[Primer/Deck] Pox

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Originally Posted by Will_L

I've been playing this list to great success locally. I've been testing jamming Braids and she really has been spectacular in my build


x3 Mishra's Factory
x3 Urborg, Tomb of Yawgmoth
x4 Wasteland
x14 Swamp

x1 Nether Void
x1 Haunted Plate-Mail
x2 Toxic Deluge
x2 Cursed Scroll
x2 Crucible of Worlds
x2 Braids, Cabal Minion
x2 Inquisition of Kozilek
x4 Smallpox
x4 Hymn to Tourach
x4 Dark Ritual
x4 Innocent Blood
x4 Sinkhole
x4 Liliana of the Veil

SB

x1 Damnation
x1 Perish
x1 Toxic Deluge
x2 Umezawa's Jitte
x2 Disfigure
x2 Massacre
x2 Grafdigger's Cage
x2 Extirpate
x2 Trinisphere


Any glaring omissions? Sometimes it feels a little threat light... What to people think about 7 colorless lands versus 8? (4th Factory)

is 4 Urborg really bad? I've never tested it... Interested in the experience of people who have played 8 colorless 4 urborg

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i strongly suggest to max out on the number of IOKs..its our first line of disruption against many decks.. :smile:

i want to know the reasoning behind the only 3 copies of factories:eyebrow: ..i personally prefer 4 copies of urborg, tomb of yawgmoth since i am also running 4 factories and 4 wastelands and it is critical that i get that 2nd black mana on turn 2 so i can cast that 2nd turn hymn to tourach, sinkhole or smallpox! i see some players running only 3 urborgs, i wouldn't go below 3..

braids is an interesting concept, gives our deck a stax like feel..it can work especially since you're also running a pair of crucibles..but keep in mind though that she dies TOO EASILY to almost every removal in legacy plus she doesn't provide a good defensive body that nether spirit offers..she can also create awkward situations with your 4 copies of innocent bloods and 4 copies or smallpox' or sometimes even to your toxic deluges too..:frown:

i like haunted platemail, doesn't die to our symmetrical sac effects and can kill opposing enemy jaces especially when they're not holding any swords in hand..its also immune to abrupt decay..though my choice of finisher would be tombstalker first then desecration demon second.. :smile:

I, otoh, don't think there is much removal in format. Only decks that can kill braids is RUG, burn and decks running Stp. Any deck relying on Abrupt Decay will be helpless.

Edited my main post, sideboard was wrong.

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Originally Posted by zenitramleirdag

i strongly suggest to max out on the number of IOKs..its our first line of disruption against many decks.. :smile:

i want to know the reasoning behind the only 3 copies of factories:eyebrow: ..i personally prefer 4 copies of urborg, tomb of yawgmoth since i am also running 4 factories and 4 wastelands and it is critical that i get that 2nd black mana on turn 2 so i can cast that 2nd turn hymn to tourach, sinkhole or smallpox! i see some players running only 3 urborgs, i wouldn't go below 3..

braids is an interesting concept, gives our deck a stax like feel..it can work especially since you're also running a pair of crucibles..but keep in mind though that she dies TOO EASILY to almost every removal in legacy plus she doesn't provide a good defensive body that nether spirit offers..she can also create awkward situations with your 4 copies of innocent bloods and 4 copies or smallpox' or sometimes even to your toxic deluges too..:frown:

i like haunted platemail, doesn't die to our symmetrical sac effects and can kill opposing enemy jaces especially when they're not holding any swords in hand..its also immune to abrupt decay..though my choice of finisher would be tombstalker first then desecration demon second.. :smile:

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Thanks for the detailed response

I could play more IoKs... I would probably just cut into the Crucibles or Deluges. I like having lots of bombs though. As for Braids, I am usually able to just play around losing value on Innocent Blood / Smallpox. You generally jam those spells earlier than Braids anyway. Sometimes even if you get two triggers off her on your opponent it's enough to win. Other times against more fair decks you can jam Braids / Crucible and win.

I only play 3 Factories because I thought running 4 Urborg would give me too many double Urborg hands. I just haven't tested it to see if that's true. Since I'm only playing 3 Urborg I thought 8 colorless lands in the Sinkhole/Hymn/Smallpox deck would be too greedy. I basically cut the 4th Factory over the 4th Wasteland because I felt it was more important... Open to other opinions, though...

I've played Tombstalker in Pox and am not a huge fan, losing Tombstalker to Innocent Blood / Smallpox is worse than losing a Braids, which already sucks. Desecration Demon seems good though, never thought of using it before.

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Originally Posted by Hardcore

I, otoh, don't think there is much removal in format. Only decks that can kill braids is RUG, burn and decks running Stp. Any deck relying on Abrupt Decay will be helpless.

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Yes! Braids, Factory, Platemail are all untouchable by Abrupt Decay... when this deck gets it's clock in place is can be hard for BUG or Jund to kill

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Originally Posted by Hardcore

I, otoh, don't think there is much removal in format. Only decks that can kill braids is RUG, burn and decks running Stp. Any deck relying on Abrupt Decay will be helpless.

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I actually bought a set of Smokestack for my Pox deck though I haven't implemented it yet. Not 4 obviously due to mana constraints but possibly two. The fact that Braids can die to Shock and has a harder casting cost than Smokestack itself makes me wonder why one would choose her over the other. Smokestack is an artifact and therefore a hard target and won't die to our Poxing. Smokestack is easier to cast as well.

Braids is a win con.
Remember prison pox is short on threats all ready. Unless you substitute other disruption for smokestack you may find yourself unable to close games.

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Originally Posted by Will_L

I've played Tombstalker in Pox and am not a huge fan, losing Tombstalker to Innocent Blood / Smallpox is worse than losing a Braids, which already sucks. Desecration Demon seems good though, never thought of using it before.

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I've thought about Abyssal Persecutor in that role as well, since pox/small/innocent blood can get rid of him for you once you have their life total down.

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Originally Posted by hovercraft

I've thought about Abyssal Persecutor in that role as well, since pox/small/innocent blood can get rid of him for you once you have their life total down.

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THE GATE, another mono black legacy deck uses abyssal persecutor as its primary beater since it also runs innocent blood, cabal therapy and gatekeeper of malakir to ensure that you can get rid of percy when you need to..

in pox, i'd go for desecration demon than abyssal persecutor..but thats just me..

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Originally Posted by zenitramleirdag

THE GATE, another mono black legacy deck uses abyssal persecutor as its primary beater since it also runs innocent blood, cabal therapy and gatekeeper of malakir to ensure that you can get rid of percy when you need to..

in pox, i'd go for desecration demon than abyssal persecutor..but thats just me..

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Desecration Demon is superior since it kicks total ass all by itself. If you don't have a sac ability/spell in the moment your foe drops to 0 life with percy, you're pretty much done for. 1 turn is enough in Legacy to die to a top deck. Happens enough to me.

I think the point I'm trying to make is we're kind of swerving away from the original idea is that Pox is card advantage. Desecration Demon is great advantage if your foe had to sac a creature to him already to stay alive, Percy has nothing of the sort, in fact he's card disadvantage since you need him AND a sacrifice card of some sort to work.

The less resources you can win with the better. As for smokestack vs. Braids, I suppose I can drop Nether Void for it. Late game, the stack will keep your Nether Spirit in boomerang mode but your foe will probably be without lands. By then they'd probably scoop. How's that for a win con? ^_^ I also run 8 threats so I'm not that short on killing power. Without Nether Spirit, if you're running 6 lands on the field, I'm sure you can sac a few before sacking the Smokestack itself to put your opponent extremely behind.

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Originally Posted by zenitramleirdag

THE GATE, another mono black legacy deck uses abyssal persecutor as its primary beater since it also runs innocent blood, cabal therapy and gatekeeper of malakir to ensure that you can get rid of percy when you need to..

in pox, i'd go for desecration demon than abyssal persecutor..but thats just me..

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I have been moving towards Loam/Depths/Chalice Pox recently, as its a lot quicker to finish out the game with Marit Laige than other pox threats. The deck is a bit clunky, but jamming out a chalice on 1 first turn with a mox diamond shuts down a lot of legacy cards

Myself I am not sure pox is about card advantage. Miracles with Jace, or any deck with a card draw engine sure, but "top deck pox"? Add Phyrexian arena for card advantage, pox and hymn for destruktion/disruption.

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Originally Posted by Hardcore

Myself I am not sure pox is about card advantage. Miracles with Jace, or any deck with a card draw engine sure, but "top deck pox"? Add Phyrexian arena for card advantage, pox and hymn for destruktion/disruption.

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"The emphasis here is the card advantage, this deck is setup to be disruptive, & play some of the most effective Swamp tapping cards you can throw at your opponent in the format that is Legacy."

The very first post... :rolleyes:

Pox is by design the 'cheapest for mana' card advantage out there. Ancestral Recall is unusable and Ancestral Visions is too slow. There is no blue card advantage that's 2 mana, kill more cards.

Pox has Hymn and Smallpox. 3 for 1? sure! "But what about ourselves?!" Well, we run more lands than most and our bigger bombs are Eng. Plague and Night of Souls' Betrayal that locks out decks and exterminates armies. How can we not be about card advantage?

Phyrexian Arena, Sign in Blood, etc. is just minor extras at the price of life. It'll never match banned draw blue power and I find those cards useless since I want to draw disruption. Not more draw and then wait a turn cause the mana is low to cast what I 'card drew'.

I still believe the old original thread's philosphy to be true. "If it doesn't deal damage, provide mana, or disrupt your opponent, it doesn't have a place in Pox".

I've tried other approaches over the years and this old rule still holds true.

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Originally Posted by Hardcore

Myself I am not sure pox is about card advantage. Miracles with Jace, or any deck with a card draw engine sure, but "top deck pox"? Add Phyrexian arena for card advantage, pox and hymn for destruktion/disruption.

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Pox is definitely about card advantage, just in a different way than traditional sense. Pox doesn't really generate cards of its own like decks with Jace or ancestral vision but it has card advantage like punishing fire + grove of the burnwillows in that 1 of your cards will deal with 2,3, or 4 cards or even sometimes the majority of an opponents deck. The only way that "top deck pox" could exist is card advantage in this fashion, if you get the opponent to no cards in hand and a low land count, most decks can still function and just out draw you, which is how pox generally loses besides getting overwhelmed, but if you have the type of CA pox has, CA that effects the board then pox shines in those situations. For example against any delver or stoneblade deck a Liliana on an empty board basically blanks almost all of their draws, they can't play creatures into edicts and they can't hold onto them because of the discard and they can't really use reactive spells like removal or counters since Lili just eats them because they don't have a target. Against elves a card like cursed scroll when you slow them down is almost gg because you blank so many of their cards and kill almost everything in play. Even crucible of worlds if you run it will often lock decks out of the game, and using 1 wasteland to decimate an opponents land base is definitely card advantage. There are a lot of ways to get card advantage in pox, like Feline states in the primer, that don't involve drawing cards and these card advantage engines are really what makes the deck tick.

To me card advantage is when you play cards that give you a net increase of cards in your hand. Ancestrall, Bob, Sylvan, jace etc.
This is the classical definition, imo, and it probably originated with the advent of "The Deck". BW control employing Jayemdae Tome.

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Originally Posted by Hardcore

To me card advantage is when you play cards that give you a net increase of cards in your hand. Ancestrall, Bob, Sylvan, jace etc.
This is the classical definition, imo, and it probably originated with the advent of "The Deck". BW control employing Jayemdae Tome.

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This is why I'm a big fan of Loam Pox variants over mono black. Pox's weakness is capitalizing on the created card/resource advantage

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Originally Posted by Hardcore

To me card advantage is when you play cards that give you a net increase of cards in your hand. Ancestrall, Bob, Sylvan, jace etc.
This is the classical definition, imo, and it probably originated with the advent of "The Deck". BW control employing Jayemdae Tome.

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"Card advantage is any process by which a player obtains effectively more cards than his or her opponent."-http://archive.wizards.com/Magic/magazine/article.aspx?x=mtg/daily/lo/286

Drawing multiple cards with one card is the most popular definition but that isn't the end of card advantage. Bloodbraid elf into a tarmogoyf is card advantage, as you just used 1 card and the end result is 2. Using a Hymn to Tourach to spike 2 cards in your opponents hand that is card advantage as you used 1 card to deal with 2 of your opponents. The Pox decks the way they are built now function off of this card advantage and whether or not you think it is card advantage doesn't really matter because the fact of the matter is that it is card advantage. (Sorry if the last line sounds rude, it was just the only way I could think to explain it)

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Originally Posted by Hardcore

To me card advantage is when you play cards that give you a net increase of cards in your hand. Ancestrall, Bob, Sylvan, jace etc.
This is the classical definition, imo, and it probably originated with the advent of "The Deck". BW control employing Jayemdae Tome.

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Virtual card advantage- an old concept which still holds true:
http://www.starcitygames.com/magic/f...ge_Theory.html

Discusion about definitions is something of a distraction, and i don't want Wade in too deep, but it touch the question; "what makes me win?"

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Originally Posted by Hardcore

Discusion about definitions is something of a distraction, and i don't want Wade in too deep, but it touch the question; "what makes me win?"

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After months with my initial Pox deck, when it was on a budget, that question became marked by me as:

"Destroy more of their cards than mine while keeping 1-2 win conditions on the table."

I keep it a point never to play 3 win cons unless it's multiple Mishra's Factories since they provide mana. Having 2 Nether Spirits or 2 C. Scrolls on field can be bad since pithing needle or board wipe can shut them off. With Factory, they make mana, which gets around needle.

I highly suggest you try and steer clear of a any 'traditional' card advantage since Pox works by derailing those. It takes 4 mana to Concentrate or Jace and 3 mana for Divination and Sinkhole lovers won't let you play those. Smallpox is the anti-brainstorm since if you play it when an enemy creature is on the field, you'll max it out and it takes 3 brainstorms to get all those lost resources back. Let blue decks keep their hard draw, we're not MBC like other black decks, we're Pox.

Draw more or wreck more? If you're going to play Pox, WRECK YOUR FOE SOME MORE!! :cool:

Yeah, get a threat out and make it stick. That otoh sounds like the plan for many decks.
What makes the best way to win for me is to have two different type of threats in play at the same time while playing pox and hymn like mad.
(This is the path of overloading as described by Carsten)
The rack and bloodghast work very well for that.
I know control pox works, but this is more poxy.

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Originally Posted by Hardcore

Yeah, get a threat out and make it stick. That otoh sounds like the plan for many decks.
What makes the best way to win for me is to have two different type of threats in play at the same time while playing pox and hymn like mad.
(This is the path of overloading as described by Carsten)
The rack and bloodghast work very well for that.
I know control pox works, but this is more poxy.

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Have you considered running Ensnaring Bridge, 4 Racks and 4 Shrieking Affliction? there's no protection and creature removal is moot. Player Shroud also is ineffective. :laugh: Only reason I don't run that is cause I loved Pox due to LD. It's the one mechanic in Legacy that's considered 'weak' but Pox makes it work.