If you're new to the deck, play a stock list. Splitting halves on a ddft list and menendian's lab man list is not a good plan. Lots of dead/non-synergistic cards.
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If you're new to the deck, play a stock list. Splitting halves on a ddft list and menendian's lab man list is not a good plan. Lots of dead/non-synergistic cards.
Fully agree. Very good advice.Quote:
Originally Posted by anwei
I'm about to say the same thing in quite a few more words.Quote:
Originally Posted by anwei
I understand why you would want to have so many answers, but this deck is so powerful on its own that you shouldn't need to worry about trying to get an edge over opponents by confusing them with transformational sideboards--especially since your opponent has the opportunity to look through your deck anytime you cast Doomsday and your deck configuration screams that you have a Tendrils somewhere in your 75 because you're playing a bunch of cards that don't make sense in your maindeck otherwise. The way this deck works, you should be able to play around your opponent's answers without having to commit so entirely to two completely separate plans that have little synergy with each other. For instance, you don't have a good reason to side in Tendrils at all when Ideas Unbound and one LED give you a pile that is unaffected by the graveyard and Chromatic Sphere gives you the ability to dodge creature removal entirely, so Tendrils looks like a wasted card in your sideboard and the extra copies of LED look really weird in your mainboard.
I asked you the question about your three-of cards because all of them are so strong that you should be running full sets of them, but they're also all so anti-synergistic that you shouldn't be playing half of them in the same deck with each other. First off, the way I've seen it described is that committing to Maniac is meant to leverage the power of blue permission, while you commit to Tendrils to get the power of LED. This is because blue permission and LED shouldn't go into the same deck without a compelling reason, and I don't think you've offered one. Your maindeck is basically a bad version of the Laboratory Maniac deck playing LEDs that don't do much, Infernal Tutors that do even less, and not enough cards that actually protect a Maniac in your pile. If you switch to the Tendrils deck from the sideboard, you're playing a neutered version of DDFT with less powerful draws in a reduced number of LED, Infernal Tutor as a horrible draw because you don't play enough LED nor do you play the types the spells to facilitate actually casting ten spells, and you have only two protection spells that are actually capable of forcing a Tendrils through because counterspells can't be held up past the point when you use an LED.
The main thing that strikes me is that Infernal Tutor is especially bad here. Your deck is playing too many cards that you can't easily empty from your hand (Laboratory Maniac, and all of your blue permission) and you're not playing enough fast mana (not to mention not enough LED) to make it work well too often. You have to jump through too many hoops to make Infernal Tutor good, and I don't think you can build your deck in a way that makes this card good while you are playing the Maniac combo. Your deck is pulling itself in so many different directions that it seems so mediocre at doing any of the things that it wants to do that I can't see the trade-off in versatility being worth it. I think that actually trying to build the kind of deck you want to make basically requires Burning Wish to tie everything together. If you don't want to play Burning Wish (which is understandable), I think you need to focus more on one plan. You can build the Tendrils deck to work well with Infernal Tutor (the original lists looked more like ANT with Ill-Gotten Gains). As the Maniac deck alone, I can understand feeling like 4 Doomsday isn't enough, but Infernal Tutor is just not an effective answer. I'd probably play Lim-Dul's Vault or something similar--it's also not a great card, but it requires less work to make it actually find Doomsday.
I know you said you wanted to win this turn... but as an alternative, you can win easily with a pass the turn Time Spiral pile as well. Your pile would be:Quote:
Originally Posted by nevilshute
Ideas Unbound
LED
LED
Burning Wish
Burning Wish
pass the turn, and on your next main phase, use your Tundra to cast Silence eliminating whatever interaction they drew (unless it was something like Thalia or the like), and then it's just a normal Time Spiral pile from there. (IU, LED, LED, flip top, Crack LED's for RRRUUU, Burning Wish -> Time Spiral, LED, LED, SDT, Burning Wish -> Tendrils).
Just another option anyway if for whatever reason a scenario comes up where you can't use Lab Maniac in this case (since it is clearly better to win right now as you don't give them a chance to interact).
Thank you all for the feedback. Time to do some much needed deliberation.
Maybe a pile like this should win on the spotQuote:
Originally Posted by nevilshute
TOP
ideas
led
probe
probe
labman
BOTTOM
- tap top to draw ideas
- cast ideas with two lands of your choice and draw top, led and probe
- cast top with the remaining land and led
- cast probe and in response crack led for UUU, draw the second probe
- cast the second probe to draw labman and cast him with the mana floating
- tap top to win the game
However I'm angry at you nevilshute, you left the food chain thread now that it's become my weapon of choice!!!!!
Just joking ^_^ , it's nice to see you here and I know that I'll soon have to play this deck more seriously because I feel it's a beast and I love the puzzle you can come up with.
That's the pile that would have won it. Thanks. GoboLord already beat you to it though. Thanks anyways :smile: I couldn't for the life of me work it out. Nice to have people chiming in!Quote:
Originally Posted by kingtk3
Sorry about being a bit awol in the Food Chain thread. I'm still playing it, just not that regularily. Believe me, I still love it, and I'm so happy it had something of a breakthrough this year. Keep it at. I still browse the thread weekly :smile:
I was browsing the thread from my smartphone and kinda missed Gobolord's post... so lame on my part: sorry Gobo!!! ^_^'''Quote:
Originally Posted by nevilshute
Don't worry, we'll "see" each other in one of these threads, although during this summer in my shop there will be almost modern tournaments.
Here's a short puzzle that came up in yesterday's legacy tournament. I was playing this list (sorry, no lab maniac for you fans of that card):
MD:
4 Scalding Tarn
4 Polluted Delta
2 Underground Sea
1 Badlands
2 Volcanic Island
1 Tropical Island
2 Island
2 Swamp
4 Sensei's Divining Top
4 Ponder
4 Brainstorm
4 Gitaxian Probe
4 Lion's Eye Diamond
2 Lotus Petal
4 Dark Ritual
1 Cabal Ritual
3 Doomsday
3 Burning Wish
1 Ideas Unbound
1 Chain of Vapor
4 Duress
3 Cabal Therapy
SB:
4 Abrupt Decay
1 Flusterstorm
1 Doomsday
1 Time Spiral
2 Tendrils of Agony
1 Empty the Warrens
1 Virtue's Ruin
1 Toxic Deluge
1 Massacre
1 Infernal Contract
1 Cabal Therapy
Game 2 vs Werewolf Stompy (I lost game 1):
SB as follows:
-1 Duress
+1 Tendrils of Agony
We played the game to this point:
My Hand: Dark Ritual, Doomsday, Gitaxian Probe, Lotus Petal, Cabal Therapy, Tendrils of Agony
My hand: Dark Ritual, Doomsday, Brainstorm, Lotus Petal, Cabal Therapy, Tendrils of Agony
My Board: Scalding Tarn (can only tap for red), Swamp, Volcanic Island (can only tap for red) (all untapped)
His Board: Blood Moon, Phyrexian Revoker (naming Lion's Eye Diamond), Phyrexian Revoker (naming Sensei's Divining Top), Ancient Tomb (tapped).
Life Totals: 19 (me) vs 18 (him)
To me, the most obvious pile ends up one storm short, and is as follows:
Dark Ritual (1) -> Doomsday (2) building:
top-Brainstorm, Lotus Petal, Dark Ritual, Dark Ritual, Dark Ritual-bottom
Probe (3) -> Lotus Petal (4) -> Brainstorm (using Petal) (5) (put back dark ritual and cabal therapy) -> Lotus Petal (6) -> Dark Ritual (7) -> Tendrils of Agony (8).
top-Probe, Lotus Petal, Dark Ritual, Dark Ritual, Dark Ritual-bottom
Lotus Petal (3), Brainstorm (using Petal) (4) (put back cabal therpy, lotus petal, in that order), Probe (5), Lotus Petal (6), Dark Ritual (7), Tendrils of Agony (8).
One storm short. So is there a pile that can win the game here?
EDIT: See my below post for an explanation of why the first post was incorrect.
Play Dark Ritual (1) -> Doomsday (2).
You can build the pile:
TOP
Brainstorm
Lotus Petal
Dark Ritual
Gitaxian Probe
Random Card
BOTTOM
Play Probe (3) drawing Brainstorm
Play Lotus Petal (4) -> Brainstorm (5) drawing Lotus Petal, Dark Ritual, Gitaxian Probe. Put Back Cabal Therapy and Dark Ritual or Tendrils on top.
Play Probe (6) drawing Dark Ritual or Tendrils
Play Lotus Petal (7) -> Dark Ritual (8) -> Tendrils (9) for lethal.
So you basically just need to add that Probe to your pile. ;)
This should work:
(Top)probe, brainstorm, petal, dark rit, blank(bottom.
Dark rit(1), doomsday(2), probe drawing probe (3), probe drawing brainstorm (4), petal (5), cast brainstorm (6) drawing petal, dark rit, blank, put back blank and therapy. Petal (7), dark rit (8) tendrs (9 - lethal)
Well those are both definitively better than my pile.
I was thinking about adding a probe to get one deeper into my pile, but I somehow kept thinking that I would still be one storm short. Not sure how I came to that conclusion.
EDIT: I know how. I didn't have the probe in my hand. I had the brainstorm in my hand, I just failed to recall it when writing the above post. At this point, I think I probably built the pile:
top-Probe, Dark Ritual, Lotus Petal, Dark Ritual, Dark Ritual-bottom
so you instead of the first sequence in the post, it's more likely that it's: Petal (3), BS (4) (putting back cabal therpy and lotus petal), Probe (5), Lotus Petal (6), Dark Ritual (7), Tendrils of Agony (8). Which is still one storm short.
I recall this now because I remember there was a specific reason where I had to cast a brainstorm before I could cast a probe, meaning that brainstorm was most likely in my hand, unless I really screwed up (which is definitely possible). My bad :rolleyes:
This is still with sleep in my eyes so bear with me. But if the probe was a brainstorm how about this pile:Quote:
Originally Posted by Kidbails
(Top)ideas unbound, petal, petal, probe, dark rit(bottom).
Line: petal(3), brainstorm (4), drawing petal, petal, iu, putting back tendrils and therapy. Petal (5), petal(6), iu (7) draw tendrils, therapy, probe. Cast probe (8) draw dark rit, dark rit (9), tendrils (10)
This isn't possible because there is no B left to cast Dark Ritual then.
If you played Rain of Filth which you somehow don't you could go:
TOP
Burning Wish (Infernal Contract)
Dark Ritual
Lotus Petal
Swamp
Rain of Filth
BOTTOM
storm count would be 10 then.
Maybe exchange Cabal Ritual for Rain of Filth? :D
Wow, yeah, missed the need for B. That's a pretty sweet pile (with RoF) :smile:Quote:
Originally Posted by Janske
Quote:
Originally Posted by Janske
Yea, it probably should be a rain of filth (especially seeing that). That is a sweet pile and definitely gets the job done.
So I've been testing Counterbalance as protection in DDFT. During a test game yesterday against burn, this situation came up, and I couldn't figure out a pile to stay protected and go for the kill:
List:
4x Sensei's Divining Top
4x Ponder
4x Gitaxian Probe
4x Brainstorm
4x Dark Ritual
4x Lion's Eye Diamond
1x Rain of Filth
2x Lotus Petal
3x Doomsday
3x Burning Wish
2x Duress
1x Cabal Therapy
4x Counterbalance
1x Chain of Vapor
1x Ideas Unbound
4x Polluted Delta
4x Scalding Tarn
2x Underground Sea
2x Volcanic Island
1x Badlands
1x Tropical Island
2x Island
2x Swamp
--SB--
4x Abrupt Decay
1x Doomsday
1x Time Spiral
2x Tendrils of Agony
1x Empty the Warrens
1x Void Snare (wished for and used)
1x Meltdown
1x Hurkyl's Recall
1x Massacre
1x Toxic Deluge
1x Cabal Therapy
My Board: Volcanic Island, Underground Sea, Badlands, Island, Island (tapped to spin top in the upkeep); Counterbalance, Sensei's Divining Top
My Hand: Ponder, Dark Ritual, Doomsday, Burning Wish, Cabal Therapy
Life: 10
His Board: Mountain x3
His Life: 18
I cabal therapy (storm 1) him, naming fireblast and hit all four. I then see: 1x Price of Progress, 1x Flame Rift. He couldn't cast these as he knows I have a two drop on the top of my deck.
Is there a pile that can win from here? Things to consider: a two drop needs to remain on top for the entirety of the storming process, in order to protect us from the two drops in his hand. It's possible to try and next-level him by not having a two drop on the top and hoping that he doesn't realize this, but I don't like this line.
Why not going for bw into therapy. And then casting cabal. If he pops u just discard rift snd counters with balance pop.
Next turn his only out is drawing anothrr pop. Cause you can negate eidolon and rift. Then combo on your turn. Cause at 10 life if he draws a bolt u still survive after dday.
Also whats on your top of library apart from the cc2.
I think best plan is to therapy. He cant draw a 5th fireast.
Quote:
Originally Posted by Togores
I thought about this, but if I can win here, then it's obviously better. Plus it's just an interesting situation.
Man, gotta love this riddles.Quote:
Originally Posted by Kidbails
What i would have done was this:
Tap U.Sea and Cast Cabal Therapy, wait for response of opponent. Then either he respons with Price of Progress or not.
When he PoP,s, respond with CB trigger @ 2 and name Flame Rift or
Just name PoP.
Then tap Badlands, cast Dark Ritual, cast Doomsday. Library:
1. Tropical Island
2. Ideas Unbound
3. Rain of Filth
4. Lotus Petal
5. Lotus Petal
then tap Volc Island, cast Ponder, look at top 3, do nothing and draw Trop and play it.
Flip SDT for IU and cast it with the Trop and the remaining Island to draw SDT, Rain of Filth and 1 Petal.
Cast and sac Petal for (B) and cast Rain of Filth. Sac all lands for 6x(B).
Cast SDT and flip it for the remaining Petal. 5x(B)
Cast Petal and sac Petal for red, then cast Burning Wish for Tendrills. 4x(B) and storm 10.
Cast Tendrills and win now.
Edit: offcourse thinking this thru took me 5 minutes and a cup of coffee. Can't imagine playing this at a tournament, but i gotta try it some time.
This would be the best line, except that I had used the cabal therapy to get rid of his fireblasts, of which he had four.Quote:
Originally Posted by Bobmans
I read over you already played that Therapy and tapped a land.Quote:
Originally Posted by Togores
This would be the safest bet. I can't think of any pile that wins from there.
Also there would always be one window open to cast that PoP thru (in respons) to you casting something and not being able to have a CMC 2 on top. It is inevitable that at one point you open yourself up to that.
This is an interesting scenario to me as I have also experimented with CB in DDFT, ultimately going back to other forms of protection to combat FoW.
Here is my solution
Tap badlands for DR(2) DD(3) building
Rain of filth
Brainstorm
Lotus petal
Gitaxian probe
X
Tap island cast Ponder(4). If he responds with PoP(5) you draw with top play Rof(6) off Usea tap volc float U and sac lands for BBBBB let PoP resolve. Ponder resolves drawing BS with top petal on top. Play BS(7) drawing petal. Play petal(8) sac R cast BW(9) and ToA(10).
If he lets Ponder(4) resolve draw RoF and cast with Usea(5). If he responds with PoP(6) when you cast RoF then you tap top draw BS and cast it(7) drawing Top LP Probe. Put back BW Top and let CB counter. Use probe(8) to draw BW and play petal(9) for red for BW(10) ToA(11).
EDIT: I see that I forgot to tap B for the cabal therapy on fireblast in which case this solution is no lonfer valid :frown:
Well, we're getting closer to a solution. This might be the kind of pile we should be going for, but as you said, we're a black mana off here. The good news with this one is that as soon as we've sacced all of our lands to RoF, PoP is turned off completely and the top of the deck is no longer relevant. In my previous piles, I had been trying to always keep a two drop on top even with RoF, but this is just much better.Quote:
Originally Posted by MangoUnicorn
So past sunday I was unreasonably hungover and decided to play UBRg DDFT in our small local tournament, for I thought it would make a great story.
I copied a list and built a sideboard myself where I thought "I won't be boarding in Thoughtseize, so let's cut the discard spell", totally neglecting BW->discard.
So guess what? I top-8'ed the thing haha! I lost round 1 against TES and won against Miracles, 2x BUG Delver and Deathblade, drawing into top 8. There I lost against Maverick with a black splash for DRS and Thoughseizes post board. First game I won easily, second game he hit the complete cashew with 3 different hate-bears and a Knight beating me down. In the third game I had 2 turns to find a burning wish or a Doomsday and I would see 10 cards in that timespan. Didn't find it and died horribly to Canonist + Teeg + Qasali Pridemage.
Anyway, I couldn't figure out the LabMan+Sphere pile with a SDT as your only cantrip unless it costs 4UUU (which I think is unreasonable).
Can somebody elaborate?
Thanks in advance,
Tom
The Storm Boards have a bit of discussion about this, but in general, it's pretty sloppy. Tendrils is much better with Top out, and using SDT instead of sphere is much better if you're playing around Teeg.Quote:
Originally Posted by Tom T
If they have removal and Leyline or Teeg and you can't get Karakas (already made land drop?) and you need to go now, the piles are pretty ugly since you need draw 5 before your SDT or Sphere work as a win con. So assuming an IU list with IC still in the board, you need IU + 2 probes or BW->IC. If they have Leyline/Teeg, be really stingy with your cantrips, and SDT gives you more redundancy for going off sooner (not needing sphere), rather than being a huge bummer.
If you don't fear removal, the standard pile works just fine for 1UU, swapping out Sphere for another Probe, since you already have the SDT: IU, LED, GP, GP, Lab Man. Also, if you already have an LED or Probe or anything, you can swap whatever piece you have out for another Probe or cantrip and play the pile like normal as well.Quote:
Originally Posted by emidln
// DDFT 2014.Q4
3 Doomsday
3 Burning Wish
1 Laboratory Maniac
4 Sensei's Divining Top
4 Brainstorm
4 Ponder
4 Gitaxian Probe
1 Treasure Cruise
1 Ideas Unbound
1 Chromatic Sphere
4 Duress
3 Cabal Therapy
4 Dark Ritual
1 Rain of Filth
4 Lion's Eye Diamond
1 Lotus Petal
4 Polluted Delta
5 Scalding Tarn / Misty Rainforest / Flooded Strand
3 Underground Sea
2 Volcanic Island
2 Island
1 Swamp
SB: 1 Tendrils of Agony
SB: 1 Empty the Warrens
SB: 1 Doomsday
SB: 1 Cruel Bargain
SB: 1 Thoughtseize
SB: 1 Cabal Therapy
SB: 1 Treasure Cruise
SB: 1 Void Snare
SB: 1 Massacre
SB: 4 Abrupt Decay
SB: 2 Tropical Island
Latest changes:
Treasure Cruise is in the deck. I'm not sure the exact number, but it was easy to fit 1 and the first is pretty strong. The deck naturally fills its yard pretty fast and mostly doesn't care what it exiles. Having the second one to side in is nice in the grindier matchups. I tried Dig through Time, but costing UU vs U turned out to be a deal breaker. Playing Abrupt Decays as the only real predator to the deck exists in Counterbalance. Chromatic Sphere routinely earns its keep for me, letting me be highly aggressive with my discard spells and gitaxian probes against the lack of hard counters in common matchups. I'm not 100% sold on ETW, but it serves a purpose that's a little different than Lab Man. I find I want it less and less often, particularly given that I side out an LED or two in most blue matchups. This might be better as another Treasure Cruise or something similar.
Interesting. I'll have to pick up DDFT again and give TC a try.
How has testing against U/R burn and Miracles been? These both appear to be quite difficult match-ups.
UR Delver has 4-6 cards (Forces plus 0-2 Spell Pierce) that actually matter. It's a pretty easy matchup. I've yet to drop one of the matches I've played against it (currently 12) in the post TC world.Quote:
Originally Posted by elroy
I'm not exactly sure how this particular build has been vs Miracles due to only playing against bad players or players who had to mulligan a lot so far. In the past, Miracles has been fairly strong with a similar decklist.
I tried out a maindeck Treasure Cruise as well, but didn't really come up very often, and I moved it to the sideboard as a wish target only. Particularly with Lab Maniac main, it seems like the second Lotus Petal might be better to allow more often for T1 Doomsday -> PTT Lab Maniac? I can Treasure Cruise being really good running Empty the Warrens though too, and better than the second Petal there. Maybe I'll give it a whirl again in place of the 2nd Petal and try Empty the Warrens in the sideboard again. I was just wary of having a dead card maindeck post-Doomsday, but maybe that is not a big deal.
Personally, I ended up cutting Chromatic Sphere from my lists, but maybe I just haven't run into those situations enough. Where do you find yourself using it the most? The best I can think of is Miracles to avoid terminus or Swords in response to the Lab Maniac trigger, but it is still a 1 drop that is tough to resolve with counterbalance.
And for reference, the list I'm currently running is below. I switched back to Silences/Chant due to the rise of Stifle, more Pyroblast, and Surgical Extraction again. It's also felt pretty strong against the new crop of Delver decks.
4 Flooded Strand
1 Island
1 Karakas
1 Plains
4 Polluted Delta
1 Scrubland
1 Swamp
1 Tundra
2 Underground Sea
2 Volcanic Island
4 Lion's Eye Diamond
2 Lotus Petal
4 Brainstorm
2 Cabal Therapy
4 Dark Ritual
1 Duress
4 Gitaxian Probe
4 Ponder
1 Rain of Filth
4 Sensei's Divining Top
4 Silence
3 Burning Wish
1 Ideas Unbound
3 Doomsday
1 Laboratory Maniac
Sideboard:
1 Tropical Island
1 Cabal Therapy
1 Chain of Vapor
2 Xantid Swarm
3 Abrupt Decay
1 Burning Wish
1 Pyroclasm
1 Cruel Bargain
1 Doomsday
1 Massacre
1 Tendrils of Agony
1 Treasure Cruise
I agree a 2nd petal seems like it would be nice. That being said what would you cut? Seems like the 17th land would be the choice but that also seems a bit aggressive. Tough call but might be worth testing.Quote:
Originally Posted by .dk
The appealing thing about Chromatic Sphere from my perspective is that it is the 5th way to store a draw spell post Doomsday and in my experience means you often have this resource available to you for both Lab Maniac as well as Tendrils piles. Blanking removal is just a bonus.
Being on Silence does seem really nice given what you said. Discard does help with identifying / creating the opportunities to slip through with an earlier/aggressive Doomsday though. This seems as much as a play style preference as it does a metagame call. That being said, I'll still be on discard for the GP just to help with the randomness that comes with no byes :(.
My 2 cents. Cheers
It seems that you're not particularly in the market to be turboing out your Doomsdays for Maniac piles given how you have your deck constructed right now. Did you try it and find that it wasn't satisfactory? That's kind of what happened to me--I enjoy being able to just cast Doomsday ASAP with all of the extra Lotus Petals I've been playing, but I lost to a lot of pass-the-turn topdecks. In any case, your comments about Empty the Warrens give me the feeling that I don't understand the roles that certain cards are supposed to play in this deck as you perceive it. Would you please expand on the work that Chromatic Sphere is doing for you? I played it for a while and it never felt like it did anything, but I could see I was missing what it was supposed to be doing, and using it incorrectly as a result. Also, Empty the Warrens certainly does seem a bit weaker when you've cut down on Petals, Wishes, and even LEDs in some of your postboard games. What role do you see it fulfilling that makes it seem like a worthy inclusion (despite being on the chopping block) despite the choices in deckbuilding that make it weaker?Quote:
Originally Posted by emidln
All in all, what I really want to know about the most is the sideboard. Would you please explain why you're playing both a Thoughtseize and a Cabal Therapy in the Sideboard? And how is Void Snare performing for you? Laboratory Maniac and Massacre seem to do a lot of the work that a Wishable bounce spell would do, and Chain of Vapor seems better as an actual sideboard card. From the looks of your changes, I feel like it's mainly there so you still have Wishable removal when you side Massacre in, but I'm not 100% sure.
I haven't played a 4 Petal build in quite some time. Turbo is relative. You can definitely cast Doomdsay via Dark Rituals, the one petal, and the 4 LED pretty early (via cantrips and/or brainstorm) pretty easily if you want to. I find there are a lot of scenarios where I can punish my opponents with a turn 2-3 doomsday, go that would otherwise be unthinkable. Having the ability to Doomsday through a known removal spell is what lets me exploit discard heavy matchups and make decisions vs Tempo (particularly BUG) about whether my situation will improve vs opponent hitting off the top. This has lead to increased percentages in traditionally very difficult matchups like BUG Tempo, Tezzeret, and misc Chalice decks. It also works well that I can often cast Doomsday after looking with probe and hold back Therapy/Duress to cast pre-Ideas Unbound the following turn.Quote:
Originally Posted by Namida
The problem I have with 4 Petal is that Petal isn't really a card I want to draw past turn 2. I'm not a turn 1-2 deck (although there are circumstances where it's correct to just jam Doomsday or a Wish->ETW). One of the advantages Doomsday has is that it carries very few dead cards in any matchup. I like to press that for percentage in grindy matchups, which makes me eschew most of the petals.
Sphere lets you Doomsday comfortably calculating only countermagic that the opponent might draw if you pass. It has corner cases where you use it to suspend a draw or randomly fix for Wish/Doomsday, but it's mostly there as an option to Doomsday with impunity vs Abrupt Decay/STP. I side it out against decks that I don't think can afford to leave in removal spells against me postboard.Quote:
In any case, your comments about Empty the Warrens give me the feeling that I don't understand the roles that certain cards are supposed to play in this deck as you perceive it. Would you please expand on the work that Chromatic Sphere is doing for you? I played it for a while and it never felt like it did anything, but I could see I was missing what it was supposed to be doing, and using it incorrectly as a result.
ETW has two purposes in my list (there are other things it can do, but Lab Man mostly replaces them). The first is a way to utilize mana + wish. A reasonable percentage of games present you with the opportunity to just for an ETW (potentially after a discard spell). You might not do it 25% of your games, but you can certainly do it at least 1 out of every 10 if you want to. A turn 3-5 ETW to exploit holes in a deck like RUG (particularly on their threat-light draws) is the other reason I'm playing ETW. It makes the RUG matchup incredible because it forces your opponent into respecting an early kill when they want nothing more than to be dropping threats and setting up to heavily defend and stall into their t6 kill. Whether these two things are worth it is a question I don't have a solid answer to right now. I don't like the mid ETW as much against UR Delver, and UR Delver seems to be taking players from RUG Delver.Quote:
Also, Empty the Warrens certainly does seem a bit weaker when you've cut down on Petals, Wishes, and even LEDs in some of your postboard games. What role do you see it fulfilling that makes it seem like a worthy inclusion (despite being on the chopping block) despite the choices in deckbuilding that make it weaker?
Just because I can cast Burning Wish to fetch a card does not mean that it isn't the actual best card to sideboard in. In this case, Thoughtseize is an 8th discard spell to side in, one that often comes in with Therapy in matchups where I need to take creatures. I haven't actually wished for it yet (I usually want Therapy), but wishing for it isn't the point.Quote:
Would you please explain why you're playing both a Thoughtseize and a Cabal Therapy in the Sideboard? And how is Void Snare performing for you? Laboratory Maniac and Massacre seem to do a lot of the work that a Wishable bounce spell would do, and Chain of Vapor seems better as an actual sideboard card. From the looks of your changes, I feel like it's mainly there so you still have Wishable removal when you side Massacre in, but I'm not 100% sure.
Void Snare is just a wishable bounce spell. There are a number of reasons why and situations that a maniac line might be inadvisable or more difficult where paying 1UR over potentially 2 turns is fine. I sometimes side it in (so that I can leave Massacre (which is a cheaper removal spell) when I have to Wish for it) just to have a bounce spell. So far, I've used it to bounce a Jace that was about to ultimate as well as a Chalice @ 3. It has also bounced a Lodestone Golem (and is notable in being the only way besides paying extra for everything with lab maniac to remove Lodestone Golem in my list). There were a couple times I wished for it because I'd need it if I didn't draw to an out, but ended up hitting the out. Those are some of the most difficult lines in the deck (knowing ahead of time that you need to wish for a removal spell in case your draws don't go well so that you can still have a plan).
Newbie here. Sorry if this question's been asked before. I was wondering where I could find resources to learn to play DDFT? This includes pile guides, primers, and video coverage or streams. I'm a part of the storm boards, but it's been pretty stagnant for a while now.
Past experience: plenty of TES.
Browse the link in Emidln's signature. It's stormboards, which is the only place to find proper info about DDFT.Quote:
Originally Posted by laserstone
Worth noting that it's not really stagnant. The information remains relevant, which is why Lejay reclassified it by topic instead of the former giant DDFT thread.Quote:
Originally Posted by laserstone
Oh, I didn't mean to imply that this deck isn't capable of winning quickly--what I intended to ask was if you're moving away from building the deck in a way that supports playing Maniac piles quickly. I have been playing extra Lotus Petals and a Cabal Ritual instead of Rain of Filth because they increase the number of turn 1-2 hands that the deck offers (Like say, turn one Doomsday into the three mana you need for a basic Maniac Pile). Basically saying this deck really isn't a turn 1-2 deck answers my question--you're supporting Maniac wins, but not trying to force them.Quote:
Originally Posted by emidln
I had Chromatic Sphere in my deck for about six months and I never used it to beat removal. This could be from any number of factors, I suppose. I haven't been playing against Miracles and the sorts of decks that give you a ton of time to make Chromatic Sphere shine; usually I end up in a position where I have to go off and I don't have enough mana to actually add a Sphere to my pile--perhaps it's just poor planning on my part because thinking about it now makes me wonder why I literally never had four mana to work with by the time I reached the point where I *had* to cast Doomsday. I did use Chromatic Sphere plenty to fix my mana and as a saved draw, but that didn't seem like enough to warrant inclusion. Also, I feel like I'm missing something because I think anyone who actually knows what's going on can target Chromatic Sphere with Abrupt Decay before Laboratory Maniac resolves. Are you playing around that somehow? In any case, Abrupt Decay has never come up against me because my opponents just seem to tap out on the post-Doomsday turn I give them to try to break up my combo with Hymn, Liliana, or other discard because they assume my cards in hand matter or they try to run out all of their guys because they assume that the pressure actually will do something.Quote:
Sphere lets you Doomsday comfortably calculating only countermagic that the opponent might draw if you pass. It has corner cases where you use it to suspend a draw or randomly fix for Wish/Doomsday, but it's mostly there as an option to Doomsday with impunity vs Abrupt Decay/STP. I side it out against decks that I don't think can afford to leave in removal spells against me postboard.
Okay, all of that sounds reasonable. I was being a bit short-sighted because midgame Empty is a move that still does a number on certain decks not equipped to handle Empty at any stage of the game, and I wasn't respecting it as something you would want access to despite feeling like you're not well equipped to perform turn 1-2 Empty very often.Quote:
ETW has two purposes in my list (there are other things it can do, but Lab Man mostly replaces them). The first is a way to utilize mana + wish. A reasonable percentage of games present you with the opportunity to just for an ETW (potentially after a discard spell). You might not do it 25% of your games, but you can certainly do it at least 1 out of every 10 if you want to. A turn 3-5 ETW to exploit holes in a deck like RUG (particularly on their threat-light draws) is the other reason I'm playing ETW. It makes the RUG matchup incredible because it forces your opponent into respecting an early kill when they want nothing more than to be dropping threats and setting up to heavily defend and stall into their t6 kill. Whether these two things are worth it is a question I don't have a solid answer to right now. I don't like the mid ETW as much against UR Delver, and UR Delver seems to be taking players from RUG Delver.
Fair enough--that's what I needed to know. Have you been siding Thoughtseize in against decks with Eidolon? It's the only creature I've ever had enough trouble with to want to change my deck around, but Thoughtseize would be pretty low on the list of cards I would have considered putting in my 75 for a better Burn matchup.Quote:
Just because I can cast Burning Wish to fetch a card does not mean that it isn't the actual best card to sideboard in. In this case, Thoughtseize is an 8th discard spell to side in, one that often comes in with Therapy in matchups where I need to take creatures. I haven't actually wished for it yet (I usually want Therapy), but wishing for it isn't the point.
would it possibly be better to run dig through time in the main instead of cruise?even if dig cost "twice as much", this deck has the land drops for it, and doing it EOT during an opponents turn seems pretty strong. I would figure that the ability to find a good selection of cards would be better than the random draws, given that you have random stuff you might not necessarily need/want like drawing superfluous lands or pile pieces. and then the sb cruise/contract can still let you bounce back from discard and the likeQuote:
Originally Posted by emidln
How are people liking maindeck Treasure Cruise?
My results are admittedly still early but so far I've had it be quite useful. It is no doubt synergistic with the aggressive use of Probe / discard in the lab man builds. I've had a couple games against Show and Tell and ANT where I was able to keep discard heavy hands and cantrips (Ponder --> Therapies) and TC drew me into the Doomsday win. I'm interested to keep testing it.
For reference, I'm running emidlns list.
Cross post from StormBoards. I took DDFT to GP New Jersey this past weekend. I’ve been playing DDFT for 1 year and consider myself a beginner trying to achieve intermediate status. I went 5-3 in the matches I played. 2 of my losses were to my misplaying so all in all I felt like the list I played and DDFT in general was solid. I was set on discard because I highly value the information you get and I personally like how you can spend early turns cantripping and stripping the opponents hand. I find this helpful to “free” up mana during some combo turns if you know your opponents hand (so you don’t need an extra mana to cast chant) Here is the list I played,
4 Polluted Delta
4 Flooded Strand
1 Scalding Tarn
2 Underground Sea
2 Volcanic Island
1 Tropical Island
2 Island
1 Swamp
4 Lion’s Eye Diamond
3 Lotus Petal
4 Dark Ritual
1 Rain of Filth
4 Duress
3 Cabal Therapy
3 Doomsday
3 Burning Wish
1 Treasure Cruise
1 Idea’s Unbound
4 Brainstorm
4 Ponder
4 Gitaxian Probe
4 Sensei’s Divining Top
Sideboard
1 Tendrils of Agony
1 Doomsday
1 Infernal Contract
1 Empty the Warrens
1 Laboratory Maniac
1 Treasure Cruise
1 Massacre
1 Pyroclasm
1 Cabal Therapy
1 Thoughtseize
1 Chain of Vapor
1 Void Snare
3 Abrupt Decay
I had been testing UBRg DDFT for months leading up to the event. Even as the initial incarnations of U/R delver and Treasure Cruise were popping up in my playgroup I found that the extra petals for aggressive Empty the Warrens was often enough to get there and I had dropped Lab Man giving preference to either the 4th Burning Wish or Chain of Vapor depending on my opinion that week. I was really comfortable with the configuration and was having a lot of success.
That being said, a couple weeks before the event I started testing emidlins new list that had more of a Lab Man focus given how well he was finding it and how others in the community had found maindeck Lab Man to be a benefit. My success rate and comfort went down. I missed my petals. One week before the event I started trying a number of things. In my mind I had 3 slots (in the above list TC, 2nd petal, & 3rd petal) as flex slots. I tried Lab Man, Chromatic Sphere, Petals, Preordain, 4th Burning Wish, and Chain of Vapor all in various combinations to find something I liked. Ultimately, the night before I settled on the above. 4th wish was often redundant. Preordain was fine but it felt less impactful and I like the idea of 7 “business spells”. I’m personally a fan of Petal vs the Delver decks, of any variety. So I opted for Petal 2 and 3 and treated Treasure Cruise as my 7th business spell. Lab Man seemed okay but not something I always wanted and in some cases felt like a dead draw. This may be my inexperience playing with him but I prefer Petal or Chain of Vapor as maindeck options.
In my experience GPs and larger tournaments can through randomness or unfamiliar matchups at you. I wanted my maindeck to be streamlined towards “the combo” and wanted a very broad and flexible sideboard to answer a variety of threats from my opponents. The idea to aggressively combo game one and then be flexible to adjust in games 2 and 3 (Control’ish with mass discard, win attrition wars with TC, be aggressive with Lab Man against fast decks, etc). I also wanted to have wishable targets to answer surprises in a pinch.
Generally speaking I mulligan hands with no library manipulation unless they have a high probability of an early protected Doomsday(assuming protection is necessary), i.e. (in a perfect fantasy world) LED, Doomsday, Petal, Duress, Probe, Dark Ritual, Underground Sea.
My matches were,
1. Nic Shift (2-0 Win) - He had discard and was playing red so I boarded -1 Petal, -1 Ponder, +1 TC, +1 Infernal Contract. Being a slow deck with no blue I still wanted to be faster but I didn’t want to fold to pyroblast or lose to mass cabal therapy.
2. Death and Taxes (2-1 Win) - -4 Duress, -1 Therapy, 2 decay, +1 chain, +1 snare, +1 pyroclasm I had in my board. On the play I put back in the therapy and a thoughtseize for decay. He had Leyline of Scantitys (weird) so I board in Lab Man for a Therapy.
3. U/R Delver ( 1-2 Loss b/c I had a brain fart and we were on time. Opponent was dead on board) - Board was -1 TC, -1 Ponder, +1 Cabal Therapy, +1 Infernal Contract. These decks are full of Pyroblasts and I feel like TC is too slow. I find if I can strip their creatures earlier you can have the extra turns you need to also pave a way through their permission. We went to time on game 3 so I had a “friendly” judge breathing down my neck to resolve Doomsday and make plays. Note for game 3 I boarded out a Therapy for a Chain of Vapor after seeing Null Rod. The scenario,
Opponent tapped out with 2 cards (TC, Young Pyromancer) and a Null Rod in play. I’m dead on board his next turn.
Me: U. Sea, U. Sea, Volc, Island, in play. Doomsday, Gitaxian Probe, Gitaxian Probe, LED in hand. I draw Rain of Filth. I’m at 4 life.
My pile: Chain, Ideas Unbound, LED, Petal, Wish...Long story short between my opponent and judge hounding me to make and get through my pile and answer all the nick picking questions as to what I’m doing, storm count, etc I forgot to sack my last land to make the last mana I need to Wish → Tendrils. So by the end of the pile I forget I had RoF active and assumed I miscounted mana and ended up one short. I realize my error not ten seconds after scooping. This was a complete brain fart..one I’m still salty about.
4. Death and Taxes (1-2 Loss) - -4 Duress, -1 Therapy, +2 decay, +1 chain, +1 snare, +1 pyroclasm I had in my board. On the play I put back in the therapy and a thoughtseize for the Decays.
5. U/R Delver (2-0 Win) - Board was -1 TC, -1 Ponder, +1 Cabal Therapy, +1 Infernal Contract.
6. 12 Post (2-1 Win) - His deck seems slow. I only lost game 1 because I went for a quick Empty and underestimated how much life he can gain with the locus lands. So I go -1 Petal, +1 Lab Man. He ends up having Leyline so Lab Man helps and I win the next two.
7. ANT (2-1 Win) - I find I want hands that win fast or have tons of discard so I board -1 Petal, -1 Ponder, +1 Lab Man, +1 Therapy. Thought process is that often these games end in both of us discard eachothers hand to oblivion. Lab Man turns on top deck Doomsdays / Burning Wishes. I left TC in the side to help with Wish targets and I also didn't want to dilute the deck with slower cards.
8. ANT (1-2 Loss but again misplayed and should have won) - -1 Petal, -1 Ponder, +1 Lab Man, +1 Therapy. Game 3 I had 2 Sensei’s Tops in play and he casts Pithing Needle. In a flurry to use my tops / fetch, etc to find good cards I accidentally shuffle a Burning Wish. My opponents hand was Tendrils + Land with 3 lands in play. My next turn I could have went Wish, crack LED → Doomsday and set up Lab man PTT pile with my 3 lands in play. Alas, I gave him enough turns to top deck Dark Ritual and Ad Nauseam.
In the end I had a blast playing the deck. I always do. I still think it is a solid choice if you are comfortable piloting it. I have certainly come a long way since I picked up DDFT 1 year ago and the best part is I still have a very, very long way to go.
I liked my decklist and sideboard (mostly). I could see changing a few sideboard slots around. I’m interested to try 1 Preodrain in place of 1 Petal some more. I liked being on discard for the reasons I previously mentioned but I also noted by the end of the tournament how well it worked with Treasure Cruise. I played some side matches on Sunday with the 7 chant version, I actually liked how it ran over the chant / discard splits I see most UBRWg DDFT lists run. I intend to test it some in the future in case a metagame pops up that would encourage chants. I liked my Treasure Cruises. I could see trying to test 1 more maindeck or sideboarded in the future. Lab Man was fine in the board. I don’t see myself maindecking him, at least for the time being, and I might experiment with cutting him from the board. Pile experience will probably facilitate that transition.