Gush Players, represent!

Glad that Snape got it to T8. Looks like a fun event.

Hey bro! This is Nighthavk that you played yesterday on Cockatrice.

We first ran with me on a Karn PW Mud, and it wasn't even close. Steel Sabotages aren't even funny. I didn't even bother playing this MU after 2-3 games because I knew I had no shot. So I piled up my Jace list (a pretty standard one, with tinkerbot, time vault, and singleton Tez) and we played three matches, me winning 2 of them, but all matches going to 3 games.

I didn't really know how to best SB (I have a brief Red splash for artifact hate) so I sided in my 3 Remoras in addition to 3 Bobs in the main, and brought in Darkblast for Hex and some pyroblasts, getting rid of some cantrips, 1 land, and slow tutors. I didn't really care for card quality but chose to fight his remoras with pure card advantage, and I might've been onto something, as I had my FoWs or Misdirections more often than he had his FoWs or traps.

Hex Parasite, tbh, never did anything, tho one game he misplayed to sac it to a Tinker when he could've used an off color moxen, and I won it off a Jace, it could've been different then. But then again, that was one in 9 games.

I honestly think Hex Parasite is just too cute. Games I lost to this deck with MUD was due Steel Sabotages, Drains, FoWs making anything I do irrelevant. They never came up in the Drain mirror (or were just beating faces or eating a Fire/Ice I had).

One thing that this build cemented for me was Praetor's Grasp. It was just sick, removing my win conditions and getting to use them for himself. My MVP was probably Misdirection.

Overall they were ton of fun games, looking forward to testing with you again!

Nighthavk @ WotC, Cockatrice, MWS.

Mbruker, first of all great job! I was looking for a way to use MWS on Mac, and now I'm fully sold on MWS.

There's only one thing I'd like to see implemented - ability to sort out cards in my hand the way I want. Currently, if I hold a card and move it anywhere, it'll always go to the right side of the hand. I'd like to stack cards in my hand, on mana cost / lands-nonlands, combo pieces-not combo pieces. Etc. I've heard this from other players I've been porting from MWS to Cockatrice, and it would certainly be of great help!

Anyways, thanks for your work so far on this project. Gl.

Basically this.

Bitterblossom, Ghast and Clamp.. etc.

I stuck with Cephalid Sage, because *not* discarding a card can often be relevant, especially considering I might probably need that land I had in opener / that I dredged. The body didn't really interest me, because if I'm in a situation to dread return, I'm pretty close to winning that the power will often be irrelevant while a land most certainly can be.

My concern with Coliseum was that it would take third turn to be able to use it. I'm trying my best to make a deck that can operate for easy - random turn 2 wins and guaranteed turn 3 wins. I believe, having more of cards for the former scenario will still serve in my third turn wins and especially under pression like a double wasteland. I'm certainly happy with the amount of lands I'm running. More coliseums would come at the expense of other non-lands.

Fatestitchers has been good for me. With one mana producer you can chain cast your stitchers and more the creatures the merrier. In fact, I've been wanting to make it a 3-of, or even outrageously, 4 of. It might seem weak once a Bazaar is down; but again, on your turn, you can chain cast them from your graveyard essentially for free, and use them as cannon-fodder for theraphy, return, or just give yourself additional mana.

I'm definietly changing Gemstones to City of Brass. Many games the life loss would be irrelevant but I had ran out of counters, since untapping lands with fatestitcher (or even using Emerald charm once to give myself threshold, untap land, and sac coliseum).

I think I'll cut Ichorids altogether. My first list didn't run any, then on whym I added them again (seeing them on lists all around), but now I've come to conclusion it's just useless. Bloodghast already allows you to go one full turn faster compared to ichorids and between Ghast, Narco and Fates, I've plenty of critters abound.

I think I'll just go -2 Ichorid, -1 Thug, +1 Fate, +1 Cephalid Sage, +1 Dread Return. I had cut one because I was getting swarmed with it - but better more than less, rite? Though I'm not really sure about one more Sage. And I would really like to try out 4 Stitchers.

Meadbert: Thanks for the reply. I'll definietly test extensively against ANT.

I've been tinkering around a Bloodghast Dredge list for a while, and figured it would've already made a presence (which it certainly did). Looking around, I came up with the following list:


// Lands
    2  Cephalid Coliseum
    2  Dakmor Salvage
    4  Undiscovered Paradise
    4  Bazaar of Baghdad
    3  Gemstone Mine

// Creatures
    3  Golgari Thug
    4  Narcomoeba
    4  Bloodghast
    4  Stinkweed Imp
    1  Flame-Kin Zealot
    1  Cephalid Sage
    4  Golgari Grave-Troll
    2  Fatestitcher
    2  Ichorid

// Spells
    4  Cabal Therapy
    4  Breakthrough
    4  Serum Powder
    4  Bridge from Below
    2  Dread Return
    2  Darkblast

// Sideboard
SB: 1  Darkblast
SB: 4  Emerald Charm
SB: 4  Chain of Vapor
SB: 4  Wispmare
SB: 2  Unmask

At first I had analysis, but it was a full turn slower than I wanted it to be thus I replaced them with Fatestitchers.

Coliseum suffers from the same problem and I wouldn't be really hard pressed to get rid of it.

15 Dredgers If you count 2 Dakmors (I wouldn't, but I digress). Without lands, it's 13, which is 2 more than I'd like; however, Thug fetches the few Ichorids I play (more of a back-up than a real win condition here) and also dredges one more than Dblast - however, running Dblast in the main gives me space to breathe in the SB. Thoughts?

Nothing for Mirror No Leyline or Trap or anything. Should I make room for it?

No Chalice Would I really need it?

Breakthrough wins a lot of games on turn 2 which I shouldn't. Is its randomly "Ooops" situations worth having less outs for game 2 & 3?

For meta - currently I'm blind building mostly for MWS fun until I get arsed to order Bloodghasts and shuffle the deck up for some local tourneys. Locally, there's a lot of drain, r/g tempo and sui black variants abound.

That's about it. Thanks for any help!

I've been tinkering about [Meandeck] Gifts build. Playtesting, and more tinkering. I guess I've a few words to talk about it. For reference, here's your everyday MD Gifts build:

//Mana
1 Black Lotus
1 Lotus Petal
1 Mana Crypt
1 Mana Vault
1 Mox Emerald
1 Mox Jet
1 Mox Pearl
1 Mox Ruby
1 Mox Sapphire
1 Sol Ring
3 Island
3 Flooded Strand
2 Polluted Delta
2 Underground Sea
2 Volcanic Island
1 Tolarian Academy
2 Snow-covered Island

//Direct Card Advantage + Tutoring (18):
1 Ancestral Recall
4 Brainstorm
1 Fact Or Fiction
4 Gifts Ungiven
1 Mystical Tutor
1 Burning Wish
1 Demonic Tutor
4 Merchant Scroll
1 Recoup

//Control (11):
1 Echoing Truth
4 Force Of Will
4 Mana Drain
2 Misdirection

//Win Condition
1 Tinker
1 Darksteel Colossus

//Misc
2 Rebuild
1 Time Walk
1 Yawgmoth's Will

First of all, I would like to say; whatever I'm writing here is based on my playtests and opinions.

Taking my first look at the deck without having any other information, I just figured it was an aggressive deck. There are 18 tutors, 4 of them bring out the win condition. But deck's defense was poor -8 hard counters, 2 dependable counters and a misc bounce. I figured that counters were there not to gain card advantage, but rather to protect the win condition and prevent opp from playing it's finest bullets.

Because 8 hard counters usually mean that. It seemed to me that deck had just too many draws etc, and really few control bullets, thus figured tutoring and card drawing should be made towards bringing out the Tinker, rather than a Mana Drain.

I took the deck, merged into counter wars / build up for the combo early turns, almost everytime I played it in the beginning. I would usually cast Gifts on 3rd turn, and would have the counters to protect the combo. My usual gifts picks were Tinker, YawgWill, Recoup, Gifts/Recall/Etc if I'm short on counters, or Time Walk.

Deck awarded me for aggressive playing. In a mirror match, opp went off with gifts first, going for Card Advantage. I went off with a Trio + Recall (although I already had a FoW in my hand), casted the Tinker, brought out DSC. He tried to bounce DSC, I casted Recall which he countered, I casted FoW on bounce later on, discarding a Brainstorm while keeping another in my hand.

That was a random game which I've won.

But after a while, I was playing with a friend of mine, who's more expert on Vintage than I am. He told me that aggressive game wasn't meant for Gifts, that I was playin the deck wrong. I was confused. I knew how many games I've won, and how he could be right. I've took the same deck, and played it with focusing on card advantage and control.

I lost pretty fast. It almost always seemed to me that I was just drawing more card draws that would draw me more card draws. 8 Counters were never enough.

It could be just me, my luck that won me my aggressive games and made me lose others. But I doubt it.

I wonder what's your approach to Gifts builds, and how do you play them. If you have a modified deck list, please post them and say why you've felt you needed to make those edits.

I run almost the exact deck list as this, the only difference being playing a single Crop Rotation and having the mana base to go with it.

What do I do if my opponent plays cards, Steve?

Well to be frank, this deck looks... solid, should I dare to say, but anyway, it won't be the next format breaker. It might go well rogue at unexpected metas, but that's much about it.

Gah, I know, but I don't have a keyboard right now so I can barely type. ;P

Kedi's "Back to the Future"
Vintage Legal
60+15 Cards

//World Money Fund (23)
1 Mox Jet
1 Mox Pearl
1 Mox Ruby
1 Mox Sapphire
1 Mox Emerald
1 Black Lotus
1 Sol Ring
1 Mana Crypt
1 Mana Vault
1 Lotus Petal
1 Tolarian Academy
2 Tropical Island
2 Underground Sea
1 Volcanic Island
2 City of Brass
2 Polluted Delta
1 Bloodstained Mire
2 Flooded Strand

//Academic Researchs (11)
4 Brainstorm
1 Fact or Fiction
3 Merchant Scroll
1 Demonic Tutor
1 Vampiric Tutor
1 Mystical Tutor

//Ancient Knowledges (8)
4 Force of Will
4 Mana Drain
2 Misdirection

//Hidden Technologies (16)
4 Gifts Ungiven
1 Tinker
1 Yawgmoth's Will
1 Time Walk
1 Mindslaver
1 Regrowth
2 Eternal Witness
1 Crop Rotation
2 Recoup
1 Burning Wish
1 Darksteel Colossus

//Restricted Knowledges(15)
1 Duress
1 Diabolic Edict
1 Tormod's Cryp
1 Red Elemental Blast
1 Pyroclasm
1 Primitive Justice
1 Rack and Ruin
1 Engineered Explosives
1 Gorilla Shaman
1 Lava Dart
1 Massacre
1 Eye of Nowhere
1 Shatterstorm
1 Mind Twist
1 Cranial Extraction

Bullets are awesome. Going Time Walk / Slave on 6 straight turns is nuts. Happenens, and I often over abuse them to drive my opp nuts. Walk/Slave/Walk usually makes it a game.

Budget: Priceless
Meta: Fish, Gifts w/out Drains, TPS, and tuned Legacy.   
Concerns: Mana Build, Bullets.

Test runs against mirror w/ or w/out Drains delivers. Awesome against Workshop Aggro. Any suggestions to tune the deck are welcome.

Inspired, this is my version

//Mana Base (21):
4 Polluted Delta
4 Mishra's Factory
6 Swamp
1 Strip Mine
4 Wasteland
1 Mox Jet
1 Sol Ring
4 Dark Ritual

//Beats (14):
3 Phyrexian Negator
3 Nezumi Graverobber
4 Withered Wretch
4 Mesmeric Fiend

//Savage (25):
4 Æther Vial
4 Unmask
3 Duress
4 Chalice of the Void
4 Night’s Whisper
4 Jitte
1 Demonic Tutor
1 Vampiric Tutor
1 Necropotence