Playing cards for less than their CMC

[Roat17]

I would just like to start this post in hopes of generating new ideas, based on old premises.

First off I am a fan of using creatures.  I like the idea that they are continual sources of damage as opposed to the one time (albeit sometimes massive) punishment that spells dish out.  That being said, the creatures being used today in Vintage Magic scream redundant.  I understand the concept that if it's not broke, don't fix it.  I also understand the fact that some creatures are just plain awful. 

Vintage however has the largest cardpool among any format, and sequentially has access to the coolest/"best" creatures.  As I said however, the use of creatures has been restricted due to the fact that decks are so explosive they often win within the first 5 turns.  Therefore, in order to get a creature out that will have an impact on the game, one either needs to use the cheapest creatures available, and of course, the cheapest non-vanilla creatures.  Else, players have to rely on getting non-cheap creatures into play in alternative ways. 

I would like to discuss some of the alternative ways to perhaps see if there are any other creatures that could be used in Vintage, but are too many intensive to be used currently.

First off is Tinker.  Tinker can be used to get out any artifact creature in your deck, provided you have an artifact in play.  In both Gifts as well as other decks, Darksteel Colossus is the Tinker target of choice, as he's damn hard to get rid of.  I'm aware that certain versions of Stax may run more 'Lock' style creatures and therefore Tinker for them.

Second, Oath of Druids.  Oath decks now rely on getting Forbidden Orchard on the board to give the opponent a creature, then use Oath's ability to dig out a creature (usually Akroma and Razia or sometimes DSC).  Other creatures can be used, however, Oath decks attempt to get their pieces on the board and protect them as soon as possible, and as such, all their slots are dedicated to drawing the pieces needed and protecting them.  This makes the use of creatures without all those fancy keywords a little more difficult.

Ichorid is yet another creature that gets into play for free (in terms of mana). 
Goblin Welder is also used.
Anyhow, I think you all get the idea of this post by now.

Other ways I can think of to get creatures into play include:


Reanimator.
Show and Tell.
Sneak Attack.
Dragon Arch.
Elvish Piper.

Personally, I like the idea of show and tell in the current metagame.  Because many decks are not perminant based, I don't think the drawback is as bad as one might think.  I understand the consequence of, Brainstorm in response and then an opponent dropping DSC, but considering many decks run him as a 1 of, I am not too worried.  The creatures I would use in conjunction with it would probably be Tidespout Tyrant and Niv-Mizzet.  My main concern about testing/building a deck at the moment is that I would like to theorize with some of the more adept palyers before I start to assemble anything.

I'm sure more ways exist to get creatures into play alternative to paying their mana cost that I have not included.  If anyone else could post some ways that I have missed I would appreciate it.  My question is, are any of those non-mainstream alternatives viable in today's explosive meta game?  I feel that if any viable ways can be found, new innovative rogue decks will be able to surprise people more and more often.  Thanks for reading and responding.

[wethepeople]

A really long time ago a friend of mine had a deck that he threw together using four Show and Tells, Tinker, and every tutor imaginable (including a Personal Tutor and proxied I.Seal) that resulted in some big creature cheating it's way onto the board. I believe he used DSC (so Tinker was playable) and some other janky creatures that he found in his binder.

I am sure the deck could be improved greatly because this was before we were into much competative play. However, with a little more thought the list seems to me like a viable deck.

[LotusHead]

Natural Order is a Tinker for green creatures.  At only 2GG it can dig up SLIVER QUEENS!  Well, that's what I used it for.

[Tha Gunslinga]

There once was a deck based around Show and Tell.  It was called "STD" which stood for "Show and Tell Day."

Googling "show and tell day std" didn't exactly help me, but I added "darksteel colossus" and here's the list:

This is a Team Reflection list, originally posted by Methuselahn.

      Maindeck

      4 Darksteel Colossus

      4 Show and Tell
      2 Future Sight
      1 Time Walk
      1 Yawgmoth's Will
      1 Tinker

      4 Force of Will
      4 Duress
      1 Damping Matrix
      1 Mind Twist
      2 Cunning Wish

      4 Brainstorm
      2 Impulse
      1 Ancestral Recall
      1 Demonic Tutor
      1 Vampiric Tutor
      1 Mystical Tutor

      7 SoloMoxen
      1 Mana Crypt
      1 Mana Vault
      4 Underground Sea
      5 Island
      1 Swamp
      4 Polluted Delta
      2 Flooded Strand

      SB: 3 Chalice of the Void
      SB: 2 Damping Matrix
      SB: 3 Hurkyl's Recall
      SB: 2 Skeletal Scrying
      SB: 1 Demonic Consultation
      SB: 1 Stifle
      SB: 1 Fact or Fiction
      SB: 1 Echoing Truth
      SB: 1 Echoing Decay

[Harlequin]

Googling "show and tell day std" didn't exactly help me

Thats probably the funniest thing I've ever read on the drain. 

As far as the orginal question is concerned you can add these to your list:
Trash for Treasure (its the illegitamate child of Welder and Tinker)
Animate Dead, Reanimate, Necromancy, Shallow Grave, Zombify, etc etc...
Eureka and Hypergenisis
Gate to AEther
Oath of Ghouls
Heartstone + Rebels (broken!)
Summoner's Egg (best casual play ever: berserked summoners egg??)


There are tons of cards that let you cheat costs.

[warble]

First off I'd like to start by mentioning the three commonly played methods to go aggro with creatures in Vintage:

1)  Aether Vial
2)  Goblin Lackey
3)  Goblin Welder (with Bazaar of Baghdad)

Without a mention to these three it's hard to establish a baseline for "how good" a card should be.  All of these alternatives cost exactly 1 (yes that is ONE) mana and play creatures without casting anything, putting them directly in play from your hand or graveyard.

If we go up to the less "aggro" and more combo level of creature power we get

1)  Oath of Druids
2)  Animate Dead

For two mana we can get creatures like Sundering Titan, Worldgorger Dragon, Akroma, Salvagers and SSS.  We are already seeing a trend towards winning the game.

Looking at three mana, we are at the control level of creature power so we level out at:

1)  Thirst for Knowledge (with Goblin Welder)
2)  Tinker
3)  Necromancy

At this level of "free creatures" we now desire flexibility in our engine and the ability to win instantly (with a deck containing Mindslaver for instance) is present simply because we have so much mana available.

So what is my issue with Show and Tell?  Why is it "less strong" than any of the listed cards?  Because we are paying 3 mana for a card, it must be strong enough to warrant the extra mana.  Mana is a very VERY limited resource especially if you play large creatures (also known as dead cards, in vintage)  What I see from Show and Tell is a card with power equivalent to a two-mana costing free creature placement, with the drawback that the creature must be in your hand and that your opponent will get a free permanent drop.  Because you assume you have 3 mana at this point, against mindslaver.dec you face auto-losing.  You will occasionally get the free drop, but it has cost you two cards from your hand, 3 mana and a turn.  That had better be one heck of a creature!  I think we've established that there isn't a good way to salvage show and tell for vintage, outside of a control/disruption shell that would need to completely destroy your opponent's hand prior to casting the card.  The alternative would be running suicide blue...that can't be a real deck...even rogue...

Without seeing where we are in vintage, it's hard to focus on how we can evolve from there.  We have at the lowest mana tiers (Ichorid actually has a 0 mana method for playing creatures) virtually uncounterable creature wins.  This isn't simply aggro, for two mana in vintage we win the game easily with Worldgorger Dragon.  When we advocate a rogue creature deck we typically focus on the disruption capabilities of the creatures, or their ability to combo together to win on an early turn (hello lackey, meddling mage).  Because we desire early disruption we don't care about going around a casting cost of arbitrary size, so we can easily employ aether vial.  Winning on an early turn also requires that we have low casting cost creatures, so why focus on playing them for free?

What I believe you would like is a deck that employs the typical free creature playing methods, but with a different creature base.  By saying you want a new creature playing method you're essentially roping yourself into a less efficient engine with the same creatures.  If you were talking about playing a card other than a creature, it would make a lot more sense.  Let's look back at the card Show and Tell for a moment.

Show and Tell was vastly inferior to our other free creature playing methods, but if we expand our search space outside of creatures we immediately see that the card is playable in vintage.  What card does show and tell combo with?  Dovescape!  Yes, our opponent immediately plays something and it could suck but even if the card played is mindslaver, we haven't lost!  We broke the casting cost for a win condition, not some aggro creature that, with three turns, can possibly win unless your opponent has a DsC in play.  Does this mean that I envision a deck with show and tell dovescape as the win condition?  Hell no, but it's certainly feasible given what we want from the cards.

What is really not feasible is using a completely sub-optimal engine such as elvish piper to play gigantic creatures and beat face.  That event is unique to formats that don't contain one-card win conditions...and vintage is far from that format.  Innovation doesn't always break the mold, and with creatures such as dark confidant, meddling mage, goblin lackey, goblin welder, and worldgorger dragon available playing a creature in vintage is definitely not always about going around the casting cost.

I really think that dread returns is intensely underutilized, however.  For zero mana, it should be winning tournaments, because the construction of a zero mana deck allows for sooooo much disruption and aggro it's not right.  I understand that a large portion of the post is dedicated to the existing engines, but that is because to find something better than what we have, we really have to know how friggin' good what we have is first.

[Purple Hat]

the problem I've always had with show and tell is that it's unlikely to resolve unless your opponent has something bombish to drop as well.  you show DSC....your opponent shows Bargain... not a good trade.

[Methuselahn]

Show and Tell decks are too slow for today's serious tournament settings.   However, they're super awesome in casual with jank like Boseiju. 

If I wanted to build a competitive Show and Tell deck,  I'd look to Legacy before Vintage if you want to experiment with the card/idea.