[Deck] U/b Mad Scientists

[THE AIDS]

Hi, this is my first post, let me know if something is wrong please.

Land

3 Polluted Delta
3 Flooded Strand
4 Underground Sea
4 Wasteland
8 Island


Combo

4 Academy Researchers
4 Fool's Demise
4 Altar of Dementia


Support/Draw/Other

4 Dark Confidant
4 Duress
4 Intuition
4 Brainstorm
4 Force of Will
3 Serum Visions
3 Counterspell


If you don't see it, the combo is to, first, get out Altar, then play a Researchers with Fool's Demise on it, then mill them to death. I just came up with it and threw a list together, seems rather solid though. Splashing black helps tremendously, although, I am going to test white as well for swords, chant, maybe scepter, etc.

My SB is:

3 Blue Elemental Blast
2 Hydroblast
4 Engineered Plague
3 Tormod's Crypt/Extirpate
3 Pithing Needle


Let me know what you think, thanks for reading this!

[Rabbi Dan]

I always love reading about new combos! I don't agree with the black splash (although getting access to plague in the sideboard would be awesome), white seems more favorable as it would give you access to enlightened tutor to grab two of your combo pieces, and I'd probably run that in place of intuitions and hope you hit the researchers. Maybe on top of that run Orim/Scepter to stall until the later game? I don't know if this deck has tier one potential, but it definitely looks like a fun deck to play and I'm probably going to start testing some alternate builds. Nice first post and welcome to the source!

Edit to say that Sensei's Divining Top would go well with enlightened tutor, and StoP would help a lot against Meddling Mage which could wreck this deck. U/W would also give you access to your own Meddling Mage!

[THE AIDS]

Ahh, right, Enlightened tutor, completely forgot about it :tongue:. That certainly does make white more appealing. I'll do some rigorous testing with both, but it will most likely stay black, as I just remembered about Lim-Dul's Vault, which is pretty sick in this deck, and the SB plagues help alot too. So I changed,

-1 Intuition
-1 Serum Visions
-1 Dark Confidant
+3 Lim-Dul's Vault (Will probably be 4 soon)

Thanks for your comments!

[Zork]

I feel like voidmage prodigy has a place in this deck somewhere since a researchers + fool's demise + voidmage is a recurrable counterspell, not to mention that you could use voidmage to get rid of confidants that are going to kill you. With a white splash, you could also throw Meddling Mages at a spell in a pinch.

I feel like the deck might benefit from a white splash, which you could easily accomplish by switching out the wastelands for tundras and upping the fetch count to 8. I don't feel like it would hurt too much since this deck really wants to be making land drops for mana.

[THE AIDS]

I'm not really feeling the Voidmage, maybe as a one-of. The white splash is entirely possible,

-4 wasteland
-2 island
-2 serum visions
-3 counterspell
-1 fool's demise
-1 altar of dementia

+4 tundra
+1 fetch
+3 enlightened tutor
+4 meddling mage
+1 lim-dul's vault


New SB looks like:

4 engineered plague
4 swords to plowshares
4 orim's chant
3 tormod's crypt

Unless I get a read on what they are playing, Mage will be getting set to Pithing Needle. If one gets out, naming Altar, I have to switch to aggro mode, which is not good :frown: Keep the comments coming! Thanks!

[Team-Hero]

You can also run Vedalken Æthermage to be able to search for your Academy Researchers. With Vedalken Æthermage and Enlightened Tutor you are bound to be able to grab your combo piece at least more than once during a match in case something happens. I like the white splash idea for sure because it does give you Enlightened Tutor and Meddling Mage... and a tutorable Meddling Mage and Voidmage with Vedalken Æthermage. I would also recommend Saprazzan Skerry since it doesn't seem like your going to be tapping your lands too much unless you have the combo in your hand. Just some thoughts.

[blaat]

I really like this combo and tried to make a deck with it, like the ones posted above.
I searched for possible kill cards and came up with this list:

Kill:
B carrion feeder

2 altar of dementia
1R goblin bombardement

3 blasting station
2B nantuko husk/phyrexian ghoul

I chose altar as wincondition:

//NAME: Foolish Research.mwDeck

4 Polluted Delta
4 Flooded Strand
4 Tundra
2 Underground Sea
9 Island

4 Academy Researchers
4 Meddling Mage

3 Altar of Dementia
4 Brainstorm
4 Counterspell (or Daze)
3 Enlightened Tutor
3 Fool's Demise
4 Force of Will
4 Lim-Dul's Vault
4 Lotus Petal

// Sideboard:

Usuall stuff like plow, chant & crypt.

Can this become something in the current legacy meta?
I mean, is a 3-card combo with counter backup worth trying?

I'm trying to find some time to test this :frown:, so if I actually find some time I'll post the results.

[Iranon]

Wouldn't it make more sense to discuss just the combo for now and talk the direction of the rest (Just cantrips or true draw? Just counters or other forms of disruption/protection? etc) for later?


+ Fairly compact. Just 3 cards, no further deck requirements.
+ Doesn't require vulnerable 1-ofs
+ Available in a single colour
+ Reasonable mana costs in 2+3
+ Not dependent on the yard
+ Unaffected by Chalice @ reasonable values

- None of the cards is very useful on its own
- Shut down by Pithing Needle
- Requires 3 cards, 2 must be in hand at the same time
- Lacks efficient enablers (like Aether Vial or Gamekeeper)
- doesn't realistically come online before turn 3


It's not quite as compact as Severance/Belcher, and and doesn't easily lend itself to turn 2 wins like Cephalid Illusionist/enabler, but has noticable advantages over either.
On the whole, the combo looks fairly viable to me.