I saw an interesting list on deckcheck that placed Top8 in an event:
http://www.deckcheck.net/deck.php?id=28209
It utilizes Goblin Welder and Master Transmuter in a Stax shell to create a lock against the opponent. The main idea is to get out Master Transmuter/Goblin Welder to cheat out bombs (Titan, Inkwell), and to use Transmuter to reset Tangle Wires and cycle Titan for land destruction. Note that in a rainbow-based manabase, Titan becomes a one-sided Armageddon, leaving your lands untouched. That's the beauty of the deck.
I loved the idea and list but I disliked the most part of his deck. I didn't like how it was 3 colors, with white mainly for Armageddon. It's already difficult to handle 2 colors in a Stax shell (recent success is Dutch Stax with a green splash). So I took his list and tweaked it a little, to further abuse Tangle Wire and Trinisphere, and to break the symmetry of Winter Orb.
I did not like how his deck will be less functionable under Blood Moon. The new list I propose is just a little blue heavy but can play well without the blue cards. His list would be white-dead under a Moon, and I don't want to run into such problems. Back to basics is bad for this deck, but there's no way out for that matchup anyway, and B2B is losing some popularity recently.
The deck only runs very little blue, so in cases of moon effects, if you don't have Mox Diamond, you can live off the colorless and red aspects and still Weld things around. I've explored a similar idea with this deck, but never got to build it since I was too worried about Welder dying to StP, or be unable to play Welder since I'm playing Chalice@1. I took the brave step of removing Chalice@1 for reasons I shall state below. But here's a decklist before I rant on again.
Lands: 25 (24 mana-producers)
4 Ancient Tomb
4 City of Traitors
4 Wasteland
4 Gemstone Mine
2 City of Brass
2 Great Furnace
4 Seat of the Synod
1 Tabernacle at Pendrell's Vale
Acceleration/Card-advantage: 14
4 Mox Diamond
3 Crucible of Worlds
4 Thirst for Knowledge
3 Intuition
Cheaters: 6
4 Goblin Welder
2 Master Transmuter
Prison: 12
4 Winter Orb
4 Tangle Wire
4 Trinisphere
Win-conditions: 4
3 Sundering Titan
1 Inkwell Leviathan
Sideboard: 15 cards
1 Platinum Angel
1 Nullstone Gargolye
4 Chalice of the Void
2 Smokestack
3 Pithing Needle
4 Propaganda
Other options:
REB/BEB/Boil/Chill/Defense Grid/Powder Keg.
DECK-EXPLANATION
No Chalice??
One big reason to not include Chalice is that you have Welder and don't want to run into conflicts with casting Welder. It is true that Transmuter/Welder will inevitably become StP targets but this deck works by resolving Trinisphere/Winter Orb asap and accomplishes it much more often when the deck has good card-draw off TfKs. The deck wants to set up a Tangle-Wire/Orb/3Sphere lock before resolving Welders since Welder is not useful at all in the early game.
Once you set up 3Sphere and WOrb/Tangle Wire, you can safely resolve Welder without fear of StP and removals. I am testing another list that includes Chalice but without WOrbs and I prefer the synergy to WOrbs than being fearful of StP against Welders. Another reason why this deck does not fear StP is because if you do get a Titan online, an StP would force them to lose another 2 lands, making them helpless in the face of a 3Sphere/Tangle Wire.
Without Chalice, I can also now safely resolve Pithing Needle post board, against troublesome decks (Survival etc) and at the same time I can protect myself against Disk/Pernicious Deed, which is a big trouble when resolved.
Staxless??
I was disappointed that the original list on deckcheck did not run Smokestack. I went about playing with Smokestack and realized that I did not need it at all. It was great in the SB if I wanted to play the Stax role against control but with the synergy of the deck, Smokestack is in fact a little too slow for this Staxless Stax variant. It is possible to include 1 Smokestack in the MD as an Intuition target but Sundering Titan + Wastelock together with WOrb + Tanglewire/3Sphere provides enough lock. If you get either WORb/3Sphere with Tanglewire out, you can rest assured that their creatures will become tapped. One drawback of this deck is that it cannot contain aggro as well as White Stax could since it had Magus/Armageddon and Ghostly Prison/Moat/Humility to completely shut down aggro. This deck needs Tangle Wire to tap down opposing creatures, or rely on turn 1 3Sphere to buy some time. The nice thing however is that you can weld/transmute larger deadlier creatures which Geddon Stax is incapable of doing so. The strength of this deck also lies in the inbuilt permanent recursion in Welder/Transmuter. The fact that the ability can be reused makes it potentially powerful in Stax-builds that have little to no card-advantage.
Master-Transmuter
I really want to test 3 in the MD. She is what pushes the Staxless nature of this deck ahead. She enables fast Titans in hand without the help of TfK. She can recylce Titan over to armageddon asymmetrically (you run no basic land types). She can bounce WOrb at the end of your opponents turn to free your lands or reset/bounce Tangle Wires. If you can resolve one Titan and recycle Titan, you should most likely have the game. The issue with Transmuter is that even with a Stax shell, she is too slow (4cc) although if you have TfK on turn 1, you can always ditch her into the yard and weld her out later if you need to.
This deck is still in its initial stages, but I feel that the Winter Orb approach is the right direction for the deck. Since the deck cheats its creatures/permanents into play via Welder/Transmuter, WOrb seems ideal even though you do not get to untap. WOrb has tremendous synergy with 3Sphere or Tangle-Wire, and complements each other well. The deck has a better card-draw than regular Stax but does not have a stronger swarm aggro backup plan. However, against swarm aggro, Propagandas in the SB + WOrb would complement each other well and buy some time. Intuition and Tabernacle in the MD allows you to tutor up a Wrath effect under Tangle-Wire/WOrb, acting like Magus+Armageddon in white stax.
The deck is new and has potential of development, so for the Welder lovers, here's another thread for discussion.
Chris, you have to bring this to Asgards for a little testing. Are you going up there on Wednesday?
I definitely will bring this. I tested some games on MWS. Kinda insane when you get it going. Sundering Titan is broken when you can't destroy your lands.
I just beat Rock and Survival. Need to play against the more developed metas such as Landstill/Dreadstill/Thresh. Winter Orb is a beating with Tangle Wire. It's insane. It's my form of creature stall since the tapped lands don't untap under orb and they have to keep their creatures tapped. Master Transmuter cycling Tangle Wire is really hideous lol.
i've been contemplating something similar but in place of master transmuter splashing black for reanimate spells seems much stronger in legacy. transmuter just cost too much and only functions well when welded in.
I've seen the URb versions with reanimation. It was cool and definitely strong, but I found the Stax shell to fit better. Surprisingly, Transmuter comes down fairly fast on turn 3 in the Stax shell. A few games playtested shows that you really want to try to stall the games with a few tangle Wire, before playing cool tricks. It involves some set up with TfK/Intuition, but most of the time, it's good.
I can already see the weaknesses of this deck. It will roll over to Zoo/Sligh/Goblins. Anything that's too fast kills this deck. Not sure if Propaganda will help much. I'll bring it to testing this Wed/Thurs to see how it goes.
I'd be interested in hearing the results of having more than 2 transmuters in the deck if you do go through with it as you mentioned in your earlier post.
thought trinispheres the proven card, what about thorn of amenthyst (spelling) in its place? It certainly would mess up the opponent from droping anything north of 3 that isn't a creature.
In addition i strongly recommend making space for a duplicant, if a goyf does get out its quickly working for you and not them.
But Trinisphere stops players from playing anything if they don't have at least 3 mana. Thorn don't seem to have the same effect.
I like this deck very much. I think you might want to try and squeeze propaganda main deck though. Otherwise land, vial, pass is sure to wreck you.
(maybe solemn simulacrum?)
Any reason not to run academy ruins as a 1 of?
EDIT: Actually Im not too sure about this deck. It seems WAY too dependent on getting a trinisphere in play early.
Correction: It seems way important to get Winter Orb in play. 3Sphere is good, but WOrb is what powers the deck. Tangle Wire OR 3Sphere would spell doom even against aggro.
I agree that this is the fundamental weakness of the deck, the reliance on tap-locks. If you don't succeed well, you're really screwed. Yesterday I've tested games against UGw Thresh, Mono-U Dreadstill, Survival and it was brutal when I got WOrb out. Top is killed, and Survival engine is slowed tremendously without being able to play spells under WOrb.
In the games where I got Sundering Titan under WOrb/3Sphere, it was GG. Master Transmuter + Sundering Titan achieved Armageddon with just one activation. I think Propaganda needs to be in the MD to fight against aggro. The deck already has a good control matchup with the MD WOrbs and 3Sphere, but fast aggro is a problem. Well, B2B and Blood Moon is a problem too but there's no out with the nature of this deck lol.
There was one interesting game where I got WOrb out and 2 Welders with 2 Seats in the yard and 2 Furnace in play. My opponent tried to Daze me but I could weld out lands to pay for Daze, and recycle lands to play spells under WOrb. It was somewhat cool. But what's more cool is that when Welders were not StPed, every artifact spell they counter is going to come back. He FOWed a 3Sphere and I welded it back immediately, locking him out.
Transmuter + Tangle Wire + WOrb is pretty vicious from my testing.
From my testing, the ultimate weakness of the deck still falls because it's a Stax-based deck, thereful it needs to rely on its opening hands and good mulligans. At the very least, 4 TfK and 3 Intuition really helps it better than other Stax-based decks. Put it up to test and let me know how to improve it. I've already seen the weaknesses and hope to find more with more testing to improve it.
I'm not sure if Gifts should be included as well with TfK and Intuition. Intuition is strong with Transmuter + Welder and you can Intuition for:
Welder + Transmuter + big dude if you have Transmuter in play
Big dudes if you have Welder in play.
etc
The options of intuition is more extensive in this Stax-deck since you can tinker around with both GY and hand targets with Welder and Transmuter respectively.
I am tempted to put in Chalice back again. If so, I have to play 3 Transmuter, so if I do want to resolve Welder, I can always bounce Chalice back and play it again. I seem to have too many 3cc slots and not enough non-Mox Diamond turn 1 plays. I might consider Sphere of Resistance and Chalice of the Void. 3Sphere is sometimes not fast without Diamonds on turn 1 while Sphere of Resistance can do fine although I would be hurt under WOrb although to a lesser degree. One thing that can help the deck alot is more artifact mana.
With the Welders and Transmuters, would it be a good idea to lock the game out completely using Possessed Portal?
With Possessed Portal out, your opponent can no longer draw answers to your locks.
Or does it seem like a win-more card?
I think you absolutely need propaganda. Otherwise Ichorid is going to be a problem, as is goblins and merfolk.
What does the deck do game one against combo? Looks pretty damn bleak.
http://www.mtgthesource.com/forums/s...ead.php?t=4407
^ some ideas in there. I understand that this deck has a very different game plan but there are some things this deck needs. Echoing truth for sure. Otherwise things like moat are bad times. Echoing truth can also stop a horde of zombies and can buy just enough time to stabilize against goyf decks.
----
FWIW I really really really want this deck to be good.
If the deck resolves Trinisphere, it shuts down most storm combo decks.Originally Posted by clavio
The trick is to get the Trinisphere before combo kills you through.
THANKS
They can win turn 2 easily, so basically you NEED 3sphere in your opening hand and that's still FAR from a guaranteed win for you. I really feel like as a stax type deck it needs to be able to reliably beat combo.
I really think powder keg could find a home here.
Well, that is the nature of Stax deck... or any deck against Combo.
They have to have an answer in their hand and/or in play before Combo does its thing.
You can have a hand of Chalice, Trinisphere, and the mana to play it. However, if they 1st turn kill you, that hand is meaningless.
Now, do you have to change the deck around to the point that we assume every deck is going to be fast combo? Not really.
Obviously, if combo is that big in your metagame, just put in Chalice of the Void or something along those lines.
Or play a different deck.
OK OK OK OK
List of decks that will give this deck a hell of a time currently (hell of a time being unwinable to very unfavorable):
Anything that plays Aether vial
Ichorid
Combo
Blood Moon/B2B/moat/these things
Things that play deed
Things that play hymn to tourach.
You're bound to run into one of these things. There isn't a meta in the world that's just landstill and goyfy aggro control.
EDIT: I wouldn't think too much about the list on deck check. It has 62 cards and came in 8th in an event that had 13 people.
Well, the nature of Stax like decks have huge problems with people messing with their opening hands. Similarly, it has problems with anything that is put into play without actually casting, and successful board sweepers.
However, Stax's answer to all of those are usually the same.
Lock them out, or die.
Crz87's proposed sideboard tries to address some of those matchups as well.
Tangle Wire is good at restricting mana from playing sorcery speed spells. The purpose of Tangle Wire + Winter Orb is try to stop them from playing spells such as B2B, Deed, etc. With extra draw power and tutors, there is a high chance of finding one through.
This is funny, but the more I think about it, the less the deck needs Welder. I'm testing a monoU Stax shell with just 3 Transmuters and Titans. It seems to be better in some ways since you can now play Chalice @1 and you are more consistent. You do lose the synergy with the discard/intuition and Welder. I think in this build Academy Ruins isn't bad. I'm still debating on it because currently, the only red card that I run is Welder, which doesn't seem to justify splashing just for him and giving up Chalice.
I've also been working on a UW list with Armageddon and Elspeth with draw power from Thirst and Intuition with Transmuter. But that's another topic to discuss. I'll continue to test the Welder builds.
Some observations: Shivan Reef>City of Brass. Don't know if you still play it but it seems better as long as your not playing more then 2 colors ;).
Nice deck all around I like the fact that you found a use for tangle wire, I love that card and it would be nice to have a deck where I could use it.
What about playing something like Duplicant on the board to take care of creatures like dreadnought/goyf?
I was actually just testing a mono blue version of the deck myself. Chalice @1 is very good against threshold type decks. They become inconsistent when they cant play ponder/brainstorm and mongoose is also stopped.
I think it can work but it needs work. There's alot of cards that I'd like to run but it's really hard to do it with just 60 cards.
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