Basic rules in legacy:
1- No Brainstorm without 7x or 8x Fetch
2- No playing worse mana than Delver. 8x Fetch target 6x U sources...with very conditional option for 7x Fetch target 7x U sources. Your magic number is 14.
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Basic rules in legacy:
1- No Brainstorm without 7x or 8x Fetch
2- No playing worse mana than Delver. 8x Fetch target 6x U sources...with very conditional option for 7x Fetch target 7x U sources. Your magic number is 14.
Mycosynth Gardens came in the mail yesterday and the card has been excellent. Just leave it always up once you have a Dreadnought online and youre hedged vs removal. A couple of copies are well worth including in Dressnought.
Fox pointed out elsewhere that, Ark4n's 4-1 ed with the below list yesterday.
4x Dragon Rage Channeler
4x Phyrexian Dreadnought
1x Grim Lavamancer
2x Currency Converter
1x Phyrexian Furnace
2x Scroll of Fate
4x Dress Down
4x Stifle
4x Brainstorm
4x FoW
4x Bolt
3x Minor Misstep
4x Vista
4x Tarn
4x Mycosynth
3x Island
2x Saga
2x Wasteland
2x Otawara
1x Mountain
1x Volcanic Island
I felt the list can be slightly more focused but its a great starting point.
Edit: I understand the logic of not playing Ponder or EI due to the low number of blue mana sources and high density of colorless lands but I would personally make the following changes to the above list…
-1 Currency Convetor
-1 Scroll of Fate
-1 Minor Misstep
-1 Bolt
-1 Island
+1 Volcanic Island
+1 Street Wraith
+1 Mishra’s Bauble
+1 Manamorphose
+1 Daze
The free cantrips all enable delirium and help fill the yard for Lavamancer.
I would also replace the last remaining Scroll of Fate with Torpor Orb if your local meta has a decent number of Initiative decks.
Ok out 1 S. Library and 1 basic LandQuote:
Originally Posted by Fox
In 2 fetch
Tot 19 Land
1 basic island is useful against many decks.Quote:
Originally Posted by babau
Since you're playing Uro (mana hungry), you should be fine going up to 20 lands. That's only 15 real mana sources (+ Wasteland and Boseiju) so you shouldn't mana flood.
8x blue fetch
3x Underground Sea
3x Tropical Island
1x Island
4x Wasteland
1x Boseiju
To make space you can cut Sylvan and 1 Daze. You don't want to be on 4x Daze when building up to big mana plays like Uro, Loam, Lazav activations... 4 Daze is for decks that play turn 1 creatures like Delver.
Thank you, in fact 18 lands were few,-)
Do you have any recommendations for the side?
I would focus a little more on what happens you have these enabling-Nought cards...but:Quote:
Originally Posted by babau
1- someone Surgicals your Noughts and has something as simple as Relic to control escape fuel
2- someone kills your Noughts and Wastelands you off escape mana
These are the problems you're not going to fix with a SB. These flaws hard lock your deck into bad matchups against every tier 1-1.5 deck that is not combo or Delver. You can get away with this in combo-boosted leagues...but it probably doesn't work in short challenges anymore due to Tomb/Chalice [Initiative] depriving you of ability to get paired vs Delver. For reference, we used to be seeing about 30% of the winner bracket being Delver. To get back into the 6-7 round challenge scene, you need to guarantee 3-4 pairing autowins vs inbred meta [online-only phenomenon]. You need to keep the overwhelmingly favorable matchup vs Delver and also construct to also autowin against the Initiative fraction that stole Delvers representation total (which Stiflenought was totally reliant upon).
All the issues above creates a ceiling these 3c Stiflenought decks can never break through, having tied their strategy completely to the most-hated zones in the format (graveyard followed by battlefield). If you want to play near [but always below] that ceiling, the data shows you are on RUG getting CA from Iteration and Uro with SB Blasts. URB with Iteration and Kroxa with Blasts is a worse approach by the numbers, but still second place.
BUG however is horrendous, and this really tracks back to UB being the absolute worst color set to support Nought. It's also the single worst color combination at killing artifacts - and it's so bad that Karn is the best UB answer to Chalice. Recall that you have to chase that Chalice win %, discussed above, particularly when leaving the league environment. While Decay/Trophy-types require black mana, green by itself already has that covered (FoV, Boseju, etc).
Here's the net effect of black:
1- you get removal spells that are more powerful than white removal, but less reliable. Sheoldred's Edict, Bloodchief's Thirst, Murderous Rider all directly target PWs and Sudden Edict has split second. Problem is they're more expensive, and overloading on dual lands is antagonistic to casting these.
2- you get the single best maindeckable, mana-requiring counterspell in the format with Drown in the Loch...but you need removal that puts their stuff in the GY rather than exile...and we're getting back to the issue with overloading on duals vs higher mana costs.
3- you get access to single color pip, 3 mana wraths...but you need to get to that mana, and if you want to avoid hemorrhaging life on a Toxic Deluge that gets countered, then you need snow basics to split with Dead of Winter.
4- you get Cling to Dust, which requires creatures to be put into the GY to give the deck access to lifegain...and you need to develop your mana to use this as your [anti-titan] alternative to Uro/Kroxa. The dual land issues again rear their ugly head.
5- you're still trying to be Stiflenought, and you still need to beat Chalice...and Karn is still the best way to do this...and you need basics to get you to this mana total.
6- You get 2x SB Plague Engineer and 1x Nihil Spellbomb. Cool...oh I can't access easy wins against blue decks, nor can I deal with Murktide as well without 4-5x SB Red Blasts.
Black either adds nothing you need or it takes you down a not-Dreadnought-friendly decision tree. If you want Strix, play Ice-Fang (people play Meltdown, get ahead on cards). If you want discard, draw cards instead with Uro and Iteration (get ahead on cards). If you want Plague Engi, throw Uro into deathtouchers and recur Uro (get ahead on cards). If you want Decay, play the best green spell in the format: FoV (get ahead on cards). If you want Decay, mulligan less b/c Boseju is a land (get ahead on cards). If you want Nihil Spellbomb, play Endurance (block Delver and DRC or flash in to steal the initiative, get ahead on cards). A theme should be standing out here: get ahead on cards...and also have Red Blasts while doing it.
At a baseline you should heavily associate Black + Dreadnought with a 40% winrate...in combo-boosted leagues (it's worse in paper weeklies and tournament settings). If it's Black + Kroxa/Iteration/Red Blasts, way better than 40% but significantly less win % than same thing with Uro/Iteration/Red Blasts.
The reason for no Ponder or EI is because Fox designed the deck and Fox doesn't play Ponder or EI with Dreadnought. But there is enough blue mana. It has 14 blue lands + 4 Mycosynth. Ponder or EI would be better than those bad free cantrips.Quote:
Originally Posted by Clark Kant
Bauble is a mistake. DRC does not need Bauble. UR Delver needs Bauble because it doesn't have artifacts or enchantments, so it needs Bauble to add a card type. Urza's Saga & Dreadnought already give you 2 more card types than Delver has, so you don't need Bauble to reach Delirium. Saga into Dreadnought or Phyrexian Furnace gives you 3-4 card types out of nowhere.
Manamorphose & Street Wraith are bad too... DRC already fills the yard for itself and Lavamancer. It doesn't need much help. Currency Converter helps fill the yard too.
Scroll of Fate is much better than Torpor Orb because it can make end of turn Dreadnoughts and convert dead cards into 2/2 threats. Torpor Orb also makes your Uro worse. You could play Torpor in the SB vs Initiative, but the main deck already has Dress Down and Stifle to hate on them.
The net effect of your suggested changes @Clark Kant is cost increase of $800 and significant loss of winrate. My deck costs about $1900, and it uses 1x Volc. That means the cost of entry to legacy is $1100 with a Steam Vents. This gives you a deck with a card pool and a play experience that have use outside of DnT, and has drastically better matchup profile vs the entire format than Shadow ever could.
On the 2nd Volc, you just suggested having 4x Vista and only 3x targets.
On the 1x Daze, that list has 11 lands that do not have descriptor Island.
On the Bauble, turning Mycosynth into a sacrifice rod with zero continual impact on the board state is the worst way to turn the land into a cantrip.
One cutting Scroll, you have to have a plan versus Chalice.
On two completely worthless cards with zero impact on the gamestate (Wraith, Manamorphose), wtf? I have zero interest drawing deeper into a deck with an anti-Chalice plan you just suggested removing.
Here's how this works:
-1 Nought, +1 Lavamancer
-1 Mycosynth, +1 Mountain
-1 Dress Down, -1 Minor Misstep, +2 Shark Typhoon (look at my mana progression, look at DRC, look at Currency Converter)
On things to test to determine max winrate:
-2 Minor Misstep, +2 FoN
-1 Stifle for +1 flex slot (singleton Misstep, another cantripping artifact like Map, another burn spell, another spell land like Spikefield Hazard to go from 83.5% odds of opening hand with 2 land minimum to 85.7%)
This is very important to understand: the reason you don't see Standstill in here is that *maybe* it's good enough CA if Mycosynth can cantrip itself, tap to counter removal, decrease mulls due to color fixing, and on top of all that result in higher slot investment in Dress Down (more CA). Also understand that this is a Standstill manabase, and we don't have Standstill - and that means we need to have anti-flood built in (spell lands, Converter, useful Mycosynth CA targets, Scroll). Almost everything you suggested turns the mana base against the deck's own winrate.
Thank you, you were really kind to write all this explanation about the best choices based on the current metagame, I will treasure it.Quote:
Originally Posted by Fox
To add to what @FTW is talking about:Quote:
Originally Posted by FTW
-Playing a deck with <60 cards (via adding Gitaxian Probe clones) helps decks with too few lands not get mana screwed.
-Bauble + Fetchland work together to increase the odds of Delver flipping (despite sabotaging the flip with card type artifact reveals).
-Free cards that cantrip by going to GY, and then become +1 delve mana are effectively cantripping Lotus Petals.
So having stated all 4 mechanisms by which Delver decks specifically benefit from using Bauble, we declaratively know that my deck will never be able to use Bauble as well as or better than Delver can. My list doesn't cheat on land totals, it doesn't need help assembling delirium, it doesn't need to flip a Delver of Secrets, and it doesn't delve. Simply by stating these facts we know that my deck can only play Bauble worse than Delver, meaning it is a winrate-lowering decision (that needs no testing).
Not disagreeing with bauble or not here (I don't play the deck), but this argument is wrong. It is not because a deck plays a card better that another one shouldn't play it.Quote:
Originally Posted by Fox
Or stop playing brainstorm in Uxx decks and StP in D&T because miracle use them better?
The way people play Brainstorm is with Fetches. You absolutely should never use Brainstorm if you can't use it as well as everyone else (averaging 8x Fetch).Quote:
Originally Posted by dte
No matter what deck Plow is in, it requires the opponent to provide targets, otherwise it rots in hand. About the only decks that can't achieve this level of success with Plow are the Chalice on 1 team.
Now think about putting Plow in a Dreadnought deck where no other Plow user can goldfish to gain 12; that's playing the card better (not a great line vs non-Bolt decks, but also only a matter of time before a playable card comes along that says "when you gain X, drain opponent X").
The way to maximizing winrate is always going to be finding something novel that others can't use or doing "the thing" better than any other deck. You are allowed to make sideways moves with staples as long as they allow other aspects of your deck to do "the thing". If that means buying time with Bstorm/Fetch or treading water with Plow, it's good enough.
These sideways moves affect the gamestate, but Bauble doesn't. You are required to get mana out of Bauble in this format whether you funnel it into something like delve, threshold (eg Cabal Rit), metalcraft (Mox), or improvise. Again you have to accomplish this before ever testing the card.
The Mycosynth has been great. It enables Nought and it also protects Nought from removal.
I think its finally time to cut Stifles from the Dressnought as both Dress Down and The Mycosysynth are stronger and have more utility and warrant 4 copies.
I have the gardens in anticipation of this but I just love stifle too much for that to be the cut.Quote:
Originally Posted by Clark Kant
Can't be forgetting where your winrate comes from. Stifle beats combo, allows you to mangle Delver's mana base, and creates games where opponents have to trade resources ineffectively (eg discard 2 cards to counter Stifle). The backup mode of Stifle has always been to make a Nought. Making Noughts with Stifle is a salvage line, and you do not want to be losing a land drop to force this line of play. It's also a three land play...so you might want to protect that glass cannon manabase with Stifle.Quote:
Originally Posted by Clark Kant
I think dte's point was a general one, not specific to any card (Bauble, Brainstorm, StP, etc). It's a fallacy to go from "deck B cannot use the card as well as deck A" to "the card would definitively lower deck B's win rate, without testing needed". There are other reasons you reached the conclusion for Bauble vs for staples like Brainstorm & StP, but that argument itself is faulty.Quote:
Originally Posted by Fox
For example, adding Black Lotus would increase many decks' win rates (ignoring game loss for illegal deck). Just because some combo deck uses Black Lotus even better doesn't mean it wouldn't also increase other decks' win rates.
The relevant question is "does this card increase my deck's win rate?" not "is this card even better in another deck?" (either way Bauble fails)
This works up to a point. When you start imitating a deck and have the same slot totals invested in Ponder, Brainstorm, FoW, Iteration, etc; and then add more copying to it with Bauble, we have to start directly comparing the deck winrates. The slots necessary to accomplish distinctly different gameplay are rapidly diminishing. At some point you are just worse Delver with jankier dudes. Copying slots is just speedrunning your way to a less competitive endpoint if you can't do [insert thing] the same or better.Quote:
Originally Posted by FTW
As far as Black Lotus goes, it would be like wanting to make a Null Rod tribal deck with 4x Lotus (but we also need to pretend Karn doesn't exist, because every deck would be a Lotus deck, and thus be forced to jam 4x Karn). We know such a deck can't possibly use Lotus as well as other decks since it is killing its own topdecks. Same thing a Chalice deck will run into if they jam Plow. In the first case you can't use the mana at least as well as other decks, and in the latter you can't use the card/effect as well as other decks. We can explain the lower win rates in all sorts of ways, but at the end of the day they used the same tool worse; and that's the crux of the problem. It's the same as jamming Tarmo vs Murktide: same thing, just crappier.
Cards like Brainstorm and Plow don't determine a direction. They don't move the advantage bar or produce overwhelming advantage or force opponents to answer a question. If you rearrange things with Bstorm or buy time with a Plow you're left with a multitude of novel paths to take (aka deck construction). You still need to select a novel path and do it better than anyone else. Differing novel paths are like apples and oranges; they have different matchup profiles. It doesn't matter if staples lead to a single, knowably best aggro build (like say Delver)...it doesn't mean everyone has to play aggro, and it certainly doesn't mean aggro beats every other novel approach to the game.
I think if your self given example is "I would not play black lotus, given the chance" then maybe your deck building heuristics are utter trash and you need to throw them out
Backed up by the fact there is a format we can point to and say "wait a minute, people play null rod and lotus together all the time"
Re-read it. I said every single deck would have to start at 4x Karn and 4x Lotus. So if we pretend Karn doesn't exist...I said nobody would get ahead by ramming their 4x Lotus into their own Null Rod tribal - it would be a monumental failure. Null Rod would be soft-banned b/c every not-Rod deck would use Lotus better.Quote:
Originally Posted by FourDogsinaHorseSuit
Learn to read.
---
So going back to the suggestion to play Bauble, it shows a fundamental deficit in understanding how magic works. That card is a cantripping Lotus Petal via the delve pathway in the Delver deck. This pathway is not in my list. If you think Bauble would better my deck (completely skipping on the cantripping Lotus Petal effect), it means you forgot that mana is the most basic and important currency to pay attention to in the game.
This is a weird gaslight because your post is still up, unedited:Quote:
Originally Posted by Fox
You opened right up saying that you were going to pretend Karn doesn't exist. So no, you didn't say every deck would be 4 Karn 4 lotus, you said you were going to intentionally exclude it from the example.Quote:
As far as Black Lotus goes, it would be like wanting to make a Null Rod tribal deck with 4x Lotus (but we also need to pretend Karn doesn't exist, because every deck would be a Lotus deck, and thus be forced to jam 4x Karn). We know such a deck can't possibly use Lotus as well as other decks since it is killing its own topdecks. Same thing a Chalice deck will run into if they jam Plow. In the first case you can't use the mana at least as well as other decks, and in the latter you can't use the card/effect as well as other decks. We can explain the lower win rates in all sorts of ways, but at the end of the day they used the same tool worse; and that's the crux of the problem. It's the same as jamming Tarmo vs Murktide: same thing, just crappier.
You also are so far into your own make-believe land you don't seem to understand that they do run null rod and lotus together. In the same deck. The whole thesis of this tangent was you saying not to run the cards that would be worse in your deck.
So, once again, you're wrong about just about everything and shame on everyone (especially me) for still engaging with you. How do people fall for your shtick every time? Go back to fucking off.
So we're talking about Black Lotus, so you do understand that every single deck has Lotus right? And you understand that every deck has to spam turn 0 Karn right? That is what Black Lotus leads to. It's the only endpoint...So knowing that this is the only endpoint, and that Karn is a 1-sided Null Rod...then nobody would play symmetrical Null Rod effects, because everybody would be a 1-sided Null Rod deck.Quote:
Originally Posted by FourDogsinaHorseSuit
So what the discussion has been about is adding cards that other people use effectively, but you can't. So if we pretend there is no Karn in this hypothetical, we already know that Null Rod spamming would be self-defeating. It would be very cool and powerful feeling to have 12/60 card be Black Lotus and Null Rod and Ouphe wouldn't it.....until you realize everyone else is going to Lotus -> Minsc or whatever you into the dirt. At no point are you getting out of that by deploying redundant Null Rod effects and topdecking Black Loti you can't activate (from waaaaaaay behind on board).
So why would the Null Rod spammer lose? At the core of the answer is that they can't use Black Lotus as well as or better than everyone else. As it turns out, mana is kind of important to pay attention to.
Nice try, but fuck off!
Since you don't want to participate in a meaningful discussion, I suggest you proxy up what you think is a viable example of a vintage deck playing Lotus and Null Rod. I want you too add 3x Lotus to it...and then I want you to jam it against like any other vintage deck that also gets to play 4x Lotus. Let me know when you understand just how unplayable that idea is when your opponent always has the Lotus in their opener (particularly when you're on the draw). Gentlemens' agreement to use no Karns ofc.Quote:
Originally Posted by FourDogsinaHorseSuit
Here's your helpful stats (not counting mulligans): your opponent is going from 11.7% to 39.9% of opening hands with Lotus. Best of luck to our Null Rod hero.
Quote:
Originally Posted by Fox
Quote:
Originally Posted by FourDogsinaHorseSuit
We're making progress, I can feel it. You play legacy, and you know that slinging do-nothing 1-for-1 discard spells at Uro is futile. Deep down you know that spamming do-nothings at do-somethings works nowhere. Connect the dots, you're so close!
Quote:
Originally Posted by Fox
Quote:
Originally Posted by FourDogsinaHorseSuit
Nope. We're so close.
You brought up a point that was worth discussing. You said that we would see wild success out of 4x Black Lotus Null Rod tribal decks in @FTWs hypothetical. You point is based solely on the existence of 1x Black Lotus decks with Null Rods in Vintage.
The thing about having an adult discussion is thinking critically. You overlooked the fact that successfully dropping a Null Rod is a different thing in a deck that only has 1x slot of Lotus vs 4x slots (see also how 4x Chalice in legacy does not get to play 1-drops that can't escape Chalice through the Saga pathway). You also overlooked that every time a current vintage Null Rod deck stares down an opponent, that that opponent only has an 11.7% chance to open a hand with Lotus...and when they mull they get another 11.7% chance to see a Lotus...and when we do the math we recognize that current Null Rod decks in vintage owe a lot of their success to that 11.7% not being 39.9% (with one mull, that is over 50% odds to open Lotus, and that might be a problem if they can just win on the play by going down to 3 looking for something as simple as land, Lotus, Minsc vs someone drawing do-nothings like Null Rod)
So you brought up a reasonable discussion point, and I told you why it doesn't reasonably work. While I'm sure responding with a content bereft personal attack feels good, we're right back at the same place where in @FTWs hypothetical where the reason a 4x Lotus deck will never be viable as Null Rod tribal, because they're playing from too far behind and through too much self-sabotage - it's actually a lot like playing discard tribal vs Uro.
So the point stands. The reason a deck or idea finds its way to being uncompetitive can be stated as; failing to do something novel [and relevant] better than any other deck could. So the reason why Dreadnought can't run Bauble can be simply understood as: Delver does it better, and we would do it worse... because we can't use it as a cantripping Lotus Petal.
To help you understand this we can look at DRC. Dreadnought decks use it better than Delver ever could. Delver is consistent and powered (tier 1), but Dreadnought is tier 2 meaning that it is overpowered at the cost of consistency. For us DRC addresses an aspect of our game the generates disproportionate amounts of win % b/c it addresses a primary deficiency (which Delver decks do not share).
This doesn't mean that Delver doesn't get to play DRC b/c we're the best at using it. It means that Delver is not allowed to use DRC in the same way as we do - they have to find a different novel direction and be better at that novel thing than anyone else. In the simplest of terms Delver has defined their novel direction as using Bauble as a cantripping Lotus Petal - and they're better at it than anyone.
But that doesn't mean that only Delver gets to use Bauble. Other decks still get to do novel things with Bauble that still make mana like threshold (Cabal Rit) or metalcraft (Mox) or improvise (Kappa).
This is all that I have said, and until we see trash ideas like Tarmogoyf vs Murktide or discard vs Uro winning from way behind, we know that every deck in magic traces its success to being the best at the novel thing it does. It doesn't mean they get to have a monopoly on staples.
Quote:
Originally Posted by Fox
Quote:
Originally Posted by Fox
First, you're assuming the an equilibrium state reached of optimal design for all decks. The context of this discussion is whether adding a card would improve the win-rate of a New & Developmental deck, which may not yet be optimized.Quote:
Originally Posted by Fox
You also picked a very extreme case with anti-synergy (Null Rod). That falls into the "other reasons" category. If you take some generic brew deck like MonoGreen Beasts, adding Lotus would increase the win rate, even if some storm combo deck uses Lotus even better.
Anyway, Lotus does increase the winrate of Vintage Fish/Stax/Prison decks. That's why they run it. Lotus helps them power out turn 1 prison pieces on the play. You argue this only works because they run Lotus as a 1x and not a 4x, but they often run some number of Moxen too, so it amounts to the same frequencies.
The scenario you're describing is Null Rod tribal with 4x Lotus On the Draw vs proactive deck (aggro, combo) with 4x Lotus On the Play. Yes, the aggro/combo deck is favored. That's not because Lotus is winrate lowering in Null Rod tribal, or because Null Rod only works in formats with Lotus @ 1x, but because Null Rod itself is bad on the draw vs Lotus. Null Rod is very bad against Lotus on the draw, because Lotus has already been used on turn 1 - it's too late. It's like playing Suppression Field in Legacy turn 2 on the draw, after opponent has fetched twice & in a deck that also has fetchlands! The problem you identify has more to do with Null Rod being a bad Lotus hate piece than mana acceleration being bad in Null Rod tribal.
Vintage decks mainly run Null Rod to hate on Moxen (present at 3-5x the rate of Lotus). Null Rod is good against Moxen on the play & on the draw. It's also good against Sol Ring, Mana Crypt, Time Vault, etc. These artifacts are already present in Vintage decks at higher frequency than 4x Lotus, and accelerated Null Rod has still always been a pillar of the format.
If you have a Legacy format with 4x Lotus but no Moxen, then Null Rod tribal with Lotus will be too slow on the draw. But that has more to do with Null Rods failing to stop Lotus on the play (the deck is stuck powering out cards that can't help it catch up) rather than Lotus being bad in the Null Rod deck. A Null Rod deck with lands instead of Lotus would have the same problem on the draw (fail to catch up to what the other decks are powering out with Lotus), except it would be even worse on the play!! Null Rod is the win-rate lowering component here, not Lotus.
Why? Lotus casts Turn 1 Karn & Turn 1 Null Rod & Turn 1 Collector Ouphe and all other cards that are good against the opponent's Lotus deck when going first. Without Lotus, you would not be able to power out all those cards on turn 1 as easily, letting opponent use their Lotus first.Quote:
Originally Posted by Fox
The other decks may use Lotus better, but Null Rod Tribal would have an even lower win rate without Lotus to help it power out turn 1 prison pieces. Casting Turn 4 Karn would be much worse than casting Turn 1 Karn.
The relevant comparison for win rate is:
a) Null Rod Tribal with Lotus
b) Null Rod Tribal without Lotus
NOT
a) Null Rod Tribal with Lotus
c) Other deck with Lotus
Whether c > a (the other deck uses Lotus better) doesn't change whether a > b. If a > b, the Null Rod deck is still better with Lotus in it than without Lotus. Even if that win rate is 30% ("soft-banned") and deck c is 55%, Lotus still increases the win rate for deck a.
This is the exact flawed reasoning with Dressnought vs Delver that I was trying to point out with the analogy, and you used it again. Other decks' win rates are tangential to whether Lotus improves Null Rod Tribal's win rate.
Back to Delver and Bauble:
Bauble is bad in your deck is not because Delver uses Bauble better (Delve & extra card type for Delirium), but because Bauble doesn't really do much for your deck. It doesn't add anything that your strategy needs. It's just a filler "slowtrip". Cards like that make mulligans and cantrips worse without advancing your game plan.
I agree with you on the conclusion. I just felt like you were arguing backwards from the conclusion, using a faulty reason to justify it. dte seemed to say the same thing. While it amounts to the same conclusion either way in this case, that reasoning could be wrong for other decks and other scenarios.
do not engage!
If we needed to build a monoblue dressnought list, how would you build it?
4x Phyrexian Dreadnought
2x Delver of Secrets
2x Murktide Regent
2x Sailor’s Bane
1x Brazen Borrower
1x Currency Converter
1x Phyrexian Furnace
4x Dress Down
4x Brainstorm
4x FoW
3x Stifle
3x Minor Misstep
2x Ponder
1x Flusterstorm
1x Misdirection
1x Daze
1x Slip Out the Back
1x Force of Negation
4x The Mycosynth Garden
4x Snow-Covered Island
3x Otawara, Soaring City
3x Misty Rainforest
3x Flooded Strand
3x Urza’s Saga
2x Wasteland
SB:
4x Hydroblast
3x Mindbreak Trap
MonoU died the moment they printed Prismatic Vista, now monoU always begins with 4x Tarn, 4 Vista, 1x Mountain + 4x Bolt and 4x SB Blasts. MonoU died harder when they printed DRC, so add 4x DRC and 1x Volc (Steam Vents if budget). MonoU dies yet again with the printing of Myscosynth, which taps for red. Keep going till you get to my list for ~$1100 [budget]. It's also important to recognize that people play Minsc as the premier "I don't want to lose to Red Blast" PW...and just how trashy the card is vs Bolt.Quote:
Originally Posted by Clark Kant
More than not having red, you have 3x Otawara (legendary land) and 3x Saga. Going from 2x to 3x is roughly triple the odds of opening hands with 2 copies of the same land name. Going up on Saga with max Dress Down is incorrect. On Otawara it replaces Brazen Borrower, and as a result mulligans decrease; the only reason Brazen still sees play is that cantrip cartel decks can't get to 4 mana and/or they can't restrict themselves to a 1c land, so they have to play the worse card (loses to REB, loses to discard, loses to Steppe, loses to Counterbalance, can't protect their own cards, and the list goes on). Once you have a real mana base, there should be zero Brazen. 6x Fetch is not enough to play Brainstorm.
Sailors' Bane and Dreadnought don't go in the same deck; cards like Dress Down and Otawara and higher land counts sabotage Bane and Delver. Likewise, bad mana and Brazen spam required for Bane antagonizes any Dreadnought plan. Highly conditional spells (like Stifle and Misstep) with Bane is also suspect; you should always play 2x FoN with Bane b/c FoN and FoW are Dark Ritual (net +2 mana).
Playing slow, random big dudes lacks synergy. Get on board from turn 1 and kill them, we have DRC and Lavamancer - this is how you make them tap out of Red Blast. Attack the cards you know people have to play.
A mono U list I don't think could run saga and Dress Down. While I think that it's ok to have multiple plans, they can't actively work against each-other and hopping your saga just lives for 3 turns when the Deck to Beat is on Wasteland sounds like a bad time.Quote:
Originally Posted by Clark Kant
I also think you're missing what made Bane so playable over murktide, which was a card like Uro which pressured your own graveyard. If you're not using your GY for anything else then Murky is probably better. So if you have no uro then you'd need to max out on Force, Misdirection, Borrower, ect to leverage the exile clause on Bane, which is a lot of slots I don't think you want to commit.
If I was going to build a mono-U list there's two directions I would consider: First, a control deck. Op resolves nothing, and what they do resolve is Brazenly Borrowed.
The second is a torpor orb stompy. You have blue cards for a light protection suite (force, misdirection, stifle) but otherwise you're running a deck that is looking to maximize turn 1 dreadnoughts. Think Monolith->Orb->Dreadnought. I had some success with this approach when I first got into legacy, but that was a long time ago and if I tried it again today I'd look towards the 12-cast (or whatver they're calling the cannoneer affinity decks) lists for inspiration on where you can insert your dreadnought package.
Why are you forced into monoblue? The problem with monoblue is it lacks removal. Splashing red (Bolt) or white (Swords) is easy and would fix that, giving you removal and better sideboard tools.Quote:
Originally Posted by Clark Kant
If it's a budget issue, you can play Ur or Uw with only 1 dual, and you can use a Shockland if you really have to.
For the sake of this hypothetical discussion, I'll assume you're stuck in monoblue.
#1 Problem: Removal
You need a way to deal with creatures and other permanents. The normal way is to use white cards, red cards, or black cards. In monoblue that means multiple Brazen Borrower. (Otawara is important too, but on its own too slow to stop things like fast Marit Lage or Murktide).
You could also try playing Thing in the Ice as an alternate threat and thing that bounces creatures.
Subtlety may be a good idea, but then you need a powerful draw engine like Standstill to support it. Rood had a good brew like that earlier. Notice the combo with Subtlety. It's "Force of Creature". You can force a Murktide/Minsc/Narset/WPA, then Stifle the sacrifice trigger to keep a 1-mana 3/3 flyer. Or you can cycle Dress Down and then spend 2 cards to make a 0-mana flash 3/3, ambushing an attacker or planeswalker. It has synergy with Dreadnought cards and also answers things blue struggles with (creatures & planeswalkers). The only problem is it hemorrhages cards, so you really need to follow up with something like Standstill to get cards back.
Back in 2010 the monoblue tech was Vedalken Shackles or Sower of Temptation, but those are way too slow today.
Ultimately you need some way to interact with faster resolved threats, because you won't be the fastest deck in Legacy and adding more fatties (Murktide, Sailors' Bane) won't fix that.
#2 Problem: Stable blue mana
The other thing is you need to be careful about colorless lands. You need minimum 14 blue lands with 7-8 fetches. Colorless lands (Mycosynth, Saga, Wasteland) come after that, and you also have to balance the risk of mana flooding. 4x each = 26 lands, too many, so you have to cut back on some. 20-22 lands seems like a good spot. That still means prioritizing some over others and picking a plan.
#3 Problem: Pick a direction
If you're on the Delver/Daze tempo plan, 20 lands max and I agree with FourDogs that you should be on Murktide and drop Sailors' Bane. This sort of build wants Delver, Ponder, Murktide, Daze (because you'll be tapping out for early threats), and skip Minor Misstep (because you'll be tapping out for early threats). Thing in The Ice may be good here.
Edit - Example:
//Creatures: 13
4 Delver of Secrets
4 Phyrexian Dreadnought
3 Murktide Regent
2 Brazen Borrower
//Spells: 23
4 Force of Will
4 Brainstorm
4 Ponder
4 Stifle
4 Daze
2 Dismember
1 Slip Out the Back
//Enchantments: 4
4 Dress Down
//Lands: 20
2 The Mycosynth Gardens
4 Wasteland
4 Polluted Delta
4 Scalding Tarn
8 Island
//Sideboard: 15
2 Surgical Extraction
2 Hydroblast
2 Submerge
2 True-Name Nemesis
1 Flusterstorm
1 Force of Negation
1 Grafdigger's Cage
1 Ashiok, Dream Render
1 Brazen Borrower
1 Echoing Truth
1 Energy Flux
It'll be a worse tempo deck than UR Delver or UR Dressnought, but within your rigid parameters it should be at least FNM playable. It might be even better cutting Delver for Thing in the Ice.
Minor Misstep is much better in a "draw go" version without Ponder or Delver, where you pass with T1 land untapped threatening Stifle or Misstep. That sort of build has 0 Delver, 0 Ponder, 0 Daze, and probably leans into an instant-speed controlling plan with cards like Brazen Borrower, Shark Typhoon, Standstill, Subtlety...
Edit - Example:
//Lands: 22
2 Flooded Strand
2 Polluted Delta
2 Scalding Tarn
2 Misty Rainforest
5 Island
1 Hall of Storm Giants
2 Otawara, Soaring City
4 The Mycosynth Gardens
2 Urza's Saga
//Creatures: 8
4 Phyrexian Dreadnought
4 Subtlety
//Spells: 15
4 Force of Will
4 Brainstorm
4 Stifle
3 Minor Misstep
//Enchantments: 10
4 Dress Down
4 Standstill
2 Shark Typhoon
//Planeswalkers: 2
2 Karn, the Great Creator
//Artifacts: 3
1 Currency Converter
1 Relic of Progenitus
1 Scroll of Fate
//Sideboard: 15
1 Liquimetal Coating
1 Ensnaring Bridge
1 Grafdigger's Cage
1 Torpor Orb
2 Hydroblast
2 Surgical Extraction
2 Force of Negation
2 Brazen Borrower
2 True-Name Nemesis
1 Ashiok, Dream Render
Again, this is worse than UW Dreadstill or UR Dreadstill, because monoblue lacks the tools to play a proper control game, but within your rigid monoblue parameters it should at least do a thing.
But the much better plan is to not be monoblue and just splash a color.
Bouncing creatures isn't all that effective. If you're bouncing specifically Murktide, Lage, or Nought it will usually work out. The problem is that Goyf-types (Murktide) really destroy the diversity of the format and either force people to either play Goyf or play anti-Goyf, or just opt out and combo hard. When it comes to all the anti-Goyf options, they're all creatures you can't bounce without falling behind (Strix, Ice-Fang, SCM, Uro, SFM) - this by itself is too much of the meta to carry around a self-defeating removal package...and it gets worse when you think about bouncing hamster tokens.
You can do one of these:
-You can avoid any Dreadnought stuff, and instead play crappy Goyf (Bane) to beat Goyf (Murktide) via lots of Brazen; b/c while Murktide #1 comes out faster than Bane #1, Bane #2-4 comes out faster than Murktide #2-4. To beat anti-Goyf strats however, you're going to need Lavamancer or Plague Engi-type cards. You're also going to need ramp (DRC). At 11-12 slots of dudes + 3x Brazen (since you're really targeting MurkGoyf), you're not allowed to add Noughts or Dreadnought tech. Instead you just copy/paste UR Delver stuff with a worse dude in the Goyf slot...and b/c your mana is going to be awful while you're also trying to play Iteration/Sanctuary/Daze, you don't get to mess around with Saga.
-You could also get a 7/7 ward 3 dude on a land (Hall of Storm Giants) which says "every time opponent makes a PW at sorc speed, dome it for 7 b/c all kill spells cost 4)". This requires the hardest of hard control elements (Teferi 3cmc and Karn murdering lands), and also requires mana development (no Saga allowed). This is UW Dreadstill, and Timeless Dragon + Standstill + higher land totals all favor Storm Giants over Saga/Gardens. The main thing Mycosynth adds is a 3rd color for Ending without corrupting the colored manabase.
-If you want Saga/Gardens, that's UR Dreadnought and it works b/c the CA pathway is consistent ability to find value trinkets with option to copy with Mycosynth thus turning lands into value. Bane/Brazen are not part of the plan; they don't play nicely with the tech.
So name your CA engine and follow it. No half-plans. All synergy, all the time. Do something novel, and do it better than any other deck in the format.
---
One more thing on 3x Otawara and 3x Saga: self-defeating at these level. Trying to channel Otawara with so much land sacrifice is problematic. Trying to power out constructs with 3x legendary land is problematic. These cards play at 2-ofs.
On Delver of Secrets the card is basically unplayable, and widely regarded as the worst card in Delver. The unplayability of this card was first demonstrated by UR Dreadstill where Standstill then Shark'nado then some utility targets for Saga brought card type instant/sorcery below 24 slots. Delver has only ever been a good card in the early games, and once you start racing towards 20 instant/sorc it doesn't even matter if you have the Delver early b/c it cannot be trusted to flip. The only thing you can trust Delver of Secrets to do, beyond not flipping, is be one of the absolute worst mid-to-late game topdecks (like seriously, it's almost as bad as Mox Diamond at this point in a game). Delver of Secrets is also absolute garbage below 4x copies, b/c the only thing the card ever offered was a good early game - like it's so bad at 2x copies that Ascendant Spirit would win more games. That's why we always always always choose DRC before any of this.
My comment was building/exploring within OP's defined parameters: monoblue only, Dreadnought deck, the types of cards he listed. Otherwise the obvious answer is to play a 2nd color, which we all said.
Unfortunately outside OP's parameters.Quote:
Originally Posted by Fox
I like this in a grindier Standstill plan, although you can't complete the package (Teferi, Dragon, proper control elements) in monoblue. Monoblue control without Wraths or Ending?Quote:
Originally Posted by Fox
Edit: I had vaguely discussed the option above, but now edited to include a potential list. 1 Hall fits in well. But it looks anemic at control.
Outside OP's parameters. He could still do monoblue with Saga/Gardens into trinkets, without Sailors' Bane (bad) or Delver, but he needs some sort of answers to early creatures.Quote:
Originally Posted by Fox
Those are the main threats that would race a tempo deck with Dreadnought & Murktide. You can also out-tempo Minsc & Boo by bouncing an attacking Hamster, then attack the PW with a 3/1 flyer (if you don't have the mana to flash & counter-attack, bounce Minsc and try to counter it?). Flash 3/1 also kills Narset. Most importantly the same bounce also removes Chalice @ 1 or Ensnaring Bridge lock (vs combat-reliant deck), so your removal deals with a whole range of problems. Otawara answers the prison pieces too, but Otawara can't do the first few modes with reasonable tempo or give you another threat that counts to 20.Quote:
Originally Posted by Fox
Bounce is also marginally effective vs these accelerated Initiative creatures (if they blow 1-time acceleration on it) or if you can follow up with Daze (-2 turns to opponent). Sure it's not as good as permanent removal, but what other options do you have in monoblue?
The only real option is Dismember. Dismember will answers fast creatures that are ineffective to bounce (DRC, Allosaurus, WPA), but it can't answer bigger threats. Luckily Borrower covers those bigger threats well. So play a mix of both? What else are you going to do in monoblue?
Initiative has mostly pushed fair midrange out of the format. You can also interact with those creatures via Dress Down (also good vs Initiative), so OP might not get punished for it in the current meta.Quote:
Originally Posted by Fox
Good point. Especially with the low spell count. But then what else do you play to race as monoblue tempo after Dreadnought + Murktide? Thing in The Ice? Do you just give up on any turn 1 play and leave mana open for Minor Misstep/Stifle/StubbyD?Quote:
Originally Posted by Fox
Remember - DRC is outside OP's parameters.
Awesome suggestions. Thanks everyone. This was mostly a theoretical discussion to see what tools blue lacks, because it felt like a controllish blue deck should be able to win with a surprise 12/12 trampler easier than with other blue win conditions, and its viable now due to the high density of ways blue has to enable the 12/12.
I mean the OP list is technically 5c, it has 4x Mycosynth and 3x Saga targeting 1x Currency Converter. Get the correct Fetches and a basic Mountain...and even if you don't do this, just add 4x Bolt and 4x SB Blast and cast them off the "monoU" mana already in OP list.Quote:
Originally Posted by FTW
It looks like BoshNRoll tried out the Greater Good list and 5-0ed with it…
Artifact (2)
1 Chrome Mox
1 Soul-Guide Lantern
Creature (10)
4 Phyrexian Dreadnought
4 Uro, Titan of Nature's Wrath
2 Endurance
Enchantment (7)
3 Greater Good
4 Dress Down
Instant (17)
1 Misdirection
3 Lightning Bolt
4 Brainstorm
2 Stifle
4 Force of Will
2 Abrade
1 Minor Misstep
Land (19)
1 Island
3 Scalding Tarn
4 Misty Rainforest
1 Taiga
3 Tropical Island
3 Volcanic Island
4 Urza's Saga
Sorcery (5)
3 Ponder
2 Expressive Iteration
60 Cards
Sideboard (15)
2 Carpet of Flowers
1 Pithing Needle
2 Pyroblast
2 Torpor Orb
1 Surgical Extraction
1 Hydroblast
1 Force of Negation
1 Force of Vigor
1 Veil of Summer
2 Run Afoul
1 Endurance
I think Greater Good is an excellent 1 of in green lists but I really dont think I would play more than 1.
Meanwhile, Ark4n 5-0ed with a list featuring 4 The Mycosynth Gardens…
Artifact (9)
4 Mox Diamond
1 Aether Spellbomb
2 Scroll of Fate
1 Shadowspear
1 Soul-Guide Lantern
Creature (8)
4 Phyrexian Dreadnought
3 Uro, Titan of Nature's Wrath
1 Haywire Mite
Instant (12)
4 Stifle
4 Force of Will
4 Brainstorm
Land (25)
3 Wasteland
1 Island
1 Forest
1 Flooded Strand
1 Windswept Heath
3 Tropical Island
4 Urza's Saga
4 Misty Rainforest
1 Boseiju, Who Endures
2 Otawara, Soaring City
4 The Mycosynth Gardens
Sorcery (6)
2 Life from the Loam
4 Ponder
Sideboard (15)
1 Pithing Needle
1 Hydroblast
2 Torpor Orb
4 Endurance
2 Force of Negation
2 Force of Vigor
1 Haywire Mite
2 Minor Misstep
25 lands!!??