[Primer] Six Shades of Dressnought aka Vaka-Nought

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Originally Posted by FourDogsinaHorseSuit

I played with Bowmasters tonight and the card performed great. Didn't even play against a fellow cantrip deck, just sniping dnt and gb creatures
Bowmasters were also the only black card in the deck plus two massacre side

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Yes Bowmasters is so good and the black splash also gets you Thoughtseize which is another excellent way to protect Dreadnought and making sure the path is clear of opposing Bowmasters before casting Brainstorm. The format is full of /1 creatures and cantrips.

Even if we dont splash black, Dressnought is still probably the best positioned of all cantrip/xerox lists in this Bowmasters meta. Dreadnought and the threats that typically accompany it (Uro, Deaths Shadow, Kroxa, Endurance, Shelodred, Murktide etc) are resilient to Bowmasters pings.

An even more relevant point is that Dress Down is a strong response to enemy Bowmasters. Stops their trigger, or buys you a window to cast cantrips. Dress Down's draw goes unpunished when other cantrips would fail.

Dress Down is extremely well-positioned against many format titans: Bowmasters, Thassa's Oracle combos, Initiative decks, Yorion ETB value decks. Dressnought maindecks 4 copies anyway, while other decks now cram some Dress Down into the 75 just to not lose to other broken mechanics.

UB also has Drown in the Loch which can either counter Bowmasters (prevent ability) or kill one in play.

I do think there's some tension with Dress Down and Bowmasters, you cast Dress Down, they know it's safe to cast their own cantrips. If you don't, they'll be content to stare. The play might be, and I'm throwing up in my mouth as I type it, Standstill.

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Originally Posted by FourDogsinaHorseSuit

I do think there's some tension with Dress Down and Bowmasters, you cast Dress Down, they know it's safe to cast their own cantrips. If you don't, they'll be content to stare. The play might be, and I'm throwing up in my mouth as I type it, Standstill.

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Standstill got even worse.

1U: Tap out sorcery speed to put Standstill on the stack.
1B: Opponent puts Bowmasters on the stack. Bowmasters resolves. Bowmasters beats down. If opponent even needs to crack Standstill, you get punished.

Meanwhile Dress Down beats ENEMY Bowmasters. They play Bowmasters, you respond with Dress Down. Or you can EOT Dress Down, then untap and freely drop cantrips & Dreadnoughts.

It has tension with your own Bowmasters (which you don't have to play, or you can choose better sequencing with own cards), but it pairs up well vs what the rest of the format is doing. If that's the case... maybe the cut is Bowmasters and not Dress Down? Or just play fewer Bowmasters. Same problem Urza's Saga had.

Standstill is doing just fine. The more people play black, the less they can get under Standstill - remember legacy has never had a playable black 1-drop since the banning of DRS...and it's not like a player can sit there on 4x Delver (only 1 drop) and 4x Bowmaster b/c we know that those cards lose to MurkGoyf...and so we know the next 4 dudes are MurkGoyf (if you can't beat em, join em)...only it's sh*tty MurkGoyf b/c the other player has DRC mills.

If they're DRC + Delver + Bowmaster they are Honda Civic, which is a joke. The only thing that deck was ever able to do was no-skill legalized cheating with cantripping Lotus Petal (Probe) and Therapy...safe from response -> Wasteland due to DRS. Seriously, just Wasteland them and watch what happens when they don't have DRS or DeathriteMonkey.

I care precious little if an opponent has 1B mana up and flashes in a Bowmaster; they have to attack into a larger shark [while Standstill has nothing but time to play the up the land totals]. So team Bowmaster attacks *on their turn* and has to save their dude in combat with an instant [so they've constructed themselves out of EoT crack Standstill]. Standstill really don't care if they can ping a little into -> now I wrath you. The mindset of "I'm going to beat enemy Standstill by forcing myself to crack their Standstill" is misguided. You're not going to get there by making a 4/4 with a 1/1; Standstill is built to deal with 8/8 MurkGoyfs. Otawara is also going to be a massive beating for orc army.

The other thing about Standstill is we got the draw 3 effect on another mulligan-decreasing card name: Lorien Revealed. We don't really give Bowmaster much to trigger on; our mana progression is not tied to cantripping (we don't cut land slots for Ponder)...and that mana progression is increasing in relentlessness: fewer duals (Vista) -> more raw draw (Dress Down, Shark, Currency) -> higher lands totals thanks to spell mode (Otawara) -> all colors find blue (Lorien). None of these changes care about enemy Bowmaster.

I'm curious to see how it plays out in a larger sample of games.

If they flash in Bowmasters in response to Standstill, it may take a few turns (land drops & random draws) to be able to deploy that Shark. If you only deploy Standstill knowing you have Shark, that's weakened the usecases of Standstill. Otherwise maybe you don't find Shark soon enough before taking many Orc hits.

Let's assume you get to the sufficient game state (enough lands in play, Shark in hand) to ambush attacking Bowmasters in combat. You tap out (or close to it) for Shark. The draw triggers Bowmaster (+1 to Army and ping you or add 1 damage to Shark). If that's enough to trade with Shark, maybe opponent allows it and keeps going with the other body. If the Shark is much bigger (tapped out and/or many land drops later), opponent has another line: cast instant removal spell on Shark. Standstill triggers: You draw 3, +3 to attacking Army, 3 pings. You're probably too tapped out to use those extra cards yet, so unless you have an unanswered Force that Shark never gets assigned to block, you take a bunch of unblocked damage + pings, and opponent can make postcombat plays vs your tapped lands.

If the Shark is 4/4 or smaller, opponent doesn't even need removal, any instant will make enough pings to kill the Shark and +4 the unblocked Army. If you rely on making a 5/5 Shark, those Orcs may get a lot of unchallenged attacks first...

I'm not saying that is an unwinnable position for Standstill (eg dig into Verdict after they crack Standstill to answer the Shark), but is that really an advantageous line to lean on to treat Bowmasters as inconsequential?

There are ways to get on board earlier in Black. They involve card disadvantage: Grief + trick, Dark Ritual + Opposition Agent/Bowmaster. Currency Converter/Saga? The meta may eventually adapt to pair Bowmaster with other things.

Example: You're UR Dreadstill. T1 DRC/Lavamancer. T2 Standstill. Seems like a safe play? Opponent flashes Bowmasters, killing your onboard threat and sliding in surprise bodies under Standstill (Murktide/Goyf cannot do that). Bowmasters starts attacking 2 per turn. How many Sharks are in your deck as outs? Saga helps but loses to Wasteland. Otawara on a 1/1 army seems wasteful. Do you break your own Standstill to answer the Orc?

Versus Bowmancer decks in 6-1 or so in matches; constructions include honda civic, Shadow, and Uro/Grief, 5c maverick. Nothing quite like them all running basic Islands they can't use, and Daze they can't capitalize on b/c I have all the time in the world to make land drops. As expected, I'm very happy sitting there doing nothing, forcing the opponent to crack under the pressure of wasted mana, and spam out a 2 mana 2x 1/1s with no ping targets. The only real opponent in in these matchups is the mtgo shuffler, which does not accurately portray how statistics work. The Bowmancer play patterns are anemic, predictable, slow, and highly susceptible to Wasteland. The one that did beat me was the maverick build, and that really comes down to not auto-killing themselves by putting Daze in their deck.

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Originally Posted by Fox

Versus Bowmancer decks in 6-1 or so in matches; constructions include honda civic…

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Not surprised at 6-1, the deck is very well positioned vs Bowmasters, but whats this honda civic deck?

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Originally Posted by Fox

Versus Bowmancer decks in 6-1 or so in matches; constructions include honda civic, Shadow, and Uro/Grief, 5c maverick. Nothing quite like them all running basic Islands they can't use, and Daze they can't capitalize on b/c I have all the time in the world to make land drops. As expected, I'm very happy sitting there doing nothing, forcing the opponent to crack under the pressure of wasted mana, and spam out a 2 mana 2x 1/1s with no ping targets. The only real opponent in in these matchups is the mtgo shuffler, which does not accurately portray how statistics work. The Bowmancer play patterns are anemic, predictable, slow, and highly susceptible to Wasteland. The one that did beat me was the maverick build, and that really comes down to not auto-killing themselves by putting Daze in their deck.

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Nice results.

What's your current build?

I'm not surprised Dress Down/Stifle decks do well against Bowmasters, since both stop the ability. It's Standstill I was unsure of. Otherwise the deck overall is well-positioned to beat Grixis or UB on many axes: punishing their mana, invalidating their Daze, countering the Bowmaster ability, making threats that don't die to Bolt.

Esper Staff Bowmasters seems like a tougher matchup. Have you faced that / did you have any input in Ark4n's Challenge build?

I think players will eventually discover the card makes more sense in draw-go control or midrange creature piles. Tempo decks can't afford to hold up Bowmasters indefinitely without deploying it or using mana. It seems inherently bad with Daze, yet most of the early builds had Daze. Draw-go seems a better fit. No cantrip to ambush? No problem. Develop lands. Cycle Shark Typhoon. Cast instants at EOT. Hold up counters that cost mana. Activate Staff. These are things that make sense to do if you have to pass holding up Bowmasters mana. Drawing Daze and Spell Pierce? No.

Pretty much the same UR Dreadstill, just running some Lorien Revealed in a Brainstorm and land slot. Main change in Standstill is I'd rather have a 1 land + Lorien than a 1 land + Brainstorm. The thing that's so nice about Lorien is that you effectively go up on mana while going down on land totals. The amount of 1-land keeps increases, as a 1-land hand is actually a 2 land hand with Lorien. At 2 copies of Lorien, this accounts for 22.1% of opening hands (and thus 22.1% of 1 land hands).

The only real benefit of Brainstorm is negating a mulligan due to 5/6/7x land hands. Like sure, Brainstorm does some other stuff, but in a land-heavy deck it's mostly there to ensure that [at 4 copies] 39.9% of hands with 5/6/7x lands are reshapeable. So the question is how often are such hands seen. Counting Otawara as a land in opening hand and Spikefield as a spell (due to mana costs of spell modes), the odds at 23 not-Spikefield land slots are: 6.83%. Lorien displacing a land changes our number to 22, which brings the odds of 5+ land hands to: 5.57%.

Going down a land for Lorien changes 1 landers (here Spikefield counts as a land) from 12.1% (24 lands) to 13.8% (23 lands). But again, 22.1% of that 13.8% are actually 2 landers thanks to Lorien. So comparing the two, we have 12.1% 1 landers vs 10.75% with Lorien at 2x. The 0 landers goes from 2.16% to 2.67% with Lorien (approximately 1 in 50 hands seen to 1 in 40).

On the flip side, going back to 5+ land hands we went from 6.83% circumvented by 4x Brainstorm down to 4.1%. Meanwhile the Lorien build with 2x Brainstorm sends 5.57% chance of 5+ lander down to 4.3%. In either case we're ignoring the 5+ land hand that can't make any blue and the 7 land hand that can't have a Brainstorm, which is fairly impossible to roll without thousands of hands being seen. This is also ignoring Currency Converter and Saga find Currency Converter, which is also an out to land-overloaded hands.

Concerning optimal hands [2, 3, or 4 landers, where Spikefield counts as a land], we go from 26.9%/30.9%/19.6% on 24 lands to 28.6%/30.3%/17.8% on 23 lands. Again, we note that 22.1% of exactly 2 land hands have a Lorien by the odds; so it more or less works out to being equivalent, with better clustering at 3 land hands. Of the 28.6% 2 land hands adjusted for Lorien, the percentage of true 2 landers is 22.3%. The 3 landers goes up to 36.6%, adjusted for Lorien.

The tldr is that the mana works out a lot better + mulligans decrease in a Standstill manabase by pushing down Brainstorm copies. This mana/mulligan improvement process randomly craps all over Bowmaster.

How many copies of Standstill are you running? Did you cut back on those as well as cutting Brainstorms? (Otherwise it seems strange to play 4 Standstill 2-3 Brainstorm)

If you're on something like 2 Standstill 2 Brainstorm, no wonder Bowmaster is not an obstacle, especially with Stifle and Dress Down and Spikefield.

I like that Dress Down's cycling is unaffected by Bowmasters or Hullbreacher.

2x BS, 2x Standstill, and Standstill copies 3 & 4 are Lorien.

Im very happy someone is taking the time to post challenge finishes and 5-0s leagues on reddit again this week. All the challenge finishes and 5-0 Dressnought lists this week were UGr/UGrw surprisingly. Every other deck is splashing black for bowmasters and our deck also really benefits from Thoughtseize in clearing the path for a Dreadnought but all of our undefeated streaks this week came from lists that played every color except black!

Garmonzoria(sp?) 5-0ed and placed a challenge with this…

Artifact (2)
1 Mox Diamond
1 Soul-Guide Lantern
Creature (7)
4 Phyrexian Dreadnought
3 Uro, Titan of Nature's Wrath
Enchantment (4)
4 Dress Down
Instant (18)
4 Stifle
4 Force of Will
4 Brainstorm
2 Daze
4 Lightning Bolt
Land (23)
1 Snow-Covered Island
3 Tropical Island
3 Volcanic Island
2 Flooded Strand
2 Polluted Delta
4 Wasteland
2 Misty Rainforest
2 Scalding Tarn
4 Urza's Saga
Planeswalker (2)
2 Minsc & Boo, Timeless Heroes
Sorcery (4)
4 Ponder

Sideboard (15)
1 Meltdown
1 Carpet of Flowers
1 Life from the Loam
1 Counterbalance
2 Null Rod
1 Hydroblast
3 Pyroblast
1 Veil of Summer
1 Force of Negation
2 Surgical Extraction
1 Haywire Mite

I really love the concept of a 1 of Mox Diamond in a high land Saga list as both acceleration and an occasional Saga target.

With 4 Urza Sagas and 4 Wastelands, I would have expected to see some…

Yavamaya, Cradle of Growth
Mycosynth Gardens
As additional ways to turn colorless mana into Uro mana.
Urzas Saga and Mycosynth Gardens synergize so well together in Dreadnought decks.

Was expecting to see atleast some Dressnought lists playing…
4 Thoughtseize
4 Bowmasters

Thoughtseize to protect Dreadnought has won me so many games over the years. We are sort of a combo deck as landing just a hit or two with either Dreadnought or Uro or Minsc often wins the game. Bowmasters making the black splash even better is welcome.

Also curious if The One Ring makes sense in this deck since this is just about the last Uro deck standing in legacy. Uro negates the lifeloss of The One Ring.

The One Ring negates the card disadvantage of FoW or from stifling a Nought (should rarely be done, Stifle should almost always be saved for Uros/Fetchlands/Wastelands or to disrupt your opponents triggers.)

The 1-of Mox seems like a useful Saga target. Is Chrome Mox better than Mox Diamond though? Seems like you get Mox when you can't afford to lose the land (Saga dies) or need color fixing for Uro or Minsc. When that's true, can you afford to lose a land from hand? Don't you need the mana?

If you're land flooded (have 1 to discard), do you want to tutor for Mox? How will Mox Diamond help mana flood?

If it was Chrome Mox, it helps when you're flooded on colored cards and short on lands, which is exactly when you want to tutor for a Mox.

Otherwise the deck looks pretty standard. 4 Saga 4 Wasteland is very greedy on colorless sources for a Uro deck. Maybe some of those should be Gardens.

The One Ring seems weak here. Can't afford more space for 4s. Deck had Daze, Wasteland and Saga to reduce your land count lol. Uro and Minsc are already a lot of top end. One Ring is better in control decks or Ancient Tomb decks, while this just wants to beat down.

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Originally Posted by Clark Kant

Also curious if The One Ring makes sense in this deck since this is just about the last Uro deck standing in legacy. Uro negates the lifeloss of The One Ring.

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BUG midrange might be playable again. That would be a good Uro + One Ring shell.

Eg
//Creatures: 11
4 Orcish Bowmasters
3 Witherbloom Apprentice
4 Uro, Titan of Nature's Wrath

//Spells: 24
4 Force of Will
4 Brainstorm
4 Ponder
3 Thoughtseize
2 Cling to Dust
2 Fatal Push
2 Assassin's Trophy
2 Chain of Smog
1 Toxic Deluge

//Artifacts: 3
3 The One Ring

//Planeswalker: 2
2 Grist, the Hunger Tide

//Lands: 20
3 Polluted Delta
3 Misty Rainforest
2 Verdant Catacombs
3 Tropical Island
3 Underground Sea
1 Bayou
1 Island
1 Swamp
1 Forest
2 Boseiju, Who Endures

Something like that should be able to profit off Uro and The One Ring.

You could try to squeeze in Dreadnought, but there isn't really space or synergy. Witherbloom's a better fit.

Anyway, that's off topic. BUG Dreadnought could run Uro and Bowmasters, but probably doesn't have space for The One Ring. It's also awkward that Dress Down turns off your own Bowmasters.

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Originally Posted by FTW

The 1-of Mox seems like a useful Saga target. Is Chrome Mox better than Mox Diamond though? Seems like you get Mox when you can't afford to lose the land (Saga dies) or need color fixing for Uro or Minsc. When that's true, can you afford to lose a land from hand? Don't you need the mana?

If you're land flooded (have 1 to discard), do you want to tutor for Mox? How will Mox Diamond help mana flood?

If it was Chrome Mox, it helps when you're flooded on colored cards and short on lands, which is exactly when you want to tutor for a Mox.

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If you play Lorien Revealed then this choice becomes symbolic and not real

At baseline there are 2 ways: to play The "One" Ring. Either you have Sol lands or you have very reliable removal (Plow/Ending). In either case, you're talking about a ton of copies [deck space Dreadnought doesn't have].

Due to terrible design, the play pattern is knowably: draw 1 then lose 1, draw 2 then lose 2, draw 3 and abuse legendary rule to not suffer a free Bolt to the dome each turn. This is not tenable over time (see also why people play uncounterable Chandra +2 ability). The Plow/Ending side also gets to reset with Teferi -3.
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On the Mox stuff, we just need to point out the card FoV exists, as well as multi-artifact kills (the second most common finding in any legacy deck regardless of archetype, after yard hate). Ask your local Parfait player how their god hands of Mox/Land Tax are working out vs FoV. Losing Saga + artifact card that can't replace itself isn't really recoverable; particularly when you're losing a 3rd card (the discard to Diamond or exile to Chrome).

We see this Mox acceleration stuff come up in Standstill quite a bit, and when you do the math you've warped a deck to play game actions...but you're not really going up cards (you draw 3 sure....but you discarded a Standstill and 2 cards to Mox...so???).

Ark4n had a number of streams with these Saga/Nought/Uro/MoxD builds. It works fine when you're ahead and spamming Loam, but quite poor at playing catch-up. There are also consistent problems with "I made constructs and I can't cast Dress Down."

^these problems are locked-in by slot investment. Manipulating a deck harder at the cost of a further -8 slot penalty [cantrips] just means you ram ever harder and more frequently into the deck construction problems. It's not sustainable with the Nought package also competing for slots.

Your next stop is trying again at 80 slot deck, as constructed.
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As for Lorien Revealed, you are not doing the Ponder thing where you have terrible mana security and bloated color pip demands. You need to realistically threaten to cast it and draw 3.

This becomes nore problematic as Lorien cannot find what every [not-combo] Ponder deck relies on: finding and cheese'ing wins off 1-card combos. Things like: SFM, 2 mana Juzam (Goyf/Gurmag/Murk), Shardless, JTMS, Counterbalance, Hymn, Strix/Ice-Fang, Wrenn, Oko, Uro, Ragavan, Minsc, The "One" Ring....pick your era of legacy - I promise you Lorien ain't gonna tutor it.

While it is cool that a Lorien in hand makes the Mox descriptor of Chrome or Diamond equivocal, the Mox is sloppy deck construction that walks you into knowable (i.e. avoidable) blowouts. What you are looking for is cycling + Currency Converter.

Maybe you can use Lorien to put Island Fish Jasconius in hand.

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Originally Posted by FTW

Maybe you can use Lorien to put Island Fish Jasconius in hand.

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Does not work, as you can't fetch fish into play.

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Originally Posted by FTW

Maybe you can use Lorien to put Island Fish Jasconius in hand.

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Jasconius hasn't been an island in over twenty years

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Originally Posted by FourDogsinaHorseSuit

Jasconius hasn't been an island in over twenty years

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I'm glad someone got the (very outdated) joke.

Lorien Revealed is interesting but looks too clunky for Dreadnought. If it was an instant it might be playable in control (fixes land, pitches to Force, draws cards). 3UU sorcery speed is a lot just to draw 3. Compare that to Standstill, Sylvan Library, Brainstorm, Ancestral Vision, etc... even Predict. There are more efficient ways to draw cards.

You misunderstand what lorien and their ilk are: they're fetches that enter tapped, and pitch to forces and elementals
Don't think of them as spells, and unlike the MDFCs they're multicolored

Lorien is only going to work if you have a coherent plan for your mana. When the plan is spamming duals into Wasteland and never getting to 6 mana to play around Daze, you're not unlocking the point of the card. It's also pointless to have no real plan for 1 mana, grab your second land while your dual (first land) gets Waste'd and end back up on 1 mana asking yourself why it is you can't deploy a 1 mana threat...particularly since this puts a sorcery into the GY at instant speed for DRC.

Play 2c, play basics. Add Lorien, drastically reducing true 1-land hands, and getting to & staying at 2 mana.

Unlike fetches or MDFC, Lorien needs another land in play. It's more like Ash Barrens than Terramorphic Expanse (tapped fetch), except it doesn't have Ash Barrens' backup mode of entering as initial mana (2 Ash Barrens = 1 colorless + 1 fetch, 2 Lorien = 0 mana).

The ability's good. But it doesn't let you get as greedy cutting lands as MDFC (can be initial mana). You still need enough real lands to draw initial mana and not get screwed by Wasteland. It's also much better if you can use the 3UU mode.

Fieldmist Borderpost is a tapped dual that pitches to Force and Solitude, grows Saga constructs, and ramps. Saw 0 competitive play in the last decade. It's a weak way to spend turn 1. If it's not standalone mana like MDFC, the spell side needs to be relevant too.

If you do cut to 2c, is UB now viable with Bowmasters? Or is black still too weak compare to UR or UW?

Does the UW build want Samwise to recur Saga, Dreadnought, Dress Down, Standstill, etc?

It also DID see play (or it's ilk) with restore balance in either modern or legacy.
But also:
Sorcery Speed spell
Basic Land in play
Fixed dual
Enters Tapped (so costs two mana)
Vs
Activated ability
Any mana source
And land of the chosen type
Costs 1.

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Originally Posted by FTW

If you do cut to 2c, is UB now viable with Bowmasters? Or is black still too weak compare to UR or UW?

Does the UW build want Samwise to recur Saga, Dreadnought, Dress Down, Standstill, etc?

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I like the sound of UB but there's a lot of cards out there I'd want in either green or red.

I don't think you want Sam., Not with dreadnought. Same way you don't want reanimate with dreadnought in your ub list. (Though you should probably play reanimate anyways for Bowmaster and grief)

The problem with UB is that since the banning of DRS, the color has not had a playable 1-drop (Gurmag and Shadow can't be played turn 1). If we march out all the deckbuilding decisions, you always end up with UB-based Landstill being the better option. So the best UB-based Dreadstill build is just UB Landstill with a 13 card SB + Dreadnought & Scroll of Fate (just to meet the requirement of being called Dreadstill).

As far as UB Dreadnought goes: you don't have damage-based gameplan, you don't have turn 1 proactive plays (so you can't use Mycosynth effectively, and you can't count to 20 dmg), you can't use black's polarizing removal (Innocent Blood and 3 mana wraths hit your own things, Snuff Out can't kill enemy Bowmaster), Daze isn't helpful, we know that the only playable way for UB to answer Chalice is Karn, and so on. Meanwhile UB Landstill can play the asymmetry game of not really having creatures to turn on opponents' removal and not hitting itself with it's own kill spells. Everything that UB Dreadnought can do is too slow - and I mean as slow as Landstill...just without control. We're not going to play Qarsi High Priest,Sultai Emissary, Bowmaster, and Nought. I mean it is cool that you can sacrifice the orc army to manifest, and send the ping from Bowmaster to Emissary, but Scroll of Fate is better and less slot-intensive.

On the CA side of things, you're not allowed to play Confidant or Strix (too much waiting for cmc 2, too vulnerable to enemy Bowmaster, and too slow of a clock to pressure combo). Bowmaster itself is often a dead card, so you also need 4 slots of SB mapping to get this thing out of your deck in g2/3. Like I'm not going to play Arcane Denial to try and make Bowmaster relevant when the opponent isn't being cooperative (certainly not when Drown in the Loch exists). So we're down to Dreadnought and a Bowmaster we have to be able to side out....and uh....we're just doing what else? Playing into yard hate with MurkGoyf or not being able to block enemy MurkGoyf b/c we chose Sailors' Bane (aka SeaGoyf)? There are few things worse against combo than tapping out for Goyf.

Then what is the plan for the mana? Keep railroading yourself while all of these can't be cast while Saga is eating the mana at the same time as you need to deploy these? Then you go down a land b/c Saga died, and you're losing land drops to activating Wasteland...like when are you going to start playing the game; turn 5??? Okay well, now you need Landstill levels of controlling cards, otherwise your opponent is going to go crazy with 1 mana kill spells *the same turn as making PWs.*

On the Grief stuff, you don't have the CA to alt-cast this guy. The only redeeming thing is that Grief + Stifle is a turn 1 black threat....but your hand is now 3 cards (-1 land, -1 Grief, -1 exile, -1 Stifle). You're not winning from this point with a 3/2 menace. Even if you impeded your own combo by cutting Stifle for Reanimate, you're still probably losing...but also why is your 12/12 not Death's Shadow at this point?
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On Samwise in UW, I can recur everything Sam could except for Karn for 1x slot of Sevinne's. Sam also has issues with being played at 1x since you need 3-4x copies to cheese removal; e.g. kill spell target Sam #1 -> cast Sam #2 -> kill Sam #1, rebuy Sam #1. UW doesn't have the slots for this, and for 2 mana I'm going to punish Daze users with Timeless Dragon.

With Sam you're better off without Standstill. You'd be doing something slow like Saga find Map find Karakas -> Sam/Dress Down looping to simulate Gush. Problem there is that that's 4 lands (2 to power Saga/activate Map/cast Sam, 1 from the Saga sacrifice, and 1 from Karakas); at 4 lands I could just go Teferi -> progress to Karn -> wish Coating -> Coat Teferi, bounce self each turn...but also I'd be answering a ton of effects with the passives and developing towards endlessly Sinkhole'ing my opponent's manabase before Teferi self-Gush'ing.

UB Dreadstill wouldn't work (lack of proactive 1s to play under Standstill). The question is if UB Dressnought would. You make a good point that all the best tempo plays are done better by UB Shadow without consuming as many slots.

Shadow already jumped to Tier 1 since Bowmaster. So if you're running Grief, Bowmasters, Reanimate, Murktide, Daze, Thoughtseize, you're hard-pressed not to make those 12/12s into Shadows and have a more cohesive deck.

Edit: Shadow also gets to run the Swampcycling creature (mana stability) AND Reanimate it profitably OR Delve it to Murktide OR pitch it to Grief. I guess Dressnought can use Lorien as Uro fuel, but it's not getting the same level of value. Lorien hasn't been showing up in winning lists yet.

Need to make a Venn diagram of everything in shadow that works with dreadnought.
Force, dress down, brainstorm ponder and Bowmasters in the center
Ofc no guarantee the things in the middle go with each other

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Originally Posted by FourDogsinaHorseSuit

Need to make a Venn diagram of everything in shadow that works with dreadnought.
Force, dress down, brainstorm ponder and Bowmasters in the center
Ofc no guarantee the things in the middle go with each other

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Useless synergy until we can combine big stats + CA (Arguel's Blood Fast -> transform to Diamond Valley) + "when I gain X, opponent loses X".

The biggest pro of Death Nought/Naked Shadow is Thoughtseize and the scam package (Grief/Troll/Reanimate).

Thoughtseize is amazing in a resolve/protect the Queen strategy for two turns to win the game like Nude Shadow lists.

But I feel the decks are being misbuilt. Murktide>>Channeler.

Slip out the back should be played here. I prefer it to the Stifle/Daze/Wasteland approach. I would rather be playing Slip Out the Back/Thoughtseize/Mycosynth Saga in those slots.

The only threats in the deck should be playing are some combination of Dreadnought, Death’s Shadow, and Murktide. These threats win the game in 2 attacks. The rest of the deck should be focused on resolving and protecting these threats. Utility threats like Brazen Borrower, Bowmasters, Uro, Troll/Grief/Reanimate are worth playing but more for their disputive role in helping resolve and protect the threats.

Basically every actual threat in the deck should win the game if it attacks 2-3 times.

In a world where initiative decks are readily able to get 4-5 swings in, if built correctly we should easily be able to get 2 swings in with our threats and win the game faster.

So Thoughtseize is a pretty terrible magic card against FIRE. Not a card you want to be drawing when other people have Uro or monarch off Forth, initiative stuff, etc. The only redeeming quality to the card is that it contributes to the life loss engine of Shadow. The Shadow deck does not get better by adding Dreadnought package b/c they don't share tech (same concept as why Nought + Painter always fails to generate a real deck).

Trying to play 2-drop threat: the Gathering is bad deck construction (particularly vs combo which Shadow or Nought decks are supposed to farm). Adding crappy mana on top of that is worse. Adding Daze on top of the inability to pressure on turn 1, worse still.

Let's be very clear on this point: DRC is way better than yet another 2 drop. It generates pressure, it reduces variance, it passively combos with landcyclers and Saga (delirium; note also how the cyclers and Saga stuff does not make big Murktides), and it puts you in red giving you Blast effects and Price of Progress.

You want to time the meta? Cast Price. Just go to twitch and watch this 4-5c Ring decks and Shadow, count their dual lands and look at their life totals. Then look at what else is going on (Mind's Desire) - go back in time to RUG Delver vs Storm; how do you beat Storm: a turn 1 clock and disruption. Get on board, play DRC.

The other timing you're missing is Vision Charm. This card 1-shots Doomsday, 1-shots Saga, and 1-shots High Tide (Mind's Desire). Slip scores an impressive 0 out of 3 here. The other thing you can do is prevent Ring resetting: they cast #2, you phase out #1 and now they do not get to fade the upkeep damage (this is helpful b/c you play Bolt and PoP).

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Originally Posted by Fox

The other timing you're missing is Vision Charm. This card 1-shots Doomsday, 1-shots Saga, and 1-shots High Tide (Mind's Desire). Slip scores an impressive 0 out of 3 here. The other thing you can do is prevent Ring resetting: they cast #2, you phase out #1 and now they do not get to fade the upkeep damage (this is helpful b/c you play Bolt and PoP).

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Not sure what you mean by crappy mana. Shadow Nought can easily work as a UB Deck or a UBr Deck.

You’re minimizing the synergy of Dress Down with Shadow. They also complementhh hh each other in that Shadow, Dreadnought (and Murktide usually) are bigger than whatever your opponent has and can swing in with impunity for 12 damage while racing any creatures your opponent has on the board. You dont need to play removal if your threats are outright bigger and faster than your opponent. You can instead fill up the rest of your slots with proactive disruption (Thoughtseize, Grief), counterspells (FoW, optionally Daze/Fluster) and cards that protect your threats from removal (Slip Out, Vision Charm, Reanimate, Mycosynth Gardens)

Shadow/Nought/Murktide essentially end the game with even a single successful attack in a list with Bolts/PoP. Both are very cheap threats that you just need to resolve and protect for a turn or two in order to win the game. If the rest of the deck is built to do that, they work very well together. The appeal of Slip Out the Back is that it protects all of your threats from removal, not just Dreadnought but also Shadow, Murktide, Grief and Troll.

But otherwise good points and especially in regards to Vision Charm.

It hasnt occured to me how much utility Vision Charm has now. Definitely worth trying atleast as a 1 of if High Tide ends up a popular deck once the dust settles. Two questions…

How does it 1-shot Saga?

Dont both Slip and Vision 1-shot Painter for a turn as well? Is that worth it, stopping Painter for a turn?

P.S: Thoughtseize and Grief are excellent cards. Plenty of top tier decks succeed while utilizing proactive black cards as the majority or even the only disruption they play.

I am thinking my new list is going to cut some Stifles, Dazes and Wastelands and instead play the following Dreadnought package…
4 Dreadnought
4 Dress Down
2 Stifle
1 Slip Out the Back
1 Vision Charm (if Hide Tide stays popular)
1-2 Mycosynth Gardens
Maybe 1 Urza’s Saga if I am cutting Wasteland.

Alongside the shadow/scam/grief package…
4 Thoughtseize
4 Grief
4 Troll
4 Reanimate
4 Shadow
X Bowmasters
X Murktide

Quote:

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Originally Posted by Captain Hammer

How does it 1-shot Saga?

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Name "Urza's" for the land type, and name anything for the basic land type.
The saga is now a basic land, and like with blood moon, dies due to being a saga past it's last chapter.

The Shadow/Scam package is the best direction for the deck currently.

Boshnroll 5-0ed with a sweet build…

https://youtu.be/_pYeymSuFs4

4 Dress Down
4 Brainstorm
4 Death's Shadow
2 Dismember
2 Fatal Push
4 Grief
3 Misty Rainforest
2 Overgrown Tomb
3 Phyrexian Dreadnought
3 Polluted Delta
4 Ponder
4 Reanimate
3 Stifle
4 Thoughtseize
3 Troll of Khazad-dûm
1 Tropical Island
2 Underground Sea
2 Varolz, the Scar-Striped
3 Wasteland
3 Watery Grave

SIDEBOARD:
1 Brazen Borrower // Petty Theft
2 Dauthi Voidwalker
1 Flusterstorm
4 Force of Will
1 Hydroblast
1 Life from the Loam
2 Null Rod
1 Sheoldred's Edict
2 Surgical Extraction

The list is damn near perfect except for one fundamental flaw…
The Fatal Push/Dismembers are near worthless in the current meta. They did nothing all league and were sided out every round. If they were Daze, Bowmasters, Brazen Borrower, Spell Pierce or the 4th Stifle or 4th Troll or 4th Dreadnought, they would be much more impactful. You dont need to play removal if your threats are outright bigger and faster than your opponent. You can instead fill up the rest of your slots with proactive disruption (Thoughtseize, Grief), counterspells (FoW, Daze/Fluster) and cards that protect your threats from removal (Slip Out, Vision Charm, Reanimate, Mycosynth Gardens)

New Lazav, the Multifarious just dropped.
https://mythicspoiler.com/woe/cards/likenesslooter.jpg

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Originally Posted by FourDogsinaHorseSuit

New Lazav, the Multifarious just dropped.
https://mythicspoiler.com/woe/cards/likenesslooter.jpg

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Functionally similar to Varolz, yes Varolz also combos with Shadow but the loot ability is a massive asset. If only it had 2 toughness it would absolutely be worth a slot or two.

The new card is fine in the sense that Lazav is garbage vs Karakas and useless after they inevitably cast Surgical target Nought; whereas this card can still draw/discard. Bowmasters is about 40% of the meta however, so this card is a massive liability. There is also a problem where you can't trade with a Delver/DRC/Murktide/Endurance, which makes flying flavor text. You also run into the problem where black hasn't had a playable 1-drop since DRS.

In either case JVP is the better use of 2 mana, particularly with Darkblast targeting Bowmaster. Azcanta, and even Sultai Emissary, would also be better in this slot. Better still would be Scroll of Fate.

Quote:

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Originally Posted by Fox

You also run into the problem where black hasn't had a playable 1-drop since DRS.

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We already play Deaths Shadow. Other than Shadow, what would a playable black one drop even look like?

A 1/1 that you can sac to thoughtseize your opponent, thats all I can think of.

White has taxing and protection, green has ramp, red has haste, what does black offer its creatures thats relevent to legacy?

Can't Gurmag on turn 1, nor can you Shadow on turn 1. These are not real gameplans. Black has nothing comparable to DRC, Delver, Reclaimer, or Mother of Runes. The closest black has come to this is Reanimate/Grief, which begs the question of why we're diluting Shadow with Dreadnought variance without synergy (i.e. power) to offset the variance.