[Deck] Dredge

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Originally Posted by TheSleeper

This whole 'reactive vs proactive' SB thing depends on your meta IMO. In our local store, the last 3 months there has only been a total of 2 decks running Leyline of the Void. With those kinds of numbers, you can afford flat out ignore it. I personally would keep 3 Grudge in the SB as its useful against a number of things (someone mentioned Chalice/Jitte earlier). There is no empirical right and wrong SB plan, just will give you the best chance at winning where you play.

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For the most part I agree with you. If your meta involves people playing 5-6 sb cards against dredge or involves leyline/wheel of sun and moon then yes it is probably better to be prepared for some hate. Similarly if your meta is very heavy on path to exile maybe a reanimate target like Iona is in order. Overall though, in an scg meta like this list was set up for, you'll see 2-3 sb cards from your opponents if that, and mostly you will be seeing relics and crypts. Neither of these cards are scary for competent dredge players and usually it requires two crypts/relics to really cause any problem so why bother siding in 3-4 ancient grudge and potentially some nature's claims just to beat them? Grudging chalice in the one game you might see it in 9 rounds is cool and all but you can recur ichorids and flashback dread returns without one drops, it just might be slower. Similarly while jitte can be annoying it is often too slow, this deck is consistent enough to dread return on turns 2-3 (thats testing results not random numbers out of my ass.) Simply put jitte just cannot keep up.

If your meta is gunning hard for dredge then bring in some reactive cards. If you play in a typical meta that does not have a high representation of dredge and dredge hate then you don't need slow reactive cards that cause bad keep/mulligan decisions and don't actually help you win. Dredge is one of the most unfair decks in legacy, embrace and take advantage of that.

i dont understand playing Wings of Change, Tolarian Winds is 1 mana more, and u get to discard the hand, true, if youve drawn any narcomoebas, they dont go back in the deck, but i still dont see a problem with playing Tolarian Winds. u need a second land for Cephalid Coliseum, Breakthrough for 1 is common, and between 14-15 lands and 3-4 Careful Study, 2 lands isnt unheard of. u may state that TW is weak if they Wasteland you, but very few people in my experience want to use Wasteland vs Dredge on their second turn (on the play), much less their first turn (on the draw)

my problem is really with Careful Study, which is only good for searching for something better in the draw, discard, or land department, as it is our 'worst' -albeit most versatile- card in the deck (arguments may be made for Tarnished Citadel). i currently run 4 study and 14 land, so i figure 3/15 or 2/16 split of TW and lands is fine.

i believe this decision to be sound with upcoming release of Mental Misstep, and the consensus that it will probably replace Daze in most, though not all decks.

Yes, but is dodging Mental Misstep the right call as opposed to, say, overloading it? It's the same reason why Affinity and Enchantress don't fear Nature's Claim - It can't hit everything.

In other words, what if you replace 2 Careful Studies with lands, and then get a hand where you have the Land and a Study or Land and a Lion's Eye Diamond, whereas without it you'd have had Study/Study or LED/Study?

Study/Study requires them have a Misstep and a second counter. LED/Study requires them have a Misstep and a Force if you're smart (Misstep/Daze or Misstep/Pierce will sometimes also work if they went first.)

Study/Land becomes an unkeepable hand if it's your only outlet. The LED/Land hand can be decent, but it'll eat it hard to a Force of Will and a clock.

i was talking about replacing all 4 studys with a combination of Tolarian Winds and additional lands to up the percentage of drawing 2 lands in you first 8-9 cards. this is the second time you've made a comment about a post of mine without fully reading it correctly

as i constantly keep telling myself and others, "Read, read, read the fucking card!"

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Originally Posted by Sunsatzu

i was talking about replacing all 4 studys with a combination of Tolarian Winds and additional lands to up the percentage of drawing 2 lands in you first 8-9 cards. this is the second time you've made a comment about a post of mine without fully reading it correctly

as i constantly keep telling myself and others, "Read, read, read the fucking card!"

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I might be going out on a limb here, but I think he is reading it correctly. It seems more like he's saying that by increasing your land count and cutting study, how many hands are you going to open that will be unkeepable in the face of countermagic or just sheer what your hand consists of compared to how many would have been unkeepable if those winds or lands had been Careful Study.

Study may be one of the weaker cards in the deck, it is one of my most boarded out cards, but it does have a purpose and it's versatility helps make the deck work. Im not bashing or saying it's a tubl idea, but it's one that definitely will require testing or results before really being able to say if it's worthwhile or not.

I will just stick to normal LED-less Ichorid in the future.
My Sideboard is where the Magic happens, though:
2 Ray of Revelation
4 Nature's Claim
4 Ancient Grudge
1 Elesh Norn
1 Iona
1 Darkblast
1 Realm Razer
1 Terastodon/ Metaslot

Is what I will bring to the table post- NPH. Elesh Norn just completely nullifies the need for Firestorm and Chosen.I don't worry about MM too much, Blue Control decks will most likely only play max.3 of it and in other matchups it's just like having to play around Force vs Goblins (Oo)
Just 1st Turn Therapy instead of discard will do the trick I think.

So what are we supposed to do against Cephalid Breakfast? Played against it last night. Game 1 he blew me out (combo'd out turn 2). Game 2 I side boarded in Leyline of the Void. Stalled him long enough to get there with reanimated Iona. Game 3 sided in Chain of Vapor in addition (as I had forgot to game 2 in anticipation of graveyard hate from him, but he had none to speak of). Opened with Leyline and played the DDD plan for a bit until I could get there with Ichorids and Zombie tokens. Basically, I won games 2 and 3 because he simply couldn't draw relevant spells (was mostly hitting lands) (I felt like I just got lucky). So what's the game plan there? Iona on black to stop them from Dread return + Leyline of the Void to get there? That was my basic thoughts of what to do given my list.

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Originally Posted by Sunsatzu

i was talking about replacing all 4 studys with a combination of Tolarian Winds and additional lands to up the percentage of drawing 2 lands in you first 8-9 cards. this is the second time you've made a comment about a post of mine without fully reading it correctly

as i constantly keep telling myself and others, "Read, read, read the fucking card!"

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My point still doesn't change. You're not going to solve your problems by running less discard outlets. Now you run less outlets and are 300 times more vulnerable to Daze and Thoughtseize.

Secondly, since you complain about lack of reading, I'll start dissecting your post more. You claim people don't want to spend a Wasteland on Dredge's first land. Are you on crack? I don't know a single high tier player who wouldn't lead with wasting Dredge's land when Dredge went land, go, and didn't establish anything in the yard. That's practically an auto-play. If Dredge kept a hand and went land go, they clearly have a plan for a second land, or they wouldn't have kept the hand. Wasteland here is almost always the right play, and good players would make it.

I still think the right thing for Dredge to do is to pick up a set of Lion's Eye Diamonds, up the discard outlet count by 2 or 3, and just roll with the punches.

I don't think the LED plan is necessary. We have more then enough discard outlets compared to their 4 missteps. Its not 4 more counters in each deck, it is in place of other counters so really we face the same dangers just value your tribes and pimps higher and evaluate leading with them accordingly. If counters become a serious problem then firestorm gains even more value. LED just lowers our consistency and makes us use narrow cards.

While Feldman's SB plan was interesting I'm not sure I like it enough to stick with it. I'm thinking of bringing the following to a tournament this weekend:

Maindeck:
3x Ichorid
4x Golgari Grave-Troll
4x Stinkweed Imp
4x Goglari Thug
4x Putrid Imp
4x Tireless Tribe
4x Narcomoeba

2x Dread Return
4x Careful STudy
4x Cabal Therapy
4x Breakthrough
4x Bridge from Below

4x City of Brass
4x Gemstone Mine
4x Cephalid Coliseum
3x Tarnished Citadel

Sideboard:
1x Flame-Kin Zealot (combo)
1x Iona, Shield of Emeria (just wins against some decks)
1x Terastodon
1x Elesh Norn, Grand Cenobite
1x Ray of Revelation
2x Nature's Claim
4x Ancient Grudge
4x Firestorm

Some things I am still on the fence about:
-1 Golgari Thug +1 Darkblast: While I realize darkblast has utility I don't think it is necessary if I am running four Firestorm which I like in a MM meta. Also it may seem small but the one thing I liked about Feldman's list was the consistency of having 4 careful study and more dredgers that could hit for max amount of cards. My careful study and breakthroughs have felt much better with 4 thug main.

-1 Careful Study +1 Dread Return: The third dread return could be a good thing to have but I don't expect to reanimate more then two times in a game. I am considering moving a Terastodon to the MD in which case maybe a third Dread Return is right. This is the one I am most interested in other people's thoughts on as I can't decide when exactly a third DR is truly necessary.

-1 Careful Study or Thug +1 Terastodon/Angel of Despair: I like having Terastodon somewhere in the 75 for answering random cards and having him in the MD is nice because at the very least you can deny your opponent lands or kill your own to add more to your army. I would love to have him as the only DR target main so I don't lose to moat and the like but if I do this I am wondering if I need to bump up to three DR in the main.

I'd really appreciate any thoughts on the above mentioned things and the list in general, I'm also wondering if my artifact/enchantment answer collection is correct. I went through the SCG Open lists and almost no one uses Ray of Revelation and a lot of people seem to drop below 3 ancient grudge to increase the number of Nature's Claims and free up some SB slots due to the overlap. I don't mind dedicating half my board to beating hate but I do want the best mix possible. This is the one I like best atm but again criticism/thoughts are appreciated.

@Chags: The list looks good, but I'm only counting 59 cards main. Personally, I'd opt for a 4th Ichorid.

Stuff you're on the fence about:

Thug vs. DB - With the Firestorms in the board (which I think is a great choice right now), I'm not playing Darkblast at all. There have been times when I've wanted it, but all in all, I'd rather the extra dredger.

Study vs. Return - If I'm playing no MD targets (aside from Troll), I don't like more than 2 DR. Even when I'm playing Iona and FKZ main, I don't always need the 3rd copy.

Study/Thug vs. Terastodon - It's probably a meta call. If I'm playing one MD target, it's going to be Iona. I'll keep Terastodon in the SB, but I don't lose too many game 1's just because of a random permanent. It happens, but not all that much.

Re: Sideboard

For me, 4 Grudges seems like too many. Flashback is nice, but at the beginning of the game I'd like something cmc1 to answer hate. I'm also running 1 less land than you are, though.

I've never liked Ray that much, to be totally honest. I want something to answer a T-zero leyline, and again, I'd rather have Chain or Claim.

I'm running 4x Claim, 2x Chain of Vapor, 3x Grudge, and I'm pretty happy with it.

The md is 60 cards as is. For the hate answers I talked with a few people and am thinking 1 ancient grudge 4 nature's claim 2 ray of revelation. The only real hate I am scared of is leyline and wheel, the rest we can play through for the most part so loading up on claim vs grudge seems better.

I don't really get why anyone cuts an ichorid if you are not running zealot. True that ichorid is a slower path to victory. But game 1 it is inevitable if you get them in your grave, and you want them early and often so running 4 seems the best option to me. Ive been running chags 60 with -1 breakthrough ,+1 ichorid ,-1 citadel, +1 Iona for some time. Having ichorid maxed out makes for turn 2 double therapy all the more likely.

I would rather have 4 breakthrough then 4 ichorid for sure. If anything I would cut a careful study or a golgari thug for the ichorid but I don't think 4 is necessary, I haven't played with 4 in a long time. They are good for slow rolling but you rarely need to slow roll game 1 and I prefer having a high number of dredgers and discard outlets to ensure I get to dredge.

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Originally Posted by chags

I would rather have 4 breakthrough then 4 ichorid for sure. If anything I would cut a careful study or a golgari thug for the ichorid but I don't think 4 is necessary, I haven't played with 4 in a long time. They are good for slow rolling but you rarely need to slow roll game 1 and I prefer having a high number of dredgers and discard outlets to ensure I get to dredge.

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I can probably count on 1 hand out of hundreds of games that I actually cast breakthrough and it won me games without running the speed kill. True that is an amazing accelerant, but breakthrough is a risky card even game 1. A permanent discard outlet is way more important for victory and ichorid is a path to victory where breakthrough can "whiff" although it is not extremely likely. I never found a need for 4 breakthrough, but I understand why some may want to max it out, but I'd see maxing both ichorid and breakthrough to be a better choice than running 1 less of a card that will win you a game for sure if you get ichorid recurring

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Originally Posted by Joe_C

I can probably count on 1 hand out of hundreds of games that I actually cast breakthrough and it won me games without running the speed kill. True that is an amazing accelerant, but breakthrough is a risky card even game 1. A permanent discard outlet is way more important for victory and ichorid is a path to victory where breakthrough can "whiff" although it is not extremely likely. I never found a need for 4 breakthrough, but I understand why some may want to max it out, but I'd see maxing both ichorid and breakthrough to be a better choice than running 1 less of a card that will win you a game for sure if you get ichorid recurring

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A permanent discard outlet is more important then nearly anything else in the deck, I did not argue that breakthrough is more important than a discard outlet. If breakthrough whiffs you are probably using it wrong, if you plan on using ichorid then you clearly have time to win so taking the time to discard dredgers before breakthroughing should be more then doable. Also with 4 thugs 4 imps and 4 trolls breakthrough does not seem to whiff very often.

Was second on 14 man tournament: http://thecouncil.es/tcdecks/deck.ph...5&iddeck=44272

Few words about the build:

Its hybrid with LED/LED-less lists.

13 lands - enough to get 2 on draw and also not so annoying when dredging too many lands - I used Undiscovered Paradise as 13th land (don't like Citadel in some aggro MU like burn etc)

MD Angel of Despair - Hate losing vs random MD hate like Ensnaring Bridge or Moat, works good - good body and always useful (u can blow up chasm for etc)

Other targets for DR - Sphinx of the Lost Truths and FKZ - normal combo package.

Discard outlets - 4 Putrid Imps, 3 LEDs, 1 Tireless was very good in speed/stability compromise.
Drawing spells - 4 Careful Study, 4 Breakthrough and additional Deep Analysis to maximize stability and gold fishing with LED.

11 Dredges and here is something new - Life from the Loam - it works so good here that i couldn't imagine.

Trick: Hand: LED, Loam, Deep A, any land, Dredger

Play land, LED crack LED for green/blue (doesn't matter), Deep A, dredge both Loam and Dredger, cast Loam -> have nuts on hand (lands for example Cephalid Coliseum with ********).

Mostly it was used as Coliseum recurring with additional dredger, and avoiding wastelands mana disrupt.

SB:

In meta was Merfolks, U/R painter, Rocks, Zoo, storm combo + other blind meta.

vs merfolks:
2 Darkblast - very useful to blow up cursecatcher waiting for bridges
3 Firestorm - obv board cleaner

vs combo:
-Iona

vs Zoo:
Ancestor's Chosen

vs Painter:
4 Ancient Grundge

vs Hate:
- Terastodon (its needed additional to Angel in Lands MU)
2 Darkblast vs Gaddock Teeg
-2 Chain of Vapor + Nature's Claim vs Leyline and Wheel
-4 Ancient Grudge vs Crypts/Relics

Last word about build:
Sometimes I miss 4th Therapy but didn't know what to take off anyway it was 61 cards already.

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Originally Posted by chags

A permanent discard outlet is more important then nearly anything else in the deck, I did not argue that breakthrough is more important than a discard outlet. If breakthrough whiffs you are probably using it wrong, if you plan on using ichorid then you clearly have time to win so taking the time to discard dredgers before breakthroughing should be more then doable. Also with 4 thugs 4 imps and 4 trolls breakthrough does not seem to whiff very often.

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How do you use breakthrough wrong? If you have any dredger in the grave you will want to cast it if you want to win quick. If you don't see another dredger in those top 4-6 cards it whiffs. It can happen. I run 4 of all the dredge creatures. Since I run 3 breakthrough when I have it in my hand, I am likely to not mill another breakthrough, yet a card that is useful in my grave

Playing breakthrough with just a golgari thug in your yard seems pretty bad. If I didn't have to win in the next turn or so I'd just dredge the thug to see if I hit something better before wasting my breakthrough on a dredge 4 whiff x3.