[Deck] Dredge

[badjuju]

The Spanish have been doing pretty well with a consistent looking dredge list in these mid-sized tournaments (see Adria Romero from March).

http://manainfinito.com/articulos/le...lcl-2012-abril

The list is basically 1 DR while maxing out on consistency and upping to 13 lands. It's kind of like the evolution of quadlazer, so to speak. They still keep packing Gravecrawlers, along with 2 rainbow lands in the board. I suspect that they like Gravecrawler because the guy is consistently hard-castable and can be called back at will. For all other recurring threats (besides Bloodghast), you need to wait another turn, but not for Gravecrawler, which can be the difference between getting Crypted and at least having a few zombies to show for it. I personally am on the fence about it, but I guess it's been working for them. They also all still run the DR targets in the board even with only 1 DR. As I've stated before, it becomes a fallback plan and doesn't affect your consistency as much. Digging it.

[jares]

I prefer Griselbrand to Sun Titan because,

1) Griselbrand is black instead of white
2) Griselbrand is a superior threat to Sun Titan considering he's bigger, evasive and has lifelink to stabilize.
3) Griselbrand's draw effect isn't reliant on Lion's Eye Diamond being in the main deck
4) Griselbrand's draw effect is more powerful
5) Griselbrand's draw effect can be triggered twice on the same turn.

Seems kind of straight forward in theory and playtesting IMO, being life dependent is kind of annoying but so is being graveyard dependent on LED/Looting, Coliseum etc.

This looks like a pretty good summary to me, as I have noted the same for myself. I have forgone running Dread Return in my configuration, and I expect to go back to running DR because I find it difficult to say no to what Griselbrand has to offer (though I haven't really had the chance to test the card thoroughly).

Kind Regards,
jares

[jares]

Yes, actually I regularly keep hands without Dredgers. As long as you have at least two Study effects, enough Land and the potential to go nuts once you find a Dredger, you're perfectly fine.

If your hand contains at least two Lands, at least two Study effects plus an LED or Breakthrough, I always keep. Except if I have like double Narco in it as well.

Keeping hands w/o Dredgers is much easier than people think in a deck with so many Study effects. I fare very well with this strategy.

Same here - in fact, I have found that keeping such hands has been surprisingly reliable, though that might have just been luck all along. Caution and careful consideration should always be applied for any hand without a dredger.

Kind Regards,
jares

[jares]

The Spanish have been doing pretty well with a consistent looking dredge list in these mid-sized tournaments (see Adria Romero from March).

http://manainfinito.com/articulos/le...lcl-2012-abril

The list is basically 1 DR while maxing out on consistency and upping to 13 lands. It's kind of like the evolution of quadlazer, so to speak. They still keep packing Gravecrawlers, along with 2 rainbow lands in the board. I suspect that they like Gravecrawler because the guy is consistently hard-castable and can be called back at will. For all other recurring threats (besides Bloodghast), you need to wait another turn, but not for Gravecrawler, which can be the difference between getting Crypted and at least having a few zombies to show for it. I personally am on the fence about it, but I guess it's been working for them. They also all still run the DR targets in the board even with only 1 DR. As I've stated before, it becomes a fallback plan and doesn't affect your consistency as much. Digging it.

I have also been considering adapting the 1-DR configuration, but so far I haven't been comfortable with it. I haven't tested it rigorously, so it's still up in the air for now. Anyone else that might have done their homework on this configuration?

Cheers,
jares

[badjuju]

I have also been considering adapting the 1-DR configuration, but so far I haven't been comfortable with it. I haven't tested it rigorously, so it's still up in the air for now. Anyone else that might have done their homework on this configuration?

Cheers,
jares

I haven't tested it yet, but it makes a ton of sense to me in theory. A single DR adds dynamism and threat diversity to the deck at the cost of a single slot. It doesn't beg to shave from consistency like a lot of the DR-heavy lists are struggling with. The sideboard also suggests that they favor grindier games over going for the throat. Again, another list that's up for interpretation, but a good one for those who are still looking for consistency while maintaining the ability to play DR.

The singleton Darkblast in that list was a Breakthrough for Adria. It can also be another land or another Dread Return imo. This is the flex spot based on your preference. It's a bit odd to me still that you'd have DR targets in the board with only 1 DR main, but I've explained that already, even if I myself am weary about it lol. Also, Gravecrawler deserves another look again for all naysayers. Possibly.

[Izor]

1 DR is very good. You just have to get rid of the assumption that the point in casting DR is bringing a huge monster into play that will win the game on its own. Running one DR is only about ine thing: creating tokens if you fail to find as many Therapies as you have Narcomoebas. And one DR does that job very well.

DR targets are unnecessary for our game plan. Creating tokens is not. Therefore the 1 DR.


Back to the keepable hand discussion.

It should be clear that Land-Dredger-Discard outlet-draw effect is what we want and no matter what, if you have those 4 components you always keep.

The real question is when you can keep if you're lacking one of those pieces.

You can keep LED+Dredger+Looting if you have to.
You can also keep multiple Careful Study effects without Dredgers if the rest of your hand is good.
You can keep Land+dredger+Putrid Imp if you've mulled already.

Among all of those things, the Dredger-less version is the best hand imho.

You can't keep a no-lander, you can't keep without discard outlets unless you know you're otD against CounterTop.

[Parcher]

This advice applies to the women at the bar scene by some strange coincidence.

I think Griselbrand is going to find a home in Dredge. The ability to draw cards and be able to race decks ala life link seems too good to pass up as a back-up-plan. If someone were going to run the Griselbargin, what cards would we take out?

Nothing main deck. He seems needed there at the moment about as much as any other target. That is to say, not at all.

I'm running two in the SB, to go with my two DR main. He just replaces any other targets. Against RUG, basically any resolved DR wins unless you are in a straight race, and they have both Burn, and Delver. Griselbrand just does that a bit better since you win any race when you have 6+ life and he hits play. For the most part, the same holds true against Stoneblade. Though you do have to play it differently. I bring in Grudge against the U/W versions, so he's not spectacular there. Against Esper though, I often bring in Firestorms. Both as an additional discard outlet to replace LED, since many of these run Leyline, and as an answer to Lingering Souls. He pretty much ends the game there too. I'll probably board in one against these decks.

Against Combo decks, he replaces Iona+Sphinx/Sun Titan. Since they don't affect your life total until they win, the ability to draw 7-10, while dredging the rest of your library should win almost any scenario. Especially if you have multiple lands or LED in play, since you can actually cast what you draw. The only deck this may not happen against is Burn. Iona actually seals the game there, where with GB you have to pass the turn and hope that you either had several Therapies, or they just don't have it(draw it) before you get to swing. Not high enough odds there to worry about in my opinion.

He also replaces what I call the "Oh Shit Button", in cards like Terastodon, and AoD. Since you can use him to draw your SB cards. This is assuming of course that we are using those cards for things like Ensnaring Bridge et al. Since if they have actual Hate, you won't get him into play anyway.

Against creature-based/Aggro/Tribal strategies, he replaces Elesh Norn if you have Firestorms. Being able to use his ability, and sweep basically anything away, all at instant speed (if you have access to R) is to me one of the main reasons to run Griselbrand. Hell, if you have enough life, you can live the dream and use his ability twice, then Firestorm for 7+ in response to your first Firestorm to do huge amounts of direct damage. In testing I've even done things like make my turn two land drop, go off, DR Griselbrand, draw 7, play LED, draw 7 while saccing LED for R, then Firestorm for the win. The only concern in these cases is if they play Cage, since you can't play around it with PImp and Firestorm like Crypt/Relic, or just overpower it like Surgical. Since most of these decks don't/can't use Cage well, it's not a huge concern. You'll just need to play carefully Game Two, and get all of the information that you can. Or hope they just don't drop Cage turn one.

[badjuju]

Nothing main deck. He seems needed there at the moment about as much as any other target. That is to say, not at all.

I'm running two in the SB, to go with my two DR main. He just replaces any other targets. Against RUG, basically any resolved DR wins unless you are in a straight race, and they have both Burn, and Delver. Griselbrand just does that a bit better since you win any race when you have 6+ life and he hits play. For the most part, the same holds true against Stoneblade. Though you do have to play it differently. I bring in Grudge against the U/W versions, so he's not spectacular there. Against Esper though, I often bring in Firestorms. Both as an additional discard outlet to replace LED, since many of these run Leyline, and as an answer to Lingering Souls. He pretty much ends the game there too. I'll probably board in one against these decks.

Against Combo decks, he replaces Iona+Sphinx/Sun Titan. Since they don't affect your life total until they win, the ability to draw 7-10, while dredging the rest of your library should win almost any scenario. Especially if you have multiple lands or LED in play, since you can actually cast what you draw. The only deck this may not happen against is Burn. Iona actually seals the game there, where with GB you have to pass the turn and hope that you either had several Therapies, or they just don't have it(draw it) before you get to swing. Not high enough odds there to worry about in my opinion.

He also replaces what I call the "Oh Shit Button", in cards like Terastodon, and AoD. Since you can use him to draw your SB cards. This is assuming of course that we are using those cards for things like Ensnaring Bridge et al. Since if they have actual Hate, you won't get him into play anyway.

Against creature-based/Aggro/Tribal strategies, he replaces Elesh Norn if you have Firestorms. Being able to use his ability, and sweep basically anything away, all at instant speed (if you have access to R) is to me one of the main reasons to run Griselbrand. Hell, if you have enough life, you can live the dream and use his ability twice, then Firestorm for 7+ in response to your first Firestorm to do huge amounts of direct damage. In testing I've even done things like make my turn two land drop, go off, DR Griselbrand, draw 7, play LED, draw 7 while saccing LED for R, then Firestorm for the win. The only concern in these cases is if they play Cage, since you can't play around it with PImp and Firestorm like Crypt/Relic, or just overpower it like Surgical. Since most of these decks don't/can't use Cage well, it's not a huge concern. You'll just need to play carefully Game Two, and get all of the information that you can. Or hope they just don't drop Cage turn one.

Awesome.

Have you changed anything since your finish at NELC? Still running Ashen Ghouls?

[Parcher]

I dunno for sure. I'm definitely cutting the Purge/Journeys for Firestorms. This version is consistant enough against Reanimator with it's current decline. And whoever goes busted first wins the mirror, all other things being equal. With GB, Firestorm just has a higher value. The Land, Grudge, Claim, and the 4th Bthrough are all staying, with the 3rd DR target becoming Firestorm as well.

I might switch back to Shadow over Ghoul. Against Extraction, with Bridge being a primary target, and Ichorid being secondary, Dread Return is your next line of attack. To take full advantage of this in conjunction with Griselbrand, I not only don't want to miss a turn of being able to DR him due to mana constrictions, I also want to have access to mana if I do have a land to best take advantage of his drawing power. Neither of these scenarios lend well toward playing Ghoul. And his extra power only makes a difference in maybe a third of the games he actually comes in , and hits play. I'm not certain either way yet, but these are my thoughts currently.

[Final Fortune]

+1,

Parcher has the right idea, I don't MD Dread Return and Dread Return targets but I do SB 2xDread Return and 1xGriselbrand because it provides a second angle of attack vs Surgical Extraction and it's important to have a game plan for when either Bridge from Below and to a lesser extent Golgari Grave Troll are RFGed.

Regarding additional SB threats vs Surgical Extractions, I think you should play 1xAhen Ghoul and XxNether Shadows where you can SB out X of your Ichorids (in the case of Quadlazer, -2 Ichorid) and diversify your threat base to minimize the impact of Surgical Extraction.

If you're looking for SB space, I think the space you should look for is the 2xTarnished Citadel and Firestorms to replace, because the 2xTarnished Citadels are only relevant when you're trying to cast Nature's Claim, Ancient Grudge or Ray of Revelation in some match ups (RUG) and even in those match ups you should consider keeping your Lion's Eye Diamonds MD because they're funtionally mana sources for Faithless Looting and Cephalid Coliseum, a draw spell, an accelerant and a come back mechanism. Firestorm is only good, and when I say good I mean it actually addresses a problem and plays a necessary role you need, vs Maverick if they are MDing more than 1xScavenging Ooze and, which makes Scavenging Ooze a 2G lock piece they can't immediately activate and that you can race regardless.

I really dislike seeing the number of Ancient Grudges at +2x in SBs, I think a lot of people need to stop playing the second Ancient Grudge in favor of playing Tireless Tribes because it's better to make the deck more resistant vs Tormod's Crypt than it is to dry and address a hate card they may or may not draw and just hold onto a card that can't prevent Tormod's Crypt from activating later when they do draw it instead of just playing Tireless Tribe and accelerating your game plan.

Nature's Claim is also a card I'm hating more and more, mainly because the only hate I SB Nature's Claim in against is Leyline of the Void and Grafdigger's Cage, both of which can be addressed by Chain of Vapor and you have 4 more mana sources to cast it than Nature's Claim and don't need to SB in any more lands to support it at that rate. Chain of Vapor actually does useful shit in otherwise close match ups as well, like bounce Reanimator targets.

As far as the whole "let's all play Dread Return MD again" band wagon, I really think this really fucking sucks and it's not a question of preference any more. I've been playing a lot of games on Cockatrice with the quadlazer list and the Flayer list, and I think the Flayer list is litterally the "idiots guide to Dredge" because it over emphasizes Dredge as a combo deck. The deck is threat dense enough to let you get away with it to an extent, but it literally has no ability to judiciously "DDD" those games where you lose the coin flip and see "Island, go." You just straight up don't need to "kill" the turn you go off or circumvent the combat step vs any deck that matters game 1, so you're giving up your strategic and tactical plan of DDD in favor of some flashy shit that actually retards your play skill from eliminating decision trees when you start the game on the draw and you're cold vs STP way too often.

I'll leave the list I'm playing after those thoughts, I think it's probably where other people want to go once the whole "illusion of preference" goes out the window.

4 City of Brass
4 Gemstone Mine
4 Cephalid Coliseum

4 Lion's Eye Diamond

4 Putrid Imp

4 Golgari Grave Troll
4 Stinkweep Imp
4 Golgari Thug

4 Breakthrough
4 Careful Study
4 Faithless Looting

4 Ichorid
4 Bridge from Below

4 Narcomoeba
4 Cabal Therapy

SB

1 Ancient Grudge
1 Ray of Revelation
4 Chain of Vapor
3 Tireless Tribe
2 Dread Return
1 Griselbrand
2 Nether Shadow
1 Ashen Ghoul

I SB out Breakthrough more than any other card.

I may consider cutting both Ancient Grudge and Ray of Revelation for 2xTarnished Citadel to better support Tireless Tribes when they come in, I have that feeling that we shouldn't give a damn about any permanent that doesn't stop us from Dredge and that they're really a wet blanket. We race most of that crap anyway and you could probably consolidate space with a Terrastadon etc.

Edit: Actually screw Terrastadon, I think Parcher is right about Griselbrand just being able to draw ~14 cards and find Chain of Vapor + Land.

[badjuju]

My only gripe with quadlazer is that it runs 12 lands. I've actually just bumped my MD list up to 14 lands and I don't think I'm looking back.

[Final Fortune]

My only gripe with quadlazer is that it runs 12 lands. I've actually just bumped my MD list up to 14 lands and I don't think I'm looking back.

I think the Spanish list with 1 Dread Return and the 9th Gold Land instead of the 4th Ichorid and 4th Golgari Thug is a compromise, opening up two slots in the SB is really appealing.

Grave Crawler is a mixed bag, relying on a land and either a Putrid Imp or activated Bridge makes it really conditional and I'm not certain scoring a Savanah Lion every once and awhile is worth it. Maybe if you play 4 and you can get them to chain off each other by casting one and then using it as an anchor to bring the others back over time, but you've still got a 1 per turn bottle neck most likely.

[HokusSchmokus]

I am testing an updated list from one of our dredging group's members, sporting 14 lands(+2 tarnished) and 1 DR for -3 PImps.

[badjuju]

I think the Spanish list with 1 Dread Return and the 9th Gold Land instead of the 4th Ichorid and 4th Golgari Grave Troll is a compromise, opening up two slots in the SB is really appealing.

Grave Crawler is a mixed bag, relying on a land and either a Putrid Imp or activated Bridge makes it really conditional and I'm not certain scoring a Savanah Lion every once and awhile is worth it. Maybe if you play 4 and you can get them to chain off each other by casting one and then using it as an anchor to bring the others back over time, but you've still got a 1 per turn bottle neck most likely.

I think the German group on here has been testing Nether Shadow to great success. I've played a few boarded games vs RUG and they were surprisingly good. One glaring issue with Gravecrawler is that he can't block, and that's where Nether Shadow really takes the cake.

[HokusSchmokus]

In a RUG and BUG heavy meta Shadow in your board is perfectly fine. Should run at least 3 PImps and 1-2 DR though- the Shadows will not do the work, just enable.

[K1w1]

I'm the one, who tested the Shadows in the board and first of all i thought it was great. But all in all i cut them again.
The main reason why i did this is that our opponents are playing Leyline + artifact hate more often than surgical atm. Like my 5-1 in the local tourney. As i said, i played against Mav,Nicfit,Nicfit,Mav,Reanimator,EsperStoneblade. I boarded them against NicFit and Stoneblade, but they were good in the Stoneblade matchup.

I'm actually playing the Quadlazer -1Thug +1DR.

Btw, played in a local tourney 3-1 for the 2nd finish. There were only 10 players.
2:1 Past in Flames Storm
2:0 Reanimator ( perfect hand game 2, therapy/gemstone/coliseum/nature's claim/study/gravetroll/leyline )
1:2 MUD
2:0 Sneak Attack with Show and Tell ( He gave me the wins due to he had to go and we splitted the price )

K1w1

[blindspotxxx]

Yikes... it might have been better if your teammate had just given you the win.

Cheers,
jares

It was round 1 and I firmly believed that the burn deck had great matchups since Maverick and Rug are on the rise. To my surprise he fought 2 more dredge decks lol Philippine Meta is not changing most people still play their trusty old decks so I think Burn didn't make it.

How many nether shadows can we fit in the sb? I only have 2 slots at the moment and I think gravecrawler seems to be good.

[jares]

1 DR is very good. You just have to get rid of the assumption that the point in casting DR is bringing a huge monster into play that will win the game on its own. Running one DR is only about ine thing: creating tokens if you fail to find as many Therapies as you have Narcomoebas. And one DR does that job very well.

Agreed. I believe that the concern, though, is that these "Spanish Lists" (for lack of a better term) might not be running enough DRs in their 75-card lists to reliably support their game plan of getting meta-specific DR targets into play. In the past, I did successfully pilot a build that had one Dread Return in the main deck (with no DR targets; this is in reference to the point that DR's main purpose is not to get the DR targets into play), but I did have another DR in the SB for when I would board-in DR targets for specific match-ups (this is to ensure that I could minimize the probability of encountering the need to get a DR target in play while also not having a DR available).

At the end of the day, it seems to me that these considerations may just boil down to how a player would like to use that 1 slot to support one (or more) of the many factors that contribute to how Dredge's engine works (add a DR to increase the probability of getting a DR in the GY, add a DR target, add another Dredger, add a land, add a Firestorm/Tireless Tribe, etc.).

Cheers,
jares

[jares]

Regarding additional SB threats vs Surgical Extractions, I think you should play 1xAhen Ghoul and XxNether Shadows where you can SB out X of your Ichorids (in the case of Quadlazer, -2 Ichorid) and diversify your threat base to minimize the impact of Surgical Extraction.

I also currently like this suggestion over running a few Gravecrawlers. I'll need to continue testing Ashen Ghoul, though - in fact, it might be worth testing it alongside a Gravecrawler or two, or maybe even one of each (which would seem like the best way to minimize the effect of Surgical Extraction). Come to think about it, has anyone ever tested the following post-board configuration?

• [1x] Ichorid (possibly more)
• [1x] Ashen Ghoul
• [1x] Nether Shadow
• [1x] Gravecrawler

The deck is threat dense enough to let you get away with it to an extent

With this I most certainly agree. In fact, this is also one of the major considerations that I build my configuration around.

Kind Regards,
jares

[Final Fortune]

Gravecrawler isn't the same kind of threat as Nether Shadow and Ashen Ghoul, because Gravecrawler's consistency is baded on the number of Gravecrawlers in the deck, where each can be hard cast to recur others, and where Nether Shadow and Ashen Ghoul are fine as just 2xetc.

I don't think I'd bother to reduce my deck to 1xIchorid, there's a line between reducing the impact of Surgical Extraction and increasing the impact of Swords to Plowshares and the effectiveness of the aggro beat down plan.