Vintage Wizard Port

[Eldarion]

Picked this up from a thread on The Mana Drain, says there it made top 4 in a 51-man Vintage tournament, and I'm wondering if we could port this over to legacy. (Original post: http://www.themanadrain.com/index.php?topic=41417.0) Ideas, anyone?



Vial Wizards All Stars

// Lands
4 Flooded Strand
3 Wasteland
4 Tundra
2 Tropical Island
2 Underground Sea
1 Polluted Delta
1 Strip Mine
1 Island

// Creatures
4 Voidmage Prodigy
4 Dark Confidant
4 Meddling Mage
4 Qasali Pridemage

// Spells
4 Force of Will
4 Chalice of the Void
4 AEther Vial
3 Daze
3 Stifle
3 Swords to Plowshares
1 Ancestral Recall
1 Time Walk
1 Black Lotus
1 Mystical Tutor
1 Mindbreak Trap
1 Balance

// Sideboard
SB: 1 Stifle
SB: 3 Mindbreak Trap
SB: 4 Leyline of the Void
SB: 3 Path to Exile
SB: 3 Engineered Explosives
SB: 1 Plains

I'm tempted to just play the list, but there's 7 power cards there that need replacing for the deck to be Legacy-legal.


Ported version for testing:


// Lands
4 Flooded Strand
4 Wasteland
4 Tundra
2 Tropical Island
2 Underground Sea
1 Academy Ruins
1 Volrath's Stronghold
1 Island

// Creatures
2 Voidmage Prodigy
4 Dark Confidant
4 Meddling Mage
3 Qasali Pridemage
3 Trinket Mage

// Spells
4 Force of Will
4 Chalice of the Void
4 AEther Vial
3 Daze
3 Stifle
3 Swords to Plowshares
4 Engineered Explosives
1 Umezawa's Jitte
1 Vedalken Shackles

[Atwa]

Try -7 power, -1 Mindbreak Trap, + 1 Swords (no brainer), +4 Brainstorm (unrestricted now), +1 Wasteland, + 2 Ponder.

[Aggro_zombies]

I can't see this deck ever beating aggro, which is quite prevalent in this format (infinitely more so than in Vintage). I'm not sure you can remedy that without completely gutting the deck and starting over.

[Scatterbrain]

This deck is really a metagame deck in Vintage, which doesn't transfer well to Legacy. Chalice of the Void in this deck is basically useless in Legacy. The only way to make this deck truly viable for Legacy is to change it to be more aggressive, probably with Vendilion Clique, Jace, Tarmogoyf, and Cursecatcher. You probably also need the fourth Swords.

[Jeff Kruchkow]

Riptide Laboratory and Spellstutter Sprite seems awesome.

[Eldarion]

@Atwa: Those suggestions sound good, but I think we'd have to junk the CotV since its best use is @ 1, especially vs zoo and the like.

@Aggro_zombies: You're probably right, though I think Chalice and EE with Academy Ruins might be a good way to go, though I also like the Punishing Fire recursion engine as a possible substitute for the Chalice.

@Scatterbrain: Clique and Jace might be good additions. I don't like Goyf simply because everyone who can spare green mana and four slots seems to run it, and what drew me to the deck was the wizard theme.:smile:

[Eldarion]

@Jeff: Spellstutter looks okay, but I kinda want to have the option to counter more than just 1-drops, so I'm running it in my take on the Fae instead of in this deck.

[Waikiki]

The problem with the deck is it isn't build to deal with creature formats and tuned to beat the vintage decks expected in the meta. It will not be able to keep up in legacy without any fat.

[Eldarion]

@Waikiki: Edited the opening post to show the deck I wantto try testing. I think the set of EE's and the Academy Ruins to recur them will help against critters. Also added a Trinket Mage package to fetch those EE's and midgame CotV's. Thinking of taking out the tempo package of Wastelands + Stifle in favor of Grove of the Burnwillows and Punishing Fires. Thoughts?

[kiblast]

@Waikiki: Edited the opening post to show the deck I wantto try testing. I think the set of EE's and the Academy Ruins to recur them will help against critters. Also added a Trinket Mage package to fetch those EE's and midgame CotV's. Thinking of taking out the tempo package of Wastelands + Stifle in favor of Grove of the Burnwillows and Punishing Fires. Thoughts?

I don't understand CotVs. Instead if you want some targets for Trinket try 2x Relic of Progenitus, 1x Meekstone and 1x Pithing Needle. In the Vintage Build CotV's are here for obvious reasons, reasons lacking in Legacy. They are also horrible late game and horrible to topdeck.
Taking out the tempo package will lead to lose the only viable basis on wich you can win games...

EDIT: Also 1x Shackles is very situational without any way to dig for it, you could put either the 4th Stifle or the 4th Daze instead of it.

[Eldarion]

I don't understand CotVs. Instead if you want some targets for Trinket try 2x Relic of Progenitus, 1x Meekstone and 1x Pithing Needle. In the Vintage Build CotV's are here for obvious reasons, reasons lacking in Legacy. They are also horrible late game and horrible to topdeck.
Taking out the tempo package will lead to lose the only viable basis on wich you can win games...

EDIT: Also 1x Shackles is very situational without any way to dig for it, you could put either the 4th Stifle or the 4th Daze instead of it.

The thought behind the CotVs is an early CotV for 1 against Zoo and combo. Even if Zoo has good 2-drop critters, practically all its removal is at 1, so that can be backbreaking. Mid and late game CotV can come in after an EE sweep, help you keep your opponent from rebuilding his board. Will see how/if this works in practice.

Since I don't have much experience playing Wasteland/Stifle I'll give that a try as well though Punishing Fire/Grove can also wear the control opponent down as well as clean the aggro guy's board.

Agreed on the Shackles - 4th Stifle it is.

[Mystical_Jackass]

What about using Thoughtseize/Duress or Extirpate, something where you can see their hand and/or entire deck, which would go well with Meddling Mage.

You could also considered running Circu? His cmc is higher, but lets say you drop CoTV for Brainstorms' and Spell Pierce or w/e--once he hits the table, between him and MM you could have your opponent unable to play spells in a couple turns.