If you are planning on making a transformational sideboard, maybe you can make it:

3 future sight
4 sensei's top
4 heml of awakening.

It seems like the cores of both decks are the same

I do care, because I always like to hear what kind of deck/engines other people play with.

Claws is indeed the better option for this deck over furnance. I used them as proxies for pyrexian furnance (only own 2 of them) in other decks, stupid I never thought of it myself.

Bazaar is indeed an option when going to a proxy tournament, I think it can be really good (or at least cool to surprise people with).


Never thought of it, but it can be really good indeed. I really must try it before I can really say something decent about it, but it seems like it has potential.


I'll experiment with some of these tips, I'll post a tuned decklist one of these days with results. Please feel free to post any comment or tips, I check this site at least once per day.

The last posts are getting better, thanks.

I already play a oath deck, I just wanted to try to make an other decent creature combo deck. I am fully aware that oath (or mask) are better deckchoices when going to a tournament. Unlike some other people, I go to tournaments for the fun, I simply do not care if I win or lose. Winning is a cool thing and it will always be my goal when playing a match, but I really prefer to play something controversial and surprise my opponent with decks they are not familiar with.

BTW, sucking out my joy of magic will be very hard. I can have fun going to a 10 proxy tournament playing a really shitty mono green weenie deck (did it once, the deck wasn't worth giving it a name, I really had a blast)

But, back on topic:
Making the deck 2 colours is indeed better for the deck. Being used playing 2 enlightened tutor in Legacy, I simply replaced them by the black tutors, which was a very bad thing to do indeed.

I have made the following changes:

-1 Underground Sea
-1 Mox Jet
-1 Demonic Tutor
-1 Vampiric Tutor

+2 Island
+2 Impulse

I am thinking about replacing the Quirion Rangers, but what to replace it with? I still believe Flowstone hellion the better choice over Akroma, but when I remove the rangers, maybe I'll test playing both.

I am not saying this build is better than any other list, this build is in desperate need of tuning. Also, I am not saying this will be better than (for instance) Vengeur Mask, I just want to make it a good/decent deck. If I was claiming this build would be better, I'd be posting in the open forum, not the newbe forum.

All I'm asking for is a little openminded thinking, instead of these kind of comments, if you don't have something usefull to say, simply don't post.

By the way, I found a reason I'd rather play FEB instead of Vengeur. Have you seen the prizes on Illusionary maskes lately in europe? Those are very hard to get.

Really cool a friend gave you some cards to begin with, those people are the best. About your questions:


The best way to find these decks, is to go to the deck database of starcitygames, which you can find here: http://sales.starcitygames.com/deckdatabase/index.php?exp=vin
You can chose which colours you want to search in. I think the best decks will be: TPS, Hulk Smash and Doomsday. The decks are sorted by tournament results, so you'll only see good decks.


A Fish deck is a deck that packs a lot of hate and small creatures to provide the kill. Hate is mostly provided by cards like chalice of the void, null rod, wastelands. There are a lot of different strategies a fish deck can follow, so there are also a lot of different build of fish (U/R, U/W, with or without aether vial), if you want to play fish, again go to the deck database and find a build you like. 


Oath is a really powerfull deck because it's really explosive. It runs a lot of control cards (FoW, drains, etc) and it can have a active oath on turn 1 (forbidden orchard, Mox, Oath of Druids with FoW backup is a something very hard to recover from).

Oath can be played as a control deck, so it doesn't really have to win ASAP. Also there is a lot of graveyard hate in the format, any of it will shut down reanimator.

Can't answer B, I haven't seen his list.

The best tendrils deck for me, is TPS. Meandeck Tendrils is possibly the most powerfull Deck, but it is really hard to play it. TPS has protection in the form of FoW and Duress. Life Drain is not a card I would play in Vintage (or any other format), first of all: Consume Spirit is a lot better, second: if you have enough mana for a decent (read big/lethal) life drain, there are better ways to win the game, even with less mana.

I hope this covers most of your questions, English is not my native language, so I hope you can understand What I tyred to explain.

Have Fun.

Quirion Ranger is included to protect my lands, green is the main colour and I can return them to my hand if needed. There aren't a lot of deck which have a lot of cards that can kill a BoP, at least not the first game, only random aggro decks and FCG.

I do need something to protect my graveyard, I was thinking of playing Ground Seal MD. It works against welder decks, and gives protection against the most popular graveyard disrupter in my area: Phyrexian Furnace. Removing the bottom card isn't very usefull most of the time, because I can always discard a extra creature for the kill.

Does someone else have some ideas on this matter?

Cephalid Inkshrouder is a very good creature indeed, any ideas of which card to cut for it?

I am really a casual player, nothing is better for me than smashing my opponents face with a really big creature. Because of this, I have Been working a while on a Full English Breakfast (FEB) list for Legacy. One thing I notice on recent lists in this site, is that most Vintage lists don't pack a lot of creature hate. I think this deck can benefit from that. Here is a list I brainstormed out last night:

Vintage FEB (v1.0)

Mana: 19
4 Tropical Island
4 Polluted Delta
4 Elvish Spirit Guide
1 Forest
1 Island
1 Underground Sea
1 Black Lotus
1 Mox Sapphire
1 Mox Jet
1 Mox Emerald

Engine: 8
4 Survival of the Fittest
4 Vorath's Shapeshifter

Draw/Search: 8
4 Brainstorm
1 Ancestral recall
1 Time Walk
1 Demonic Tutor
1 Vampiric Tutor

Support/Protect: 17
4 Force of Will
3 Daze
4 Birds of Paradise
4 Wall of Roots
2 Quirion Ranger

Toolbox: 8
2 Phyrexian Dreadnought
1 Phage, the untouchable
1 Flowstone Hellion
1 Palinchron
1 Hypnox
1 Arcanis, the Omnipotent
1 Morphling

Card explanation:
Mana: I play only 19 mana sources which is really low. However, being able to gain extra mana from Bop and Wall of Roots and this low count doesn't matter. Nothing is more annoying in this deck than drawing dead lands.
Elvish Spirit Guide: Normally, I would play extra land instead of the guide, but unfortunately you can't discard any extra land you have drawn to the survival.

Survival of the Fittest: This card is the engine for the whole deck, it gives you the cards in your hand that you need, and it put the right cards in the graveyard when you need them.
Volrath's Shapeshifter: Most of the time, when this card hits the floor, it means you have won (or will next turn)

Brainstorm: No explanation necessary.
Ancestral Recall: Too broken not to play.
Time Walk: Too broken not to play.
Demonic/Vampiric Tutor: These were enlightened tutors in the Legacy version, not sure they are really necessary, but You'll be happy when you draw one, most of the time

Force of Will: The best counterspell in the format.
Daze: It is crucial to play your engine as fast as possible, therefore you'll need every free counterspell you can get.
Birds of Paradise: Acceleration, mana-fixer, pitchable to survival.
Wall of Roots: Acceleration, pitchable to survival, also a good blocker first game against decks like fish and goblins.
Quirion Ranger: Not so sure about this card, in legacy it is a rock, but in vintage I'm not so sure. It is mostly used to protect you lands against strips.

Flowstone Hellion: If you have enough mana after you play shapeshifter, this guy can provide in win in the same turn. Some people play a Akroma in this spot, but I like the flowstone ability, which combos really good with phyrexian dreadnought (before damage goes on the stack, activate the flowston ability 8x, in respose discard the dreadnought).
Phage, the untouchable: If you are attacking and your opponent has no blockers, discarding pahge gives you a instant win.
Phyrexian Dreadnought: Most of the time, this card is your win condition, included twice because this is the only creature you really want to be able to find in your library, even if you've drawn one.
Palinchron: Is a nice creature to discard finding a shapeshifter, untaps all your land when you play shapeshifter.
Hypnox: See above.
Arcanis, the Omnipotent: Combos well with morphling. Mostly used in long games to force an opening .in your opponent's defence.
Morphling: See above, activate morphlings untap ability a couple of times, discard arcanis, and draw 3 cards for each time you activated morphlings ability.

Sideboard:
I'm not sure what to include i the sideboard. I'm thinking on the following:
4 Naturalize (against al sort of random decks)
3 Ground Seal (against welderdecks, Dragon)
1 Crater Hellion (against Goblins, Fish etc)

Note: come in to play abilities only trigger when I play the shapeshifter, if I discard a dreadnought after the shapeshifter was played, I don't have to sacrefice creatures.

Any comments, tips, flames of other kind of tought about this deck, Please leave it.

Why not just forking the drain?

It gives you the 3 cards from ancestral, and 2 extra mana.

Oath is indeed a very strong deck to play budget (even when no proxies are allowed).

If you play a UBG version, you simpley don't need drains or intuitions. I'll post a list here of a deck I played for a while. (may not be too acurate).

Maindeck:      
5x Island  
4x Forbidden Orchard  
4x Polluted Dealta  
2x Underground Sea  
2x Tropical Island  
2x Faerie Coclave  
1x Strip Mine  
1x Mox Diamond  
1x Chrome Mox  
1x Lotus Petal  

1x Akroma, angel of wrath  
1x Darksteel Colossus

4x Force of Will
4x Counterspell  
4x Duress  
4x Accumulated Knowledge
4x Impulse  
4x Oath of Druids  
4x Brainstorm  
2x Daze  
1x Fastbond  
1x Lim-Dul's Vault  
1x Vampirc Tutor    
1x Demonic Tutor    

You can replace the intuition/mana drain for 4 counterspells, demonic/vampiric tutor, lim-dul's vault and some extra impulses. It will never be as strong as a full powered meandeck oath build, but this is also a very fast and strong build.

most people play mana leak, which is a very good card, but I prefer the counterspells, every mana source in the deck (except the strip mine) provides blue mana, so the castingcost will never be a problem.

The fastbond can easely be replaced, I didn't test it very well, but it wasn't that good, maybe you can replace it with a wasteland.

I played budged Oath for a while, that is a very strong budgetdeck indeed. Fish is also a cool deck to play.

That would be a nice translation indeed

Limbo is right, I can only proxy the real expencive cards, no berserks. (I do have brainstorms on the other hand  ).

I have concidered Rogue Elephand, but when playing only 9 forest, I don't think that is a good idea.

Any other comments?

I'm planning on playing monday's 10-proxy tournament in eindhoven, but I have one big problem: I own a lot of cards for a lot of decks, but I can't make one decent deck of it.

I have the cards for a slaver deck, but lack the welders.
I can make TPS, but don't own the right lands
and so on.

I started looking trough my casual decks (I usualy only play casual) and only found an old aggro deck I haven't played in ages. Here is a list:

Mono Green Agro:

mana:
9 Forest
4 Land Grant
1 Elvish Spirit Guide
1 Lotus Petal
1 Mox Emerald
1 Black Lotus

creature:
4 River Boa
4 Mtenda Lion
4 Skyshroud Elite
4 Ghazbán Ogre
4 Wild Dogs
3 Skyshroud Ridgeback

other fun stuff:
4 rancor
4 ankh of mishra
4 Bounty of the Hunt
4 Root Maze
3 Naturalize

Sideboard:
3 Ground Seal
3 Tangle
1 Gaea's Blessing
1 Naturalize
7 open slots

The idea of the deck is to play out little weenies very fast to kill the opponent. The creatures are chosen because they all (except the boa and the elite sometimes) are 2 power creatures for 1 mana. They all have their disadvantages, but I think that it's pretty safe playing them.

Card by Card explanations:

Creatures:
River Boa: No Brainer, the meta I'm expecting will be full of those blue making lands
Mtenda Lion: Even if the meta will be full of Islands, the lions still says: T: pay u or lose 2 life. Because of the mana disruption I'm playing maindeck, this guy rocks.
Ghazbán Ogre and Wild Dogs: These guys are pretty safe to play, there is nothing in my deck that causes me to lose life (a lot of opponents will) and playing a weenie deck ensures me that my opponents life will drop very fast.
Skyshroud Elite: A lot of players will play non basics: Workshop, Duals, Strips etc.
Skyshroud Ridgeback: I played Pouncing Jaguar in this spot, but found that echo is a very bad thing in Vintage.

Non creatures:
Rancor: a must have for each weennie deck that can support it.
Ankh of mishra: Playing only 9 lands makes this thing worth playing, If you ever had one turn one against you, you know what I'm talking about. Also a very good card vs Dragon
Bounty of the Hunt: I first played the good old Giant growth, but being able to play one for free is very good in a deck light of mana. Cards to pitch: land grant, naturalize, 2nd root maze.
Root Maze: an other part of the land disruption, also a no brainer against combo.
Naturalize: no brainer

Mana:
Forest: Playing only 9 is a bit risky, but the deck can have it. Nothing is more irritating than drawing land while having ankh in play
ESG: If I had 4, I would play 4, but since only power cards are allowed to proxie, I can play only 1
Land Grant: Forest nr 10-13. So much better than fetch in this deck. Pitchable with Bounty of the Hunt.
Black Lotus: no brainer
Lotus Petal: getting a smal boost is always a good thing. This would be the fist card to go when I get my 2nd ESG
Mox Emerald: no brainer

Can someone tell me what are good green sideboard cards for green? I want to stick with the Ground seal, but can't really think of something else.

Does anyone have tips of comment? please post them.

First of all, english is not my native language, so don't blame me for any gramar/spelling errors in this post (I'll edit it when I find some).

A couple of weeks ago, I started thinking about building a white weenie deck. I usualy only play casual T1 and I rarely go to a tournament, but I had a feeling that WW could become a very good (rogue)deck.

Let me explain.

While trying to make a sideboard, I found a new card in my binders I had never looked at: Samurai of the Pale Curtain. I think this card can easily disrupt any deck that plays with permanents. (stax, dragon, any welder based deck).

I started to search for other new weenie creatures an found an other very good one: True Believer. Seems very good against any combo deck (it totaly wrecks Doomsday, TPS and most dragon builds) and it should also be usefull against slaver.

I already had a decklist, but because I was planning on making a casual deck, I needed to change the whole deck. First I didn't want to do so, but I saw an article written by a member of team meandeck, who said it could become a decent deck.

I'll post the list wich I now have:

Mana:
8x Plains
4x Flooded Strand
3x Windswept Heath
4x Wasteland
1x Strip Mine
1x Chrome Mox
21 total

Weenies:
4x Samurai of the Pale Curtain
4x True Believer
4x Soltari Priest
4x Silver Knight
4x Raise the Alarm
3x Ramosian Sergeant
2x Battle Screech
25 total

Draw:
4x Skullclamp
4 total

Other:
4x Swords to Plowshares
2x Crusade
2x Seal of Cleansing
1x Crucible of Worlds
1x Enlightened Tutor
10 total

Card Analises:
Mana:
7 fetch: I always liked to play a lot of fetch in a mono-coloured deck, I works out fine with me, but maybe some pro-players disagree with me.
8 plains: Obviously, you'll need these
5 strips: Great hate against almost every deck in the field
1 Mox: If I owned power, this would be Mox Pearl..

Creatures:
4x Samurai of the Pale Curtain: Great hate
4x True Believer: Also great hate
4x Soltari Priest: This was a white knight when I started this deck, but nobody plays black creature hate
4x Silver Knight: Great creature against goblins, fire/ice etc.
4x Raise the Alarm: 2 creatures for 1 card is always a good thing
3x Ramosian Sergeant: playing creatures from anywhere but your hand (at instantspeed) is a great thing
2x Battle Screech: This card often reeds: 22WW: put 4 flying 1/1 tokens into play.

Draw:
4x Skullclamp: Because of whites lack of draw engines, I first wanted to spash blue, witch made the deck inconsistend. T1 is the only format where you can play Skullclamp, so why not do so?

Other:
4x Swords to Plowshares: Best creature removal in the game, great against oath
2x Crusade: I'm not sure about keeping this card, it's cool to lay it down, but often you'd rather want an other card
2x Seal of Cleansing: T1 is al about artifacts, playing (searchable) hate md seems a good thing to do.
1x Crucible of Worlds: Allows many tricks (wasteland, fetch)
1x Enlightened Tutor: Allows you to search for the good cards

I'm not sure yet what to do with the sideboard, I'm thinking something like this:
4x Null Rod
3x Sacred Ground
3x Rule of Law
3x Disenchant
2x Seal of Cleansing

Please leave comments and tips.

Well, as I said, I don't own any power and in the Netherlands are no proxies allowed, so I must improvise a little.

Because of the lack of drains, I added black for duress and the tutors. this decision makes this deck more control, but that doesn't really matter.

On the other hand, to be able to play the combo, you just need some acceleration. Mox Diamond, Chrome Mox and Lotus Petal are the best accelerators available for a powerless player. Elvish Spirit Guide would also be a good card, but it suckes in a oath deck.

Maybe Sol Ring could be good, but I need to test that before I can something about it (but I think it wouldn't work because this deck needs coloured mana).

Does anybody have some ideas about this? Please let me know.

My meta doens't have a lot of wastes, so it is pretty safe to play the 3-colour version.

After testing a lot of comments posted here, I ended up with the following deck:

Combo:
4x Oath of Druids
1x Gaea's Blessing
1x Akroma, angel of wrath
1x Spirit of the Night

Draw:
4x Accumulated Knowledge
4x Brainstorm
2x Impulse

Search:
2x Cunning Wish
1x Vampiric Tutor
1x Demonic Tutor
1x Crop Rotation
1x Lim-Dul's Vault

Disrupt:
4x Counterspell
4x Force of Will
4x Duress
2x Daze
1x Miscalculation

Mana:
6x Island
4x Forbidden Orchard
4x Polluted Delta
2x Underground Sea
2x Forest
1x Tropical Island
1x Mox Diamond
1x Chrome Mox
1x Lotus Petal

Sideboard:
3x Energy Flux
3x Hydroblast
2x Coffin Purge
2x Naturalize
1x Pristine Angel
1x Platinum Angel
1x Misdirection
1x Stifle
1x Berserk

I have made the following changes:

-Changed the sideboard, it is better now for a lot matchups (and I am not going to replace Berserk, it is my most expencive card and it was a present from my wife)
-During testing, miscalulation proved to be better than mana leak
-Added daze (I had never looked at it before, but is it as a very good card)
-Replaced night's wisper for impulse, it works a lot better, I can use it for force of will, chrome mox and it digges deeper than wisper.
-Added Lim-Dul's Vault (can dig though your whole deck to find the card you need)
-Removed the lone strip mine
-Added chrome mox

Any other comment is welkom.

Thanx, those are the comments I was hoping for

Maybe raising the amount of Duress could be a good idea, I'm defenatly going try give it a try.

AK is a very good card in this deck, because the oath will probably put at least a few of them in the graveyard, If the blessing goes to the grave also, I can respont to it by casting one, giving me a lot of cards and getting them shuffled back in my library afterwards.

Intuition is very hard te get here, but because of the lack of power, I can use a wish because the deck won't win before turn 3. (and berserking a spirit or a akroma is a very cool thing to do), If my deck would rely on them, I would play 4 of them, but it doesn't so I think playing 2 of them is the correct number, they always come in handy.

I forgot to add a strip mine to the decklist, I'll edit the list

Mana:
7x Island
4x Polluted Delta
4x Forbidden Orchard
2x Underground Sea
1x Tropical Island
1x Forest
1x Strip Mine
1x Lotus Petal
1x Mox Diamond

Combo:
4x Oath of Druids
1x Gaea's Blessing
1x Spirit of the Night
1x Akroma, angel of wrath

Draw/Search:
4x Accumulated Knowledge
4x Brainstorm
2x Night's Wisper
2x Cunning Wish
1x Fact or Fiction
1x Mystical Tutor
1x Demonic Tutor
1x Vampiric Tutor

Disruption:
4x Force of Will
4x Counterspell
4x Mana Leak
2x Duress
1x Misdirection

Sideboard:
3x Naturalize
3x Energy Flux
3x Hydroblast
2x Coffin Purge
1x Platinum Angel
1x Pristine Angel
1x Misdirection
1x Berserk

Where I live, no one has power (including me), so there is no problem for me, playing any deck without power.
Because of this, I splashed black for some extra disruption and some aditional search cards.

During testing, I haven't found any problems. Stax isn't a problem for me (a populair deck around here), nor are any other workshop-based decks.

I would like some comments on this build, I'm not playing a lot of tournaments, so I'm sure there most be something that can be improved.

Sidebord is made especialy for my meta, Naturalize is a no-brainer, Coffin Purge and Energy Flux are for welder-based decks, Hydroblast is for (chain-)Goblins, the extra Misdirection is a good card for combo.

Please, share your thoughts.

First of all, when you want to play discard spells, why don't you play the best one, Mind Twist. It's restricted for a purpose.

Second, I think you need a more stabile mana-base. I would remove white completly and make the deck 3-colours. Removing white would give you 3 empty slots (including Windswept Heath).

If you also remove 2 forests and a swamp and replace them with 2 tropical island and a underground sea, you can fetch al your land with Polluted Delta.

Gush is a really powerful card, try combining it with Fastbond and it turns into a necropotence witch gives you mana, it works in my deck.

If you are having trouble finding your Cadaverous Bloom, adding one single tutor for it won't solve the problem, try to find the most optimal draw engine for this deck. Try experimenting with: Fact or Fiction, Night's Wisper, Accumulated Knowledge, Deep Analysis or something else, there are many good draw spells available in Vintage.

Replacing a braingeyser for a stroke of genius makes your deck more flexibale, since you can respond with it to your opponent. The extra mana is worth it.

These are my toughts on the deck, I'm not a pro, I don't even play tournaments on a regular basis, but I think at least some of tips can improve your deck. Good luck making it at its best and I hope you enjoy to play it.

Niels

Thanks for your help.

I just don't understand where tinker fits. I have played regrowth and it was oke, but nothing more than that, often it was just a dead card.

Where proxies are allowed, i usualy proxi ancestral, time walk and 3 moxen, but buying then is imposible until I gratuate.

Can anyone please advaise my if my draw-engine is oke? I have tried Ak, but I think Night's Wisper is a lot better.

Hello,

This is my first post here, and I'm dutch, so please don't start picking on me because of any mistakes I might make (in content and language).

I have made the following deck:

Mana::
4 Underground Sea
4 Tropical Island
4 Polluted Delta
2 Flooded Strand
2 Island
1 Bayou

1 Lotus Petal
1 Sol Ring
1 Mana Vault

Creatures:
4 Quirion Dryad
3 Psychatog

Disruption:
4 Force of Will
3 Counterspell
3 Misdirection
2 Duress
2 Pernicious Deed
1 Mind Twist

Draw:
4 Brainstorm
4 Night's Wisper
3 Serum Visions
1 Fact or Fiction
1 Gush

Tutoring:
3 Cunning Wish
2 Merchant Scroll
1 Demonic Tutor
1 Vampiric Tutor
1 Mystical Tutor

Other:
1 Fastbond
1 Yawgmoth's Will

Sideboard:
4 Hydroblast
3 Stifle
2 Rend Flesh
2 Naturalize
1 Cremate
1 Pernicious Deed
1 Berserk
1 Rebuild

The deck is based on the build by Stephen Menendian and Paul Mastriano on starcitygames http://www.starcitygames.com/php/news/expandnews.php?Article=4552.

The idea is to play an early dryad, pump it by playing a lot of non-green spells and deliver some massive beatdown.
If you lose steam during the midgame, you can play a Psychatog and beat your opponent to dead (psychatog + Beserk is really cool).
If you are really lucky you can combo out with Fastbond, Gush and Yawgmoth's Will.

This deck plays pretty good, but when playing tournaments, I always happen to run out of steam (even with a Psychatog).

Can somebody help me tuning my deck?

In the Netherlands are no proxi-tournaments held and I am a poor student, so I don't have acces to power and drains.

Thanks for your time,

Niels