Melissa DeTora featured that decklist on the mothership
The Grim Tutor got me thinking, what percentage of the time is Infernal Tutor bad?
I'm sorry if this topic has been discussed before but this deck has (or can play) a bunch of awesome high-impact 1ofs and the gameplan already involves both players being hellbent.
It is definitely easy to be hellbent is any Pox deck with cheap spells and discard outlets like smallpox and liliana.Originally Posted by apocolyps6
I could image a common situation is that you are hellbent casting a tutor (Grim or Infernal) with an active Liliana and not enough mana to cast the tutor and what ever you searched for so you'd have to be able to plus liliana first then cast a hellbent tutor then cast what you searched for the next turn before plusing liliana again, with grim tutor you don't need to worry about that potential awkwardness. So I'd think Grim Tutor is better but that is part of why it has a price tag 25 times Infernal Tutor.
We have discussed this before and Omnistrata pointed out that tutors are not mana efficient and potentially card disadvantage, both are valid points so if we want a tutor in the deck it need to be a high enough impact play to overcome this. A good example is how high impact Crop Rotation for Tabernacle is in a GB Pox deck. Another way to justify it is to give us more versatility which as you pointed out being able to play "a bunch of awesome high-impact 1ofs"
I wish there were more local legacy events so that I could try out more of these things.
I think more of the reason this person ran the tutor is because we wanted to have the high impact permanent answers like nether void, night of Souls betrayal and chains. Having a tutor essentially gives him additional copies of whatever card is relevant. For that reason it is perfectly fine. Infernal tutor is an awkward one for sure though. In top deck wars it could give you exactly what you need when you need it. But as you said having liliana be the reason you're in that top deck war makes tutor extremely awkward.
Tutors are black mana's version of hand sculpting. They're not Brainstorm and they have higher mana costs and what really stinks is when Liliana is out and we need to have land on hand to cast what we tutored for. Otherwise, we can't use Liliana.
If you're poxing often, cause I run big pox as well as smallpox and wastelands, and Mishra's factory is punching your enemy with Cursed Scrolls, getting the mana needed to cast what you tutored becomes unlikely. The vast majority of Pox decks we see winning don't use tutors, but rather high quality permanents in order to prevent our opponent from playing. Nether Void, Ensnaring Bridge, Chains of Mephistopheles, and Liliana probably being the absolute most dangerous ones.
Tutors from what I've seen only work for the biggie combo decks. If you're going for a 20/20 Indestructible Marit Lage, you want that setup 2 turns ago. I've almost never been in a situation where I couldn't get what I needed over time. Some people run only 1-2 Nether Spirits and when i'm playing Pox, I never fail to see my one-ofs in most games [yay Bridge for stalling for time] Traditional Pox decks can't win with a tutor since we have no game winner-in-one-turn game plans.
I never have mana to cast what I've tutored anyway and that always sucks. Tutor is like a timewalk I spent money for for them!
Three Lilianas to rule them all. One Pox to find them. Smallpox to bring them all and in the Sinkhole bind them!
I irritated a 12 post player yesterday.
First game i drew all four wastelands prompting my opponent to holler "-Deck check on Carl-Magnus here!" (not that we do any at the local place:-))
Next game i had to mulligan, but got a hand with wasteland and Surgical extraction. When i wasted his cloudpost, and removed them all from the game, my opponent scooped the cards in disgust:-D:-D:-D
"Pox early, Pox often, and Pox hard!" - Le_Lepreux
If you're pissing someone off, then you're doing it right! Besides, a mature player accepts his weakness and moves on, but the tenacious ones fight to the death! In my local games, I usually go ahead and fight Dredge game 1 despite the impossible matchup. In a serious tourney, I scoop and save time lolz.
I've never fought 12 post but I run Extirpate instead of Surgicals. Ah, good times.
Three Lilianas to rule them all. One Pox to find them. Smallpox to bring them all and in the Sinkhole bind them!
Josh how much has your list changed since you top 8'd that SCG? Are you running DD/Thespians in your 75?
Below is pretty close to what I am playing now, My top 8 list was the last tournament before adding darkdepths. I really like my current list, I never change more than a couple cards from tournament to tournament mostly sideboard. I have thought about going back to a no dark depths build but there are not enough local events for me to be able to effectively test bigger changes like that. The post below is from Legacy Champs time frame (August?)
Dark depths was mostly a concession to avoid draws that I was getting against miracles a lot. I needed a fast clock, I think that was discussed further in this thread when I made the change.
I have tried surgicals in the main deck once, and am thinking of doing so again.
"Pox early, Pox often, and Pox hard!" - Le_Lepreux
If you ultimately ditched the DD Combo would you still run crop rotations main?
I suppose, he could get wasteland, tabernacle, karakas, and maze of it. Or something else.
"Pox early, Pox often, and Pox hard!" - Le_Lepreux
Maze of Ith... ah, the awesome sauce when there's 1 threat and you don't have an answer for it yet... Quick question, what in the rulings allows you to attack with a Mishra's, untap it after damage with Ith, and then use it for mana main phase 2? The card itself says prevent all damage this turn. Or was that only effective when damage used the stack way back when?
Three Lilianas to rule them all. One Pox to find them. Smallpox to bring them all and in the Sinkhole bind them!
Taking damages doesn't end the attack phase.
So you can still use Maze of Ith once the damages are done to untap Mishra (for example).
Thus Mishra is available to produce some mana main phase 2.
No doubt there is utility, but without the ability to win out of nowhere it makes you wonder if its worth it since you already have Entomb / Loam to find your special lands and Bojuka Bog is really only the land you need at instant speed.
GB without DD is not worth it imo.
It is what make it worthwhile, otherwise you could go play mono b.
"Pox early, Pox often, and Pox hard!" - Le_Lepreux
Agreed. DD is what makes gb pox an alternative choice, even abrupt decay and loam aren't worth it alone. However, once you commit to crop rotation it becomes natural to include those other cards. In my limited testing of gb pox with depths it has shown itself to be leagues ahead of other win cons (worm harvest, factory, nether spirit.) The deck space required is hardly oppressive, about 6-10 cards while also providing a toolbox with bog, maze, and tabernacle.
Brainstorm Realist
I close my eyes and sink within myself, relive the gift of precious memories, in need of a fix called innocence. - Chuck Shuldiner
I don't know if I agree with that. Life from the Loam allows you to cast smallpox more aggressively and create CA out of it much easier.
Crucible of Worlds is equivalent in mono-black. Cycle lands as a card advantage tool in loam pox is abysmally slow, really only worth about two of the land slots. Wasteland recursion, and land recursion post-pox/smallpox is actually more efficient with Crucible due to its one-time cost. Loam is much more mana hungry as an engine.
Brainstorm Realist
I close my eyes and sink within myself, relive the gift of precious memories, in need of a fix called innocence. - Chuck Shuldiner
I will note that crucible also allows you to take actual draw steps as well so that you can draw action
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