Would you actually post in a Vintage subforum?

[mmcgeach]

The problem is that there are quite a few "tuned" Vintage Aggro lists that require only minimum Power (typically a Lotus and on-color Mox[en]). Some of them look quite fun, like the mono-white one and the Vintage-Edition of Deadguy Ale.

OH man, there should be a vintage subforum!

First, as an aside, the requirements of vintage decks to run power is a regional one: tournaments in USA allow 15 proxies (or more), while tournaments in Europe allow no proxies. But it's common in European tournaments to give out significant prizes to the top-performing unpowered deck.

There's historically been very few good (pure) aggro decks in Vintage. I think the reason for this is two-fold: 1) there's fast and strong combos in vintage, which tend to provide a more efficient wincon than swinging with dudes or bolts to the face, leading people who might want to play aggro to play combo instead, and leading people who do play aggro to lose to combo players. And 2) decks that get bigger dudes into play using, eg, oath of druids or mishra's workshop. That being said, here's a pure aggro deck that got 2nd in a 41-player tournament: http://morphling.de/printview.php?c=1580&d=2. (41-players is pretty respectable for vintage events. Also note he lost in the finals to Oath of Druids.)

Thus, the successful aggro decks have to be at least half focused on disruption. In vintage this means artifact destruction in addition to the discard and wastelands common in legacy. This basically define the "fish" archetype. There's sort of a careful balance a fish deck has to run between playing aggressive creatures and disruptive creatures. It's not quite as simple as taking a successful legacy deck and adding moxes and a lotus. There are, of course, successful ports of legacy decks to vintage, but it requires some testing and development to get the build right. And I think this would be a great benefit of a Vintage subforum here! We could get great legacy players thinking about how best to bring aggro decks and successful legacy builds to the vintage format. It's win-win!

This thread is already full of great vintage discussion...

[socialite]

The only straight aggro deck viable in Vintage is Dredge. If you want to play aggro but not Dredge, Fish is it. RUG, Bant, GW, and BUG are all solid choices.

[Koby]

The only acceptable form of Aggro is attacking with Myr Battelsphere and his army of peons.

[aahz]

The only acceptable form of Aggro is attacking with Myr Battelsphere and his army of peons.

My Alpha Scathe Zombie tokens beg to differ.

[Solaran_X]

My Alpha Scathe Zombie tokens beg to differ.

All the budget aggro decks wit 3-4 Grafdigger's Cage and 3-4 Stony Silence/Null Rod beg to differ with you both.

[Koby]

All the budget aggro decks wit 3-4 Grafdigger's Cage and 3-4 Stony Silence/Null Rod beg to differ with you both.

Still dense I see. Explain how removing none of Battleball's activated abilities stop it from turning sideways, Mr Ponypower.

[bfeingersh]

Posting my current BUG list for opinions. I started with a list that got top 8 at BoM, made a few changes and I'm pretty happy with it. Now that Tinker's gone I think I'm going to cut Crypt for something, I don't know if I need more mana or if I can just have it be another Snapcaster.

Creatures:
4 Dark Confidant
3 Tarmogoyf
2 Snapcaster Mage
2 Trygon Predator

Disruption:
2 Thoughtseize
4 Force of Will
2 Flusterstorm
2 Mental Misstep
1 Hurkyl's Recall
2 Mystic Remora

Draw/Tutor:
1 Brainstorm
1 Ponder
3 Preordain
1 Gush
1 Ancestral Recall
1 Demonic Tutor
1 Vampiric Tutor
1 Merchant Scroll

Busted:
1 Yawgmoth's Will
1 Time Walk
1 Jace, the Mind Sculptor

Mana:
5 Mox
1 Black Lotus
1 Mana Crypt
1 Sol Ring
3 Tropical Island
3 Underground Sea
1 Island
4 Misty Rainforest
1 Polluted Delta
1 Flooded Strand
1 Strip Mine
1 Wasteland

Sideboard:
2 Flusterstorm
1 Hurkyl's Recall
2 Dismember
4 Leyline of the Void
1 Nihil Spellbomb
2 Yixlid Jailor
3 Nature's Claim

[Koby]

Not sure why even include Y-will when there's no inherently broken spell to cast. You should probably also bump Gush to 3-4 copies as a source of card advantage. Adding a 2nd Jace wouldn't hurt too, since you're trying to play fair. I'm glad to see no Mystical Tutor in the list - the card is just bad and overhyped.

[bfeingersh]

My first change to the BoM list was - Mystical Scroll Tinker Colossus Vault Key, +2 Snapcaster 2 Thoughtseize 2 Standstill. The Standstills became Remoras but the Snapcasters stuck around. I put Scroll back in when I added Gush (cut Sower and 3rd Trygon)

Will is never really used to end the game, just for value (flash back an Ancestral, play an extra creature, take an extra turn, etc.).

[Koby]

Seems like just adding more Snapcasters would get the job done better.

[nedleeds]

All the budget aggro decks wit 3-4 Grafdigger's Cage and 3-4 Stony Silence/Null Rod beg to differ with you both.

Stony Silence is out of my main for Gencon. Kataki and Pridemage will have to get it done. Stony Silence is dead a doorknob against the man based shop decks (and even just plain old smokestack) and is pretty useless vs. the Delver decks. At this point it's best use is stopping Time Vault.

I think it's a fine card but being dead against all the above and Dredge (and other g/w aggro stuff) means moving it to the side (at least for me).

Oh ... and it can't attack.

[socialite]

Ben,
If I were you I would probably drop Gush for Mystic Remora #3 and Merchant Scroll for JtMS #2. Dark Confidant coupled with Mystic Remora is a solid choice for our local meta.

Despite a few bigger names running Gush with Remora, I found the synergy between the two more detrimental then beneficial. Gush isn't well positioned enough to run a straight Gro build and to be honest a lot of those builds were super greedy running both Dark Confidant and Gush.

Merchant scroll is clunky with Remora and rather lacking considering your target selection.

If you want to run a miser's Strip Mine OK but cut the Wasteland for a basic Island and adjust the dual to basic ratio. You almost certainly want a basic Forest out of the board as well. The mana base in it's current form is just asking for punishment.

[Koby]

@Ben
Got me thinking... Cut Gush, Scroll, Will, and 2 Remoras; add 1 Snapcaster Mage, 2 Trinket Mage, 1 Skullclamp, and Jace #2.


SnapClamp baby!
<grin>

[xfxf]

Guys, shouldn't you be discussing this in the Vintage BUG thread? Oh sorry, we were trying to get it opened, my bad...

[Arianrhod]

I guess for now this will have to do, until our desire is recognized!

I'll contribute my Bomberman build:

3x Jace TMS
1x Tezz the Seeker

3x Trinket Mage
3x Auriok Salvagers
3x Snapcaster Mage

3x Mana Drain
4x Force of Will
2x Spell Snare
2x Mental Misstep
1x Ancestral Recall
1x Vamp Tutor
1x Demonic Tutor
1x Brainstorm
1x Merchant Scroll
1x Time Walk
1x Tinker
1x Repeal

5x Moxen
1x Lotus
1x Sol Ring
1x Mana Crypt
1x Time Vault
1x Voltaic Key
1x Nihil Spellbomb
1x Aether Spellbomb
1x Sensei's Divining Top

2x Island
1x Plains
3x Polluted Delta
3x Flooded Strand
2x Underground Sea
3x Tundra
1x Tolarian Academy
1x Library of Alexandria

//Sb
2x Devout Witness
3x Energy Flux
2x Surgical Extraction
1x Grafdigger's Cage
1x Tormod's Crypt
2x Yixlid Jailer
2x Massacre
2x Flusterstorm

Still very unsure about some of the choices -- experimenting with running Top and Repeal instead of a tinkerbot and Thirst. Thirst was always meh whenever I found it, Tinkerbot has so many commonly maindecked answers it isn't even funny anymore. I always thought Top wouldn't do enough for me, but it's been pretty good so far, and tricks with Key and Repeal are always awesome. Repeal gives me (an) answer for Stoney Silence other than just beating down or planeswalkers, which is nice.

[mmcgeach]

I agree with the Bob + Jace + Remora suggestion for the BUG fish deck... that's definitely the conventional wisdom or safest choice. That Trinket Mage + Skullclamp idea is more out there... could be a lot of fun. :)

For Bomberman, you need Cavern of Souls. All your men are humans and having your combo being uncounterable is pretty strong. Why no EE? (And that's a legitimate question... I haven't played bomberman enough to know if spellbombs do enough w/o EE).

[Arianrhod]

I was actually thinking about editing in that I'm planning on trying a pair of Caverns tonight at my local, but had decided to wait until after the event =P I should probably trim out two of the Deltas, I'm guessing (which annoys me, since they're pack foil and the strands just regular lol).

EE hasn't impressed me whenever I've tried it. I'd like it if it could kill Null Rod or Stony Silence, but obviously there's a problem there. Dredge is a faceroll already since black allows me to play Nihil Spellbomb. It could be decent against shops, but at the same time, it doesn't kill the things I really care about (ie Lodestone Golem). It would also likely have to be tutored, and resolving a Trinket Mage can be hard enough, even with full artifact mana and Drains. Besdies, I'd rather just drop Energy Flux and watch them writhe in agony.

[bfeingersh]

@Ben
Got me thinking... Cut Gush, Scroll, Will, and 2 Remoras; add 1 Snapcaster Mage, 2 Trinket Mage, 1 Skullclamp, and Jace #2.


SnapClamp baby!
<grin>

If I had seen this message 6 hours earlier I could have tried it tonight. I ran the above list -1 Crypt +1 Snapcaster to 3-1 tonight, lost to Bant fish off 2 mulls to 5 :(

[Final Ritual]

Not sure why even include Y-will when there's no inherently broken spell to cast. You should probably also bump Gush to 3-4 copies as a source of card advantage. Adding a 2nd Jace wouldn't hurt too, since you're trying to play fair. I'm glad to see no Mystical Tutor in the list - the card is just bad and overhyped.

I would also add two more gush to the deck. Just cut the mystic remoras for another MM and mystical tutor.

[Arianrhod]

Repeal was a boss for me all night. Cavern was never relevant one way or the other...not sure what I think about it at this point. Definitely nice for my creatures to resolve for certain, but if they're holding a counter, it'll just nuke my Lotus, which is awkward and annoying.

Lost the last round to Cobra Gush -- my opponent had the stonecold nuts both games, and I actually misplayed really badly in game two, or I might have stabilized -through- his draw. Even as a tutor for Vault/Key/Lotus/Spellbomb, Tinker isn't impressing me at the moment. Might try to cut that. If I cut Tinker, do you guys think I should also cut Mana Crypt?