'Mississippi River' (All In Creativity Technique Combo)

Discover 5 = It can only cast Creative Technique. It misses the 6-mana cascaders.

It also loses to Counterspell.

Compare that to cards like Boarding Party: 100% chance of revealing Creative Technique, does not lose to Counterspell (Cascade trigger goes on stack, Creative Technique can Demonstrate around a single counter).

So it doesn't seem good enough to maindeck, but it could be SB material replacing Pyrokinesis - if you can afford to wait until turn 3. One nice thing about Pyro is you can remove a hatebear early and still combo off turn 3, though it is worse to reveal mid-combo.

Edit: misread new ability

Why does it need to be in the top five cards?

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Originally Posted by FTW

Discover 5 = It can only cast Creative Technique. It misses the 6-mana cascaders.

Probability of exactly Creative Technique in top 5 cards is quite low. It also loses to Counterspell.

Compare that to cards like Boarding Party: 100% chance of revealing Creative Technique, does not lose to Counterspell (Cascade trigger goes on stack, Creative Technique can Demonstrate around a single counter).

So it doesn't seem good enough to maindeck, but it could be SB material replacing Pyrokinesis - if you can afford to wait until turn 3. One nice thing about Pyro is you can remove a hatebear early and still combo off turn 3, though it is worse to reveal mid-combo.

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That's not how discover works.
However, the rest is still correct.
The question is if you can afford to play something like this when you're ok with not being able to start the chain with it.
Not working with Dress Down might also be relevant.

You 2 are right. I misunderstood Discover. It's better than I thought.

Still, it's a weaker "fixed" version of Cascade because it requires the spell to resolve. Unlike Boarding Party it's stopped by a single counter, Dress Down, Torpor Orb, Humility, etc.

As a maindeck card it's a bigger liability than the 6 cmc cascaders.

As a SB card it looks better. If you're bringing in burn, then you won't be using it as a chain starter anyway, you don't have to pitch the other starter in your hand, and then mid-combo it's a much better reveal than Pyro! However it slows you down compared to Pyro.

I've found it to be a better answer to Teferi and Lavinia then the current answer of Otawara in testing.
It's a liability in the combo chain, but it's comparable to the underwhelming land drop Otawara represents.

Thanks for the discussion on Discover and its potential role in the Mississippi River deck. It's interesting to see how the community is evaluating this new mechanic and its potential applications. My game review you can find here

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Originally Posted by PirateKing

I've found it to be a better answer to Teferi and Lavinia then the current answer of Otawara in testing.
It's a liability in the combo chain, but it's comparable to the underwhelming land drop Otawara represents.

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That makes sense. It seems better than Pyrokinesis or Otawara as an "answer" slot. Do you run it in the SB then? How many copies?

In testing it's 4 main right now, could see going down to 3.

The fail case isn't as bad as I thought, typically the Forces get smoked out on the Creative Technique, they wait to see what they blind flip, then Force to only get you 1 CT, and then once you're going the dinosaur is equivalent in the chain as any other cascader. The cascade/discover difference turns moot very quickly.
The weakest I could see it is when it's your only initial starter creature, you play Trumpeting Carnosaur and they Force and you get nothing, but that's whatever the opposite of Magical Christmas Land is.
The most unexpected upside I've come around to is the 7/6 Trample body is legit. Had a game against 8cast that suffered from the Throes/Trickery failcase but was left with 2 dinosaurs plus a few others. Sai tokens would have absolutely stabilized them in any other build, but instead they were forced to make lossy blocks, plus a cheeky cycle on Shadowspear to deny them lifegain and the game was over quickly.

I'm not sure if the math changes if the opponent's get savvy and let both CT resolve, hoping to one for one a dinosaur with a Force. I think I'd welcome twice as many chances to flip an Emrakul or Apex Devastator.

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Originally Posted by PirateKing

The fail case isn't as bad as I thought, typically the Forces get smoked out on the Creative Technique, they wait to see what they blind flip, then Force to only get you 1 CT

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Sounds like a critical play mistake from the opponent.

If they Force the dino then you get no bodies, no CT, no chain. They counter everything. Waiting to Force the discovered Creative Technique is a misplay.
If it was a 6cmc cascade creature, Force can't stop it. Their options: counter the creature or counter 1 CT.

If you get lucky with dino, they let it resolve and try to counter the discovered card (CT), then you keep going and win. Just like the cascade line. But opponent doesn't have to misplay into that.

Brewer's advantage means you steal some win % when opponent misplays around unfamiliar cards. It works at first. Eventually opponents wise up. You can only trick them into Forcing the wrong thing so long.

Even if you find another starter after, fizzling loses a turn of tempo, which could mean death vs a fast clock (Delver, Shadow, Dreadnought, Kappa, Doomsday).

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Originally Posted by PirateKing

The weakest I could see it is when it's your only initial starter creature, you play Trumpeting Carnosaur and they Force and you get nothing, but that's whatever the opposite of Magical Christmas Land is.

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Yeah, if you have other starters, you don't have to use Carnosaur to start.

If Carnosaur is in a non-essential slot and you have redundant starters, then there's no risk. If it's replacing a slot that was a starter (for optimal odds to go off turn 3), then maybe it matters? Most of the time you should draw more than 1 starter in 9-10 cards. But after mulligans, counters, and discard, could you be left relying on Carnosaur as a starter?

Maybe it doesn't happen that often?

The upside is much better than typical SB options (Pyrokinesis, Otawara, Sky Turtle).

That's what I'm saying, starting with Boarding Party or Aurora Phoenix, you go and hit a CT. Maybe it's Creative Technique straight up. Either way, it's typically at that junction that the Forces come out, with CT on the stack after the demonstrate decision.

If they know you have the dinosaur, their options are:
get a free flip, counter 1 CT and you get 1 CT
get a free flip, give you 2 CT and hope 1 is a dinosaur to counter

What I'm saying is even if the best case for them we flip into a dinosaur and they get to stuff the discover, they risk giving us two clean CTs that could flip and of the bombs.
You want to give me two chances at Emrakul in exchange for a chance to counter a dinosaur? Deal.

Quote:

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Originally Posted by PirateKing

That's what I'm saying, starting with Boarding Party or Aurora Phoenix, you go and hit a CT. Maybe it's Creative Technique straight up. Either way, it's typically at that junction that the Forces come out, with CT on the stack after the demonstrate decision.

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That's the normal line with the original build. You start with cascade or CT, and they can only Force once both CT copies are on the stack.

If you start with Dino instead, they don't have to wait for CT, they can Force the dino and End The Turn. That's the real fail case.

The failcase from flipping Dino with CT is much smaller because chances are that you have another branch OR they spent counters to restrict you to one branch. They're unlikely to have another Force for the Dino. If they had one they'd just counter the CT instead, because letting you reveal Boarding Party or Emrakul instead of Dino loses for them.

The failcase I meant is if Dino replaced a slot that used to be a starter and you need it as a starter. Rationalist did a bunch of math to optimize the deck composition for turn 3s. If Dino replaced a starter slot, that must have some effect. Maybe it's small?

ehh I mean, it's nonzero but has yet to happen.
You have other starters or just play it knowing you're taking a risk, I donno
You're not starting with the dinosaur unless you have no other choice, in which case you're a few steps down in things going wrong
My experience has shown the upsides to be many and the "but sometimes!" has yet to manifest

Ok, so let's say we run 3-4 Carnosaur and it doesn't replace the key starters. This opens up some new doors. For one, all the starters can be red now. The manabase could be streamlined to fewer colors to reduce variance in the mana.

I ran some math to see what the optimal ratios should look like in that altered build with 4 Carnosaur. Carnosaur competes with space for other things (starters, land, "big" effects like Emrakul) so it alters the odds. It would be useful to see where is best to cut to make that space.

The ideal opening hand should have 3 lands + 2 starters. 3 lands + 1 starter is also good, but 2 starters is even more redundant to disruption. I've run some numbers on those joint hands.

Opening Hand Probabilities
To avoid a clunky post, I've excluded the calculations. It was done with the Hypergeometric Distribution and some Combinatorics in Excel and should be easy to replicate.

The 60-card deck has 4 Carnosaurs, X sol lands, Y starters (Creative Technique or 6cmc cascade), and some number of "Other" cards.

What are the chances of a good opening draw with different compositions of sol lands & starters?
"Other" are the remaining slots that are not sol lands, starters, or Carnosaur. They could be: 1-mana lands, Emrakul, Maelstrom Wanderer, Apex Devastator. Cards that don't help start the chain on turn 3, but may be useful otherwise.

Sol lands	Starters	Other	3+ land, 2+ starter	3+ land, 1+ starter
34	14	8	42%	75%
34	15	7	46%	77%
34	16	6	50%	78%
34	17	5	53%	80%
34	18	4	57%	81%
35	13	8	39%	74%
35	14	7	43%	76%
35	15	6	47%	78%
35	16	5	51%	80%
35	17	4	55%	82%
36	12	8	36%	73%
36	13	7	40%	76%
36	14	6	45%	78%
36	15	5	49%	80%
36	16	4	53%	82%
36	17	3	57%	83%

Even with Carnosaurs in the deck, the chances are good of having a good random 7.

Adding more lands has less benefit than adding more starters, so perhaps the deck should be tilting towards a slightly lower land count and running more of the 6cmc red starters.



Some math on mulligan decisions
But what if you don't get an ideal hand. Are other hands keepable?

Suppose you keep a 2 land hand. What are the chances of drawing into a 3rd sol land by turn 3?

Sol Lands	T3 OTP	T3 OTD
30	78%	90%
31	80%	91%
32	82%	92%
33	83%	93%
34	85%	94%
35	86%	95%
36	88%	96%
37	89%	97%
38	90%	97%

The chances are good to hit the 3rd land.
The chances should be close to hit a 4th land from a 3-land opener (not shown here) to play around Wasteland / Daze.



Suppose you keep a hand with 1 starter (CT or 6cmc cascade). What are the chances of drawing into a 2nd starter by turn 3, for redundancy against discard or counters?

Starters	T3 OTP	T3 OTD
10	31%	43%
11	34%	47%
12	38%	51%
13	40%	54%
14	43%	58%
15	46%	61%
16	49%	64%
17	52%	67%
18	54%	70%

Hitting a 2nd starter is less reliable, though the chances go up a lot as more 6cmc starters are added, especially on the draw. The hand is still keepable if 1 starter could be enough to get there.
It's a bad idea to keep an opening hand with no starter. Similar math shows the chance of finding one in the top cards is low, although it gets better with 17-18 starters and on the draw.

What are the chances of having an opening hand with only Carnosaur as the starter? Should you keep it against a blue deck? What are the chances you'll whiff drawing into another starter?
(This assumes 4 Carnosaur in the deck and 1-4 drawn in the opening 7)

Starters	Only Carnosaur	Whiff T3 OTP	Whiff T3 OTD
10	12%	66%	53%
11	10%	62%	49%
12	9%	60%	46%
13	8%	57%	42%
14	7%	54%	39%
15	6%	51%	36%
16	5%	48%	33%
17	4%	46%	30%
18	4%	43%	28%

You could get stuck with only Carnosaur 5-10% of the time, not negligible.
Keeping that hand, the chance to find another starter is not good. Better to mulligan. Although there is significant benefit to adding more starters.

Optimal Mulligan Decisions:
2 land hand -> Keep
Hand with no starter -> Mulligan
Hand with 1 starter vs disruption -> Keep, especially on the draw
Hand with only Carnosaur -> Mulligan vs blue decks (lose to FoW, Daze, Dress Down)

Based on that above math, it looks like there would be benefit to streamline the deck with more 6cmc red starters and a red-focused manabase instead of the tricolor mana. Especially now that red mana can do more disruption (Carnosaur).

That should both reduce variance from the mana and improve the % of good draws.


//Lands: 36
4 Ancient Tomb
4 City of Traitors
3 Crystal Vein
4 Sandstone Needle
4 Dwarven Ruins
4 Tinder Farm
4 Sulfur Vent
4 Saprazzan Skerry
4 Svyelunite Temple
1 Otawara, Soaring City

//Spells: 8
4 Creative Technique
4 Let the Galaxy Burn

//Creatures: 16
4 Boarding Party
4 Aurora Phoenix
4 Trumpeting Carnosaur
2 Maelstrom Wanderer
2 Emrakul, the Aeons Torn

//Sideboard: 15
3 Throes of Chaos
2 Tibalt's Trickery
2 Karakas
2 Otawara, Soaring City
3 Mirrorshell Crab
3 Leyline of the Void


35 Sol Lands
16 starters + 4 Carnosaur

Maybe +1 Maelstrom/Apex -1 Otawara.

This build cuts green mana to simplify to a 2-color manabase. You can't hardcast Maelstrom Wanderer anymore, but how often was that happening before? Instead there are more blue sources to use Otawara and Crab more reliably.

4 Galaxy seems excessive, but 5R cascade is at a premium here. It's one of the most reliable starters and it also disrupts things. The downside is it adds some risk of running through more Creative Techniques without hitting enough creatures. Etherium-Horn Sorcerer could be an option with all the blue mana but is harder to cast reliably. Sakashima's Protege is another option (works very well with Carnosaur in play), but UU is not easy for a starter.

Edit: Tested 10 hands with this build
8/10 - Had right lands & starters
1/10 - Had T3 Carnosaur only (mull or risk it?)
1/10 - No red mana, mull to 6

7/10 - Turn 3 CT/Cascade
1/10 - Turn 3 Carnosaur
2/10 - Turn 4 CT/Cascade (tapped lands)

10/10 - Lethal power + haste/time walk
Each hand was able to "go off". Demonstrating twice was usually enough.

I tested many more.

I think the deck wants the 4th Crystal Vein/City (12 colorless sol lands) to have enough entering untapped to go off turn 3 instead of turn 4. In previous builds too much colorless mana was a drawback, but here the streamlined red-based deck hits its color requirements more easily. It seems more important to get untapped mana for tempo.

The 2nd Maelstrom Wanderer might be better as a 3rd Emrakul or 1st Apex Devastator. They're not really castable anymore and the 2nd copy is redundant, while the 2nd Emrakul revealed is not redundant (extra turn & puts used Creative Technique back in library).

The 4th Galaxy Burn feels like a lot when going through the combo chain, but there aren't really better alternatives in red. The 4RR equipment is worse.


//Lands: 35
4 Ancient Tomb
4 City of Traitors
4 Crystal Vein
4 Sandstone Needle
4 Dwarven Ruins
4 Tinder Farm
4 Sulfur Vent
4 Saprazzan Skerry
3 Svyelunite Temple

//Spells: 8
4 Creative Technique
4 Let the Galaxy Burn

//Creatures: 17
4 Boarding Party
4 Aurora Phoenix
4 Trumpeting Carnosaur
1 Maelstrom Wanderer
4 Emrakul, the Aeons Torn

//Sideboard: 15
3 Throes of Chaos
2 Tibalt's Trickery
1 Karakas
3 Otawara, Soaring City
3 Mirrorshell Crab
3 Leyline of the Void

I'm still low on Let the Galaxy Burn, it's such a disappointing hit.
Keeping it heavy red is a positive turn, but fitting some Sweet Gum Recluse as B tier creatures shouldn't stress the mana too hard. Also, I'm not ready to give up on Boseiju as an out just yet. Compared to your list I'm less on the Invasion lands.

What's been your trouble spots?
I expect an abundance of Turbo Moon decks, very low number of Teferi. Not sure which Leyline to favor.

If not Galaxy Burn then it's either run fewer starters (the math & testing suggests that's worse) or play an off-color creature (affects mana variance). For an off-color creature, Etherium-Horn Sorcerer seems better than Sweet Gum Recluse. Sweet Gum's effect is better but Etherium is more castable. The stock 3-color manabase can very rarely make GG.

In the Ru build I could consider swapping blue for green, with Boseiju and Sweet Gum instead of Otawara and Etherium/Crab. Boseiju is strong and Otawara is slow, although Otawara is flexible. I have used Otawara to remove big Murktides.

Galaxy does clear chump blockers. Hitting 2-3 Galaxy instead of creatures has happened but didn't cost me any games. I've never gone off and come up short on board presence. Either they disrupt me from going off or I go off and win. I don't run the small 3/xs though. The bodies are: 4x 5/3 flying, 4x 6/3, 4x 7/6 trample, 4x 15/15 flying, 7/5. It doesn't take many bodies to win. The older builds may have needed more bodies.

Maybe the high Emrakul count makes up for it. Time Walk + 15 power annihilate 6 does a lot. Once I accepted any of the top end are uncastables (Emrakul, Apex, Maelstrom) it felt suboptimal to not play 4x the strongest creature in the game. Annihilate 6 has solved the blocker issue in many games (especially after Galaxy kills small bodies), while hitting a 2nd Maelstrom Wanderer was underwhelming. Emrakul also randomly jukes Show and Tell or Painter.

Emrakul does have a downside. In one game I had CT into Emrakul (CT copy got Forced), chain ended, and opponent had untapped Karakas to bounce. However with the extra turn I cast a 2nd starter into the win. Time Walk was still good.

The Invasion lands aren't great but they're sol lands that make red. I've lost games to tempo with double Wasteland on red source, so I want as many red sources as possible. Red non-sol land could work but then costs more lands, turns, and tempo to catch up.

Blood Moon slows you down but CT is still castable if they don't kill by turn 5, and Carnosaur can still Bolt Caves of Chaos Adventurer or Rabblemaster.

What does your mana look like? How reliably have you been able to use Boseiju to bail you out against hate?

Going green instead:


//Lands: 35
4 Ancient Tomb
4 City of Traitors
4 Crystal Vein
4 Dwarven Ruins
4 Sandstone Needle
3 Sulfur Vent
4 Tinder Farm
4 Hickory Woodlot
4 Havenwood Battleground

//Spells: 6
4 Creative Technique
2 Let the Galaxy Burn

//Creatures: 19
4 Boarding Party
4 Aurora Phoenix
4 Trumpeting Carnosaur
2 Sweet-Gum Recluse
1 Maelstrom Wanderer
4 Emrakul, the Aeons Torn

//Sideboard: 15
4 Throes of Chaos
2 Tibalt's Trickery
4 Boseiju, Who Endures
1 Aeve, Progenitor Ooze


Maybe that would combo off more smoothly and also benefit from Boseiju removing hate. Don't know what else to run in the board. Chancellor of the Annex? Leyline? Pyrokinesis? Maddening Hex?

Quote:

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Originally Posted by FTW

The 4th Galaxy Burn feels like a lot when going through the combo chain, but there aren't really better alternatives in red. The 4RR equipment is worse.

[/cards]

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Since you're already playing a nearly full complement of UU sol lands, perhaps Sakashima's Protege would be preferable to Let the Galaxy Burn due to its favorable interaction with Trumpeting Carnosaur? I'm not sure if it's worth messing with the mana requirements though...

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Originally Posted by gngpostalsrvc

Since you're already playing a nearly full complement of UU sol lands, perhaps Sakashima's Protege would be preferable to Let the Galaxy Burn due to its favorable interaction with Trumpeting Carnosaur? I'm not sure if it's worth messing with the mana requirements though...

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5R with 15-16 red lands should be easier to cast than 4UU with 7-8 UU lands, so I feared it would add variance to the mana. 5R is castable off Tinder Farm even if they Wasteland your Sandstone Needle, so it adds some redundancy when the 8 4RR cards are uncastable.

But I did end up making the equivalent choice in the RG build (4GG with 8 GG lands), so it would be no different in RU with Sakashima.

Etherium-Horn Sorcerer would be castable off Sulfur Vent and Otawara. In total, 11-14 blue lands & 15-16 red lands. It should be easier to cast as a starter than Sakashima but is worse to reveal in the combo chain.