[Deck] Polymorph

[Lurker101]

Here's a deck that I made that revolves around the card Polymorph which only costs 1 more than Tinker and can get a DSC out pretty easily.
Lands: 20
Swamp 3
Tolarian Academy
Underground Sea 4
Island 6
Urborg, Tomb of Yawgmoth 2
Mishra's Factory 4

Creatures: 2
Darksteel Colossus 2

Other Spells: 38
Timetwister
Imperial seal
Ponder
Brainstorm
Declaration of Naught 2
Sensei's Divining Top 4
Tinker
Black Lotus
Mox Jet
Mox Ruby
Mox Emerald
Mox Pearl
Mox Sapphire
Polymorph 4
Vampiric Tutor
Thirst for Knowledge 4
Force of Will 4
Ancestral Recall
Time Walk
Demonic Tutor
Bitterblossom 2
Duress         3

The point is to get Bitterblossom or Mutavault out and Polymorph a token or an activated Mutavault to get a DSC. You can also tinker out a DSC. Declaration of Naught kills combo pieces by naming Tezzeret or Grindstone or ad nauseam or whatever and it can win counter battles by naming force of will.

Sideboard:
Platinum Angel 2
Thoughtseize 3
Counterbalance 3
Extirpate 4
Echoing Truth 3

The sideboard is pretty self explanatory, it contains more powerful artifact creatures to polymorph out as well as some disruption and counterbalances to go with Sensei's divining top if need be.


The deck needs some work and is largely untested, do you think it would be viable? Do you have any suggestions for improvement?
Edit: Changed Mutavault's to factories, cut 2 Bitterblossom and 1 Declaration of Naught and added 3 duress. Changed sideboard to include echoing truth.

[IthilanorStPete]

Might as well put Mishra's Factory in over Muta.

[mr.grim]

I think its a neat idea for a deck ........
1.I would like to see duress or seize in it
2.Why the lack of bounce?  If your opp. drops ,meddling mage, oath,stax lock pieces what do you do?
3.I do agree with the factory over vault call.
4.The bb's count seems high.

[Lurker101]

I cut two bitterblossom for 2 duress and replaced the vaults with factories. I would like to add bounce and more discard but I don't know what else to cut.

[Bill Copes]

I'd suggest reworking the manabase to be something like this:

1 Tolarian Academy
1 Swamp
2 Island
4 Underground Sea
4 Polluted Delta
2 Flooded Strand
3 Mishra's Factory (considerably better than mutavault - you probably don't need 4 with 4x bitterblossom)
1 Black Lotus
1 Mox Jet
1 Mox Ruby
1 Mox Emerald
1 Mox Pearl
1 Mox Sapphire
1 Mana Vault
1 Mana Crypt
1 Sol Ring

The addition of fetches will make your sensei's tops better.  You can probably cut 2 tops for added disruption.

You can power out a polymorph faster with the addition of Sol Ring, and Crypt/Vault.

Instead of declaration of naught, have you considered running mana drains or duress effects?  Are imperial seal and timetwister worth it?

Have you considered Sundering Titan (main-deck) instead of Darksteel Colossus?  It's probably overkill, but polymorphing a titan into play, and then polymorphing it out of play for a 2nd titan is stupidly devastating.  Then again, you could always morph a colossus into the 2nd one without any drawback.

The majority of people out there will consider this deck highly unplayable, but I think it's a really fun idea.  If the polymorph plan doesn't work, you can always go aggro-control with bitterblossom and man-land beats.

Here's how I'd try it if I were to give it a go:

1 Tolarian Academy
1 Swamp
1 Island
4 Underground Sea
4 Polluted Delta
2 Flooded Strand
3 Mishra's Factory
1 Black Lotus
1 Mox Jet
1 Mox Ruby
1 Mox Emerald
1 Mox Pearl
1 Mox Sapphire
1 Mana Vault
1 Mana Crypt
1 Sol Ring

2 Polymorph (3 "Tinkers" are probably enough -- you only need to resolve 1 to win the game)
1 Tinker
2 Sundering Titan

2 Sensei's Diving Top
1 Ponder
1 Brainstorm
1 Timewalk
1 Ancestral Recall
1 Fact of Fiction
1 Merchant Scroll
1 Echoing Truth

4 Thirst for Knowledge
4 Force of Will
3 Mana Drain

4 Duress
3 Bitterblossom
1 Demonic Tutor
1 Vampiric Tutor
1 Yawgmoth's Will

[timp]

i would take out some of the basics for fetch lands (and also keep in mind you probably don't need that much land in your deck because you have moxen and lotus and generally vintage decks dont run the same amount of lands as standard decks)
i would get rid of the declaration and main deck the counterbalance
and make room for helm of awakening and a copy of a brain freeze for an alternate win with those divining tops
throw some earwig squad in the side board

[mr.grim]

counter balance is a fantastic call ....... and good job on the land lists A.T.B

[IthilanorStPete]

Since you have blossom and manlands...what about Standstill over, say, TfK?

[Lurker101]

I think I'll stick to tfk for now. Here's the list I've been running, it's been pretty sucessfull so far.

Lands: 17
1 Swamp
1 Tolarian Academy
4 Underground Sea
1 Island
1 Urborg, Tomb of Yawgmoth
3 Mishra's Factory
4 Polluted Delta
2 Flooded Strand

Creatures: 3
2 Sundering Titan
1 DSC

Other spells: 40
1 Ponder
1 Brainstorm
2 Sensei's Divining Top
1 Tinker
1 Black Lotus
1 Mox Jet
1 Mox Pearl
1 Mox Emerald
1 Mox Ruby
1 Mox Sapphire
3 Polymorph
1 Vampiric tutor
4 TfK
4 FoW
1 Ancestral Recall
1 Time Walk
1 Demonic Tutor
3 Bitterblossom
4 Duress
1 Mana Crypt
2 Echoing Truth
3 Counterbalance
1 Sol Ring

Sideboard:
1 DSC
2 Echoing Truth
2 Platinum Angel
2 Thoughtseize
4 Extirpate
2 Spell Snare
2 Crucible of Worlds

Thanks for all the help so far, the deck is really fun to play.

[CoryM]

if you want to keep the bitterblossom i think adding in the scull clamps would be pretty sweet for draw and a secondary synergy with the creature generation you got going on

[Lurker101]

if you want to keep the bitterblossom i think adding in the scull clamps would be pretty sweet for draw and a secondary synergy with the creature generation you got going on

I don't think that would work as well as TfK or Standstill plus you want to have the faeries in play for Polymorphs and as a back up plan.

[zeus-online]

This idea is actually pretty close to a casual deck i'm working on...*

I'm wondering why you'd bother with polymorph, manlands, bitterblossoms etc. when you could just play more tutors to get tinker in the first place?

If the idea is to get DSC out asap, wouldn't 4 personal tutors, 1 vamp, 1 demonic and a mystical along with tinker and the usual suspects (5 moxen, 1 lotus, 1 vault, 1 crypt, 1 ring) make alot more sense?

/Zeus

*I'm using proteus staff instead of polymorph, and verdant force since i can then find more of them turn after turn....

Preedit: I'm not suggesting neither verdant force or proteus staff...Both are completely unplayable in vintage.

[Darkenslight]

Is there any potential at all in using Show and Tell, or Dramatic Entrance with Mad Green Men? Or am I just being crazy again?

Also, props on the Proteus Staff, although it is sorcery speed, and that affects it far more than Polymorph; unless, of course, I misread all those Polymorph copies I have.  :p

[Lurker101]

I'm wondering why you'd bother with polymorph, manlands, bitterblossoms etc. when you could just play more tutors to get tinker in the first place?

If the idea is to get DSC out asap, wouldn't 4 personal tutors, 1 vamp, 1 demonic and a mystical along with tinker and the usual suspects (5 moxen, 1 lotus, 1 vault, 1 crypt, 1 ring) make alot more sense?

/Zeus

Well what if tinker gets countered? Also the manlands and bitterblossoms have a dual function of working with polymorph and also providing a back-up plan in case plan A doesn't work out. Also the idea is more along the lines of getting multiple Sundering Titans out for an aggro control edge with DSC being in there as an alternate win.

[vassago]

in my opinion i think counterbalance sees best play in legacy. i think you should cut 1 top and the 3 counterbalnces to 4 mana drains. i just think it would work better. try it and see how it goes

[wjcuttler]

I was inspired by this deck and tried to run a build similar to this in a recent Legacy tourney. I ended up scrubbing out real fast.
I ran 2 reanimates and 2 threads of disloyalty main deck. I used thoughtseize in place of duress (hoping to reanimate a goyf). I chose to use standstills over TFK (I couldn't ignore the synergy with factories and bitterlossom). Sadly though it turns out my build was highly suicidal and I was my own destructor the whole day. Between the thoughtseizes, bitterblossoms, and fetchlands my opponents need'nt do too very much to win. I wish I realized this flaw earlier during testing, but that's where the prob is I believe, not enough testing.
Overall, I regretted using black altogether. Sure, I may feel differently and had more success if I had chosen duress instead of thoughtseize, but I think if/when I try this again I will go with a blue and white build using decree of justice and it'll have that classic landstill feel to it.
I feel this deck is geared more torward Legacy as Oath is just better IMO. I do really like this deck though and will most likely play it again.

[Lurker101]

I was inspired by this deck and tried to run a build similar to this in a recent Legacy tourney. I ended up scrubbing out real fast.
I ran 2 reanimates and 2 threads of disloyalty main deck. I used thoughtseize in place of duress (hoping to reanimate a goyf). I chose to use standstills over TFK (I couldn't ignore the synergy with factories and bitterlossom). Sadly though it turns out my build was highly suicidal and I was my own destructor the whole day. Between the thoughtseizes, bitterblossoms, and fetchlands my opponents need'nt do too very much to win. I wish I realized this flaw earlier during testing, but that's where the prob is I believe, not enough testing.
Overall, I regretted using black altogether. Sure, I may feel differently and had more success if I had chosen duress instead of thoughtseize, but I think if/when I try this again I will go with a blue and white build using decree of justice and it'll have that classic landstill feel to it.
I feel this deck is geared more torward Legacy as Oath is just better IMO. I do really like this deck though and will most likely play it again.

You should check out the Legacy version of this deck on The Source. There's pages and pages of lists and suggestions. The thread's name is "Not Quite Tinker".