Has anyone proxied up Chaos Warp and tried in, either mained or sided? Might be useful in the board as a generic answer card.
Boil is better than Boiling Sea. Also, If you only want U-Hate against Merfolk, what about An-Zerrin Ruins and Spinal Villain?Originally Posted by Clark Kant
I like your list, like I said, but I think, I would only play 2 Kothes in the flexslots, with a random Batterskull.
still... testings will show =), and thank you for bringing up a constant DS list ^^
Kenjawn, Mutator of Cells
:16:- (See, now Erratic Explosion's a deck)
Legendary Creature - Horror
Haste, Hexproof, Double Strike, Trample
Kenjawn, Mutator of Cells is indestructible.
Permanents you control can't be sacrificed or copied.
Whenever Kenjawn, Mutator of Cells attacks, defending player gets liver cancer (This effect doesn't end at end of turn.)
13/13
Has anyone tried Koth in the flex slots? I'm thinking about it over the Lodestone Golem x2 in my build.
And Revoker has been quite useful in testing. I've also tried SOWAP in the sideboard, which is something we need to work on as well.
Still waiting on my Koth to arrive so I can test it. I will try out Choas Orb too when the card gets printed.
For now, I have to say, Firespout from the board has been absolutely fantastic, an MVP against so many matchups. It's particularly potent in my more consistent version of Dragon Stompy on the previous page, since all the actual threats I play fly, and the only non flyer is Magus of the Moon (which gets sided out against some of the matchups that Firespout excels against, and wins the game by itself already if it sticks against the rest).
Yeah, have been running 3-4 in my 75 for a while. (I've been trying a more controllish version with removal maindeck) They're great against all the creatures in the format now. I think the SB is harder to put together than the main.
Edit:
I can't decide on finishers beside 4 Moltensteels, my deck has 1 of Arc-slogger, Covetous, RPD, and Batterskull to test them out. I don't run Songs
I had Koth for a while, but he isn't good enough with the creatures in the format. Possible sb card against control though.
I found Songs to work amazingly well in a build with 3-4 Moltensteel, and 3-4 Covetous Dragon. That's even more true, if you also run an Arc Slogger or Batterskull alongside them. At worst, Songs pump Moltensteel.
Given how amazing Firespout is, and how the more consistent version of the deck does away with both Rakdos Pit Dragon and Gathan Raiders in favor of flying beasts, maybe Firespout should be maindeck.
I'm heavily favoring playing a list like this...
//Lands
5 Mountain
4 Great Furnace
4 Ancient Tomb
4 City of Traitors
2 Crystal Vein
//Mana Acceleration
4 Chrome Mox
4 Simian Spirit Guide
4 Seething Song
//Bombs that destroy opposing decks
4 Magus of the Moon
4 Blood Moon
4 Chalice of the Void
4 Trinisphere
3 Firespout
//Bombs that end the game asap
3 Moltensteel Dragon
3 Covetous Dragon
2 Lord of Shatterskull Pass
2 Batterskull
One major goal I had when designing this deck was to absolutely maximize the ability to cast a turn one Moon or Trinisphere (or Chalice) because there has been a surge in the number of decks with mana bases and combo decks that pretty much fold to a turn one blood moon or a turn one trinisphere. Crystal Vein help with this task.
It's a heck of a lot more controllish, and consistent. And every single non-mana card the deck plays is a powerful bomb that can singlehandedly win the game by itself.
Or do you think there are too many matchups where Firespout is a dead card. The only decks I can think of that can survive a Moon effect, and that wouldn't get ripped to shreds by a Firespout are Burn and Storm combo. Trinisphere and Chalice help immensly against both.
Last edited by Clark Kant; 06-15-2011 at 04:53 PM.
In this deck, with no Green sources, isn't Slagstorm a significantly better card, as it's relevant to both flyers/nonflyers, and cutting the RPDs means none of your flyers die to it? Plus it can be a finisher itself.
I'm had a similar thought on Koth, as it loses to other creatures, but it's also much better when ramped out on Turn 2 because you can apply immediately pressure better then something like Lodestone or 5-drops. Plus Moltensteel can't be dropped with Chrome Mox. I honestly think RPD still needs to be in the deck because it's cheaper to play and abuses equips more, and Gathan Raiders is pretty good for its CMC.
The ability deal 3 damage off a singlemana is why Firespout is more important than Slagstorm.
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A manacost of 1RR is too difficult to support consistently. A 2R manacost is infinately superior.
RPD is hard to cost due to the RR mana requirement, and hard to make flying for the same reason.
Also, with a butt of 3, it can be killed by a Lightning Bolt, or a Serendib Efreet, and is a crappy blocker.
And lastly, it's not very good without hellbent. Sure, if you are certain you will have hellbent every time you cast him, he would be worth it, but lots of games have you holding an uncastable five drop for a turn or two atleast.
Post board, he can fairly bad with Firespout.
No it really is not. You are spending 3 mana, AND discarding a card from your hand, for a vanilla 3/3 that is conditionally a vanilla 5/5. Again, if you are certain you will have hellbent every time you cast him, he would be worth it, but even then, the fact that he's card disadvantage is relevant especially in a deck that has no draw engine to speak off, and that he can many times just be a 3/3 is pretty bad. Not to mention that he has no evasion, or trample or vigilance, or any other combat abilities and can simply be chumped by 1/1 elves all day long.
Also post board, he can fairly bad with Firespout.
I highly disagree on the CMC issue, when have you ever actually had issues with RR? The entire deck is built around Blood Moon effects and every ramp piece only makes R mana.
I understand the points on RPD and Gathan, but at least you'll be able to play them in time to matter. Playing Moltensteel means paying 4 life to cast, then significantly more afterward to boost to actually make kills in time. Plus Moltensteel in the main means you have significantly less R sources for Chrome Mox, which is important if the deck is supposed to be able to use them.
I also don't understand the hate towards Hellbent. The deck plays so naturally towards achieving it that I have never had a game without it, and it essentially makes RPD a turn 1 or 2 clock. When you add cards like Seething Song and stuff with CMC-5, you have the same thing except you need all of the cards to work together, or you draw poorly. The Hellbent creatures are much better individually, though I see the appeal of Moltensteel if you cut Phyrexian Revokers and such.
I'm sure we all understand how Hellbent plays out. Yes, getting Hellbent can be easy for the deck, but its much easier for us to run into one of dozens of instances where we screw ourselves out drawing nothing but sol lands, dropping a Moon and being stuck on 3 lands with a bunch of 4/5cc etc.). Gathan can't deal with 'Goyf/KotR/any other creature with sizeable power. RPD is only good with Hellbent. It dies to burn and requires heavy mana investment if you want to make him any good. Hellbent also forces you to constantly either cast cards, drop lands, or RFG SSG/Imprint on Mox to empty your hand which isn't always what you want to do. Sometimes its better to keep some mana accel. (Song/SSG/Land) in your hand or keep a Slogger for later rather than just throw them away to provide a +2/+2 buff or Double Strike on a creature already requiring a hefty investment of resources.
Ultimately Hellbent forces you to go all-in which can cost us many games. RPD requires you to spend every resource to keep him competing with other threats so rather than dropping several threats at once you're attempting to do what Junk does and use vast amounts of disruption while falling on the back of powerful creatures, the difference being their creatures are those without extra investment needed to make them good.
Yea, Moltensteel Dragon typically requires a 4 life investment, but he sits on a 4/4 body so he's above burn, he has static evasion (flying) and consider how many times you've let an opponent connect direct damage because you didn't want to block and lose a RPD. I see little difference between no-blocks to save a RPD and paying 4 life to cast Moltensteel. But I do see a difference between a creature than can be cast off 2 Sol lands and requires no extra investment and a creature who much more readily dies, requires 2RR which contrary to 4 Mox/4 Song/Moon effects CAN be difficult to cast. Thus I think its reasonable to assume 2-3 Moltensteel as an adequate replacement for RPD.
As for Gathan raiders, Lord of Shatterskull Pass fills the slot nicely. 3R to cast with an extra 1R to gurantee a creature that will always be bigger than 'Goyf unless by some miracle 2 of either planeswalker/artifact/enchantment/tribal get into the 'yard or they're sitting on multiple Exalted triggers. His Level 6, although almost never actually obtained, can randomly blow out creature decks once achieved.
As for the 1RR vs. 2R scenario, yeah, I think majority of us can concede the deck most of the time can eventually achieve 1RR without issue. What those of us in favor of 2R are arguing is that 2R is more consistent for us to cast based on the 8 Sol lands. Sometimes imprinting on Mox isn't what we want to do. Sometimes its more relevant to save Song for Batterskull/Slogger/Kazuul/Moltensteel/etc. Sometimes we don't have SSG, or dropping a Moon effect can screw us out of being able to drop threats. Heck, sometimes we even get stuck on a bunch of sol lands with 1 mountain. I am loathe to do the "situational," argument since a person can make up any situation to support their argument, however due to the deck design of DS I think these are actually valid. The fact of the matter is that even though we can reasonably cast 1RR, 2R means we'll pretty much never have to compromise our hand/board to cast it.
Forlorn Egoist
How to play Belcher:
Step 1) Draw 7 cards.
Step 2) Throw said 7 cards onto the table while making a "BLAH!" sound.
Step 3) Hold up hands quizically and ask: "Do I win?"
Decks
Enchantress
Dragon Stompy
Rock
UG Madness/Thresh (Pauper)
Excellent post. Very well said.
You make an excellent case for Lord of Shatterskull Pass as well. I think I will play that as a 2 of in the new list above (cutting 1 Moltensteel, 1 Covetous). Updated the list to reflect the change.
If your going to play Level-up creatures, why not use Kargan Dragonlord or even Figure? Your paying for a 6/6 for 6 mana that's just as susceptible to removal, except you have to probably tap-out the turn you play it. I just don't see how it's a viable option at all.
@ Figure of Destiny: When was the last time you were able to get 6 red mana reasonably without using Song? Figure is a great late game card, but his level 1 is useless and his level 2 is a vanilla 4/4 leaving his level 3 as the only viable level. Oh, and Chalice @ 1.
@ Kargan Dragonlord is better than Figure but not by much. Pre-Phyrexia I would say he occupied the Moltensteel slot but he's no longer necessary IMO. Moltensteel costs 4 to Kargan's 6 to become a 4/4 Flyer however Moltensteel has firebreathing which is a definite plus. Moltensteel also can't get blown out by that random Chalice @ 2 and he doesn't force us to decide between Leveling up or casting threats. Kargan does.
Yea, on paper Figure or Kargan seem infinitely better than Lord of S/P but lets look at the grand scheme of mana they eat up: Figure requires 6R which realistically we're never going to cast short of Song or late-game. Kargan requires 8R to give him a 4/4 edge over Moltensteel. Lord requires a one-time 1R to enable him to kill nearly any creature with exception to KotR/Terravore/Crusher/Emrakul(Prog)/etc.
You need to look at how much raw investment each card requires to make it good. Lord of S/P requires only 1 red source and at bare minimum 1 turn after casting to make him strong enough to deal with nearly any creature threat. Figure necessitates 6R, 2-3 turns and most likely either a Song or an insane amount of Mountains/Mox/SSG. Kargan requires 3 turns at bare minimum assuming you have 3 red sources and don't want to do anything else in those turns.
Realistically, Lord of Shatterskull Pass is quite obviously the most viable option. I fail to see where the confusion is coming from.
Forlorn Egoist
How to play Belcher:
Step 1) Draw 7 cards.
Step 2) Throw said 7 cards onto the table while making a "BLAH!" sound.
Step 3) Hold up hands quizically and ask: "Do I win?"
Decks
Enchantress
Dragon Stompy
Rock
UG Madness/Thresh (Pauper)
Sorry for the double post but seeing as how this post has a completely different subject from my previous post I figured it might be forgiven (I'd edit the previous post and just add this but I'd like to ask a genuine question which can sometimes get missed in longer posts).
What is the best way for us to deal with "Cheated," creatures such as Emrakul/Prog/etc.? I've been considering Noetic Scales but sometimes that seems like it could hurt us as well (although since going non-Hellbent I've been finding myself able to keep cards in hand much easier).
Forlorn Egoist
How to play Belcher:
Step 1) Draw 7 cards.
Step 2) Throw said 7 cards onto the table while making a "BLAH!" sound.
Step 3) Hold up hands quizically and ask: "Do I win?"
Decks
Enchantress
Dragon Stompy
Rock
UG Madness/Thresh (Pauper)
Phyrexian metamorph has been amazing for me in testing.
It destroys any of the legendary guys, and doesn't force your creatures back to your hand. esp bc a lot of our creatures have high power, it's difficult to support noetic scales.
I haven't faced s&t in tourney play, but metamorph was key in beating dredge last month (iona).
Also, as an sb slot, he's much more versatile. I've been trying out him as an anti stonforge mystic + batterskull strategy. You can copy SfM and search for a SoLS or SoFF to get pro black, which will beat the black token clean. right now, i like SoLS bc it will get past both SfM and batterskull.
For Emrakul, Stingscourger I've heard is effective, but I have no idea on Progenitus unless you can equip a Sword of B/M on to a creature or use Jitte to gain life and race.
And the confusion on Lord of SP is simple - it's a godawful card that no deck would ever take seriously, is not efficient for its cost at all, and overall just seems terrible for its investment. If you have the mana for LOSP, you almost certainly have it for Kargan, or FOD, Rakdos, or Moltensteel. I agree on Moltensteel and I'm going to try it over Gathan or maybe Revoker/Lodestone/flex shot, but I think we need another red card them for Chrome Mox. I think the deck needs 20 Red cards at minimum for Chrome Mox.
EDIT: Phyrexian Metamorph sounds like an awesome card in the side or maybe even mained? Willing to give it a shot.
Oh, right, I had completely forgotten about Metamorph. Thanks for reminding me (I really wasn't too fond of the Noetic Scales).
I'm pretty sure if an opponent is sitting on 'Goyf(s) and you have a 6/6, they're going to be taking it pretty seriously. At least, more so if the DS player has a 3/3 or a 5/5 Gathan on the table or a non-Hellbent RPD which they'll have to invest 3 mana in just to trade with a 'Goyf. As for efficiency, I hardly see how spending 6 mana for a 6/6 is inefficient for our deck when RPD requires a hell of a lot more mana to compete with any creature non-Hellbent and it dies to burn.
As for the whole "mana," argument you just made, if you read the entirely of my above post I make note of the fact that FOD is too mana-intensive (RRRRRR) to be reasonably cast in an average game and Kargan requires RRRRRRRR just to make him superior to a Moltensteel. 3R to cast/1R to Level once is reasonable. At absolute most you need 2 turns (1 to cast/1 to Level) to make Lord useful. I'd like for you to playtest FOD/Kargan and honestly tell me that short of lucking out with a Song it doesn't take far longer than 2 turns to make either of them viable.
If you don't like him, fine. If you're content to stick with a Hellbent build, thats fine too. But based on your arguments for him being a "gadawful card," and how "an opponent won't take him seriously," I'm assuming you've done little if any playtesting with him to which I would ask you to do so before offering the argument you've just provided.
Forlorn Egoist
How to play Belcher:
Step 1) Draw 7 cards.
Step 2) Throw said 7 cards onto the table while making a "BLAH!" sound.
Step 3) Hold up hands quizically and ask: "Do I win?"
Decks
Enchantress
Dragon Stompy
Rock
UG Madness/Thresh (Pauper)
Arena of the Ancients deals with the big Eldrazi and Progenitus.
Edit: And you can cast it while Iona is out.
the only thing i didn't like about arena is that, if you do it proactively, it won't tap an emrakul until it's to late. if you do it after they come out, they have a lot of stuff in terms of chain of vapor, echoing truth, ee, etc to take it out.
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