Dazed and Confused Part 3

[mchainmail]

http://strategy.channelfireball.com/featured-articles/sweeping-ice-and-other-important-topics-emrakul-and-the-gang/

Wherein Steve Birklid makes the finals of a tournament for a Lotus, playing against such hits as "Life Combo" and "UW Tezzeret" (in the 2-0 and 3-0 bracket)

Wherein Steve Birklid creates a deck with the phenomenal mana stability of 2 basics and 19 total lands (6 spirit guides.)

[lordofthepit]

I'll give him props, that deck looks fun to play.

I didn't go to the tournament in question, but from what I hear, it's one of the most competitive ones in the Seattle area (and 60 people showed up). I wouldn't discount his results, even though I'm not sure of the validity of what he had to say in his first article (hell, he ignored his own advice).

[frogboy]

http://strategy.channelfireball.com/featured-articles/sweeping-ice-and-other-important-topics-emrakul-and-the-gang/

Wherein Steve Birklid makes the finals of a tournament for a Lotus, playing against such hits as "Life Combo" and "UW Tezzeret" (in the 2-0 and 3-0 bracket)

So what you're saying is, he won a tournament.

Add some lands to your deck.

[morgan_coke]

A couple of people have tried out nonsense like that on MTGO before the results are generally ... poor.

One of the biggest problem is that since online has an accessible supply of Karakas, and a LOT of decks run Knights, the "dump big legends into play" strategy has a much lower tendency to pay off. While I realize that this isn't a problem in paper, the deck still suffers from MASSIVE consistency problems because it runs no search/filtering. And I'm not talking about ways to find a hypergen/SnT, i'm talking about finding the right monsters for any given match.

Let me just put it this way, last week a guy Eureaka'd out Progenitus, Iona, and Emrakul on turn 3. I killed him two turns later. This is not an exceptionally uncommon sequence of play online. Goblins also tends to stomp all over this strategy thanks to the presence of Wasteland and Stingscourger and Warren Weirding and pro: blue piledrivers. I'm not even sure tuned zoo lists have that bad of a matchup anymore since, as one friend put it "zoo is just new horizons now but with burn instead of counters" - i.e. Knights and Karakas.

This is a nice gimmick deck, but it suffers from many of the same problems that have doomed such decks in the past, such as symmetry of effect, counterspell and counterbalance (flipped lands counter hypergen, keep a land and a 3 floating and the opponent literally cannot win), and lack of search/draw/filter cards.

[menace13]

So what you're saying is, he won a tournament.

Add some lands to your deck.

Oh yeah, I'm on it. Right now as we speak i am just going around dropping 2 extra basics in every deck. You can tell it was good advice since he followed it and won with it:rolleyes:

[IsThisACatInAHat?]

I agree that deck looks like fun to play. I plan to throw it on MWS, make a bunch of changes and play some games with it when I'm not preparing for the GP. But, it also features all of the weaknesses of other combo decks except it's got a ton of dead cards, it's slower and uses a strictly inferior protection suite to TES, FT+ variants and the now-deceased ANT+ variants. Not the epic revolution in Legacy deckbuilding I expected after all of the hype from parts 1 and 2. It's just poetic justice that he lost to Merfolk to win the tournament. Good luck in Columbus where FoW is two thirds of the field!

[frogboy]

Yeah I mean I guess the turn two combo deck with Force of Will would have a hard time if the beatdown deck made it to turn four and had Knight of the Reliquary and the combo deck was all in on Emrakul.

[morgan_coke]

Yeah I mean I guess the turn two combo deck with Force of Will would have a hard time if the beatdown deck made it to turn four and had Knight of the Reliquary and the combo deck was all in on Emrakul.

Yeah, except you get to play your knight at the same time they play thier Emrakul, and you untap first, or if you're holding Karakas you can just drop it then. Symmetry of effect is generally considered bad for a reason. And again, T2 combo deck with FoW HAS NO SEARCH. It's got Belcher level consistency issues, with a clock thats about 4 turns slower. Not a recipe for long term success.

[frogboy]

and the combo deck was all in on Emrakul.

[morgan_coke]

Show and Tell is always only one critter.

But, ok, yes, in magicchristmas land where the non-combo player has only knight and the combo player playing the deck with no card selection, draw, or search hits his t2 goldfish AND has the perfect mix of multiple monsters and counters for anything the opponent didn't drop into play off of his own spell, then yes, the combo deck wins. Congrats on living the dream. Maybe we should start a [Paranoia] thread about this great new deck now? I mean, add two basic lands and its perfect because then it can ignore Daze and Wasteland, right?

[frogboy]

Show and Tell is always only one critter.

But, ok, yes, in magicchristmas land where the non-combo player has only knight and the combo player playing the deck with no card selection, draw, or search hits his t2 goldfish AND has the perfect mix of multiple monsters and counters for anything the opponent didn't drop into play off of his own spell, then yes, the combo deck wins. Congrats on living the dream. Maybe we should start a [Paranoia] thread about this great new deck now? I mean, add two basic lands and its perfect because then it can ignore Daze and Wasteland, right?

I'm not saying it's the best deck in the format, but your post seems to indicate that you think you can show a Karakas and the other guy will just dry up and blow away.

Daze is pretty atrocious against the 27 mana source deck, especially when eight of them are Spirit Guides. Wasteland isn't particularly good against a combo deck that needs to get to three and has a ton of acceleration; you'd basically have to have exactly Lackey into Wasteland.

re: inconsistency: see also PT Austin, GP Oakland, etc.

[Artowis]

He took the deck, played it, did well. People are still complaining? Are some of you for real?

Also for real, no search is a complaint when pretty much the same base made it through 15 round Extended GP's? (edit: Max got it, as usual)

[Aggro_zombies]

Progenitus blanks the Karakas plan, and many of the other, non-legendary creatures he can make are evasive.

Decks only fold to Knight, tap, Karakas when they aren't built properly. Even Reanimator, the flagship Iona deck in the format, has ways around Karakas (like, say, Inkwell Leviathan).

[Meekrab]

Playing 13 cards you can't actually cast cannot possibly be optimal, can it? (Okay theoretically you could cast them, if it was turn one miliion and you had 8 lands and 4 spirit guides in play...)

Also this deck is basically like Reanimator, except your combo costs more and is harder to assemble, and in exchange its slightly harder to disrupt?

[Hopo]

He took the deck, played it, did well. People are still complaining? Are some of you for real?

A legit question. If backing up your claims with results isn't enough, what is?

Nice deck. I played somewhat similar last year racing storm combo et al. One of the funniest decks I have played so far. 4 Fow and 4 Misdirection is huge. I never managed to squeeze in 4 Unmasks, though. That would have been one disruptive combo deck.

[JosephBono]

I'm not saying it's the best deck in the format, but your post seems to indicate that you think you can show a Karakas and the other guy will just dry up and blow away.

Daze is pretty atrocious against the 27 mana source deck, especially when eight of them are Spirit Guides. Wasteland isn't particularly good against a combo deck that needs to get to three and has a ton of acceleration; you'd basically have to have exactly Lackey into Wasteland.

re: inconsistency: see also PT Austin, GP Oakland, etc.

Steve built an awesome deck, played well all day, and went the distance. It was a large, tough field, and while he did get some favorable pairings and played against some bad decks and players, he also had some rough matches and experienced opponents. He deserves congratulations.

But let's not delude ourselves either. Daze isn't atrocious against a 27 mana source deck that revolves around casting 3 mana spells. It's not awesome either, but even if it forces you to go off a turn later it contributes value for an aggro control deck like Merfolk, which may be able to kill you in that extra turn. Same with Wasteland. And there are those times (24% of the time turn 4 on the play) that the deck just won't have the fourth mana source and will have to try to go off or won't be able to go off.

It also is an inconsistent deck. Being honest about this doesn't detract from Steve. Hypergenesis was a very powerful strategy in Extended, and it gets even better and more hate resilient in Legacy. The reason why it wasn't a tier one deck in Extended was because it needed the exact right combination of mana sources, cascade spells, and creatures, and having the wrong proportions or missing a crucial piece was a frequent problem. You end up mulliganing a lot with the deck and keeping speculative hands like 2 mana sources, fatties, and a cascader, or cascade spells and mana sources but no fatties, and hoping to draw into the right cards.

The printing of Emrakul, being able to run Show and Tell instead of Demonic Dread, and having a less painful manabase mitigates some of the issues with the deck, but it's still liable to lose to itself. Unfortunately the deckbuilding constraints you are forced into by the nature of cascade make it very hard to actually fix these flaws. Similar combo decks that rely on having the right combination of two types of cards and the mana to cast them - decks like Reanimator, Dream Halls, and Aluren - are able to run cantrip spells to help them find the missing pieces and smooth out their draws. The extended version of the deck didn't have the tools to do this well, as Compulsive Research, Idyllic Tutor, and Thirst for Knowledge didn't have a powerful enough effect for their speed in extended. Legacy has better tools, and perhaps adding Intuition, Cunning Wish, or some other card will be enough to make the deck consistent.

Pointing to Van and Saito's success with the deck isn't a refutation of the variance of the deck - just like Steve they played well but also did not get unlucky and have the deck lose to itself.

[Cthuloo]

Ok, this thing is becoming surreal. Well, props to him for the result and the deck (though he didn't follow his own advice and played only two basics, plus lost to that crappy merfolk deck), but his tone and his writing style are atrocious. I am not going to read any Dazed and Confused Part 4.

[pippo84]

Well, Props for the finish and for the deck.

Merfolk beat him. This makes me laugh.

He played just 2 basics. This is just huge! What did he write in his first article?

[lordofthepit]

Discussion of the deck probably should go here: http://www.mtgthesource.com/forums/showthread.php?13519-Cascade-Hypergenesis/page6

[Deviruchi]

This report was funny to read. I like the deck idea but I can't see how it can be better than Aeon Bridge. Idea of having FoW in combo deck seems nice but from the report I see that he had many great draws which won him games. I know that deck was designed to have bombs and opportunities to do so but still, no search spells and there were situations like drawing 4 lands in a row or praying to draw 3 S&N to have a chance to win. I'm not a hater but I think he "was blessed by Jesus" to top2 with this deck. Anyway, gratz for getting to 2nd place.

[DrJones]

He got second place with a deck he built on the spot, without having tested it even once, and replacing some cards by others because nobody had them in their binders. He either:
1. found a pot of gold at the end of the rainbow.
2. is an exceptional player with a lot of luck.
3. all his opponents were bad players, or
4. his point is true and combo decks with Force of Will really can win regardless of the player's deckbuilding or piloting abilities.

And I'm inclined to agree with one of those points.

[Ecoris]

He got second place with a deck he built on the spot, without having tested it even once, and replacing some cards by others because nobody had them in their binders. No, read the article a bit closer. He went 4-1 the first time with the deck full of borrowed cards.
His 2nd place was not achieved with that decklist (but with the list a bit further down) and it was apparently his third tournament with the deck.

[(nameless one)]

I think the pilot is a good player (he is supposed to be up there) and he got lucky with his build.

Maybe a new beginning for Hypergenesis, after all, it did get the shaft in extended. Yes, the deck can be easily hated out in Legacy with all the hate but with a big enough cardpool, it also has enough tools to fight against hate. He already started fiddling with Force of Wills and Misdirection. Someone already mentioned Unmask.

We'll see if one of us sourcers would actually propel this deck into the Established area.

PS. Shouldn't Aeon Bridge be on the Established section? Or Nightmare is just playing the humility game?

[Pastorofmuppets]

I've been waiting for a cascade combo deck to show up. Almost nobody runs Stifle now, which was a big problem for the builds. He Conley Woods'd the tournament. Whether or not he did it on purpose is moot, since he'll say he did anyway (fuck man, I would).
EDIT: It also looks like he didn't run into trinisphere. With his persistent "play around Daze" philosophy, he's going 1-for-1 with Forces on game 1. Not bad. Might be too easy to hate out. Still, I'd love to have gone in there with the NLI lists that've been jumping around. Might've wrecked hard.

[Nessaja]

He won a tournament with a meta deck. I really don't see a big deal with it.

Yes he brought something new to the format, but stuff like that happens a lot (Dream Halls, Team America, UWT) a large portion of the valid legacy decks prey on weaknesses in the established decks.

[Sims]

He didn't really bring anything new to the table, people have been working on Hypergenesis decks since people first realized cascading into it is pretty hilarious and an effective way at comboing out on your opponent. It picks up tools in Legacy and i'm sure he spent some time tweaking the list, power to him. I have wanted to have a successful cascade deck in Legacy for a while but even with the advances he put forth, i'm not sure the deck is stable enough to make repeat performances without a lot of luck and preying upon weak opponent playskill.

I partially agreed that legacy manabases suck in part 1, but disdained his way of going about it.
I didn't even read all of part 2 because I don't like his writing style.
I looked up part 3 on my phone (channelfireball blocked at work) so that I could see the list, but didn't read anything else for the same reasons i didn't read part 2.... Congrats to him, but I think he's got a long way to go article-wise.

[Plague Sliver]

He got me good with the deck in Round 1 of that tournament.

My version of the story:
http://www.mtgthesource.com/forums/showthread.php?18290-[Report]-Delve-for-six-Alex-13th-Place-with-TEAM-AMERICA-at-the-Mirkwood-Cup

Looks like I got some details wrong, nevertheless Steven played pretty darn solid.

[xTrainx]

Okay, so; he did well, and people continue to try and bitch about it?

Major props to him, for continuing to face the community, and showing them that he knows how to play.

[zalachan]

I liked his latest submission because he actually provided decklists. Too bad he missed that Lotus.

Still, i found it quite funny that he got beaten by Merfolk :)

[Morim_Brightsmoke]

I don't think he is bad, nor do I think the deck is horrible or anything. I also don't think he "discovered it" or anything. It is hypergenesis, we all have lists of that floating around somewhere.

My question is how this deck beats CB decks, I understand that it runs FoW and that is how he plans on doing that according to the "run more basics and combo with force of will" plan, but they run FoW, Daze, and a must counter in the form of counterbalance. Depending on which CB deck it is they also run a decent clock, humility plus tutors, ensnaring bridge (should be in enlightened tutor decks), knight + karakas, or their own oh shit button in Natural order progenitus. Misdirection is only good when you are going off, so basically he has FoW, for counterbalance and hope they don't have more counters than him after that, seems worrisome.

[Hopo]

My question is how this deck beats CB decks, I understand that it runs FoW and that is how he plans on doing that according to the "run more basics and combo with force of will" plan, but they run FoW, Daze, and a must counter in the form of counterbalance. Depending on which CB deck it is they also run a decent clock, humility plus tutors, ensnaring bridge (should be in enlightened tutor decks), knight + karakas, or their own oh shit button in Natural order progenitus. Misdirection is only good when you are going off, so basically he has FoW, for counterbalance and hope they don't have more counters than him after that, seems worrisome.

My take on this was to play Wispmare in sideboard for especially Counterbalance. It is easier with a build with Oblivion Ring as you don't need to splash white only for SB cards. Wispmare and Ingot Chewer are tailor-made for Hypergenesis deck.

[SpikeyMikey]

I think that this guy is seriously interested in the format, meaning that in a year or two, he'll be up to speed and he won't be as irritating to read anymore. Remember when Menendian made the jump to the Legacy bandwagon? He swore he was going to break the format. All you poor scrubs step aside while the master of Eternal solves your format for you. As I recall, his first attempt was FEB. Any of you remember FEB ever working in Legacy? Thought not.

Hypergenesis won't go far either and Birklid will produce some more fluff before he realizes that Legacy is 100% unlike any other format. It's not just the bigger cardpool, the balance of the format is such that the viable strategies often share no common weaknesses. The pros see this and assume that the best deck to play, therefore is one with little to no interaction, but this is not the case, as those decks do share a weakness. They all hinge on one or two cards, making them vulnerable to control strategies and often to themselves. The consistent decks that prey on control tend to do better over the long haul. Yeah, they lack the answers to busted plays, but they don't mull into oblivion and the don't rely on topdecking specific sequences of cards.

That having been said, Hypergenesis seems better than all the damn Sneak Attack decks I see on MWS.

[Hanni]

That having been said, Hypergenesis seems better than all the damn Sneak Attack decks I see on MWS.

LOL, qft

[DragoFireheart]

He lost to fish, therefore his deck is terrible.

[dahcmai]

I kind of wish this guy would stop writing about Legacy. He doesn't take criticism well and responds to every negative comment like a scolded middle schooler. I like the deck ideas and reading about those things, but it's really not worth it in this guy's case. He even starts this article talking about people in the comments of the last one. Ugh let it die.

[Kuma]

For supposedly being able to "race or ignore Counterbalance," he's totally cold to a CounterTop player keeping a three on top.

[mchainmail]

For supposedly being able to "race or ignore Counterbalance," he's totally cold to a CounterTop player keeping a three on top.

Not really... Ardent Plea / Violent outburst gets countered, but Cascade happens separately...

[Kuma]

My mistake. Aside from Show and Tell, he's cold to a zero on top.