I really need to be able to play 2 lands a turn for Glacial Chasm I think. Me having to sac a land when it comes in, and then itself later on is rough. Though, maybe it buys enough time to set up behind, idk.
Ok, Tournament report time. I didn’t keep the best notes and I’m writing this a couple of days after, so this is all from memory, and the order of opponents might be off. Either way, though, it will still give a good idea of how the deck performed.
I took Daretti Stax to the Legacy 5k portion of SCG Columbus this past Sunday. I have been working on and tinkering with the list for about 3 months now (before Daretti was printed) and I am very happy with how I finished, as well as with how the deck performed. There are some changes I would make to my list, but I’ll mention that after. Here's the
list:
Round 1: U/r Delver
This was a nice guy, I think his name was Jared? Either way, it started off with him winning the die roll and taking a mulligan down to 6. He led with a fetch and Ponder, then passed. I kept a hand with a Plateau, Ancient tomb, and Chalice with some other relevant spells. He Dazes my Chalice (I think I should have probably waited to cast it to play around daze, though forcing him have it could also be right). His turn 2 is a young pyromancer and I drop an ensnaring bridge. I can’t empty my hand fast enough, however, and 10+ dmg from tomb doesn’t help things. I die to Young Peezy and his crew.
Game 2 I resolve a Moat fairly early and hide under it while I set up. I get a Chalice at 1 as well as a Crucible but double Smash to Smithereens turns both artifacts into scrap and he is able to clean me up with burn combined with Tomb damage.
This match is heavily dependent on the die roll as Daze becomes much more relevant when I am not on the play. Chalice and trinispheres are powerful, but less so when they get to land the initial threat, before they come down. Punishing Fire and Moat were strong, but I never saw any of my sideboard.
Round 2: B/G midrange
Game 1
Some sort of old school B/G deck this round. I’ll call it Eva Green for a lack of a better classification, as this mostly fits the bill. Keep my 7 with a Plateau , Tomb, I think Daretti, and some other spells. He starts us off with a Deathright, which can turn off my Crucible locks, as well as my P.fires. I drop my plateau and pass. He Hymns me on his second turn, nabbing my Tomb and a Trinisphere. This leaves me with no lands in hand. I top-deck a Grove and punish the Deathright . This buys me some much needed time. His turn 3 or 4 is a Goyf, which has 5 power due to the Sphere in my yard. I drop a Daretti after drawing a City of Traitors but only get 1activation before he kills it. This pumps Goyf even further, and puts me on a quick clock. To make matters worse, he hymns me again, forcing me into top-deck mode. I draw a land, pass, take 6, and then top-deck an Ensnaring bridge (Yes!). The Bridge resolves and I am able to hide behind it and crawl back into the game. Slowly, I resolve more spells. Eventually a smokestack eats away his board and he scoops.
Board:
I don’t remember how I boarded against him. I didn’t see any planeswalkers game 1 but assumed he had some Lillianas. I was also scared of Pernicious Deed so I most likely brought in Revokers and took out either 1-2 smokestacks or chalices/Trinispheres. If anyone has board suggestions I’m all ears, but I feel like these are correct.
Game 2
I mulligan the second game due to a 1-land hand. I keep a 2-lander and he Hymns me down to a 1-lander again. Not cool, bro. I get lucky, though, and game 2 plays out much like game 1. I have the Punishing Fire for his 2 Deathrights and get a Wasteland/Crucible lock, which keeps him on 1-2 mana and forces basics to be fetched. A late game Hymn discards a Smokestack, but Welder is a straight up G that don’t take no crap from nobody, getting the smokestack back into the fray. The combination of Welding repairs and the Wasteland lock forces him to scoop it up.
Round 3: Loam Depths
Game 1
I don’t actually know if this was lands, or some sort of more B/G loam deck. I’ll assume the latter, as I didn’t see any Exploration or blue for Intuition. I don’t know what I’m facing and I keep a quick Chalice into Smokestack because why not. The hand with no Crucible, though, which became relevant. After the smokestack is pumped I see the Loam and tears are shed. Now that I know I can’t win the permanent race without a Crucible I sac the Smokestack and hope to draw something more relevant. Nothing comes and he wasteland locks me out of the game (how ironic).
Board: I don’t feel strong taking Smokestack to victory against Loam so I take 2 out alongside a Chalice and bring in my 3 Crypts. I felt that Trinisphere was actually relevant in this match-up because it forces him to pay 3 for his loam, and can slow down anything that would search for the Dark Depths combo, Which would make the game a lot easier.
Game 2
He mulligans to 6, I don’t. I have Punishing Fire + Grove and am able to drop a Daretti fairly early to get tons of card advantage, discarding the P.fires to Daretti’s +2 and returning them with the groves. I land a welder and a Tormod’s Crypt and begin recurring the Crypt to eat away at his yard every time he attempts to loam. The game ends with smokestack and him scooping.
Game 3
This goes much the same as game 2 with Wasteland lock and Daretti dropping P. Fire like it’s hot. Eventually, this leads to a Daretti ulti and Smokestack…stacking. He can’t keep up with 5 soot counters and scoops . I am fairly certain I contributed to global warming on a non-trivial level in this tournament.
Round 4: Burn
I’m always scared of the Burn match-up because Price of Progress exists and I’m all about progress. Ancient Tomb doesn’t help, either. All in all, this goes really well though. I win the die roll and start with a Chalice at 1, followed by a Trinisphere, and then a Smokestack. He can’t keep up. He plays it out a little, but I think eventually realizes that he’s not going to be able to do anything and scoops.
Board: -3 Goblin Welder +3 COP: Red
Game 2
Pretty much a repeat of game 1 except he went first, leading with a threat (Don’t remember if it was a guide or swift spear). I was able to drop a turn 3 COP:Red and that, combined with the other lock pieces, meant he couldn’t do much. He was visibly frustrated and I had to convince him to scoop when I had a Trini + Smokestack + Crucible lock on him while he had no permanents.
Round 5: W/r Land Tax
Game 1
This was a very interesting list and I had no clue what to expect at any time. I mulligan to 5, which stunk, and on top of that I misplayed very hard game 1. I went first with Plateau, Tomb, and Chalice in my hand. Instead of leading with Tomb and Chalice at 1 I just dropped the plateau and passed (I have no clue what I was thinking). This allowed him to drop his turn 1 Land Tax, which neutered any chance at smoking him out of the game (Or so I thought). I figured Scroll Rack was somewhere in the list, but I didn’t really know what his win condition was. I end up dropping the Chalice at 1 and he doesn’t really play any other spells for the rest of the game. I get a Daretti out and ulti him, pumping a smokestack to 4 and sacking random artifacts that came back at the end steps.
Board: I had no clue what was going on but I knew that chalice at 1 hurt him a lot. I took out some Bridges and put in some Revokers for the Scroll Rack I knew he had to have.
Game 2
I mull to 5, giving me a Tomb and no red source, and then drew 3 Punishing Fires and a Daretti. Even in this situation it took him a long time to kill me. He played a Jotun Grunt and got some attacks in before not being able to pay the upkeep, but I died to some eventual bolts anyway.
Game 3
After seeing the Grunt, I put the Bridges back in and decided I could take out some Smokestacks. My reasoning being that they would not do much against a resolved Land Tax or couple of Tithes, which I saw in game 2. He leads with a Mox Diamond discarding a land, and then passes without making an actual land drop. I drop my second land and play a Revoker naming Mox diamond. This turns out to be back breaking as he goes another 5+ turns with no more lands. (I think he was planning on playing a Tithe or something to get lands, though I don’t know). That play + a Chalice on 1 is too much for him and after a little bit he scoops it up.
Round 6: Death and Taxes
This guy ended up getting 2nd place (though SCG lists him as 4th, which is incorrect)
Game 1
I Mulligan to 6, and keep a hand with a Chalice, Welder, and Smokestack. It’s a very long game that has me pumping my Smokestack to 3 before welding it out on his end step to keep me from losing permanents. I do this 2 times, with him sacrificing 6 more permanents than me in total, but he still makes every land drop, as well as multiple creature drops. I, on the other hand, am stuck with 3 & 4 costs in hand and not enough lands to cast them under a Thalia. Needless to say, he wins the permanent race. I never really thought about it, but besides Plowshares in game 1 his deck is all permanents. This means Smokestack is not going to be very good without Crucible.
Board: -2 smokestack -1 Trinisphere +3 Pyroclasm
Game 2
I keep a 6 with Plateau and Grove with P. Fire but no other lands. My hopes are that the grove + P. fire against a creature deck would buy me enough time to draw at least 1 more land, given that I’m running 24 of them. After 5 turns of no land, and a Rishidan port tapping my grove, I succumb to Thalia. Looking at the next couple of cards showed that I wasn’t going to draw a land for another 3 turns, and it was going to be a Tomb that I was too low to use anyway. Sometimes you just draw badly. Maybe it was a bad keep, too. I’m not sure. He played well though, and kept the right permanents while under the pressure of a ticking smokestack. I shake it off, ice my bum, and move on to the next round.
Round 7: U/r Delver
Rematch! I’m usually a pretty nice guy, but this match was no fun for me. Granted I’m at a fairly large tournament event but Magic is game, meant to be fun. My opponent was very technical and tried to get me to miss my chalice triggers every chance he got. I understand playing to your outs, but he was distracting me with talk and other plays to get me to drop my guard. To each his own I guess. If you want to win that badly it’s not my place to fault you. He wins the die roll, which isn’t a good sign for me. Game 1 I resolve an early Chalice, eventually drop a Moat, and sit in my comfy chair like the Bond villain I am. He runs spells into my chalice all game but I never miss a trigger. We then proceed to sit there for 30 minutes as he plays draw go with me. Eventually I have a stack with 5 piles of soot under it, a Daretti ulti, and trinisphere. I explain to him that he is not going to cast another spell all game and I’m not going to lose permanents, then ask him if he would like to save time and move on to game 2. He refuses and I say “okay.” My P. fires end up being in the last 20 cards of the deck (all 4 of them) so it takes me a while to kill him. I feel that this was very un-sporting of him, and also not very smart, as I was up a game with only 20 minutes to go for the last 2.
Board: -4 Goblin Welder -2 Smokestack +3 CoP: Red +3 Pyroclasm
Game 2
We both end up taking a mulligan and he leads with a Delver. I have a COP: Red in my hand but don’t want it to get dazed so I wait until my 3rd turn to try and play it. I have 2 Plateaus on the board and a Grove and Tomb in my hand. I make a pretty big misplay and play the grove first, thinking I’m playing around Daze. Much to my dismay he has a Spell Pierce and I am one mana short of stopping it. (If I had dropped the Tomb instead it would have played around both Daze and Pierce, so that was just bad play on my part). I don’t have the Punishing Fire to deal with the Delver and my only large mana source was a Tomb that ended up doing 6+ damage to me. I die to that and some heavy burn.
Game 3
This was a long game. I kept a 7 that had the COP: Red in it and it resolves. I drop land after land and Punishing Fire any Delver he plays, leaving us in a position where he was drawing as much burn and Swiftspears as he could. I don’t any tap mana, and just wait for the storm. Before we reach turns he throws 7 burn spells and 3 Swiftspear at me. I had 10 mana, 2 of it being from a tomb, and I was at 3. This put me at 1 life, but left him with no way to kill me. P. Fires would kill delvers, and I have more than enough mana to pay for the COP against any red damage remaining in his deck. Turns came and we ended in a draw. Neither of us wanted to give the other the win. I had 2 losses at this point and 1 more would put me out of prize. I assume he was in the same position, but I felt I had the winning board position. Either way, we both took the draw.
Round 8: Last round, Elves
Game 1
I’m pretty confident in this match-up. Punishing Fire with a Groves keeps his board clear of all creatures for the whole game. I have a Chalice at 1, which he kills with a Zenith into Reclamation Sage, but I have another on my turn. This is followed by a Trinisphere, and the constant rain of fire forces him to enter the scoop phase.
Board: -2 smokestack – 1 Crucible -1Daretti -1 Batterskull + 3 Pyroclasm +2 Revoker
I actually didn’t expect to see Elves here, so I didn’t practice the boarding. I think it’s pretty solid, though probably not perfect. Elves can drop a lot of permanents fast, so I felt smokestack wasn’t very reliable unless I had a good lock going.
Game 2
I start much the same as game 1 with an early Chalice. I land a Welder after he blows up the Chalice, then hide under a Touchy-Feely Bridge with a Pyroclasm in hand. He plays out 4 elves and that gets the punishing fire out of my hand to clear the board. This ends up being a 5-for-2 as It killed his Dryad Arbor, but Original G Welder had to take one for the team. I take a long time to do much of anything, then ulti Daretti. It doesn’t matter, though, as he is able to build up his board and EoT kill my bridge. The Daretti ulti means I get it back at the end of his turn, but I don’t live that long because of a certain Behemoth. This was my mistake, as having an active Welder would have meant he had no way to kill the Bridge, or me. Killing 5 creatures with a pyroclasm was too juicy though and I didn't think it through.
Game 3
I have a hand with 2 Pyroclasm and not much else. He leads with a Deathright which I know I need to kill to prevent it from turning off my Welders and P. Fires. I wait to see if he drops any more creatures, which he does, so I fire off the first Pyroclasm and kill the Shaman, a Scavenging ooze, and a Nettle Sentinel. The Scooze eats a Wasteland before it dies. I drop a Crucible the next turn, which meant losing the Wasteland was relevant. I drop a late chalice and Trinisphere and eventually draw another Wasteland. My 1st Punishing Fire of game 3 comes soon after. The combination of P. Fire and Wasteland eating away at his mana meant he couldn’t do much, and he eventually scoops to another Daretti ulti under a Smokestack full of soot.
Changes for Indianapolis
I am not really sold on Moat. It was a deciding factor in 1 game against U/r delver, but in the B/G game it could have easily been a Maze of Ith and done the same thing, while at the same time having a chance to be discarded to Mox Diamond in the case I need the mana. Taking Moat out would also mean I could all but drop white from the list, giving me much less of a chance to run into mana troubles. Really, it just comes into play when I can’t empty my hand fast enough for Ensnaring Bridge, they have a Noble Hierarch, or a Jitte with counters on it.
The Batterskull was useless all tournament. I included it as a way to end games faster if needed, and gain me life in match ups where life was a big issue. I think I tried to cast it once, and it was irrelevant. I am considering turning this into a Dark Depths and putting a Thespian Stage somewhere in the list. This gives me the option to discard it to Mox Diamond, and it’s also recoverable with Crucible. It doesn’t cost 5, and still finishes games fast. That being said, though, it’s pretty scared of Deathright Shaman. I’ll play with it at me LGS before Indy and see how it feels. If anyone has any suggestions in this regard I’m all ears.
The board needs to change as well. I didn’t use O-ring once, though this could just be because I didn’t run into any matches that would use it (Miracles and Show and Tell / Reanimator). If I go mono-Red it will need to be replaced anyway, along with COP: Red, which will probably become Dragon Claw or Sun Droplet. I feel these are sub-optimal, but I need something against U/r Delver and Burn.
Pyroclasm might be better as something else. Slice and Dice is very interesting as the cycle is un-counterable, it cantrips, and 6 for the full cost is not unimaginable in this deck. Although, doing only 1damage instead of 2 means Deathright , Nettle Sentinal , Stoneforge Mystic, and flipped delvers don’t die to it. Volcanic Fallout does the same amount of damage as Pyroclasm, but is uncounterable. There are others that do 3 to all creatures, which means U/r Delver has a tougher time triggering prowess to keep Swiftspears alive. I need to test all 4 and see which is more relevant: the damage, the uncounterability, the mana cost, or the cantrips.
I was really happy with how the day went, given that I was playing my own brew. I ended 5-2-1 which gave me 24th on tiebreakers. I had fun all day and most people were very friendly. I received a ton of compliments on the deck, which means a lot to me. 5 or 6 guys asked me to lay the deck out after the tournament and talk about it, and a judge came by and took a picture of it with his phone. I’ve put a lot of time into trying to make Daretti competitive so the interest in the deck felt really good. Feel free to throw ideas my way as I’m always looking to improve the deck and my own playing. Thanks for reading and I hope I can run into some of you at Indy.g. Thanks for reading and I hope I can run into some of you at Indy.
Haven't posted in a while but I wanted to put my 2 cents in.
Lodestone is a house. He takes advantage of all of the greedy mana bases out there right now and is a must have in my opinion. Landing him turn 2 cripples too many decks to not run him.
Also through testing I have found that Cavern of Souls is just sauce in this deck, I'm going to be running it as a 4 of at the upcoming SCG in Detroit.
Fatties I currently run maindeck
3 Wurmcoil Engine
1 Duplicant
1 Platinum Angel
1 Myr Battleshpere
1 Blightsteel Colossus
1 Steel Hellkite
3 Lodestone Golem
1 Spine of Ish Sa (not really a fatty, but a tutor target)
I think Construct is what you want to name. Uncounterable forgemaster and metalworker seems really good. I can see where you would name goblin if you are running the red version, as when Welder hits any counters for the rest of the game mean basically nothing.
My brother just top 64ed the Indianapolis GP with Dream Halls, I didn't fare as well but played the same list. It was a lot of fun. I was just looking at the card the other day and that lead to this post.
Lately I've been playing the mimeo kill, and it's been working nicely. Appart from being the coolest one by far (even opponents must admit that ;)) it helps you dodge Stifle which is always a plus.
And come on, it's not everyday that you get to machine gun somebody with a Triskelion!
Not to mention the kiki kill uses the battle phase, which opens it up to all kinds of vulnerabilities.
Does anybody know where the flavor text for Dream Halls comes from, or even what it means or what it is referring to? I don't know if it is from a poem or what.
Lotus petal worked fine, but I might have preferred something more constant. I'm not sure whether I want it over diamond or not. It got me to a turn-1 metalworker, which promptly died to removal.
This is why I don't run any form of moxen or petals. You don't need that speed in the beginning, a turn 1 metalworker is useless in 90% of the situations you are put in. You only need 2 mana your first turn. Imagine if that petal had been a chalice at 1 or a spellskite, your metalworker would have come down 1 turn later, but would have promptly won you the game. That a trade off I would make any day.
There's a lot of word going around that Memphis consisted of underprepared players and less than optimal deck lists. Zac's card choices should be taken with a grain of salt.
I got that feeling when I was watching the live stream, there were only 7 rounds as well, which means a really low turnout for an SCG.
With Forgemaster functioning as a Tinker toolbox, I like to give myself as many options as possible. I obviously won't fetch a BSC to soft lock someone out. Neither would I fetch Sundering Titan if I have an open shot for an immediate victory. Speaking from experience, the wins a tutored and Greaved BSC outweighs the times I've had the dead draw negatively affect me.
Same, I took him out for a while, but put him right back in. There are just too many times where is wins out of nowhere.
He's right. RUG is a difficult matchup and even besides them, decks in legacy have gotten more and more greedy with their mana base. A cad like blood moon is there to punish them for it, while it does little damage to you. If a blood moon lands against RUG it is pretty much gg.
I don't think he helps with the untapping, as far as I know, the creature retains all abilities it had before animation, and so therefore will not untap.
I took Daretti Stax to the Legacy 5k portion of SCG Columbus this past Sunday. I have been working on and tinkering with the list for about 3 months now (before Daretti was printed) and I am very happy with how I finished, as well as with how the deck performed. There are some changes I would make to my list, but I’ll mention that after. Here's the
list:
4 Plateau
4 Wasteland
4 City of Traitors
4 Ancient Tomb
2 Flagstones of Trokair
1 Plains
1 Karakas
4 Grove of the Burnwillows
4 Goblin Welder
4 Daretti, Scrap Savant
4 Chalice of the Void
4 Smokestack
4 Mox Diamond
3 Trinisphere
4 Ensnaring Bridge
4 Punishing Fire
3 Crucible of Worlds
1 Batterskull
1 Moat
3 Circle of Protection: Red
3 Phyrexian Revoker
3 Oblivion Ring
3 Pyroclasm
3 Tormod’s Crypt
Round 1: U/r Delver
This was a nice guy, I think his name was Jared? Either way, it started off with him winning the die roll and taking a mulligan down to 6. He led with a fetch and Ponder, then passed. I kept a hand with a Plateau, Ancient tomb, and Chalice with some other relevant spells. He Dazes my Chalice (I think I should have probably waited to cast it to play around daze, though forcing him have it could also be right). His turn 2 is a young pyromancer and I drop an ensnaring bridge. I can’t empty my hand fast enough, however, and 10+ dmg from tomb doesn’t help things. I die to Young Peezy and his crew.
Board -4 Goblin Welder -2 Smokestack +3 CoP: Red +3 Pyroclasm
Game 2 I resolve a Moat fairly early and hide under it while I set up. I get a Chalice at 1 as well as a Crucible but double Smash to Smithereens turns both artifacts into scrap and he is able to clean me up with burn combined with Tomb damage.
This match is heavily dependent on the die roll as Daze becomes much more relevant when I am not on the play. Chalice and trinispheres are powerful, but less so when they get to land the initial threat, before they come down. Punishing Fire and Moat were strong, but I never saw any of my sideboard.
Round 2: B/G midrange
Game 1
Some sort of old school B/G deck this round. I’ll call it Eva Green for a lack of a better classification, as this mostly fits the bill. Keep my 7 with a Plateau , Tomb, I think Daretti, and some other spells. He starts us off with a Deathright, which can turn off my Crucible locks, as well as my P.fires. I drop my plateau and pass. He Hymns me on his second turn, nabbing my Tomb and a Trinisphere. This leaves me with no lands in hand. I top-deck a Grove and punish the Deathright . This buys me some much needed time. His turn 3 or 4 is a Goyf, which has 5 power due to the Sphere in my yard. I drop a Daretti after drawing a City of Traitors but only get 1activation before he kills it. This pumps Goyf even further, and puts me on a quick clock. To make matters worse, he hymns me again, forcing me into top-deck mode. I draw a land, pass, take 6, and then top-deck an Ensnaring bridge (Yes!). The Bridge resolves and I am able to hide behind it and crawl back into the game. Slowly, I resolve more spells. Eventually a smokestack eats away his board and he scoops.
Board:
I don’t remember how I boarded against him. I didn’t see any planeswalkers game 1 but assumed he had some Lillianas. I was also scared of Pernicious Deed so I most likely brought in Revokers and took out either 1-2 smokestacks or chalices/Trinispheres. If anyone has board suggestions I’m all ears, but I feel like these are correct.
Game 2
I mulligan the second game due to a 1-land hand. I keep a 2-lander and he Hymns me down to a 1-lander again. Not cool, bro. I get lucky, though, and game 2 plays out much like game 1. I have the Punishing Fire for his 2 Deathrights and get a Wasteland/Crucible lock, which keeps him on 1-2 mana and forces basics to be fetched. A late game Hymn discards a Smokestack, but Welder is a straight up G that don’t take no crap from nobody, getting the smokestack back into the fray. The combination of Welding repairs and the Wasteland lock forces him to scoop it up.
Round 3: Loam Depths
Game 1
I don’t actually know if this was lands, or some sort of more B/G loam deck. I’ll assume the latter, as I didn’t see any Exploration or blue for Intuition. I don’t know what I’m facing and I keep a quick Chalice into Smokestack because why not. The hand with no Crucible, though, which became relevant. After the smokestack is pumped I see the Loam and tears are shed. Now that I know I can’t win the permanent race without a Crucible I sac the Smokestack and hope to draw something more relevant. Nothing comes and he wasteland locks me out of the game (how ironic).
Board: I don’t feel strong taking Smokestack to victory against Loam so I take 2 out alongside a Chalice and bring in my 3 Crypts. I felt that Trinisphere was actually relevant in this match-up because it forces him to pay 3 for his loam, and can slow down anything that would search for the Dark Depths combo, Which would make the game a lot easier.
Game 2
He mulligans to 6, I don’t. I have Punishing Fire + Grove and am able to drop a Daretti fairly early to get tons of card advantage, discarding the P.fires to Daretti’s +2 and returning them with the groves. I land a welder and a Tormod’s Crypt and begin recurring the Crypt to eat away at his yard every time he attempts to loam. The game ends with smokestack and him scooping.
Game 3
This goes much the same as game 2 with Wasteland lock and Daretti dropping P. Fire like it’s hot. Eventually, this leads to a Daretti ulti and Smokestack…stacking. He can’t keep up with 5 soot counters and scoops . I am fairly certain I contributed to global warming on a non-trivial level in this tournament.
Round 4: Burn
I’m always scared of the Burn match-up because Price of Progress exists and I’m all about progress. Ancient Tomb doesn’t help, either. All in all, this goes really well though. I win the die roll and start with a Chalice at 1, followed by a Trinisphere, and then a Smokestack. He can’t keep up. He plays it out a little, but I think eventually realizes that he’s not going to be able to do anything and scoops.
Board: -3 Goblin Welder +3 COP: Red
Game 2
Pretty much a repeat of game 1 except he went first, leading with a threat (Don’t remember if it was a guide or swift spear). I was able to drop a turn 3 COP:Red and that, combined with the other lock pieces, meant he couldn’t do much. He was visibly frustrated and I had to convince him to scoop when I had a Trini + Smokestack + Crucible lock on him while he had no permanents.
Round 5: W/r Land Tax
Game 1
This was a very interesting list and I had no clue what to expect at any time. I mulligan to 5, which stunk, and on top of that I misplayed very hard game 1. I went first with Plateau, Tomb, and Chalice in my hand. Instead of leading with Tomb and Chalice at 1 I just dropped the plateau and passed (I have no clue what I was thinking). This allowed him to drop his turn 1 Land Tax, which neutered any chance at smoking him out of the game (Or so I thought). I figured Scroll Rack was somewhere in the list, but I didn’t really know what his win condition was. I end up dropping the Chalice at 1 and he doesn’t really play any other spells for the rest of the game. I get a Daretti out and ulti him, pumping a smokestack to 4 and sacking random artifacts that came back at the end steps.
Board: I had no clue what was going on but I knew that chalice at 1 hurt him a lot. I took out some Bridges and put in some Revokers for the Scroll Rack I knew he had to have.
Game 2
I mull to 5, giving me a Tomb and no red source, and then drew 3 Punishing Fires and a Daretti. Even in this situation it took him a long time to kill me. He played a Jotun Grunt and got some attacks in before not being able to pay the upkeep, but I died to some eventual bolts anyway.
Game 3
After seeing the Grunt, I put the Bridges back in and decided I could take out some Smokestacks. My reasoning being that they would not do much against a resolved Land Tax or couple of Tithes, which I saw in game 2. He leads with a Mox Diamond discarding a land, and then passes without making an actual land drop. I drop my second land and play a Revoker naming Mox diamond. This turns out to be back breaking as he goes another 5+ turns with no more lands. (I think he was planning on playing a Tithe or something to get lands, though I don’t know). That play + a Chalice on 1 is too much for him and after a little bit he scoops it up.
Round 6: Death and Taxes
This guy ended up getting 2nd place (though SCG lists him as 4th, which is incorrect)
Game 1
I Mulligan to 6, and keep a hand with a Chalice, Welder, and Smokestack. It’s a very long game that has me pumping my Smokestack to 3 before welding it out on his end step to keep me from losing permanents. I do this 2 times, with him sacrificing 6 more permanents than me in total, but he still makes every land drop, as well as multiple creature drops. I, on the other hand, am stuck with 3 & 4 costs in hand and not enough lands to cast them under a Thalia. Needless to say, he wins the permanent race. I never really thought about it, but besides Plowshares in game 1 his deck is all permanents. This means Smokestack is not going to be very good without Crucible.
Board: -2 smokestack -1 Trinisphere +3 Pyroclasm
Game 2
I keep a 6 with Plateau and Grove with P. Fire but no other lands. My hopes are that the grove + P. fire against a creature deck would buy me enough time to draw at least 1 more land, given that I’m running 24 of them. After 5 turns of no land, and a Rishidan port tapping my grove, I succumb to Thalia. Looking at the next couple of cards showed that I wasn’t going to draw a land for another 3 turns, and it was going to be a Tomb that I was too low to use anyway. Sometimes you just draw badly. Maybe it was a bad keep, too. I’m not sure. He played well though, and kept the right permanents while under the pressure of a ticking smokestack. I shake it off, ice my bum, and move on to the next round.
Round 7: U/r Delver
Rematch! I’m usually a pretty nice guy, but this match was no fun for me. Granted I’m at a fairly large tournament event but Magic is game, meant to be fun. My opponent was very technical and tried to get me to miss my chalice triggers every chance he got. I understand playing to your outs, but he was distracting me with talk and other plays to get me to drop my guard. To each his own I guess. If you want to win that badly it’s not my place to fault you. He wins the die roll, which isn’t a good sign for me. Game 1 I resolve an early Chalice, eventually drop a Moat, and sit in my comfy chair like the Bond villain I am. He runs spells into my chalice all game but I never miss a trigger. We then proceed to sit there for 30 minutes as he plays draw go with me. Eventually I have a stack with 5 piles of soot under it, a Daretti ulti, and trinisphere. I explain to him that he is not going to cast another spell all game and I’m not going to lose permanents, then ask him if he would like to save time and move on to game 2. He refuses and I say “okay.” My P. fires end up being in the last 20 cards of the deck (all 4 of them) so it takes me a while to kill him. I feel that this was very un-sporting of him, and also not very smart, as I was up a game with only 20 minutes to go for the last 2.
Board: -4 Goblin Welder -2 Smokestack +3 CoP: Red +3 Pyroclasm
Game 2
We both end up taking a mulligan and he leads with a Delver. I have a COP: Red in my hand but don’t want it to get dazed so I wait until my 3rd turn to try and play it. I have 2 Plateaus on the board and a Grove and Tomb in my hand. I make a pretty big misplay and play the grove first, thinking I’m playing around Daze. Much to my dismay he has a Spell Pierce and I am one mana short of stopping it. (If I had dropped the Tomb instead it would have played around both Daze and Pierce, so that was just bad play on my part). I don’t have the Punishing Fire to deal with the Delver and my only large mana source was a Tomb that ended up doing 6+ damage to me. I die to that and some heavy burn.
Game 3
This was a long game. I kept a 7 that had the COP: Red in it and it resolves. I drop land after land and Punishing Fire any Delver he plays, leaving us in a position where he was drawing as much burn and Swiftspears as he could. I don’t any tap mana, and just wait for the storm. Before we reach turns he throws 7 burn spells and 3 Swiftspear at me. I had 10 mana, 2 of it being from a tomb, and I was at 3. This put me at 1 life, but left him with no way to kill me. P. Fires would kill delvers, and I have more than enough mana to pay for the COP against any red damage remaining in his deck. Turns came and we ended in a draw. Neither of us wanted to give the other the win. I had 2 losses at this point and 1 more would put me out of prize. I assume he was in the same position, but I felt I had the winning board position. Either way, we both took the draw.
Round 8: Last round, Elves
Game 1
I’m pretty confident in this match-up. Punishing Fire with a Groves keeps his board clear of all creatures for the whole game. I have a Chalice at 1, which he kills with a Zenith into Reclamation Sage, but I have another on my turn. This is followed by a Trinisphere, and the constant rain of fire forces him to enter the scoop phase.
Board: -2 smokestack – 1 Crucible -1Daretti -1 Batterskull + 3 Pyroclasm +2 Revoker
I actually didn’t expect to see Elves here, so I didn’t practice the boarding. I think it’s pretty solid, though probably not perfect. Elves can drop a lot of permanents fast, so I felt smokestack wasn’t very reliable unless I had a good lock going.
Game 2
I start much the same as game 1 with an early Chalice. I land a Welder after he blows up the Chalice, then hide under a Touchy-Feely Bridge with a Pyroclasm in hand. He plays out 4 elves and that gets the punishing fire out of my hand to clear the board. This ends up being a 5-for-2 as It killed his Dryad Arbor, but Original G Welder had to take one for the team. I take a long time to do much of anything, then ulti Daretti. It doesn’t matter, though, as he is able to build up his board and EoT kill my bridge. The Daretti ulti means I get it back at the end of his turn, but I don’t live that long because of a certain Behemoth. This was my mistake, as having an active Welder would have meant he had no way to kill the Bridge, or me. Killing 5 creatures with a pyroclasm was too juicy though and I didn't think it through.
Game 3
I have a hand with 2 Pyroclasm and not much else. He leads with a Deathright which I know I need to kill to prevent it from turning off my Welders and P. Fires. I wait to see if he drops any more creatures, which he does, so I fire off the first Pyroclasm and kill the Shaman, a Scavenging ooze, and a Nettle Sentinel. The Scooze eats a Wasteland before it dies. I drop a Crucible the next turn, which meant losing the Wasteland was relevant. I drop a late chalice and Trinisphere and eventually draw another Wasteland. My 1st Punishing Fire of game 3 comes soon after. The combination of P. Fire and Wasteland eating away at his mana meant he couldn’t do much, and he eventually scoops to another Daretti ulti under a Smokestack full of soot.
Changes for Indianapolis
I am not really sold on Moat. It was a deciding factor in 1 game against U/r delver, but in the B/G game it could have easily been a Maze of Ith and done the same thing, while at the same time having a chance to be discarded to Mox Diamond in the case I need the mana. Taking Moat out would also mean I could all but drop white from the list, giving me much less of a chance to run into mana troubles. Really, it just comes into play when I can’t empty my hand fast enough for Ensnaring Bridge, they have a Noble Hierarch, or a Jitte with counters on it.
The Batterskull was useless all tournament. I included it as a way to end games faster if needed, and gain me life in match ups where life was a big issue. I think I tried to cast it once, and it was irrelevant. I am considering turning this into a Dark Depths and putting a Thespian Stage somewhere in the list. This gives me the option to discard it to Mox Diamond, and it’s also recoverable with Crucible. It doesn’t cost 5, and still finishes games fast. That being said, though, it’s pretty scared of Deathright Shaman. I’ll play with it at me LGS before Indy and see how it feels. If anyone has any suggestions in this regard I’m all ears.
The board needs to change as well. I didn’t use O-ring once, though this could just be because I didn’t run into any matches that would use it (Miracles and Show and Tell / Reanimator). If I go mono-Red it will need to be replaced anyway, along with COP: Red, which will probably become Dragon Claw or Sun Droplet. I feel these are sub-optimal, but I need something against U/r Delver and Burn.
Pyroclasm might be better as something else. Slice and Dice is very interesting as the cycle is un-counterable, it cantrips, and 6 for the full cost is not unimaginable in this deck. Although, doing only 1damage instead of 2 means Deathright , Nettle Sentinal , Stoneforge Mystic, and flipped delvers don’t die to it. Volcanic Fallout does the same amount of damage as Pyroclasm, but is uncounterable. There are others that do 3 to all creatures, which means U/r Delver has a tougher time triggering prowess to keep Swiftspears alive. I need to test all 4 and see which is more relevant: the damage, the uncounterability, the mana cost, or the cantrips.
I was really happy with how the day went, given that I was playing my own brew. I ended 5-2-1 which gave me 24th on tiebreakers. I had fun all day and most people were very friendly. I received a ton of compliments on the deck, which means a lot to me. 5 or 6 guys asked me to lay the deck out after the tournament and talk about it, and a judge came by and took a picture of it with his phone. I’ve put a lot of time into trying to make Daretti competitive so the interest in the deck felt really good. Feel free to throw ideas my way as I’m always looking to improve the deck and my own playing. Thanks for reading and I hope I can run into some of you at Indy.g. Thanks for reading and I hope I can run into some of you at Indy.
Lodestone is a house. He takes advantage of all of the greedy mana bases out there right now and is a must have in my opinion. Landing him turn 2 cripples too many decks to not run him.
Also through testing I have found that Cavern of Souls is just sauce in this deck, I'm going to be running it as a 4 of at the upcoming SCG in Detroit.
3 Wurmcoil Engine
1 Duplicant
1 Platinum Angel
1 Myr Battleshpere
1 Blightsteel Colossus
1 Steel Hellkite
3 Lodestone Golem
1 Spine of Ish Sa (not really a fatty, but a tutor target)
Not to mention the kiki kill uses the battle phase, which opens it up to all kinds of vulnerabilities.
This is why I don't run any form of moxen or petals. You don't need that speed in the beginning, a turn 1 metalworker is useless in 90% of the situations you are put in. You only need 2 mana your first turn. Imagine if that petal had been a chalice at 1 or a spellskite, your metalworker would have come down 1 turn later, but would have promptly won you the game. That a trade off I would make any day.
I got that feeling when I was watching the live stream, there were only 7 rounds as well, which means a really low turnout for an SCG.
Same, I took him out for a while, but put him right back in. There are just too many times where is wins out of nowhere.
Artifact lands are still artifacts under Blood Moon. Artifact is card type, not super type, and therefore they are still turned off by Null rod.
Also, The player who won the SCG was running a Blightsteel.