[Deck] Dragon Stompy

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Originally Posted by THEchubbymuffin

And what happens if you mill them of 13 cards that are mostly irrelevent, I.E. brainstorms after you land a chalice at 1.
Theres just a good of a chance that you just made it easier for them to find what they want.

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your right there is a good chance of that but, its still 13 cards off there library which is appealing to me.

Of all the traps i have seen thus far it appeals most to me.

But none the less DS can run some of these none red traps, I was just using Archive Trap as an example. I never said i would run it but it could benefit decks, but i think in the last few posts we definitely rules out DS as a possible beneficiary to its 0 cost milling.

My original point was are there any "traps" DS would benefit from red or none red.

I think it is kind of funny to say this in a Dragon Stompy discussion, but milling 13 cards ist completely irrelevant, unless you win by completely removing their library. The card they need to win might be on top of ther library, or it might be the 14th from the top. Chances are the same.
The only use for that trap in a non-mill-deck would be after they played a Mystical Tutor or something, so you mill the card they just tutored. But Mystical is mostly played in Storm (correct me if I'm wrong), and DS does not need another Stormhoser, I think. That also makes Mindbreak Trap unnecessary for DS.

Additionally, I've heard that Tarmogoyf is an often played card in Legacy, so putting 13 cards in a graveyard might be not so smart.

And why do I think the question is so funny, especially in a Dragonstompy discussion? Because I get scalded by Noobs everytime I play that deck for playing such a bad, bad creature that exiles 1/6 of my Library for just two damage...

So after a long hiatus (Fiddling around with other decks) I decided to take a look back at my old DS list and update it. My meta is a pile of control and aggro, with the only recent combo deck being a budget "The Cure." I'm mostly having issues deciding on a sideboard. Here is the current list:

// Lands
4 [TE] Ancient Tomb
4 [EX] City of Traitors
11 [TSP] Mountain (4)

// Creatures
4 [FUT] Gathan Raiders
4 [DIS] Rakdos Pit Dragon
4 [MR] Arc-Slogger
4 [FUT] Magus of the Moon
4 [PLC] Simian Spirit Guide
3 [MOR] Taurean Mauler
2 [PS] Flametongue Kavu

// Spells
4 [MR] Chalice of the Void
4 [MR] Chrome Mox
4 [MR] Seething Song
2 [DK] Blood Moon
2 [BOK] Umezawa's Jitte

// Sideboard
SB: 2 [PS] Flametongue Kavu
SB: 1 [BOK] Umezawa's Jitte
SB: 3 [REW] Powder Keg
SB: 3 [AT] Pyrokinesis
SB: 4 [DS] Trinisphere
SB: 2 [GP] Shattering Spree

3spheres are one the side "just in case." I have plenty of anti-aggro in kinesis, kavu, and jitte. I'm not sure if I want to use kegs or what to replace with them (needle?). What's the word on ingot chewer? Would he be something to consider over spree?

I believe a lot of my indecision stems from the fact my meta is very "random." Who shows up is very up in the air and what deck they might be using is also up there.

@Droxis.. Trinisphere is huge in the main, I would cut 2 sloggers at least, I really like the FTK, so maybe cut all the sloggers for 3 trinisphere and another FTK.

i'd argue to keep slogger in. You drop him turn 1 or 2 the game is practically yours. if you do cut them i would put in an extra jitte. the 3 spheres are very strong in the deck as well. cut that 11th mountain for something suggested as well. 10 mountains is plenty in the deck. Maybe instead of a 3rd ftk try a 4th mauler.

Going in with no slogger just doesn't seem right to me though, no matter the advice.

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Originally Posted by Shanghi Knights

Going in with no slogger just doesn't seem right to me though, no matter the advice.

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This. Cutting 1-2 is ok, but entirely dropping them is insane.

If Zoo and other aggro seems to be a problem, I see MD Flametongue Kavu SB Firespout working very well. Of course, Jitte is great too.

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Originally Posted by Droxis

What's the word on ingot chewer? Would he be something to consider over spree?

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I definitely love him. The only decks which pack lots of artifacts are Stax, and the other Stompy variants. So, their artifacts (except for Crucible and Smokestack, or equipments) are irrelevant. Affinity, maybe, but Trinisphere is already huge against that matchup. Thumbs down to the Shattering Spree. Ingot Chewer is way cooler. It fits the curve, can be recurred with SoLaS, and it even removes Bridges!!!

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Originally Posted by Hanni

If Zoo and other aggro seems to be a problem, I see MD Flametongue Kavu SB Firespout working very well. Of course, Jitte is great too.

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Yay on the FTK trend. More Kavus for a better world. Card advantage is always a great thing.

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Originally Posted by Hanni

If Zoo and other aggro seems to be a problem, I see MD Flametongue Kavu SB Firespout working very well. Of course, Jitte is great too.

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Is Zoo a problem? I was reading around to try and find the initial opinion on this matter and found in the Naya Zoo thread pre-Pridemage that we supposedly have a good matchup against Zoo. Post Pridemage I am willing to bet the matchup gets a little bit more difficult but still favorable since a Chalice at 1 pretty much seals them out of all their removal and then we're a Blood Moon away from them being locked out of their deck.

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Originally Posted by Digital Devil

This. Cutting 1-2 is ok, but entirely dropping them is insane.

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What is you logic behind this statement, awhile back dragonstompy with no sloggers at all won a 430+ man bazzar of moxen tourney..

ARC SLOGGER IS NECESSARY.

Okay. One list won with zero arc sloggers. 946720594 lists around the world play and succeed with arc slogger.

Firespout = Bad. This has been discussed.

Mindbreak Trap? this is not the wizards forums. Cmon.

@ Droxis: PLAY 4 PITHING NEEDLE SIDEBOARD. No questions asked. My personal sideboard with 3 MD trini 2 MD jitte 2 MD sulfur/mauler 3 MD moon

4 Pyrokinesis
4 Crypt
4 Needle
1 Blood Moon
2 Flametongue Kavu

So i inquired about trap cards in the deck and was quickly told to shut it. But this guy below found what looks like a real promising one for the deck.

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Originally Posted by georgjorge

Summoning Trap 4GG
Instant - Trap

If a creature you cast this turn was
countered by a spell or ability an opponent
controlled, you may pay 0 rather then pay
Summoning Trap's casting cost.
Look at the top 7 cards of your library.
You may put a creature card from among
them onto the battlefield. Put the rest on
the bottom of your library in any order.

When I finally have time to play some Magic again, I'll DEFINITELY test that nice little Trap in the anti-counter (currently: Shusher) slots. With 14 creatures, the chances of hitting one are pretty good, and in this deck any creature is a threat. It's only okay against CBalance as you still lose a card, but playing it after your first- or second-turn threat got Dazed/Snared/Forced looks like a very strong Tempo play.

Also, finally a card whose casting cost doesn't match ANY card in the whole Counterbalance deck, not even Force or Sower !

Zendikar rocks...

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Now he talks about 14 creatures in another deck. But we run 20 to 25 pending on build. put 4 of these in there and were talking some serious creatures coming down the piles that we want to have come down the pipes. they counter our magus of the moon we could get a dragon or even a slogger. hopefully it won't get swords away but the potential this card has for getting us the big guys we want and have a hard time getting out. seems really good for DS.

p.s. anyone for using this to get out red akroma? (you know you wanna play her!)

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Originally Posted by Gibsonmac

What is you logic behind this statement, awhile back dragonstompy with no sloggers at all won a 430+ man bazzar of moxen tourney..

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I personally know Francesco dalla Via, and he admitted he was lucky with the pairings. He is mainly an Extended player (with random Vintage partecipations). And he won due to his 3x Umezawa's Jitte all-time-long. So, some form of removal is needed. But what if, instead of fighting against critters like him, you are facing Stalkers and Tarmogoyfs? Then Slogger is a house. Tacosnape and Kuma also said if someone top8'd or even won a tournament it doesn't necessarily mean his card choices were optimal. It is the shell that matters, not a single card or two (Jotun Grunt and Shivan Dragon examples). As already said, Arc-Slogger is necessary.

I don't agree, but thats cool.. I've never won solely because of slogger, and usually their tombstalker has to block a dragon swinging for lethal, and DS takes care of it, same for goyf.. so milling 30 cards to kill a single creature, is in my opinion, bad, you can't kill a stalker and a goyf in the same game with slogger anyway, and with extensive testing I found the slogger to be the weakest link. also you can win before stalker hits the board most times anyway. Just my opinion, if you like the slogger play it, whatev its cool; I don't, so I don't.

Also shells don't win tournaments, lists and pilots do, its all in the daily tech of the list and the competence of the player, ask any pro..

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Originally Posted by Gibsonmac

I don't agree, but thats cool.. I've never won solely because of slogger, and usually their tombstalker has to block a dragon swinging for lethal, and DS takes care of it, same for goyf.. so milling 30 cards to kill a single creature, is in my opinion, bad, you can't kill a stalker and a goyf in the same game with slogger anyway, and with extensive testing I found the slogger to be the weakest link. also you can win before stalker hits the board most times anyway. Just my opinion, if you like the slogger play it, whatev its cool; I don't, so I don't.

Also shells don't win tournaments, lists and pilots do, its all in the daily tech of the list and the competence of the player, ask any pro..

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Thats a pretty quick win! Slogger usually comes down on turns 1-3 for me so your list must be blitzing fast. Sloggers ability to remove blockers and utility creatures is very powerful and makes him a very strong card in this deck.

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Originally Posted by Gibsonmac

I don't agree, but thats cool.. I've never won solely because of slogger, and usually their tombstalker has to block a dragon swinging for lethal, and DS takes care of it, same for goyf.. so milling 30 cards to kill a single creature, is in my opinion, bad, you can't kill a stalker and a goyf in the same game with slogger anyway, and with extensive testing I found the slogger to be the weakest link. also you can win before stalker hits the board most times anyway. Just my opinion, if you like the slogger play it, whatev its cool; I don't, so I don't.

Also shells don't win tournaments, lists and pilots do, its all in the daily tech of the list and the competence of the player, ask any pro..

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Let's have a little talk about arc-slogger.

We can both agree that dragon stompy has a problem with resolved creatures sometimes, since we run no swords to plowshares or gempalm incinerators or doom blades or whatever. Right?

We can also both agree that on the power vs. consistency scale, the philosophy of dragon stompy is to try to maximize power so that the issue of consistency does not come up. To this effect, consistency does not become an issue because such a high concentration of powerful hosers does the job instead of a fluid synergy of 60 cards. Right?

Arc-Slogger, is, in my opinion, the second best creature in the deck, behind Gathan Raiders.

Why?

First off, the argument that it is "not worth it" to mill 30 cards is interesting. Why not use our library as a resource? Why worry about milling cards? You say he can "only kill a stalker or a goyf, not both," isn't that better than killing zero? And you say "stalker usually dies to block RPD anyway," can't that still be achieved with arc-slogger in the deck?

The amount of cards DS draws in an average game is very low. Therefore, the argument that "slogger ruins hellbent" is not as valid if it were a deck that tries to draw the game out longer. While it appears to be valid, as it would be for many decks if the game drew out longer, the math of the situation shows that slogger has a significantly less chance of ruining hellbent because the amount of cards drawn in an average game is less than comparative aggro decks such as zoo, goblins, or merfolk. Sometimes slogger will ruin hellbent, yes. But there are other times where sometimes you can cast the slogger in your hand. And the most times when 4 sloggers sit quietly in your deck.

The argument that stalker and RPD trade is a bad one. You do not want this trade. That one-for-one trade buys the opponent time. Time in which he can draw the answers to your questions. The fundamental philosophy of DS is to not allow the opponent the opportunity to answer your questions. This is what makes it different than another "question" deck like Stax - you have the power to end the game so they do not draw their answers. You have the power to end the game as quickly as possible. This one-for-one trade buys the stalker player 2+ turns: you have to hopefully lay another creature next turn, wait for it to lose summoning sickness, and then attack the next turn. This gives your opponent two more turns to answer the other "questions" you may have on the field. The math involved with this shows that trading a RPD for a tombstalker is a bad trade.

Unfortunately, it is a trade you have to make. With the inconsistent draws of DS, you cannot rely on spot removal like doom blade and stp to be in your deck (it is NOT just because of chalice that you can't play a card like lightning bolt for removal). But we desperately want spot removal. It is too bad that it can't really fit in the deck because the way the math and the deck's playing style fit together to form the "best plays." When we come across arc-slogger, however, we see he is a threat that matches what should be the "best plays" in DS. He also acts as removal with a resource which we would have NO other way to spend, because generally speaking in an average game we can afford minimum 30 sometimes 40 cards. This is an untapped resource.

If we were allowed to start with a mountain in play turn 0 every game, would we do it? Otherwise, the mountain sits in a box in your basement doing nothing. I would certainly make the choice of having it in play. This turn 0 mountain is an untapped resouce that we might as well use.

What if we were only allowed to put that mountain into play turn 0 20% at the very beginning? The other option is to have it be left in the basement box. Still, there is no reason why we would not want to start with it in play.

What if were only allowed to put that mountain into play turn 0 15% of the time, and in addition, 5% of the time are RPD and Gathan Raiders did not have hellbent? And what if there was also a 5% chance we could put that mountain into play later in the game for free?

I would definitely say yes to that as well. And I would definitely say yes to 4 arc-slogger, all the time, forever playing this deck, with no questions asked.

Please play 4 arc-slogger.

I was in a strong darksteel colossus environment. Knowing that ahead of time, i main boarded 3 dead/gone. for spot removal it was pretty effective. But i need to explore dead/gone more in the md, in a not so absurd environment. with it mainboarded i took out 1 slogger and 2 ftk and put in the 3. a fourth would be good soon as i decide what to drop.

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Originally Posted by FoulQ

Let's have a little talk about arc-slogger.

We can both agree that dragon stompy has a problem with resolved creatures sometimes, since we run no swords to plowshares or gempalm incinerators or doom blades or whatever. Right?

We can also both agree that on the power vs. consistency scale, the philosophy of dragon stompy is to try to maximize power so that the issue of consistency does not come up. To this effect, consistency does not become an issue because such a high concentration of powerful hosers does the job instead of a fluid synergy of 60 cards. Right?

Arc-Slogger, is, in my opinion, the second best creature in the deck, behind Gathan Raiders.

Why?


The argument that stalker and RPD trade is a bad one. You do not want this trade. That one-for-one trade buys the opponent time. Time in which he can draw the answers to your questions. The fundamental philosophy of DS is to not allow the opponent the opportunity to answer your questions. This is what makes it different than another "question" deck like Stax - you have the power to end the game so they do not draw their answers. You have the power to end the game as quickly as possible. This one-for-one trade buys the stalker player 2+ turns: you have to hopefully lay another creature next turn, wait for it to lose summoning sickness, and then attack the next turn. This gives your opponent two more turns to answer the other "questions" you may have on the field. The math involved with this shows that trading a RPD for a tombstalker is a bad trade.

If we were allowed to start with a mountain in play turn 0 every game, would we do it? Otherwise, the mountain sits in a box in your basement doing nothing. I would certainly make the choice of having it in play. This turn 0 mountain is an untapped resouce that we might as well use.

What if we were only allowed to put that mountain into play turn 0 20% at the very beginning? The other option is to have it be left in the basement box. Still, there is no reason why we would not want to start with it in play.

What if were only allowed to put that mountain into play turn 0 15% of the time, and in addition, 5% of the time are RPD and Gathan Raiders did not have hellbent? And what if there was also a 5% chance we could put that mountain into play later in the game for free?

I would definitely say yes to that as well. And I would definitely say yes to 4 arc-slogger, all the time, forever playing this deck, with no questions asked.

Please play 4 arc-slogger.

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First off, I'm not suggesting a dragon/stalker trade, I said when hellbent the first strike damage takes care of the stalker with a pump of 2 and the dragon lives most times in my experience, and there are a ton of rock/evagreen decks in my meta, so I've played this match 100+ times.

Second, what the hell is a turn 0 mountain, and in what way is it relevant.

Third, I in no way said that slogger is a dog-shit card to play, only that I do not like it, I yield the utility of the card in certain situations, however in my personal experience, the card has been lackluster, and has in fact ruined hellbent many times when I used to run it, so I started playing lotus petal and the deck became crazy consistent and much faster.

Also, on average a stalker hits the table turn 4 at the earliest, so yeah you can win before they play a stalker..

And I prefer powerful consistency to overall utility..

like you said how is turn 0 mountain relevant. more so how is such accomplished? that being said the only way i see anything close to that happening is by running gemstone cavern and i don't see anyone putting that into DS.

I was referring to an untapped resource. A mountain that we can optionally have put into play on turn 0, I'm going to tap that. My library is another untapped resource. If given the option, I'm going to tap that.

That's where I was going with the mountain thing.

Yeah I wasn't arguing over turn 1 stalker thats pretty much impossible?? Turn 2 and turn 3 extremely rare too. So you are completely right on that point.

Lastly, I don't see why you feel you can't have RPD kill tombstalker with slogger in your deck anyway. "He ruins hellbent" is not that valid, it really does not come up that often. And if you have the mana to truly make your opponent fear and block with one of his ~8 win cons in the deck, then I think you can probably just race the tombstalker or have time to draw a mountain and play the slogger.

You didn't really address the fundamental arguments of what I was saying about slogger. But whatever. You like lotus petal. I like arc slogger. I think I'm right, you secretly know I'm right, but we'll just leave it at that. Plenty of discussion has happened enough about arc-slogger.