[Primer/Deck] Pox

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Originally Posted by mykatdied

So your win condition is just 4 factory main, or making them scoop? I would have to trust your judgment as I've never played a similar list, but that seems super loose. Void isn't going to stop decay from killing liliana or wasteland from killing factory, so how do you actually beat an opponent?

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Abrupt Decay kills Tarmogoyf. Does that mean nobody's going to play it? Decay kills Liliana even without a Nether Void on the field. I think the problem people are seeing is that there are 'too few' win conditions.

I have to cry foul cause way back when, during the days when I didn't have a career job, me and my friend played budget decks. He played a form of Psychotog and it only had 4 win conditions, Psychotog. :eek:

It pulled wins. Not against $1000 tournament decks but it was one of the strongest decks in our kitchen table meta. Protect the snot out of your threat.

Long grindy lists are what Pox can work under last I remember. All the big name builds that top 8'd didn't need Marit Lage or anything fancy. Just slap you to death for 2 damage a turn. I do look forward to the actual list vs. a quick review off the top of your head. Personally, the biggest reason I loved Pox as a deck to begin with is that it's the most effective land destruction deck in MtG right now. Granted, it's designed to murder your hand as well but that doesn't hurt its effectiveness.

My only sad testing was that Sphere of Resistance didn't carry as hard as I thought it would. I replaced Hymn to Tourach as a test and it allowed for some very impressive anti-combo strategy, but did poorly vs. Miracles (worst matchup ever) and Vial agro. Looking forward to Warping Wail's addition and got to test it once it arrives in the mail.

An idea inspired by that list...

Mono-B Prison Pox

Threats (6)
4 Mishra's Factory
1 Cursed Scroll/Chimeric Idol
1 Nether Spirit

Spells (30)
1 Trinisphere
1 Nether Void
1 Bottled Cloister
2 Crucible of Worlds
4 Liliana of the Veil
4 Inquisition of Kozilek
4 Hymn to Tourach
4 Sinkhole
4 Innocent Blood/Warping Wail
4 Smallpox
1 Pox

Land/Mana (24)
4 Dark Ritual
11 Snow-Covered Swamp
4 Wasteland
1 Ghost Quarter
4 Urborg, Tomb of Yawgmoth

Sideboard
2 Pithing Needle
1 Cursed Scroll/Underworld Dreams
1 Contamination
2 Extirpate
2 Leyline of the Void
4 Sphere of Resistance
3 Ensnaring Bridge

Innocent Blood may be split like 2/2 or something with the Wail. Though C. Scroll and N. Spirit upped the threat count a notch, I like how they both generate card advantage in the right circumstances. I'm considering Chimeric Idol for the Cursed Scroll slot. Granted, it prevents Mishra's use, but it allows me to cast spells and then when I tapped out [assuming I used Mishra's to cast], I have a threat that's free to perforate my enemy's head. Or get rid of it altogether and bring back Night of Souls' Betrayal, but my meta doesn't have much swarm agro anymore.

Decisions decisions. :confused:

i kinda feel doubtful about warping wail for our deck because of its restrictive colorless requirement in its cost, i also feel that we don't really need it in our deck..

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Originally Posted by zenitramleirdag

i kinda feel doubtful about warping wail for our deck because of its restrictive colorless requirement in its cost, i also feel that we don't really need it in our deck..

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We'll have to wait and see. Crucibles keep the colorless lands coming back and with 9 colorless mana sources, which is almost half the land, I don't think it'd be that hard to cast. I'm more than likely going to be bringing in 1-2 instead of a full set since early turns are for active disruption and our top decked spells can't disrupt as effectively. Nothing like top decking say, Hymn to Tourach when Liliana already did maximum brain damage.

Top decking this thing kills some of the most annoying and prevalent creatures in the game by targeting them and sorceries are more common in my meta than I first anticipated. Considering Pox's default deck skeleton, there aren't many decks that could use this card due to the colorless requirements but Pox players usually already have 8 in Wasteland and Mishra's. I'll make my decision after fighting my nemesis, Miracles... :mad: I distinctly remember, long ago, when Cursed Scroll was deemed unfit to be used in Pox [see original old thread]. If I'm wrong, the card was barely a loss at less than $2. If I'm right, maybe it'd be better if I kept it to myself... :tongue:

Deck: pox blade (60)

Lands 24
3 Flagstones of Trokair
1 Karakas
4 Marsh Flats
1 Plains
3 Scrubland
3 Swamp
4 Urborg, Tomb of Yawgmoth
1 Verdant Catacombs
4 Wasteland

Creatures 2
2 Stoneforge Mystic

Spells 34
2 Bitterblossom
1 Chains of Mephistopheles
3 Hymn to Tourach
4 Inquisition of Kozilek
3 Liliana of the Veil
3 Lingering Souls
1 Nether Void
2 Sensei's Divining Top
3 Sinkhole
4 Smallpox
3 Swords to Plowshares
1 Trinisphere
2 Umezawa's Jitte
2 Vindicate

Sideboard 15
1 Circle of Protection: Red
2 Engineered Plague
2 Enlightened Tutor
2 Extirpate
1 Grafdigger's Cage
1 Moat
1 Oblivion Ring
1 Pithing Needle
2 Thoughtseize
2 Zealous Persecution

This is the list I settled on tonight. I was honestly a little tired and feeling sick, but my play overall was good. Made a few minor errors and ended up 1-2-1 drop.

Round 1 - Drew with Miracles
Game 1 - I crushed him with land destruction, taking cantrips with discard and souls/bitterblossom + nether void get there.

Game 2 - Tight game, but he gets there with a Jace eventually.

Game 3 - Very close game to time. I likely had the game, but I made a mistake and shuffled top away with flagstones after a smallpox and it took several turns to find what I needed. My top deck in the end was top, souls, land and I have liliana at 6. It happens. Slight misplay was tough.

Round 2 - Lost to Tezzerator
Game 1 - He did his thing on the play and I just couldn't do much to stop him fast enough.

Game 2 - Long and drawn out. Had engineered plague on bird for strix and engineered plague on thopter obviously. He was able to gain annoying amounts of life and I was able to top deck SFM and get batterskull into play. Won from there with a bit of LD, nether void, 3sphere and chains on board. 5 minutes left.

Game 3 - Had to play quick, kept a 1 land hand and he just had a great start. Couldn't do much so I scooped.

Round 3 - Beat miracles 2-0
Game 1 - He can't keep up with my lingering souls and nether void out. He scoops quick. I took his cantrips seeing he was light on mana.

Game 2 - Quick bitterblossom, he plays blood moon. It hurt him as much as me. I was able to also cast and flashback a lingering souls. He dropped mentor and I had to take 3 swings before I had 2 faeries to trade with mentor and then another to trade with the token. I got there quickly after I stabilize the board and spam tokens to race my bitterblossom. I win at 2 life.

Round 4 - Loss to BR reanimator
Game 1 - I crush him leaving him with no permanents, no hand and souls taking him down slowly.

Game 2 - He gets turn 1 Iona on black and I don't find a white source after dropping cage.

Game 3 - He gets stronghold gambit to Iona on black, but I am able to e-tutor for o-ring. He is able to exhume an ashen rider and takes o-ring stranding the smallpox and liliana in hand once again. I feel like crap so I scoop and drop.

Overall was happy where the deck is. I am not sure I like the batterskull, but SFM was nice to tutor equipment. I may add a sword of some sort in place of batterskull. Think I want the second jitte though.

Moat was great. Forgot how much I loved having it. Used to be Nether Void in the side with Moat in the main. I will likely stick with Void in the main

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Originally Posted by mykatdied

Deck: pox blade (60)

Lands 24
3 Flagstones of Trokair
1 Karakas
4 Marsh Flats
1 Plains
3 Scrubland
3 Swamp
4 Urborg, Tomb of Yawgmoth
1 Verdant Catacombs
4 Wasteland

Creatures 2
2 Stoneforge Mystic

Spells 34
2 Bitterblossom
1 Chains of Mephistopheles
3 Hymn to Tourach
4 Inquisition of Kozilek
3 Liliana of the Veil
3 Lingering Souls
1 Nether Void
2 Sensei's Divining Top
3 Sinkhole
4 Smallpox
3 Swords to Plowshares
1 Trinisphere
2 Umezawa's Jitte
2 Vindicate

Sideboard 15
1 Circle of Protection: Red
2 Engineered Plague
2 Enlightened Tutor
2 Extirpate
1 Grafdigger's Cage
1 Moat
1 Oblivion Ring
1 Pithing Needle
2 Thoughtseize
2 Zealous Persecution

This is the list I settled on tonight. I was honestly a little tired and feeling sick, but my play overall was good. Made a few minor errors and ended up 1-2-1 drop.

Round 1 - Drew with Miracles
Game 1 - I crushed him with land destruction, taking cantrips with discard and souls/bitterblossom + nether void get there.

Game 2 - Tight game, but he gets there with a Jace eventually.

Game 3 - Very close game to time. I likely had the game, but I made a mistake and shuffled top away with flagstones after a smallpox and it took several turns to find what I needed. My top deck in the end was top, souls, land and I have liliana at 6. It happens. Slight misplay was tough.

Round 2 - Lost to Tezzerator
Game 1 - He did his thing on the play and I just couldn't do much to stop him fast enough.

Game 2 - Long and drawn out. Had engineered plague on bird for strix and engineered plague on thopter obviously. He was able to gain annoying amounts of life and I was able to top deck SFM and get batterskull into play. Won from there with a bit of LD, nether void, 3sphere and chains on board. 5 minutes left.

Game 3 - Had to play quick, kept a 1 land hand and he just had a great start. Couldn't do much so I scooped.

Round 3 - Beat miracles 2-0
Game 1 - He can't keep up with my lingering souls and nether void out. He scoops quick. I took his cantrips seeing he was light on mana.

Game 2 - Quick bitterblossom, he plays blood moon. It hurt him as much as me. I was able to also cast and flashback a lingering souls. He dropped mentor and I had to take 3 swings before I had 2 faeries to trade with mentor and then another to trade with the token. I got there quickly after I stabilize the board and spam tokens to race my bitterblossom. I win at 2 life.

Round 4 - Loss to BR reanimator
Game 1 - I crush him leaving him with no permanents, no hand and souls taking him down slowly.

Game 2 - He gets turn 1 Iona on black and I don't find a white source after dropping cage.

Game 3 - He gets stronghold gambit to Iona on black, but I am able to e-tutor for o-ring. He is able to exhume an ashen rider and takes o-ring stranding the smallpox and liliana in hand once again. I feel like crap so I scoop and drop.

Overall was happy where the deck is. I am not sure I like the batterskull, but SFM was nice to tutor equipment. I may add a sword of some sort in place of batterskull. Think I want the second jitte though.

Moat was great. Forgot how much I loved having it. Used to be Nether Void in the side with Moat in the main. I will likely stick with Void in the main

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awesome, i missed this..
i see you dropped the mox diamonds..

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Originally Posted by zenitramleirdag

awesome, i missed this..
i see you dropped the mox diamonds..

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Well the other list still have mox diamonds it in. Which I kind of missed last night. The list I played last night was the second list that I had posted and was less familiar with. I was just really pleased to see how much game it had vs miracles.

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Originally Posted by mykatdied

I was just really pleased to see how much game it had vs miracles.

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yes, i wouldn't be surprised if it did, cards that can continuously deal damage(cursed scroll), or churn out threats(bitterblossom), or hurt their cantrips(trinisphere) is effective against miracles..

Zealous Persecution is an interesting pick, its good against elves and DnT..as a mono black player, i have to run both perish and dread of night for those matches..

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Originally Posted by zenitramleirdag

yes, i wouldn't be surprised if it did, cards that can continuously deal damage(cursed scroll), or churn out threats(bitterblossom), or hurt their cantrips(trinisphere) is effective against miracles..

Zealous Persecution is an interesting pick, its good against elves and DnT..as a mono black player, i have to run both perish and dread of night for those matches..

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That was certainly the point of running them over threats like tombstalker, which I still love regardless.

Persecution was good overall. I had it in the tezzeret match up and was able to blow him out a bit until I dropped engineered plague on thopter. Vs death and taxes it is definitely great as well being able to hit most every problem creature they run. The deck was a lot of fun overall. The main issue I had was one to be expected, time constraints. None of the tokens are a fast clock and the bodies are fragile and easily answered. May be worthwhile to test a sorin, solemn visitor out just to get that extra pump and lifegain.

For a faster clock, might I suggest Chimeric Idol or Chimeric Sphere, depending on whether or not Moat is out? I noticed you don't use Cursed Scrolls or Mishra's factories. Both threats hit harder than anything else in the deck when unequipped.

Tested Warping Wail as a 2 of, then a 1 of, then found what I needed.

I needed a threat that didn't need mana that dodged all my sac effects. 3 Innocent Blood, 4 Smallpox, 1 Pox are main decked and I ran into situations where if C. Scroll or Mishra's attacked, I couldn't cast the Wail at all unless I chose not to attack. It's envelop ability didn't have much use late game but was great against early game sorcs like tutors or Ponder or mana dorks and early game I don't use my threats as I'm busy disrupting first.

Late game I found myself killing top decked mana dorks or threats like Monastery Swiftspear and Delver of Secrets. By including a single Chimeric Idol to my threat list, I'm able to cast spells while punching for 3. Granted, it does conflict with Mishra's Factories and end of turn Cursed Scroll activations but being able to cast top decked spells while punching for 3 turned out to be a great idea. As a singleton, he doesn't conflict as hard as I thought he would. Even better, he's a pretty beefy blocker when you do decide to attack with a pair of Mishra's Factories.

So 4 Wails is too loud, lolz, 1 Wail works. Trick to the countering is against Miracles which casts it's sorceries at instant speed, damn cheaters with SDT. :mad:

On a high note, Wail works great when Night of Souls' Betrayal/Eng. Plague does it's job but doesn't kill your problem threats. It also gives your Wastelands something to do when the enemy decides to not fetch non-basic dual lands after the first Wasteland.

I would likely run a 1 of sorin over idol just for the fact that his tokens fly and he gives us what can be some much needed life back. Idol isn't a bad idea though. The main issue with a clock was when my threats were answered. I'll continue to test and update.

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Originally Posted by mykatdied

I would likely run a 1 of sorin over idol just for the fact that his tokens fly and he gives us what can be some much needed life back. Idol isn't a bad idea though. The main issue with a clock was when my threats were answered. I'll continue to test and update.

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In that case, you could run Chimeric Sphere for a 2/1 flier that costs as much as Mishra's to activate, or a 3/2 ground stomper. Problem is, like C. Scroll and Mishra's, do you cast what you drew or attack? Of course, super late game with 6+ lands on the field, that becomes less of an issue, assuming you burned some Wastelands and Smallpoxes on your own land and don't run Loam/Crucible.

I wouldn't worry much about life loss unless you keep getting burned to death. Spinning Darkness or Sun Droplet could heal you for chunks if you're really hurting I'd suppose and both are cheap on the mana base. Circle of Protection: Red prevents damage but feels too narrow when you could just directly heal yourself against more than just red bolts to the dome.

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Originally Posted by OmniStrata

In that case, you could run Chimeric Sphere for a 2/1 flier that costs as much as Mishra's to activate, or a 3/2 ground stomper. Problem is, like C. Scroll and Mishra's, do you cast what you drew or attack? Of course, super late game with 6+ lands on the field, that becomes less of an issue, assuming you burned some Wastelands and Smallpoxes on your own land and don't run Loam/Crucible.

I wouldn't worry much about life loss unless you keep getting burned to death. Spinning Darkness or Sun Droplet could heal you for chunks if you're really hurting I'd suppose and both are cheap on the mana base. Circle of Protection: Red prevents damage but feels too narrow when you could just directly heal yourself against more than just red bolts to the dome.

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There is certainly a lot to test. Mana usually isn't the issue as I have flagstones that tend to get sacrificed to smallpox and what not. I can't always count on that either though. I'll likely continue to test as is and maybe throw a random thing in once in awhile to see if I ever wish it was x card rather than what I am testing it for.

Quick question for any rules advisors / judges.

I declare combat step. In response to activating Chimeric Idol, can I float mana as tapping all lands I control is the effect of paying 0? Would that allow me to cast Warping Wail in response to a Terminus activation off SDT?

Hell, I can pull off some wicked mind games if I had like 6 land out and floated 6 mana in response to Chimeric's ability.

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Originally Posted by OmniStrata

Quick question for any rules advisors / judges.

I declare combat step. In response to activating Chimeric Idol, can I float mana as tapping all lands I control is the effect of paying 0? Would that allow me to cast Warping Wail in response to a Terminus activation off SDT?

Hell, I can pull off some wicked mind games if I had like 6 land out and floated 6 mana in response to Chimeric's ability.

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The ability is able to be activated at instant speed. So yes, you could potentially do that of you chose to. Doing that every combat can certainly play mind games with your opponent. Holding lands and playing them post combat so you can still do other things is viable as well

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Originally Posted by OmniStrata

Quick question for any rules advisors / judges.

I declare combat step. In response to activating Chimeric Idol, can I float mana as tapping all lands I control is the effect of paying 0? Would that allow me to cast Warping Wail in response to a Terminus activation off SDT?

Hell, I can pull off some wicked mind games if I had like 6 land out and floated 6 mana in response to Chimeric's ability.

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i remember in the old days, the mana pool is emptied at the end of each phase and at the beginning and end of an attack, plus you will also take mana burn..
i'm not an expert on the new rules..

It is true you lose mana after combat phase so if my enemy is just going to sit there and let my 3/3 slap their dome instead of blocking or SDT activate>Terminus, that's fine. I've managed to stuff Terminus and Entreat the Angels with Warping Wail provided the SDT was Pithing Needled. ^_^

Being able to exile flashed in blockers before combat damage made me :eek:. Get slapped Vendillion Clique! :mad:

It's like how you have just a single Nether Spirit, Night of Souls' Betrayal or Spinning Darkness in your deck, but despite being a 1-of, you manage to see it in a majority of your games. :confused:

Have any of you guys ever noticed that unlimited sinkholes are a bit lighter in color compared to other black cards? I just noticed the color on mine and it has made me a bit paranoid..

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Originally Posted by eternaldarkness

Have any of you guys ever noticed that unlimited sinkholes are a bit lighter in color compared to other black cards? I just noticed the color on mine and it has made me a bit paranoid..

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A lot of earlier sets have weird color variations, quality control was not the best (see misprint groups), unlimited has a very unique look color wise, second in my mind only to summer(edgar) magic. If your concern is potentially being fake have a dealer you trust look at them. Even the best Chinese fakes I've seen just don't look right be it color, text size, font, etc. The also tend to not have the right texture, waxy feel.