Vintage Strategy

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  Read Me! Vintage Strategy FAQ
  • Brass Man

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  R/G hatebears (deck in Progress)
  • John Cox

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  https://www.mtggoldfish.com/deck/1226275#paper

  inspiration

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  How are you training for Eternal Weekend?
  • moorebrother1

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  walk around between matches. Gets the blood flowing.
  Been using untap with @Prkchpsndwiches to run the "gauntlet" of decks we expect to see, and that is working well. Allows us ot build things/change fast, as well as talk through strategy and proper play without feeling pressure.

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  Gifts and Intuition Piles.
  • Sovarius

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  @neo_altoid said in Gifts and Intuition Piles.:

  @brass-man said in Gifts and Intuition Piles.:

  lethal gifts The cheapest deterministic Gifts kill with no additional requirements is Time Vault/Voltaic Key/Argivian Find/Reconstruction which clocks in at 6 mana post-Gifts. I don't know if I'm into this because of how much worse it is to naturally draw Find/Reconstruction than the cards that other kills use.

  The Auriok Salvager pile of Lotus, Salvager, (some sort of Salvager combo wincon), and Unburial Rites kills for 7 mana. If you already have a wincon, it kills for 6! Just a "worth noting" one, as another known Gifts pile which works, and doesn't include too many bad cards

  And having salvagers in play already, you get lotus, walking ballista any 2 cards you want and win for effectively no mana.

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  Survival Salad
  deck tech deck discussion decklist survival hollowone • • wfain

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  @drstreetmention @GutoCmtt
  I suspect there is a no Bazaar BUGish version that cuts Hollow One down to a one of, plays Prized Amalgam and Gravecrawler in addition to FoW and Missteps. Maybe has room for a Dack or two. I’ll think about what that might look like.

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  Druid
  deck tech decklist deck discu • • J-B-E

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  @brass-man

  Fair I didn't really go into a huge amount of detail and just focused on the fun part of seeing your opponent bring in 8 dead cards.

  Yes but I did say I was going out on a limb, it's a bold claim and could well not be true

  As for the dead cards, the only completely dead ones are the bridges, you can cast Dread Return, it doesn't come up, you can cast the narcos & pitch them to FOW, Lab Man again is castable but not ideal and is deep Analysis.

  Definitely easier to transform Oath into OmniTell as you said due to the creatures being in the deck already. The advantage with this transform is that you tend to get your opponent way more in the board with the exception of Containment Priest, however you can play around that.

  TBH I think the suggestions from this thread of using Angel of Glory's Rise instead of Deep Analysis are good and I've made that change to the list, didn't fully agree on the Azami, sure it gives you slightly more resilience but Snapcaster probe seems a fraction better and limits the number of dead cards.

  You can resolve Oath, untap and not win the game whether it be through not having a Forbiden Orchard or simply that Emrakul wont get it done, tbf Griselbrand does 95+% of the time I would imagine.

  Testing has gone really well, it's been quite a long process. The original build had Concordant Crossroads, Cavern of Souls and was just a silly turn 1 win or lose deck.

  I think that Thoughtseize is really fantastic in Vintage , so many decks have specific cards in them the deck is trying to find, like Oath, PO etc and being able to take the one card they need leaving the rest is pretty strong.PO especially will keep a hand that either has a PO, Tinker, maybe even a draw 7 and nothing else so the Thoughtseizes are pretty great there.

  Aggro Shops is an awful match up game 1, Revoker & Ballista are close to unbeatable, improves a lot game 2 as they tend to weaken their deck a bit bringing in graveyard hate, needles etc and also use Revoker/ Needle to name Hermit Druid.

  I like the PO matchup, the hand disruption is very good and they have no way to interact with Druid apart from usually a 1 of bounce card. The problem is they don't have a heavy sideboard for graveyard hate usually just some crypts.

  Storm - good matchup, hand disruption is king here.
  Oath is usually a good matchup made so by the Abrupt decays, but your show and tell plan can be a little less good if you don't have a discard spell and they draw Grisselbrand. Also unless there's Inferno Titan if you play a druid into an oath, your win percentage is not TERRIBLE, but not great either.

  I haven't lost to dredge....yet, but their game 1 Leyline is close to unbeatable. The new Abrupt decay coming out of Ravnica looks like it will slot right into this list.

  Big fan of your lists btw Brian, try this one out and see what you think

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  Budget/Unpowered options in 2018
  • Stuart

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  Just for clarification, I'm pasting the deck construction restrictions to be competing in the "budget" category.

  Budget prizes are awarded to the highest placing decks without any of the following cards:
  any "Power Nine", Bazaar of Baghdad, Mishra's Workshop or Library of Alexandria

  The change from last year I can see is you can no longer run Library of Alexandria, but you can run Time Vault.

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  Vintage Lands
  deck tech • • Guest

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  @childe_roland Crucible is very bad against Dack Faden, it does seem like there should be a slot for it in vintage lands, even in the board against shops but funnily it's not quite as good as you'd think.

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  Lands, A Different Build For Vintage
  deck tech decklist deck disc • • J-B-E

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  @bactgudz They are worth considering perhaps 3 shops and a mox might be right. The advantage workshop does have is that most of the time it will be a Savannah and you often need all the mana you can get in lands. Having played with 4 X Shops I haven't found it to be a hinderance that much of the time but yeah for sure there are occasions where you don't get the Riftstone, one small advantage shops has and it's only come up a couple of times is that sometimes casting the Serum Powder is the correct play if you need that bit more mana, usually you just hold it and discard to Bazaar.

  This list still needs a couple of slight changes and playing 3 shops could be well be the best way to do it.

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  Paradoxes
  deck tech deck discussion decklist paradoxical outcome • • J-B-E

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  Oath
  oath archetype • • Brass Man

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  @pugsuperstar

  You're not cutting a creature in the matchups you bring in Gisela or the dragon. That feels incorrect. I think Muldrotha's out vs. shops and Xerox.

  I would probably cut an Island vs. at least dredge.

  Maybe @brianpk80 can answer this better, but I think you can cut a number of oaths in the PO matchup.

  Depending on the flavour of dredge, I think you can cut 0-2 FoW.

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  Oath Sideboard Plan Help
  • PugSuperStar

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  Paradoxical Outcome - Deckbuilding Primer
  • IamActuallyLvL1

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  @walked I am streaming all my challenges on twitch and loading the vods to youtube. The PO decks I stream are a little gimmicky but the lines are the similar. Maybe they will help you out.

  http://themanadrain.com/topic/2120/iamactuallylvl1-youtube-vintage-challenge-recordings

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  Junk Hatebears
  • Stormanimagus

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  Howdy, so I am working on a mostly WB version of the deck and I was vacillating on a couple things.

  Here is the list with which I am starting :

  White Black Hatebears Jacob Hilty Mana (26) 4 Cavern of Souls 4 Marsh Flats 1 Windswept Heath 1 Verdant Catacombs 3 Scrubland 1 Savannah 1 Plains 1 Swamp 1 Karakas 1 Strip Mine 2 Wasteland 1 Black Lotus 1 Mox Ruby 1 Mox Emerald 1 Mox Pearl 1 Mox Sapphire 1 Mox Jet Spells and Critter (34) 3 Stony Silence 4 Deathrite Shaman 4 Dark Confidant 4 Thalia, Guardian of Thraben 3 Spirit of the Labyrinth 3 Phyrexian Revoker 3 Kambal, Consul of Allocation 2 Containment Priest 3 Mental Misstep 3 Swords to Plowshares 1 Demonic Tutor 1 Demonic Consultation Sideboard (15) 3 Fragmentize 1 Containment Priest 2 Rest in Peace 3 Kataki, War's Wage 1 Stony Silence 3 Infernal Reckoning 2 Ravenous Trap

  My thought was that I could maybe get by with Karn over bob as the CA engine, which I think is better, but likely that means I would want to also run a different lock piece in place of stony silence in the main (namely damping sphere). I would also probably run 1 additional revoker at that point.
  That may or may not be feasible against shops (read Ballista) any thoughts?

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  Playing Strategically - Wheat vs Chaff
  • BandsWithOthers

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  I find that mastery is not always about winning but looking for improvement in every game. Sometimes it is experimentation and sometimes is it mentoring players no matter who they are.

  I played a lot in the lead up to SCG Con and I lost some games because I showed my opponents how to beat me, I wanted them to play their best game and I needed to see how to counter it. I out played some high level people and still lost, but I still had fun. I also just won some games because in Vintage your deck will just crush people.

  When playing at a level where everyone you play against is a master it is easy to see your flaws. That is where you truly need to notice your weaknesses - engagement, timing, sequencing, strategy, etc...

  To me a true master, is someone who knows their deck and their own limitations. We all have limitations and it important to know them and so that you can expand your game and your range.

  I mostly play Vintage but sometimes I play Legacy and Modern. I typically play at a high level but those formats do not keep me very engaged and I tend lose my motivation after a bit in large events.

  I find that I am playing at my highest level when I am having fun. When I am playing only to win at any cost and I am not having fun then I am not a player that anyone wants to play against. It is important to have more purpose than just winning, I find that is not just good for playing Magic but generally good in life.

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  Best Dredge deck to build for testing?
  • Prkchpsndwiches

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  @serberoth the chance of you having the card in your opening hand + top 2-3 is a few percentage points; that times how much it changes the match isn't worth what it costs you.
  dredge, of all decks, least wants to run over 60, because it wants to get to one of its 4 copies of one specific card. in other decks, particularly in non-vintage formats, it's easier to justify stuff like 61-63 card scapeshift decks.

  anything worth playing is worth putting in the 60; if you decide to add an ingot chewer, for example, to a 60, for example, it is likely not the 61st card, something else is, and you cut that.

  if you want to play "sideboard" cards main you can, but it doesn't require going beyond 60. jeskai doesn't go to 61 to play fragmentize or wear/tear main, they cut another card for it.

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  Life from the Loam in Dredge
  • Oestrus

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  @ten-ten

  I have not streamed in quite some time (a lot of issues trying to stream where I lived the last couple years), but may start again in a couple weeks after I finish moving into my new apartment.

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  Bazaar Control! 2018
  • YakuzaXRock

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  @macdeath
  Thanks.

  Maybe the land idea should be tested. It looks a little slow and requires mana, which the bazaar deck is sorta slow at. But testing would tell. Usually you kill with colos not damage...

  Gush is not as great in this deck as others, but it still has its tricks why it stays. You can use it as regular mana boost+against wastelands with a little minus as the opponent usually tries to kill your groves which you cant bounce. The gush lands can go to fayden discard or bazaar.

  If theres a ton of workshop you can add more ancient grudges which is a fine card with bazaar and intuition. Theres just no room! You need a lot of blasts against leovold and control in general. Rebs are good right now, always been but stops many key drawing spells anything blue matchup wise paradox, oath mentor etc etc and good with fayden.

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  Enchantress Viability?
  • Tittliewinks22

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  @oestrus said in Enchantress Viability?:

  It does matter when you're trying to lay the groundwork, and your bricks all fold to Misstep (e.g. Wild Growth, Utopia Sprawl).

  As I indicated, I did not play these cards. Please read my reply entirely before responding. If you want to play 3 colours, you cannot afford to play these cards and get 3-for-1'd by an opposing Wasteland. The only 1 cmc cards I cared about resolving was Mystic Remora.

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  White Eldrazi
  deck tech eldrazi • • Brass Man

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  A few more recent Eldrazi finishes:

  GodOfSlaughter's list is similar to the ones I posted a few weeks ago: we're seeing Spirit of the Labyrinth and Misstep, replacing some number of Smashers. Interestingly it's also running Lodestone, which has been kinda out of vogue. Espiatrianero's list is more similar to the lists @i_b_TRUE and I have had some luck with.

  On a different note, what do you guys think of the powered Colorless lists? I keep coming back to Henrik Storm's EU Vintage Champs list as something I'd like to mess around with.