GWS Grim Long-The Man Plan

[Moxlotus]

When it was announced that Grim Tutor was going to be legal and unrestricted I, like many others, rushed to find the perfect storm combo deck.  Well after 9 months my team failed and succeeded at the same time.  How?  We failed in that we cannot beat workshop.  If somebody else can figure out a way (with the many SB slots as you’ll see) then I will be so excited I may give you a hug and a shiny nickel.  This inability to beat Stax, to our knowledge, makes this deck unplayable in the Midwest.  Because of this, I will present you a version that absolutely rolls control—especially Gifts.

GWS Long-The Man Plan

11/12 land
4 Orchard
3/4 Gemstone
4 City
0 Academy

Mana Accel 18
7 SoloMoxen
1 Crypt
1 Vault
1 Lotus Petal
1 LED
4 Dark Rit
3 Culling of the Weak

Doods 9/10
4 Xantid
3 Trinket Mage
2/3 Dark Confidant

Tutors 7
4 Grim Tutor
1 Demonic tutor
1 Vamp
1 Imperial Seal

Random 3
1/2 Defense Grid
0/1 Sensei’s Insane Top
1 Echoing Truth/Hurkyl’s

Good Stuff 11
1 Yawg Will
1 Tendrils
1 Wheel/Tinker (Most of the team likes Wheel and Necro)
1 Necro/Jar
1 Twister
1 Ancestral
1 Bargain
0 Desire
4 Brainstorm

I won’t list a SB because we never found 1 we really liked.  I can say however that a transformational into Oath doesn’t work against Stax.  Putting 4 ESGS, 4 Hurkyl’s, and 4 Scavenger Folk also doesn’t work against Stax.  Since the maindeck is suited to beat control, you guys have essentially every card in the SB to use.  Go to it.

The theory we set out is all the deck needs to win is lots of black mana and 1 tutor.  Play lots of black mana, tutor for will,  replay lots of black mana, tutor for tendrils, win.  That’s all the deck had to do.  This is different from Deathlong which needed a draw 7 or something to find a second Wish.  While looking through random crappy cards we found Culling of the Weak.  Immediately we thought of its usefulness with Xantid Swarm.  Now we only needed 1 more creature to make it work (note: this was before Confidant was printed).  Blood Pet sucked.  So did Priest of Gix.  Then we found Trinket Mage.  Here’s the kill at its simplest:

Turn 1, stuff
Turn 2: Somehow have 2UB available, Trinket, Culling, Grim in hand.  The mana is either from Moxen, or Dark Ritual or whatever, but I won’t count it towards storm. 
Spend 2U on Trinket (storm 1, B), get Lotus.
Play Lotus, break for BBB (storm 2, BBBB)
Play Grim for Will (storm 3, B)
Culling away Trinket (storm 4, BBBB)
Cast Will (storm 5, B)
Replay Lotus, sack for blue (storm 6, BUUU)
Use blue to replay Trinket, search for LED, break for BBB (storm 8, BBBB)
Replay Culling on Trinket (storm 9, BBBBBBB)
Replay Grim for Tendrils (storm 10, BBBB)
Tendrils for 22.

This actually comes up much easier than you would think.  Here are the goldfishing results of 100 games (keeping in mind that many of the worse draws were from earlier versions of the deck):

Turn 1 with protection (protection is an attacking Xantid or Defense grid): 1
Turn 1 without protection: 8
Turn 2 with protection: 17
Turn 2 without protection: 24
Turn 3 with protection: 22
Turn 3 without protection: 13
Turn 4+/fizzle: 15

Confidant was added later because that card is insane card advantage and can sack to Culling.  He is an amazing turn 1 play.  The typical turn 1 is to card disadvantage tutor for something, BS, or play Xantid.  Turn 2 is either going for it, or setting up for turn 3.  If it’s later than turn 3 you’re pretty much dead.  However, that isn’t always the case.  If you and your opponent both stall, it isn’t that hard to beatdown for the win.  Each attack is 1 less storm required for the win.  I’ve played a couple games where I’ve stalled, beat down, Tendrils for like 8 to stay alive, then attacked for 2 more turns FTW. 

The deck is all about Lotus and LED.  Probably 90% of the time I cast a turn 1 tutor it is for Lotus.  The other 2 common tutor targets on turn 1 are Sol ring/Crypt and Wheel of Fortune.  Sol Ring/Crypt if you need it to cast a Trinket Mage and Wheel if your hand is infinite acceleration, and no tutor that puts cards directly into hand.  Wheel is chosen because you get to keep the insane acceleration in the grave.  I really don’t like Twister, but realize that it is necessary in case Will is countered.

What cards aren’t in the deck:
Tolarian Academy.  If you look at the business spells, all but Wheel of Fortune are black.  The Broken Academy doesn’t produce black and had to be cut.  It was rough doing this and I staunchly opposed the idea until I actually tried it.  We’ve never looked back.  Black mana is simply too important.

Mind’s Desire.  Look at the deck.  First notice the severe lack of good stuff to desire up.  Then look at how hard it is to cast this, especially once we removed Academy.  The only way to cast Desire was off Lotus and for a while I played a replacement for Desire—Salvagers.  Desire is a 6 mana spell that requires set up and Lotus to cast.  Salvagers is a 6 mana engine that requires Lotus to cast and no set up.  In the end, both were replaced for simply not being good enough.

Tinker/Jar.  Feel free to play these, but I wouldn’t.  I feel that the random turn 1 Necro, or the tutoring for Wheel is much more important to the deck than Tinker/Jar.  Tinker/Jar is good.  It is really good-even in this deck.  However, I feel the other business spells and the protection are more important. 

ESG:  It doesn’t add to storm, doesn’t produce black, and isn’t replayable from the yard.  It may have a home in the SB against Sphere of Resistance.

Why play this over Stephen Menendian’s deck (http://sales.starcitygames.com/deckdatabase/displaydeck.php?DeckID=14156)?  Well, if you plan on playing against Stax PLAY STEVE’S DECK.  If you have lots of Drains in your metagame, give this a try.  This is by far the simplest storm combo deck ever built to my knowledge.  Before this I had never played storm combo, and after 50 goldfish games I knew every play and what to mull.  My teammates who have played storm combo before said it was about 20 goldfishes before they knew the deck inside and out. 

The only important thing is to make sure you don't walk Trinket into a Drain.  Make sure your opening hand has lots of mana.  The deck only needs 1 business spell, but needs lots of mana.  Sleeve the deck up and give it a try.  Casting 4 Loti on turn 2 can be really fun!

[BigMac]

now to get grim tutor and imperial seal. For real that is.

I am wondering about the manabase. Your assumption with goldfishing is that nothing is either contered or you have protection from counters.  I played deathlong once and found that 3 orchards was to many. When something was countered the tokens did the most damage to my death when i was building for the kill again. So how is this when you play with 4 orchards with this deck.

As for the sideboard. I do not see why you could not use the transformational sideboard to oath against staxx. You have lots of acceleration, lots of tutors and can easilly remove 15 cards for it to become a good oath deck. You can even put 3 sacred ground in your sideboard as you have enough possible white mana. Yes you lack to counterability you think you need against staxx. But you do not. You will lose to a turn one trinisphere. But whatever you do in your sideboard you will lose to a turn one trinisphere. When Sphere is cast you can go land plus acceleration to go for a turn 2 oath. These are the 15 cards i would remove against staxx.

3 culling the weak
4 xantid swarm
3 trinket mage
2/3 dark confidant
1/2 defense grid

put back in
4 oath of druids
2/3 critters you have put in your sideboard
1 gaea's blessing
3 sacred ground
2 bounce spells

The basis of you deck will be gone and this is in no way comparable to normal oath. But you will be able to oath somebody to death as well as use the oathed cards in a more deadly way when you find will in some way. As you still have most of the combocards of normal TPS in there without its protection you could potentially still go turn 1 kill with the right hand. the advantage against staxx is that you do not need to think about counters, only how to kill him as fast as possible.

Nice build and after i get the portal tutors (will take some time) i will certainly try this one out.

[Smmenen]

I applaud GWS on thinking of putting Trinket Mage and Culling of the Weak together. 

I saw this list some time ago and made alot of modifications.  The lack of Mind's Desire is ludicrious.  You also def. need Tinker and Jar. 

[cssamerican]

I guess my first question would be why run Defense Grid/Sensei’s Divining Top in the main and not Duress? Duress at least has a chance of ripping a Chalice, Null Rod, or Sphere out of someone’s hand before it hits play. It just as good if not better versus control, and it can add to your storm count by being played from the yard after you cast Will.

You said that your team tried a transformational Oath sideboard; however, I am not really sure exactly what you tried. So, if I were to try something this would probably be where I would start.
4 Oath of Druids
1 Akroma, Angel of Wrath
1 Spirit of the Night
1 Hurkyl’s Recall
2 Chain of Vapor
2 Rack or Ruin
4 Hidden Guerrillas (It gives you higher threat density with varied a casting cost, it doesn’t screw up Oath if it is in your library, and it can trample over spirit tokens.)

I would probably start by siding out
4 Xantid Swarm
3 Trinket Mage
2/3 Dark Confidant
3 Culling of the Weak
2/3 Grim Tutor
I guess you could make an argument for siding out Tendrils and focus on the beatdown for the win. However, it is still possible to land an early Necro, or to drop a bunch of artifacts a recall them back to hand and go off. So, I think I would still keep it in the main, at least until testing proved otherwise.

Whether that in conjunction with maindeck Duress would be effective or not I really don’t know for sure because I haven’t actually tested anything, but I would be surprised if it were completely unsuccessful.

[Komatteru]

I have to say that the lack of Tinker and Jar is very disturbing.  In fact, I find it mostly unacceptable.  That is by far the best draw7 ever printed, and I could definitely see that being the only one worth running.  You're maindecking 3 Xantid Swarms, and th esynergy between the Bees and Jar is outrageous.  The other draw7s give your opponent a turn to dump his hand into play first, but Jar + Xantid = mill 7 cards, no Brainstorming back Tinker or Will.  Even if you didn't have the Swarms, you'd still need to run Tinker/Jar because it's the go-to spell in storm combo, in my opinion and vast experience.

Wheel is good, but it's not Jar.  Your decision to pair up Tinker/Jar with Wheel/Necro is problematic, as Necro is like a 50-pound gorilla in that comparison.  That's like saying "I can run either Ill-Gotten Gains or Will, but not both."  The decision there is very clear, and with Necro in the picture, you're making up for Wheel's defencies with one of the 4 most broken cards ever printed.  What you should try to do is get Necro in there for sure, work Tinker/Jar in there, and then figure out if there is room for Wheel.

I also cannot accept not having Desire and Academy.  You need the former because it's like Necro or Bargain - hard to play, but an instant win when it hits.  Academy also needs no explanation.

[Moxlotus]

I forgot to say that most of the testing against Stax was Cron-Stax.  We have not tested against Uba Stax.  The lack of spheres may be better.  Sphere of resistance seriously shuts the deck down a lot.  Followed by a wasteland it is pretty much game.  Null Rod will probably be better to play against, but still suck.  Duress vs. grid-good idea.  That wasn't really tried.  Hidden Guerrillas is also something I never would have though of.  That could be an interesting SB plan and could greatly improve the match. However, most of the time Chalice is set at 1 anyways.

This deck was on the back burners and was only really tested in spare time or when we were bored of Oath.  However, our attention is on other things and none of us were interested in playing the deck any time soon-so we thought we'd show everybody and see if anybody else can get the Stax match to not completly suck.

I stand that Desire is terrible in this build.  The only things you would want to desire up are Will, Bargain, and Tendrils.  Double blue is really really hard to get for a 6 mana spell that hits a lot of crap.  The desires in this deck are worse than TPS.  Salvagers was better than Desire.  6 mana to win the game.  However, they are not black (so it required Lotus) and therefore were cut.

Tinker/Jar is really good, but I simply cannot find room.  Besides, most of the time I would want to Tinker I could simply Wheel instead.  I like Tinker/Jar but can't find room.  I don't need a lot of draw 7s, I only need 1 tutor.  We started the deck with 0 draw 7s.  Twister was included in case Will was countered and Wheel was included because too many hands were 5 mana, 1 disruption, vamp/imperial and I wanted the acceleration in the grave.  When I draw 7 (which happens rarely-they are the "oh shit" button) I am going off that turn and don't give my opponent a chance to play his stuff.  One thing I must say is that with Steve's build, I found I played draw 7s a lot more than I do with this build. 

If someone can point to what to cut those are the next 2 cards to be added.  However, this list is tigher than others because of the creatures needed for Culling.  I feel that Wheel is better than Tinker because it puts my hand into my grave.  I want things in the grave, not removed from game, for the turn I'm going off.  However, I could be wrong and Tinker/Jar may be better than Wheel-but when I had both in I almost always tutored for Wheel over Tinker in both goldfishing and gameplay.  Also, Jar is shut down by Rod-it came up a few times against fish.

On Academy-I hate saying this but I have to insist to just test it.  Every land needs to produce black mana.  Academy just doesn't work.  I have 2 land most of the time when going off and it is necessary that each produce black.

[Komatteru]

If someone can point to what to cut those are the next 2 cards to be added.  However, this list is tigher than others because of the creatures needed for Culling.  I feel that Wheel is better than Tinker because it puts my hand into my grave.  I want things in the grave, not removed from game, for the turn I'm going off.  However, I could be wrong and Tinker/Jar may be better than Wheel-but when I had both in I almost always tutored for Wheel over Tinker in both goldfishing and gameplay.  Also, Jar is shut down by Rod-it came up a few times against fish.

You don't need Defense Grid if you have Xantid Swarms.  In fact, Defense Grid is bad in any case.  4 Xantids still seems like way too many, since I found that when I brought in 4, I was often drawing too many and not getting enough action spells.  The only reason to run 4 Xantids in Belcher or Death Long is the wishes.  You never bring in more than 3 and leave the last one back to wish for if you want.   Even you can sac extra ones to Culling of the Weak, paying BG for BBBB seems bad, since you'd need to tap 2 lands to do that.  Then you don't get to cast blue spells like Brainstorm or Trinket Mage or anything, which seems rough.

[Moxlotus]

That is an option.  Those slots have just been other metagame slots and were Hurkyl's when we were trying to beat Stax.  Using those slots for more bombs wouldn't be terrible.

We've never tried less than 4 Swarms.  We've always had them for both protection and Culling bait.  It may be better with only 3.