[Deck] Dredge

[Cipher]

First of all I don't like Flame-Kin Zealot as it demands bridges in your gy to do something at all. And even if you get it to do something it will just win one turn faster. Most of the time you will win anyway one turn later because after you "comboed off" you can strip your opponent of his most valuable spells and assemble a huge army of the undead. FKZ is useless against prison effects like Elefant Grass.

If you want to play the Dread Return package I would use Flayer of the Hatebound in addition to Griselbrand. Flayer can win without bridges, goes through prisons and turns your Ichorids into Lightning Bolts. My biggest concern with Flayer is the "need" for a third Dread Return.

You should not cut Cephalid Coliseums and Careful Study. Study is the best card to cast out of coliseum. It also helps in postboard games finding your antihate pieces. I would rather cut a breakthrough before cutting studies.

Thanks for the response.

I stated in my post that FKZ is in the sideboard for combo decks. He's there is to win 1 turn faster, specifically when they play Show and Tell and pass the turn, or something along those lines. I figure that Griselbrand flipping your entire deck has to be stronger than anything else, except for the situation where cabal therapy on their entire hand is still going to lose the game. That's why I wanted the FKZ.

I'm thinking I've figured out why you guys are running the Flayer. It deals 4, then you hopefully sacrifice it again to deal 5, which is 9 total. But I don't think it's necessary to run 2x targets in the maindeck, and the Flayer's got to be worse after sideboarding than specific targets that are tailored to matchups.

About the Coliseums: I didn't have any Careful Study in my list. The 2 Coliseum's came out for them.

[Ziilot]

Thanks for the response.

I stated in my post that FKZ is in the sideboard for combo decks. He's there is to win 1 turn faster, specifically when they play Show and Tell and pass the turn, or something along those lines. I figure that Griselbrand flipping your entire deck has to be stronger than anything else, except for the situation where cabal therapy on their entire hand is still going to lose the game. That's why I wanted the FKZ.

I'm thinking I've figured out why you guys are running the Flayer. It deals 4, then you hopefully sacrifice it again to deal 5, which is 9 total. But I don't think it's necessary to run 2x targets in the maindeck, and the Flayer's got to be worse after sideboarding than specific targets that are tailored to matchups.

About the Coliseums: I didn't have any Careful Study in my list. The 2 Coliseum's came out for them.

You animate Flayer and then you animate Golgari Grave-Troll and that's a game. But I for myself would not play Dread Returns in my 75.

I was playing standard quadlazer list in Bazaar of Moxen main event, played 5-2-1 drop :/

Draw:
R7 vs. Nic Fit - Very loooooong match. Punted in a second game, because I didn't have third black creature for Ichorid and last turn I had discarded GGT. (I had so many Stinkweed Imps in my hand)

Losses:
R2 vs. Death and Taxes - I still can't play against Bojuka Bog. (1st turn Bojuka Bog, 2nd turn RiP) 1-2
R8 vs. RUG - Guy had three maindecked Scavening Ooze and he drew 2 Ooze + 2 Surgical opening hand in second match 0-2

I haven't played MTG in a year so it was fun but I think over 15 rounds MTG in a weekend is too much :D

[Onslaught]

I play Legacy pretty infrequently, but I like some of the cards in Dredge enough to want to have a deck built for it. With that in mind, I'm willing to have a suboptimal build in order to meet some of my pet deck criteria, though obviously I still want to maximize the competitiveness as much as possible within my weird requirements. Which are:

-Bloodghast instead of Ichorid
-No LED
-Unmask maindeck x4

With those rules in mind, here is what I've been playing (and thoroughly enjoying) lately:

4 Unmask
4 Cabal Therapy

4 Bridge from Below
4 Narcomoeba
4 Bloodghast

4 Golgari Grave Troll
4 Stinkweed Imp
1 Golgari Thug
1 Darkblast

4 Careful Study
4 Faithless Looting
3 Breakthrough

2 Dread Return
1 Griselbrand

4 City of Brass
4 Cephalid Coliseum
3 Undiscovered Paradise
3 Gemstone Mine
2 Dakmor Salvage


Sideboard: standard array of Nature's Claims, Ray, Grudge, Chain of Vapor, toolbox reanimation targets, etc. Also contemplating a Dark Depths transformational board, or Painter/Grindstone.

So if anyone has suggestions to improve this build given my weirdo criteria at the top, I'd love the input. On a side note, why did Entomb never catch on in Dredge?

[raikenxy]

I play Legacy pretty infrequently, but I like some of the cards in Dredge enough to want to have a deck built for it. With that in mind, I'm willing to have a suboptimal build in order to meet some of my pet deck criteria, though obviously I still want to maximize the competitiveness as much as possible within my weird requirements. Which are:

-Bloodghast instead of Ichorid
-No LED
-Unmask maindeck x4

With those rules in mind, here is what I've been playing (and thoroughly enjoying) lately:

4 Unmask
4 Cabal Therapy

4 Bridge from Below
4 Narcomoeba
4 Bloodghast

4 Golgari Grave Troll
4 Stinkweed Imp
1 Golgari Thug
1 Darkblast

4 Careful Study
4 Faithless Looting
3 Breakthrough

2 Dread Return
1 Griselbrand

4 City of Brass
4 Cephalid Coliseum
3 Undiscovered Paradise
3 Gemstone Mine
2 Dakmor Salvage


Sideboard: standard array of Nature's Claims, Ray, Grudge, Chain of Vapor, toolbox reanimation targets, etc. Also contemplating a Dark Depths transformational board, or Painter/Grindstone.

So if anyone has suggestions to improve this build given my weirdo criteria at the top, I'd love the input. On a side note, why did Entomb never catch on in Dredge?

im not rlly sure why you want to run 4 unmask's main? theyre rlly not that synergistic with your cards or the decks strategy at all. Even playing with lands, you will never as a dredge player have four lands on board to hardcast an unmask, so if you can't hardcast that i assume you'll be exiling the black cards from your hand as an alternate cost.

THIS IS NOT OPTIMAL

1) your either exiling your own beaters (ichorid/bloodghast) or your own dredgers, or even worse your own bridges... which you DONT want. you want your dredgers in the graveyard, not exiled. theres a reason why surgical extraction is a pain to deal with, so don't surgically extract urself to play Unmask when you can simply play Cabal therapy for 1 instead, and then for free the second time around.

2) Bloodghasts are rlly not that reliable without dakmore salvage, and i think if you played with ichorid you'd realize that simply having ichorid come back for a creature like putrid imp is better then having a sub-optimal dredge with a dakmor salvage that is not even that useful once its on the field anyway.

if you don't wanna play with LED's i'd recommend the LEDless builds with tireless tribes or faithless looting in place of LED's.

dredge is a combo deck first, so no reason to dilute the combo since game one you usually win anyway. id reccommend running gitaxian probe over unmask, it makes your therapies better and accelerates dredging turn one.

that being said if you like the deck list play it by all means, i think you'd enjoy and get more out of it though with ichorids and probe though

[tyriion]

On a side note, why did Entomb never catch on in Dredge?

Because for one mana you can do more powerful stuff. Like Careful Study, Faithless Looting, activate Cephalid Coliseum or Breakthrough. I'd say even Putrid Imp is better, as he allows you to recur your dredgers each turn.

[Que]

I personally like to play at least one dread return in the 75. It gives the deck a bit of versatility. Sometimes decks can't beat a DR'd 15/15 Troll that regenerates. It gives you the ability to churn out a lot more tokens from a single source. And it gives you another sac outlet in the event your cabal therapies get extracted/extirpated..etc.. and its only 1 slot.

[tyriion]

I personally like to play at least one dread return in the 75. It gives the deck a bit of versatility. Sometimes decks can't beat a DR'd 15/15 Troll that regenerates. It gives you the ability to churn out a lot more tokens from a single source. And it gives you another sac outlet in the event your cabal therapies get extracted/extirpated..etc.. and its only 1 slot.

I'm going to take the deck for one more tournament before shelving it for the rest of the summer as more and more people start bringing GY hate in. Especially as some people picked up TinFins around here as well. One thing I noticed over my last 3 or 4 tournaments is that I didn't really cast Dread Return. (Running quadlazer where I dropped one Ichorid for a DR) And when I did it wasn't enough. So while in theory it sounds great you need a pretty good position before you are able to cast it so it feels like win-more or the reanimated grave troll is too late to change the game.

So I'm now dropping it in favor of Darkblast as an extra dredger in the main. Hopefully this will make the deck mull better, although I'm very much thinking about a 13th land as well.

[chlb]

Quick question about sideboarding with the standard Quadlazer list:

If you anticipate both Surgical Extraction and Grafdigger's Cage, do you usually board in both the Ashen Ghouls and the Nature's Claims along with the land package? Or do you just ignore the Surgical in this case and board against Cage only?

[Cipher]

Quick question about sideboarding with the standard Quadlazer list:

If you anticipate both Surgical Extraction and Grafdigger's Cage, do you usually board in both the Ashen Ghouls and the Nature's Claims along with the land package? Or do you just ignore the Surgical in this case and board against Cage only?

I would board an Ancient Grudge if I suspected. It's a good singleton since you "draw" it extremely easily.

[tyriion]

I would board an Ancient Grudge if I suspected. It's a good singleton since you "draw" it extremely easily.

Would be quite useless against cage however, as you are not allowed to flash it back under the cage effect. If my opponent would board both these cards it would depend on the number really and the deck you are facing. They will probably have 3-4 extractions and 1-4 cages. Depending on whether or not they can tutor them and how dedicated they are to grave hate. As you should easily have room to board 8 cards for game 2 I'd bring in 3 Ghouls and 5 artifact hate. Against Cage the Grudge isn't your best bet though.

[Onslaught]

Here's an updated version of my list from a few posts ago, I figured if I am going to dilute the deck by playing Unmask I might as well maximize the usefulness of the disruption by having a transformational combo sideboard (similar to the Imperial Painter/Grindstone/Enlightened Tutor sideboard package). Also, I feel like with my grindy playstyle that Dread Return for Griselbrand has been a win more, though I still am going to leave behind a single copy of Dread Return as a Bridge enabler/Grave Troll reanimator. If I were to play a non Grave Troll target for Dread Return, it would just be a sideboarded Flamekin Zealot to use against combo...but that's not necessary since I board into a win condition that dodges all graveyard hate.

With the cut Griselbrand/Dread Return, I went ahead and made a few more modifications to get LEDs into the deck. I'm not that impressed with them outside of the obviously amazing "Land, LED, cast Looting, crack LED in response" opening, but ultimately I just needed more discard outlets than what I was playing. It came down to Putrid Imp vs LED, and the explosive early wins from LED made it the clear winner. I would have liked to try a 3 Bloodghast/1 Ichorid split if I had gone with Putrid Imps though, as it would have raised my black creature count kinda high enough to support Ichorid.

[Countertoplol]

Here's an updated version of my list from a few posts ago, I figured if I am going to dilute the deck by playing Unmask I might as well maximize the usefulness of the disruption by having a transformational combo sideboard (similar to the Imperial Painter/Grindstone/Enlightened Tutor sideboard package). Also, I feel like with my grindy playstyle that Dread Return for Griselbrand has been a win more, though I still am going to leave behind a single copy of Dread Return as a Bridge enabler/Grave Troll reanimator. If I were to play a non Grave Troll target for Dread Return, it would just be a sideboarded Flamekin Zealot to use against combo...but that's not necessary since I board into a win condition that dodges all graveyard hate.

With the cut Griselbrand/Dread Return, I went ahead and made a few more modifications to get LEDs into the deck. I'm not that impressed with them outside of the obviously amazing "Land, LED, cast Looting, crack LED in response" opening, but ultimately I just needed more discard outlets than what I was playing. It came down to Putrid Imp vs LED, and the explosive early wins from LED made it the clear winner. I would have liked to try a 3 Bloodghast/1 Ichorid split if I had gone with Putrid Imps though, as it would have raised my black creature count kinda high enough to support Ichorid.

Have you even tried playing the regular quadlazer list? I tried playing your build for a few games and it just felt completely underpowered compared to a stock dredge list. If you can afford the LEDs, I don't know why you want to downgrade from pimp and ichorid, they're infinity better than unmask and bloodghast.

[Seraph2k]

But he is playing LEDs..

[Countertoplol]

But he is playing LEDs..

Yea, i'm saying that if he can afford to get the regular LED version, why play a suboptimal list when he could just play quadlazer.

[fimo]

I want to start stating that i m very new with the deck... I picked up the deck for two reasons: 1) it plays magic in an absurd way that no other magic deck does (it is damn fun) and 2) It is very hard to play against it unless you know it well, so learning how to play this deck makes you a better magic player overall. This is of course true for every deck there is, but I think it is true in particular for dredge because of the crazy way it plays. I find particularly attractive the randomness that dredging brings about: when you dredge you don t know beforehand what is going to end up in your GY and this opens up for a ton of different situations and decision making.

I don t own LEDs (yet) so I m playing the LEDless version. However, when I look at lists on the internet it seems like nobody plays firestorm MD. I wonder why... It seems like such a powerful card. Especially the printing of DRS and ooze make this card amazing. I understand that it is weak against combo but in worst case scenario it still lets you discard 2 cards. I have the feeling that decks running DRS have much less hard-GYhate in the SB because they already have 4 pieces of GY hate MD. A firestorm can completelly ruin their day.
Also: is griselbrend the best MD dread return target right now? is iona and FKZ outdated from the MD?
thanks in advance for the help!

[Niggurath]

Could someone post a LEDless dredge list? Can't find any recent and decent list.

I'm trying to play this deck on MTGO, but can't afford LEDs since it's the expensivest card right now

Thanks in advance!

[Anusien]

4 Golgari Grave-Troll
4 Stinkweed Imp
4 Golgari Thug
4 Careful Study
4 Faithless Looting
4 Cabal Therapy
4 Putrid Imp
4 Breakthrough
4 Cephalid Coliseum
4 City of Brass
4 Gemstone Mine
4 Tarnished Citadel
3 Ichorid
4 Narcomoeba
4 Bridge from Below
1 Dread Return

[Niggurath]

4 Golgari Grave-Troll
4 Stinkweed Imp
4 Golgari Thug
4 Careful Study
4 Faithless Looting
4 Cabal Therapy
4 Putrid Imp
4 Breakthrough
4 Cephalid Coliseum
4 City of Brass
4 Gemstone Mine
4 Tarnished Citadel
3 Ichorid
4 Narcomoeba
4 Bridge from Below
1 Dread Return

Thank you very much. No tireless tribe? I suppose it's hard to find slots for them.

[Vandalize]

Thank you very much. No tireless tribe? I suppose it's hard to find slots for them.

People used to run Tireless Tribe before Faithless Looting was printed. But it's pretty bad compared to FL. It does offer an extra body for Cabal Therapy and Dread Return and does block like a pro, but Faithless Looting add lots of consistency and explosiveness.

I, personally wouldn't run more than 15 lands in Dredge, because getting flooded with lands that hurt you (like Tarnished and City of Brass) can add damage pretty fast, and LEDless is a full turn slower than LED.

I, personally would run this:

4 Gemstone Mine
4 City of Brass
4 Cephalid Coliseum
3 Tarnished Citadel
4 Stinkweed Imp
4 Golgari Grave-Troll
4 Golgari Thug
4 Narcomoeba
4 Putrid Imp
3 Ichorid
4 Careful Study
4 Breakthrough
4 Faithless Looting
4 Cabal Therapy
4 Bridge from Below
2 Dread Return
SB: 4 Nature's Claim
SB: 4 Firestorm
SB: 2 Wispmare
SB: 2 Ancient Grudge
SB: 1 Elesh Norn, Grand Cenobite
SB: 1 Iona, Shield of Emeria
SB: 1 Ray of Revelation

Or you can even put -1 Putrid Imp/Breakthrough and +1 Griselbrand, for more explosiveness. It's a pretty good list, and does mulligan a lot less than LED versions (maybe it's even to Quadlazer).

[Niggurath]

People used to run Tireless Tribe before Faithless Looting was printed. But it's pretty bad compared to FL. It does offer an extra body for Cabal Therapy and Dread Return and does block like a pro, but Faithless Looting add lots of consistency and explosiveness.

I, personally wouldn't run more than 15 lands in Dredge, because getting flooded with lands that hurt you (like Tarnished and City of Brass) can add damage pretty fast, and LEDless is a full turn slower than LED.

I, personally would run this:

4 Gemstone Mine
4 City of Brass
4 Cephalid Coliseum
3 Tarnished Citadel
4 Stinkweed Imp
4 Golgari Grave-Troll
4 Golgari Thug
4 Narcomoeba
4 Putrid Imp
3 Ichorid
4 Careful Study
4 Breakthrough
4 Faithless Looting
4 Cabal Therapy
4 Bridge from Below
2 Dread Return
SB: 4 Nature's Claim
SB: 4 Firestorm
SB: 2 Wispmare
SB: 2 Ancient Grudge
SB: 1 Elesh Norn, Grand Cenobite
SB: 1 Iona, Shield of Emeria
SB: 1 Ray of Revelation

Or you can even put -1 Putrid Imp/Breakthrough and +1 Griselbrand, for more explosiveness. It's a pretty good list, and does mulligan a lot less than LED versions (maybe it's even to Quadlazer).

Hey Vandalize, I did some goldfishing yesterday, and already did some changes: -1 Tarnished Citadel +1 Griselbrand. I like your 2x Dread Return idea, because sometimes I had to dredge almost all the deck in order to find it, so I'll will try -1 Breakthrough +1 Dread Return.

I understand running Griselbrand gives more explosiveness, but here comes a question: isn't it better to run Flame-Kin because it makes you win a turn earlier?