[Deck] Dragon Stompy

[Prkchpsndwiches]

Forlorn - Are you playing seething song in your list? If not do you have a hard time hitting six mana for Akroma?

[ForlornEgoist]

Yes I am playing Song in my list which is required if you plan to run RKroma. I've never been overly fond of Song as it becomes one of the worst topdecks late game but our deck doesn't want to stall out the match. Having that added acceleration in the first few turns can mean a world of difference. Plus even if I end up stalling the game having RPD/Lord of SP/RKroma means I have some leniency should it become a topdeck later.

I've been considering RKroma because she can pretty much win any game once morphed. Evasion and pro-white/blue means she's pretty much impossible to remove aside from black kill spells such as Go for the Throat. The fact that she morphs also lets you hide her as just another Gathan and even if she is revealed can lead opponents to worry anytime you do a morph.

Forlorn Egoist

[vikram]

I'm sorry, I believe that Covetous Dragon has already been tested extensively. Maybe the results will prove promising this time around.

Testing failed previously only because the deck didn't have enough artifacts worth playing.

Phyrexian Revoker and all the equipment people have been adding changes the math. Now the deck often plays 4 Chalice, 3 Trinisphere, 7 equipment, 4 Phyrexian Revoker, 4 Chrome Mox. You're playing as many artifacts as you are land. And if you want, you can even play 4 Great Furnace though that doesn't seem neccesary.

[NecroYawgmoth]

WHAZZAWHAT????

Explain me how DS plays 7 Equipments? I never see a list with that many Oo

But I tend to agree that it is still possible to play 2 Covetous with 4 CotV, 3-4Trini, 4 Equipments, 4 Revoker and 4 Moxen. Still, we don't like to get 2-for-1-ed, and he costs 5.

[Tivon]

he isn't as good as slogger, and is much more conditional than slogger. There is zero reason to run Covetous.

[ForlornEgoist]

he isn't as good as slogger, and is much more conditional than slogger. There is zero reason to run Covetous.

I'm sorry, I forgot. Slogger is irreplaceable for the deck and as such any discussion for a card to replace his slot is utterly moot. As we just pointed out his so-called "condition," is essentially negligible with the increased number of artifacts we've begun to run. The deck isn't the same as it was a year ago and the average decklist now runs x4 Revoker and 3-5 equip in addition to the typical standard of x4 Cotv/x4 3pshere/x4 Mox (you could even run x4 Great Furnace to up the count which would not only retain Mana/Artifact supertype but would also be removed from nonbasic hate under our Moon effects).

Secondly, whereas Slogger requires an ability activation to take down bigger creatures such as 'Goyf, Covetous can take them head on without any investment. He also has evasion which, when combined with equipment, works out quite nicely particularly for decks looking to abuse Sword abilities. And, unlike RPD/Gathan, he doesn't require Hellbent to be useful. I think it's pretty safe to say that on average we can keep at least 1 artifact on the field but we can't always achieve Hellbent when its needed. Without it RPD/Gathan are vanilla at best. Covetous can easily compete with 'Goyf and 'Stalker while still putting the opponent on a relevant clock. RPD early-game requires a heavy investment of mana to be useful and dies to any blocking creature w/o Hellbent and Gathan is a 3/3-5/5 with no evasion.

I doubt Covetous is going to find much use for the broad spectrum of Stompy players. Indeed, most players I presume are still sticking to Sloggers for the reason of MD spot removal, but to say that he has zero purpose in this deck I think is entirely close-minded. We all acknowledge the divine power of Slogger, but many people have begun to find him clunky and the 3RR annoying to cast sometimes, thus they're looking for a replacement of which Covetous is a viable choice. If you want to keep Slogger in your build, that's fine, but please provide better arguments for not running Covetous beyond, "He's not Slogger."

Forlorn Egoist

[NecroYawgmoth]

he isn't as good as slogger, and is much more conditional than slogger. There is zero reason to run Covetous.

I don't want to defend Covetous here, but IMO Slogger is a Relic that deck needs to get rid off...

The Gate has learned that Dark Ritual is a wrong move, because even if it allows unfair first turns, it is the baddest topdeck you can have. Same logic for Seething Song here, except that Ritual is a tad better, because it can be played from 1 land first turn, where Song needs 2 Mana land PLUS another land or a Mox & Card.

Sure, there is that turn 1 brokeness randomly, but there are as many situations where you lose because of topdecked Song.

Also... Slogger isn't that what it was 2 years ago... nuking that 7/7 Knight and then lose to a topdecked Knight or similar big Goyf? Hey... Flametongue isn't considered because he CAN'T ACTUALLY KILL Goyfs... So why should I trade a 3RR Creature + 10 cards from my library to nuke that thing?

Slogger and Song aren't good enough anymore, and I believe cards like Sword of Body & Mind / Jitte and hopefully Sword of War & Peace are solving our problems much better than Slogger.


Oh, and don't forget that you can just chump 2 turns and simply win with Covetous as 6 Power and flying is a thread to take care of...

[Tivon]

The swords and jitte should be run in complement to creatures. I personally had previously cut down to 2 sloggers, but am currently back up to 3 (and considering the fourth quite seriously). I also cut one song. There just aren't any comparable creatures. It is a creature that opponents are almost never happy to see on the other side of the table, and other than jitte, it is your one real answer to tribal on the other side of the table game 1. SoBaM pretty much single handedly deals with goyf and Knight, and other creatures like Stingscourger are fantastic against those tempo-ish creature packages. Especially when you can lock them off the creature with a followed up moon effect or some such business.

Slogger is one of the few creatures with an ass that doesn't loose to burn in the deck. It also has reach. It also can remove those pesky creatures that resolved before we could drop moon and chalice which typically help opponents get out from under moon soft lock.

In short, yeah, its a relic. But its a relic that is still better than anything else currently available. Equipment aren't a replacement for what is one of the best creatures available for the deck; they are a supplement, and make those creatures better.

tl;dr: Run slogger, covetous sucks

[Prkchpsndwiches]

Anyone ever try Silent Arbiter out of the SB. Seems like it could be good vs lots of decks. Just hold and swing with a flyer. Especially vs Merlfolk, Goblins and tokens.

[ForlornEgoist]

@ Tivon:
Okay, so we've established that equipment deals with bigger creatures. But you're still relying on the equipment to deal with threats rather than stand-alone creatures. Slogger by him self requires at bare minimum 1 activation to deal with bigger threats like 'Goyf/KotR/'Stalker/Crusher/Terravore and that means in most cases you had to block their attacker or they blocked your attacking Slogger. In more extreme cases you opt to do 3-4 activations at which point if they topdeck another creature you can no longer use any more Slogger activations lest you deck yourself. Yeah, I won't deny Slogger has the ability to remove 1 incredibly powerful threat and can thus win you the game, but he's a one trick pony and if they draw another 1 then you're Slogger now becomes a 4/5 body for 3RR which isn't too impressive. Of course he's great for killing Hierarch or Bob who hit the field pre-lock but realistically you're never going to get a Slogger down at the precise time you need him to be there.

Okay, let's look at the tribal MU. At the point Merfolk drops at least 2 Lords you now require either a combat situation or 2 activations to remove a threat, neither of which is incredibly ideal. Sure, if you drop a Slogger T1 it's amazing, but so are the other thousands of scenarios in our deck where it's minutely possible to get a T1 Chalice @1/3sphere or T1 Moon->T2 Beater, or any other situations I'm sure we've all run into. But realistically short of that single rare situation you're not going to get a T1,2, or even 3 Slogger. And that's assuming its in the opening 7. Merfolk, however, runs what averages 16 Lords MD. They are pretty much guranteed to get 2+ Lords by Turn 4. If we look at Goblins Slogger obviously gets better, but Goblins is a much rarer MU and our CotV/3sphere are much more relevant against them and our SB options are much vaster than the Merfolk MU so I wouldn't consider Slogger to be the optimum choice.

Oh, but Slogger is out of burn range. So are Covetous, and RKroma, and Lord of SP, etc. etc. Burn is at an all-time low. The only deck that even bothers with it anymore is Zoo which has lost much prevalence in the average meta. We're beginning to see a rise in decks like Rock or 3/4-color control, etc. that rely on bigger creatures, Jace 2.0, or StP/PtE. None of which really care for the 4/5 body of Slogger.

Anyone ever try Silent Arbiter out of the SB. Seems like it could be good vs lots of decks. Just hold and swing with a flyer. Especially vs Merlfolk, Goblins and tokens.

It's a solid answer to the tribal MU, but I think a lot of people are finding their metas to see more and more decks such as NO Bant/Junk that win on the back of 1 or 2 beaters or decks such as Show and Tell that cheat a singler overwhelming beater like Emrakul, thus Arbiter is less than ideal.

Still, I think I may consider testing him in the x4 Pyrokinesis slot.

Forlorn Egoist

[Tivon]

I missed your initial reply forlorn, so my initial reply wasn't directed at you, though most of the argument presented still stands. The swords int he deck provide plenty of evasion. SoBaM lets you get past a large majority of the decks which you require evasion for. The ones that it doesn't, are matchups where slogger shines. If covetous had haste... Well then I might be more interested in revisiting.

As it is, both are effectively 3 turn clocks once they start going at it. Slogger though has additional utility beyond ending the game. It is precisely for that additional utility that slogger is more valuable, despite the evasion provided by covetous.

regarding silent arbiter, I personally don't particularly like its artifact body. In a deck which will already see our opponents bringing in artifact hate, it seems even more vulnerable. I also like the reactive nature of pyrokinesis - which is why that isn't the particular card that I would necessarily cut in order to fit him in. And for the tribal MU, Taurean Mauler is usually a beast. Arbiter is probably best against goblins or zoo (though zoo has TONS of answers for him, so his effect is probably negligible) We have lots of other cards for merfolk that are just that much better (FTK, Spinal Villain, Pyrokinesis, Ratchet bomb, etc)

@ Tivon:
Okay, so we've established that equipment deals with bigger creatures. But you're still relying on the equipment to deal with threats rather than stand-alone creatures. Slogger by him self requires at bare minimum 1 activation to deal with bigger threats like 'Goyf/KotR/'Stalker/Crusher/Terravore and that means in most cases you had to block their attacker or they blocked your attacking Slogger. In more extreme cases you opt to do 3-4 activations at which point if they topdeck another creature you can no longer use any more Slogger activations lest you deck yourself. Yeah, I won't deny Slogger has the ability to remove 1 incredibly powerful threat and can thus win you the game, but he's a one trick pony and if they draw another 1 then you're Slogger now becomes a 4/5 body for 3RR which isn't too impressive. Of course he's great for killing Hierarch or Bob who hit the field pre-lock but realistically you're never going to get a Slogger down at the precise time you need him to be there.

Okay, let's look at the tribal MU. At the point Merfolk drops at least 2 Lords you now require either a combat situation or 2 activations to remove a threat, neither of which is incredibly ideal. Sure, if you drop a Slogger T1 it's amazing, but so are the other thousands of scenarios in our deck where it's minutely possible to get a T1 Chalice @1/3sphere or T1 Moon->T2 Beater, or any other situations I'm sure we've all run into. But realistically short of that single rare situation you're not going to get a T1,2, or even 3 Slogger. And that's assuming its in the opening 7. Merfolk, however, runs what averages 16 Lords MD. They are pretty much guranteed to get 2+ Lords by Turn 4. If we look at Goblins Slogger obviously gets better, but Goblins is a much rarer MU and our CotV/3sphere are much more relevant against them and our SB options are much vaster than the Merfolk MU so I wouldn't consider Slogger to be the optimum choice.

Oh, but Slogger is out of burn range. So are Covetous, and RKroma, and Lord of SP, etc. etc. Burn is at an all-time low. The only deck that even bothers with it anymore is Zoo which has lost much prevalence in the average meta. We're beginning to see a rise in decks like Rock or 3/4-color control, etc. that rely on bigger creatures, Jace 2.0, or StP/PtE. None of which really care for the 4/5 body of Slogger.

as long as merfolk don't resolve kira, i personally view it as a very positive matchup. RKroma and Lord of SP are both also better than covetous. I see much less of a problem with running those two over slogger. but covetous does absolutely NOTHING to make those matchups even remotely better other than to sit back and block. - Which slogger does as well, and has the additional benefit of being able to ping a creature when they try to swing through. The other tribal you are forgetting is elves, which slogger absolutely wrecks - and is once again increasing in popularity (at the very least in my local meta).

Whenever slogger hits the field, it is relevent. I've had it drop as early as turn 1, outright winning the game, and much later in the game, landing and firing off that crucial last few points of damage to close the game.

Covetous deals with one bigger creature - the same as slogger. Slogger can also do a lot more though. The largest toughness creature that covetous can deal with is 6. With slogger it is much higher - potentially as high as 10 or 12 if it will absolutely put the game away for you. There have also been plenty of games I've played where gofy is no bigger than a 3/4 for the first several turns its on the field (instant, land, creature usually), which slogger handles. and SoBaM absolutely touches jace 2.0. Bounce what? and StP and such should be getting stopped by moon/chalice.

regarding burn - oldschool canadian is popping up here or there in addition to NLT gaining a lot of popularity - both of which run burn. Also, without counterbalance there is no guarantee that burn doesn't start showing up again. Yes, its the same ass as dragon, smaller than RKroma and both for Lord of SP - but the utility can't be discounted when comparing it to other creatures competing for the same slot.

[vikram]

Evasion is a huge pro for Covetous Dragon, especially since the deck runs swords equipments.

It's a three turn clock that flies over everything else.

He's basically Abyssal Persecutor but without the you can't win the game clause. With all the dual lands the deck runs, you can easily cast him second turn off a Chrome Mox + Ancient Tomb + City of Traitors or whatever.

Slogger needs two red sources to even cast, so without Seething Song (which is a horrible deck and should be moved away from), Slogger almost comes out one full turn slower than Covetous Dragon.

[vikram]

Evasion is a huge pro for Covetous Dragon, especially since the deck runs swords equipments which work far better on evasive creatures.

It's a three turn clock that flies over everything else.

He's basically Abyssal Persecutor but without the you can't win the game clause. With all the dual lands the deck runs, you can easily cast him second turn off a Chrome Mox + Ancient Tomb + City of Traitors or whatever.

Slogger needs two red sources to even cast, so without Seething Song (which is a horrible topdeck and should likely be moved away from), Slogger almost always comes out one full turn slower than Covetous Dragon.

[Gui]

Just a doubt of mine, maybe noob doubt: Are tormod's crypts in most SB just because of Dredge? I mean, it's the most played grave-based deck right now, and as far as I can tell, Dredge has some hard time beating DS before the usual dragons steamrolling them with moon/chalice/3sphere backup slowing them down. Are the 3~4 Tormod's really necessary?

[Tivon]

Evasion is a huge pro for Covetous Dragon, especially since the deck runs swords equipments.

It's a three turn clock that flies over everything else.

He's basically Abyssal Persecutor but without the you can't win the game clause. With all the dual lands the deck runs, you can easily cast him second turn off a Chrome Mox + Ancient Tomb + City of Traitors or whatever.

Slogger needs two red sources to even cast, so without Seething Song (which is a horrible deck and should be moved away from), Slogger almost comes out one full turn slower than Covetous Dragon.

Again, the evasion is negligable. Especially when arguing that it allows the swords to connect. The swords, with the exception of jitte - especially SoBaM, are their own evasion. Abysall prosecuter also costs four. This deck also isn't the gate.

Song, as much as it sucks late game, is one of the best cards you can see in your openeing hand (even if it only pitches to mox so you can drop moon turn one or trini turn one. Not having to pitch a serious business spell is huge, but being able to drop a big fat threat on turn one or multiple lock pieces is often a huge difference maker.

Crypt also ins't necessary. It's realy only necessary if non-dredge graveyard decks are running around. Your probably better off with ratchet bombs as they hit dredge, but they are also able to hit lots of other bad things for us - like the entire enchantress matchup.

If you guys don't want to run slogger, go ahead. But it still is one ofthe best threats in the deck and is much less conditional that most of our other beaters. Its still good when we have cards in our hand for example.

[eq.firemind]

Guys, I've slightly different approach for the deck.

First the list:
4 Ancient Tomb
4 City of Traitors
10 Mountain
4 Chrome Mox
4 Simian Spirit Guide

4 Phyrexian Revoker
3 Kargan Dragonlord
4 Magus of the Moon
4 Gathan Raiders
4 Rakdos Pit Dragon
3 Lord of Shatterskull Pass

4 Chalice of the Void
4 Blood Moon
4 Sword of Feast and Famine

While the most popular removal is white, it costs 1 and Chalice covers it. But there are also popular black removal spells that hurt our assault through Chalice: Go For The Throat, Smother and Vindicate. SoFaF still gives protection from Goyf and KotR, but it also protects from removal spells. Now, the main part: BG sword's abilities.
Discard part is nice only when we start swinging early (we should anyway). Not awesome, but limits their ability to answer our threats. The untap lands allows us to throw whole hand into play faster (good for Hellbent and for general fast beating plan) and top-level Lord or Dragonlord is much easier to achieve now (actually, every creature with permanent effect for mana fits, just failed to find better ones). What do you think of this list?

[Admiral_Arzar]

Guys, I've slightly different approach for the deck.

First the list:
4 Ancient Tomb
4 City of Traitors
10 Mountain
4 Chrome Mox
4 Simian Spirit Guide

4 Phyrexian Revoker
3 Kargan Dragonlord
4 Magus of the Moon
4 Gathan Raiders
4 Rakdos Pit Dragon
3 Lord of Shatterskull Pass

4 Chalice of the Void
4 Blood Moon
4 Sword of Feast and Famine

In B4 "ZomG you cut Slogger and Seething Song this deck isn't DS anymore go play a different deck n00b!111!1111"

Anyways, I feel FaF could have potential because, as you said, it allows you to vomit out threats very quickly. I'm not sure if it's better than SOFI, but it's an interesting angle of attack. The lack of Trinisphere here makes me unhappy, but I suppose you could sideboard it for the matchups where it's actually a wrecking ball. I'm almost tempted to cut a creature or two for land just so you can make us of FaF to the utmost, but I'm not sure if that's the right choice.

[Yuri8]

Im testing something similiar to eg.firemind's list. I dont think revoker is md card, of course it can help in so many matchups, but he has body which cant solve anything on its own(without sword).

4 Ancient Tomb
4 City of Traitors
10 Mountain
4 Chrome Mox
4 Simian Spirit Guide
4 Seething Song

1 Jaya Ballard, Task Mage
3 Arc-Slogger (one will propably become new R/W sword)
4 Magus of the Moon
4 Gathan Raiders
4 Rakdos Pit Dragon
4 Lord of Shatterskull Pass

4 Chalice of the Void
3 Blood Moon
2 Umezawa's Jitte
1 Sword of Fire and Ice

[TheDarkshineKnight]

I really don't think DS can afford to run less than 3 Trinisphere main deck at the moment due to how well combo is doing. I'm also not feeling the equipment love and Slogger/SS hate.

Anyhoo, I've been running a very slightly modified version Tacosnape's list. So:

3 Arc-Slogger
4 Gathan Raiders
4 Magus of the Moon
4 Rakdos Pit Dragon
4 Simian Spirit Guide
4 Phyrexian Revoker
3 Blood Moon
3 Seething Song
4 Chalice of the Void
4 Chrome Mox
3 Trinisphere
4 Ancient Tomb
4 City of Traitors
12 Mountain

So, yeah, all I really did was drop a Slogger and a Blood Moon for two more Mountains. However, doing that has actually increased the consistency of deck by a huge amount. Really, my only issue with the deck was frequently not having enough red mana sources even after aggressively performing mulligans. So, I dropped one copy each of Slogger and Blood Moon since I'm not big on having multiples of either and doing so made the deck feel just right in playtesting.

And while I like Covetous Dragon, I just don't feel he's right for DS, primarily because you'd have to replace Slogger for hm. Yes, I know, everyone is for whatever grumpy with Slogger right now, but, he really is essential to the deck. I can't count the number of games where Slogger won the game simply because he's both a large body and a shock on a stick. When I'm able to land a hit with Gathan Raiders on the opponent, half of the time it's only because Slogger was able to deal with the opponent's creatures. Yes, the double red is a bitch, but, that's why I dropped a Moon and a Slogger for two mountains.

[Clark Kant]

Really, my only issue with the deck was frequently not having enough red mana sources even after aggressively performing mulligans.

Playing more mountains makes the deck slower though. And you get mana flooded more frequently.

I think that's behind the Slogger hate. The deck is too damn reliant on having several red mana sources. Slogger is a big part of the reason why, and a big reason why the deck needs Seething Song.

Covetous Dragon is castable off a single red source and two mana lands like ancient tomb and city of traitors. You don't need to run Seething Song to run it.

Similarly, Lord of Shatterskull also requires only one red source in play to use.

I think the deck could do well to move away from Slogger and Seething Song and towards threats like Covtous Dragon and Lord of Shatterskull that don't need multiple red sources in order to be playable.