Hmm... It's really hard to choose an optimal list of this deck.
Would you guys post your lists and tell me the pros and cons?
I'm really into 3/4 duress and 3/4 silence in the MD, as Bryant Coook runs in his TES.
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Hmm... It's really hard to choose an optimal list of this deck.
Would you guys post your lists and tell me the pros and cons?
I'm really into 3/4 duress and 3/4 silence in the MD, as Bryant Coook runs in his TES.
I would second that, and I think what's important is consistency.Quote:
Originally Posted by Charlatan
Sorry, but I didn't understand what you wrote. Could you explain?Quote:
Originally Posted by nayon
I play what is essentially the old German list but I've cut white for 7 duress effects over chants - I much prefer being somewhat proactive in taking cards and gaining information. The manabase now is also completely stable and beautiful and with 17 land and no white I can run 3 basics.Quote:
Originally Posted by Charlatan
I've switched back to meditate over IU because of snare which I'm sure people will contest against but - hell, it just feels right.
1 Lotus Petal
4 Lion's Eye Diamond
4 Sensei's Diving Top
4 Brainstorm
4 Ponder
4 Infernal Tutor
4 Doomsday
4 Dark Ritual
2 Cabal Ritual
1 Meditate
1 Rain of Filth
4 Duress
3 Thoughtseize
1 Chain of Vapor
1 Ill-Gotten Gains
1 Tendrils of Agony
4 Misty Rainforest
4 Polluted Delta
2 Flooded Strand
1 Bayou
1 Tropical Island
1 Island
2 Swamp
2 Underground Sea
I might swap over to 4 thoughtseize and 3 duress simply because of clique.
Iv'e been playing with out IT in Md, only one copy in the SB. And beend oing well.
I've add 3 probe and it's nut. I will do some tests and post my list soon.
I'm kind new with this deck. Could you explain the roll of rain of filth in this deck?
Once, somebody told me that was against needle naming LED...
I take it from your first idea that you're playing the red list with Burning Wish - otherwise I'm just not sure what you would play in place of IT.. maybe LDV?Quote:
Originally Posted by Charlatan
I ran probe when I played red with ideas unbound. Yes, the mana requirements for piles with probe are bonkers low and being able to jump into a pile with one less mana is nice, but has been rarely all that relevant. I really do just prefer meditate piles.
Rain of filth is dark ritual number 5. Once you have more than three lands, its simply better than Dark Ritual. If someone does name LED with needle you can do things with rain like tap down all your mana for blue, sac it for black and build your piles with rits instead of LEDs.
Hmm, pithing needle naming LED does not even do anything, so this is an odd reason. I'd say it's kind of the 5th dark ritual.
Ehrm... Revoker.Quote:
Originally Posted by MWR
I don't know why but people tend to forget that you resolved a Rain of Filth. Some spells later they think they can get you wit Daze and Spell Pierce, which you can pay out of your lands.
RoF is basically Dark Rit Nr. 5. so it fixes your mana for DD (BBB) while producing BBBB or even BBBBB sometimes.
My experience isn't so great that I can speak for anyone other than myself, the cost of Ideas Unbound has been really restrictive for me. I find it much easier to only need one blue mana to go off, but I'm going to keep testing.Quote:
Originally Posted by Chikenbok
People will always have differing opinions on IU v. meditate; I know I've just stuck with meditate the entire time, I don't like IU too much on paper due to the double blue cost and meditate can occasionally be used outside DD piles against control to just destroy them; either they FoW your EoT meditate or they get one more turn to do what they want then you crush them on your turn due to you having a ridiculous number of cards in hand.
Went 2-2 last weekend with the german list -2 ponder +2 gitaxian probe. Should have went 3-1 but I was slightly rusty with the deck and I punted twice against goblins after winning game 1. Game 2 he mulled to 3 cards and started with leyline of the void and said go without doing anything. The game went on he got some board presence with a rishadan port. I did a pass the turn pile with 2 top's in play. I EoTed drew with one top into meditate. During my upkeep I had 3 lands untapped then he tapped one with port and I like a moron didn't float mana and cast meditate from hand. I had no doomsday in the pile and couldn't pull it out before he killed me. The last game I went infernal tutor with lotus petal exiled due to leyline of the void yet again and me having exact mana to combo off but I floated only BBB + UUUU so I misplayed again when I was thinking about it later on; I had top in play, I could have used top to draw into a doomsday pile of meditate, LED, LED, GP, tendrils to kill him but I forgot that line of play since I rarely use GP in doomsday piles and I just went for the hail mary meditate, drew into tendrils but I didn't have enough mana to switch tops enough to then tendrils him since I drew only one dark ritual in my 4 cards. I really like the deck overall it was just frustrating punting 2 games and losing in part to leyline of the void both games since without leyline I could just IGG loop goblins out with ease.
I love rain of filth. It enables threshold and can be a really powerful ritual sometimes. Granted it sucks turns 1 and 2 but after that it's usually golden. I also love how my opponents read the card every time :tongue:
I was praticing some piles from emdlin sheets. And I couldn't figure out how this works:
In Hand===Mana==== Storm=====Pile=========Tutor
BS IGG======U======10=====SW LED LED PN BW==TOA
How does it work?
I am not intending to be offensive in the least but it is going to come off that way. I have been posting on these threads a long time ... anyone ... ANYONE who asks what are the differences between Chants and Duress effects as protection spells should not be playing DD. It is always posted by people with little to no experience with combo decks. I feel like a broken record, play something easier like ANT. Get experience, and these questions will answer themselves. Everything depends on your meta .... pure and simple. This is why DD is so hard to play correctly, 1/2 the time the piles are just straight off the sheets ... but the other half are improved on the spot ... u have to understand storm combo. Fuck, I won 2 seperate games against Manaless Dredge by Infernal Tutoring into a Meditate stack two games in a row because apparently I don't run cantrips. The point of this is not to be a dick, but if you don't know what decks different protection spells are good against, sorry, ur in the wrong thread.
That pile does not work from what I can tell ... it needs another card in hand to be relevant. But here is how it would work w three cards in hand:
Brainstorm (1), drawing SW, LED, LED put back IGG and second random card from hand.
LED (2) LED (3), cycle SW stack it and blow up LEDS for UUUBBB.
Draw and cast IGG (4) with UU floating and bring back BS, LED, LED.
LED (5) LED (6) BS (7) stack it and blow up LEDs for BBBRRR.
Draw Ponder w Brainstorm and cast it with the U floating (8).
Burning Wish (9) for Tendrils (10). Since you cast DD this turn it ends up being exactly 11 assuming there is no ritual or Petal played beforehand.
@Meditate VS IU: All preference to me. We don't need another debate, each has their perks. I have always hated IU since I have won quite a few games, especially against blue control by just playing EOT Meditate. Also, with Top in play, double Dark Ritual + U ends the game fairly often. Threshed Cabal Rituals are also awesome, I have ritualed into Meditate numerous times where I haven't had access to UU. I also do not like how reliant on Probe they are becoming .... especially needing to have 5 life to combo off rather than 2. And the SS thing but ... more so Meditate being a spell, that on turn 4-5, if I have Top in play and can't find anything relevant, the hail mary play will get there on occassion. Point is, Meditate is almost always good and when I ran IU I just hated casting it cause I net -1 cards and it just sat in my hand.
@Pulp, I don't think anyone would really ever disagree that you're one of the founding fathers of both playing, and engineering this deck and for that, thanks - I've really only got one serious year of practice down with it.
But on another note, while yes - everyone is tired of hearing white vs. black - iu vs meditate, sometimes its important just to keep dialogue going. This time we got some information regarding working through a cantrip pile - so, at least we got something out of it.
@Dark Rit - how did you feel replacing 2 ponders with 2 probes? I usually find lines of play being something like, turn 1 cantrip, turn 2 top/discard spell, turn 3 win. Ponder helps a lot in that regard but I'd like to know how you felt with the probes in the deck, were they for piles?
I love probes for information as well as them being a free albeit 2 life cantrip. They are occasionally useful in piles but usually I do the standard pile of meditate, LED x2, petal, tendrils with top in play but with brainstorm/ponder/probe the LED's are obviously dark rit's. I love the digging power of ponder I really do but probe is quite handy. I also love when you draw into a pile with probe since it's free like top so long as you have 5 or more life pre DD. In this regard it speeds you up as well; I can just go turn 1 duress, coast is clear turn 2 LED, dark rit, doomsday, probe, crack LED, meditate, and the rest for lethal. And it is also extremely helpful for knowing how much time you have before you *must* combo since I generally only want to go off when I need to go off sans against control where I go off as soon as the coast is clear.
Has anyone tried snapcaster mage in this deck at all? I've thought about it but I'm not sure if SCM is a card we can abuse. I like the interaction with LED but I'm not too sure if SCM is really needed.
Today. I practice against a Death&Taxes with so much hate that I couldn't win one game.
4 Leonin Arbiter
2 canonist
4 Revoker
2 White tuor
A really tough. And I couldnt go off on turn 1-2.
I mean: I also think that it is hard to find an optimal decklist, so if someone could give pros and cons of different decklists, I'd also appreciate it. However, I also think that I would rather be consistent than fast, I'd rather not lose to bad draws of my own deck, and if it means sacrificing t1 wins I'm fine with that. So I would like to have an emphasis on consistency when listing the pros and cons of different decklists.Quote:
Originally Posted by Charlatan
On the whole "IU vs. Meditate" debate, there are really two ways to break things down. There are obviously exceptions, but with the printing of Gitaxian Probe, things have kind of split into:
Run Ideas Unbound:
-2-4 Probes
-Most likely Burning Wish
-Probably cut Cabal Rituals, etc.
-Probably cut Ill-Gotten Gains
Run Meditate:
-Usually no probes (which is debatable)
-Most likely Infernal tutor
-Keep Cabal Ritual and IGG
Obviously, Cabal Ritual and Ideas Unbound don't work very well together, so one has to go. Without Cabal Ritual, getting UU for Ideas Unbound is fairly easy and isn't nearly as bad as everyone says it is. Gitaxian probe is much stronger with IU than with Meditate.
So, it really comes down to:
IU Lists:
Pros
-Most cost-efficient piles possible in Doomsday (running 16 cantrips is really strong)
-Probe is great for checking your opponents hand for counters.
-Redundancy of Burning Wish is really strong (effectively 7 DD, 5 IU, and 11-12 protection spells.)
-Burning wish is very strong at dealing with hatebears like Gaddock Teeg with cards like Deathmark and Silent Departure.
Cons
-Manabase is usually 3-4 colors
-Between Thoughtseize, Probe, DD and fetches, you need to keep an eye on your life total moreso than other lists.
-More vulnerable to Spell Snare
Meditate Lists:
Pros
-Piles' color requirements are slightly easier.
-If you have a top in play, you can Infernal Tutor -> DD.
-Infernal Tutor -> IGG can be really strong.
-Can have a more stable manabase, but this varies between lists (2-4 colors).
Cons
-Piles are more expensive.
-Infernal Tutor is often a dead card without LED.
-Ill-Gotten Gains is usually a terrible card to draw on its own.
-Fewer cantrips.
There are almost certainly points I have missed, but this is what it boils down to. In my mind, Ideas Unbound is almost certainly stronger. If any of you haven't tried playing IU with 4 Probes, I highly recommend you give it a try. That being said, if you find yourself in a meta with lots of Spell Snares and wastelands, Meditate may be a better option for you.
Charlatan, the reason you won't find an optimal list is that each person plays differently, and since this deck is based on being able to mass tutor for any five cards you would need in any situation, you will find that the deck is more customizable than in other archetypes because the chance of you seeing your random one-of cards is almost completely guaranteed.
The breakdown on Ideas Unbound v. Meditate as has been laid out is good. I was just about to write a post about how I feel like it's really hard to kill on turn one or two with the color requirements of Ideas Unbound, but I decided to come up with a few scenarios on paper first before I looked like an idiot, and well, I guess I'll be trying out IU a bit more because Probe makes it possible with little to no hassle. We'll see when I actually get the chance to play in a tournament.
It should also be said, regarding serrated's post above that Infernal Tutor can also be played as virtual cards #x-y. Playing out an infernal tutor when you have the rest of the win in your hand, and then going to find a second duress, second LED, or second ritual is many times exactly what you need to win a game.
Having IT counterspelled when not relying on it to be hellbent? Nice duress bro.
I finally, after quite a long time switched back to playing meditate without any probes in the list. It was simply a call due to inability to draw into my tendrils at the bottom of the pile with no mana/no blue mana because I was at either 1 or 2 life and probe would have killed me.
Also, I don't know about you guys, but spell snare is back HARD right now in the north east (along with its pals: stifle and wasteland). So meditate is a must for me. I've cut white opting for only black protection and manabase resiliency, and jammed 4 swarm 3 CoF back into my board.
There was an argument against never beating thresh without white, but game 2 and 3 with swarm and CoF makes the fight much, much easier.