Obviously I'm going to say that I don't like the Mystical tutors or lack of Putrid Imp. I can see how he has just as good of a chance to do good things with Lotus Petal on Turn 1, but they all involve him having Reanimate, where exhume would be uncastable.
I don't like the 3-cost cards the game can often be too close to being lose by the time that turn comes around.
It seems like Deed in the board would be a lot stronger (I considered it myself.) But EE along with many other cards in his deck are just wrong choices.
My Current creatures:
4 Iona, 2 Sphinx of the Steel Wind, 1 Blazing Archon, 1 Tidespout Tyrant, 1 Empyrial Archangel.
And SB:
4 Echoing Truth
4 Krosan Grip
4 Spell Pierece
2 Hurkyl's Recall
1 Rushing River
Did you drop the Tombstalkers, or is that list just your reanimation suite?
I like the 2 Sphinx of the Steel Wind, but I can't imagine cutting the Leviathan (at least in my meta). It's my go-to against decks with Stp/Maelstrom Pulse/Vindicate and Sower of Temptation.
Tusk up.
Originally Posted by Finn
Hi, I'm the one who won the dutch open nationals. As for our meta, it's control mostly.
Mystical tutor is good in this build, on average I should have a big creature on turn 1-3 ( turn 2 mostly)
I'll say why I choose for my creature build first
Iona, shield of emeria: this shouldn't need any explanation, even though it hasn't been my most animated creature on the tournament, it still wins you games singlehandedly.
Inkwell leviathan: This is a creature no blue player can ignore, but they simply have to. it has trample, a fat behind and shroud. Most non-blue decks will have a problem with the 7 damage each turn. shame both this one and Iona, can be outraced if played from reanimate.
Empyrial archangel: this one wins soo many games simply because it has evasion, won't be killed easily and gives you a free hit and still can sit back and relax.
angel of despair: a card you won't use often but it is insane, it did win me a game or 2 by removing their threats that could've outraced me.
Akroma, angel of wrath: why this one over sphinx of the steel wind? it has haste, nothing else really matters mainboard, It's prefered to have one big fat haste creature. Against most decks that also works for sphinx, akroma also wins singlehandedly. ( goblins, zoo, aggro-loam) the haste can make this creature an unexpected finisher.
manabase:
fetch: a lot of fetch for deckthinning, shuffling and abusing brainstorm to the fullest.
bayou/underground sea: the necessary duels, while some prefer to stick to B/U, I prefer the green splash for krosan grips. decks like counterbalance can become highly difficult to beat without the grip. you will still suffer no difficulties maintaining the mana.
lotus petal: why this above dark ritual? It can produce blue and green. this way I can go off turn one with reanimate, yes it might sound horrible, but I have more discard outlets for turn 1 this way. careful study/reanimate. it also protects me just as easily from a daze if I want to cast EoT mystical tutor or entomb.
basics: the necessary basics to protect you from wasteland, moon effects and back to basics.
spells:
Mystical tutor: I use the mystical to be able to search for my combo pieces, even a Force of will, brainstorm or show and tell have been searched by it. It's much better than you would suspect. It can tutor for sideboarded extirpate and krosan grip to make the match-up better.
force of will: this is so good in reanimate, it let's you go off early with protection, or protects your creature from unexpected removal like WoG,humility,edicts or other threats. I cannot imagine having won a match without Force of will that day.
carefull study: delicious, it digs your deck, throws creature in your graveyard and even gets your creatures back into your graveyard after a bounce.
entomb/reanimate/exhume: the combo-pieces, they need no explanation itself. all 4-offs and it's more than enough.
show and tell/intuition: 3-mana spells, yes, you will be surprised how often you get there. these are the cards that gets the deck past a chalice from the void or any graveyard hate. the intuition gets the combo pieces, throws more creatures in your graveyard or can be used for a mind-game. You will be surprised how easily you can influence a game with a simple mind-trick pulled off by intuition.
brainstorm: does this need explanation? it serves as both a search engine as handprotection. what more do you want at instant speed.
thoughtseize: you can use this card for both seeing an opponents hand rip their hate out of their hands or use it as a discard engine.
Sideboard:
guttural response: this card has served me well, especially on the long games, but it will be replaced by something else.
extirpate: by far the best graveyard hate card for this deck, it beats the artifacts by miles and is questionably better than ravenous trap. I used it a lot to see opponents hands, get their searched cards with tutor back in their libraries and get their own combopieces away.
infest: it is searchable, removes a lot of goblins and more. it works pretty well
krosan grip: a very good card against dreadstill decks and counterbalance decks. it is able to remove their counterbalance or other big chunky artifact threats like dreadnaugts,crypts or relics. no counters involved :)
sphinx of the steel wind: this card is an addition to the akroma for sideboard against zoo,goblins and aggro-loam.
engineered explosives: I choose this over pernicious deed, because the deed was too slow in the end. It's good, but it has one casting cost which makes it harder to avoid any counterbalance tricks, which the EE has no problem in doing so. it's less versatile in blowing things up like the pernicious deed has, but it works more than enough for the decks I need it against. ( chalices, zoo (2 is enough), counterbalance, zombietokens or empty the warren tokens) the pernicious deed is too slow against these.
so why did I not use the following:
putrid imp:I did use this card before. In the end I couldn't make place for it anymore. It's not as good as I want it to be, because it stands still, can't block and will probably find itself target by a removal they had in hand already. It's good, but I found it's relatively slow and makes the deck go into top-deck mode to early. which I wanted to avoid.
blazing archon: this card is rubbish, it will get removed/destroyed or anything. I chose my creatures carefully on a single choice. They shall not be removed! all of my creatures, except angel of despair, have some sort of protection. This one gives me a protection the deck does not need. If you are affraid of dredge. find yourself an angel of despair and let her target herself. or beat harder than they do and get the empyrial for self-protection.
tombstalker: a good card and addition to this deck, but has one major downside. it will get the removal they haven't been able to use on all of your other creatures. sadly enough that won't suffice.
I'll post match-ups later and stuff, since my housemates demand me to join for dinner and a movie.
I'll try to discuss/answer any question or remarks you may have
Match-ups were:
The rock, 3 color (2-1)
goblins (2-1)
fairy stompy (2-0)
the rock, kotr build (2-0)
the rock, 3 color (2-1)
Doomsday ANT (2-0)
ID
ID
quarterfinals:
the rock, 3 color (2-1)
semi-finals:
Doomsday ant, same person as round 6 (2-1)
finals:
dreadstill (2-0) fastest match of the day
Practical Joke, thanks for coming to the thread and congrats on the win. Its good to read your explanations. Any chance you can give some detail to your matches?
I just top8'd at my local tourny tonight , losing in the top 8 to a play error.
I got paired against Affinity rd 1. That was a nightmare. Plating on Ornithopter = my guys don't attack.
Tusk up.
Have you guys tried splashing red and green for Ancient Grudge? Entombing that thing is amazing post board vs aggro-control, also Red is useful for Burning Wish to give the deck some MD removal and a tutor for combo pieces like Buried Alive, Reanimate and either a Show&Tell or a variety of outlets.
Instead of splashing red, I use green for krosan grip. 4 color splash is horrible for a deck taht only plays 16 lands. you will be asking for a color screw big time.
Red could be an option, but I prefer not to be to dependand on 3 colors. You will get wasted into oblivion if you will go there.
Burning wish would make the deck unnecessary slow. the deck itself does not really need a wishboard just for removal. if you really worry about anything that could outrace you, make sure you get the right creature in front of it. In my fourth game I had to get my angel of despair to get rid of something like that.
here's a short story, since I have some time now :P
it's been a while now, so I cannot remember everything.
Round 1: 3-color rock (2-1)
I'm not sure how it went, but I drop an empyrial archangel quite fast since the only thing I saw was a heath, not taking risks. I was able to thoughtseize a goyf later on and he sees no options left.
SB: out AoD,akroma,intuition. Board in, 3 extirpate. The rock is one of those matches I have to win on playing wisely instead of boarding. it has no use.
Second game is finished in short order, I keep searching for my cards in the deck, but I am unable to find a single reanimate spells. Game ends without a fight.
third game I drop an iona quite fast, he could speed it up with a single goyf, because I had to seize his 2nd goyf and a pridemage. still the goyf remains to small to strike me down. after a miscalculation, he sees no exit and extends his hand.
Round 2: goblins (2-1) I know this player, and so far the statistics haven't been very good.
he has to mulligan down to 5 cards, but is on the draw. I start with a carefull study dropping empyrial and an AoD. his turn he drops a lackey. I go off and put the AoD into play destroying his lackey, hoping to remove the speed from his deck. I was wrong, he plays another lackey the turn after. I go off again with exhume, he gets his lackey back, but I get an iona on red. we have a stalling game. In the end he had some more goblins and a vial, I drew for an exhume, drop empyrial and he's down soon.
sideboard: intuition out, inkwell leviathan out. infest and sphinx in.
He goes for lackey turn 1, I cannot go off on that turn, he wastes me twice and attacks a few times with a lackey. even removing his siegegang makes him go insane and I have no way of outracing that speed with an infest on hand and my wasted lands.
third match, i start digging for a turn 1 akroma, angel of wrath ( I choose her, for her speed and his inability to remove her) he then start vial, and some other nuisance artifacts knowing he cannot win it.
round 3: fairy stompy (2-0)
he wins the roll, and drops an island. islands are pretty good. I want to play some studies and mystical tutor. but he keeps dazing them. after that I play an entomb and go off on inkwell leviathan. I've seen a single fairy. so I knew this wasn't going to be easy. but he has no answer.
Sideboard: I have no clue, I don't think I boarded against this deck, or maybe a krosan grip or 2. being affraid of vials and spellstutters.
he start again, I have to go on a slow play since he drops a relic. I did play a careful study so a single leviathan is in there. Nothing happens untill he plays a clique, I know that he has not a counter on hand. I brainstorm into double exhume, double entomb. I reveal a hand to him with entomb, double exhume and some land,petal and something random. he chooses exhume and I draw a second entomb. next turn I play exhume, he removes my gy, After getting back priority I respond with an entomb. exhume makes me get a new inkwell leviathan. he didn't expect that to be possible due to inexperience. I explained him that i had a second one on top and he knows he couldn't have beaten that.
Round 4: Kotr rock (2-0)
Yay, more rockbuilds. These decks can be quite challenging for reanimate since they also play with graveyard cards.
In the first match I chose an empyrial archangel. after seeing him drop a knight of the reliquary, i start digging for an AoD and destroy it before it gets out of control. finish is there shorty after.
besides the extirpate board again. nothing new.
I get my ion on turn 3 on white. he has not a single option to try against me because he is facing double foW back-up.
Round 5: 3-color rock build (2-1)
round 1, I FoW his duress, and then go off turn 1 with empyrrial archangel. He cannot recover on time.
same boarding again as against the other rock fights
round 2, i know he has extirpate and a relic in play. I have double mystical tutor, he removes one. but I cannot find anything big enough to show and tell. he drops elspeth, I FoW, he drops another one and elspeth goes all the way.
round 3, I go off pretty on turn 2, after I brainstormed his duress. his extirpate on hand never did a thing.
that rock build sideboard the following inside: 2 diabolic edict, 3 pates and 3 relics if I'm right. Just the insane hate that makes it hard to play against.
Round 6: doomsday ANT (2-0)
match 1, I drop iona early, the deck has no options.
sideboard: removing some creatures, show and tell, intuition. boarding in 4 pates and a single krosan grip and the other spots went to guttural responses.
match 2, I always make this a long game, since they can bounce my iona and are able to off through FoW fights. he chants me, I fow it with a hand full of cards, he decides not to risk it. ( I had a second one ready) after a few turns he has put back up some safety in his hands, after his drawstep I extirpate his chant, I find another chant in his hand, and he doesn't take the risk of going off. also I see no blue cards. I choose iona on black and go all the way with counter-back-up.
now I have some time to relax and chill up since i can double ID myself reaching first place after the swiss with a 6-0-2 record.
quarterfinals: 3-color rock ( well hello skeggi)
it's feels like a casual match, both players enjoying the game.
I think I win game one again on an empyrrial angel which he has no answer nor speed for in time.
After sideboarding the usual rock match-up. I draw up only blanks after he removes a combo-card out of my hand. game ends quickly. got stuck on 1 single land, but was able to reanimate his goyf which he shortly swords.
the third match I seized him, saw nothing of an edict, went for iona on white.
which was allowed to go all the way when the empyrial joined ( might be wrong, my memory is pretty much blank)
semi-finals: doomsday ANT same player as the 6th round.
This time I cannot win game 1, he goes off on doomsday, I have no options.
second game goes a long way, which i always have against ant decks. A lot of countering, discarding and searching goes on. I extirpate his chants again. somehow it ends up me being able to extirpate his tendrils.
game 3, another extremely exciting game, been fowing some cards, extirpated his doomsday. I go for an iona on blue this time, knowing his mystical in hand has to be used. he searches for a chain of vapors in response of the color choise so he has a change when he digs up for a protection he can still go off. he fetches his top card. Later on I extirpate his deck again after I got some sense he topped something nice. I needed to see his hand, and went for a mystical tutor into FoW.
I draw force of will, beat him to 5 lives (or 4) and he decides to go off with protection. he expected me to counter it, which in fact I cannot, neither did I want it, because there's no doomsday he could go off with nor a good graveyard for an ill-gotten gains. he goes for the expected ad nauseam.
he needs to topdeck into enough storm to kill me without getting too many blue cards. he start with LED, top, LED after that he starts counting. I already extirpated his infernal tutors. after that he counts, knows he need to use his fetch for sure. he draws ponder, silence, something that killed him.
finals dreadstill (2-0)
I seize his hand, i see fow, stifle, fow, daze. after a long day of playing I miscalculate. I remove his daze. second turn i decide to go off for iona. he fow's, I think it's okay. ( had foW back-up, but forgot he only had no other blue cards) next turn I go off with exhume again, and he has no counters.
he scoops up his cards for g3
I board out a few cards (empyrrial,AoD, akroma, single inkwell, intuition, and a single careful study)
I board in 3 krosan grips and 3 guttural responses.
I draw pretty bad, and it goes into a long draw-go. he has a relic in play, counterbalance and top online, and 3 lands and a wasteland in graveyard. one of his lands is a mishra's. I have been spending cards to keep my graveyard filled up so he won't remove my creatures. he has a dreadnaught somewhere in the top 3 cards. He decides to tap all his lands for a crucible of worlds, I responds with a FoW, he does the same, the I respond with a guttural respone, he puts the top on his library and I respond with a mystical tutor which he dazes. he gets his wasteland back, has a 1 mana card on top, he wastes my bayou and I'm stuck with 1 basic land and he has no mana open. I start my turn, draw a land ( best thing I could've drawn) and play exhume. he has no counters left and no mana for his relic. iona on blue finishes the match.
as you see i boarded intuition out a lot, since I played against decks that I really needed my sideboard cards more. I haven't drawn into it a lot, but it helped me once to mind-trick my opponent. that's why I shall not replace it yet.
hope you liked the report
Congratulations on your finish, and thanks for posting.
I've thought about it quite a bit and I like the Lotus Petals but I'm not really sure if it is something that I would want to play, although I can see how it compliments the heavy amounts of blue.
I don't understand very well why you were playing with Guttural REsponse over some kind of discard as it can be useful in more match-ups and hit more problems cards and not require a bayou/petal to play it off of.
I feel that it was a very big mistake to not play any bounce in your sideboard and that you were quite fortunate to never have had it come up. I question a lot of your sideboarding but you are the winner of Dutch Legacy Champs so apparently it worked for you.
It seems like even in the MU where you talking about how great Akroma is, Sphinx of the Steel Wind would have been just as good or better. Both have protection from red, both are unblockable. The difference is Akroma's Haste to Sphinx's Lifelink. There have been countless times where a deck has picked pu their cards to me becuase it is impossible for them to get around the lifelink.
The matter of playing Mystical and a billion blue cards to support FoW isn't something I really want to discuss. I feel very stronghly that Cabal Therapy is the best choice for disruption. You apparently do not feel that way.
I've been playing Reanimator since Entomb was unbanned, and originally felt the same way until about a week ago, and I'll at least offer my explanations why.
I was running a build similar to his Dutch winning list, except I ran a disruption suite of Thoughtseize, Duress, and Cabal Therapy, with a split of Duress and Therapy over Force of Will. In a majority of matchups, I often disliked the extra discard because it was generally a bad topdeck midgame and could occasionally slow the deck down on turn 1-2. Game 1 this isn't a problem as you want to see what you're playing against, but it is post-board. Most of the time, you will win game 1 and be on the draw game 2. This makes discard as disruption terrible, because they play hate before you can remove it. Force of Will is much stronger on the draw because you open the option of stopping their hate before you have a turn. Plus, it's much better against topdecks whereas discard won't do anything. The number of times I've played Force of Will against a topdecked Tormod's Crypt, Counterbalance, or Path to Exile is incredible. Also, Force of Will not only provides better options for disruption, but it also speeds the deck up. If you open a hand with Entomb and discard, it's common to lead with the discard to see what you can do and you don't Entomb until turn 2. In using Force of Will, you're free to play Entomb turn 1 while still being able to handle opposing threats, and then animate the creature turn 2 as opposed to turn 3. I find this especially important in aggro matchups like Zoo, where giving them a single turn can be an issue if they have a strong hand. Plus, it allows you to use Sphinx of the Steel Wind a bit more aggressively as you don't have to worry about topdecked Path to Exiles, which can occasionally happen. As long as you have the blue cards to support it, it does virtually nothing to hinder your disruption plan, but instead gives you the benefit to disrupt them on the draw and against topdecks, when you're tapped out, and when you want to play other spells that turn. I also find it stronger in the blue matchups due to the prevalence of Brainstorm. If you lead with discard, most especially a blind Cabal Therapy, you'll either watch them respond with Brainstorm and hide their best card, or you'll miss with Therapy. Cabal Therapy by itself can be really weak, and that's an issue if you can't hit something. Force of Will does a better job of handling these situations and allows you to play much more agressively against them as a result.
Although despite feeling Force of Will is better, I still think it's wise to run some additional discard, either Cabal Therapy or Duress, in the sideboard to supplement Thoughtseize in blue matchups. In all other matches though, Force of Will is strictly better.
My rebuttal is summed up in the rephrasing of something I've said numerous times. I play the deck like a combo deck, I want redundancy [over tutors] and cards that take my opponent out of the game for game 1 and I want to bring in answers for hate (Which more and more decks are simply not using) for games that have been sideboarded.
I'l test a list with Force of Will but I know my bias against it is going to make me unhappy with the choice unless it preforms amazingly well.
cabal therapy is only good if you have either a heavy discard set-up or putrid imps.
I play neither.
I have changed my deck slightly since recently, making my counterback-up a little stronger.
I play this deck aggressively, dropping the threat as early as possible, so the opponent has to top-deck for an answer. Even then I have a good possibility of a counter.
I removed
-1 swamp
-1 intuition ( too slow)
-1 inkwell leviatha ( 6 creatures should be enough)
+ 3 daze.
this should make my match-ups faster and more controllable. as Di said, discard are a true terrible card when topdecking. you can ditch them somehow, but it still horrible. If I topdeck, I don't wanna see a daze either, but a force is always a welcome card.
Now taht I play daze the guttural's are removed, they did came in an did their job, but I will replace them with a slight testing combination of
multani's presence/show and tell/a few usable fat creatures/ 4 duress/gilded drake.
I'm not yet sure of what I need, since some match-ups might have increased a good ammount with the coming of daze. Why I play akroma mainboard above sphinx, is the haste fact. She can, compared to sphinx, come out of nowhere for an alpha strike when the opponent is outtapped. could be enough for the kill. The sphinx is good, but it's use is limited therefore he is in the sideboard, but will definately get boarded in, and be a first choise target against a few decks. sometimes it's speed> control and vice-versa.
I removed the wipe away from my deck, since I've never ever needed it at all.
I played around chalices and gy hate just as easy as fetching for your bounce was. I am considering a hurky's recall, but as long as I have show and tell mainboard, there;s no use for bounce.
Try out force of Will please, it's heavenly, you'll understand why a bigger counter-back-up is slightly stronger than heavy discard. I played heavy discard before, with less blue, and I gained some heavy beats those days.
With heavy discard you will not/hardly win from ANT or any hybrid form from it. You won't survive any first-turn kills from belcher. It's too limited for the current meta I play in.
so far another chaotic post
Let us know what you think of the force and the lesser discard once you tested it.
I have a small tournament tomorrow, so I will let you know if the results where good with the slight change and the new sideboard options ( though I expect a lot of the rock decks again -.-)
I am really happy with your post. I am testing UB Reanimator since two weeks and had your lists as a reference. My changes included exactly what you stated above. -1 Reanimator target (Inkwell becasue I rarely chose him). 3 Daze for 3 other cards especially Intuition (it is not a bad card it just feels to slow). I also went down to 3 Careful Study plus the fourth Mystical Tutor. Mystical is soo strong because it is virtually every card in the deck. Entomb, Reanimtor Spell, Draw, Counter. Most games are won with an opening hand fo Entomb/Mystical Tutor or Reanimator Spell/Mystical Tutor. Will post my list this evening. I also like UB more because it makes Iona stronger. Usually you have to really think about which color to take away. It is not that you go "Pick the removal color". Against Zoo e.g. I would like to pick red of course but due to PtE I actually can't. If you have force backup I can risk to actually put it on red. And btw I also play it completely like a combo deck. Assembling the two spells you need at times and in ways the opponent can react to in the most minimal way and so on. Usually there is a fatty out Turn 2/3 latest even if you play around Daze/Counters (of course if you have backup yourself).cabal therapy is only good if you have either a heavy discard set-up or putrid imps.
I play neither.
I have changed my deck slightly since recently, making my counterback-up a little stronger.
I play this deck aggressively, dropping the threat as early as possible, so the opponent has to top-deck for an answer. Even then I have a good possibility of a counter.
I removed
-1 swamp
-1 intuition ( too slow)
-1 inkwell leviatha ( 6 creatures should be enough)
+ 3 daze.
this should make my match-ups faster and more controllable. as Di said, discard are a true terrible card when topdecking. you can ditch them somehow, but it still horrible. If I topdeck, I don't wanna see a daze either, but a force is always a welcome card.
Now taht I play daze the guttural's are removed, they did came in an did their job, but I will replace them with a slight testing combination of
multani's presence/show and tell/a few usable fat creatures/ 4 duress/gilded drake.
I'm not yet sure of what I need, since some match-ups might have increased a good ammount with the coming of daze. Why I play akroma mainboard above sphinx, is the haste fact. She can, compared to sphinx, come out of nowhere for an alpha strike when the opponent is outtapped. could be enough for the kill. The sphinx is good, but it's use is limited therefore he is in the sideboard, but will definately get boarded in, and be a first choise target against a few decks. sometimes it's speed> control and vice-versa.
I removed the wipe away from my deck, since I've never ever needed it at all.
I played around chalices and gy hate just as easy as fetching for your bounce was. I am considering a hurky's recall, but as long as I have show and tell mainboard, there;s no use for bounce.
Try out force of Will please, it's heavenly, you'll understand why a bigger counter-back-up is slightly stronger than heavy discard. I played heavy discard before, with less blue, and I gained some heavy beats those days.
With heavy discard you will not/hardly win from ANT or any hybrid form from it. You won't survive any first-turn kills from belcher. It's too limited for the current meta I play in.
so far another chaotic post
Let us know what you think of the force and the lesser discard once you tested it.
I have a small tournament tomorrow, so I will let you know if the results where good with the slight change and the new sideboard options ( though I expect a lot of the rock decks again -.-)
the problem I had with 4 mysticals I had to often, is that I drew 2+ with the cards you'd normally search for.
So till that time I play 3, but replacing a careful study with a mystical doesn't even sound that bad, actually it's pretty good.
you'll see me change that pretty soon, or I change a 4th careful study into the 4th daze, but I'll go for 4 mysticals first. Might be a good idea to change for tomorrow :)
I play the deck like a combo deck too, primarily because, it is a combo deck. Playing Force of Will doesn't change that premise. It doesn't turn you into a control deck. I listed several reasons to support this. If we were playing Flash, would you be running discard over Force of Will? No. You play Force of Will because it allows you to continue playing your combo game very aggressively while being able to disrupt the opponent for free. Playing discard in those slots slows you down, and then opens you up to topdecked answers, neither of which you want to happen as a combo deck. It's worse that you actually admit a bias can skew your testing results, because it's stifling innovation and arguably stronger slots simply because you don't like it. That, to me, is unacceptable in deck design and progression. But again, you haven't tested the card and come back with results, so I suppose we can wait until you do so before making such judgments.
Regarding Mystical Tutor, that's a different subject that you're more qualified to object to, because it comes down to design and playstyle preference, and not out of actual experience. It becomes a matter of redundancy v. consistency. Running Mystical Tutor really opens you up to more consistent turn 2/3 combos because odds are you will find another combo piece either through opening hand or from a turn 1-2 cantrip. That makes Mystical great in that sense. But it hurts the redundancy of the deck because you have to cut down important slots to make room for them. So again, that's a personal choice with what to take. For me personally, I'd rather have the consistency though because it has better odds in comboing in the first place.
This is an issue I also had with Mystical Tutor, so I cut them down to 3. Opening multiples is just terribly slow and is too predicatable for the opponent to see what you're trying to do. It's turn 3 at best, which isn't terrible, but usually by then I'm already looking to reanimate a second time.
I have try the deck with daze, but it was before the unban of entomb, I think I'll give it a try again, cause I always played with FoW over tseize or therapy.
But I think is better to have a big amount of creatures to pick up in the first game, and then replace them with side. I play the followins creatures on MD:
3 Iona
1 sphinx (thinking on the 2nd one due to my meta)
1 inkwell leviathan
1 empyrial archangel
1 blazing archon
2 tombstalker
3 putrid imp
I personaly think that tombstalker is a great plan B or a "turn giver" when you dont have the pieces of the combo, but thats just me.
I use 2 mystical tutor, I don't think is really necesary 3 or 4.
I really don`t think Daze is good at all in this deck. The last thing you want to do is put land back in your hand. The hole point on this deck is to win fast.
Trying to trade into power!!!
Hit me up if you have any unlimited power that isn't creased. Maybe we can make a deal.
Daze seems just fine when almost all of your deck costs <3. Mos of your plays will take place regardless of you missing the land. It also comes in handy when someone try's to force your relevant spell because tapped out on turns 1 or 2.
The only substitude for Daze would be Spell Pierce. I don't play it because with a usual hand I am able to combo Turn 2/3. With 2 lands on the average and 2 lands needed to combo Daze kann backup your play whereas no mana is left for Spell Pierce. If you have 3-4 lands Spell Pierce is better but usually you neither have nor want 4 lands. Against decks like Zoo I would board Daze and play something more relevant. Maybe anti-crypt hate or Show and Tell.
Daze is only for protecting your combo not to proactively counter things your opponents play. At least game 1. Game 2 that maybe different if hate enters play. If not played around Daze can hit that as well. Apart from that I wouldn't waste daze to win time usually since I want to combo quickly and then protect the pieces in play.
I have to say it again. Mystical Tutor is EVERY card in your deck apart from the 6 creatures. It is Entomb, Reanimate, Study, Ritual, Daze, Force, Exhume, Brainstorm and Thoughtseize. I can't imagine playing less than 4.
My list today is:
Creatures (6):
2x Iona
1x Empyrial
1x Woodfall Primus
1x Akroma
1x Sphinx
Spells (38):
4x Thoughtseize
4x Force
4x Mystical
4x Entomb
4x Brainstorm
4x Dark Ritual/Lotus Petal (undecided if I splash green or stick to UB right now)
4x Exhume
4x Reanimate
3x Daze
3x Careful Study
Lands (16):
4x Polluted Delte
4x Bloodstained Mire
4x Underground Sea
2x Swamp
2x Island
Sb: Totally undecided yet but roughly
6x Bounce to get rid off GY hate
2-3 Show and Tell
1-2 Extra Fatties
Rest are free slots for maybe EE, Needle whatever
About mystical tutor
It is everything in your deck +1 turn.
If you open with 2 on hand, you will not go off before Turn 3.
If you already have on of the combo-pieces the second one is a dead card.
Mystical tutor is very good, but the last thing you want is be depending on mystical to find your combo-pieces. It's very very slow :(
The problem I have with most creatures, is that they will get removed. I've met in my reanimate matches, only 2 decks, that didn't play removal. ( seen loads of swords and edicts lately, but also some bounce, sowers and terminates)
they finally get something to do with the removal they have for dead in their hands. That's what makes the deck so effective, the opponent cannot, or hardly get rid of the fat ones. If you give them a chance and play a tombstalker it will feel their removal easily :)
That's true when you play it alone, but when you can do this play most of the time "1st turn: fetch for underground, dark ritual, entomb for iona, reanimate, and putrid imp, go" "2nd turn: fetch for another underground sea or bayou, atack with iona, discar any card with putrid, then tombstalker for 2 manas and removing te useless cards in yourGY (6 of them)" it's kinda funny to see your oppnents face, when iona blocked they removal color.
still, you would've won that match anyways.
so adding the tombstalkers still gave you no advantage
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