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Thread: WBG Magecraft Aggro Combo

  1. #1
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    WBG Magecraft Aggro Combo

    Many years ago I built a GWB “prowess” deck that managed to take down a small legacy tournament, and I think the playing spells that count as lands essentially could be decent with the new magecraft cards, and you also get a combo kill with chain of smog.

    Link here to the old deck.
    https://magic.facetofacegames.com/abzan-mentor-legacy/





    Is running Tithe and Land Grant way more risky than just a higher land count and cantrips? Absolutely. I’m sure there is a similar type of build where you cut green for blue and the deck gets way better but this seems like a more fun space to explore.

    So the general idea here is to sort of play like a fair Aggro Deck with your prowess creatures etc, but if you ever get an opening you can threaten to combo.

    This might be trying to do too many things, I’m sure the greediness could be cut back in favour of more consistency but this is where I want to start. The Mox Diamonds might be too risky as well.

    Bob is worth thinking about, so is a more human disruptive focus, or maybe a Dead Guy or D&T style approach with Vials more or less Herirarchs?

    Grand Abolisher is also worth thinking about.

    2 Noble Heirarch
    4 Mother of Runes
    4 Clever Luminancer
    4 Leonin Lightscribe
    4 Witherbloom Apprentice
    2 Cabal Therapy

    1 Unmask
    3 Thoughtseize
    3 Night's Whisper
    4 Chain of Smog
    3 Swords to plowshares
    1 Abrupt Decay / Assassin’s trophy
    4 Tithe
    4 Land Grant
    2 Mox Diamond

    4 Marsh Flats
    1 Windsweapt Heath
    1 Plains
    1 Swamp
    1 Forest
    1 Bayou
    2 Savannah
    4 Scrublands

    Happy to hear anyones thoughts if they think this is crazy or might have some legs.

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    Re: WBG Magecraft Aggro Combo

    Isn't Once Upon a Time fairly perfect for this deck?
    Brainstorm Realist

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  3. #3

    Re: WBG Magecraft Aggro Combo

    Don't forget the green cantrip



    Between this and Once Upon A Time and Veil of Summer you can even pretend to play a "blue" deck. You don't need to bother with Land Grant and Tithe imo.

    Snuff out also seems pretty nice, or maybe murderous cut if you don't feel like giving your opp life.

    Maybe run caverns on humans to force your creatures through countermagic?

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    Re: WBG Magecraft Aggro Combo

    once upon a time is an excellent call.

    That being said, with the printing of this:


    You could just drop the GB mage and go WB no green splash. Sure you can't win outside the combat zone anymore, but with Mom and maybe some Giver of Runes, and just straight having more attackers than they have blockers, shouldn't be too hard to win.

    I'll have to tinker around and see if BW alone is more worth it.

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    Re: WBG Magecraft Aggro Combo

    Cabal Therapy seems bad here (creatures not profitable to sacrifice) while StP should be a 4-of. Cling to Dust seems like a maindeckable on-color cantrip.

    Land Grant and Tithe seem too cute. OUAT is a better version of Land Grant that doesn't open you up to the same manascrew blowouts vs Daze. OUAT can also find Caverns @ Humans. Green seems appealing if only for the cantrips, Decays to fight hate, and ability to win outside the combat zone.

    If you go BW, Monastery Mentor probably belongs. That would justify keeping Cabal Therapy too.

    Why is Silverquill strictly worse than Lightscribe for a worse mana cost? Due to creature type Human? Was there an error in the spoiler that missed something relevant like "+1/+0 and deathtouch"?
    Last edited by FTW; 04-02-2021 at 09:05 PM.

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    Re: WBG Magecraft Aggro Combo

    The BW Mage can target any creature not just Itself.
    Strictly worse than the Leonin and harder to cast, so i don't know what they were thinking.

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    Re: WBG Magecraft Aggro Combo

    Quote Originally Posted by ReAnimator View Post
    The BW Mage can target any creature not just Itself.
    Strictly worse than the Leonin and harder to cast, so i don't know what they were thinking.
    The 1W Mage can pump any creature as well. And every other creature at the same time.

    There's a corner case where the BW can boost your Teammate's creature or target an enemy creature, but that's not worth it. The only rationale I can see is if the BW one also granted a keyword ability to target creature. Giving +1/+0 and deathtouch to target creature would be interesting and more balanced. Painsmith already gives +2/+0 and deathtouch to target creature on artifact cast so that should not be broken.


    Edit: 3-color version with the cantrips


    //Spells: 23
    4 Once Upon A Time
    4 Abundant Harvest
    4 Swords to Plowshares
    4 Thoughtseize
    4 Chain of Smog
    3 Abrupt Decay

    //Creatures: 19
    4 Mother of Runes
    4 Clever Lumimancer
    4 Leonin Lightscribe
    4 Witherbloom Apprentice
    3 Sedgemoor Witch

    //Lands: 18
    4 Cavern of Souls
    3 Marsh Flats
    3 Windswept Heath
    2 Verdant Catacombs
    2 Bayou
    2 Savannah
    2 Scrubland

    //Sideboard: 15
    3 Veil of Summer
    2 Surgical Extraction
    2 Cling to Dust
    2 Cabal Therapy
    2 Force of Vigor
    2 Assassin's Trophy
    2 Choke

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    Re: WBG Magecraft Aggro Combo

    I'd like to see this in an Aether Vial shell.
    -rob

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    Re: WBG Magecraft Aggro Combo

    I think that's a good start FTW
    I feel like i want a basic or 2 in there.
    But i'll start with your list.

    I missed this card as well:



    Slightly worse than the BW one, cause it only helps itself, but easier to cast.
    The BW one can win with "haste" sort of, by pumping up a Mom or something, but really not amazing, and very corner caseish.

    I'm not sure Sedgemore Witch is worth it. 3 mana and can't win on the turn you combo, and leaves you empty handed. It's more the 3 mana i think.

    There is also this human:

    Which is better than a few other options. It can sort of just grow fairly and stay big, which is nice, for when you don't combo.

    I think i want noble heirarchs in here, to help make the mana more stable and to accelerate.

  10. #10
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    Re: WBG Magecraft Aggro Combo

    I like FTW's list as a base. Although Dragonsguard Elite might be better than the Leonin due to being a Human and staying beefier for longer if the combo plan doesn't work out.

    The inclusion of Noble Hierarch gets my vote as well. Aside from making the mana better/faster, it also makes a blue splash for stuff like Meddling Mage/T3feri more feasible in the 75. In the end, you have to ask yourself how you can protect yourself while going off and those two are pretty good at it.

    Not exactly a fan of Sedgemore Witch. Aside from being 3 mana, you still have to wait a turn to win with your infinite tokens. The deck would already get hit pretty badly by Plague Engineer due to the number of humans (especially if Hierarch is included as well)- no reason to One for Nothing yourself if it wipes your infinite tokens afterwards. With Elite/Apprentice you can still have 8 wincons that don't die to Engineer immediately.

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    Re: WBG Magecraft Aggro Combo

    Sedgemoor was there for the fair plan, not to combo. It's usually not worth discarding your hand for it but it will make some free bodies when you cast spells, which is a better lasting effect than most of the others. It also makes Cabal Therapy a lot better. Still, it may be worse than just playing Monastery Mentor.

    With the spoiling of Dragonsguard Elite there's probably no reason for a 3-drop anymore. There are enough good 1s and 2s now, and winning 1-2 turns later is just too slow.

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    Re: WBG Magecraft Aggro Combo

    Given how popular Plague Engineer currently is, that's probably a good call.

    That said, isn't Chain of Smog kinda the bottleneck of the deck? It can run plenty of Magecraft wincons - you could even run GSZ if there was a lack of those. But only 4 Chains with very limited ways to find it. That's probably something that still needs some work.

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    Re: WBG Magecraft Aggro Combo

    imho the whole reason to play this WBG Magecraft version with so many creatures is to play the fair plan. The plan A is fair, and the plan B is infinite combo if you happen to have it. That's a reasonable goal for this deck.

    If the plan A is combo, I'd argue this whole deck concept is doing it wrong. It lacks the card selection to assemble the pieces (in this case Chain is the bottleneck) and it lacks the protection to resolve it and beat SB hate. Even if you have Chain, it will often lose to Force or removal. I think if you want to look at this linearly as trying to go infinite as often as possible, the way to go is in blue with Xerox cantrips or maybe the SI shell. But the best thing going for this white-heavy version is that it can just play fair prowess aggro and beatdown. If you have Chain you can go infinite, but there's no reason to force it if your hand can do other things too.

    Token makers do make the fair beatdown plan better. If Witch is bad, maybe Monastery Mentor should be in the deck. It doesn't allow the infinite combo but it can just win games with a few cheap spells.

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    Re: WBG Magecraft Aggro Combo

    Quote Originally Posted by FTW View Post
    imho the whole reason to play this WBG Magecraft version with so many creatures is to play the fair plan. The plan A is fair, and the plan B is infinite combo if you happen to have it. That's a reasonable goal for this deck.

    If the plan A is combo, I'd argue this whole deck concept is doing it wrong. It lacks the card selection to assemble the pieces (in this case Chain is the bottleneck) and it lacks the protection to resolve it and beat SB hate. Even if you have Chain, it will often lose to Force or removal. I think if you want to look at this linearly as trying to go infinite as often as possible, the way to go is in blue with Xerox cantrips or maybe the SI shell. But the best thing going for this white-heavy version is that it can just play fair prowess aggro and beatdown. If you have Chain you can go infinite, but there's no reason to force it if your hand can do other things too.

    Token makers do make the fair beatdown plan better. If Witch is bad, maybe Monastery Mentor should be in the deck. It doesn't allow the infinite combo but it can just win games with a few cheap spells.
    I agree 100%, it should be fair plan A, but threaten to combo at any point, which bottle necks how your opponent can react to you.

  15. #15

    Re: WBG Magecraft Aggro Combo

    I think this deck needs to play flusterstorm as additional copies of chain of smog. Doesn’t quite go infinite but both protects and will usually make a 2 turn clock with the witch.

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    Re: WBG Magecraft Aggro Combo

    Another option, especially in the Jund version, is Ground Rift. It basically makes your team unblockable while triggering multiple times.

    A card I really wanted to make work here was Prismatic Strand. It's live in the GY after you Chain yourself, able to protect your guy from Bolts or other things in response to the Magecraft triggers after your hand is gone. Unfortunately it just protects you from damage but not targetted removal.

  17. #17

    Re: WBG Magecraft Aggro Combo

    I really like the look of this. How about not running either Sedgemoor or Mentor and then you can put Lurrus in the board as a companion, this would really help the decks overall plan wouldn't it? Diabolic Intent is an option if you really want more ways to find chain to combo off. I really like the idea of adding Witherbloom Command as a 2-of, just does a lot of work in the deck.

    Also, Show of Confidence is white, has Storm even though it isn't keyworded, and puts permanent +1/+1 counters on your guys.

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    Re: WBG Magecraft Aggro Combo

    Lurrus of the Dream-Den is banned in Legacy as of the last day it wasn't 70% of top 8s.

    Edit: The list I posted above and most others could run Jegantha as a companion, but it's probably not worth losing the SB slot for an 8cmc creature.

  19. #19

    Re: WBG Magecraft Aggro Combo

    Quote Originally Posted by FTW View Post
    Lurrus of the Dream-Den is banned in Legacy as of the last day it wasn't 70% of top 8s.

    Edit: The list I posted above and most others could run Jegantha as a companion, but it's probably not worth losing the SB slot for an 8cmc creature.
    D'oh

  20. #20

    Re: WBG Magecraft Aggro Combo

    Jund approach:

    -No white creatures (the magecraft doesn't provide lasting benefits)
    -Red gives access to Bolt for extra reach and Pyro
    -Less creatures, more spells

    //Spells
    4 Once Upon A Time
    4 Abundant Harvest
    4 Lightning Bolt
    3 Thoughtseize
    4 Chain of Smog
    2 Abrupt Decay
    3 Veil of Summer
    4 Cabal Therapy
    2 Ground Rift

    //Creatures: 12

    4 Young Pyromancer
    4 Witherbloom Apprentice
    4 Dragonsguard Elite

    //Lands: 18
    4 Cavern of Souls
    3 Marsh Flats
    3 Windswept Heath
    2 Verdant Catacombs
    2 Bayou
    2 Taiga
    2 Badlands

    //Sideboard: 14
    1 Veil of Summer
    2 Surgical Extraction
    2 Cling to Dust
    1 Abrupt Decay
    3 Hull Breach
    2 Assassin's Trophy
    3 Choke

    // Companion (because why the fuck not)

    1 Jegantha, the Wellspring

    I guess you could also run 4c, but at some point you're going to have to justify not running Ponder/Brainstorm/Flusterstorm. I get this is for fun but in all likelihood the cantrip amalgam will eat that deck too.

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