[Deck] Spoiled Tendrils

[Snoop]

There has been alot of fuss about this belcherless Belcher deck that was a surprise deck at this past Waterbury. I believe one Meandecker, the Saucemaster, even Top 8'd with it. Anyway, I figured I had to get to the bottom of this "new" idea for Tendrils. The core of it actually seems to be like Belcher, but it plays much more like the Legacy (formerly Type 1.5) deck known as Easter Egg Tendrils. The idea is to use the cycle of artifacts that sacrifice to both add mana to your pool and draw a card. Besides netting card advantage, the preservation of mana is key to accumulating a high enough spell count to eventually win. As a disclaimer I myself am no Meandecker and probably never will be, but I provide this information for public domain for the bettering of the combo possibilities of the best drain life card ever printed, Tendrils of Agony.

Also for those of you who don't know me, I rarely write or post on TMD, but have well represented combo at every major tournament since GenCon 2004. Tendrils decks have been my specialty since i became obsessed with the insaneness that was Long.dec

Needless to say I have to give Meandeck credit for one thing, they seem to find some simple tweak to combo decks i have scrapped that turns them from zero to hero. For example, I scrapped the Eggs Tendrils deck last September after having a few major problems, the main being drawing lands and not spells off eggs. The "new" version of this deck solves this problem using a belcher like mana setup. Also the search provided by Spoils of the Vault seems to work ideally in this deck as it will most likely not kill you, and since you are going to win immediately off playing Tendrils. So without further adio here is my version of this interesting new combo engine:

Spoiled Tendrils

"the Mana" (22)
5x Moxen
1x Black Lotus
1x Lotus Petal
1x Sol Ring
1x Mana Crypt
1x Mana Vault
1x Chrome Mox
1x Lion's Eye Diamond
4x Dark Ritual
3x Cabal Ritual
3x Elvish Spirit Guide

"the Land" (6)
4x Land Grant
1x Tropical Island
1x Bayou

"Draw Engine" (13)
4x Chromatic Sphere
4x Darkwater Egg
4x Sleight of Hand
1x Ancestral Recall

"the Win" (2)
2x Tendrils of Agony

"Search Engine" (8)
4x Spoils of the Vault
1x Demonic Tutor
1x Vampiric Tutor
1x Mystical Tutor
1x Tinker

"Brokenness" (4)
1x Yawgmoth's Will
1x Timetwister
1x Memory Jar
1x Necropotence

"Protection" (5)
4x Duress
1x Hurkyl's Recall

So from what I've taken the basic idea is to accumulate a couple of eggs, generating mana to power a few draw spells and maybe one broken spell and the ending it by casting spoils for Tendrils. That is by no means to say this is an easy to pilot deck. I've been playing combo for well over a year solid now and this deck is quite complex. The main problem I would see with running a deck like this is that unlike DeathLong (also incredibly skill intensive) is that you can make all the right decisions and somehow still depend on good draws. Although this is arguably the case with most Draw7 / Tendrils decks netting one card for one card leaves much more risk in the hands of the user. And if you aren't planning on winning now maybe you should be playing a deck that wins later more consistently. ANother problem this deck seems to face is the amount of utter hate that it faces. Nearly every card that kills Belcher hurts alot. Not to mention I think this decks main strength is beating people unaware of how it works. Countering something as simple as Dark Ritual is usually the correct and most efficient way to win.

Needless to say let the boards flood with ideas of innovation and creativity, I'd love to see a deck like this flourish into a new dominant combo engine.

[Snoop]

I think honestly the problem with this deck is you are limiting the possibilities that having the eggs open up to you. Mystical, Vampiric, and Enlightened Tutor are all missing as well as a solid way to refill your hand such as Timetwister or Tinker for Jar. I feel minimum adding the three tutors has helped me as I can find chains or hurkyl's in a snap and it increases the efficiency of draws and INCREASES CONSISTENCY. I don't think I can stress that enough. Remember even Long didn't desire to win turn one all the time. It would go off turn 2 realistically all the time. Maybe that's the problem with the direction of this forum. My intent was to make this a tournament worthy deck much like Longdeath or TPS but it has contorted into this possibility of what's the best way to add 1% to my chance of winning turn one. This is also why i think the deck should add Duress, the tutors, maybe Timetwister and Tinker and focus more on consistent turn 1/2 kills instead of these insane ballz to the wallz, win or crap out luck draws.

My point is this deck has opened up the explosive tutoring power of spoils and i think if refined into a more consistent deck it could see success much like Long did.


Edit: removed a bunch of me babbling because i had a bad weekend

[Zherbus]

If this was indeed a discussion about your own deck, I'll leave everything in this thread that pertained to your deck. We won't bother you with that silly Meandeck Tendrils topic here.