good.
I usually side in 4 Grudges and Chosen for 1 Ichorid (they have zero removal) 4 Breakthrough.

Might be too obvious, but I´m not sure what your missing..:eyebrow:


Definitely helpful, thanks a lot, it is appreciated.

Still I think it is hard to draw 2 lands and a permanent discard outlet when we only run 12 lands and 7 discard outlets in games 2 and 3. I dunno what the probability of a hand like that is, but it seems low... ? How aggressively do you mull into a hand like that?

I could be missing something, I am not the best player and I am new to the deck so forgive me for being naive.

[NQN]

Oh, I just realized I posted my SB plan for the LEDless list >.<.
For the Parcher list you go for:
+4 Grudge +3 Tribe -4 LED -1 Hypnotist -1 DA -1 Unmask, chosen is still good if you have one

Ofcourse there are other ways to win, but with a permanent discardoutlet it´s like a "cakewalk"(as parcher said^^).
A perfect hand would look like: City,Cephalid, Unmask,Therapy, Tribe,Grudge,GGT on the draw getting a black spell off of the top.
But the core is: City,Tribe,GGT. If you get a 7 card-hand that only has city+tribe+GGT you could try DDD first and if they have the relic, cast your tribe hoping they have no daze. If they don´t have it, you can try to therapy fow/daze(I usually call Daze) your p.outlet through their counter and win from there on, even if they topdeck the Relic.
It´s definitely one of the harder matchups when it comes to how-to-play it, but if you win g1 you should be able to get 1 win out of 2 :)

[junkdiver]

Oh, I just realized I posted my SB plan for the LEDless list >.<.
For the Parcher list you go for:
+4 Grudge +3 Tribe -4 LED -1 Hypnotist -1 DA -1 Unmask, chosen is still good if you have one

Ofcourse there are other ways to win, but with a permanent discardoutlet it´s like a "cakewalk"(as parcher said^^).
A perfect hand would look like: City,Cephalid, Unmask,Therapy, Tribe,Grudge,GGT on the draw getting a black spell off of the top.
But the core is: City,Tribe,GGT. If you get a 7 card-hand that only has city+tribe+GGT you could try DDD first and if they have the relic, cast your tribe hoping they have no daze. If they don´t have it, you can try to therapy fow/daze(I usually call Daze) your p.outlet through their counter and win from there on, even if they topdeck the Relic.
It´s definitely one of the harder matchups when it comes to how-to-play it, but if you win g1 you should be able to get 1 win out of 2 :)

Makes sense! Thanks a lot.

I have a few tourneys coming up, and I am just waiting on a new set of LED's since my LED's are in use elsewhere, but I am looking forward to trying the deck out again with all the advice.

[stacker]

Search didn't find anything. For those playing woodfall primus, is terastodon the better replacement?

[SuperBean]

Yes, he certainly is a lot better.

[Anusien]

Terastodon kills more things with less support. The only situations Primus is better in are when you need to kill things sequentially, like beating Sterling Grove or killing Chasm twice or something.

[Wyrath the Great]

Pelakka Wurm 4ggg
Creature - Wurm Uncommon
Trample
When Pelakka Wurm enters the battlefield, you gain 7 life.
When Pelakka Wurm is put into a graveyard from the battlefield, draw a card.
7/7

Clicky. (http://puremtgo.com/sites/default/files/u411/wurm.png)

I'm trying to decide if I prefer this over Ancestor's Chosen (or perhaps as a complement?) in my Ichorid deck. Not only does this swing like a pro, the fact that that you can gain 7 life, beat for 7 and dredge when you sac it seems pretty nifty, but I guess the massive life swing from AC might just be better.

Opinions?

[NQN]

I take gaining 15-30 life over a bigger dude all day. When you reanimate chosen you should already be winning, no matter how big he actually is then. The Carddraw is also irrelevant as it´s only for one and you have to sac it.
all in all I think this shouldn´t even be considered, as it´s just too narrow.

[juzamjedi]

I`m not 100% sure if thats what you mean, but it could be like:

They: Land,Creature,Crypt
You: Land, Tribe
They: Atk, block with tribe, discard dredger/Grudge if you have it
You: In the case of a dredger, dredge and lets say hit Bridge,Narco,THerapy+X. Therapy them, if they break crypt, win. if not, proceed until they crack it and win. Always try to create a situation where a topdeck crypt doesn´t safe them f.e. go for DR even if you only get 3 tokens and a 8/8 troll. Usually they won´t topdeck and you can proceed, but if they do you´re on the "safe" side.
Also note that if zoo has a quick keep but only goes for Nacatl t1 they´ll most likely slowrol a Crypt(Just faced Trap once, guess you just loose that). If thats not what you wanted, just call me back ;)

From reading your response I think my error is that I am not going for the DR as aggressively as I should. A friend of mine will be coming over Wed. night for some play. Yes, this is the kind of answer I was hoping to read thank you.

[junkdiver]

Yo d00ds. As of today do you think this deck is still a valid deck choice? There is currently much debate about the topic, even on these forums, and I figured it would perhaps be beneficial to ask some experienced pilots their opinion on the matter.

In my meta there is probably a 10-15% dredge population, and everyone packs hate for it. I have heard numerous times, that the deck can beat hate, and numerous times that it folds to hate etc. I personally have trouble playing the deck due to the skill level required etc. I am not a dumb person (at least in my own opinion) so I think I am capable of learning and getting better with the deck, but I would not consider myself someone who could say one way or another if the deck is still a solid choice in the current state of legacy, and more so if the deck was still an acceptable choice when people are expecting it.

What do you guys think?

[NQN]

If not for the beauty of my nearly finished asian ANT I´d play Dredge at every tournament I compete in. Yes, it´s that sick.
If people start packing too much hate it will get troublesome especially if you´re not experienced, but as I said like xXx times now:
If there are no/only a few leylines/Jailers but lots of Crypt/Relic, it´s still not that hard.

[junkdiver]

If not for the beauty of my nearly finished asian ANT I´d play Dredge at every tournament I compete in. Yes, it´s that sick.
If people start packing too much hate it will get troublesome especially if you´re not experienced, but as I said like xXx times now:
If there are no/only a few leylines/Jailers but lots of Crypt/Relic, it´s still not that hard.

I understand about the asian pimpage ;)I love the asian cards, as I do feel the cards just look better...

Anyways, to the point at hand: thanks for the input. I think you probably have the most recent and relevant success with the deck so it is well noted. Do you think some of the lack of success is due to people not playing LED?

Thanks again NQN!

[unicoerner]

Hi,
i am right now experimenting with a lot of decks and played Non LED Dredge for a while. I now want to experiment with the additional power of LED.

Somehow i don`t see it`s power right now. Can someone plz explain all the tricks to me?
I know that i can float the mana, but to what usage besides Deep Analysis?

[Julian23]

Play Cephalid Coliseum turn 1, discard your hand with LED and Dredge with Deep Analysis while having perfect mana to activate Coliseum afterwards for even more Dredge!

[Lemuria]

Another example and very common is:

Play land, play LED, use mana to play breakthrough and sac LED in response. Discard your hand and start dredging all the way to victory.

[NQN]

In my opinion the lack of succes can only be explained with the disability of the people to play the deck properly. When I decided to play the deck I was like "If so many horrible players still get decent results (like not going 1-X) the deck has to have a BIG potential". Guess what, it has even more.
I´ve so far seen 1-2 decent players in rl but >30 horrible ones. I`m currently testing without LED but have to bring it to some tournaments before I can actually say something about the difference. So far, I don´t feel there´s a big one as both have their pros/cons.

As for the use of LED: I often use it to pay for Daze/Scratcher or even to bait FoW as a good player will usually try and counter every outlet you play g1 (as their only chance is to slow us down). But yeah, the most common and probably most powerful play is
Land,LED,Breakthrough->Sac LED in response->win. Never forget that you can just play LED and discard your hand which can be enough oftentimes game 1 (if your Opp doesnt get the nuts and kicks you out of top16...grrr:tongue:)

greetz

[Zappa]

For those of you that runs Sphinx of Lost Truths or Cephalid Sage over Eternal Witness, what is your opinion on one of the RoE cards to play around with? The creature Thought Gorger? It can act as a discard outlet and a card draw as well, being black means it gets fed to Ichorid as well. Thoughts?

[Dredgehammer]

With what mana were you going to cast Thought Gorger? And of what use would it be to DR into play if you have no cards in hand?
Either that was serious trolling or you are responding to a topic you don't full comprehend.

[Lemuria]

With what mana were you going to cast Thought Gorger? And of what use would it be to DR into play if you have no cards in hand?
Either that was serious trolling or you are responding to a topic you don't full comprehend.

He probably meant to reanimate him

IMO he is not better then sphinx who actually comes into play drawing you cards while Gorger is situational. You have to reanimate him and then sac him for another dredge or cabal therapy. Also, you may not have cards in your hand most of the time. Not worth the spot over sphynx I think..

[Cavius The Great]

This deck should run Entomb.

I mean, cmon, it's obvious.

[juzamjedi]

I haven't tried Entomb. What can Entomb replace in your opening hand and be good?

Dredgers: It can tutor for any dredger.
Draw: It can tutor for Deep Analysis - helpful if you have Lion's Eye Diamond or 2 mana sources. So it can sometimes get the card draw spell you want.
Discard: It cannot help with Putrid Imp or Tireless Tribes or Lion's Eye Diamonds or Cephalid Coliseums. You could get Cabal Therapy, but that is the worst discard outlet.
Mana: It could put Dakmor Salvage in the yard which is way too slow. Besides, if you could get Black to cast Entomb you really don't need a second source that will only get you black. So it isn't very useful here.
Combo pieces: generally there are plenty of Bridges, Dread Returns, and targets (Grave Troll counts!) that if you have already started chain-dredging you don't need Entomb to do this.

Entomb seems best at getting Grave-Troll in the GY and somewhat useful if you wanted DA. If the main purpose is putting a dredger in the grave yard I would probably just run more dredgers in those slots instead. What lines of play make Entomb better than additional dredgers?

[1maarten1]

Hey nQn! Would you mind posting the list you played at the GP? :)

I just tried to read through the thread to make it up myself, but it was too confusing :D!

Im usually playing Non-Led, but I got enough cards atm to trade a playset of LEDS :)! I'll just look what I like more.

Thanks, Maarten

[Valtrix]

Entomb seems to help board scenarios a little bit more by grabbing anything with Flashback, though that's not huge deal. I agree there are plenty of targets for dread return, but having any creature seems very useful. Second, entomb can function as a foil to reanimator if they go the exhume route. It's a little different from the just getting a dredger, because it's getting it straight in the graveyard for you and circumventing the discard outlets usually needed. It could potentially get you a free narcomeba or an ichorid in the grave to bring back in the upkeep. Just a couple other thoughts. No opinion on if it should be used or not.

[Ninjineer]

I am going to go out on a limb on this one and say: Entomb is bad for LED Ichorid. There are just too many better cards, and taking any of them out for this card is just going to hurt it's efficiency. You can quote me on that.

[Gibbie_X]

I agree, entomb is really bad for LED Ichorid, but it works wonders in the other version.

[Leonvii]

The only time I think Entomb would be really good is late game when you still haven't seen your Dread Return target. Bam, put Iona there. (hopefully win the game) Though I can see a T1 Entomb for Troll then T2 breakthrough for an attempt to win but T1 putrid imp/tribe is better because they will consistently put your highest dredger in the yard, and sometimes laugh at goyf in the process. Also I have to point out that getting a creature out early is important for an early dread return which is very needed sometimes.

[GoldenCid]

Glad of seeing this deck back in DTW, is it a real one??

On topic: I tested entomb and it simply didn't make it! :(

[marclark]

Tried this list out for the Seattle 5k:

Creatures:
4 Golgari Grave-Troll
4 Stinkweed Imp
3 Golgari Thug
4 Ichorid
4 Narcomoeba
4 Putrid Imp
1 Iona, Shield of Emeria
1 Angel of Despair

Spells
4 Bridge from Below
4 Lion's Eye Diamond
4 Breakthrough
2 Deep Analysis
2 Dread Return
4 Unmask
4 Cabal Therapy

Land
4 Gemstone Mine
4 Cephalid Coliseum
3 City of Brass

Sideboard:
4 Chain of Vapor
4 Leyline of the Void
2 Ancient Grudge
2 Tireless Tribe
1 City of Brass
1 Ancestor's Chosen
1 Nature's Claim

I wanted to play something else but dredge was all that I had completed so I sleeved them up and begged lady luck to give me a break. I decided to work 4 Unmask maindeck to give a little extra maindeck disruption pzazz, Which worked fairly well when I got it. Next I switched the 2nd DR target to Angel of Despair, which I figured would at least help a fraction of a percent vs lands or stax or enchantress etc. In addition it can be pitched to Unmask/removed for Ichorid and has evasion, which gives it a leg up over Terastodon or Woodfal Primus (although primus does have trample, flying is just better in most cases). Overall, I was happy with the switch. I thought the sideboard needed a lil tweeking as well, since reanimator and lands need some grave hate to disrupt them, and also because I correctly guessed that leyline would be seldom played, and the diversity of hate would be high. Obv. the Wispmare I originally had wouldn't be too great if I'm taking a wild guess as to whether or not the opponent has Leyline or not, so I just threw a Nature's Claim in to replace it, since that hits crypt/relic as well. Grudge were good as is because more often than not I would have extra cards to side out anyways, and most decks pack some number of arty's maindeck that the Grudges could wreck if I didn't need them for a Crypt or Relic. Honestly though, while they aren't good enough to replace Chain of Vapor, Nature's Claim was so good when I had it that I would suggest running it if there's any possible way to make the space.

Unfortunately for poor little me, Luck would not be on my side that night. I did fairly well in the first two matches, tying with Lands when I probably should have lost that one. Luckily I AoD'ed his Manabond early to slow him way down, and he could only glacial-lock for about 5 more turns before I got him. He wasn't happy with the tie, but I certainly saw it as better than losing lol. Second I played Countertop Foundry, and I won in 2, with very little resistance from him. In his defense he did mull to 5 the first game and to 6 the second. He crypted me once second game but I recovered fairly quickly and won with a 10/10 troll. I got done early so I had a chat to see how my friends were doing. All of us but John (t4 John) were sucking pretty badly or doing mediocre. I jokingly said "watch now I'm going to play Stax and Enchantress for the next two rounds." Round three starts and I laugh as I see T1 Tomb, Mox Diamond, Random Hate Arty (think it was Trinisphere). The guy was cool though and we just kind of joked around as I tried to play through everything that makes Ichorid miserable AKA Everything Stax Does. The good news is we had enough time after the match to get Chipotle =D. The next two rounds I play vs New Horizons, which is a very solid deck that I had 0 familiarity with. I remember having a dredge into 5 lands while staring down at a Terrivore lol. So I decided to drop and watch John at the top tables after round 5, having gone 2-3-1. I knew that Ichorid wouldn't be an extremely good choice in the meta, but, like I said earlier, its what I had and so I had to try with it. I really should have practiced more with it beforehand too because I did make a few mistakes I could have avoided if I had gotten more practice. Unfortunately work kept me busy nearly every legacy night since January, when I finally got my LED's =(. Oh well, I still love the deck and will play it in smaller events for a while.

[GoldenCid]

Good call on angel of dispair. It's a great black (ichorid fodder) creature. And i included it in my list.
At first glance, i would not run unmask main deck now. I prefer no addition disrruption other than cabal therapy. I know, unmask it's pro combo yes, but i want as much cards as possible in my hand!! I leave them for side (4x).
Another thing is that you dont run witness / sphinx what slows down terrible to capability of combing of!
Take a look to my list for discussion:

/ Lands
4 [AN] City of Brass
3 [OD] Cephalid Coliseum
4 [TSB] Gemstone Mine
1 [VI] Undiscovered Paradise

// Creatures
4 [RAV] Stinkweed Imp
4 [TO] Ichorid
4 [TO] Putrid Imp
4 [RAV] Golgari Grave-Troll
4 [FUT] Narcomoeba
3 [RAV] Golgari Thug
1 [RAV] Flame-Kin Zealot
1 [FD] Eternal Witness
1 [ZEN] Iona, Shield of Emeria
1 [OD] Tireless Tribe
1 [GP] Angel of Despair

// Spells
4 [FUT] Bridge from Below
4 [TO] Breakthrough
4 [JU] Cabal Therapy
3 [TSP] Dread Return
1 [TO] Deep Analysis
4 [MI] Lion's Eye Diamond

// Sideboard
SB: 4 [ON] Chain of Vapor
SB: 3 [WL] Firestorm
SB: 3 [TSP] Ancient Grudge
SB: 1 [10E] Ancestor's Chosen
SB: 4 [MM] Unmask

[Ozymandias]

I think less than 4 coliseums is a mistake, because it's an uncounterable draw spell that doubles as a mana source in a pinch, and it comboes insanely well with LED, especially on the draw. 4 maindeck DR targets seems like too many, and one more deep analysis is also nice. One maindeck Tribe should either be something else or supplemented with more out of the SB.

[GoldenCid]

I think less than 4 coliseums is a mistake, because it's an uncounterable draw spell that doubles as a mana source in a pinch, and it comboes insanely well with LED, especially on the draw. 4 maindeck DR targets seems like too many, and one more deep analysis is also nice. One maindeck Tribe should either be something else or supplemented with more out of the SB.

The manabase of the deck i mean MD and side is fully coloured. So blue is a spot. 4 Colisum cut lots of important spells, such as putrids, cabals, tribes and so on. But due to its strenght as a combo card i wouldn't run less than 3.
I don`t know, maybe 4 is too much, maybe no. It's circunstantial. 3 Of them are for the win, the other is a big girl that solves a potetial md hate/trouble.
+1 For an additional tribe post board!

[juzamjedi]

Here is a dread return target in M11 that might be good enough to make the deck. I know that I will be testing it because "Free Zombies" is what this deck is all about. Thoughts?

Grave Titan
4bb
Creature - Giant Mythic Rare
Deathtouch

Whenever Grave Titan enters the battlefield or attacks, put two 2/2 black Zombie creature tokens onto the battlefield.
Death in form and function.
Illus. Nils Hamm #97/249 6/6

[GoldenCid]

Looks good at frst glance, but i'm not sure about deathtouch...It puts zombies but removes bridges....i feel a bit confused right now.

[Nachthorn]

Hello,
I've been playing merfolk until recently but I think it's a bad metagame choice in the post-mystical tutor meta. Thus, I've been following this thread for awhile and have been putting Ichorid together. I want to ask- why isn't greater gargadon still in the board? in what matchups is it most powerful? thanks.

[alderon666]

A friend of mine suggested something that I thing deserves at least some testing.

Playing 4 Leyline of Anticipation either MD or SB, don't quite know.

http://image3.examiner.com/images/blog/replicate/EXID21272/images/leyline_of_anticipation.jpg

It looks a little underwhelming at first, but think about it. In the MD we don't have a single instant spell, just being able to cast all your stuff at instant speed is a fine advantage. But if you look deeper into it, you'll see that it allows you to play around several hate cards, given you have the right cards in the grave. Not Leyline of the Void, but that's another story.

Let's see what it can do for you:

Say the opponent starts with a Crypt/Relic and you have Leyline of Anticipation:
- You can start with a Imp/Tribe/Study and sit on it dredging with what you get. When the opponent tries to break the hate, you can go off in response with Breakthrough/Study/Coliseum. Then you can get enough tokens and a reanimation target into play before the hate removes your grave. Outside of Wrath and maybe Firespout (probably not) you win. But that shouldn't be that much of a problem either, beucase you can instant speed Therapy.

Say your opponent Bolts his own cat in response to a Therapy:
- You can either respond with a draw Spell, flipping more Moebas and then Dread Return getting a huge amount of Zombies or simply sacrifice your other non-token creatures getting a bunch of zombies with the Bridges that otherwise(no Leyline in play) would be gone for good before you could do anything else.

- It allows you to let your opponent gessing what is your play all the time, forcing him to let mana open and being careful with every spell he casts. You can just cast everything on his EOT!

I could go on listing the situations that the Leylines gives you an advantage, but I'll let you figure that out by yourself.

A you can see, the Leyline adds a hole new level of interaction between Ichorid and other decks. The real question are:

- Is this what the deck needs to rise to the top?
- Do the advantages warrant the inclusion of 4 dead cards in a somewhat tight deck?
- Does it help you fight hate enough to justify its inclusion?

Please discuss.

[juzamjedi]

Tonight I tested a lot of side boarded games with Leyline of Sanctity against Charbelcher. We played 20-25 games and the Leyline was in my opening hand 8 times. I mulligan'd a lot (which I do anyway). I won 7 out of 8 games where I played T0 LoS and maybe could have won the 8th one if I had Therapy'd myself to discard my Dredger instead of worrying about Burning Wish (it was the first game I played with Leyline; after losing I decided to just always race once LoS was in play).

1 of the 7 LoS games I won was a 4 card hand with LoS, Cephalid Coliseum, Putrid Imp and City of Brass. I even won a game where I *slow dredged* against Charbelcher with a 6 card Leyline opening hand. I was quite impressed. For the Charbelcher matchup in particular they can Burning Wish for Reverent Silence, but otherwise you're racing goblins and I won almost every time.

I am hoping Leyline of Sanctity plays just as well against creature decks with Crypt / Relic / Ravenous Trap. In my limited testing it was an absolute beating, try it!

[Dark Ritual]

Sanctity leyline doesn't work against relic since it doesn't target. It does work against crypt and trap however and can be a blowout however it has a problem if you don't have it in your opener, it is nigh uncastable in this deck and as such I prefer cabal therapy and ancient grudge as the cards against trap and relic/crypt. Grudge is hard to best in a deck that can dredge into it to force them to pop their relic/trap.

I've always thought of what it would be like if all the cards in ichorid were instant speed and as such the leyline of anticipation fits the bill perfectly since vedalken orrery is uncastable in this deck. Only problem with it is again the problem with the new white leyline. You need it in your opener or it is deader than a doornail however it would be sweet to make people pop crypt then breakthrough in response and combo out all in response to a crypt/relic/trap activation.

This deck might resurge in popularity now that reanimator is gone so people aren't hating out GYs so hardcore like.

[juzamjedi]

Leyline of Sanctity stops the tap ability of Relic. You might be thinking "so what" and you might be right; I haven't tested enough yet. However, I know I have kept DDD hands on the draw against Blue decks that didn't work out because they played turn 1 Relic. I keep 4x Cabal Therapy in the deck as well FWIW.

The castability / dead draw aspect of Leylines don't bother me. Maybe other Dredge players aren't doing this, but I play Leyline of the Void in my sideboard already because it's such a strong tool against Lands.dec, Dredge mirrors, and Reanimator. This is already a deck that doesn't mind mulling a lot for the right hand if the payoff is worth it. The same can be said for Leyline of Anticipation - if the flash effect is worth it then I'll be happy to play it in my sideboard. How has LoA played in your testing?

[Dark Ritual]

The problem with the leyline cycle has been, traditionally, not having them in your opener so you mull into them if you really need them and when you hit them in your hand of 5 cards or something what if the rest of the hand is absolutely terrible? Like no dredgers or odd cards to have in your hand like ichorid, dread return, narcomoeba, etc. or no discard outlets because if you don't get leyline in your opening 7 DDDing might be out the window because leylines reduce your hand size by 1, making it effectively 6 cards or less in your hand at the start of the game if you open with turn zero leyline of any type so DDDing might take a few turns to get active and when it does get active the opponent could be beating you down with a goyf or something with a fast clock. But you play your deck how you want to play it, I can't decide it for you.

[The Pharmacist]

Good call on angel of dispair. It's a great black (ichorid fodder) creature. And i included it in my list.
At first glance, i would not run unmask main deck now. I prefer no addition disrruption other than cabal therapy. I know, unmask it's pro combo yes, but i want as much cards as possible in my hand!! I leave them for side (4x).
Another thing is that you dont run witness / sphinx what slows down terrible to capability of combing of!
Take a look to my list for discussion:

/ Lands
4 [AN] City of Brass
3 [OD] Cephalid Coliseum
4 [TSB] Gemstone Mine
1 [VI] Undiscovered Paradise

// Creatures
4 [RAV] Stinkweed Imp
4 [TO] Ichorid
4 [TO] Putrid Imp
4 [RAV] Golgari Grave-Troll
4 [FUT] Narcomoeba
3 [RAV] Golgari Thug
1 [RAV] Flame-Kin Zealot
1 [FD] Eternal Witness
1 [ZEN] Iona, Shield of Emeria
1 [OD] Tireless Tribe
1 [GP] Angel of Despair

// Spells
4 [FUT] Bridge from Below
4 [TO] Breakthrough
4 [JU] Cabal Therapy
3 [TSP] Dread Return
1 [TO] Deep Analysis
4 [MI] Lion's Eye Diamond

// Sideboard
SB: 4 [ON] Chain of Vapor
SB: 3 [WL] Firestorm
SB: 3 [TSP] Ancient Grudge
SB: 1 [10E] Ancestor's Chosen
SB: 4 [MM] Unmask

Ok I'm new to Ichorid and the question I'm asking may be stupid, but I'll ask anyways. Looking at your md you don't play Careful Study. I run two of them and really like the card. You also only run one deep Analysis were I run two of them. I use to run just one but never really hit it that much so I made it a two of. To me if you hit deep anaylsis within the first few turns, It should be good game. Plus I really like Sphinx of the Truths md. How do you feel about him?

[GoldenCid]

Ok I'm new to Ichorid and the question I'm asking may be stupid, but I'll ask anyways. Looking at your md you don't play Careful Study. I run two of them and really like the card. You also only run one deep Analysis were I run two of them. I use to run just one but never really hit it that much so I made it a two of. To me if you hit deep anaylsis within the first few turns, It should be good game. Plus I really like Sphinx of the Truths md. How do you feel about him?

No stupids questions.
You can play 2 off of the mentioned card. I give up using them to make the deck a bit more protective if that are the words. I really like 1 DA and a permanent discard enable (tireless tribe) but you can play 2 CS and 2 DA if you wish.
In my testing Eternal witness > Sphinx.

Good luck!

[CabalTherapy]

This is my first post in this forum. I'm a Legacy player from Germany and often write in the main MTG forum there.
But the people there stopped discussing the LED Ichorid and just concentrate on the LEDless version, which I personaly don't like.
I'm playing now this list:

1 Flame-Kin Zealot
4 Golgari Grave-Troll
3 Golgari Thug
4 Ichorid
1 Tireless Tribe
1 Iona, Shield of Emeria
4 Narcomoeba
4 Putrid Imp
4 Stinkweed Imp
4 Breakthrough
4 Cabal Therapy
2 Careful Study
1 Deep Analysis
3 Dread Return
4 Bridge from Below
4 Lion's Eye Diamond
4 Cephalid Coliseum
4 City of Brass
4 Gemstone Mine

2 Tireless Tribe
4 Ancient Grudge
1 Chain of Vapor
4 Nature's Claim
1 Ray of Revelation
3 Unmask

[Seraph2k]

You are right - I think it is an error to play without our LEDs. This card make the difference, it makes us soooo fast. Ok other ichorids are more consistent, but what helps that if you are simply not fast enough....

[GoldenCid]

This is my first post in this forum. I'm a Legacy player from Germany and often write in the main MTG forum there.
But the people there stopped discussing the LED Ichorid and just concentrate on the LEDless version, which I personaly don't like.
I'm playing now this list:

1 Flame-Kin Zealot
4 Golgari Grave-Troll
3 Golgari Thug
4 Ichorid
1 Tireless Tribe
1 Iona, Shield of Emeria
4 Narcomoeba
4 Putrid Imp
4 Stinkweed Imp
4 Breakthrough
4 Cabal Therapy
2 Careful Study
1 Deep Analysis
3 Dread Return
4 Bridge from Below
4 Lion's Eye Diamond
4 Cephalid Coliseum
4 City of Brass
4 Gemstone Mine

2 Tireless Tribe
4 Ancient Grudge
1 Chain of Vapor
4 Nature's Claim
1 Ray of Revelation
3 Unmask


Nice list, indeed. What it's not clear to me is why replacing chain of vapor for nature's claim?

[CabalTherapy]

Nice list, indeed. What it's not clear to me is why replacing chain of vapor for nature's claim?

A good question. I know that 4 Chain of Vapor is maybe the most common card in the SB and I ran it.
But after testing the Caim I realize that it is also very powerful. The only problem is that you need green mana, but in certain situation it can be the matchwinner.
I've played a big tournament three weeks ago. Against SneakAttack.dec I played three Nature's Claim destroying two Ley Lines and one Sneak Attack. I finally scored a 5-3, which was ok to me.


You are right - I think it is an error to play without our LEDs. This card make the difference, it makes us soooo fast. Ok other ichorids are more consistent, but what helps that if you are simply not fast enough....

Exactly. Especially Merfolk is a poblem, if you are too slow. The 16 lords version is sometimes too fast and with their FoW and Daze a hard MU.

[Saff]

Hey guys. I am new to Ichorid and I have huge problems with creating SB. In my meta I have merfolks, painters, eva green, lands, reanimator, enchantress, goblins, zoo, ant and dredge.
I was thinking to make sth like that:
1x Ancestor's Chosen
1x Realm Razer/Terastodon/Woodfall Primus
4x Leyline of the Void
3x Firestorm
3x Pithing Needle
3x Chain of Vapor/Ancient Grudge/Nature's Claim
but I suppose I made wrong cards ;s
Could any1 help me? :(

[Adan]

Nice list, indeed. What it's not clear to me is why replacing chain of vapor for nature's claim?

Because it makes sense I guess. If the opponent drops a Leyline, I often end up draw-going for Chain of Vapor which gives the opponent time to draw himself out of his crappy hand or to develop a boardposition. I can then bounce Leyline, but then I am forced to do some serious brokeness before it gets replayed again.

On the other side, Chain of Vapor can be casted with Cephalid Coliseum which might be the elemental difference between Claim and Chain.

[CabalTherapy]

1x Ancestor's Chosen
1x Realm Razer/Terastodon/Woodfall Primus
4x Leyline of the Void
3x Firestorm
3x Pithing Needle
3x Chain of Vapor/Ancient Grudge/Nature's Claim
but I suppose I made wrong cards ;s
Could any1 help me? :(

In every meta I would play 3 or 4 Ancient Grudge.
If you are going for two DR-target-slots take the Chosen and Woodfall Primus.
I would also argue about the Needle. I played it a few times and I don't like it much.
If you don't know, if your opponent has Relic or Crypt, it is just gambling.
Sure, you can target other permanents like Wasteland or Top, but Ancient Grudge
is way better.

[juzamjedi]

Nice list, indeed. What it's not clear to me is why replacing chain of vapor for nature's claim?

In my experience with the deck there are only 2 permanents that I have encountered where I wished I had Chain of Vapor instead of Nature's Claim. Chain of Vapor deals with Yixlid Jailer (rarely played) and Blazing Archon (Reanimator target). For most of the other problem cards (especially Leyline of the Void) I would rather have Nature's Claim. Leyline is a lot more popular at least in my part of the US. For what it's worth I have removed CoV from my sideboard and rarely miss having it.

[sa17dk]

This is my first post in this forum. I'm a Legacy player from Germany and often write in the main MTG forum there.
But the people there stopped discussing the LED Ichorid and just concentrate on the LEDless version, which I personaly don't like.
I'm playing now this list:

1 Flame-Kin Zealot
4 Golgari Grave-Troll
3 Golgari Thug
4 Ichorid
1 Tireless Tribe
1 Iona, Shield of Emeria
4 Narcomoeba
4 Putrid Imp
4 Stinkweed Imp
4 Breakthrough
4 Cabal Therapy
2 Careful Study
1 Deep Analysis
3 Dread Return
4 Bridge from Below
4 Lion's Eye Diamond
4 Cephalid Coliseum
4 City of Brass
4 Gemstone Mine

2 Tireless Tribe
4 Ancient Grudge
1 Chain of Vapor
4 Nature's Claim
1 Ray of Revelation
3 Unmask

What is your SB plan against the various matchups? I find the hardest part about dredge to be the sideboarding.

[Kiljae8n]

What metagame changes or cards has cause Ichorid deck to no longer be a Deck to Beat or top tier deck?

[Pastorofmuppets]

What metagame changes or cards has cause Ichorid deck to no longer be a Deck to Beat or top tier deck?

probably the heavy shift to combo, and the fact that people are packing fair amounts of grave hate even in decks that have a tight G1 against this deck, because of stuff like lands and, formerly, Reanimator. Also, for semantics' sake, it was a DTW.
Has anyone tried Stormtide Leviathan as a DR target?

[SHABOOGS]

Most of the recent successful Ichorid builds are LEDless. I can only speculate but I think it may be due to the availability of LED or just preference of consistency over explosiveness. I myself have been using the LEDless build for three months until I got a hold of a playset of LED last week. But contrary to popular belief, based on what I've experienced when playtesting at least, the LED build is as consistent as the LEDless build.

[CabalTherapy]

What is your SB plan against the various matchups? I find the hardest part about dredge to be the sideboarding.
Can be pretty simple. I often board +4 Ancient Grudge and +2 Tribe in and throw the LEDs, Deep Analysis and the FKZ out, when I expect some crypts/relics. The reason for boarding is just the hate, when I can hit a Top or somewhat with my antihate, it is ok too.
I just look at their SBs. Against Combo.decs I have normaly in addition to Cabal Therapy the three Unmasks.



Has anyone tried Stormtide Leviathan as a DR target?
No, but it looks funny. I think Blazing Archon is better.

[sa17dk]

I played the LEDless version before playing the LED version and I agree that there isnt that much of a difference in consistency especially if you run 3 Tireless Tribes in the board for games 2 and 3.

The budget argument is a bit misleading. LEDs are only about $40 which is still cheaper than Tarmogoyfs and there is no lack of Tarmogoyf based decks. I'd say its mostly the fact that there exists a version that doesnt have LEDs that lets people rationalize not buying LEDs. I can guarantee you that if there were "Goyf-less builds" of Goyf decks people would also flock to those as well.

Consistency issues aside, I prefer the LED version because of the speed it offers us. I played the LEDless version at a tournament recently and I definitely felt some pressure trying to race other fast decks in the format. I'm not sure which version I'll settle on yet as I've been switching back and forth, but the one thing I always wanted in the LEDless build was the Unmasks. Obviously taking a card from their hand is crucial, but what I wanted most during games 2 and 3 was the information that Unmask would offer. Youre only going to have one Cabal Therapy in your hand and I'd rather get the information of what theyre holding AND take a card I want rather than trying to psychic snipe with Cabal Therapy. Playing without Unmasks felt like I was playing Belcher that dies to both counterspells and graveyard hate.

The next time I switch back to the LEDless version I'm definitely going to cut the Careful Studies and replace them with Unmasks. Careful Study is just terrible.

[GoldenCid]

The next time I switch back to the LEDless version I'm definitely going to cut the Careful Studies and replace them with Unmasks. Careful Study is just terrible.

Na, they aren't terrible it's just that, compared with unmask, they are subpar...

[juzamjedi]

I think Stormtide Leviathan would be awful; Merfolk could still attack you and your Zombies won't be able to attack. Besides the dread return targets don't matter too much except FKZ because it helps us race faster combo decks. Even though we sideboard FKZ out in a lot of matches he is invaluable in game 1 and games 2/3 against combo opponents. Personally I play Flame-kin Zealot + Sphinx of Lost Truths + Woodfall Primus, but even if you cut all 3 of them the deck would still largely play out the same.

[GoldenCid]

After a time...has anybody tested this guy?

http://www.uploadfilesystem.com/thumbs/10/09/14/tn_mli28892.jpg (http://www.uploadfilesystem.com//viewimage.php?file=/imagenes/10/09/14/mli28892.jpg)

[CabalTherapy]

He has got style but...
...a 6/6 without Evasion and a (almost) pure Casualability (Deathtouch) is simply to weak.
Bringing 2 2/2 Token is nice but for example Iona "locks the door". You need something like that and not a
average token machine.

[Kage]

I Agree. Iona, FKZ, and Eternal Witness are much better DR targets anyway, not to mention that vs aggro (against which Titan would be useful) reanimating a large GGT fills basically the same role.

[GoldenCid]

He has got style but...
...a 6/6 without Evasion and a (almost) pure Casualability (Deathtouch) is simply to weak.
Bringing 2 2/2 Token is nice but for example Iona "locks the door". You need something like that and not a
average token machine.


I Agree. Iona, FKZ, and Eternal Witness are much better DR targets anyway, not to mention that vs aggro (against which Titan would be useful) reanimating a large GGT fills basically the same role.

Anyone of you tested it?

6/6 + deatouch + 2 zombies > 10/10 Gravetroll.

[popiezhius]

Anyone of you tested it?

6/6 + deatouch + 2 zombies > 10/10 Gravetroll.

Iona, Chosen, Terastodon, Primus, FKZ, EW or Hypnotist will win You the game when they ETB in certain situations. Titan will not.
While titan may be slighly better, than GGT, but it uses an additional slot, while GGT doesn't.

[maxflow2]

Iona, Chosen, Terastodon, Primus, FKZ, EW or Hypnotist will win You the game when they ETB in certain situations. Titan will not.
While titan may be slighly better, than GGT, but it uses an additional slot, while GGT doesn't.

I agree with this, but has anyone tried Sun Titan as a DR target in a Bloodghast build? I've been using him in Classic Dredge on MODO where he's been pretty insane because he can return Bazaar, triggering Bloodghasts while also dredging, or LED (which is unrestricted). But I think he might also have a place in Legacy Dredge in a build with Bloodghasts and LED. If you have mana, returning Cephalid Coliseum to play seems good, and if you have Deep Analysis in the graveyard, returning LED like you might with Witness seems good. I was thinking he could maybe replace Sphinx or Witness.

[keys]

Well, Sphinx/Witness normally occupy the same spot. Witness has an edge over Sun Titan because it can get you Breakthrough or SB cards. Maybe if you added more Deep Analyses it could work out. It's an interesting suggestion.

[SHABOOGS]

I tried out the Ichorid+Bloodghast build for quite some time and I noticed that Sun Titan in the LEDless Build was very effective. When Sun Titan hit the battlefield, I produced more tokens by sacrificing Bloodghasts from the landfall triggered by the titan. And when the titan attacks, I get my ghasts back via landfall. But when I tried to squeeze Ghast in the LED build, I noticed that I was taking more mulligans than before, which made the deck very unstable.

[Mizeri]

Wow! DTB! Now people are going to bring back their sideboards and we are gonna be dtw again.. Almost time to talk about new sideboards! The alliances black pitch spell? Removes jailer and such. You know, all the new yard hate we're gonna see. I saw a while back that some people were dropping chain for grudge. Any reasoning or is it to just force an earlier crypt or relic?

[Seraph2k]

Never play without the chain in your SB. I have seen so many Ichoriddecks lose to jailers in the last few months....

[Dune Echo]

I agree with this, but has anyone tried Sun Titan as a DR target in a Bloodghast build? I've been using him in Classic Dredge on MODO where he's been pretty insane because he can return Bazaar, triggering Bloodghasts while also dredging, or LED (which is unrestricted). But I think he might also have a place in Legacy Dredge in a build with Bloodghasts and LED. If you have mana, returning Cephalid Coliseum to play seems good, and if you have Deep Analysis in the graveyard, returning LED like you might with Witness seems good. I was thinking he could maybe replace Sphinx or Witness.
I've tested Sun Titan (http://www.magiccards.info/ptc/en/45.html) briefly in a Bloodghast (http://www.magiccards.info/zen/en/83.html)/Ichorid (http://www.magiccards.info/tr/en/65.html) hybrid deck and while Sun Titan has two advantages (a big body and the ability to put a permanent directly into play from your graveyard), keys is correct that Eternal Witness (http://www.magiccards.info/5dn/en/86.html) edges out Sun Titan just because it hits your sorceries as well as permanents. The ETB ability of Sun Titan to circumvent countermagic also doesn't matter versus countermagic will just counter the Dread Return. Sun Titan's ability also doesn't help you when he swings right away since none of your spells are at instant speed. He is only an I-Win-More type card rather than a key component to surviving a tough matchup.

[GoldenCid]

Wow! DTB! Now people are going to bring back their sideboards and we are gonna be dtw again.. Almost time to talk about new sideboards! The alliances black pitch spell? Removes jailer and such. You know, all the new yard hate we're gonna see. I saw a while back that some people were dropping chain for grudge. Any reasoning or is it to just force an earlier crypt or relic?

I has hate in form of creature, instant, LAND, artifact an so on...and it's still a DTB...the best deck in the format??

[CabalTherapy]

I has hate in form of creature, instant, LAND, artifact an so on...and it's still a DTB...the best deck in the format??

I don't know why Ichorid is a DTB again and Ledless Dredge isn't. But if there would be a "I like" button, I would klick on it.
It may not be the best deck in this format (sure it isn't), but it is strong enough to win against every relevant deck.
(Except Lands)

[Mizeri]

I don't know why Ichorid is a DTB again and Ledless Dredge isn't. But if there would be a "I like" button, I would klick on it.
It may not be the best deck in this format (sure it isn't), but it is strong enough to win against every relevant deck.
(Except Lands)

Lands suck. I don't think ledless dredge can auto win turn 1 thru fow with a sack of luck. Parcher dredge can! It doesn't enough.. But i have! I just wish it was more consistent. Has anyone used street wraith effectivly?

[sa17dk]

As I said in the LED-less dredge thread, I'm pretty sure this Ichorid thread is for all versions of dredge. All the threshold decks are in one thread, and the differences in the threshold builds based on color are arguably more distinct than the 6 card changes between the two dredge builds.

There arent separate threads for Big Zoo and normal Zoo, or for monoblue Merfolk and U/x Merfolk so I dont know why we still have separate threads for dredge.

[Sintheros]

Because the LED and LEDless versions are different enough. These threads should be flip-flopped, methinks.

[sa17dk]

Because the LED and LEDless versions are different enough. These threads should be flip-flopped, methinks.

What's your criteria for a significant enough difference?

[(nameless one)]

Dredge is dredge. It is played with the same principles and die to the same hate

[sa17dk]

Dredge is dredge. It is played with the same principles and die to the same hate

Exactly. I've been trying to tell people to stop bickering about why this thread made it into the DTB and the other didn't. I've been trying to invite players from both threads to come here and talk about dredge, because this thread is for all dredge players and not just "LED dredge players."

[Bischof]

Hi i'm from Germany (so please be indulgent with my terrible english) and i also play the LED version. The discussion at the german Forums were stopped like Cabal Therapy already said. So i want to post my current Decklist in this forum because of the nice arguements and replies other users got here.

So, thats my list:

Creatures:
4x Golgari Grave Troll
4x Stinkweed Imp
4x Putrid Imp
4x Narcomoeba
4x Ichorid
3x Golgari Thug
2x Tireless Tribe
1x Flame Kin Zealot
1x Sphinx of lost Truth
27

Enchantments:
4x Bridge from below
4

Artifacts:
4x Lion's eye Diamond
4

Sorceries:
4x Cabal Therapy
4x Breakthrough
3x Dread Return
2x Deep Analysis
13

Lands:
4x City of Brass
4x Gemstone Mine
4x Cephalid Coliseum
12

Sideboard:
4x Ancient Grudge
4x Natures Claim
3x Unmask
1x Ancestor's Chosen
1x Terastoden
1x Ray of Revelation
1x Realm Razer
15

Normaly i play Iona but atm i'm testing Realm Razer against Lands.dec and Enchantress. I want to test Eternal Witness but i don't know what to cut.

[sa17dk]

If you want to test Eternal Witness you should cut the Sphinx for it. They both have similar functions in that they help to keep your ridiculous dredging going by returning LED or Breakthrough.

[Bischof]

And what do you think is much better? Witness or Sphinx?

[sa17dk]

I personally prefer Iona and FKZ, but if I had to run FKZ + Sphinx/Witness, I would run the Witness.

Anyways, so I've been trying to build a list that combines the best of both worlds as I've been constantly switching back and forth between LED and non-LED dredge. I like the explosiveness of the LED builds, but I also like the increased land count of the LED-less versions. The biggest problem I had with the LED build was that I would get hands with LED, Breakthrough, and a dredger, but no land to actually cast the Breakthrough. The other problem was getting hands without LED. When that happens I'm basically playing a shittier version of non-LED dredge cause the deck runs less lands, no Tribes, and dead DA's. As a result, when I dont have LED the rest of the hand/other hands tend to be less keepable.

Thus, I want a hybrid build that would incorporate the following in the MD (in addition to all the other normal dredge stuff of course):

2-3 Tireless Tribes
3-4 LED
2 Deep Analysis
14 Lands

The hard part is figuring out what to cut. I'm probably going to have to cut all the other cute maindeck DR targets (e.g. Iona). Many people have already advocated cutting cute maindeck Dread Return targets because theyre not needed. Results seem to agree: http://www.deckcheck.net/deck.php?id=37949. I'm not sure that FKZ is really even needed at all except in the combo matchup. I mean, imagine it's game one, and you manage to do the whole LED + Breakthrough + Deep Analysis bullshit on turn 1. Now you've basically dredged your entire deck and have a million zombie tokens. Realistically, what's going to stop you? Very few decks - with the exception of decks like Enchantress - can do anything about it.

This is the preliminary list I've been thinking of:

4 Golgari Grave Troll
4 Stinkweed Imp
4 Putrid Imp
4 Narcomoeba
4 Ichorid
3 Golgari Thug
3 Tireless Tribe

Enchantments:
4 Bridge from below

Artifacts:
4 Lion's eye Diamond

Sorceries:
4 Cabal Therapy
4 Breakthrough
2 Dread Return
2 Deep Analysis

Lands:
4 City of Brass
4 Gemstone Mine
4 Cephalid Coliseum
2 Tarnished Citadel

[CabalTherapy]

Thus, I want a hybrid build that would incorporate the following in the MD (in addition to all the other normal dredge stuff of course):


I'm runnig this SB:

4 Ancient Grudge
4 Nature's Claim
1 Chain of Vapor
1 Ray of Revelation
1 Terastodon
1 Ancestor's Chosen
2 Tireless Tribe
1 Undiscovered Paradise

When I board the LEDs out, I can board the 13th land in and hope for better
landdrops. The Citadel may be better here, but I'm running Paradise. (I'm owning it already and I want simply to test the 13th land.)
I think, that it can improve postboardgames by letting you hardcast a Grudge or Stinkweep Imp more consistence than with 12 lands.

[GoldenCid]

Because the LED and LEDless versions are different enough. These threads should be flip-flopped, methinks.

Exactly...it's diffucult to compare a LEDless list with a LED list. Due of that separated threads makes order.

[sa17dk]

I'm runnig this SB:

4 Ancient Grudge
4 Nature's Claim
1 Chain of Vapor
1 Ray of Revelation
1 Terastodon
1 Ancestor's Chosen
2 Tireless Tribe
1 Undiscovered Paradise

When I board the LEDs out, I can board the 13th land in and hope for better
landdrops. The Citadel may be better here, but I'm running Paradise. (I'm owning it already and I want simply to test the 13th land.)
I think, that it can improve postboardgames by letting you hardcast a Grudge or Stinkweep Imp more consistence than with 12 lands.

Given my MD list posted above, this is what I would run in my SB:

4 Ancient Grudge
4 Nature's Claim
1 Ray of Revelation
1 Wispmare
3 Firestorm
1 Ancestor's Chosen
1 Terastodon

Of course this is adapted to my meta. While I'd love to put a 15th land in the SB, I just dont have room. If a slot opens up it's immediately going to Firestorm because Firestorm has been godly.

[TheSleeper]

Has anyone seriously tested Yosei as a DR target? I'm not claiming this to be an original idea, I just think it warrants bringing up again.

I wasn't a believer, until testing and loving him. Definitely prefer him over Iona. Either of them should win you the game early on so that's a wash. Later (say turn 4-5) an Iona won't do much if you're already behind. A Yosei however can help you immensely. He basically reads: Time-Walk your opponent. All your creatures are unblockable next turn.' Sign me up for that!

Yes you need a sac outlet to get his effect straight away, however you almost always have a therapy or another DR. Worst case scenario you have a 5/5 flyer. You can also sacrifice him multiple times and the ability will stack - potentially useful.

"But they still get an extra turn! FKZ kills instantly!!" etc.

Yes they get 'a turn'. Sure they could drop a land.... and then what? A Kird Ape isn't going to save them. And if they have a bunch of blockers (Goblins, Zoo often do), an FKZ probably wouldn't have got there anyways as they have enough to chump. With Yosei this is not an issue.

I still think FKZ deserves a place, I just think Yosei is a great tool to have as well. Combined with tokens he's often the only DR-target I need. Just thought I'd put it out there.

[LordEvilTeaCup]

Exactly...it's diffucult to compare a LEDless list with a LED list. Due of that separated threads makes order.

But isn't the LEDless list that is performing the best between the two? Does anyone have the numbers behind this?

[keys]

What's the correct way to play Ancient Grudge? I'm just curious how effective it is at stopping artifacts like Tormod's Crypt and Relic of Progenitus. Is the hope that you flip a Grudge into the yard early to force the opponent to activate them prematurely? It doesn't seem to do anything to prevent a player from topdecking and immediately activating hate cards.

If the need is for a proactive answer to graveyard hate, something like Unmask or Thoughtseize (provided you support it with enough lands) seems better to me. As a reactive answer to Crypt/Relic, Stifle counters both effects and can be played off of any land, although it conflicts with Breakthrough @ x=0. Force of Will is also playable if you bring in 4 Chain of Vapor with it.

[RaNDoMxGeSTuReS]

What's the correct way to play Ancient Grudge? I'm just curious how effective it is at stopping artifacts like Tormod's Crypt and Relic of Progenitus. Is the hope that you flip a Grudge into the yard early to force the opponent to activate them prematurely? It doesn't seem to do anything to prevent a player from topdecking and immediately activating hate cards.

If the need is for a proactive answer to graveyard hate, something like Unmask or Thoughtseize (provided you support it with enough lands) seems better to me. As a reactive answer to Crypt/Relic, Stifle counters both effects and can be played off of any land, although it conflicts with Breakthrough @ x=0. Force of Will is also playable if you bring in 4 Chain of Vapor with it.

Having Ancient Grudge in the opening hand is probably the best situation.

The idea is that Tormod's Crypt or Relic of Progenitus will be cracked on your terms, not your opponents. This is performed by the earlier stated having it in your opening hand or dredging into it.

Once the card is dredged into the graveyard, you stop dredging. This makes it so your opponent is forced to pop the graveyard hate. If they don't, you blow it up.

For other hate like Pernicious Deed, Engineered Explosives, etc. that's where Unmask comes in.

I've seen Force of Will played in Dredge lists, but not to great extent.

[keys]

How often do you have 2 lands to hardcast Grudge? With 12-15 Lands this doesn't seem very common. Has anybody tried Stifle/FoW? You could play both at the same time and have a high enough blue count, and maybe even tip the combo matchup in your favor.

[RaNDoMxGeSTuReS]

With 15 land casting any card in the deck becomes fairly easy. It may not look like it on paper, but it happens in high frequency.

If you're running 12-13 land, odds are you're playing an LED list that doesn't plan on casting creatures aside from discard outlets.

Personally I wouldn't run Force of Will. The deck already has an insanely tight list and trying to support Force of Will would already be difficult.

The combo matchup is pretty much a coin flip.

[keys]

Most non-LED lists already contain 12 blue cards minimum (Narco, Breakthrough, Study). Add in 4 Stifle/4 FoW and you have enough blue and 8 cards that stop Crypt/Relic without slowing you down. If you expect Leyline, Jailer, or Wheel, bring in 4 Chain of Vapor/4 FoW.

[maxflow2]

I think that it's very hard for this deck to play FoW effectively, as, even though it theoretically plays enough blue cards to always have one in hand, it usually can't afford to pitch them because it needs those cards to execute its game plan (Narcomoeba is really the only one that is nice to pitch to FoW). A sideboard with playsets of Chain of Vapor, Stifle, and FoW might be able to actually afford to pitch a blue spell to FoW that's not crucial, but it's going to be tough figuring out what to cut from the maindeck to get all those cards in there without severely neutering the deck.

[SHABOOGS]

First off...

Wow! It's been a while since I visited the source and now Dredge is DTB! Cool! Just a suggestion, Would it be possible to change the Topic Name from "Ichorid" to "Dredge" so that we can all just move along from talking about [DTB] LED vs [DTW] Non-LED? C'mon guys, LED or Non-LED: Dredge is Dredge! XD


I've tested Sun Titan (http://www.magiccards.info/ptc/en/45.html) briefly in a Bloodghast (http://www.magiccards.info/zen/en/83.html)/Ichorid (http://www.magiccards.info/tr/en/65.html) hybrid deck and while Sun Titan has two advantages (a big body and the ability to put a permanent directly into play from your graveyard), keys is correct that Eternal Witness (http://www.magiccards.info/5dn/en/86.html) edges out Sun Titan just because it hits your sorceries as well as permanents. The ETB ability of Sun Titan to circumvent countermagic also doesn't matter versus countermagic will just counter the Dread Return. Sun Titan's ability also doesn't help you when he swings right away since none of your spells are at instant speed. He is only an I-Win-More type card rather than a key component to surviving a tough matchup. With the Bloodghast build, I prefer using Sun Titan over Eternal Witness simply because the ETB ability of Sun Titan is simply better in triggering Landfall because it isn't counted as your 1 land drop per turn. And you can do it each turn thereafter (When attacking). In addition, you can revive most of the permanents w/o casting them using our limited lands in play (Thug>Therapy>Narc for more tokens, Stinkweed Imp for defense, LED for mana/discard, etc). However, with lists that doesn't run Bloodghasts, I would prefer Eternal Witness over Sun Titan because it can fetch spells.

[LordEvilTeaCup]

First off...

Wow! It's been a while since I visited the source and now Dredge is DTB! Cool! Just a suggestion, Would it be possible to change the Topic Name from "Ichorid" to "Dredge" so that we can all just move along from talking about [DTB] LED vs [DTW] Non-LED? C'mon guys, LED or Non-LED: Dredge is Dredge! XD



Actually I think that conversation should continue. If you were going to a Grand Prix or a Star City Games Open, which build would you bring? They are both dredge, however I think it is helpful info to know which deck version is best suited to today's metagame. Granted, in local metagames that answer will be very personal, but I think it is possible to arrive at a reasonable conclusion concerning larger metas.

[SHABOOGS]

Actually I think that conversation should continue. If you were going to a Grand Prix or a Star City Games Open, which build would you bring? They are both dredge, however I think it is helpful info to know which deck version is best suited to today's metagame. Granted, in local metagames that answer will be very personal, but I think it is possible to arrive at a reasonable conclusion concerning larger metas. Sorry for my poor choice of words there. What I was trying to suggest was to have the conversation in just one thread instead of having two separate threads since they are both Dredge.

[Parax]

Sorry for my poor choice of words there. What I was trying to suggest was to have the conversation in just one thread instead of having two separate threads since they are both Dredge.

I agree if you make a new thread for every variation of decks, it'd be harder to discuss the decks as whole.

16 Lord Folk VS Non 16 Lord VS Black Splash
Big Zoo VS Small Zoo

This would dilute the conversations about the deck.

[CabalTherapy]

Has anyone seriously tested Yosei as a DR target?


I tested Yosei, because of the coolness factor and the thought, that with sacraficing him into another DR or with a Cabal Therapy, he could be strong enought to be seriously played. He pervormed average. Obviously the problem is, that without a DR or CT he is just a 5/5 flying, which is also very good, but not comparably to Iona or in certain situations FKZ.



The combo matchup is pretty much a coin flip.

Against TES you can disrupt him easily or simply race his token, which are too weak to stand against our Zombies.
But you're right. It is about pretty much about who is playing first.

[Adan]

noLED has been Top8ing Milano recently... the list runs maindeck DR targets in place of some cards (I think at the cost of 2 lands and a Thug from the standard list).

Found it:
http://morphling.de/top8decks.php?id=1329

Since I don't like the maindeck DR targets, I'd run the stock list together with that SB. Not sure about Blazing Archon, I guess I'd play another Chain over it. The format is just too random to ensure that Nature's Claim works well, so I'd stick to Chain as a catch-all.

Terastodon has been devastating for me when I played noLED. But i remember that I completely sucked out that day, I'm still not sure if it's my own fault or that the deck doesn't mulligan as well as I thought.

[Adan]

noLED has been Top8ing Milano recently... the list runs maindeck DR targets in place of some cards (I think at the cost of 2 lands and a Thug from the standard list).

Found it:
http://morphling.de/top8decks.php?id=1329

Since I don't like the maindeck DR targets, I'd run the stock list together with that SB. Not sure about Blazing Archon, I guess I'd play another Chain over it. The format is just too random to ensure that Nature's Claim works well, so I'd stick to Chain as a catch-all.

Terastodon has been devastating for me when I played noLED. But i remember that I completely sucked out that day, I'm still not sure if it's my own fault or that the deck doesn't mulligan as well as I thought.

[sa17dk]

http://www.eternal-central.com/?p=918#more-918

[GoldenCid]

I can't understand how people wants to get stability with 3 ichorid and 3 or less therapies!

[maxflow2]

http://www.eternal-central.com/?p=918#more-918

I don't see how that deck plans on casting Putrid Imp and Entomb consistently with only 8 black sources.

[sa17dk]

I personally dont like the Entomb either. I'd much rather have the 4th Thug and a Tireless Tribe over the two Entombs. However, I do like the Street Wraith for that immediate dredge. I might experiment with Street Wraiths over Careful Study.

[Izor]

I can't understand how people wants to get stability with 3 ichorid and 3 or less therapies!

Cabal Therapy is easily one of the most important cards in the deck, which is why I wouldn't want to run less than 4 main. However, some people cut the 4th for additional Dread Return Targets in the main. The deck can work well with 3 Therapies but against Combo and Control I think the 4th Therapy should be at least in the sb, and most of the times it is. I agree that less than 3 Therapies is not optimal.

3 Ichorids do work very well. Against fast decks you don't really need Ichorids, so 3 are fine. Against Control you often want to have the 4th, but then it is sufficient to have it in the sideboard. Also you will more often have Ichorids in your opening hand (which is a dead card there) and you will also run out of Ichorid food more often if running 4. It's matter of preference I guess.

[CabalTherapy]

Cabal Therapy is easily one of the most important cards in the deck, which is why I wouldn't want to run less than 4 main. However, some people cut the 4th for additional Dread Return Targets in the main. The deck can work well with 3 Therapies but against Combo and Control I think the 4th Therapy should be at least in the sb, and most of the times it is. I agree that less than 3 Therapies is not optimal.


Running 4 Therapys is the only right choice you can make.
It is pure crap to cut maybe the best card in this deck (besides Breakthrough). It is the most flexible spell we have.
So if you want a slot, cut one Ichorid to 3, but please play the playset Therapys xD.

[maxflow2]

Running 4 Therapys is the only right choice you can make.
It is pure crap to cut maybe the best card in this deck (besides Breakthrough). It is the most flexible spell we have.
So if you want a slot, cut one Ichorid to 3, but please play the playset Therapys xD.

... says the guy with CabalTherapy as his name and avatar. But yeah, I think Cabal Therapy should definitely be a 4 of. I pretty much always want to see two of them, and they're pretty much this deck's only source of advantage in the storm matchup since it'd likely lose a straight up race.

[ivanpei]

Ok I just bought into ichorid (had the unique opportunity to get the deck whole) and I have a few questions vs led and non-led lists. Please be patient with me :)

I play the most consistent non-led list available. No DR targets, playsets of everything, 2 dread return, 14 lands (2 tarnished citadel).

If I wanted to play LEDed, I'd go - 2 tarnished, -4 careful study, +4 LED, + 2 Deep analysis. Is this correct? I'm aiming for consistency mainly.

What matchups are different? From what I understand:
LED advantages= Quicker, better vs storm, better vs fast aggro.
Non-LED advantages= More consistent, don't mull to death as often, better vs blue (stuff with force), better after sideboarding because of more manasources.

Is the above accurate? I'm leaning on non-leds at the moment as, I'd just play storm combo (I have LEDs) if I were facing an aggro field. I plan to play Ichorid in an all blue meta as it just rapes unprepared sideboards.

[Izor]

Ok I just bought into ichorid (had the unique opportunity to get the deck whole) and I have a few questions vs led and non-led lists. Please be patient with me :)

I play the most consistent non-led list available. No DR targets, playsets of everything, 2 dread return, 14 lands (2 tarnished citadel).

If I wanted to play LEDed, I'd go - 2 tarnished, -4 careful study, +4 LED, + 2 Deep analysis. Is this correct? I'm aiming for consistency mainly.

What matchups are different? From what I understand:
LED advantages= Quicker, better vs storm, better vs fast aggro.
Non-LED advantages= More consistent, don't mull to death as often, better vs blue (stuff with force), better after sideboarding because of more manasources.

Is the above accurate? I'm leaning on non-leds at the moment as, I'd just play storm combo (I have LEDs) if I were facing an aggro field. I plan to play Ichorid in an all blue meta as it just rapes unprepared sideboards.

Basically you got everything right.

But in the LED build you will also use Sphinx of Lost Truths and Flame-Kin Zealot in order to have the chance to win on turn 1. As this is basically the only thing LED builds do better than non-LED ones, you won't want to miss them. Of course that makes the deck even more inconsistent.