Wild Zombies 2K12

[ACME_Myst]

Hey guys, what's up?

So, I've been toying around with updating the Wild Zombies lists of old, as I feel that certain cards printed in the last couple of years really add to the archetype (most notably, Faithless Looting).

I really don't currently have time to go through the trouble of writing a full primer, but for completeness sake I'll link back to the old threads, as nothing much has changed strategy-wise:

Original primer, 2K7
(http://www.mtgthesource.com/forums/showthread.php?5409-Primer-Wild-Zombies&highlight=)
Updated primer, 2K8
(http://www.mtgthesource.com/forums/showthread.php?8015-Primer-Wild-Zombies-2K8&highlight=)
Updated list, CaNG contest thread
(http://www.mtgthesource.com/forums/showthread.php?8609-Deck-Wild-Zombies&highlight=)
(Minor sidenote. Reading back I'm feeling slightly embarrassed at the little adolescent cunt I appear to have been - my sincere apologies to everyone who was around back then. Anyway..)


So, my updated list as of this moment:

Wild Zombies 2K12


// Lands (21)
4 Verdant Catacombs
3 Wooded Foothills
3 Badlands
2 Bayou
2 Taiga
2 Mountain
1 Swamp
1 Forest
3 Forgotten Cave

// Engine (11)
4 Squee, Goblin Nabob
3 Life from the Loam
4 Faithless Looting

// Beats (17)
4 Basking Rootwalla
3 Bloodghast
2 Wild Mongrel
4 Tarmogoyf
4 Zombie Infestation

// Disruption (11)
3 Firestorm
4 Cabal Therapy
4 Inquisition of Kozilek


Some of the more notable changes from the old lists:

- The manabase has been tweaked slightly to emphasize the higher earlygame dependence on red mana, by upping the Badlands count and swapping out Tranquil Thicket for Forgotten Cave. This is pretty straightforward. I've dropped one of the original 22 lands because we now finally have some real draw.

- Faithless Looting! My initial response when reading the card was that Wizards must've printed this because they really wanted this deck to be good. Red Careful Study with reasonable flashback is just about the best thing that could happen for this deck, barring an unbanning of Bazaar. I'd probably play more than the full playset if I thought I could get away with it.

- Bloodghast is really awesome in replacing Nimble Mongoose, and synergizes much better with the deck's overall strategy. He's also absolutely freaking insane with Cabal Therapy.


Things that haven't changed much:

- I'm still rather torn about the disruption package. I feel that with the inclusion of Bloodghast and Looting, Therapy is now a must-play, as opposed to merely a good alternative to Duress/Thoughtseize.
Firestorm is probably still one of the better sweepers for this deck, and offers great board control and reach. My main dilemma is with the choice of IoK over more spotremoval (the old lists ran 4 Terminate + 1 Smother).
On the one hand, IoK + Therapy allows you to proceed in an ungodly amount of hand raping, while on the other hand, Firestorm generally isn´t played for enough damage to take out opposing Goyfs/Knights/Misc Big Dudes.

- Tarmogoyf is still rather 'meh', in that he's a dumb big guy that doesn't particularly help in advancing the deck's gameplan and clogs up the 2CC slot. He does however offer a pretty good backup plan and is never totally bad.

- The deck is still a freaking blast to play.


Stuff that I'd like to fit (back) in, but cannot find the slots for:

- Anger
- Grim Lavamancer
- Liliana of the Veil
- Terminate
- Maelstrom Pulse
- Genesis


Full disclosure:

I don't currently play paper magic, as I've sold off all of my cards years ago. I have no idea if I will ever (find the funds to) build this in real life. I've been rocking it on MWS with some success, but I don't really think that counts for much. As a consequence, I have no idea how good this deck will perform in the current metagame in any serious, competitive environment. I have, however, been having a lot of fun with it, so I figured I'd drop a list here and see if the community is interested at all.


PS) Mods, please don't lock/merge with old threads. It's been over 4 years, might as well let them rest in peace.

[HPB_Eggo]

Why no Gravecrawler? Seems like the easiest thing in the world to recur it with Zombie Infestation on the board.

[ACME_Myst]

Why no Gravecrawler? Seems like the easiest thing in the world to recur it with Zombie Infestation on the board.

Yes, fair point. To be honest, I haven't tested it, but my reasoning was basically:
If played, it should probably replace either Bloodghast or Basking Rootwalla. However,

- Both are (generally) faster to get into play early, barring hardcasts, in which case it would be on a par with Wally. Note that the hardcast argument holds because you generally don't want to be spending either your first or second turn casting creatures. Ideally, you'd go something like turn 1 Therapy, turn 2 Looting/Discard outlet into either recurred Bloodghast or Wally, flashback Therapy (+ misc 1CC if appropriate); Gravecrawler doesn't really appear to help with this plan.

- Bloodghast recurs for free, which is huge because this deck tends to be rather mana hungry. It's recurrence is also less conditional, in the sense that you play more lands (+ Loams) than Zombies, and it recurs more easily after a devastating sweeper like Deed.

- If it were to replace Wally, you would be left without early game blockers, which probably isn't such a good idea. Wally also has the advantage of potentially beating for more and having a bigger ass.

So, Bloodghast appears to be better in the mid-late game and in the face of control. Basking Rootwalla is ostensibly better in the early game and when lacking support. But again, this is untested theorizing, so it might still be worth some testing to see how he works out in practice.

PS) Also, thanks for the "cards" tag I just discovered by quoting.

[Jabari]

The upside to running Gravecrawler is instead of Goyf you get Vengevine, giving the deck a faster potential clock. Goyf may be a little bigger but the Vines are faster and recur. The biggest problem I see with the deck is G2 and G3 you'll have trouble playing around grave hate, in which case it might be cool to run NO Pro sideboard.

Personally I prefer a Reanimator style build with Ooze combo giving you the chance to combo out without having to beat down.

[ACME_Myst]

The upside to running Gravecrawler is instead of Goyf you get Vengevine, giving the deck a faster potential clock. Goyf may be a little bigger but the Vines are faster and recur. The biggest problem I see with the deck is G2 and G3 you'll have trouble playing around grave hate, in which case it might be cool to run NO Pro sideboard.

Personally I prefer a Reanimator style build with Ooze combo giving you the chance to combo out without having to beat down.

I hate saying this, but I feel that this post was motivated by a severe misunderstanding of how this deck works and functions in actual gameplay.

First off, the Vengevine suggestion - it appeared to me at first sight to not really be worthwhile, but I figured I'd 'fish some hands with it to see how it worked out. The problem, as I expected, is that this deck doesn't typically cast 2 creatures in a single turn, not even with the addition of Gravecrawler. (I went -3 Bloodghast, -1 Wally, +4 Gravecrawler, -4 Goyf, +4 Vengevine). In almost every single situation, their counterparts would've been better.
Which is to say - Gravecrawler indeed doesn't recur nearly as easily as Bloodghast, and Vengevine without the ability to cast 2 critters is a clunky 4 drop that does nothing. I realize it was "good" with Survival in the format, but this deck cannot offer anything near the required support for it.

Second, GY hate - I know this doesn't show from the list, but the deck is (or at least, has always been) rather more resilient to GY hate than it appears to be at first sight. One of the reasons is the backup plan provided by Goyf. The other reason is that you don't really go all-in on your GY as, e.g. dredge does. From experience, the deck has the tendency to quite easily ignore multiple Crypts and/or Extirpates (Surgical Extraction wasn't a card back then, but I'd hardly consider it scarier than 'Pate).

Which isn't to say that the NO Pro plan isn't an option for the sideboard, but I'm not entirely sure it's really required.

Finally, I'm not entirely sure what "Reanimator with Ooze combo" you're referring to here. Is it some kind of derivative of the old Orlov Reanimator lists? I've never gotten those lists to work, so if you have a list it'd be appreciated. If it's just a more traditional Reanimator build I'm not sure about the relevance of it's comparison to this archetype though..

[Jabari]

My mistake, I didn't test the list before making my suggestions. To be honest I imagined the Crawler alongside the Bloodghasts cutting Mongrels and trimming a 4 of somewhere else. Again this is unfounded though so probably just as unnecessary as before.

Ooze combo is: Necrotic Ooze, Phyrexian Devourer, Triskelion - you reanimate or exhume the ooze and proceed to machine gun the face of your opponent. This is of course more reliant on the graveyard than the previous iteration and a different style list including Buried Alive etc. Again not really worth it for what your deck is trying to do.

[sco0ter]

Couldn't this be brought into a more Madness direction?

I mean Liliana of the Veil and Tortured Existence fit perfectly in this deck.
Then you can think about Reckless Wurm and Nightshade Assassin. I don't know, if they are worth it, but that's how I play the deck ;)

I've also seen a similar version with Goblin Bombardment, which works nicely with Gravecrawler and Bloodghast.

[ACME_Myst]

Couldn't this be brought into a more Madness direction?

Sure it could. The obvious question is in what sense that would make the deck better, i.e. more consistent, disruptive/aggressive and/or more resilient?



I mean Liliana of the Veil and Tortured Existence fit perfectly in this deck.

Yes, I've considered Liliana, and it really wasn't that bad as another piece of disruption. It's left out of the current build because it does slow the deck down a bit and because I'm not sure if it's really that much better than the current disruption suite.

I don't think Tortured Existence would really add much, as it's only really interesting targets would be Mongrel and Goyf. This seems to make including it as a 3/4-off a bit of overkill, whereas I feel that as a 1/2-off, Genesis would probably be better. It's not like the deck really needs more discard outlets anyway.



Then you can think about Reckless Wurm and Nightshade Assassin. I don't know, if they are worth it, but that's how I play the deck ;)

Reckless/Arrogant Wurm have been rather underwhelming in some initial testing phases, but yes, it has been considered.
Nightshade Assassin has the disadvantage of not coming online before turn 3, at which point this deck generally isn't holding more than 0-1 black cards. This seems to make it rather subpar as removal, and at 2CC under the assumption that you have a discard outlet online, a 2/1 First Striker also doesn't seem very powerful.

Also, you play this deck? Which is to say, a Wild Zombies variant, not a Madness list? If so, it might be interesting to see your list here.



I've also seen a similar version with Goblin Bombardment, which works nicely with Gravecrawler and Bloodghast.
Without further comment, it is my firm belief that Goblin Bombardment really doesn't have any place in this deck.

[Nihil Credo]

Warning: typical N&D "wouldn't these probably crappy cards that I haven't at all tested be soooooo coooool?" post incoming:

It's historically been a completely shitty card, but now that you have a fairly ridiculous number of graveyard-friendly cards, could Avatar of Discord be worth a shot? (I won't go as far as to bring up Shambling Remains though)

Darkblast or Flame Jab are kind of stupid good in this metagame and may well deserve to be a 1- or 2-of. Unless you get Grim Lavamancer to work, that is.

For that matter, is there a chance in hell the deck might support a Punishing Fire package? Yeah nobody gets their panties wet about 1RR Shocks, but then again three land cards don't sound so hot either.

Oh, and in an Infestation deck, Stinkweed Imp actually has a decent chance of beating Emrakul okImgonnastopherethankyouverymuch

[sco0ter]

Sure it could. The obvious question is in what sense that would make the deck better, i.e. more consistent, disruptive/aggressive and/or more resilient?


I can't tell you. But theoretically you benefit from Madness: Enabling a discard ability AND paying the cheap cost.
Practically it's more inconsistent probably.



Nightshade Assassin has the disadvantage of not coming online before turn 3, at which point this deck generally isn't holding more than 0-1 black cards.


True, I think Assassin is unplayable with so many green cards in it, but generally, in a heavier black list, it is fine.



Also, you play this deck? Which is to say, a Wild Zombies variant, not a Madness list? If so, it might be interesting to see your list here.


I play more of a casual BR Madness list. The only common cards with yours are Infestion, Squee, Looting, Bloodghast.



Without further comment, it is my firm belief that Goblin Bombardment really doesn't have any place in this deck.

I was referring to this deck. (http://www.thecouncil.es/tcdecks/deck.php?id=7989&iddeck=58202)

[Mirrislegend]

I played a deck VERY similar to this in Modern. Things to note from my experience:

Liliana of the Veil is fantastic

Where is Gravecrawler/Vengevine?!? Between Gravecrawler and Rootwalla, Vengevine always comes back!

Here's how I'd do it:

4 Zombie Infestation
3 Liliana of the Veil
4 Faithless Looting
3 Wild Mongrel

4 Gravecrawler
4 Basking Rootwalla
4 Vengevine

3 Bloodghast
2 Squee
3 Life from the Loam

4 Cabal Therapy

22 Land

[ACME_Myst]

It's historically been a completely shitty card, but now that you have a fairly ridiculous number of graveyard-friendly cards, could Avatar of Discord be worth a shot? (I won't go as far as to bring up Shambling Remains though)


Regarding Avatar, I don't think the problem ever was that we lacked sufficient GY-friendly cards to keep it in play. A much more severe problem seems to be the fact that it's rather worthless when you've run out of steam in the face of overwhelming permission and are in topdeck mode. In that sense, stand-alone or self-supporting beatsticks like Tarmogoyf, Genesis and even Gigapede appear to be better. It may be worthwhile however - I don't think it's a totally shitty suggestion.

Regarding Shambling Remains - I'm glad you didn't :P. I'd have to point out that it would probably have to go in the Goyf slot, in which case you'd be left rather defenseless in the face of opposing critters.



Darkblast or Flame Jab are kind of stupid good in this metagame and may well deserve to be a 1- or 2-of. Unless you get Grim Lavamancer to work, that is.


Yeah, I figured. It's mostly why I really want to fit Lavamancer in; I'm considering cutting Firestorm for him - but more on that later. I'd probably run Darkblast over Flame Jab if I would run either, but definitely a valid suggestion.



For that matter, is there a chance in hell the deck might support a Punishing Fire package?


I don't think so. Like you said, 1RR Shock is really underwhelming, and it's recurrence seems way too conditional. I'd probably rather play Death Spark over Punishing Fire, and Darkblast over either.



Oh, and in an Infestation deck, Stinkweed Imp actually has a decent chance of beating Emrakul


Yeah, we actually ran him as a 1-off in some older lists. He's not totally bad on his own, and the Emrakul point has some merit. It's possible he's sideboard material, but I'm not sure he'd survive in the face of annihilator 6. There are probably better options.




I played a deck VERY similar to this in Modern. Things to note from my experience:

Liliana of the Veil is fantastic

Where is Gravecrawler/Vengevine?!? Between Gravecrawler and Rootwalla, Vengevine always comes back!


There's some arguments about this a couple of posts higher up.. To reiterate, this deck really, really, really has trouble casting 2 critters on the same turn. It's in part because the deck was designed not to have to actually cast much creatures, so that you're less vulnerable to permission. It's also because between Wally and (if you'd play him) Gravecrawler, you only run 7-8 1CC creatures, which you prefer to either Madness out early or sacrifice to Therapy before turn 3. Another part is that between Gravecrawler and Zombie Infestation, you only have 8 Zombies, which significantly lowers your odds of recurring 'Crawler after saccing it to Therapy early on. You're essentially suggesting a 3 card combo of which the individual parts are underwhelming, and the execution of which forces you to either slowroll or abandon your early-game strategy.

Regarding Liliana, I know she isn't at all bad. I'm just not sure if she's better than some alternatives.



Here's how I'd do it:

4 Zombie Infestation
3 Liliana of the Veil
4 Faithless Looting
3 Wild Mongrel

4 Gravecrawler
4 Basking Rootwalla
4 Vengevine

3 Bloodghast
2 Squee
3 Life from the Loam

4 Cabal Therapy

22 Land


Have you tested this much? It doesn't appear to circumvent my earlier point about the Gravecrawler/Vengevine problem by, e.g. including more one-drops. Dropping your Squee count to anything below 3 (and really, 4) is something I'd personally never do - he's the absolute tits in multiples. Do you find the complete lack of reliable (spot)removal in Firestorm, IoK or Terminate/Smother to be a problem?



My mistake, I didn't test the list before making my suggestions.



Warning: typical N&D "wouldn't these probably crappy cards that I haven't at all tested be soooooo coooool?" post incoming:



I can't tell you.


I'd like to comment on this, and I hope I'll be able to do it without coming off as a total jackass. While I realize that Nihil's comment has a certain ring of irony to it, he does raise a point I'd like to emphasize. I'm not sure the other posts were as self-aware as his though.

Basically, while I posted this in the N&D thread, I don't really consider this deck to be anything "new" or very much "in development". My team and I (when we were still a thing) have worked on this extensively a couple years back, and playtested the crap out of it. The deck has multiple Top 8's under it's belt, though admittedly, in the old metagame.
So, while I really do appreciate, and certainly do not want to discourage, discussion and constructive criticism, I really would like to encourage people to try to at least playtest it a bit before attempting to take it in very different directions. Card choices were made for certain reasons, and they are still in, or not in, the above list after 4 years because they are what makes this deck work.

Having said that, I will concede that I'm not totally up to date on the current metagame - especially in terms of first hand experience - or on all cards that have become available and/or playable over the past couple of years. So, I certainly do not want to give off the impression that I think I am the Keeper of all Things True. I do, however, have a lot of experience with the deck, even though it's a bit dusty. I really think it might be playable again, now that cards like Counterbalance are seeing less play and mid-range creature-based decks are some of the DtB's.

Anyway, both to show that I really don't want to take all of your advice in stride, and because I think some of the ideas have some merit or have problems that might be overcome, I'll be doing some more testing with the following changes from the list in the OP:

- -3 Bloodghast
- -1 Wild Mongrel
- -4 Tarmogoyf
- -3 Firestorm
- -1 Inquisition of Kozilek
- +4 Gravecrawler
- +4 Vengevine
- +3 Grim Lavamancer
- +1 Darkblast

[Darkenslight]

Is there any potential in using a card like Empty the Catacombs here? This seems like an amazing 1- to 2-of.

[evanmartyr]

Big Game Hunter seems better than Nightshade Assassin, since you'll mostly be hitting opposing fatties and Tarmogoyfs and the like, and it's cheaper. The 2 power and first striking on assassin probably don't matter without equipment, so all you're looking for is a removal spell that can be tossed to ZI. Probably a sb card since you haven't got access to Survival of the Fittest.

[Mirrislegend]

Rootwalla counts as cast from exile, courtesy of madness. Thus it triggers Vengevine. With Faithless Looting powering things, Vengevine will happen often :cool:

[ACME_Myst]

Is there any potential in using a card like Empty the Catacombs here? This seems like an amazing 1- to 2-of.

I'm trying to find a funny "I see what you did there" meme, but it's probably not really worth it. Was this a serious suggestion?



Big Game Hunter seems better than Nightshade Assassin, since you'll mostly be hitting opposing fatties and Tarmogoyfs and the like, and it's cheaper. The 2 power and first striking on assassin probably don't matter without equipment, so all you're looking for is a removal spell that can be tossed to ZI. Probably a sb card since you haven't got access to Survival of the Fittest.

Alternatively, you could play much less conditional removal like Terminate, Smother, Maelstrom Pulse or even Ghastly Demise if you thought the difference in manacost was worth it. That way, you wouldn't be dependent on having to resolve your threats in order to answer those of your opponent.



Rootwalla counts as cast from exile, courtesy of madness. Thus it triggers Vengevine.


I am aware of this.



With Faithless Looting powering things, Vengevine will happen often :cool:


No, it will not. At least not, like I explained above, without either significantly hindering your early game or without striking a pact with the devil to ensure you consistently draw the absolute nuts.

[Darkenslight]

I'm trying to find a funny "I see what you did there" meme, but it's probably not really worth it. Was this a serious suggestion?

Actually, yes, for two reasons:

1) it can act as a mega-pump/token recovery tool;
2) it allows you to mitigate somewhat graveyard hate that's not Leyline/Planar Void.

Its main weaknesses are its cost (4 CMC is not good) and the fact that it's counterable. I think it might actually warrant testing at least.

[ACME_Myst]

Actually, yes, for two reasons:

1) it can act as a mega-pump/token recovery tool;
2) it allows you to mitigate somewhat graveyard hate that's not Leyline/Planar Void.

Its main weaknesses are its cost (4 CMC is not good) and the fact that it's counterable. I think it might actually warrant testing at least.

Ok, fair enough. Pardon my suspicions.
I'm not sure about your second argument (wouldn't they pop Crypt in response, for example?). This would be a lot better if it came at instant speed.
The first argument is interesting, but I'm not sure if it's worth the slots. You may have noticed from the discussion above that there's not a whole lot of flex slots in the deck.


Regarding the whole Gravecrawler/Vengevine thing - I've been goldfishing lists for the better part of my evening (now night) trying to at least get the damn thing to run somewhat smoothly. My current stance is that it may be worthwhile in a hyper-aggressive build that foregoes part of the disruption package in favor of more speed. I'm not convinced this would be better in actual gameplay, but it's probably an avenue worth exploring.
Some conclusions from that:
- Lavamancer doesn't really seem to fit those kind of builds.
- Needs moar Mongrel. With a full set of dogs, casting two critters early on becomes a lot easier.
- Gravecrawler still feels rather janky, and Bloodghast is leagues ahead in terms of adding consistency to the deck. The latter doesn't really play well with Vengevine though.
- Aggressive builds warrant a re-inclusion of Anger, which I've been missing.

This is what I'm currently toying around with:

// Lands (21)
21 Lands, as in OP

// Engine (13)
4 Squee, Goblin Nabob
3 Life from the Loam
4 Faithless Looting
2 Anger

// Beats (20)
4 Basking Rootwalla
4 Gravecrawler
4 Wild Mongrel
4 Vengevine
4 Zombie Infestation

// Disruption (6)
4 Cabal Therapy
2 Firestorm

[joemauer]

This deck is suffering from a lack of disruption.

[Jabari]

When I made the original Gravecrawler comment I was operating with the misconception that bloodghast was a vampire zombie just because it seems like a zombie. The drawback on the Gravecrawler (needing a zombie in play to cast from the graveyard) seems like a big problem with so few zombies in the list. It seems as though the deck needs more cheap zombies to afford such an attack. You do have the Infestation but more aggro zombies would be better to make them more reliable. I can't think of any right now, but an update with testing results would be greatly appreciated.

EDIT: In regards to the lack of testing on our parts. I can't comment for the others but only for myself. Personally, I don't have a lot of spare time to do testing unfortunately, and when I play with what little time I have I doubt my LGS will generate great test result info.

[ACME_Myst]

This deck is suffering from a lack of disruption.

Are you referring to the list in the OP, the more aggressive build in post #18, or to the deck in general? What disruption package did you use and in what matchups did this become apparent?



When I made the original Gravecrawler comment I was operating with the misconception that bloodghast was a vampire zombie just because it seems like a zombie. The drawback on the Gravecrawler (needing a zombie in play to cast from the graveyard) seems like a big problem with so few zombies in the list. It seems as though the deck needs more cheap zombies to afford such an attack. You do have the Infestation but more aggro zombies would be better to make them more reliable. I can't think of any right now, but an update with testing results would be greatly appreciated.

EDIT: In regards to the lack of testing on our parts. I can't comment for the others but only for myself. Personally, I don't have a lot of spare time to do testing unfortunately, and when I play with what little time I have I doubt my LGS will generate great test result info.

Yeah, I had originally expected the same thing for Bloodghast. Too bad, I guess.

And I do understand the fact that most, if not all, people have a limited amount of time to do testing. Without trying to come off as really harsh, I just don't think that fact warrants throwing out strong claims about a deck's viability or suggestions for taking something in a (substantially) different direction, as it would seem apparent that, without at least some testing, the claimee wouldn't have a thorough understanding of how and why a deck (supposedly) works or was build the way it is.
(As a minor sidenote - there are certain decks, which tend to also end up in the N&D forums here, of which it is apparent to anyone with some experience with the format that they are not going to be anywhere near competitive or even playable. I don't think my point holds for those kinds of lists.)

[joemauer]

Are you referring to the list in the OP, the more aggressive build in post #18, or to the deck in general? What disruption package did you use and in what matchups did this become apparent?


The deck in general. I haven't play tested your deck at all, but it is overly apparent that 4 cabal therapy and perhaps four IoK won't help enough against combo or control.

Two or three firestorm won't be enough against decks with creatures.

Perhaps borrow from pox decks and add something like small pox and Lillian Vess. Both synergize well with your deck and can help help compensate in your weak area.

Also, why no wasteland? Life from the loam is kind of weird without it.

[ACME_Myst]

The deck in general. I haven't play tested your deck at all, but it is overly apparent that 4 cabal therapy and perhaps four IoK won't help enough against combo or control.

Two or three firestorm won't be enough against decks with creatures.


I will readily concede that the combo matchup has always been one of this deck's weaknesses. I want to propose that this is in part a natural result of this deck's positioning within the major matchup hierarchy of control > combo > aggro > control.

The control matchup and aggro mirror have proven in the past to not be at all terrible though. You may have noticed from the OP that I'm still very much in doubt about playing more discard or more removal in the disruption slots. This is in part because I find it hard to determine the proper ratio of hate within a vacuum.

The way of beating control, other than disruption and a fast clock, is the annoying tendency of cards in the deck to keep on recurring.
The way you beat aggro is through a clock that goldfishes on a par with most other aggro decks, by generally having more critters in play to facilitate alpha-striking, and again, by recurring stuff that gets lost in the red zone.



Perhaps borrow from pox decks and add something like small pox and Lillian Vess. Both synergize well with your deck and can help help compensate in your weak area.


Small Pox has been tried in the past and has been found to be subpar. Again, Liliana (edit) of the Veil is discussed already, with it's major drawback being that it's disruption that only comes online in the mid-game, at which point you really want to be focussing on winning. It's still a valid suggestion if you'd want to take the deck in a more controllish direction.

I'm not sure what exactly this deck's weak area is in the current metagame. Which isn't to say that I think it is invincible, but it's not readily apparent to me. In the past, it was a prevalence of fast combo decks and Counterbalance, which this deck has trouble with because of the aforementioned position in the archetype hierarchy and it's overly efficient manacurve, respectively. Again, I'm not sure what specifically it is right now.



Also, why no wasteland? Life from the loam is kind of weird without it.


I was wondering when someone was going to suggest this. Basically, the manabase cannot really support it (truth be told, the 3 cycle lands are already stretching it), and we have no real way to support it or capitalize on it's tempo advantage. Which is to say, we do not play other discard that can hit lands (Hymn), other land destruction (Sinkhole, Vindicate, Smallpox/Pox, Devastating Dreams), or cards which directly punish the loss of mana development (e.g. Daze, Resistor effects).
Life from the Loam is still very good to grab cards to feed to discard outlets, develop your own manabase, fill your graveyard and protect against opposing land destruction.


In other news, I'm completely done with the Gravecrawler/Vengevine package. The previous list I posted that uses it is capable of (very) occasionally pulling off some absurdly insane stunts (like goldfishing turn 2), but the loss in consistency and disruption really aren't worth it in my opinion. If anyone wants to have a shot at making it work, be my guest, but I've reached my verdict.
I'm off to test some of the other points of discussion, mostly the inclusion of Lavamancer and Avatar of Discord (which admittedly is proving better in the current list than I remember it to be.) I still think my earlier point about it's major drawback might be a problem, but time will tell. Really, if I can find a sufficiently convincing excuse to drop Goyf (and potentially save $300 on a hypothetical purchase of the deck), I'll be one happy player.

[Mantis]

I really like this deck and have tried to make similar variants work but never succeeded. I think I will try your build out and hopefully can contribute a little bit to this archetype. For now, I will just share what I have found in the past. Smallpox has been very disappointing for me as well, I think the card is just not good enough for Legacy. Vengevine has always seemed pretty underwhelming to me (unless with Survival ofcourse), because you have to do so much to just get a 4/3 which is solid but not overwhelming. The same applies to Gravecrawler. Likewise, I have my doubts concerning the viability of Basking Rootwalla. Most of the time, you want to be doing other stuff such as casting Loams than pumping him with your mana and a 1/1 is just so underwhelming.

Perhaps a terrible suggestion; but have you considered Haakon? I haven't tried the deck so I'm not sure how agressive it is, but if you decide to take a more control orientated approach, I could see him work. 3 mana is a lot, but if you manage to exhaust both your and your opponents resources Haakon is sick. Unfortunately, there are no real excellent knights that you would want to pair him up with in your colors and fit for this strategy, although a singleton Nameless Inversion could work. But as you already have Loam, I'm not sure how much you really need to strengthen up your lategame.