MTG Salvation

I guess that is what I'm thinking about right now. Run the combo in an existing shell or go all in combo or nothing.

If I were to go all in combo, there is another side-theme with Landfall that could be interesting.

Copies of Hedron Crab could be milling away with every land drop on the combo in case opponent has removal for KotR. Steppe Lynx could become a giant beater alongside KotR as well. Lotus Cobra could load up the mana for a big finisher spell as well. Also loading up the graveyard sets up for Delve mechanic cards nicely. Just some thoughts for a combo deck.

Quote from WarMachinePrime »

If Retreat to Coralhelm is a part of the win-con engine. Wouldn't we want to be able to retrieve that integral part of the engine using say an Idyllic Tutor? If its about going "infinite" as quickly as possible, we would need to go find/fetch the pieces as quickly as possible and not wait around for top-decking them right?

I would think Collected Company would need to be a must have 3 or 4 in the main deck as well.

Wouldn't we need to protect the fragile nature of removal of our 1 key piece from things like Surgical Extraction in our sideboard as well?

Are there any W U or G spells out there that offer protection to enchantments OR let us tutor them out of our library?

So many questions.

What you are looking for is probably Commune with the Gods as TheDasuri pointed out. It digs for both halves of the combo and is a much needed 2cmc card (We won't always have a dork online T2).

But as many others I don't think this deck should go all in on it's combo. Because let's be honest this combo is pretty fragile and there are just faster and or more consistent combo decks in modern (Amulett, Griselshoalbrand, Ad Nauseam...).
The thing all these decks can't do but we can is beat face while threating combo so thats the way to go I think.
What I realized is that Mana Dorks+KotR+Retreat to Coralhelm do a pretty great job at ramping together. We should have some fair chances to reach 5 mana on T3 (T1 Dork->T2 KotR-> tap land to float the mana, sac it to KotR new land enters untapped->5mana or T1 Dork->T2 RtC-> tap Dork to float mana, play land, untap Dork with RtC->5mana).
So 5 mana bombs like Dragonlord Ojutai (who even synergizes pretty well with RtC) should at least be considered. If not MB then it's definetely SB material against Jund and Grixis.

I'll definetely brew with this this weekend!

I think a good way to make this combo shine would be to put it in a Bant or 4color aggro shell (like a big zoo splashing for Geist of St Traft), and adjust the manabase.

Just as the Twin combo, this one is really easy to interact with, so I don't think focusing entierly on it is the way to go. But if we have a good deck that just happens to win when you assemble KoTR+Retreat, it's just gravy. And I didn't do the math, but I don't think you need anything more than 6-7 plains/forest+right amount of fetches+maybe kessig to make the combo lethal.

I don't think I'll have time soon to test that, but taking a big zoo list splashing blue, cutting 2-4 cards for retreat seems like a good start for me

Just play bant aggro with Colected compagny and/or chord of calling for EOT Shenenigan

You got Knight, Geist of saint Traft, loxodon smiter, kitchen finks, voice of resurgence.

The retreat can tap blocker for geist to get in.

Very interesting ideas so far. Good to hear them all. It does seem putting this combo into an existing or modified-existing shell may be the way to go. I was brainstorming up an all in combo deck and it does seem to be fragile in nature. If I have some time later I will try to post it up. I'd love to see someone post up an existing deck with this combo worked in. The lure of the Landfall mechanic keeps me wanting to go all in combo with some synergies from cards with Landfall. Seems such a shame to have a land drop engine and not use it to its fullest extent with Landfall or anything else that synergies with cards being dumped into the graveyard.

If you go into bant colors and pure combo route, I think running some number of Pact of Negations could be worth considering.

Fans of mill decks can just run the old Ruin Ghost and Hedron Crab couple, but that has a rough time against Tron decks.

As people are saying, this deck will probably be best served as either Bant Aggro, with Lynx, Goyf, etc., or Bant/4-color Midrange with Geist, countermagic, and dorks. I don't think either is particularly better than the other, at least not without solid lists and testing.

But I do think that the fact that both are equally viable adds another element of meta-power to this deck. It makes the deck very flexible in different metas, and gives a strong element of unpredictability.



This deck honestly has so many options open to it, that it's probably the hardest I've ever had to work to come up with any lists. This one was my first full 60, and I decided to just stick to a very plain Bant Midrange shell. Lumbering Falls is a pretty amazing manland, especially if you throw swords on him. Scatter can be very sneaky in the later game if you have a manland out. This is definitely not what I would want as my final draft, but I had to start somewhere.

Edit: Also, for anybody that wants to try working on something very cute, you can almost fit this combo into a stock Eternal Command shell. If you tweaked the EC list to be a bit more midrangey, you could potentially fully support all three gameplans.

As a long time Eternal Ruse player I don't think the combo fits in the so well. Knight is a worse Goyf and Retreat to Coralhelm doesn't really cut it either if you look at it just by itself. Also both the combo and the Eternal Command Lock are hosed by the same graveyard hate.

I'd loved to be proven otherwise but I don't see the gains surpass the deficits here.

Hey, I've been playing pretty successfully with a 4 color zoo style collected company deck and I think slotting Retreat to Coralhelm makes perfect sense, it gives the deck a splinter twin-isque combo that can win on the spot if the opponent ever taps out while simultaneously being a very aggressive zoo deck that can win on turn 4 by sheer damage alone. This is what I have so far.Tarmogoyf probably have a place but I've always felt that he was less good in this style of deck than in a deck with main deck discard and I'm honestly unwilling to pony up for a playset to find out.



This deck is capable of absurd aggression and Retreat to Coralhelm works decently well here even without comboing off, tapping down blockers to get Geist of Saint Traft and your other powerful creatures through. But, the key to this deck that makes it so much better is the fact that out of nowhere you can combo off with just two cards and swing in for huge damage off of a pumped Knight of the reliquary + Trample with Kessig Wolf Run. This deck can turn three kill off of a mana dork in the opener with a Knight of the Reliquary on turn 2 into a turn 3 Retreat to Coralhelm. One Sejiri Steppe protects your knight while you're going off as long as you leave a fetch land ready to crack in response to any kill spell to untap the knight and tap again to fetch for the Steppe. The point of this deck isn't specifically to combo off, it can win a lot simply by playing an aggressive game but this is absolutely what this deck needed to be truly competitive, a way to win in the face of an opponent that's about to combo off themselves and you just can't beat face fast enough. Sideboard is probably terrible as it's just a carry over from my current deck and is heavily shaped by my local meta. Also, cycling through lands only to get your knight killed when they realize what's happening still sets up your deck for some creature stuffed collected companys!

I was playing around on MGTO with a similar build over lunch, I like the various options this will slot into, and I think CoCo could render it just insane in a creature heavy build.

In other news, the 3 main sites I look at, Knight is now sold out, lots of hype building already, more so than anything else from BfZ I think.

I can just see lines of play with this deck drawing out counterspells at opponent's eot with company, only to untap and drop retreat to combo kill. While I was initially dismissive of company and retreat together in the same deck, the more lines of play I consider the more the idea feels good. Knight is going to draw some serious removal, and likely that will be the weakpoint of the deck.

Quote from serenechaos »

Syreal94's DeckMagic OnlineOCTGN2ApprenticeBuy These Cards
4 Noble Hierarch 4 Birds of Paradise 4 Knight of the Reliquary 3 Geist of Saint Traft 2 Kitchen Finks 2 Loxodon Smiter 2 Wilt-Leaf Liege 4 Retreat to Coralhelm 4 Path to Exile 3 Mana Leak 1 Scatter to the Winds	2 Sword of Feast and Famine 1 Sword of Fire and Ice 3 Windswept Heath 3 Misty Rainforest 3 Flooded Strand 1 Breeding Pool 1 Hallowed Fountain 1 Temple Garden 1 Stomping Ground 1 Canopy Vista 1 Prairie Stream 3 Forest 1 Plains	2 Lumbering Falls 1 Celestial Colonnade 1 Kessig Wolf Run 1 Sejiri Steppe 1 Mistveil Plains

I think this is a pretty decent starting list, but I'm not particularly keen on Swords in this format. I feel they could be better protection in the form of Bant Charm or Remand. The mana base needs work, as I don't think the new lands are particularly playable in this sort of deck, and I think the most efficient man-land available in these colours is actually Treetop Village in this deck (and I don't think we need more then one of those as we can just search it up).

Cool ideas so far. A lot to think about. Lots of brewing to do as well. Took a chance and picked up 20 copies on pre-order as well at a quarter apiece. What the heck. I've blown way more than 5 bucks on much less frivolous things. Would love to see/hear more ideas from others.

This is what I have brewed up since the spoilers, I took a more resilient approach to the deck with less of an emphasis on the combo

http://tappedout.net/mtg-decks/knight-combo-1/

I think that maybe replacing a dismember or both with Chord for consistency might be a better approach but I am not sure, its a tough call.

I'll say it again, if you want the deck to be consistent the card you want isnt Chord of Calling or collected company. You want Commune with the Gods. The card is legit, especially in a bant midrange shell that can combo out.

Here's what I've drilled up so far:




So the SB is very rough, but the general thought is:

1) Bant creatures with coco is probably the most resilient thing you can do as a starting point if you want your deck not to lose to Jund trying to combo out.
2) Courser of Kruphix's interaction with Coralhelm is deceptively powerful. He offsets the lifeloss from fetchlands, gains a bunch of life in general. The ability to use fetchlands to crack, then scry 1 after the crack, gives you very strong odds of hitting land off the top with Courser most of the time (and also drawing action a lot of the time).
3) The interaction of Geist of Saint Traft and Coralhelm is very strong as well. Curving Geist into coralhelm -> crack fetchland, can be 6 damage on turn 2 and threaten to repeat it with every land drop.
4) Voice of Resurgence gives you a lot of resiliency by forcing them to remove Knight in their turn if at all, and is just a strong 2-for-1 card anyway.
5) Collected Company gives you a very strong turn 3 play as a way to combo off twin style at the endstep (hit knight, untap cast coralhelm, gg).

Some other creatures I flirted with are Aven Mindcensor and Spellskite maindeck. Threatening a turn 2 mindcensor can really mess with opponents' plans, and spellskite off of Coco is also very strong (as elf players can attest).

That said, I am not sure this deck is stronger than elves at this point. It certainly is harder to grind out because the creatures are more resilient to 1-for-1 removal (very few critters of consequence die to anything but hard removal). But the clock is a bit slower generally.

This version of the deck is very soft to combo pre-board, and it may be right to include something like bojuka bog maindeck.

Here's my initial impression. Wargate can grab either piece, and voice will help resolve enchantment/sorcery. However, that is really just a backup plan to the creature beatdown that bant company normally employs. MD spellskite helps against some matchups like affinity, twin, burn and infect.

Quote from TheDasuri »

I'll say it again, if you want the deck to be consistent the card you want isnt Chord of Calling or collected company. You want Commune with the Gods. The card is legit, especially in a bant midrange shell that can combo out.

I just don't think you need any of those cards at all! You don't have to have the combo be the focus of the deck. I think much like Twin, you can be a very good deck (Bant tempo/midrangey)that just wins out of nowhere with the Retreat. The deck can just beat you down like any other Bant deck when you don't draw a Retreat, but when you do you just win.

Ummmm... So a lot of these builds are kinda Ramp-midrange and with combo and are UGx soooo... Where's Bring to Light? Finds both combo pieces with three colors, can be cast turn 3 in lotus cobra builds and let's you run one-of hosers in the main to protect your combo or a legit plan B, C, or D

Bring to light does not hit enchantments, Wargate should be better here.