ivanpei
06-07-2011, 10:40 PM
I wrote this for my local forum, here goes:
MUD has always intrigued me as a deck. It seems to not follow the rules of Magic by cheating so many big unfair creatures into play. Going nuts into big robots has been something I’ve found really cool. When Michael Bomholt placed 2nd at a Starcitygames Open, I was extremely impressed with the synergy of the list and the new tech, Kuldotha Forgemaster. For reference, his report here:
http://www.quietspeculation.com/2011/02/slinging-mud-2nd-place-at-scg-indy/
I noticed some things while reading through his report. It seemed like he boarded in the Chalice of the Void + Revoker plan almost every match. Also, 16 lands is really greedy, especially with 3 Mox Diamonds. I acknowledge the power of Goblin Welder and loved how it simply destroys Merfolk and Counterspell heavy decks. However, times have changed, the meta has caught up and Mental Misstep was printed.
Ali Aintrazi then played this to 5th at Starcitygames Charlotte.
http://sales.starcitygames.com//deckdatabase/displaydeck.php?DeckID=38176
This deck forgoes Red and Welders for Blue and Thoughtcast. It’s an interesting list as it can afford to play Chalice in the MD since it has less 1 drops. He only plays 2 MD though and in my opinion this is a step in the right direction. Ali argues that it is only good on the play or against combo but I have to disagree with him. One of the worst matchups for this deck is Zoo with its Pridemages and infinite removal. Chalice is necessary to shut down the deck’s removal for MUD to have a chance. Chalice is also one of the best cards in legacy right now after the printing of Mental Misstep. Blue decks have shifted away from Daze and Spell Pierce to Mental Misstep and if built properly, MUD can blank Misstep and destroy blue’s 1 cc cards with Chalice.
Another problem MUD faces is artifact hosers. The most devastating and prolific ones are the dreaded Null Rod and Energy Flux. These 2 cards are seeing more and more play due to the popularity of artifact based decks like Affinity and Painter’s Servant. It is a sad thing that MUD gets caught in the crossfire. I set out to build a MUD list which can do 2 things:
1. Able to support and abuse Chalice of the Void fully.
2. Able to fight Null Rod and Energy Flux.
There are already plenty of Mono Brown lists floating around on the forums that abuse Chalice well. No Welders, no Sensei’s Divining Tops, just lots of good 2cc and above artifacts with only Voltaic Key as a 1 drop. Solving Null Rod and Energy Flux however, was still a problem. I saw Spine of Ish Sah suggested, but it is extremely unlikely you can actually cast the card without artifacts. Some lists run Karn, Liberated, but again it is unlikely you can cast him without artifact support. Most lists just ignore the hate and try to win before it comes down.
I don’t think that’s wise as the SB should always try to address the most dangerous cards against your deck. My suggestion is to run this list:
White splash MUD
Main Deck (60 cards)
4 Ancient Tomb
4 City of Traitors
4 Wasteland
4 Ancient Den
1 Horizon Canopy
1 Crystal Vein
3 Mox Diamond
2 Mox Opal
3 Voltaic Key
3 Lightning Greaves
4 Grim Monolith
4 Metalworker
4 Chalice of the Void
4 Phyrexian Revoker
4 Lodestone Golem
4 Kuldotha Forgemaster
4 Wurmcoil Engine
1 Myr Battlesphere
1 Sundering Titan
1 Blightsteel Colossus
Sideboard (15 cards)
3 Crucible of Worlds
3 Horizon Canopy
4 Seal of Cleasing
4 Trinisphere
1 Duplicant
I depart from the norm by running 18 lands instead of 16. I hate mulling and I try to decrease my mulligan rate by playing more lands. I believe 18 is the correct number of lands to run. There are no white cards in the MD so the white sources are solely for the SB tech. Basically this is a standard Mono Brown Chalice list which swaps the 4 splash cards (Welder or Thoughtcast) with Phyrexian Revoker* and the 1cc cards (Sensei’s Divining Tops and the 4th Voltaic key) for Chalice of the Void. I’ve found that trying to cast your splash card consistently is not ideal with 9 coloured sources (Ali’s list plays 5 Moxes and just 4 Seat of the Synod). This increases inconsistency greatly. Take into account opposing Wastelands and that becomes an even bigger problem.
Going mono brown in the MD is just more consistent and Revoker is an extremely powerful disruptive card that is highly underrated. It shuts down so many cards in Legacy that I believe it deserves a spot in the MD. The same goes for Chalice, that card is busted if you can stick it. This MUD list only has three 1cc cards which are Voltaic Keys, so Chalice @ 1 is pretty much a one sided affair. Sensei’s top is also quite inefficient in this deck in my opinion as there are no fetchlands and Kuldotha Forgemaster is the only shuffle effect.
Sensei’s Top + Voltaic Key is cute but not necessarily game winning. A Revoker on your opponent’s Equipment/Vial is a huge play in the early game and shutting down Walkers/Shackles later in the game is also amazing. I don’t play the 1 random Karn, Liberated because he is exactly that, a random 1-off. He isn’t an artifact that I can tutor for with Forgemaster and he doesn’t reveal to Metalworker. I’m a fan of consistency, so I’ll pass on running him.
Now I will finally come to the white splash tech from the board. Seal of Cleansing is the only effective answer to both Null Rod and Energy Field because it is preemptive. It is quite easy to drop a Seal on turn 2 on the play before Null Rod or Energy Field comes down. Having Horizon Canopy also allows you to drop the Seal even after Null Rod hits play. Post board you have 13 white sources to cast Seal with since you bring in 3 Canopies from the board. One may argue that the Canopies are a huge waste of space in the board for just trying to deal with Null Rod/Energy Flux. However, you will be surprised how many times you’ll want more land from the board.
MUD is also sometimes soft to mana screw centered decks like Team America, Junk or BW Aggro. A discard spell on a Grim/ Metalworker followed up by a Wasteland/Vindicate spells big trouble for the MUD player. In these situations you can board out your explosive cards like Mox Diamond and Voltaic Key for Crucible of the Worlds and Horizon Canopy. Not only does this make your deck more resilient to disruption, Crucible + Horizon Canopy also forms a good draw engine for the deck, ala Stax. Since you are already MD-ing the Revokers and Chalice, there aren’t really that many cards you want to fit into the board. The Duplicant is there as another good robot against Aggro decks or as a tutorable out to Peacekeeper.
So is the white splash worth it? Some may argue that it opens you up to Wasteland while Darksteel Citadel doesn’t. Truthfully though, would your opponent rather target an Ancient Den or an Ancient Tomb/City of Traitors? In my testing against Wastelands, I’ve found that the Wastelands always target my double lands. Some greedy fellow would shoot my Den to put me off white, but then that’s great, because I run zero white cards in the MD anyway and that actually saved my double land.
MUD is an extremely strong deck from my testing and I believe this is the most consistent and resilient list I’ve tried. Opinions might differ, but if you are looking for a super cool, powerful deck that is designed to be as consistent as possible, give it a shot (MUD decks will never be THAT consistent, we can’t run Brainstorm and Fetches).* I’ve sacrificed a fair bit of power for consistency and resilience but I believe it’s worth it. In reality, MUD’s biggest problem has always been losing to itself from inconsistencies (actually this applies to all double land based stompy decks). Mulling to oblivion is common so I aim to reduce this as much as possible. The best analog would be Dredge. So would you play Lion’s Eye Diamond Dredge or non-LED Dredge? Same thing applies to MUD. I hope you have enjoyed this article as much as I have enjoyed writing it. Thank you for reading and I look forward to your thoughts.
-Ivan Pei
MUD has always intrigued me as a deck. It seems to not follow the rules of Magic by cheating so many big unfair creatures into play. Going nuts into big robots has been something I’ve found really cool. When Michael Bomholt placed 2nd at a Starcitygames Open, I was extremely impressed with the synergy of the list and the new tech, Kuldotha Forgemaster. For reference, his report here:
http://www.quietspeculation.com/2011/02/slinging-mud-2nd-place-at-scg-indy/
I noticed some things while reading through his report. It seemed like he boarded in the Chalice of the Void + Revoker plan almost every match. Also, 16 lands is really greedy, especially with 3 Mox Diamonds. I acknowledge the power of Goblin Welder and loved how it simply destroys Merfolk and Counterspell heavy decks. However, times have changed, the meta has caught up and Mental Misstep was printed.
Ali Aintrazi then played this to 5th at Starcitygames Charlotte.
http://sales.starcitygames.com//deckdatabase/displaydeck.php?DeckID=38176
This deck forgoes Red and Welders for Blue and Thoughtcast. It’s an interesting list as it can afford to play Chalice in the MD since it has less 1 drops. He only plays 2 MD though and in my opinion this is a step in the right direction. Ali argues that it is only good on the play or against combo but I have to disagree with him. One of the worst matchups for this deck is Zoo with its Pridemages and infinite removal. Chalice is necessary to shut down the deck’s removal for MUD to have a chance. Chalice is also one of the best cards in legacy right now after the printing of Mental Misstep. Blue decks have shifted away from Daze and Spell Pierce to Mental Misstep and if built properly, MUD can blank Misstep and destroy blue’s 1 cc cards with Chalice.
Another problem MUD faces is artifact hosers. The most devastating and prolific ones are the dreaded Null Rod and Energy Flux. These 2 cards are seeing more and more play due to the popularity of artifact based decks like Affinity and Painter’s Servant. It is a sad thing that MUD gets caught in the crossfire. I set out to build a MUD list which can do 2 things:
1. Able to support and abuse Chalice of the Void fully.
2. Able to fight Null Rod and Energy Flux.
There are already plenty of Mono Brown lists floating around on the forums that abuse Chalice well. No Welders, no Sensei’s Divining Tops, just lots of good 2cc and above artifacts with only Voltaic Key as a 1 drop. Solving Null Rod and Energy Flux however, was still a problem. I saw Spine of Ish Sah suggested, but it is extremely unlikely you can actually cast the card without artifacts. Some lists run Karn, Liberated, but again it is unlikely you can cast him without artifact support. Most lists just ignore the hate and try to win before it comes down.
I don’t think that’s wise as the SB should always try to address the most dangerous cards against your deck. My suggestion is to run this list:
White splash MUD
Main Deck (60 cards)
4 Ancient Tomb
4 City of Traitors
4 Wasteland
4 Ancient Den
1 Horizon Canopy
1 Crystal Vein
3 Mox Diamond
2 Mox Opal
3 Voltaic Key
3 Lightning Greaves
4 Grim Monolith
4 Metalworker
4 Chalice of the Void
4 Phyrexian Revoker
4 Lodestone Golem
4 Kuldotha Forgemaster
4 Wurmcoil Engine
1 Myr Battlesphere
1 Sundering Titan
1 Blightsteel Colossus
Sideboard (15 cards)
3 Crucible of Worlds
3 Horizon Canopy
4 Seal of Cleasing
4 Trinisphere
1 Duplicant
I depart from the norm by running 18 lands instead of 16. I hate mulling and I try to decrease my mulligan rate by playing more lands. I believe 18 is the correct number of lands to run. There are no white cards in the MD so the white sources are solely for the SB tech. Basically this is a standard Mono Brown Chalice list which swaps the 4 splash cards (Welder or Thoughtcast) with Phyrexian Revoker* and the 1cc cards (Sensei’s Divining Tops and the 4th Voltaic key) for Chalice of the Void. I’ve found that trying to cast your splash card consistently is not ideal with 9 coloured sources (Ali’s list plays 5 Moxes and just 4 Seat of the Synod). This increases inconsistency greatly. Take into account opposing Wastelands and that becomes an even bigger problem.
Going mono brown in the MD is just more consistent and Revoker is an extremely powerful disruptive card that is highly underrated. It shuts down so many cards in Legacy that I believe it deserves a spot in the MD. The same goes for Chalice, that card is busted if you can stick it. This MUD list only has three 1cc cards which are Voltaic Keys, so Chalice @ 1 is pretty much a one sided affair. Sensei’s top is also quite inefficient in this deck in my opinion as there are no fetchlands and Kuldotha Forgemaster is the only shuffle effect.
Sensei’s Top + Voltaic Key is cute but not necessarily game winning. A Revoker on your opponent’s Equipment/Vial is a huge play in the early game and shutting down Walkers/Shackles later in the game is also amazing. I don’t play the 1 random Karn, Liberated because he is exactly that, a random 1-off. He isn’t an artifact that I can tutor for with Forgemaster and he doesn’t reveal to Metalworker. I’m a fan of consistency, so I’ll pass on running him.
Now I will finally come to the white splash tech from the board. Seal of Cleansing is the only effective answer to both Null Rod and Energy Field because it is preemptive. It is quite easy to drop a Seal on turn 2 on the play before Null Rod or Energy Field comes down. Having Horizon Canopy also allows you to drop the Seal even after Null Rod hits play. Post board you have 13 white sources to cast Seal with since you bring in 3 Canopies from the board. One may argue that the Canopies are a huge waste of space in the board for just trying to deal with Null Rod/Energy Flux. However, you will be surprised how many times you’ll want more land from the board.
MUD is also sometimes soft to mana screw centered decks like Team America, Junk or BW Aggro. A discard spell on a Grim/ Metalworker followed up by a Wasteland/Vindicate spells big trouble for the MUD player. In these situations you can board out your explosive cards like Mox Diamond and Voltaic Key for Crucible of the Worlds and Horizon Canopy. Not only does this make your deck more resilient to disruption, Crucible + Horizon Canopy also forms a good draw engine for the deck, ala Stax. Since you are already MD-ing the Revokers and Chalice, there aren’t really that many cards you want to fit into the board. The Duplicant is there as another good robot against Aggro decks or as a tutorable out to Peacekeeper.
So is the white splash worth it? Some may argue that it opens you up to Wasteland while Darksteel Citadel doesn’t. Truthfully though, would your opponent rather target an Ancient Den or an Ancient Tomb/City of Traitors? In my testing against Wastelands, I’ve found that the Wastelands always target my double lands. Some greedy fellow would shoot my Den to put me off white, but then that’s great, because I run zero white cards in the MD anyway and that actually saved my double land.
MUD is an extremely strong deck from my testing and I believe this is the most consistent and resilient list I’ve tried. Opinions might differ, but if you are looking for a super cool, powerful deck that is designed to be as consistent as possible, give it a shot (MUD decks will never be THAT consistent, we can’t run Brainstorm and Fetches).* I’ve sacrificed a fair bit of power for consistency and resilience but I believe it’s worth it. In reality, MUD’s biggest problem has always been losing to itself from inconsistencies (actually this applies to all double land based stompy decks). Mulling to oblivion is common so I aim to reduce this as much as possible. The best analog would be Dredge. So would you play Lion’s Eye Diamond Dredge or non-LED Dredge? Same thing applies to MUD. I hope you have enjoyed this article as much as I have enjoyed writing it. Thank you for reading and I look forward to your thoughts.
-Ivan Pei