[Deck] Hulk Breach

[m03]

-Mana generation-
4 Volcanic Island
3 Steam Vents
2 Polluted Delta
2 Bloodstained Mire
1 Underground Sea

4 Lotus Petal
4 Simian Spirit Guide
2 Elvish Spirit Guide
4 Seething Song

-Combo components-
4 Protean Hulk
4 Through the Breach
1 Sneak Attack

-Kill components-
4 Disciple of the Vault
3 Phyrexian Marauder
3 Shifting Wall
1 Phyrexian Dreadnought

-Draw and tutor-
4 Brainstorm
3 Mystical Tutor
2 Summoner's Pact

-Defense-
4 Pact of Negation
1 Daze

-Sideboard-
3 Echoing Truth
3 Daze
3 Shattering Spree
2 Red Elemental Blast
2 Summoner's Pact
2 Tormod's Crypt


This uses the basic Hulk Flash template (http://www.mtgthesource.com/forums/showthread.php?t=5646), but substitutes in enough support cards to get Through the Breach or Sneak Attack into play. This effectively converts it to requiring a 3+ card combo in order to go off early (Song -> Breach -> Hulk). Clearly, it's less efficient than Hulk Flash...and it should be.

One benefit to Breach/Attack is giving haste to the Hulk, which can score an extra 6 damage provided that they don't have any blockers.

Turn 0 God-hands are also possible, but highly unlikely. Here's an example of what one might look like:

1 Simian Spirit Guide
2 Elvish Spirit Guide or Summoner's Pact
1 Seething Song
1 Through the Breach
1 Protean Hulk or Summoner's Pact
1 Pact of Negation

It's vulnerable to all the usual anti combo-involving-creatures suspects (Meddling Mage, Swords to Plowshares, Force of Will, Extirpate, etc.), especially since it trades off defense for speed. Luckily, it's mostly immune to Counterbalance.

Card choices above may not be optimal, but so far it's worked decently in testing. The sideboard definitely requires some work. Putting the deck together was more of a mental exercise than anything.

[Elfrago]

Why are you using the Disciple combo over the Reveillark one?

[Cavius The Great]

What purpose does the Phyrexian Dreadnought serve?

[m03]

Why are you using the Disciple combo over the Reveillark one?

I'm more familiar with the Disciple build. I'll check out the Reveillark build and come up with an alternate decklist.


What purpose does the Phyrexian Dreadnought serve?

It goes to the yard as it comes into play (if I'm reading the current wording of the card correctly), and still comes in under the cost restrictions of Hulk, like the Marauder and the Wall. It doesn't have to be in there...I just threw it in rather than running a 4-of for either of the X cost creatures. Whenever there's an alternative, I like to avoid 4-ofs.

Sort of the same logic as running both Lich and Nefarious Lich, as well as Infernal Contract and Cruel Bargain in the same deck ;).

[xycsoscyx]

The Reveilark build is nice because it uses less cards for the kill than this (I believe it only uses 5), but also has backup to account for different situations (like certain cards already in hand, etc). Like the Diciple build, it still lets you win during your upkeep (for instance, with Pact triggers on the stack).

[raharu]

There's a few problems with your list though (Battletoadz has dabbled with the concept a decent bit). If you draw into any of your Hulk targets, you're fucked. You don't have any method of putting them back into the deck outside Brainstorm, and considering that you have 11 (change combos now!) cards you cannot draw if you want to win, you're in an awkward position. I would suggest Whirlpool Rider, as it gives you a new hand, puts your combo pieces back into your deck, and it's on legs, which gives you food for Cabal Therapy, if you chose to run it.

You also have very little control/ protection. This is a bad thing. Ideally, you want the deck to look and act like Solidarity, i.e. combo-control. Get your land drops, stop anything threatening, and then. You're too focused on speed, which was made incredibly difficult/ impossible due to the banning of Flash. You can't be faster than Belcher, you can't be as stable as TES, but you can do Solidarity's job better. You avoid typical combo hate because you don't need 1-2 mana spells. Inasmuch, you don't care about Chalice of the Void. You don't care about Pyrostatic Pillar. Meddling Mage is still going to be annoying, but in running red, you get 'Bolt/ Pyroclasm to fix that problem, in addition to the typical answers. You don't care about Arcane Lab/ Rule of Law because you only have to play one spell to win (even though you loose the ability to protect it). Because you don't have to build a storm count, you don't have to run storm enablers, so you have more room for control/ protection.

I’m done

[Cavius The Great]

Raharu, you can hardcast the combo peices.

@m03 - Is there any reason you're running only 1 Sneak Attack? Are you trying to be resilient through a Pithing Needle?

[m03]

There's a few problems with your list though (Battletoadz has dabbled with the concept a decent bit). If you draw into any of your Hulk targets, you're fucked. You don't have any method of putting them back into the deck outside Brainstorm, and considering that you have 11 (change combos now!) cards you cannot draw if you want to win, you're in an awkward position. I would suggest Whirlpool Rider, as it gives you a new hand, puts your combo pieces back into your deck, and it's on legs, which gives you food for Cabal Therapy, if you chose to run it.


Actually, you can draw into 2 targets and still pull off a win with them in hand (depending on what they are...two Disciples in hand would be the exception).

Whirlpool Rider *might* make a sensible choice...but if the Reveillark combo (which I intend to research in the next few hours) substantially reduced the number of kill cards required to make it work, it's probably irrelevant.


Is there any reason you're running only 1 Sneak Attack? Are you trying to be resilient through a Pithing Needle?

That, and Stifle. Breach is preferred over Attack for that reason, and the fact that Mystical Tutor can only get Breach. I figured it was a good idea to run more than 4 of each required piece...effectively having 5 Breaches and 6 Hulks (due to Summoner's Pact).

[Cavius The Great]

Actually, you can draw into 2 targets and still pull off a win with them in hand (depending on what they are...two Disciples in hand would be the exception).

Whirlpool Rider *might* make a sensible choice...but if the Reveillark combo (which I intend to research in the next few hours) substantially reduced the number of kill cards required to make it work, it's probably irrelevant.

Yeah but you can't hardcast the Revielark combo peices like you can Shifting Walls/Mauraders. That being said, it increases the number of dead cards you draw into.

[Isamaru]

The guy whose avatar was FYEAHSEAKING and I built this exact deck... except we also included in Blood Moon, Trinisphere, and Chalice for protection, and I think we used a few more Sneak Attack, and no Lotus Petal.

Considering all the combo pieces avoid the lock pieces, I would go for a Moon+Sphere+Chalice version like we had. The Reveillark combo was what gave us the room.

Tell us how your testing goes, though.

[nodahero]

If you wana make this deck work I would highly suggest running a list more similar to that of the ext list. Some of the major benefits of that list versus this is the protection is present and the more condenssed combo kill. Another option that the ext. card pool gives at least for a few more months is cabal therapy. If for some reason hulk is in play and you dont have a sac outlet you could use cabal therapy to get it running.

To deal with stuff landing in your hand we can return to the old legacy flash list and run body snatcher as a 1 or 2 of incase we land a card in hand. That was also its function in the original build when flash was legal. Also another possible addition from the old lists we could run though i see very little reason to is karmic guide to act as an additional copy of any dead card in our yard if for example they killed off the standard to feeders with burn or something.

Theoretical list
// Lands
1 [R] Volcanic Island
1 [7E] Island (1)
2 [ON] Flooded Strand
1 [A] Tundra
3 [ON] Polluted Delta
3 [ON] Bloodstained Mire
1 [A] Underground Sea
1 [MI] Swamp (1)

// Creatures
2 [PC] Body Double
2 [MOR] Reveillark
1 [UD] Body Snatcher
4 [PCS] Simian Spirit Guide
3 [AL] Elvish Spirit Guide
1 [AT] Mogg Fanatic
4 [DIS] Protean Hulk
2 [SC] Carrion Feeder

// Spells
3 [PS] Orim's Chant
2 [SOK] Footsteps of the Goryo
4 [MR] Seething Song
4 [JU] Cabal Therapy
4 [CHK] Through the Breach
4 [6E] Mystical Tutor
4 [5E] Brainstorm
3 [FS] Summoner's Pact
*edit* adjusted list to be more effective

[m03]

Too bad I don't play Extended or go to any of the Extended forums, or else I would have probably known about the Rev build.

Here's the modifications I've been testing:

Mana:
-1 Lotus Petal
+1 Elvish Spirit Guide

Kill:
-11 all of the above
+2 Carrion Feeder
+1 Reveillark
+1 Body Double
+1 Body Snatcher
+1 Mogg Fanatic
+1 Bile Urchin

Draw:
+2 Ponder

Defense:
+2 Daze

I haven't tested enough to determine whether or not running Body Snatcher is better than just running 2 of every kill component instead...especially since it only gains me 1 card, and is strictly less reliable than the 2-of everything plan. It looks to be a good choice to always run 2 Feeders and 2 damage generators (Mogg Fanatic/Bile Urchin) anyway, since those seem to attract the most hate. Also, if you were only running 1 Feeder, ending up with it in hand when the combo goes off would prevent the kill from working, even with the Body Snatcher, since you wouldn't have anything to sacrifice the Snatcher to. Regardless, the Reveillark build does improve consistency by allowing more draw and more defense.

I'm working on a proactive list utilizing discard rather than counters, but I haven't got it dialed in yet, since it requires a substantial (IMHO) change to the manabase.

[nodahero]

2 of vs. 1 of argument
Running the one of's to free up a single slot is not a very safe plan due to the possibility of hate. another problem with ur theory is if they stifle the snatchers ability. Also the lack of any basic lands in ur deck makes ur very vulnerable to moon effects and waste lands. If you do not fear those effects u may consider running veins, tombs, and traitors for more acceleration if you are going for the straight combo race.

control sweet
Also running pact is not a very safe answer due to this scenario... you breach they force you pact their force they force/daze/counterspell your breach and you lose on ur next turn likely. If you want to run protection I would recomend proactive protection in the form of targeted discard or chant/abeyance.

Alternate win
I do however like the addition of an alternate win-con as you suggested. I would however opt out of the urchin and use witsnipper for the ability to remove answers from your opponents deck in case they have a way of nullifying ur life loss ie (albeit bad examples) essence warrden/sould warrden or platnium angel. Also statistically speaking if u had to kill with either urchin or snipper and they were in ur hand and u needed to cast a spell that turn it would be more likely you could cast snipper and win then urchin.