[Deck] Reanimator

@kingsey

I call "fast" to the #2 garobidou setup that was optimized to have one of the highest reanimation % at turn 3. However, against control decks I felt the need for more library manipulation so I ended up with a 4 brainstorm version which has a little less t3 reanimation %.

My setup right now is:

4 entomb, 4 study, 1 researcher
4 reanimate, 3 ad, 3 exhume
4 FoW, 3 Daze, 4 Dispel (I only have 3 daze online, but maybe this is the right number. I'm finding dispel very usefull)
4 brainstorm
8 creatures
18 land

Sb
3 echoing truth
2 show and tell
2 needle
3 thoughtseize
5 creatures

Angel of Despair and Don are in sideboard. I never felt the need for them in mainboard. Angel is nice because it hits creatures (emrakul), and Don is good against multiple targets. I'm also testing sundering titan in sideboard (don't have enough feedback on it yet, but seems interesting against emerging rock decks). 2nd Iona always was there and always will be. 4th Jin is there too. And those are my reserve 5. But I want to test Balefire Dragon when it will be playable (replacing terastodon). It looks like a very nice adition to fight zoo, goyfs and kotrs.


Warning: Look out for your opponents graveyard when they have 3 mana open. Snapcaster Mage will be a pain.

I just wanted to share a link with everyone about a post-ban Reanimator deck. It includes 5 videos - the first discussing the deck construction and last 4 showing games in the Tournament Practice Room in MTGO. http://www.mtgoacademy.com/forcing-t...reanimator-v2/ Thanks to KillerOwen for creating the video and deck and his discussion!

We need to talk about Echoing Truth vs Chain of Vapor again. I know it was discussed a number of pages back, but I simply don't agree with the conclusions. Like this:

Echoing Truth has two major pros: it can be cast after having reanimated something, and it can hit multiple copies of Leyline of the Void. The latter is almost irrelevant; the chance that the opponent gets two leylines, and that you draw one of your bounce cards, is extremely low. So is the former: once you've animated anything, you shouldn't really need to bounce any permanent.

However, costing 1 instead of 2 is huge in this 17-18 land deck, especially when you want to force it through with spell pierce or thoughtseize. I'm going with Chain of Vapor for the moment. Any thoughts on the matter?

Quote:

---

Originally Posted by Anselm

We need to talk about Echoing Truth vs Chain of Vapor again. I know it was discussed a number of pages back, but I simply don't agree with the conclusions. Like this:

Echoing Truth has two major pros: it can be cast after having reanimated something, and it can hit multiple copies of Leyline of the Void. The latter is almost irrelevant; the chance that the opponent gets two leylines, and that you draw one of your bounce cards, is extremely low. So is the former: once you've animated anything, you shouldn't really need to bounce any permanent.

However, costing 1 instead of 2 is huge in this 17-18 land deck, especially when you want to force it through with spell pierce or thoughtseize. I'm going with Chain of Vapor for the moment. Any thoughts on the matter?

---

Like it or not, Echoing Truth is your only out to Chalice of the Void @ 1. Which unfortunately has come up for me on more than one occasion. Having Chain of Vapor stuck in my hand pretty much sucked and I cut it down to a 1 of after that.

E-Truth also has some minor relevance bouncing Goblin/Zombie tokens against TES/Dredge, and I have bounced multiple copies of Tormod's Crypt & Relic of Progenitus before where if it was Chain I would have lost.

Quote:

---

Originally Posted by RogueMTG

... and I have bounced multiple copies of Tormod's Crypt & Relic of Progenitus before where if it was Chain I would have lost.

---

Bouncing multiple Crypts/Relics isn't a play I would rely on. Opponents can simply sacrifice the Crypt/Relic targeted by the Echoing Truth to save the other copies.

For what it's worth, I think Echoing Truth is superior. It's a broader answer to legacy's cardpool, and versatility is key in our format.

Don't you think it is more important to first discuss the maindeck configuration of protection spells between 3 Thoughtseize vs. 3 Spell Pierce vs. some mix of Spell Pierce and Dispel.

I personally favor Counterspells, as with those you can be reactive to what your opponent does and react with either Spell Pierce or Entomb (I like Spell Pierce a lot more than Dispel).

You seem to board in the bounce against a much wider selection of decks than I do. I almost exclusively board it in if I know they have Leylines. Or in the mirror, I guess.

Also, counterspells are a lot slower than discard. Keeping mana up means having 3 mana if you want to protect an exhume or animate dead, for example, and that's a lot in the 18 land deck that already has problems with stifle and wastelands.

Why not run Wipe Away as the bounce spell. Opponents cant crack crypt in response. And players always wait untill you cast a reanimation spell before they crack crypt/relic. So u have time to stall the game abit, fill up youre graveyard and make sure u have enough mana to Wipe and reaniamte.

Wipe Away will become more relevant if/when the meta shifts back to Counterbalance. For now, I don't think it's necessary.

As for the Mental Misstep replacements, I'll be working with Thoughtseize and Misdirection.

I am tuning up a reani list for the next indy scg 5K and looking for some advice. I don't have anything revolutionary in the deck, 3 Thought Seize and one Daze for MM replacements, 3 Jin etc. I run Echoing Truth out of the board. My question is about Merfolk. I expect to see a lot and haven't had a lot of testing opportunities vs the folk. With the Phantasmal Image killing our legends,what is the best approach vs merfolk? I was wondering about bringing Sheoldred in but he seems to narrow and still gets killed. I like the animate Elesh, reanimate Elesh, but can that really race them? Any ideas and or advice? Thanks!

Quote:

---

Originally Posted by defector

I am tuning up a reani list for the next indy scg 5K and looking for some advice. I don't have anything revolutionary in the deck, 3 Thought Seize and one Daze for MM replacements, 3 Jin etc. I run Echoing Truth out of the board. My question is about Merfolk. I expect to see a lot and haven't had a lot of testing opportunities vs the folk. With the Phantasmal Image killing our legends,what is the best approach vs merfolk? I was wondering about bringing Sheoldred in but he seems to narrow and still gets killed. I like the animate Elesh, reanimate Elesh, but can that really race them? Any ideas and or advice? Thanks!

---

Blazing Archon.

The only splash that gives them game against it is White for StP. That, and submerge out the board. Mono Blue/UB is straight up cold to it in G1. And even if they have submerge, those extra few turns for them to actually get to 5 mana should give you adequate time to find protection and/or animate a few other creatures to assist.

I'm of the opinion the eight creatures run should be

3x Jin Gitaxias
1x Sphinx of the Steel Wind
1x Iona, Shield of Emeria
1x Blazing Archon
1x Terastodon (Keep in mind you can blow your own lands, 18 Power on the attack next turn is pretty ridiculous)

1x Your choice/Meta Choice. Going up to 4x Jin is perfectly acceptable, but Norn is still a good choice for aggro/tribal-heavy metagames. Perhaps Inkwell for control heavy metagames.

So, tomorrow is the final Legacy tournament my store will have before the Mental Misstep ban will come into effect. Since Null Rod has been quite useless over these past few weeks, I'm thinking about simply replacing them with 2 Brainstorm that I'd board in against decks where I'd want to sculpt a Thoughtseize+other disruption turn and finally trying out the Garobidou #2 list. Seems like it could be very good.

Thanks a lot guys, this is my 8 Man Plan for Indy:
Jin-Gitaxis, Core Augur X3
Sphinx of the Steel Wind X1
Iona, Shield of Emeria X1
Elesh Norn, Grand Cenobite X1
Terastadon X1
Blazing Archon X1

Now lets get some good draws:))

Had a very amusing night despite going 1-2-1, drawing with Chains of Mephistopheles/Anvil of Bogardan combo (1-1-1), losing to Bant Aggro w/ Prog (0-2), beating Dream Halls (2-0), and losing to UBR goodstuffs (1-2). Notes, observations, etc.:

-Round one was very entertaining. I go for a turn three Sphinx game one and see it get Extirpated. Ouch. He's able to assemble the long-winded and confusing combo in addition to Ensnaring Bridge before I can recover (Hapless Researcher unfortunately could not get there in time), drops Liliana Vess, and wins. I guess I should note I also cast three Mental Missteps that game, which was pretty sweet considering I'll never be able to do that again in the near future (or ever again). I won a drawn out game two through a Tormod's Crypt as time is called. Pretty fun round one.
-Round two was a good shellacking from my opponent, with him getting turn three Progenituses in both games with ample countermagic for my spells.
-Game one of round three was your classic T1 Entomb, T2 Reanimate with Force backup despite getting Thoughtseized hand. I cast Show and Tell on turn three of game two not exactly knowing what was going on (probably a mistake on my part) with his deck. I put in Rasta Don, he flips up one of my favorite cards of all-time, Dream Halls. I blow up one of his two lands, Dream Halls, and my Swamp. I then make one of my two assured mistakes of the night after I drew and cast Thoughtseize the next turn, taking Duress instead of Lotus Petal when he only had one land out. He rips an Ancient Tomb and casts Jace, the Mind Sculptor. I Brainstorm in response into a sick three of blue card, Force, Pithing Needle. He scoops.
-I win game one of round four because I drew both Brainstorms in the deck. I punt in game two by fetching up a Sea despite him having a Wasteland already out. Game three starts off with me countering a Dark Confidant and Reanimating it the next turn. The first flip reveals Elesh Norn. The second flip reveals Jin-Gitaxias, and it's all she wrote. I don't necessarily think that that was a bad line of play, and would still probably go through with it if I had the chance again (hand was Show and Tell, 2x Force, Reanimate with two lands out at the time ).
-Brainstorm actually came up dead a few times tonight, but I'd still run four if I had the chance again.

It was a good few weeks running with Mental Misstep. It'll be interesting to see how the deck will play out again in the coming weeks, as I don't think you can just replace the four Misstep slots with other forms of disruption and still have it be a DTB (although, who knows, maybe you can).

Yesteday I packed my version with misdirections to our local tornament at which everyone agreed to enforce the new bannings. I replaced the mental misteps for the fourth daze and three misdirections. I marked the fourth daze and kept attention when i had it or misdirection in hand to compare with dispel or spell pierce in those positionns. Unfortunately there was few people and we only played three rounds. I 3-0ed the tournament beating burn, affinity and rock. There was only two situations where misdirection over dispel mattered. One of them was better misdirection beacuse i didnt had mana open, on the other was better dispel. Never felt the need for spell pierce over dispel. Before the tournament started, while waiting for more people to show, i played seven games without sideboard against merfolk and i won 6-1. Without MM it is a lot tougher to counter our entombs, and that is crucial in this matchup. I think this deck will keep very strong. The loss of MM has bad things but also has good things, as our entombs become much stronger. My concern right now is about snapcaster mage. Lets see if he doesnt do much damage to us.

I'm still trying out what to replace MM with. Misdirection seems interesting, but I'll have to wait and test some more before reporting back.

On another note, am I one of the few that runs Empyrial Archangel in MB? (I threw Inkwell to SB in favour of her). Her clock isn't terribly fast but she's been such a life saver for me too many times. Even helped stave off Progenitus with the help of Elesh a couple of times (even though that scenario isn't a valid reason to include a creature). Thoughts?

Quote:

---

Originally Posted by Marvelous

On another note, am I one of the few that runs Empyrial Archangel in MB? (I threw Inkwell to SB in favour of her). Her clock isn't terribly fast but she's been such a life saver for me too many times. Even helped stave off Progenitus with the help of Elesh a couple of times (even though that scenario isn't a valid reason to include a creature). Thoughts?

---

Please read the prior material in the thread. We have been back an forth about this creature inclusion. It is my personal opinion that it does not belong in the deck. I ran it for a good period of time and it was never really that stellar. I believe that Blazing Archon is just a better creature to fill that slot. Blazing Archon stops both Progenitus and Emrakul in their tracks as well as serving double duty against quick aggro decks including Merfolk, Zoo, Affinity, etc.

The only issue I have with Misdirection in the main is that it is like playing extra Force of Wills. I'm not sure if the card loss from both is worth it. And if you play Misdirection in the side to board in over Force, I feel like there could be a better sideboard slot for the situations you would use Misdirection.

That being said, I only have limited testing with Misdirection so I'd love to hear some more feedback from people who have been playing it more.

@Marvelous

I'm also one of the few who still runs Empyrial Archangel main. Like you, I replaced the inkwell slot with him. My personal opinion about empyrial archangel is that he rules against control decks, not against aggro. Note that Jin is usually the first target against control decks, but there are times where archangel will just win the game by himself, despite the opponent having a jace or karakas in play. For example against UW Stoneblade he rules, unless they get a jitte with mystic. I like having options, and empyrial archangel gives me another option that can be game decisive in certain situations.


@zmattk

I'm playtesting with dispel online and misdirection in real life. I'm still not sure what I prefer. Yesterday I won our local GPT Amsterdam running misdirections and they were better than anything else, because they worked like FoW allowing me to go off all tapped. I didn't feel any problems about pitching blue cards (in one situation I even pitched FoW to Misdirection, not loosing 1 life). Online, dispel is also serving me well, by being a hard counter against almost everything that matters against our deck. I'm not a big fan of spell pierce. Sure it can counter artifacts (relics) and sorceries, but it is not a hard counter and if the games lasts a little longer they become useless. Right now, based on my limited testing I'd go for misdirection, but this is just an initial impression.