I have spent time thinking this through. A legendary cycle of "real" dual lands would be stellar for the game. Most eternal lists use 1-3 max, but usually 3 usea, 2 tundra/trop/volc for 3 color lists. It would be easy to fill in one of each with a cheaper legendary one.

$100/each? Give me a break. You only want one, not four, and land cycles are usually rare, not mythic. Would create lots of quick supply for 1 land, but would drive down demand for original duals, but to to zero. Net result is cheaper, easier to acquire landbase.

Replenish and Goblin Welder/Argivian Restoration/Tinker are just better, unless you want to reanimate Nicol Bolas, in.which case you are 2 shy of hard casting.

To improve the Stax issue, use his +1 and use Mana Vault and Grim Monolith with him.  He gets to untap those for free. Also helps play your spells through Sphere effects.

Welcome to TMD!  We put emphasis on proper spelling and grammar on this site.  Please be careful with that in the future - Prospero

Baleful Strix looked cool when it was previwed in Planechase. Is it actually good though?

Also, could this work with Gush?

I know it's not customary to post Legacy event results, but down in Mississippi, getting a Legacy event together is the closest we can get to a true Vintage tournament.

Van's Comic and Cards in Jackson hosted a Grand Prix Trial with byes to Atlanta. We were blessed with a good turnout of 17 guys and a pretty good and diverse field. We played 6 Rounds with a cut to the top 4.

I played White Stax, a Legacy deck that I've been playing since Legacy debuted. It has evolved from Angel-Stax and is heavily based on a 1st Place list from 2007 with Magus of the Tabernacle and Ghostly Prisons, but splashes Green for Horizon Canopy draw and Choke in the sideboard. Without further ado, here's the full list:

White Stax

3 Magus of the Tabernacle
2 Sun Titan

4 Ghostly Prison
4 Armageddon
3 Oblivion Ring

4 Chalice of the Void
4 Trinisphere
4 Crucible of Worlds
4 Smokestack

4 Mox Diamond

4 Ancient Tomb
3 City of Traitors
4 Wasteland
3 Flagstones of Trokair
1 Nomad Stadium
1 Horizon Canopy
1 Savannah
5 Plains
2 Mishra's Factory

Sideboard:
1 The Tabernacle at Pendrell Vale
2 Seal of Cleansing
3 Suppression Field
2 Karmic Justice
3 Choke
2 Tormod's Crypt
2 Grafdigger's Cage

I've played many versions of White Stax over the yeras and like them because they have access to Trinisphere and Ghostly Prisons to handle creatures and combo. Very little *true* control that is really just aggro-control, so Ghostly Prison slows them down. I decided to just run an updated version of White Stax because of the printing of Magus of the Tabernacle and Sun Titan. Also, my teammate (Nick a.k.a. TheShop) and I came to a quick conclucsion that no one runs Artifact or Enchantment hate in their decks in Legacy. We were unfamiliar with Nick Fit at the time, but it's not maindstream enough to have expected it (but it we had one present). Maverick (or Bant) is probably the *only* scare we knew of because they have between 1-3 Qasali Pridemages, and that's it. White Stax focuses heavily on its Enchantments (even from the sideboards) and so the deck is very resilient if decks were to even use Katai or Energy Flux.

Elves!, Maverick, Bant, Merfolk, Dredge, Stoneblade, and Delver lists all put creatures into play and the deck does a great job handling them or stalling long enough to setup late-game big plays, like Armageddon or Sun Titan. And outside of those creature-decks, Stax has a great game versus Combo decks too. Chalice of the Void and Trinisphere do a lot to curb combo decks like Belcher and Storm. Even though Storm has access to Hurkyl's Recall and Rebuild, Armageddon and Choke areboth present too.

All-in-all, as a Vintage Stax player, I was super-comfortable with the deck and I also played it last year at another Grand Prix Trial at the same store (slightly different too, wich Morph Angels). Here's a quick round-up of the Matches. Oh, and, I didn't really take any notes except mental ones, so some things are sketchy. I apologize in advance.

ROUND 1 -- UW Miracles (Jason)

Game 1, opponent goes firt and drops Tundra for Brainstorm. I assume UW Stoneblade or Miracles. I only have Flagstones on turn 1. He goes Island then Ponders. I draw and play Mox Diamond pitching a Plains, then play Tomb and cast Crucible of Worlds. He counters with FOW pitching Ponder. EOT, Enlightened Tutor finds a Sensei's Divining Top. Another Island and SDT, then uses it and says go. I drop Trinisphere and it resolves, then play Mishra's Factory. He draws, drops Island, and JTMS, go. I play Armageddon and it resolve. I get a Plains with Flagstones, then play another Plains. He Jace-Storms and drops a Tundra. I draw and play Crucible of Worlds, it resolves (trinisphere in effect), then replay Factory. He Jace-Storms again and drops an Island, go. I Waste his Tundra from my yard, then swing at JTMS for 2. He draws, Jace-Storms, then scoops.

I still don't know if he's Stoneblade or Miracles, so I just sideboard in +3 Choke and I take out -3 Magus. If it's either build, Magus is least-effective. I probably should have put in the Suppression Fields, but failed to do so...

Game 2, is Tundra, Ponder, go. I drop Plains, go. He plays another Tundra, go. I drop Flagstones and Chalice @ 1. He plays Counterspell. He untaps, Brainstorms, plays Island, go. I play Mox pitching Plains and a City of Traitors, then Smokestack. He Forces it pitching a Brainstorm. He untaps, plays Island and JTMS then Fateseals me. I've been holding Choke, so I play it and it resolves. He drops a Island, Fateseals me again, says go. I draw lands and/or Moxes/extra Chokes while he hits 7 lands, then Temporal Mastery (under Choke), but it was timed exactly enough to untap with JTMS for his -12... so I scoop.

Sideboard, I go an additional -2 Smokestack and -1 Oblivion Ring for +3 Suppression Field.

Game 3, I open Mox Diamond pitching Factory, Ancient Tomb and lead with Trinisphere. I have Suppression Field x2 and Choke, but I bait with Trinisphere. It resolves, he drops a Tundra, go. I miss a land drop, then play Suppression Field. He drops sacland, I remind him Suppression Field stops it, so he says go. I play Suppression Field #2 and a land. He drops a Tundra, go. I draw Suppression Field #3 and play it. He drops Wasteland, go. I play Crucible and replay Factory. For three turns, he misses lands drops and I pay 7 mana to activate and swing with a Factory. He finally scoops when I draw and play Sun Titan.

ROUND 2 -- High Tide (Tony)

Game 1, I win die-roll and open with Ancient Tomb and Chalice @ 1. It resolves. He drops Island, go. I play a land and Crucible. He plays Island, go. I play Smokestack and he Forces it pitching Brainstorm. He drops Island, go. I drop another Smokestack, and he responds with Meditate. It resolves and I go again (adding counter) and draw Trinisphere. I play it and he scroops.

For sideboarding, I drop -4 Ghostly Prison and -3 Magus of the Tabernacle for +2 Choke, +3 Suppression Field, and +2 Seal of Cleansing. Choke is weak, but better than Prison or Magus.

Game 2, he opens with Island, Brainstorm, go. I drop Mox pitching Wasteland, Ancient Tomb, and Choke. He drops Island and Ponders, go. I play Crucible, it resolves, and replay Waste from yard. He drops Island, go. I draw Chalice of the Void and play it @ 1, and he thinks for awhile, then it resolves. I'm sure he plays some more Islands, and I think I just get Chalice of the Void @ 2 down. I know I get Smokestack down @ 1, then when I put a second counter on it, he Meditates at the end of that turn. I sac some pointless stuff, add another counter, and I think I play Trinisphere. Either way, he sacs 3 lands, draws a card, then concedes.

He obviously had some bad draws to let the Chalices resolves (Choke really isn't much of a deterent). Tony was fine as he was is and old MTG-friend and let's me know that he took out both Hurkyl's Recall and Rebuild from his board because he made a meta-choice for two other cards, and he felt it totally -- bad call. Me and my teammate were both on Stax (Nick's was Red-based with Boils*).

ROUND 3 -- Elves! (Toaster)

So, Toaster (Jeremy) is an old friend, and first time I've seen him in years that weekend since he got back from Iraq. Although he has not played Magic since like 2003, he was still fairly sharp. We mostly just have an hour of fun with our games.

Both of the games we played were extremely close though, but I got them in the end. Ghostly Prisons were slowing him down from attacking, but I got Magus out which was locking his mana-elves down during upkeep so he couldn't attack, and eventually I was able to O-Ring two important dudes, then Geddon to nuke his entire board. Game 2 was much the same, except he could only get a guy in for 2 damage and I was looping Nomad Stadium or Mishra's Factories (had both in play all game with a Crucible on table). He had like 8 sac lands and only 4 or 5 actual lands, so my Geddons locked his lands out both games as well.

ROUND 4 -- Red Deck Wins (???)

Sorry, but I forgot the opponent's name. Was a great guy and it was his first tournament. His build was "testing" Thunderous Wrath, and he was unfamiliar with the exact tournament rules involving it... so he missed like 2 Miracle triggers every Round he played by sticking it in his hand first (really hurt his chances, despite winning previous 3 rounds!) The two he missed in our games were during Game 2, but he won that game anyways, so it didn't effect the outcome.

Game 1, he had turn 1 Goblin Guide and it drew me tons of lands (and I drew gas after every land I drew), so I just blew him out with card advantage. Played 3 Moxes very early, plus Crucibles, Smokestack, Ghostly Prisons, and O-Rings. Was around 10 life when I topdecked Nomad Stadium and cracked it, so he scooped to that.

He got game 2, despite missing two Thunderous Wrath miracle triggers, because I could not draw into anything important before his double-Goblin Guides took it all the way with backup Fireblasts.

Game 3, I start Flagstones, go. He plays Goblin Guide and it drew me City of Traitors. I top-deck Mox Dimaond, play it (pitch Plains), and City of Traitors, and had nothing to play. He untaps, drops a second Goblin Guide, and it draws me City of Traitors and Mishra's Factory. I go, float 2 of City of Traitors, then play another one, and play Sun Titan (return City of Traitors). He is frozen because he runs Incinerates and other 2cc spells (for lack of owning Chain Lightnings, etc) and can't kill it off with his two lands (misses his 3rd land drop), so he passes. I go, float 4 off City of Traitors, play a Flagstones (COTs die), Geddon all lands, fetch a plains via Flagstones, then drop the Trinisphere I drew that turn. I attack with Sun Titan (vigilance is nice) and return City of Traitors. He blocks for two turns, but manages to put two more mountains down, but I top-deck Geddon again and play it, so he concedes because he'll be dead before getting back up to at least 3 lands.

ROUND 5 -- Red Deck Wins (Jesse)

Game 1, I Chalice @ 1, he plays Flame Rifts, Rift Bolts, and Price of Progress... game over.

Game 2, I go turn 1 Trinisphere, and basically he's stuck at 2 lands for ever. I use a Wasteland on his Barbarian rings to keep him below 3 lands, so I win. This was a fluke of him missing land drops.

Game 3, he gets Goblin Guide (I draw City of Traitors). I play a Mox (pitch City of Traitors) and an Ancient Tomb. He Lava Spikes and Bolts me, then swings (see CotV). I drop it down @ 2 next turn, he untaps and like Bolts/Spikes me plus Fireblast for the game.

Only match loss all day, but Jesse was an out-of-town friend who joined our playtest group the night before. I knew it was an auto-loss for me because of his specific build, and I knew I dropped Sphere of Laws from the board. He packs *tons* of 1cc burn, but he plays Flame Rifts, Price of Progress, and unearth 3/1 haste-trampler @ 2 (can make up for all the damage the 1cc burn he couldn't play would have done), and he has Rift Bolts and Fireblasts. I also knew he packed 4 Sulfuric Vortex and 3-4 Smash to Smithereens out of his sideboard. Just a bad matchup.

ROUND 6 -- Dredge (Adam)

My buddy Nick and I, Jesse, and local guy (Adam) were the top 4 and were all X/1. Everyone else was at best X/2, so we ID to guarantee the spots for Final 4.

FINAL ROUNDS -- Split

So Nick and I were not going to Atlanta and did not need the Byes. Adam and Jesse decided to play for it, so we both took home like close to a Box of packs each. Jesse ended up losing to Adam in the end.

I thought of selling my packs, but decided Avacyn Restored had some good cards -- I made the right call. Opened Cavern of Souls, Temporal Mastery, red Planeswalker, Vexing Devil, other Blue-Bounce-Miracle , Avacyn, and other great cards, all best of the set although I didn't get a Griselbrand (I know, can't complain), but otherwise great stash overall.

As a team, we were very happy with our own personal results, and just as happy with the turnout and the mix of decks in general. There was UW Stoneblade, UW Mircales x2, Nick Fit, Red Deck Wins x2, Maverick, Stax x2 (White and Red), Dredge x2, Elves!, High Tide, and a few others.

As far as changes that I would have made to my deck, I would go -2 Tormod's Crypts and -2 Grafdigger's Cages for +3 Sphere of Law. I would put the 4th Trinisphere in the sideboard, then run a 3rd Sun Titan maindeck. Trinisphere is a great card, and absolutely strong if you get it on turn 1, but unlike Vintage, the amount of Basic lands (even with White Stax running Armageddons) makes it so Trinisphere isn't game-over. However, against Storm, Dredge, and some versions of control, it's worth having the 4th copy becasue it can be game-ending to those decks. After testing against Dredge, Nick and I just discovered that Trinisphere and Chalice of the Void @ 1 were all you needed. I had Ghostly Prisons for potential late-game Ichords, so those 4 anti-dredge cards were totally dead in the board... and it cost me Round 5 (or just hurt my chances of winning).

Thanks for reading!

Don

*My buddy Nick's Red-Stax that he ran played Tony Round 1, but Nick lost. Tony got game 1, and in game 2, he won because he landed exactly 20 land drops in a row -- never missed one, even after two Boils (countered first one), and at least 1 or 2 Devastating Dreams for around 3-4, and still pulled out a victory against him... statistical odds were *heavily* in his favor. Other than god-drawing lands and spells, Red-Stax should have won.

Terratodon would like to have a word with you.

Seriously, turning 3 perms in Stax into 3/3 Elephants is all you need. Will let you trigger Oath again next turn too so you can fetch up what ever other creatures you were using (Iona/BSC/Emrakul).

Angel of Jubilation 1WWW
Creature - Ange
Flying
Other nonblack creatures you control get +1/+1.
Players can't pay life or sacrifice creatures to cast spells or activate abilities.
3/3

Although she costs 4 mana, I was curious what you guys thought of this angel? From first glace, she stops all phyrexian-mana spells (if you don't play matching colors, like MUD using Metamorph) and she also stops FOW too. The second part prevents Forgemaster from sacking itself to its ability as well as Tinkering off artifact-creatures.

My take is that she's probably too slow for Vintage as she only stops Metamorph and FoW.

Anyways, just looking for thoughts on her!

I like Food Chain, Glimpe of Nature, Peter Griffin to draw deck. You can win by finding Labratory Maniac.

I'm in the camp that MUD lists aren't that great, and mostly because of two main reasons:

1) You need a color these days to help versus other decks. Being colorless it not enough. There aren't colorless options that matter quick enough. No REB, Nature's Claim, etc. You really do need something here.

2) Lodestone was amazing until the meta showed up. It was an explosive creature and decisive to early lists that didn't know how to answer his amazing power, and it only got better with Steel Hellkite, Metamorph, and Wurmcoils. However, the meta evolved and found a way through it. Part of the reason is that Lodestone is so sexy in a MUD list with more artifact creatures, which also then wants to run Thorn of Amethyst. They go hand-in-hand almost. Problem is, once you beat Thorn, you weaken Lodestone and it suddenly makes 8 cards of your deck much weaker.*

2a) I want to add that the printing (and subsequent use) of Spell Pierce also increased the playability of Lodestone because it could not counter it. However, it also forces the MUD player's hand if blue goes first -- the MUD player has to cast Lodestone if it's in their opening hand or fear their 2Sphere or Thorn getting countered by FoW/SP. But, once you commit all your 4 starting mana resources to Lodestone, if opponent has FoW (or BStorm/ARecall into it), then you have lost the game that easily.

I have been favoring 5C Stax as option to return, but it obviously needs to be updated. The assessment that "old 5C lists that lost are what you want to return" (or whatever) is pretty true. However, a lot of the meta has changed as well.

The Shop hasn't touched on many topics that he could have. We both play Stax a lot and have been playing the deck for years and years. It's a solid archetype and has *a lot* of theory for just about every strategy. It's a great deck because only real loyalists understand the underlying reasons that Stax can beat decks. One major reason is that it uses artifact lock components to slow down the opponent and original builds of Stax then went on to follow those artifacts lock pieces with colored-lock pieces that sealed the deal, but were more expensive and needed a turn or two to resolve.

One of the premises that The Shop has a problem with is how a 14 land deck (of which those lands only tap for 1 mana) is losing out to a deck with 18+ lands (generally 28+ mana sources) of which tap for more than 1 mana is losing to it. An early build of Stax used to run cards like Choke and Chains of Mephistopheles. Later builds even ran In The Eye Of Chaos too.

So, the suggestion to go back to 5Color would really need a reason to dip into all 5 colors. Arguably, adding in like 5 Mountains to a MUD list and just putting REB in the board and Goblin Welder in over Panther is better. Dropping Thorn would go a lot further for you to, even after adding more creatures. 3 Crucible of Worlds would be better in those Red-MUD builds too because one thing those MUD lists lose is the ability to recycle Wasteland/Stripmine. One of the feared aspects of Stax is gone -- hate on the mana base.* But if you want 5-Color, then you need a reason, and there are some good ones:

I would suggest any 5-Color build look at Goblin Welder, Chains of Mephistopheles, Choke, In The Eye of Chaos, Crop Rotation x2 and some main-deck artifact/enchantment hate. No Thorns and no Lodestones. You're playing to maximize your turn 1 opportunities by trying to put down 2+ lock components, or at least threaten *stronger* locks than Thorn/Sphere/Chalice on turn 1.

I love some Chalice of the Void, and The Shop and I agree/disagree on its use in 5-Color because 5-Color lists like to utilize their moxen for their colors, so sometimes that opening-hand Chalice at 0 is the wrong play. Despite this, I still like it and really think versus blue decks (and some other decks in general) that forcing Chalice Of The Void @ 2counters is probably more important than 0 or even 1. My argument is that Chalice @ 0 in 5C is sometimes symmetrical and sometimes not, in the opponent's favor (locking you out of colored mana). Chalice @ 1 can lock out X spells from the opponent's deck (where X can be 10+ sometimes). And this can be important versus TPS, but that's a different story. Versus Blue control decks, Chalice @ 1 will counter Spell Pierce, BStorm, Ponder, Serum Visions, etc... but it's not actually stopping permanents hitting the table, like Bob, or stopping *real* threats, like Ancient Grudge and Hurkyl's Recall (and when it matters, Demonic Tutor and Time Vault)... and you'll notice all of those threats cost 2, so Chalice @ 2 really makes the opponent gear themselves to keeping it off the table.

And so with the disagreement on the use of Chalice @ 0 (and 1) also hurting yourself in 5-Color, I'm a proponent of 2-3 Ratchet Bomb instead. It also doubles by allowing you to hate on Oath and other decks, like some early aggro lists.

I don't have any list to show or talk about, but I would suggest it have Goblin Welder, Chains of Mephistopheles, Nature's Claim and/or Sylvok Replica, 2x Crop Rotation, and the lands need to have 1x Bazaar of Baghdad (minimum). Other uses of colored spells can very, but at least 1 Tinker, 1 Demonic Tutor, 1 Demonic Consultation, and 1 Vampiric Tutor. I'd also run Sundering Titan over any other threat, but having a Steel Hellkite, Duplicant, and/or Triskelion isn't bad. I don't like Karn any more. I think his usefulness has dropped away other than being a mox-monkey, in which 5cc is too expensive

Anyways, this has become "TL;DR"...

*It's surprising that MUD lists are doing well without Crucible of Worlds in the main. Crucible Stip/Waste can seal the deal just as well as stacking up 100 spheres. 5Color at least hits the opponent's mana base through increased spells AND land destruction/moxen hate. MUD only does one, and that weakens the deck overall. Lodestone just isn't enough because it's almost just-as-good to follow it with a Crucible to recycle wastelands. Being able to replay wastelands is very important, even if Forcing the opponent to bust a fetchland so you can hit the land they fetch.

Premise: My friend and I are big Vintage players who live in the worst place to play said format: the deep south. So, whenever an event pops up that is close enough to attend, we try our hardest to make it there. We prefer slinging moxen and workshops and the like, but will always settle for Legacy if we have to. Playing the game is more fun than not playing.

So, the event was held in Jackson, MS at a little shop that's been there for over 10 years. They do not normally hold Legacy events on a regular schedule so I had no idea how many players would turn out. Our group consisted of 5 guys plus all others who would attend, but the day before three of them dropped out for various reasons (important or not). So, my normal playtest partner and I spent the weeks leading up to the event tossing ideas back and forth about decks. I quickly built White Stax because I have been familiar with both the Stax archetype from Vintage and because I had at least one previous tournament experience with the deck (very early and very different than today's versions). We were strained on cards with just 3 City of Tratiors between us both, so we could only build one version of Stax (despite having two plausible lists, one White Stax and one as Metal Worker Beats). Looking at our remaining card pool, I immediately suggested Ad Nauseum Tendrils (ANT) and some version of Blue Control, either URG, BUG, or straight UB. After playtesting many variations of ANT (including reverting to a more traditional IGGy Pop build) we decided the loss of Mystical Tutor really destroyed the deck beyond playability. We ended up settling on the BUG build of control because it gave us many key cards we felt would give us better flexibility and/or control in the games, namely: Ghastly Demise and Dark Confidant. The other builds played more off one-for-ones, but Confidant allowed us to keep a decent sized hand. Plus, our limited pool was missing SDTs and Counterbalance, and we had no more than 1 Phyrexian Dreadnaught, so we were strictly limited to Bob and Goyf, plus one-for-ones to lead the path to victory. We played a limited Trinket Mage tutor package (including the sole Dreadnaught since we were packing 4 Stifles maindeck anyways).

Leading in the early wee hours of the morning before sleep, we tested out finished decks. To make sure we both were piloting decks were we good at, we each played White Stax, ANT/IGGy, Sligh (just had it around as a *bad* backup), and BUG. In the end, my buddy stuck with BUG as he was most comfortable with it and I ended up being able to pilot White Stax. His esperience with Stax is not bad at all, but White Stax is different than your traditional Vintage builds (almost all of them).

Here's the list I ran:
3 Trinisphere
4 Chalice of the Void
4 Crucible of Worlds
4 Smokestack
3 Oblivion Ring
4 Ghostly Prison
4 Armageddon

3 Magus of the Tabernacle
1 Baneslayer Angel
1 Exalted Angel

4 Mox Diamond
4 Wasteland
4 Ancient Tomb
3 City of Traitors
3 Flagstones of Trokair
5 Plains
1 Temple Garden
1 Horizon Canopy
1 Kor Haven
1 Nomand Stadium
2 Mishra's Factory

Card choices:
Kor Haven over Maze of Ith -- It taps for mana. Really important. Stax has the mana because it doesn't play a spell every turn unless it has to.
Exalted Angel/Baneslayer -- More recent lists are using Baneslayer, but after playing, I've found that Exalted is still probably the better choice. She can come down for 3, and It happend off Mox + 2-Land a lot, which leads to possible turn 2 flip and beat for the win (very hard to stop unless they have Edict/STP/PTE). If I played it again, I'd make it 2 Exalted Angels.
Trinisphere x3 instead of x4 -- It's a great card, but in this format, players can actually play around it. Some decks are even running Ancient Tombs in the main or the board to get around it, so it's less-good. Plus, you really only need it to lock as you go along, not to totally destroy the opponent. COTV is better at locking out forever than 3Sphere.
Mishra's Factory x2 -- These little buggers are great. Gives the deck a little bit of feeling like Landstill. You get a semi-lock down, then can swing over or block opposing dudes. With Crucible, it's like having Kor Haven/Maze of Ith out.
Temple Garden -- Didn't have Savannah, and it's for sideobarded Chokes.
Horizon Canopy -- Even with Choke, it lets you cycle through your deck to find more cards if you've got a semi-lock.
Nomad Stadium -- Should be obvious, but recycling 4-life gain can make it hard for opponent to win. But mostly, this + lifelink angels keep your from loosing to your deck's Ancient Tombs.

Sideboard:
2 Tormod's Crypt
2 Hanna's Custody
2 Sphere of Law
3 Suppression Field
3 Choke
1 Magus of the Tabernacle
1 Trinisphere
1 Ratchet Bomb

We ended up going to sleep at 2 AM, which isn't bad compared to some players. Registration starts at 12 and event does not start until 1, so we get good sleep (important for players). We get up at 10:30, go eat lunch, and arrive on time. We fill out our decklists (required for GP stuff, even trials), and we proceed to get ready by playing fake games of IGGy Pop vs. Sligh. We hope this distraction will lead our opponents into making both false assumptions and possibly tweaking their sideboards last minute inappropriately. Some players disagree with this strategy, but we wanted to play some fun quick games instead of playing out tournament decklists.

I'm going to highlight the rounds rather than turn-by-turn because I didn't keep *great* notes, just life totals and some tallies on cards, etc. So, a lot will be coming from memory. However, I do remember most of what I sideboarded exactly (because it was mostly the same).

Round 1: Mono Blue Merfolk
Game 1: I mulligan and he keeps. I win the die roll and start with Tomb, Go. I think he opens with turn 1 and turn 2 Aether Vial. I can only muster a Smokestack (which resolves) and we start the soot race. The next few key spells I cast I get countered (2 Crucibles and another Smokestack), but I never find Magus or Ghostly Prison. The soot race was key-played by me so we both lose everything, except I think he manages to keep a Vial @ 2. He comes back with Land, Cursecatcher and I don't do anything as my life total had slowly dwindled because of Tomb activations and he gets game 1.

Sideboard:
OUT 3 Trinisphere, 2 Smokestack, 2 Crucible, and 1 O-Ring
IN: 3 Choke, 3 Suppression Field, 1 Ratchet Bomb, and 1 Magus of the Tabernacle

Game 2: We both mulligan. I open with Mox, Plains, Ratchet Bomb, Go. He opens with Land, Vial, Go. I EOT Bomb to 1. Turn 2 I drop Ghostly Prison. He upkeeps Vial to 1, then drops a land and says Go. Turn 3 I draw Choke and attempt it (with 1 open for Daze) but he throws Force of Will down... after reading Choke (obviously unfamiliar with it). I think me mutters "Man, his deck is tuned to beat mine". He EOT vials Cursecatcher and I blow them both up with Ratchet Bomb. His turn he drops Silvergill Adept revealing Reegery and draws a card and says go after dropping a sac land. I untap and float 2 off City of Traitors, then play an Ancient Tomb and cast Armageddon. It resolves, and all lands to away. He misses a land drop, and I untap into another 2-land + Crucible. He has no counter, and scoops for the next game.

Game 3: No SB changes. Turn 1 he opens with Land, Vial, Go. I open with Mox, Tomb, Ghostly Prison. Turn 2 he upkeeps Vial to 1, plays Polluted Delta, Go. I draw Suppression Field and play it. He responds with Vial by putting Cursecatcher down, then S.Field resolves (can't Daze it). I play Wasteland and pass the turn. On tun 3, he upkeeps Vial to 2 and drops Wasteland, then plays Merfolk Reegery. I drop second Tomb, second Ghostly Prison (resolves), and then pay 2 to Wasteland his Delta. From here, It's unclear because this game goes *long*, but I know he gets down 3 Energy Flux (fairly useless to me) and he mutters "Should have f*ing Aura Flux instead". I know I get 3 Ghostly Prison and 2 S.Field down and I manage to Geddon twice clearing basically all of his lands (despite him having about 10 creatures in play). We go to time, and it wasn't until second turn of the final 5 that I draw into any creature (a Magus) and last turn he loses every creature, but I can't swing for more than 2 against him. We Tie.

TIE 0-0-1

Round 2: Blue/White Stuff
Game 1/2/3: My opponent informs me that it is his first tournament and he took his 70 card deck down to 60 by removing 10 lands... leaving him with only 16, so he's been screwed. We still play and I just talk to him about ways to improve his tournament play by having a Sideboard, deck size, play, and making sure to ask questions about opponent's cards. Plus the rationale for keeping up with both player's life totals (even if one person is already doing it). I simply beat him because my deck does Moxen + Crucible + Geddons versus a land-light deck, and he never casts more than Squadron Hawk in both games we played. I felt sorry for him, and he knew the game wasn't going to be a win, but stayed to play anyways. My notes say that we both mulliganed in both games though.

WIN 1-0-1

Round 3: Bant Aggro
Game 1: We both mulligan once. All I can remember this game is that he gets down turn 1 Exalted-Manamaking-Chick, then turn 2 Knight of the Reliquary while I can only muster a Ghostly Prison off a Mox, then he wastelands me. He is stuck on two lands (basics) and I drop a turn 3 Magus and he pays upeep. I think he bated me into blocking his 5/5 knight before wastelanding me actually, which causes me to lose Magus (first or two big mistakes of the day). Even though he's got 2 lands and the chick, he forgets he killed my Magus for two turns by tapping a land and the chick during upkeep (without announcing what for, so I'm not cheating by making him pay for something that isn't on table, I can only *assume* he was floating mana for *something*, but never says and draws for turn. However, despite this, I suck and draw nothing... I did get that Smokestack down and to 1, but he Pridemage's it and run through me.

Sideboard:
OUT: 4 Chalice of the Void and 2 Smokestack
IN: 2 Hanna's Custody, 2 Suppression Field, 1 Magus of the Tabernacle, and 1 Ratchet Bomb

Game 2: We both keep our openers. Much like previous game, I go Mox + 2land + something irrelevant I think. He goes sac land into Forest, Exalted-Mana-Chick again. On turn 2, I think I make a Crucible, then pass. Either way, turn 2 for him is much harder... he drops sac land, then searches his deck. He searches like 3 times, then finally says "I can't find my Plains." Well, I say and do nothing, but he calls the judge right behind me (who overheers him and asks "is there a problem?") There is. His plains fell to the floor during sideboard and he presented a 59 card deck. I feel bad, and if the judge hadn't asked, I would have let him have it. Our turnout was only 13 guys, of which 4 were casual players, so it's a really a 9-man small event. I'm not looking for an easy win. We go by the rules, and he gets a game loss.

Game 3: I don't remember much, except that he Forces my turn 2 Hanna's Custody off Tomb + 2 Moxes (playing around Daze), but I had not seen Force in game 1 or 2. He gets down Knight of the Reliquary, but is stuck on 3 lands. I cast Crucible, Trinisphere, then Geddon in that order afterward. He drops a land, but I untap into Smokestack and he concedes. He was mad because of game 2 and that he ended up losing game 3.

Win 2-0-1

Round 4: Affinity
Game 1: I won the die roll. Opponent mulligans and I keep my opening 7. Turn 1 I drop Tomb and make Chalice of the Void @ 1. He proceeds to drop ignore it and drop Seat of the Synod, Memnite, 2 Ornithopter, then draws 2 off of lame spell (5cc... only spends 1... lame). I Untap, drop Crucible, Go. He untaps and drops land + Myr Enforcer, and swings for 1. I untap, O-Ring the Enforcer, Go. He draws another Enforcer, and plays it. I can only muster a Ghostly Prison on my next turn. He pays 2 and serves with Enforcer until end of game because I can't get around it. Saw no Geddon, Magus, or Wastelands to stop him.

Sideboard:
OUT: 2 Smokestack and 1 Armageddon
IN: 1 Trinisphere, 1 Magus, and 1 Ratchet Bomb

Game 2: I don't remember this game all that well, except I know I went Chalice of the Void @ 0 this time, Go. However, he does the opposite and goes like 2 turns of 1cc spells... how gay. In the end though, I followed with Magus of the Tabernacle, Trinisphere, and two wastelands. He conceded to spare time for game 3.

Game 3: Slower game as I opened with turn 1 Ghostly Prison. He gets down a guy + steeleaf drum + Thoughtseize. I think the turn after, he does Thoughtseize again. However, I know he yanks Smokestack and Crucible, but leaves me with Exalted Angel and 2 Armageddons. I get down another Ghostly Prison to slow him down plus Morph the Angel (I'm stuck on 4 lands) the turn before he gets a 3rd land to cast Tezzeret, Agent of Bolas. With like 8 artifacts already in play, the ultimate is game over so I have to play around it. He adds a counter and finds a land, but doesn't play it knowing I have Geddon in hand. On my turn, I do not find a second white (am playing off Mox, Wasteland, Tomb). He had to tap his only blocker with Steeleaf Drum to cast Tez, so I swing into him and drop him down to 2 counters, then make a Crucible I finally draw, allowing me to replay a pitched Plains to the mox early on. He untaps, uses Tez to find Master Etherium and plays him. On my turn, I'm stuck between a rock and a hard place. He has 4 mana to swing through two Ghostly Prisons with Master Etherium. Tezzeret has 3 counters, and I fear that he'll be putting A LOT of pressure on me, so I know it's got to go but I can't swing (he has a blocker this time). I end up making my worst play of the day, and my 2nd and last mistake of the day: I decide to morph the angel so I can swing over Master and into Tezzeret to kill him. My opponent goes, untaps, drops his 4th land to equip the euipment on table onto Master (via Drum + 1cc Battlecry guy) and serves for the game through 2 Prisons. It was a huge mistake because I was *so* worried about Tez, I overlooked the equipment on the field. I should have cast Armaggedon to prevent him from attacking that turn, then replayed a land via Crucible. He could have only played his land, then used Tezzeret to add a counter to 4, to which I'd follow with an untap into replaying my Ancient Tomb, Morphing, then killing Tezzeret. And, of course, with another Armageddon, I would be able to swing over until the end of the game and keep him off 4 lands.

What did I learn? Make sure to survey the field and take your time to ensure you have accounted for all outs. Don't focus on the immediate threats, as they sometimes aren't as immediate as you might think.

LOSS 2-1-1

Standings are posted, and despite only 2 wins, I am actually ranked in 2nd place. Affinity had lost a few games, but the number 1 was playing Belcher combo and was undefeated.

Round 5: Belcher
Game 1: We keep our openers. I drop Mox, Land, Chalice @ 1, and Chalice @ 0. He immediately concedes and we go to game 2. He said he *might* have played around that and could have won, but more than likely I would have stalled enough (as he only had Empty the Warrens, not belcher). I revealed another land + Trinisphere and Ghostly Prison to seal it. Knowing that he was beaten many opponent's on turn 1, I know I have to just raw-dawg the nutz, but at the same time, he has lost many games because it takes 2 or 3 turns to win.

Sideboard:
OUT: 2 Armageddon, 2 Crucible of Worlds, 2 Smokestack 1 Oblivion Ring
IN: 3 Suppression Field, 2 Sphere of Law, 1 Trinisphere, and 1 Ratchet Bomb

Game 2: He turn 1 kills me via Land Grant, Tinder Wall, Lots O' Rituals, Belcher.

Game 3: I open up with Mox, Plains, Chalice of the Void @ 1, Go. He turn 1 kills me anyways via 2cc rituals, Chrome Mox, Lotus Petal, and Lion's Eye Diamond. I saw none of the 0cc mana in the other games, so I had no clue that 0 and 2 cc were the *best* choices for Chalice of the Void. I was unfamiliar with the deck in the first place, so I didn't know. Also, I had a 2nd land to follow up with Trinisphere if he didn't win on turn 1 (and I had 2land + Baneslayer to follow that up with).

LOSS 2-2-1

I miss the "top 4" breakdown by a bad choice for CotV, which I didn't know to account for. Zero would have meant I won that game. I would have gone on to top 4, which would have consisted of Affinity, Merfolk, and Goblins. I *easily* beat Merfolk and Golbins, and I would have to face another close game with Affinity, which arguably I should beat. So, I do feel robbed because I was the *best* bet at defeating storm.

Overall, I had a great day and was happen to play competitive magic against come competitive players. I think the SLOPS for the day go to Chalice of the Void. I don't think I misplayed them, I think my opponent's just go lucky. Against affinity, I COTV for 1, then he plays 4 0cc spells next turn. Again, against Affinity, I COTV for 0, then he plays 4 1cc spells over next few turns. Against Belcher, I COTV for 1 not-knowing he's running 12 *crucial* 0cc mana acclerants, and lose because of it.... oh well. I'll know for next time.

Peace out!

I once utilized Memory Jar in the deck before it was the worst card by far. If you're casting it down, you could be playing Gifts or FoF instead, which is just as good (if not better).

You don't have to have extra dudage to make 'Slaver good, it's good all on it's own. It just gets better if you can get it back easier.

And, in most cases, it's not just spending the mana on these cards (which Mana Drain *does* help with), it's also abusing them with Welder. With FoW, MisD, and Gush in the format, there are many huge changes that draining a FoW/Gush can win you the game with the mana you generate from it alone with one of your bombs.

Discrediting TheShop for trying to align the discussion on the positive merits of the deck is poor. What he brought up makes sense if you think about it: More counters means you can come back faster and harder versus another control deck. 12 Counters is far stronger than going with just 8. Your topdeck capability goes up A LOT. Plus, having more lands (of which more are basics than normal) means you have a more-solid manabase. Those are really good merits versus GaT or Stax right now.

And yes, Frantic Search is the worst card in the deck. It's pretty obvious it's no bomb, but it's also one of the best cards too. Just filtering two cards can be vitally important to this deck, considering it runs more lands and more cards that don't mind being in the graveyard. And, it's blue. Can't discredit the additional blue spells because it keeps up a healthy FoW-Fodder for the deck.

To push envelope: You want Frantic and Thirst because of their discard potential, and you also want Goblin Welder* to abuse the discarded artifacts, so what's a guy to do? Put more artifacts in the deck!

Potential artifacts to abuse:
Triskelion
Duplicant
Myr Battlesphere
Jester's Cap
Mindslaver
Darksteel Colossus
Steel Hellkite
Wurmcoil Engine
Memory Jar
Time Vault (and Voltaic Key)
Crucible of Worlds
Sundering Titan

Those all scream "awesome" and "plays nice with Tinker", but let's eliminate some:
Wurmcoil -- this card is amazing for a 6cc artifact creature, but it requires an attack step to use most of the card's good abilities (lifelink and deathtouch). As for token-making, Myr Battlesphere is strictly better than it, so Wurmcoil is gone. In fact, Sphinx of the Steal Wind is strictly better too for a lifelink creature (and you can weld it from 'yard into play despite being pro-red!)
Memory Jar -- is "nice", but draw-7's are too much and not needed for type of deck. Helping your opponent dig is not a great option. Choice discard through Frantic Search and other options is stronger than massive digging.
Steel Hellkite -- again, looks amazing like Wurncoil, but has the same flaw: the attack step. Plus, even if you connect, are you guaranteeing that this guy is your route to victory? Probably not. No other support cards to make use of its only good ability.
Darksteel Colossus -- this guy is a 61st card for this deck. He'll make the cut, but he'll also miss the cut too. The utility of a powerhouse like him is awesome when you're running 12 counters and full-on moxen (plus Tinker!) but it's when you don't get that early, he doesn't work with the gameplan of pitch-welder.
Sundering Titan -- I mentioned this guy earlier, and he's a beast, but with 3 colors already, even if you drop him against a 2 or 3 color deck, you can be hitting one or more of your lands as well in those games. Plus, if they manage to kill him (especially with a *ton* of a Nature's Claims running around now) you'll probably 'Geddon yourself as he leaves play. He's just not abusable unless you're rocking a non-Dual land landbase.

The good:
Mindslaver -- Activate it once, the game should be yours. It guarantees you time walk for a whole turn (which is always insanely good), but it can even completely screw an opponent; blow their lotus/rituals/yawg will for nothing, or play their lands, gush them back to hand, then FoW their own Gush, etc. There are too many stupid game-wrecking plays you could pull off to screw your opponent into a complete game win with just 1 activation.
Jester's Cap -- 'Slaver's little sister. This card has seen less play over time, but think of it inclusion like Oath decks packing Show and Tell and Bribery: it's another win condition in your deck. Capping a player early can be game-ending, especially 3-card-or-less win condition opponents (there still are some!), or it can take out the most-problematic cards you would want to face (massive creatures or a handful of counters/removal spells). Pitching this early to the yard, then welding for a possible turn-2 activation could end a game right there.
Vault-Key -- I wanted to say "Nuff said", but I have to also say that these should be in the deck in-addition to the rest. It ups your win-card account, which is nothing to scoff at because it allows you to win earlier than a traditional Slaver deck did.
Duplucant/Triskelion -- This duo is pure utility. One can't live without the other anymore because Trike can kill small guys easily, but also can shoot your opponent, however, he can't hold a candlestick to Darksteel, Steel Hellkite, or any other monstrocity your opponent might drop on you. That's where Duplicant comes into play. It can handle the loose ends of that beefy monster, which is vitallity important for your safety.
Myr Battlesphere -- This new guy comes highly recommended for numerous reasons. First off, it's the new Pentavus. It can create a swarm of guys to block and attack with, which is always good. Plus, it creates weldable tokens to bring back goodies from the 'yard each turn (like Myr Battlesphere!). Plus, with the Battlesphere's ability, you can "swing" through any big creature that could be keeping you at bay (by dealing more damage with his ability directly). It someways, he can be seen as a 61st/62nd card, but then he can also be your 1st pick in certain matchups. His ability to make massive permanents against Stax is also a BIG bonus.
Crucible of Worlds -- first, it has amazing synergy with discarding lands (something this deck will do plenty of). Second, comboes great with Wasteland and Strip Mine for a potential lock against a land-light opponent (even GAY worries about Gushing too early). And third, (a card every list so far has left out) combos well with Gifts and Academy Ruins. Gifts for Academy Ruins, Crucible, Strip Mine, and Wasteland can be game-ending.

I don't have a finalized list because I've been working on two, Urb and Urbg, but I can say they have some similarities:
4 Goblin Welder
4 Spell Peirce
4 Mana Drain
4 Force of Will
1 Ancestral Recall
1 Brainstorm
1 Thirst For Knowledge
3 Frantic Search
1 Gifts Ungiven
1 Fact or Fiction
1 Tinker
1 Echoing Truth
1 Crucible of Worlds
1 Time Vault
1 Voltaic Key
1 Duplicant
1 Triskelion
1 Myr Battlesphere
1 Mindslaver
1 Jester's Cap
1 Demonic Tutor
1 Vampiric Tutor

That's 36 cards, and most of the deck actually.Most of the land changes are sideboard options (green for abuse of Ancient Grudge over Nature's Claim; the two-for-one for 3 mana is almost the same as Rack And Ruin, but it can be pitched an early discard outlet without fear of loss. Also may try Trygon Predator instead).

I'll have a more-definite list a little bit later.

*Goblin Welder: With Workshop decks being at the top of their game for the first in a long time, Welder becomes much more powerful. Combo Welder with your discard outlets and countering opponent's artifact spells can lead you to winning games. It is, and will remain, one of the best 1cc creatures in the game. Much of this deck operates by abusing the creature alone, but doesn't have to. It's the power of this type of deck sometimes.

My suggestions:
-1 Mox Pearl
-1 Mana Crypt
-1 Sol Ring
-3 Bob
-1 High Tide
-2 Dark Ritual
-3 Drain
+1 Lotus Petal
+1 Library of Alexandria
+1 Ponder
+4 Lotus Cobra
+1 Regrowth
+1 Mystical Tutor
+2 Preordain
+1 Spell Pierce

With those changes, the deck gets a lot of boosts.

Mostly, you don't want to fry your face with Bob, so he's gone (plus you've lost Brainstorm to combo with him). Then, you don't have a reliable mana-finder (which B-Storm used to be), so added Ponder and 2x Preordain. Also, with all of the 1cc Sorce.ries (discard and ponder/preordains) it's hard to rely on Drain even working, when these should find your Gush and/or FoW more reliably.

Lotus Cobra will generate colored mana over the colorless options the deck has, which I think is vitally important. Also, left the Red Mox because sideboard will probably contain 2 REB (if not other Red cards). Sol Ring and Mana Crypt aren't bad, but aren't great either. Other than Vault-Key, they are very dead (except *maybe* vs Shops). Additional lands would be stronger, and also Library is huge in this matchup for many reasons.

Regrowth is that huge.

Lotus Cobra Gush.dec (aka GI JOE.dec) seems a whole lot stronger than Quirion Dryad, Tog, or Goyf. While all of those can become efficient beaters, Cobra will generate the mana you need to play your disruption and counterspells, as well as vaulting the deck past MUD's sphere effects.

Building up sac lands is already strong vs Workshops, but getting double mana from them is also strong. On top of that, it provides the rainbow mana you would need to cast U, B, G, and R spells that your deck would call for.

The most-obvious downside is the lack of quick kill condition, since you lose any form of large creature. I think it's just a question of how you want to go about the deck; smoother, more-robust mana base to support digging for FoWs, or quick, efficient critters backed up by trying to find your first two FoWs.

Interesting thought, but there is a lot more to think about than that.

If Diabolic Intent was good, it would have seen play by now. Casting a turn 1 dude then turning it into any card in your deck on the next turn would more ideal than trying to combo it with Bloodghast. To get that guy to work, he needs to be in the yard... so you need to put him there via Bazaar, Breakthrough, or the 1cc draw 2/discard 2 sorcery(for name); which is almost the same as just playing a turn 1 critter.

So, even if you got all that going, what the next question is, what are you searching for that a 2cc tutor is needed? This setup is too slow for Dredge and runs dead cards for TPS and Tezz, so it'll be some other homebrew type of deck. Having access to a few extra tutors is nice, but it wouldn't be as good as just running disruption/draw and controlling until you win like Tezz and TPS, or running super-dead and super-slow cards for Dredge.

It's really interesting reading through the pages of this Thread. Lots of great information, but at the same time, some of it seems odd.

4 Serum Powder is a must.

Playing 8 rainbow lands is a must.

Playing Shaarum + Alters seems amazingly good and is the best build.

Loss of Ichorid hurts running the Shaarum builds.

Why 4 City Of Brass instead of 4 Gemstone Mines? If you can activate a Gemstone Mine 3 times, you're probably already losing. Why lose the life with CoB?

To explain some of those points:
I think Probasco hit the nail on the head with Serum Powder + Bazaar, so that's almost abvious. Also, the Shaarum + Alter plan just is amazingly consistent and speeds the deck up a lot (with the inclusion of the Bloodghast). Ichorid is a good card because it comes into play for free and attacks for 3 damage (each). That's important if you're "slow" or have been Crypt'd/Rat'd because you can just fill enough cards to ensure returning it to play to win the game. However, having the Shaarum cards makes it so you can't fit Ichorid into the deck. Maybe make room for 2, but it'll hurt no matter what.

Also, Petrified Field seems somewhat "win more" against Wasteland. Besides wasteland, you have to face Needles on Bazaar and Chalice @ 1. And Petrified doesn't help against those. In fact, those are your worst nightmare. Too bad Unmask can't hit wasteland.

@smasher: Sadly, the guy started out as a true businessman and went on that way for around 9 years. He used to cater to the playerbase by giving out deals, buying stacks of good cards for a decent amount of money, and even giving discounts to the locals who bought singles all the time. Then, suddenly, he had a change of heart when he learned how other stores (in GIANT cities) were over-pricing their cards to people who could drop $200+ when they come in. So, he instituted a buy-list where he buys for like 10-20% of a card's value, then throws it in the case for 10-25% more than what it's worth...

He alienated his local playerbase by never giving discounts, overpricing his cards, and becoming a stiff dick when they wanted some sort of old-school-catering. So, what happened? They all left. His 20+ local events dropped to 1-2 random miltary guys.

The store is located right outside of a military base (the side that leads to the mall and food, so it's used by most all the airmen) and he gets lots of traffic from new players getting into Magic with no knowledge/experience of the game. So, they come and drop serious cash on drafts that they can't win (and always lose too), then get ripped off to traders who know what cards are worth, and then they end up coming back... they're the only ones who are willing to buy ANY of the singles because they don't know better and are impulse buyers AND have nothing to do with their paychecks since most everything they have is provided to them.

Also, the BS statement of "guys who win big at the casinos buy stuff" only ever happened once. My friend got $1500 and dropped in to buy a Sapphire, Recall, Jet, and 4 Mana Drains... all of which he's sold since then, and, it's the last time power and/or good cards saw any space in the cases full of cards... so it's no wonder people don't drop cash anymore. There's nothing to drop cash ON. Other than him, NO ONE has ever come in like that. More guys have come in trying to sell cards to GO to the casino's then coming FROM the casino's with money they've won.

1) Shop was Jak's in Biloxi, MS. If you're from MS, you probably had at least somewhat heard of the place mostly because it's been around for 15+ years.
2) "Constructive criticism" might only be important for not be reprimanded, but there isn't anything of good to say about this place. The owner lies and cheats to players, and he's know to steal. On top of this, his day job is being a cop. Go figure. He tells us there are "5-6 people waiting" and when we arrive, there are two store clerks and zero players. This happens a lot (trust me, I used to work there once).
3) No, there was no tournament because we were the only two people there. But, out of the 7 games that were played throughout the day (some with one of the clerks and others with a random passerby who just wanted to play, yet didn't have a vintage deck). His deck won all of those games because those other decks were jank.

The underpowered aspect of the games is becaues the owner doesn't believe in doing a Proxy vintage tournament. If we had managed to pull together enough guys, then it would have been sanctioned and we all don't own power (I own moxes and recall and shops, but he doesn't have any of that anymore). Instead, the owner would rather do a Standard-set draft and give a mox away (like next weekend) instead of promoting a format that you could actually use the Mox in.

Overall, the idea wasn't to muster this huge vintage event w/a mox prize. We were doing weekly vintage events for $5 for standard packs just because it gave us a field of people to play against with vintage decks, considering it's our favorite format.

I can understand where The Shop is coming from. Green supplanted white as the "splash" color in Fish decks. What would predominantly been U/W/b or U/r/b or even 4-color, minus green FISH, now there's really just BUG. From that standpoint, anything that hates on an archetype in Green becomes good because green is the beatdown in the BUG color. Blue for control, black for tutor/removal, green for beatdown. This guy becomes an efficient possible-turn-1 threat that stops Balance and Smokestack, two great cards that could slow down any aggro deck (one of stax most prominent problems is a deck that puts an attacker down in front of it because it 1. creates a permanent and 2. it lowers your life total while you try to find a way to kill it).

Now, that being said, all of those white-colored options are nice, but see less play than other cards. And also, meddling mage would probably name more powerful, like Crucible of Worlds or Lodestone Golem (if one's not in play, or even if one is), depending on what the player could handle. So, for green, anytime they gain a new card that hate on a decktype, it just empowers the W/G and BUG archetypes that have become the new faces of Fish.

As far as this guy goes, he's pointless. But, it's a precedent with 2cc critters with 1 colorless and 1 colored cost with a good ability that nukes some cards becoming better and better.

@the buy who said 'you don't want new cards in vintage': There's a point of bringing new cards to vintage, but not all new cards are seen in some holy light. Dredge is definitely full of those types of cards. How many cards in dredge are present in any other vintage deck? Not many. Most players really hate dredge as a deck in vintage because it's nearly impossible to hate against, plus every set, some new card becomes a stable inclusion into the deck to the point where older hate doesn't even work anymore and the current hate can be destroyed and hated on.

So the guy got upset about this card, which i think was *too far*, but again, I can see where he was coming from (to a point).

I mostly mentioned this card because I thought you'd laugh... not call it the greatest hate against our Favorite decktype.

Also, in Fish, there are more devestating answers to Smokestack. Kataki comes to mind, as well as any 1cc instant/sorcery that destroys an artifact/enchantment (at least 1 comes to mind for sure).

WotC may have made it this splashable because of a forseeable future where they figured Oath decks going Emrakul + Dragon's Breath was really good. Even if a weaker answer to that deck, he was made splashable to answer that guy (even though ne doesn't stop 15 damage/turn) and also be somewhat useful as an answer to Balance and Smokestack as well.

In stax, though, I thinking the simple answer to aggro would be fetching up Balance though. You'd hold back to Balance their board away, then drop your shop and play more spells. Yet again though, with a 5/3 creature in Stax now, holding off an aggressive deck is a lot easier and this card may not be quite as devestating. It hurts the more traditional builds of 5-Color Stax than it does to newer builds focusing less on just lock components compared to lock-components-than-can-attack/block.

I don't agree with the creature costing 2 AT ALL though because it's an easy splash into a deck, even for the standard environment, making a whole subset of like 12+ cards from the same set not as good as they were meant to be.

Sacred Ground stopped Smokestack specifically as well if you sac lands to the ability, so it was a two-fold answer to Strip/Waste + Stack. This guy only stops Stack, again, a less-worse card in some Stax decks.

Oh, and on a positive note: he can be Dark Blast'd... pretty good I hear, and usually sees play in 5C Stax anyways. Even if playing playing B/R Aggro Stax, it'll see play probably (even though Smokestack probably won't be in those builds... /shrug)

Smokestack is a triggered *ability*, so yeah, it'd be your ability that forced the sacrifice of the opponent's permanents.

But, what you have to remember too is that it completely stops Balance from coming down and housing any self-respecting fish player who uses green. Balance sacs lands and creatures, which this guy would totally protect. So, yeah, it a way, he's pretty good aginst some Vintage tech.

While I hate that he stops Smokestack, I don't quite agree that he's as bad since Smokestack isn't a key card to many builds of Stax. While some of those decks may use the card, it can be easily cut for sideboard cards if need be. With 4cc jug-spehere-guy, Stax is a new beast (literally) altogether than older incarnations.

You never seem to have the time nor inclination to address any actually post with really discussable content because you can't seem to find an answer that you think will make it sound as if you're right. I've read numerous posts where you will bring in circular arguments that wind in upon themselves so that if you tried to break them apart, there would be no direct way without having to demeterialize you're entire post into nothing but incoherent statements to push off the fact that people who make valid points you don't agree with cannot conject against your last point.

Being a lawyer, you've learned how to do this. It's apart of core process when speaking your case in front of the court. Sadly, we're talking about a card game and you feel the need to be right about any situation based off a small, one-variable sampling and making it king.

You misconstrue all posts by quoting the most-arguable portion of a post, and normally, the less-involved portion (and usually therefore the less-on-topic) post; so you're all about blowing and brushing off all other points made as "unanswerable", unless they are deemed worthy. These worthy posts are only when accepted. You've only accepted one person's argument here and that's because his opinion was aligned with your own. Very biased form of autocracy.

In response to your "40%" deems it beyond reason to restrict, why did you not address FoW then? The same reason would also ask why, back when it was showing 40% dominance in a field of only 25% Gush/Flash, that it wasn't dominant enough to warrant restriction at that moment OVER both Gush AND Flash? I mean, if you think that these numbers mean anything... what relevance do you have to base any of your proposals on? WotC doesn't have to follow tournament results to determine whether or not to ban/restrict a card. Look at Trinisphere. It was restricted because of it's "non-interactivity" to the format... Mana Drain and FoW were both showing numbers larger than Flash and Gush, but BOTH Flash and Gush were the two cards to become restricted... care to explain? It obviously has nothing to do with being Dominant...

But, let's look at that singularly value I mentioned you point as your basis: Dominance. Your basis is solely on Top 8's where these decks were winning. In order to truly address an indication of whether a card should be considered for Restriction/Banning in Vintage, you can't apply WotC simply policy for Standard/Extended, where the card pool is smaller and more easily controlled. Instead, after mentioned how complex vintage is where cards break the standard/extended's tempo and mana constraints of their Tournaments, you need to then reliably focus on more than just the Top 8's, because not all decks are defined by their standings. Stax is always considered a Tier 1 deck within the tournament scene, but it's rarely comes in 1st place... So, if Stax started making "heavy top 8's" you would call for restriction of Mishra's Workshop? Dominance has to also encompass 1st Place finishes AND the number of similar decks in each Tournament.... there's something to say if this 40% dominance came from only a few players, and at least one of them made a Top 8 each event... that could also be that random variable of "Chance" that no one can account for. Looking strictly at all numbers, not just the numbers of Top 8 appearances MUST be used in order to take a more accurate and finite glance at trying to piece together the puzzle of what people call "dominance."

In my opinion, as well, you also should somehow factor in who was playing said deck. The skill of a player is rather important too, considering that at some of these smaller events (20 or less), there are only 5 to 6 actually skilled players, leaving room for 2 to 3 "rogues" or less-skilled players in the format to have a chance to push results into the Top 8's that may not even be relevant. Many times decks with completely odd kill conditions may include cards from the restricted list, and mana drains, or workshops, etc... and if that player happens to Top 8, but lose before their less-then-popular (or probably less-good, or just bad) kill conditions (card changes) are seen (or understood), then these can construe results of the "best decks"... although this would make it seem that even this "bad deck" constitututes inclusion into a deck of it's acheatype, it just goes to show that players will use the best cards in a format no matter the reason (especially if they have access to them.)

It's too bad that the vintage scene in America is dominated by proxy events. This construes any results of the format because you can no longer base deck's "pilot" under the Eternal ratings system. If the eternal ratings system was back in place, then we could exclude or include results based on the a ratings standard. If an eternal player were at 2000, then I would clearly see them getting into Top 8 (or top 2 for that matter) often to be based solely on the fact that that player not only played one of the better decks in the format, but that they were so exceptionally good in the format that they coud even win with a lesser-viable deck based on their skill.

Without any of these ratings, it's hard to put a value on a player's skill as a deck pilot. My point in all of this is that there are so many variables to include other than strict Top 8's percentages of Card X... because under this system, there are cards more important that Mana Drain that would be under fire especially if you're use Gush/Flash's 25% "dominance" factor as precedent. WotC took major action on Gush before it had a chance to dominate for an entire year. Flash was running long before then, but really didn't take off at first... it spent a few months under the radar while people were still testing it's validity, as well as awaiting the powerful Protean Hulk/Reveillark build (which wasn't the original.) Considering the change of kill-condition in Flash, it's hard to use all of statistics and just "clump" them together... most people found the Sliver kill condition to be weak. I've played both, and was an active player of Flash through multiple iterations of the deck... and Protean Reveillark build was the best because you didn't need an attack step, therefore maximizing Pact of Negation as an offensive and defensive counterspell, and still being able to win before losing to the Trigger.... that's a lot change, and potentially, why the deck's popularity increased. Some sort of removal of percentage needs to be made, or, just don't use the aggregate. You need to use just the 1st Place Finishes %, Top 8 Results %, and Number of Flash decks (by type) %'s... once this is done, a more accurate view of the format can be defined. In Flash's case, it was so solitaire on the first Turn kill that something needed to be done about the deck because it was too wild and over-powered... but, if you want to address power... look @ FoW and Pact of Negations % in those dekcs too... should they have been restricted instead?

I mean, you can push all of these discussions wherever you like and deconstruct posts however you like to make it look like things are inane, but the fact is that your reasonings and decisions are only conclusive to you, not to the majority of players out there and you need to be open, for once, in accepting more than just one person's argument to agree with, considering that this person already agreed with you! This is like bias on crack.

I find all this talk about restricting a staple/core card of the Vintage format to be rather amusing at best.

After reading through the entire thread, I can only conclude that restriction of Mana Drain, even if it was farcical, is indulgent of over-bearing need to find anything to create discussion (and knowing debate.)

Vintage is built upon pillars for which it's good: Bazaar of Baghdad, Mishra's Workshop, and Mana Drain.

Everyone here agrees upon this topic. Those who don't only say this in spite of the current vintage metagame. Looking over the years from 2001 until now, you can see a definite shift in which one of those three 'pillars' was the best card that defined vintage. Dragon utilizing Bazaar was a good deck, Stax (with Trinisphere) utilizing Mishra's Workshop was a good deck, and Gifts utilizing Mana Drain was a good deck. All of these decks are basically non-existence, save for Stax (having to utilize more basic, and older Kron-based principles) in order to survive the shift over the years (as well as the bannings/restrictions.)

No offense to anyone, but if you can't understand that within a complex system that is Magic, and more importantly, the Vintage format of Magic, there exist quite many cards that "break" the rules (and tempo) that is the Tournament Format. In such a format, how can even be implied that a "perfect" list of cards for Banning/Restricting can even balance this? Sadly, the B/R List has done a lot to "tame" this format, but it's not enough.

Despite the fact that Vintage is a "dead" format as people say when it comes to WotC, they adjust the rules, re-errata cards, and make changes to the B/R List more-so than they do with any other format. It's constantly within their grasp. They know what's going on and keep a keen on eye on the vintage format. Most changes to the B/R List don't come hastily or without results. They use data from tournaments, and even with some perusing through deck-creation forums, to keep up with the current metagame in order to make good chances to the B/R List.

Now back to the talk of restriction mana drain: My problem with bringing up the idea of over-use as a means by percentage is that within your own SCG article, you state how Drain decks went from 41% to 45% in the Top 8's. This is an increase in 4%... and can you actually blame that on a reactive card? Also, I'm all for The Shop's idea of defining cards; yet people tend to throw aside all discussion on how words are defined within the game of magic. These wouldn't be used terms if players didn't understand what their meanings were, so trying to toss them out as potential discussion topics in the basis that their defined definitions aren't good enough for you? That's just ludicrous and no other words you say bear any meaning then, as you don't believe in their intended meanings in the first place.

Mana Drain is a reactive card. Any card that can only be played in response to another is quite reactive, and therefore it's interactive. Requiring both players. And, don't be coy... who plays a card of their own only to Mana Drain it? That's just ludicrous too, so the only option is to counter an opponent's spell. While doing so is quite powerful, beyond that of a simple Time Walk, still doesn't make it more powerful than Time Walk because your opponent has opportunities, as well as, the ability to disrupt Mana Drain was resolving (Thoughtseize and Duress are great, and highly used, examples of this.) This all is what helps make up, and define, interaction within the format. Talk of interactivity is rather off-topic, just couldn't resist the temptation of at least saying something about it.

The restriction of Mana Drain, if it were to occur, would also require that WotC needing to restrict Bazaar of Baghdad, Mishra's Workshop, Dark Ritual (and now Cabal Ritual too, for the same reasons that were applied to Ponder when Brainstorm got the axe.) People said it's the not the same and there would need to be data first to define if the other cards would need restricting. The problem with this argument is that WotC have already attacked blue rather aggressively during the previous year, and by Smennen's statistics, has showed that Blue "rebounded" and went up 4% in he rankings (basing this off Mana Drain decks.)

If Mana Drains were already running at ~40%, then why was nothing ever spoken of before this? Under this understanding, and trying to base Tezzeret's performance on the sole factor that it has Mana Drain seems flawed. There are multiple variables to factor into this equation. It's not that Tezzeret was printed because Time Vault was also errata'd again to move toward a more "original intent" based wording. This is also on top of the fact that Voltaic Key exists. So, that's at least three other variables to apply toward this discussions, which isn't a discussion whether or not Mana Drain should be restricted, but the fact that Time Vault being errata'd to work with both Tezzeret and Voltaic Key makes it a very easily assembled via just a few tutors; and Time Vault combo wins do not require the graveyard like many decks do in order to win, so many Sideboard answers (Tormod's Crypt, Faerie MaCabre, and Leyeline of the Void) do not even touch on this combo...

All-in-all, this is just a format that's impossible to control through simple Bannings and Restrictions without just outright banning a list of the most-powerful cards in the format... and that's just a topic that will cause all sorts of debate (mostly as to which cards are "the most powerful" and should be out-right banned) and is for another day altogether if it were to even need to exist. So, until something like that permits itself to the world for discussion, at least try to look through all the numbers, decks, and previous experience to see that Mana Drain is not the culprit, but that Time Vault's new wording is.

Any reason to disbelieve Time Vault's new wording is the cause and to advocate restricting Mana Drain is someone who wants act like they believe in the health of Vintage format. Taking away the tools to combat Combo decks (control cards) is going to allow Tendrils-based decks to dominate the format. Since aggro is not quick enough to kill any combo deck in at least 3 to 4 turns, they rely on cheap disruption like Null Rod and Chalice of the Void to stall... the problem is that Storm-based decks have the ability to retroactively answer these artifact disruption cards (Rebuild at the least is main-decked already.) So, that would leave Storm-based decks running rampant in the format with control decks being constantly reduced in strength, as any way to get them back up into any dominating percentage would cause another streak of "Not Blue's good again, even after restricting drain, so lets restrict card X now!" For this sake, what is the percentage of Force of Will in vintage decks?

Yeah, Force of Will is the "glue" that holds vintage together, but under the circumstance that Mana Drain is too good, what about FoW? It doesn't require having lands or moxes, or any mana-producer in play; just a blue card and at least 2 life. This is a minute cost for a card that has the tempo and playability that it does. Even after attacking the color that it promotes, FoW is still a mainstay in Vintage... and if you want to take away Mana Drain because of the numbers that it shows in tournament results, then the same should be said for any cards that aren't restricted, including Force of Will.

I would definitely try a few SSG's... I think 3 at first will show a few advantages.

More than just being able to cast REB w/out lands, it also lets you go Turn 1 Bazaar, activate, pitch 3 cards, remove SSG, cast Welder + Mox/CotV. That just sets up a ridiculous second turn welder explosion, especially if the welded card is the Grindstone, not the Painter. Either way, it just produces some good quick speed. And always, it's fodder to pitch to Bazaar if you've already got the goods in hand.

@Tormod's Crypt: I can see your point for them, but the reason for not main-decking them is that usually Painter doesn't need them. Most U/r builds aren't running but maybe 1 as a Game 1 target, but that's it. If you end up facing Oath, then you need to decide which build they are. If they're Tyrant Oath, then you're golden. If they're Dragon-Oath, then you're going to lose game 1 unless you get Painter online on like turn 1 AND you're holding lots of REB/Pyros (they become insane vindicates that can target oath.)

I have to agree that Bazaar seems like a nobrainer include here.

Also, you've been pretty defensive towards any improvement on your deck. I feel you posted it only garner positive responses instead of possible advancing feedback, AKA: positive criticism.

As for what has been said, I'll echo: Bazaar seems really good here. First off, just like Red Stax, Bazzar + Welder create a crazy combinatin of good plays, that sometimes it just simpley overcomes your opponent's ability to do anything. Especially when the only spells you need to resolve are moxen or CotV. Speaking of CotV, I feel you need to include a few copies. This deck doesn't look like it can handle Storm at all because you run no 1cc black disruption and no FoW, making anything you play resolve. Despite having 7 Red Counters for blue spells, that just means holding up 1 extra mana in order to resolve your threats, which isn't bad, but since it's not free, relies on needing lots of mana in play (3 for Painter and 4 for grindstone.)

I will say that I do like the deck. First off, it's non-colored, so you're very safe from Wastelands not setting you back into the stone age (even if you had 4 Bazaars with your Great Furnaces, you'd still be running an enumerous amount of basics and could never get land-locked versus (possible recurring) Wastelands.

I think with Bazaars, you might make the simple cut of -1 Grindstone and -3 Goblin Lore for 4x Chalice of the Void instead. You do play Tormod's Crypt in the main, but that's for fear of Oath or something else. If people do run Darksteel... sweet, they get one turn to win. If you have least 1 mana up after milling everything else, I'm sure you could find a way to REB/Pyro their Yawgmoth's Will.

Also, I feel -3 Tormod's Crypt and +3 Simian Spirit Guide would make the hands better and easier to use REB/Pyro as defensive pseudo-"Fow" once you resolve a quick painter. Plus, holding SSG+REB after tapping out to mill leave that "hidden" counter for a possible game-winning Yawgmoth's Will (if they're holding it and it wasn't milled.) I would probably try to fit a 4th SSG too, but I don't know what to but. If you still fear Gaea's Blessing, then run 3-4 Tormod's Crypt in the board, and sideout Chalices.

EDIT: Also, about hitting Darksteel with T-Crypt... it's impossible. He has a replacement effect that says "If he would be put into a graveyard from anywhere, do something else." Meaning as he would be attempted to be put in the g'yard, he wouldn't, and gets revealed, then shuffled back into the deck. So, you never have opportunity to Crypt him. Only able to crypt Blessings, as they trigger AFTER hitting graveyard from library.

There has been some very invigorating discussion about Tezzeret in here.

The best thing about this was the debate over TfK and Int+AK. I think it's been well known that both can be very good, but which is better? I think I've been a fan of Thirst for Knowledge way too long to even consider going back to AK, mostly on the back of Intuition. I've always felt that when I upgraded to Moxen + other maindecked artifacts, that the idea of using a subpar, over costed system of 5 mana to draw 3 cards versus 3 mana to draw 3 cards was a no-brainer. The biggest ups for AK I see only come from having the ability to spend 2-mana later to draw 4 at instant speed, without discarding. That by-far beats spending 3 to draw at most 2 cards (including the discard.)

Either way, through my testing with the deck (from initial conception of just using a standard Blue Bullshit build) up to the current one has shown that there are lots of "advance" the deck can take. I think by a long shot that no deck in Vintage is super innovative, but let me add that the definition of "innovation" is "Taking and idea or concept, expanding on it, and then commercializing it." The word "commercializing" in Magic is more of the concept of "creating an archetype" or "respectable and copyable decklist that doesn't lose to the field". So, yes, there is always new innovation in Magic, even if it's using older ideas in a new light with new cards, that's still taking an "idea or concept" and trying to make it the "commercial winner".

Away from that aside: Tezzeret is good, and I feel that what I like most about Tezzeret is the ability to include Voltaic Key as a combo piece. While many players have been against the cards inclusion, I tossed it in during the first run every of putting the deck together. I originally wanted to run 3 Tez and Time Vault, but decided last minute to go 2 Tez, 1 Vault, 1 Voltaic Key... and I've never looked back since then.

Smennen, and others of this thread, have it right in that Tezzeret is the best win condition for control decks. In place of the traditional Keeper's Morphling, you put 2 Tezzerets instead. The difference, as mentioned, it only requires an untap to win the game instead of +4 Turns. This is very crucial, and with the addition of black (for Tutors at the minimum), the deck gains the ability to actually win without Tez too (in the use of Voltaic key.) There were a few games where I just opened with D.Tutor, V.Tutor, Force+Backup, and just won in two turns. It's not overly hard to just put a 1cc and 2cc artifact in play. Harder feats have been accomplished in Vintage, like recurring a 6-mana artifact with a 4-mana activation that wins the game too. In equivalence, you never wanted more than maybe 2 Slavers (usually only 1), and in Tez, Time Vault is restricted, and you don't want a 2nd Key.

Here's the list that I've been tuning, both before, and after reading:

2 Tezzeret
1 Time Vault
1 Voltaic Key
4 Mana Drain
4 Force of Will
1 Demonic Tutor
1 Vampiric Tutor
1 Mystical Tutor
1 Merchant Scroll
1 Fact or Fiction
1 Ancestral Recall
1 Engineered Explosives
1 Brainstorm
1 Ponder
1 Gifts Ungiven
1 Yawgmoth's Will
4 Thirst for Knowledge
1 Rebuild
1 Echoing Truth
2 Trinket Mage
1 Sensei's Divinning Top
1 Tinker
1 Sundering Titan
1 Tormod's Crypt

1 Tolarian Academy
1 Strip Mine
4 Polluted Delta
1 Flooded Strand
3 Underground Sea
1 Swamp
6 Island
1 Library of Alexandria
1 Academy Ruins
4 Moxen
1 Lotus Petal
1 Sol Ring

First off, I don't own the 5th Mox, Lotus, or Time Walk, so there is an excess of land, but I've played it proxied too (and the difference is huge when speaking of Yawgmoth's Will + Time Walk when casting Gifts Piles.)

This is just my current sleeved list, but it's still been winning games. The biggest change I made early on was going more control than Combo, and I swapped Imperial Seal for Mystical Tutor. 1, mystical pitches to FoW, and 2, Mystical still finds clutch cards, like A.Recall, Gifts, FoF, and Tinker, and 3, it's an instant... that's been important when you need Drain up.

The biggest problem this deck has faced so far is Tendrils based decks. After attempting to find a solution for it, I just easily fell back into post-Psychatog Mono-Blue builds: Running 3-4 Chalice of the Void in the main. Sadly, I hated not being able to play Voltaic Key here, despite shoring up one match... I lost many tools for other matches (Pithing Needle and Key.) So, instead, I opted to try Duress/Thoughtseize. They were OK in some instances, but I quickly found to squeeze them into the deck required cutting cards to be Proactive rather than Reactive, so I took them out and put answers in the deck instead (the artifacts package: Trinket Mages, Tormod's Crypt, E.Explosive, & S.D.Top.)

As far as cutting CotV altogether... I did not. Instead, I put all 4 in the sideboard. I found that games 2 &3 of Storm you needed answers, even proactive; so I usually brought in 2 Sower of Temptation and 4 Chalice of the Void. Originally I did test Duress here, but still found that playing it when I needed to hold drain up was just bad. Clumped hands of Duress and Drains are just GG for you... especially when facing a speedy deck where they also Duress/Thougtseize you. If they Duress you and see Duress + Drain, and decide to take Drain because they aren't holding a key-win-card, then your Duress is wasted on nothing and you'll end up losing, or they'll take your duress, leaving a wasted Drain until the fetch another Duress/Thoughtseize (and against a few on line guys, they packed +2-4 Thoughtseizes extra after board against control.)

These are just the scenarios I've ran into so far, and even some enlightenment on how I play my list. There are 2 Hurkyll's Recalls and 2 Thoughtseizes in the board. Although I disliked having discard, the Thoughtseizes proved useful versus aggro or even aggro-control, like Stifle-Nought... if you take their Noughts, then there's less kill conditions to face. Or, being able to take Confidant is really nice. It was just a better card than Duress, and can also be a valid trade versus Stacks, where I usually went -2 Drains +2 Thoughtseize if I was on the draw. I also tossed in a Singleton Darkblast. It's tutorable, kills Confidants and Welders, and makes Trinket on Trinket uneven combat (although that's subpar.) Without Green, using it without Goyf's seems wrong, but the positives outweigh the negatives. I originally wanted to run 2 Trops (1 Main 1 Board) and 3 Goyfs, but didn't for some reason or the other... I still may. There are open slots in the deck and sideboard for customization.

EDIT: Played a few games with a friend, and I decided to try Goyf's... they weren't bad, but not good either. Pretty decent versus Storm too, as they sometimes fill the yard with instants, lands, sorceries, and artifacts for me. Anyways, here's the sideboard that I modified:

4 Chalice of the Void
2 Hurkyll's Recall
2 Thoughtseize
2 Sower of Temptation
1 Tropical Island
3 Tarmogoyfs
1 Rushing River
1 Darkblast

Generally, when I bring in the Chalice of the Voids, the maindeck 1cc spells start taking a quick cut. Vampiric Tutor, Mystical Tutor, Sensei's Divinning Top, Ponder, Volcatic Key, and Rebuild Usually come out. Trinket mages get's weaker, but can still fetch Tormod's Crypt AND CotV, so I leave it in. The most common inclusion is +4 CotV and +2 Sower of Temptation. Sower is odd, but gives me an interesting out versus secondary Robot-like wins, and is good when opponent tries to swap-up and include Goyfs.