[INN]Mad Labs

Here's a potential Decklist for the card Lab Maniac. Laboratory Maniac turns the mill loss into a win. With that in mind, here's a basic list:

Lands (20)

4 Misty Rainforest
4 Scalding Tarn
12 Island

Creatures (8)

4 Hedron Crab
4 Laboratory Maniac

Protection (14)

4 Disrupt
4 Force of Will
2 Swiftfoot Boots
4 Lightning Greaves

Combo (10)

4 Thought Lash
4 Leveler
2 Paradigm Shift

Draw (8)

4 Preordain
4 Ponder

SB (15)

4 Ravenous Trap
4 Arcane Laboratory
4 Pithing Needle
3 Meta slot


The reason both Lightning Greaves AND Swiftfoot boots are in is to protect your Maniac from spot removal. I'm also not entirely convinced by the Paradigm Shift slot, as I'm wondering if more draw is needed or not.#

Thoughts/critiques are, as always, appreciated.

How about Doomsday? I'm considering to include Laboratory Maniac in my Doomsday-Emrakul deck.

I would try both Lantern of Insight and Sensei's Divining Top since they combo with Thought Lash.

Also, what's the use for Crab?

Needs more divining witch. Get leveler out of there. Just sayin.

Divining Witch>Thought Cast. At least Divining Witch can find the other combo piece.

Sol lands seem like a requirement in this kind of deck. Mad lab guy, greaves/boots and Thought Lash all benefit tremendously from them.

Moxes of the Diamond and Chrome variety are also begging for consideration.

I built a deck similar to this a few years back.

With Thought Lash and a card like Lantern of Insight/Field of Dreams/Soothsaying, etc., you should look at Timesifter. It was a casual deck at best even when Mana Drain was legal, so I'm not sure how well that will work.

Divining Witch is half the wincon. Not only does it tutor for the blue bear, but after Maniac is on the field, you activate witch and name black lotus or vizzerdrix. cast a cantrip and win.

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Originally Posted by Aspirin

How about Doomsday? I'm considering to include Laboratory Maniac in my Doomsday-Emrakul deck.

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Quote:

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Originally Posted by Scordata

Needs more divining witch. Get leveler out of there. Just sayin.

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When I initially saw Lab Maniac, I was thinking either Mono-U or U/b. The Leveler does exactly what I need to win, but I was thinking about Grand Architect and going for a Stax variant with a combo-kill.

Which ties into...

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Originally Posted by PyreDream

Sol lands seem like a requirement in this kind of deck. Mad lab guy, greaves/boots and Thought Lash all benefit tremendously from them.

Moxes of the Diamond and Chrome variety are also begging for consideration.

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I wasn't sure about this, but if I'm going for the U/B there's definitely two cards to consider: Dark Confidant and the Divining Witch. I also wasn't sure of the Sol Lands, which may or may not be worth it. I'll mock it up and playtest it as both Mono-U with Sols and U/B. I'm guessing Disrupt becomes discard at that point, and one of the fetches changes to Delta (Probably the Tarn, given that you can misrepresent your deck with the Rainforest.)

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Originally Posted by 3eowulf

I would try both Lantern of Insight and Sensei's Divining Top since they combo with Thought Lash.

Also, what's the use for Crab?

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Crab is there as a dual-purpose dude: for self-milling and to eat Edicts (which get around the untargetability given by the boots.) I think that the Top might be the better of the two, as it allows me to get around the CU on the Lash, at least for a couple of turns.

So the potential changes are as follows:

(Sol-U)

-2 Scalding Tarn
-8 Island
+4 Ancient Tomb
+4 City of Traitors

-4 Disrupt
+4 Chrome Mox
+2 meta slot (Propaganda/Arcane Lab/something else)

(U/B)

-4 Scalding Tarn
-5 Island
+4 Polluted Delta
+4 USea
+1 Swamp

-4 Hedron Crab
-4 Leveler
-4 Disrupt
+4 Divining Witch (aka Hag with Rod)
+4 Dark Confidant
+4 Discard (Duress/TS)

Why not just put him in Painted Stone? Am I missing something here?

I thought about squeezing him into the painter combo, but you end up cutting countermagic or cantrips to make him fit. Bad idea.
Good idea: ub control shell with a combo finish.

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Originally Posted by Richard Cheese

Why not just put him in Painted Stone? Am I missing something here?

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You only have two ways of protecting him, and 4 cards that directly find him in Painted Stone. It's definitely a possibility, and I have considered it as an alternative. For now, though, I'd like to stick with this to see if it's remotely viable.

I would splah black for Divining Witch as mentioned above and maybe some Spoils of the Vault (yah I know you might die but at least you get a chance to find whatever you need with at most 19 draws).
They are both good ways for you to tutor up Laboratory Maniac.

With only four copies of Maniac in the deck you really need some ways to make sure you can find them just in case you cant draw them. After all without Maniac you cant win the game

If you intend to cast Leveler or Thought Lash faster, adding 3X City or Traitors is also a good idea (also enables turn 2 Maniac).

I am still not really sold on this combo though... it is quite easy to disrrupt the set up and may potentially leaveing you without any cards in library for you to recover.

This is a mana hungry combo, no matter what pieces it includes. I think it needs 24-26 mana sources (including moxen). Painter's combo is less hungry and still, the most successful variant plays 24-25 sources (21 to 22 lands and 3 mox opal). That would be my first suggestion to improve the opening list.

Great start.

IMO, Leveler seems to be the most important part. You only need to resolve Leveler and if you don't have a draw spell such as Gitaxian Probe, Street Wraith, or Jace 2.0 then you get a 10/10 blocker until the next turn when you win. Also 5cc artifact creature is pretty easy to ramp in Legacy (perhaps even Goblin Welder).

Also Mental Misstep seems like a good addition as you might need protection for the Maniac after you cast Leveler. Misstep will cover the most prominant removal spells, StP and Lighting Bolt.

Those are my thoughts but haven't tried a deck list YET. Thought Lash seems to have potential too especially being blue. Diving Witch is "ok" but not sure there's room especially if you are running Gitaxian Probe and/or Street Wraith. Paradigm Shift is probably too "cute" unless somehow you can work in Relic of Progenitus.

Okay:

Taking into consideration the input above, I'm looking at this list:

Lands:(22)

2 Misty Rainforest
4 Polluted Delta
4 Underground Sea
3 Island
1 Swamp
4 City of Traitors
4 Ancient Tomb

Combo: (10)

4 Laboratory Maniac
4 Thought Lash
2 Leveler

Dig: (10)

4 Divining Witch
4 Sensei's Divining Top
2 Intuition

Protection: (14)

4 Force of Will
4 Lightning Greaves
4 Intervene
2 Disrupt

Accel: (4)

4 Chrome Mox

So, why Intervene? As you well know, both the key digging AND the central part of the combo are creatures, which in Legacy will go farming, take a Bolt to the face, or have a contract taken out on them. Disrupt is there as a stalling technique, as you don't want games going past turn 4.

Potential others:

Ancestral Knowledge: Does what the Witch does, but only for the top 10 cards. CU is a bit of a downer, but I suppose I can live with that.

Cryptic Command: Pricey, but it's a Swiss Army Knife of a spell.

Confound: Intervene that cantrips. Might actually be more useful than Intervene, due to the cantrip.

Okay:

Taking into consideration the input above, I'm looking at this list:

Lands:(22)

2 Misty Rainforest
4 Polluted Delta
4 Underground Sea
3 Island
1 Swamp
4 City of Traitors
4 Ancient Tomb

Combo: (10)

4 Laboratory Maniac
4 Thought Lash
2 Leveler

Dig: (10)

4 Divining Witch
4 Sensei's Divining Top
2 Intuition

Protection: (14)

4 Force of Will
4 Lightning Greaves
4 Intervene
2 Disrupt

Accel: (4)

4 Chrome Mox

So, why Intervene? As you well know, both the key digging AND the central part of the combo are creatures, which in Legacy will go farming, take a Bolt to the face, or have a contract taken out on them. Disrupt is there as a stalling technique, as you don't want games going past turn 4.

Potential others:

Ancestral Knowledge: Does what the Witch does, but only for the top 10 cards. CU is a bit of a downer, but I suppose I can live with that.

Cryptic Command: Pricey, but it's a Swiss Army Knife of a spell.

Confound: Intervene that cantrips. Might actually be more useful than Intervene, due to the cantrip.

1. No brainstorm in a combo deck?
2. Only 16 Blue cards for Fow?
3. Chrome Mox? AND Force of Will?

4 Brainstorm
4 Force of Will
4 Mental Misstep
4 Janky Counterspell du jour
4 Laboratory Maniac
4 Devining Witch
4 Diabolic Edict
4 Dark Confidant
2 Vendillion Clique
2 Spell Pierce
2 Ponder

4 Polluted Delta
2 Misty Rainforest
2 Bloodstained Mire
4 Underground Sea
3 Island
2 Swamp
3 Ancient Tomb

You could also splash green for Worldly Tutor/sideboard tech. Hymn to Tourach is probably an OK fit somewhere too. Decks like this need to have a plan B. Tombstalker in the sb?

Hmphf, wouldn't it be better just to play with 4 Witch and 2 Maniac's and no Lash?

A combo with only 6 cards. The rest could just be awesome control cards and carddraw.

On another note, has anybody came up with a good Doomsday Pile? I can't think of one that is better then already exsiting ones. The cheapest I found was 3 mana, but you have to pass your turn without cards in hand and on 7 life. Not really viable.

I've been playtesting combo a lot lately in Legacy and can not stress enough the importance of "protection" and "consistency" if you want to be competitive. Above is a lot of solid ideas but they are lacking in both protection and consistency, imo.

Here's my shot. Will try to find time to playtest in the near future and report back.

Combo:
4 2U Lab Maniac
4 5 Leveler

Tutor/Consistency:
4 U Brainstorm
4 U Gitaxian Probe
1 1 Sen Diving Top
3 G Worldly Tutor

Utility (Tutor/Consistency/Protection)
4 1U Snapcaster Mage
3 2UU Jace 2.0

Protection:
4 U Mental Misstep
4 3UU FoW
1 G Xantid Swarm

Land:
4 Ancient Tomb
4 Misty Rainforest
4 U/X fetch land
4 Tropical Island
2 Breeding Pool
6 Island

Lab Maniac is THE card for the deck which means tutoring/finding/protecting is priority one. There are other builds where you can get away with different things but you would need to add another win condition.

Worldly Tutor is awesome for this deck as it tutors for both parts of the combo. And there are a ton of "draw a card" cards that allow you to get the piece after casting the tutor. In addition you can search up Xantid Swarm if you are playing against non-agro or Snapcaster Mage (see below).

No one thought of Snapcaster Mage? :wink: this thing is going to see soooo much play in Legacy and is an All-Star here as it gives nearly half of your deck flashback w/ all of them having a low cc.

I guess this deck has another win condition in Jace 2.0 x3. Brainstorm will be what he's mostly used for and also cool as he can give you the win if you resolve Leveler w/ the Maniac in play. Not entirely sold on Jace 2.0 here but he seems sooo versatile and best not to underestimate Jace 2.0. If you would remove him, 3 more protection spells would probably be best though there is a good amount of protection when you consider Snapcaster Mage can flashback your Mental Missteps and there is a ton of search so you will mostly likely see multiple Maniacs.

Mental Misstep is a must as it counters StP and Lightning Bolt which are in a ton of decks. Free spells are exactly what you need when you tap out to cast Leveler or an early Maniac.

Realize if you resolve a Leveler w/ a Maniac in play you have to wait a whole turn (hoping a 10/10 can serve as a game-saving blocker :wink:) UNLESS you have a way to draw. This is why at least 1 Top, Jace 2.0 and Brainstorm are key. Gitaxian Probe seems like a perfect fit too as it's free to cast and you get to see their hand.

Don't forget fetch-lands are very important in a deck like this... pop them at the most opportunistic time!

EDIT: Change x1 Xantid Swarm to x1 Vexing Swisher.