Trike is worse than hellkite/kumano in a number of regards...
Red is not a problem for most dragon decks as well...either a 5 color mana base or dropping in a couple of volcanic islands plus mox ruby make red super easy to get....remember if you are comboing off you stop the loop when you animate witness (and the loop can be started and stopped several times)...at this time you drop either a red land that you bring back or drew into or have in your hand, or mox ruby to generate the infinte red mana needed to combo out with.
Ill give you this...
The entire point of running hellkite/kumano is to have a win outside of the eternal witness kill...if you dont have bazaar active for some reason (or compulsion) you can win anyways with kite/mano by animating it after generating the mana...laquatus doesnt work as well these days because of Oath running gaeas blessing wrecking your idea of winning in that matchup...without witness to recur a second animate (or dance or mancy) you cannot win with trike...
The red splash is neglagible...
The reasoning for verdant force is to buy you time in the stax matchup...free tokens to feed to smokestack was a good thing last time I checked...
Uhh yeah as a pure combo deck dragon takes the cake in vintage. And by me placing it as perhaps the 6th best deck T1 deck overall, that would exclude all variants of decks such as Fish and Stax. But seriously I have no idea how you could possibly not include Fish and FCG as not being amongst the best decks in vintage at this moment. They are both extremely well proven and by no means overrated.
Food Chain Goblins has done well at exactly ONE large vintage tourney....ONE...
Other than that it hasnt been for over a year since it did well at a real tourney (Waterbury over a year ago)
Food Chain is NOT a top level T1 deck, sorry...
Fish as well is mediocre at best...the deck can perform quite well in the proper meta, but when a meta swings fish dissapears from the winners brackets...take SCG Chicago for example...Fish had the higest turnout (which should place it higher in the tourney) and yet it didnt place a single deck in the top 8...as the meta swings and people take the deck into account it dies off again until the time is right...a month ago or even two an argument could be made for fish being one of if not the best CHOICE to run in a tourney...this doesnt make it the best deck there is...
If I really had to try to rank them I would just group decks as any one of them could probably win on any given occasion (this is what sets these decks apart from fish and goblins, they cannot just win in any environment)
The best decks in the format currently are Stax (of various kinds obviously) and Control Slaver...id put them at #1 and #2
#3 would probably be Gifts
The other 3 would probably be some combination of Oath, Dragon, Workshop Aggro (yes I put this over fish even though it didnt do as well at chicago either)
If I had to extend it out for a couple more spots then id probably add fish and deathlong (yes its an amazing deck, just nobody plays it enough...but its power level is way higher than pretty much anything else)
You might notice that FCG STILL hasnt made it onto my list...it would probably still be a few slots down the list under things like salvagers (oath/bomberman whatever) sensei TPS cerebral assasin, even tog probably...
FCG is a meta choice...it might be appropriate at certain times, but it by no means is a top level deck in the format...
Dragon rolls over and dies to splash hate far too easily to ever be seriously considered anywhere near the top 6. It's a deck that only works if it has suprise factor on it's side. (And even if it does, it still loses random games to splash hate) Look at the SCGP9 results and you're going to see that it isn't just me that thinks this, the results are proving it.
As far as not including FCG or Fish (and it's many variants, some better than others)...well, you obviously don't know what you're talking about. These decks have been proven again and again.
-Lance
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WHAT??? what T1 planet have you been living on that shows FCG as having prooven itself...especially more so than Dragon...
The last SCG tourney in Chicago featured Dragon in the top 8....
where was fish or FCG???? it was at the tourney in much larger numbers than Dragon, but they couldnt break through....beyond that the suprise factor of FCG showing up that big should have carried it further, but it didnt because the deck isnt that great in reality...
Look at the SCGP9 results and you're going to see that it isn't just me that thinks this, the results are proving it.
WHAT??? what T1 planet have you been living on that shows FCG as having prooven itself...especially more so than Dragon...
The last SCG tourney in Chicago featured Dragon in the top 8....
Yeah, 8th place. Consider that the tournament right before it had FCG taking 1st.
I'm not going to argue the viability of Fish or FCG in Vintage, because the decks are proven, they aren't dying to random hate and most of the time (especially with Fish and it's many variants) they don't need a suprise factor to pull results.
-Lance
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FCG has finished 1st at ONE scg tourney PERIOD...no other top 8 appearences PERIOD...Dragon has placed top 8 decks numerous times in SCG tournies and in many other places...FCG has not (2 Large tourney wins over the course of over a year...)
And 8th place out of 141 very talented magic players aint half bad...He did take home a mox for his efforts...
You are completely IGNORANT of the fact that FCG and FISH are both 100% meta dependant decks and ONLY succeed if the meta happens to swing their way...
Here is how it works
There are a handful of decks that you can take to any given meta and expect to be competitive with...These decks are what actually drive the format as we know it...The only kind of exception can be when it is a SUPER random meta that doesnt include ANY "normal" sort of T1 decks...
Fish and FCG are largely dependant on what else is being played in the area at a given time...
The deck has to be continuosly tuned and fixed to try to compete...the problem with the deck is that AS SOON AS IT GETS TARGETED IT DIES...Fish rolls over and dies as soon as any sort of real effort is put into stopping it...
This is witnessed at the last SCG tourney...even one of fishes best matchups (Stax) rolled over the fish decks in the format because they had adapted and the fish decks just became bad all of a sudden...FCG even showed up in enormous levels and it failed miserably as well...the problem was that the fish decks that FCG was prepaired to beat were all in the losers bracket after 2 or 3 rounds and the FCG decks no longer had any favorable matchups to play against...
Even when the meta was ripe for FCG to do somewhat well it failed because it is a meta dependant deck...FCG relied on Fish keeping its dominance (which it didnt) so the FCG players lost out...
On the other hand you have decks like Control Slaver and Stax...Both of these decks are consistant winners that force the meta to develop around them...Not vice versa
Fish must adapt to try to win...
Control Slaver lets them adapt around it...
Now granted, any one deck can get completely hated out of a certain meta...much like fish hated tog out a long while back...but as soon as this happened it allowed for a billion other decks to take over because fish just doesnt work in a diverse yet powerful meta...
Fish lacks the ability to defend itself on more than 1 or 2 fronts...it can win through a field of ONLY stax and gifts...it has a much harder time going through a field of Stax, Gifts, CS, Shop Aggro, Dragon, Oath....the same can be said of FCG, as long as it is matched up against one or two decks only it can do very well (and if those are the correct decks.)
But as for now it is obvious that you are deluded in your thinking and your knowledge of the OVERALL T1 format (maybe what you claim is the case in your area or something) You can go ahead thinking that Fish and FCG are defining decks for T1...In fact, I would almost appreciate if you spread this vast knowledge of yours...it will make my tournament play just that much easier if everybody goes in with the understanding that Fish and FCG are top notch decks...
But hey, maybe everybody on star city and the mana drain is wrong...(well except for the few players who have your line of thought lance.)
I'm not arguing against the fact that FCG or Fish are meta decks, I never did.
I'm also not saying the FCG or Fish are the best decks in the format. I'm saying that they are in the Top 6 at least. My personal opinion of the "best deck in the format" is Control Slaver.
What I am saying is that I think (when chosen for the right meta) they have more favorable match-ups and are less likely to die to random hate than Dragon is. (Even if Dragon is being played in a favorable meta) Period. If you're going to come to this forum with an elitist attitude, then please go back to TMD where it is tolerated, because it won't be here.
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Its really not that much of an elitest attitude...
Compare me to saaaaay...Smmenen..:cool2:
The problem is that your argument is just strange.....
I could see the argument working if you said something like this....
"For the day of SCG#whatever so and so deck was really good.."
or "for the month of june fish was amazing and the deck to beat..."
But when you get down to the overall T1 world these two decks just fall short...
Fish at least can be argued since it DID dominate the T1 world for a few months (May-June) However when you look at the data (from Phillip Stantons May-June Meta Breakdown, which is premium) you will notice that while fish had the most top 8s out of any deck in the format it had to do a lot of work to get there
What I mean is this...while fish more that tripled its amounts over any other deck in the format (fish was 17.2% of the world meta for large tournies ((over 50 players)) yet it only was able to place top 8 twice as much as the next closest deck...statistics should show it placing in a similar amount as it is run...
I suppose a good question would be "where is FCG on the list?"
Well actually FCG and Dragon both had the same number of Top 8s this time through...So I suppose we could say those two are even as far as results are concerned...
FCG results though have to be compared to the meta they are in...if you hit any meta with almost 20% fish you have got to be in heaven...But the deck falls short most other times...
I also havnt touched on the fact that the guy that ran FCG at the SCG that it won at was playing the deck illegally for at least part of the tourney, and at least one game was outright won because he was fudging the rules..but I dont want to get too into that whole thing...its been beat to death and a lot of people find that result wrong...
Dragon on the other hand is pretty stable as a top level deck...it makes top 8 as a 1 of many many a major tourney (In fact I believe it just made top 8 at GenCon Vintage Worlds today...but the tourney is still going and that isnt confirmed)
Its really not that much of an elitest attitude...
Compare me to saaaaay...Smmenen..:cool2:
Yeah, compared to him, nothing looks elitist.
Quote from Lunar »
What I mean is this...while fish more that tripled its amounts over any other deck in the format (fish was 17.2% of the world meta for large tournies ((over 50 players)) yet it only was able to place top 8 twice as much as the next closest deck...statistics should show it placing in a similar amount as it is run...
The argument there is it because it wasn't in a favorable meta? Or because it was predicted and hated out? Or perhaps, because it's a fairly popular budget deck, horrible players played it in mass while only the skilled players did well with it?
Quote from Lunar »
Well actually FCG and Dragon both had the same number of Top 8s this time through...So I suppose we could say those two are even as far as results are concerned...
That's what I didn't get, you had Dragon on such a high horse, talking about how well it performed, but then totally trashed FCG. Also consider that FCG has placed higher in it's two T8 appearances than Dragon did.
Quote from Lunar »
I also havnt touched on the fact that the guy that ran FCG at the SCG that it won at was playing the deck illegally for at least part of the tourney, and at least one game was outright won because he was fudging the rules..but I dont want to get too into that whole thing...its been beat to death and a lot of people find that result wrong...
I wasn't aware, how exactly did he cheat? It's curious how no one called him on it all day. Then again, whenever I play a creature heavy deck in Vintage such as FCG...I've always found that my opponents are fuzzy on the combat step, the many things it entails and the many tricks that can be performed during it. I assume this is due to the low level of decks running more than a few creatures maindeck in the format.
Quote from Lunar »
Dragon on the other hand is pretty stable as a top level deck...it makes top 8 as a 1 of many many a major tourney (In fact I believe it just made top 8 at GenCon Vintage Worlds today...but the tourney is still going and that isnt confirmed)
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The FCG player used Kiki to copy his opponants creatures until round 7 or 8, when someone finally called him on it.
Dragon is good in an unprepared meta. Unfortunatly, the splash hate it catches is a huge problem. When control/stax does well for a while, and Dragon isn't played very often, that's dragon's chance to shine, its a brief window every once and a while when everyone forgets about it.
The FCG player used Kiki to copy his opponants creatures until round 7 or 8, when someone finally called him on it.
Oh, wow...I can't believe it took that long for someone to call him on that. Did anyone actually determine how many games he actually got the Kiki-Jiki out and did that with it? People should read their opponents cards more often...
I combined this thread and the "Worldgorger" thread. So don't start anymore threads on Dragon. All decklists, questions, suggestions, insight etc on Dragon is to be posted here.
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It hasnt been fully determinned exactly how often he did this on his way to the top 8...still he did win through the elimination rounds to win the thing...but many people believe that this shouldnt of happened...
In round 8 he forced a draw with his opponent after he won game 1 and THEN somebody in the croud pointed out the error...the opponent should have won...if this would have happened then either Kevin Cron or Steven Menendian would have made top 8 instead and things would obviously been different...
But I digress..
GenCon Results are in and Roland Chang playing 5cStax wins the title...with Andrew Probasco playing his Shortbus Severance Belcher (no welders) to second...Dragon finished in 3rd/4th...
No fish OR fcg in the top 8....
The rest of the top 8 included Tog, 2xControl Slaver, Stax, and Oath...
Since this is the total Dragon thread now, here is the decklist he used...
Lunar, couldn't help but notice you dropped three Meandecker names in that last post.
Hooray for Roland!
Back on topic, that's certainly a different mana base for Dragon, especially with the Forbidden Orchards. That would give the deck a disadvantageous position against Stax, I think...
Maindeck Xantids are probably a good call considering the controllish metagame (Control Slaver/Gifts).
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Well the deck handled a field of Stax and Control Slaver pretty well...Im not 100% sure who he lost to in the semis (roland or andy..)
I think part of the idea is that the combo player just doesnt care a bit about its opponent maybe getting a few tokens...the idea of running orchard in combo was a hot topic when it was first in the spoilers then that idea kind of fell through.
The main bonus however is that when you combo out with hellkite you can create infinte tokens and not care..you cannot go infinte with city of brass (hence the drop to 3 of them)
It just seems he was going for as much bang for the buck as he could out of a 5 color base.
It cetainly is cool against oath though....:)
By the way that list is slightly wrong...its shivan hellkite NOT crimson hellkite....I just cut and pasted it like that. (at least I believe its the shivan kite...)
Xantid swarm has always been a must have IMO for dragon to really do well (there will always be a lot of control...and it will help against SB items other than crypt...)
I thought it was wierd to be running crimson hellkite in a vintage deck...
I assumed what you just said Lunar.
BTW-We need more people with brains that actually understand vintage on this forum, like you. You are now teh coolness./not sarcastic at all. You are cool!
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"That is not dead which can eternal lie, And with strange aeons even death may die."
- H.P. Lovecraft
looks decent, but laquatus is bad here...id go with 2 hellkites since they can win just by being animated themselfs...or maybe verdant force if you see a lot of stax in your area.
just to ask..why the 2xRead the Runes in here and not something else...
I've currently been having a lot of discussions about Rtr vs compulsion. Even though only I'm the only person who likes rtr (save the good folks at the manadrain) I've always stood by it. Recentlly I've decided to take them out anyways, at least for awhile. As for Laquatus, he's pretty much the default kill card. He's only ever dead when facing oath. Not only that hellkite/kumano can't always win in this build because you need a pain free source of red mana. I will now edit my dragon deck ever so slightly.
you could always run eternal witness though, when you are in the dragon combo just make sure you can drop a ruby or gemstone mine or orchard into the yard, then recur it with witness, then create the infinite mana and pump it into hellkite...
the damage thing with red in the deck is largely solved with dropping the number of cities to 2 or 3 and running the full gemstone and orchard sets..the odds of not having a non-city red source are pretty good for the deck..laquatus is just a bad win condition really...
think about it this way...if you have a land in play and can win with laquatus in this deck, then you can win with hellkite in this deck...since city of brass damages you you cant use it to win with laquatus either so that doesnt matter, all of your other lands are all 5 color so your argument is right out the door...not to mention that laquatus is dumb against platz...
hellkite is just plain better in your build...
another thing is intuition...with one laquatus and one hellkite the opponent gets to choose which kill you get...oath can always give you hellkite in your hand and laq in the yard so you cant deck them...having at least 2 of your kill makes intuition a lot better (thats why you generally see 2 or 3 hellkites in these builds)
compulsion feels better outside the combo to me...compulsion also lets you just stop when you want...if you read for all but say 4 of your deck and the card you need is still in there, you are now stuck, since you arent running witness...RtR seems solid in an eternal witness build though...compulsion is also a permanent against stax, which is never a bad thing.
Artifacts 1 Black Lotus (Restricted in Vintage) 1 Mana Crypt (Restricted in Vintage) 1 Mox Jet (Restricted in Vintage) 1 Mox Ruby (Restricted in Vintage) 1 Mox Sapphire (Restricted in Vintage) 1 Sol Ring (Restricted in Vintage)
Here from Washington, they say it dies because Gifts can beat it easily. But that's because our meta right now is Gifts, CS, Fish, Stax, and TPS. SO it is very hard to predict the meta here.
Dragon has been talked about being good against CS and Gifts, so how come it isn't doing better?
Is it really good against Gifts and CS?
What do you think? Can Dragon fight through the hate and beat the upper decks(CS, Gifts, Stax, Etc.)??
Sometimes it is clearly tier 1 sometimes it struggles to be tier 2...why? Well because it is very easy to beat when fully expected and prepaired for...
Dragon is really its own worst enemy...when people do good with it, players prepair for it and it becomes easy to handle in many ways...But when it dies off like this, you need only wait a short time before people forget about it and you can pick it up and it will be very strong again..
But I will say this...Dragon is clearly the best Combo deck availible in T1...
Sliver Queen is disaster waiting to happen, nobody should ever resort to using it. The fact the player above is running 3 vaults indicates a level of insecurity within himself, 1-2 is fine.
I myself consider Dragon to be tier 1, you just have to know precisely when to play it. Once your local meta has eased it's thumb off of it for awhile you strike.
A better decklist would look something like:
//NAME: Dragon Combo
3 Glimmervoid
3 Gemstone Mine
4 City of Brass
4 Forbidden Orchard
4 Bazaar of Baghdad
1 Mox Sapphire
1 Mox Diamond
1 Mox Ruby
1 Mox Pearl
1 Mox Jet
1 Mox Emerald
1 Mana Crypt
1 Black Lotus
1 Sol Ring
1 Time Walk
1 Ancestral Recall
1 Shivan Hellkite
1 Ambassador Laquatus
1 Entomb
1 Demonic Tutor
1 Balance
1 Vampiric Tutor
2 Compulsion
2 Necromancy
2 Xantid Swarm
3 Worldgorger Dragon
3 Intuition
3 Buried Alive
3 Dance of the Dead
3 Animate Dead
4 Squee, Goblin Nabob
SB: 1 Pithing Needle
SB: 1 Pernicious Deed
SB: 2 Sacred Ground
SB: 2 Swords to Plowshares
SB: 2 Ray of Revelation
SB: 2 Duress
SB: 2 Xantid Swarm
SB: 3 Rack and Ruin
One thing ive found is that there is no one RIGHT version or BETTER version of Dragon, heh....
Of all the decks in magic ive seen more arguments over which build is the best with this deck, heh...
What I would say is that builds are going to be very Player AND Meta specific...I mean you can argue that your build is superior Ajora, but then BOTH of those lists from above were top 8 lists from MAJOR US tournaments...so quantifying which build is optimal is a rough task.
The mana base on that list you gave looks wrong too ajora...you want more non-pain red sources to allow for comboing with hellkite...city of brass doesnt work as well..you should up to 4 gemstones or orchards and drop the number of City of Brass by 1 or 2...
Red is not a problem for most dragon decks as well...either a 5 color mana base or dropping in a couple of volcanic islands plus mox ruby make red super easy to get....remember if you are comboing off you stop the loop when you animate witness (and the loop can be started and stopped several times)...at this time you drop either a red land that you bring back or drew into or have in your hand, or mox ruby to generate the infinte red mana needed to combo out with.
Ill give you this...
The entire point of running hellkite/kumano is to have a win outside of the eternal witness kill...if you dont have bazaar active for some reason (or compulsion) you can win anyways with kite/mano by animating it after generating the mana...laquatus doesnt work as well these days because of Oath running gaeas blessing wrecking your idea of winning in that matchup...without witness to recur a second animate (or dance or mancy) you cannot win with trike...
The red splash is neglagible...
The reasoning for verdant force is to buy you time in the stax matchup...free tokens to feed to smokestack was a good thing last time I checked...
Other than that it hasnt been for over a year since it did well at a real tourney (Waterbury over a year ago)
Food Chain is NOT a top level T1 deck, sorry...
Fish as well is mediocre at best...the deck can perform quite well in the proper meta, but when a meta swings fish dissapears from the winners brackets...take SCG Chicago for example...Fish had the higest turnout (which should place it higher in the tourney) and yet it didnt place a single deck in the top 8...as the meta swings and people take the deck into account it dies off again until the time is right...a month ago or even two an argument could be made for fish being one of if not the best CHOICE to run in a tourney...this doesnt make it the best deck there is...
If I really had to try to rank them I would just group decks as any one of them could probably win on any given occasion (this is what sets these decks apart from fish and goblins, they cannot just win in any environment)
The best decks in the format currently are Stax (of various kinds obviously) and Control Slaver...id put them at #1 and #2
#3 would probably be Gifts
The other 3 would probably be some combination of Oath, Dragon, Workshop Aggro (yes I put this over fish even though it didnt do as well at chicago either)
If I had to extend it out for a couple more spots then id probably add fish and deathlong (yes its an amazing deck, just nobody plays it enough...but its power level is way higher than pretty much anything else)
You might notice that FCG STILL hasnt made it onto my list...it would probably still be a few slots down the list under things like salvagers (oath/bomberman whatever) sensei TPS cerebral assasin, even tog probably...
FCG is a meta choice...it might be appropriate at certain times, but it by no means is a top level deck in the format...
As far as not including FCG or Fish (and it's many variants, some better than others)...well, you obviously don't know what you're talking about. These decks have been proven again and again.
-Lance
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The last SCG tourney in Chicago featured Dragon in the top 8....
where was fish or FCG???? it was at the tourney in much larger numbers than Dragon, but they couldnt break through....beyond that the suprise factor of FCG showing up that big should have carried it further, but it didnt because the deck isnt that great in reality...
Heed your own advice...
I'm not going to argue the viability of Fish or FCG in Vintage, because the decks are proven, they aren't dying to random hate and most of the time (especially with Fish and it's many variants) they don't need a suprise factor to pull results.
-Lance
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And 8th place out of 141 very talented magic players aint half bad...He did take home a mox for his efforts...
You are completely IGNORANT of the fact that FCG and FISH are both 100% meta dependant decks and ONLY succeed if the meta happens to swing their way...
Here is how it works
There are a handful of decks that you can take to any given meta and expect to be competitive with...These decks are what actually drive the format as we know it...The only kind of exception can be when it is a SUPER random meta that doesnt include ANY "normal" sort of T1 decks...
Fish and FCG are largely dependant on what else is being played in the area at a given time...
The deck has to be continuosly tuned and fixed to try to compete...the problem with the deck is that AS SOON AS IT GETS TARGETED IT DIES...Fish rolls over and dies as soon as any sort of real effort is put into stopping it...
This is witnessed at the last SCG tourney...even one of fishes best matchups (Stax) rolled over the fish decks in the format because they had adapted and the fish decks just became bad all of a sudden...FCG even showed up in enormous levels and it failed miserably as well...the problem was that the fish decks that FCG was prepaired to beat were all in the losers bracket after 2 or 3 rounds and the FCG decks no longer had any favorable matchups to play against...
Even when the meta was ripe for FCG to do somewhat well it failed because it is a meta dependant deck...FCG relied on Fish keeping its dominance (which it didnt) so the FCG players lost out...
On the other hand you have decks like Control Slaver and Stax...Both of these decks are consistant winners that force the meta to develop around them...Not vice versa
Fish must adapt to try to win...
Control Slaver lets them adapt around it...
Now granted, any one deck can get completely hated out of a certain meta...much like fish hated tog out a long while back...but as soon as this happened it allowed for a billion other decks to take over because fish just doesnt work in a diverse yet powerful meta...
Fish lacks the ability to defend itself on more than 1 or 2 fronts...it can win through a field of ONLY stax and gifts...it has a much harder time going through a field of Stax, Gifts, CS, Shop Aggro, Dragon, Oath....the same can be said of FCG, as long as it is matched up against one or two decks only it can do very well (and if those are the correct decks.)
But as for now it is obvious that you are deluded in your thinking and your knowledge of the OVERALL T1 format (maybe what you claim is the case in your area or something) You can go ahead thinking that Fish and FCG are defining decks for T1...In fact, I would almost appreciate if you spread this vast knowledge of yours...it will make my tournament play just that much easier if everybody goes in with the understanding that Fish and FCG are top notch decks...
But hey, maybe everybody on star city and the mana drain is wrong...(well except for the few players who have your line of thought lance.)
I'm also not saying the FCG or Fish are the best decks in the format. I'm saying that they are in the Top 6 at least. My personal opinion of the "best deck in the format" is Control Slaver.
What I am saying is that I think (when chosen for the right meta) they have more favorable match-ups and are less likely to die to random hate than Dragon is. (Even if Dragon is being played in a favorable meta) Period. If you're going to come to this forum with an elitist attitude, then please go back to TMD where it is tolerated, because it won't be here.
-Lance
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Compare me to saaaaay...Smmenen..:cool2:
The problem is that your argument is just strange.....
I could see the argument working if you said something like this....
"For the day of SCG#whatever so and so deck was really good.."
or "for the month of june fish was amazing and the deck to beat..."
But when you get down to the overall T1 world these two decks just fall short...
Fish at least can be argued since it DID dominate the T1 world for a few months (May-June) However when you look at the data (from Phillip Stantons May-June Meta Breakdown, which is premium) you will notice that while fish had the most top 8s out of any deck in the format it had to do a lot of work to get there
What I mean is this...while fish more that tripled its amounts over any other deck in the format (fish was 17.2% of the world meta for large tournies ((over 50 players)) yet it only was able to place top 8 twice as much as the next closest deck...statistics should show it placing in a similar amount as it is run...
I suppose a good question would be "where is FCG on the list?"
Well actually FCG and Dragon both had the same number of Top 8s this time through...So I suppose we could say those two are even as far as results are concerned...
FCG results though have to be compared to the meta they are in...if you hit any meta with almost 20% fish you have got to be in heaven...But the deck falls short most other times...
I also havnt touched on the fact that the guy that ran FCG at the SCG that it won at was playing the deck illegally for at least part of the tourney, and at least one game was outright won because he was fudging the rules..but I dont want to get too into that whole thing...its been beat to death and a lot of people find that result wrong...
Dragon on the other hand is pretty stable as a top level deck...it makes top 8 as a 1 of many many a major tourney (In fact I believe it just made top 8 at GenCon Vintage Worlds today...but the tourney is still going and that isnt confirmed)
The argument there is it because it wasn't in a favorable meta? Or because it was predicted and hated out? Or perhaps, because it's a fairly popular budget deck, horrible players played it in mass while only the skilled players did well with it?
That's what I didn't get, you had Dragon on such a high horse, talking about how well it performed, but then totally trashed FCG. Also consider that FCG has placed higher in it's two T8 appearances than Dragon did.
I wasn't aware, how exactly did he cheat? It's curious how no one called him on it all day. Then again, whenever I play a creature heavy deck in Vintage such as FCG...I've always found that my opponents are fuzzy on the combat step, the many things it entails and the many tricks that can be performed during it. I assume this is due to the low level of decks running more than a few creatures maindeck in the format.
I haven't heard any news, so I couldn't say.
-Lance
Spread the word.
Dragon is good in an unprepared meta. Unfortunatly, the splash hate it catches is a huge problem. When control/stax does well for a while, and Dragon isn't played very often, that's dragon's chance to shine, its a brief window every once and a while when everyone forgets about it.
I combined this thread and the "Worldgorger" thread. So don't start anymore threads on Dragon. All decklists, questions, suggestions, insight etc on Dragon is to be posted here.
-Lance
Spread the word.
In round 8 he forced a draw with his opponent after he won game 1 and THEN somebody in the croud pointed out the error...the opponent should have won...if this would have happened then either Kevin Cron or Steven Menendian would have made top 8 instead and things would obviously been different...
But I digress..
GenCon Results are in and Roland Chang playing 5cStax wins the title...with Andrew Probasco playing his Shortbus Severance Belcher (no welders) to second...Dragon finished in 3rd/4th...
No fish OR fcg in the top 8....
The rest of the top 8 included Tog, 2xControl Slaver, Stax, and Oath...
Since this is the total Dragon thread now, here is the decklist he used...
4 Gemstone Mine
3 City of Brass
2 Glilmmer Void
1 Mox Saphire
1 Mox Jet
1 Mox Emerald
1 Mox Ruby
1 Mox Pearl
1 Chrome Mox
1 Mox Diamond
1 Mana Crypt
3 Intuition
3 Lim-Dul's Vault
1 Vampiric Tutor
1 DT
4 Bazaar of Baghdad
4 Worldgorger Dragon
4 Squee, Goblin Nabob
3 Xantid Swarm
1 Sliver Queen
1 Crimson Hellkite
4 Force of Will
1 Ancestral Recall
1 Echoing Truth
3 Necromancy
3 Animate dead
2 Sacred Ground (Stax)
2 Rack and Ruin
2 Swords to Plowshares
2 Ray of Revelation
3 Null rod
2 Pernicious Deed
2 Verdant Force
Hooray for Roland!
Back on topic, that's certainly a different mana base for Dragon, especially with the Forbidden Orchards. That would give the deck a disadvantageous position against Stax, I think...
Maindeck Xantids are probably a good call considering the controllish metagame (Control Slaver/Gifts).
I think part of the idea is that the combo player just doesnt care a bit about its opponent maybe getting a few tokens...the idea of running orchard in combo was a hot topic when it was first in the spoilers then that idea kind of fell through.
The main bonus however is that when you combo out with hellkite you can create infinte tokens and not care..you cannot go infinte with city of brass (hence the drop to 3 of them)
It just seems he was going for as much bang for the buck as he could out of a 5 color base.
It cetainly is cool against oath though....:)
By the way that list is slightly wrong...its shivan hellkite NOT crimson hellkite....I just cut and pasted it like that. (at least I believe its the shivan kite...)
Xantid swarm has always been a must have IMO for dragon to really do well (there will always be a lot of control...and it will help against SB items other than crypt...)
I assumed what you just said Lunar.
BTW-We need more people with brains that actually understand vintage on this forum, like you. You are now teh coolness./not sarcastic at all. You are cool!
"That is not dead which can eternal lie, And with strange aeons even death may die."
- H.P. Lovecraft
3 Glimmervoid
3 Gemstone Mine
4 City of Brass
4 Forbidden Orchard
4 Bazaar of Baghdad
1 Mox Sapphire
1 Mox Diamond
1 Mox Ruby
1 Mox Pearl
1 Mox Jet
1 Mox Emerald
1 Mana Crypt
1 Black Lotus
1 Sol Ring
1 Time Walk
1 Ancestral Recall
1 Shivan Hellkite
1 Ambassador Laquatus
1 Entomb
1 Demonic Tutor
1 Pernicious Deed
1 Balance
1 Vampiric Tutor
2 Compulsion
2 Necromancy
3 Buried Alive
2 Xantid Swarm
3 Worldgorger Dragon
3 Intuition
3 Dance of the Dead
3 Animate Dead
4 Squee, Goblin Nabob
SB: 1 Stifle
SB: 1 Pernicious Deed
SB: 2 Swords to Plowshares
SB: 2 Pithing Needle
SB: 2 Ray of Revelation
SB: 2 Duress
SB: 2 Xantid Swarm
SB: 3 Rack and Ruin
looks decent, but laquatus is bad here...id go with 2 hellkites since they can win just by being animated themselfs...or maybe verdant force if you see a lot of stax in your area.
just to ask..why the 2xRead the Runes in here and not something else...
the damage thing with red in the deck is largely solved with dropping the number of cities to 2 or 3 and running the full gemstone and orchard sets..the odds of not having a non-city red source are pretty good for the deck..laquatus is just a bad win condition really...
think about it this way...if you have a land in play and can win with laquatus in this deck, then you can win with hellkite in this deck...since city of brass damages you you cant use it to win with laquatus either so that doesnt matter, all of your other lands are all 5 color so your argument is right out the door...not to mention that laquatus is dumb against platz...
hellkite is just plain better in your build...
another thing is intuition...with one laquatus and one hellkite the opponent gets to choose which kill you get...oath can always give you hellkite in your hand and laq in the yard so you cant deck them...having at least 2 of your kill makes intuition a lot better (thats why you generally see 2 or 3 hellkites in these builds)
compulsion feels better outside the combo to me...compulsion also lets you just stop when you want...if you read for all but say 4 of your deck and the card you need is still in there, you are now stuck, since you arent running witness...RtR seems solid in an eternal witness build though...compulsion is also a permanent against stax, which is never a bad thing.
But it has died down, why?
Here's a recent list that made top 8 in Richmond:
1 Black Lotus (Restricted in Vintage)
1 Mana Crypt (Restricted in Vintage)
1 Mox Jet (Restricted in Vintage)
1 Mox Ruby (Restricted in Vintage)
1 Mox Sapphire (Restricted in Vintage)
1 Sol Ring (Restricted in Vintage)
Creatures
1 Caller Of The Claw
4 Worldgorger Dragon
Enchantments
2 Animate Dead
1 Dance Of The Dead
2 Necromancy
Instants
1 Ancestral Recall (Restricted in Vintage)
1 Entomb (Restricted in Vintage)
4 Force Of Will
3 Intuition
3 Stifle
1 Vampiric Tutor (Restricted in Vintage)
1 Ambassador Laquatus
1 Kumano, Master Yamabushi
4 Squee, Goblin Nabob
Sorceries
1 Careful Study
2 Deep Analysis
1 Demonic Tutor (Restricted in Vintage)
3 Duress
1 Time Walk (Restricted in Vintage)
Basic Lands
1 Island
1 Swamp
Lands
4 Bazaar Of Baghdad
1 Bloodstained Mire
4 Forbidden Orchard
2 Polluted Delta
2 Underground Sea
2 Volcanic Island
3 Null Rod
2 Tormod's Crypt
1 Arcane Laboratory
2 Pyrostatic Pillar
2 Fire / Ice
2 Rack And Ruin
3 Red Elemental Blast
Here's Hale Simons 5-Color Dragon List(Which I prefer)
4 Forbidden Orchard
4 Gemstone Mine
3 City of Brass
2 Glimmervoid
1 Black Lotus
1 Mox Sapphire
1 Mox Jet
1 Mox Pearl
1 Mox Emerald
1 Mox Ruby
1 Sol Ring
1 Mana Crypt
Protection:
4 Force of Will
3 Xantid Swarm
1 Echoing Truth (should have been Chain of Vapor)
4 Worldgorger Dragon
3 Necromancy
3 Animate Dead
1 Shivan Hellkite
1 Sliver Queen
Tutors:
3 Intuition
3 Lim-Dul's Vault
1 Vampiric Tutor
1 Demonic Tutor
Draw:
4 Bazaar of Baghdad
2 Compulsion
1 Ancestral Recall
Goblin Nabobs:
4 Squee, Goblin Nabob
2 Sacred Ground
2 Ray of Revelation
2 Swords to Plowshares
2 Pernicious Deed
2 Verdant Force
2 Rack and Ruin
3 Null Rod
Here from Washington, they say it dies because Gifts can beat it easily. But that's because our meta right now is Gifts, CS, Fish, Stax, and TPS. SO it is very hard to predict the meta here.
Dragon has been talked about being good against CS and Gifts, so how come it isn't doing better?
Is it really good against Gifts and CS?
What do you think? Can Dragon fight through the hate and beat the upper decks(CS, Gifts, Stax, Etc.)??
Or do you consider Dragon tier 1?
Sometimes it is clearly tier 1 sometimes it struggles to be tier 2...why? Well because it is very easy to beat when fully expected and prepaired for...
Dragon is really its own worst enemy...when people do good with it, players prepair for it and it becomes easy to handle in many ways...But when it dies off like this, you need only wait a short time before people forget about it and you can pick it up and it will be very strong again..
But I will say this...Dragon is clearly the best Combo deck availible in T1...
I myself consider Dragon to be tier 1, you just have to know precisely when to play it. Once your local meta has eased it's thumb off of it for awhile you strike.
A better decklist would look something like:
//NAME: Dragon Combo
3 Glimmervoid
3 Gemstone Mine
4 City of Brass
4 Forbidden Orchard
4 Bazaar of Baghdad
1 Mox Sapphire
1 Mox Diamond
1 Mox Ruby
1 Mox Pearl
1 Mox Jet
1 Mox Emerald
1 Mana Crypt
1 Black Lotus
1 Sol Ring
1 Time Walk
1 Ancestral Recall
1 Shivan Hellkite
1 Ambassador Laquatus
1 Entomb
1 Demonic Tutor
1 Balance
1 Vampiric Tutor
2 Compulsion
2 Necromancy
2 Xantid Swarm
3 Worldgorger Dragon
3 Intuition
3 Buried Alive
3 Dance of the Dead
3 Animate Dead
4 Squee, Goblin Nabob
SB: 1 Pithing Needle
SB: 1 Pernicious Deed
SB: 2 Sacred Ground
SB: 2 Swords to Plowshares
SB: 2 Ray of Revelation
SB: 2 Duress
SB: 2 Xantid Swarm
SB: 3 Rack and Ruin
Of all the decks in magic ive seen more arguments over which build is the best with this deck, heh...
What I would say is that builds are going to be very Player AND Meta specific...I mean you can argue that your build is superior Ajora, but then BOTH of those lists from above were top 8 lists from MAJOR US tournaments...so quantifying which build is optimal is a rough task.
The mana base on that list you gave looks wrong too ajora...you want more non-pain red sources to allow for comboing with hellkite...city of brass doesnt work as well..you should up to 4 gemstones or orchards and drop the number of City of Brass by 1 or 2...
Sliver Queen is good, because it pitches to force. I have too much Oath in my meta to run Laquatus.
You can't just say it is a better decklist.