[Deck] Dredge

[Izor]

Ever since I tested led-faithless, there's no argument, ledless is obsolete. The power of the combo is just insane and there is no way I'm going back to ledless. Want to fight hate better? Play some extra Rainbows in the board to help cast claim/chain.

For those who don't play LED because you don't have them, sorry bro. You're missing out.

For those of you who don't add anything relevant to the discussion by not giving any arguments, sorry bro. You're missing out.

I've owned a playset for... er... four years? I just eschew it at the moment because of consistency and smoothness issues (yes, even with the German 4-off list).



LEDless with Lotings over Tribe is by no means a strictly inferior version of LED. That list still features what I consider one of the most important things in a Dredge deck: 15 lands. Also, why is it Lootings OR Tribe? I play 3 of each in my LEDless build, which is in my own expierience the best Dredge build I've ever played in my life. At least until someone shows me a reliable LED list with 14 lands.

[Final Fortune]

I think justifying Putrid Imp and Tireless Tribe as defense against Tormod's Crypt etc. is incredibly loose reasoning, and while I wont argue Putrid Imp and Tireless Tribe reduce the impact of Tormod's Crypt etc. the time they buy, followed by a clock, is still a threat. Saying Nature's Claim doesn't help vs Tormod's Crypt etc. is beyond retarded, removing the hate is always going to be better than trying to play around it with Putrid Imp and Tireless Tribe because you're A) reliant on holding a second Dredger to be able to play around it at all and B) always subject to when he chooses to activate his hate. Even LEDless Dredge ~2010 used Ancient Grudge specifically against Tormod's Crypt, when Tormod's Crypt was the only relevant graveyard hate in the format and Putrid Imp and Tireless Tribe's added resiliency was a significant boon. In 2012, with Surgical Extraction, Faerie Macabre, Grafdigger's Cage in addition to the Tormod's Crypt/Relic of Progentius/Nihil Spellbomb effects, as well as the occassional Leyline of the Void, Planar Void, whatever the Black Trap is called and Wheel of Sun and Moon the effectiveness of LEDless Dredge is significantly less now than it was then because you can't predict the opponent's hate.

As much as admire Jares' dogged open mindedness, the problem is that a lot of people are testing Dredge now that never played Dredge then and they're either ignorant of why the deck was built the way it was or they are possibly playing in a metagame with an underdeveloped SBing strategy vs Dredge as a whole.

The simple argument is that LED allows you to win games that no other card can allow you to win when facing decks like Storm, Reanimator or even Elves, while Tireless Tribe only helps slightly vs hate that may not even exist in your opponent's SBs. I'm also thoroughly unconvinced Tireless Tribe is any more consistent than LED after the printing of Faithless Looting, so even that argument is outdated. I don't think Tireless Tribe is necessarily a bad card, but it seems like SB material to me at best.

Edit: Also I don't think you guys should be narrowing your argument to Tireless Tribe vs Faithless Looting, if you're looking for space Breakthrough vs Faithless Looting isn't a given.

[NecroYawgmoth]

The availability of a card should NEVER be a consideration when evaluating things at a competitive level. I suggest that, moving forward, we assume that the availability of a card is NEVER a factor - I expect this assumption to save us time and text.

What you say here is obviously totally right. The problem is, that LED is more than any other card in other deck threads here is a money-factor for some people. You see this in the past of the Dredge-thread. xx people were saying that LEDless is better, but they never owned or played with LEDs. It's different if someone is saying LED is bad, becasue he has played with both versions often enough by telling you so, or just says LED is bad, but he never played them. I never owned any LEDs and I said in the past multiple times that LED-Dredge is worse than LEDless. Nowadays I still don't own any LEDs and I am saying that LED-Dredge is better thanks to Looting.

At least until someone shows me a reliable LED list with 14 lands.

Out of my head: german Quadlazer list -1 Putrid Imp, -1 Ichoird, +2 Tarnsihed Citadel?

[Felidae]

@igri_is_a_bk:
If AEnesidem is right then I really missed your point.
As long as any of us keeps winning with the list he likes the most I don't see much reason to talk about this any further.

[Final Fortune]

I don't really have mana issues pre-board with Quad Lazer, are you SBing Tarnished Citadels post-board to support your answers and Faithless Looting? You can probably board an Ichorid and a Golgari Thug to play the 2 extra lands MD, but really the only cards you should have trouble resolving are Putrid Imp and Cabal Therapy. If you choose to draw game 1 as a default, you don't really need to be able to cast Putrid Imp that often and Cabal Therapy always has its alternate casting cost.

That aside, do you guys who are playing the Dread Return/Flayer killer need Bridge from Below in your deck to pull it off? I was thinking it might be interesting to trade between the combo kill and the bridge engine in the SB, but I have no idea how that'd functionally work out.

[joemauer]

I kinda agree with Final Fortune on this one.

LEDless was made obsolete when people started playing maindeck oozes and complete random out of the board. Winning turn one or two is sometimes better than trying to fight who knows what kind of hate that was brought in.

[Klazam]

Taking out the Bridges for anything kills Dredge. the bridge engine is one of the most powerful things that dredge has to offer.

[AEnesidem]

I think justifying Putrid Imp and Tireless Tribe as defense against Tormod's Crypt etc. is incredibly loose reasoning, and while I wont argue Putrid Imp and Tireless Tribe reduce the impact of Tormod's Crypt etc. the time they buy, followed by a clock, is still a threat. Saying Nature's Claim doesn't help vs Tormod's Crypt etc. is beyond retarded, removing the hate is always going to be better than trying to play around it with Putrid Imp and Tireless Tribe because you're A) reliant on holding a second Dredger to be able to play around it at all and B) always subject to when he chooses to activate his hate. Even LEDless Dredge ~2010 used Ancient Grudge specifically against Tormod's Crypt, when Tormod's Crypt was the only relevant graveyard hate in the format and Putrid Imp and Tireless Tribe's added resiliency was a significant boon. In 2012, with Surgical Extraction, Faerie Macabre, Grafdigger's Cage in addition to the Tormod's Crypt/Relic of Progentius/Nihil Spellbomb effects, as well as the occassional Leyline of the Void, Planar Void, whatever the Black Trap is called and Wheel of Sun and Moon the effectiveness of LEDless Dredge is significantly less now than it was then because you can't predict the opponent's hate.

As much as admire Jares' dogged open mindedness, the problem is that a lot of people are testing Dredge now that never played Dredge then and they're either ignorant of why the deck was built the way it was or they are possibly playing in a metagame with an underdeveloped SBing strategy vs Dredge as a whole.

The simple argument is that LED allows you to win games that no other card can allow you to win when facing decks like Storm, Reanimator or even Elves, while Tireless Tribe only helps slightly vs hate that may not even exist in your opponent's SBs. I'm also thoroughly unconvinced Tireless Tribe is any more consistent than LED after the printing of Faithless Looting, so even that argument is outdated. I don't think Tireless Tribe is necessarily a bad card, but it seems like SB material to me at best.

Edit: Also I don't think you guys should be narrowing your argument to Tireless Tribe vs Faithless Looting, if you're looking for space Breakthrough vs Faithless Looting isn't a given.

So i am beyond retarded for not needing nature's claim to win against crypt/relic?
Do you side in nature's claim against crypt/relic?
cause to be honest i never did that, i even stopped sideboarding ancient grudge because i could win without it. Not that i don't have a hard time beating artifact hate but i don't see how dilluting my deck and trying to draw a nature's claim will win me that game.

[Final Fortune]

There's a difference between the deck not needing Nature's Claim to defeat Tormod's Crypt and Nature's Claim not helping the deck defeat Tormod's Crypt at all, the second statement is idiotic. Having answers vs the opponent's hate increases your win percentage against said hate, usually I'll board in Nature's Claim for Lion's Eye Diamond game 3 once I'm certain the opponent is using strictly Tormod's Crypt effects.

[jares]

As much as admire Jares' dogged open mindedness, the problem is that a lot of people are testing Dredge now that never played Dredge then and they're either ignorant of why the deck was built the way it was or they are possibly playing in a metagame with an underdeveloped SBing strategy vs Dredge as a whole.

I don't think that this will ever go away - we'll always have new players discover this archetype from time to time. I was personally fortunate to have learned a lot from this forum when I started thinking competitively, and we can only hope that the newer players would be able to do the same.

As a friend once told me, "the trick is to sift through the stones and find the gems". Having said that, I feel that the problem isn't that we're getting new players and dealing with their ignorance - I think that the problem is that we're throwing too many stones around, and burying the gems in the process. If you haven't noticed, we rarely get anywhere with any of the discussions anymore.

I hope that the new primer would be able to help with these concerns.

Kind Regards,
jares

[igri_is_a_bk]

I think some of us are too concerned with direct empirical data as proof. We have to start appreciating each others' experiences, because Magic is such a high variance game and that is multiplied by the fact we play the most open format. The luxury of "x should mean y" is far from true, and I think we know that, so let's avoid theory crafting for a while and just discuss what we actually experience.

I was trying to help the non-LED players by suggesting they stick to Tribe, instead of Looting. My (literally) over a year of experience with the deck has shown me how good he really is. If that's not how you feel the deck is best, don't do it. We don't have to argue something if we're just gonna entrench ourselves in our original positions.

For this next question, I don't want people to think I'm asking aggressively, but nobody has answered it yet. How is the LEDless version that tries to play exactly like LED not an inferior build? To me, that's the question that needs to be answered. The answer, "It doesn't." isn't gonna work for me, because it really does. Think about it for a sec.

@Izor - I posted a 14 land LED build like the day Looting was spoiled. I think I even claimed that we'd have to increase the gold land count for it to work. That turned out to be not so true though.

[Izor]

Out of my head: german Quadlazer list -1 Putrid Imp, -1 Ichoird, +2 Tarnsihed Citadel?

This is probably the best way to do it, yes. Although half a year ago, I'm sure people would have told you to cut anything but PImps from this deck, no matter what.


I don't like sideboarding lands. This deck's mana base works a bit differently from other decks mana bases. While other decks have to consider how many lands they want to draw until turn X, and calculate a quotient that can be representative for the number of lands they'll need to run, this isn't quite the case in Dredge. This deck's mana base is solely built to just draw A land, because that's all we need to operate .At the same time, we desperately need it or we won't be operating at all.

The number of lands in this deck wants to give us the best possible chance to open with at least one. The situations pre and post board aren't actually that different. I want that chance all the time, not only post board. LED Dredge mulligans more frequently than my current LEDless build. I won't take LED over LEDless to a tournament until I have fixed that. My LEDless build has never had any major trouble against Scavenging Ooze or Extraction, but it just loses fewer games to random mulligans to 4.

[NewDredgePlayer]

For those of you who don't add anything relevant to the discussion by not giving any arguments, sorry bro. You're missing out.

I've owned a playset for... er... four years? I just eschew it at the moment because of consistency and smoothness issues (yes, even with the German 4-off list).



LEDless with Lotings over Tribe is by no means a strictly inferior version of LED. That list still features what I consider one of the most important things in a Dredge deck: 15 lands. Also, why is it Lootings OR Tribe? I play 3 of each in my LEDless build, which is in my own expierience the best Dredge build I've ever played in my life. At least until someone shows me a reliable LED list with 14 lands.

How about 4 Gemstone, 4 City of Brass, 4 Tarnished Citadel, 2 Cephalid Coliseums? LED is a careful study in disguise for the most part so cutting back on draw is ok. I'm actually playing zero coliseums (mulligans suck), 12 rainbow lands and I am not mulling nearly as much as before. Of course its less explosive but them are the trade offs.

[NewDredgePlayer]

Me thinks newdredgeplayer is trying to troll us with his 'new tech' of entomb.

We need to put links in the new primer where entomb has been discussed to death throughout this thread.
Oh and unmask while we are at it.

Troll? no. If I was trolling I'd talk about how Joe Mauer, the baseball player, is single handedly killing the twins. He was injured for a large part of 2011 and played crappy when he did play. Not to mention his huge contract makes it harder for the Twins to get quality free agents

Like I said I'm new to dredge and I wanted to make it more consistent. The deck mulls better than most decks but it doesn't mean I want to mull ALL the time. Entomb makes the deck more consistent so I wanted to give it a shot. I'm not saying its the right move but its worth trying since I've never played with entomb dredge before.

So far, just gold fishing I mull noticeably less and the deck is about a turn slower (cephalid coliseums are gone too). Is consistency worth the slower deck? I dont know yet, but it's one question I hope to answer soon.

[NewDredgePlayer]

What kind of hands would you guys keep (decklist doesnt matter)?

For example I would keep any hand with

Hand A:
1 or more Rainbow Land(s)
1 or more Discard Outlet(s)
1 or more Dredger(s)

Hand B:
1 or more Rainbow Land(s)
2 or more Draw Spell(s)
1 or more Dredger(s)

Hand C:
1 or more Rainbow Land(s)
1 or more LED(s)
1 or more Faithless Looting
1 or more Dredger(s)

[joemauer]

Troll? no. If I was trolling I'd talk about how Joe Mauer, the baseball player, is single handedly killing the twins. He was injured for a large part of 2011 and played crappy when he did play. Not to mention his huge contract makes it harder for the Twins to get quality free agents

When you can hit home runs like me, then you can trash talk me all you want.

[Que]

When you can hit home runs like me, then you can trash talk me all you want.

[jares]

I think some of us are too concerned with direct empirical data as proof. We have to start appreciating each others' experiences, because Magic is such a high variance game and that is multiplied by the fact we play the most open format. The luxury of "x should mean y" is far from true, and I think we know that, so let's avoid theory crafting for a while and just discuss what we actually experience.

I second this motion, with emphasis on appreciating "each other's experiences". I believe that the point of this whole forum is having the benefit of learning from each other's victories - and especially from each other's mistakes.

What we need to be cautious about, though, is treating our own experiences as absolute. Until the time comes where "the luxury of having X to mean Y" is in our laps, we should continue to keep an open mind and appreciate each other's experiences.

As for what is absolute, I believe that we all understand how this is defined, and we should continue to keep ourselves grounded on what is unquestionable while maintaining a healthy discussion of what is subjective.

Cheers,
jares

[jares]

Like I said I'm new to dredge and I wanted to make it more consistent...

...So far, just gold fishing I mull noticeably less and the deck is about a turn slower (cephalid coliseums are gone too). Is consistency worth the slower deck? I dont know yet, but it's one question I hope to answer soon.

I've noticed that the word "consistency" is mentioned a lot in these forums, and, more often than not, the claim of consistency is not properly supported.

For the purposes of card-gaming, I've found that "Consistency" is defined by the frequency with which a certain event can take place given a finite number of sample instances. Shown below is an example:

• "Dredge is able to consistently win Game 1."

Note that the above statement does not state that Dredge will always win Game 1 - it simply means that Dredge will often win Game 1. What we really want to find out, though, is "how often" Dredge is able to win Game 1. Shown below are examples of how we should state our claims of consistency:

• "Dredge is able to win Game 1 with a consistency of 75%."
• "Dredge is able to win against Leyline of the Void with a consistency of 5%."

Note that both high and low levels of consistency are shown in these examples.

In summary, I find that it's not enough to just say that "this configuration is more consistent" - we have to have a numerical basis for what we want to refer to as "consistency". Otherwise, the best we can do is to state that we "feel" like this or that is consistent - and the good thing about that is that no one can argue with you about something that is subjective to your experience.

I hope this helps.

Kind Regards,
jares

[NecroYawgmoth]

@igri_is_a_bk: The thing is that Careful Study was like the BEST card in LED-less, and now we have 8. And you seriously want to play Tribes over another Study-Effect. We don't life in an era where every gravehate is Crypt and Relic this is why Imps and Tribes got a lot weaker.

@Izor: Like I said above:Half a year ago not everyone was playing the Snapstraction train. Imos got worse with the new hate, because they are better against Crypts / Relics than against Extractions.

@NewDredgePlayer: In all seriousness... Where does the deck get more constant with Entombs?

@jares: You just got beaten by a triple post from NewDredgePlayer. =P