Reanimator deck help

[T-Funk]

I have been out of the game for a number of years now, when suddenly my interest in magic was sparked again.  I am in the process of building a reanimator deck to play in a local T1 tournament.  Before you say, “Reanimator in a T1 tourney?”  Let me explain.  I have neither the resources nor the experience to play a tier 1 deck at the moment.  However, I am anxious to start playing again and believe a good reanimator deck would allow me to re-familiarize myself with the intricacies of the game and maybe win a few games in the process. So here it is…..

Metagame

The local tournament is fairly low powered. I have seen a full TnT, the usual aggro, sui, dragon, and gro decks.  Don’t get me wrong there are some definite heavy hitters in my area, just not a full lineup of heavy hitters.

Deck:

//bury
      4 Buried Alive
      4 Entomb
      2 Zombie Infestation
//dig up
      4 Animate Dead
      4 Exhume
      4 Reanimate
//creatures
      1 Crosis, the Purger
      1 Iridescent Angel
      1 Phantom Nishoba
      1 Verdant Force
//disruption
      4 Duress
      2 Hymn to Tourach
      4 Wasteland
//utilities
      1 Demonic Tutor
      1 Vampiric Tutor
      1 Yawgmoth's Will
      2 Squee, Goblin Nabob
//mana
      4 Dark Ritual
      15 Swamp
      
Sideboard: ?
Possibly:
other creatures: Reya Dawnbringer, Spirit of the Night, Avatar of woe, Laquatus’s Champion,     Arcanis the Omnipotent(for kicks)
contaminations and another Verdant Force
Null Rod
Powder Keg


Decisions:

Most cards I believe are there for blatant reasons.
Others:
I have 12 “dig up” spells, as oppose to 8 or 10, since I believe that is the heart of this deck. There are many ways, other than reanimator’s “bury” spells, to send creatures to the graveyard.  There is really only one way to play creatures, and since this deck is creature based that one way should be accounted for.

Creature decisions:
Crosis:  kills players hand, flying
Verdant Force: able to over run defenses, possible combo with contamination
Nishoba: counter acts reanimate life loss, difficult to kill w/o spells, tramble
Iridescent Angel: hard to kill once in play, flying

Pseudo-Combo decisions:
I hesitate to use the term combo since neither of these card combinations are gaming winning, anyway here are two ideas I have been toying with: One running a Zombie Infestation combo with Squee, Goblin Nabob and two running a contamination combo using Verdant Force.

I won’t get into details on either since they seem fairly basic.  I am wondering which, in general, is more effective?  They both seem a bit slow for T1 and also they seem like win more types of combos.  Is it worth playing either of these? Both? Or neither?

Sink Holes:
I would like to add a few to my deck, though am unable to at this time.


Questions:

Well obviously I have a few question for anyone willing to help out, so here they are.

1. In general what do you think about this deck?  General concerns, things that stick out (good          and bad), impressions, your experience versus similar decks, and any pitfalls and drawbacks. Sorry I know that’s a ton of questions not even phrased as a question, any feedback would be helpful.

2. Sideboard help: I know this is largely metagame, but again any suggestions would be useful.

3. Combos mentioned above: What do you think?

4. Last and most important, what am I missing? I know probably lots, but what major flaws does anyone see with this deck (besides the fact that it is a reanimator deck).  

Thanks for reading through all my babbling; any suggestions, comments, and/or concerns would be greatly appreciated.  

Tony

[j_orlove]

One warning: the iridescent angel has protection from black. Thus, animate dead will be destroyed as soon as it brings the angel into play.    

For the SB, cards to stop tormod's crypt are key. Powder keg is good for this--plus it does all kinds of fun removal tricks.

I might SB the other 2x infestations and squees, to help versus decks with more spot removal. (also helps with SB contamination)

You could look at some of the recent extended reanimator decks for additional ideas.

Hope this helps!

[Anonymous]

Quote (j_orlove @ Nov. 20 2002,13:44)For the SB, cards to stop tormod's crypt are key. Powder keg is good for this--

Powder Keg does nothing against Tormond's Crypt.

[Anonymous]

Nevermind that comment.  I guess you can clear it away or force its use before you put your things in the graveyard with the Keg.

[Grand Inquisitor]

since i'm assuming that
1) you want to keep it inexpensive  
2) you want to keep it mono-b  

i suggest adding another zombie infestation and 1 md contamination, probably in place of the hymns.  also, 4x ashen ghoul in the sb is a beating for control decks

[ump]

If you wanted to stop Tormod's Crypt before they can use it, you can use Null Rod.  Null Rod prevents the Crypt from being activated.  Null Rod also becomes helpful slowing down some of the more fully powered decks.  Null Rods and Diabolic Edict could be helpful in the sideboard.

[T-Funk]

Thanks for the advise.  I had forgotten about graveyard hate. I'll have to keep the Crypt in mind especially since there are numerous graveyard dependant decks being played near me.

What about creature choices?  Anyone have any suggestions?

(By the way I did realize animate dead does not work with  iridescent angel, thanks for the insight though. Any and all feedback is very welcome.)

[Anonymous]

If you have type 2 players, or any kind of 'newer' players in your area, try to get some Nantuko Shades. I think they are from the Judgement set, but not totally sure.

I'm sure you can trade some of your older 'cool' cards to get them.

They are one of the best creatures in the game right now and perfect for mono-b.

[Matt The Great]

Nantuko Shades are from Torment, and while good, they do not belong in this deck. They just don't do anything special, and you don't have the heavy disruption compliment of a Suicide Black deck that would otherwise make a lot of room for the Shade to play in.

Second, you're playing four Wasteland but no Strip Mine. I asusme that's just an oversight - I recommend changing a Swamp to a Strip, bringing the uncounterable land destruction count up to 5.

Petradon is some crazy sideboard tech, if you feel you have the room. Definitely you want four Negator in the sideboard, and any Hymns you're not running maindeck.

The Squees are pretty useless unless you get an Infestation out. As you're running only two Infestations, you have a low likelihood of Squee doing anything at all, so I suggest you drop the Squees entirely to make room for other changes. Hymns are nice, as are Null Rods, which both stop Crypts from hitting your graveyard, and brutally hurts the fully-powered decks you mention, especially TNT. As a minor bonus, they make sideboarding against non-powered decks that much easier.\n\n

[Nuorukain]

Well,
first of all,
Identifying what to reanimator loses most offen,
Efficient graveyard hate:
     Tormod's Crypt  and
     Planar Void
are the two most effective. Simple answers to those two would be: Nullrod for Crypt, as mentioned before.
      1st turn Planar Void. It just wrecks you if you re not having a way to deal with it. And Black has no realistic ways of getting rid of it. If you know anyone is running Planar Void's I would recommend on huntting down a scrubland or two(or nowadays even Bayoy!) and four of those new sacrificeable fetch lands that get the dual-land of your choise. By splashing for the green or white, you would gain access to wider range of sideboard cards. Balance,  and the most importantly Disenchant and Naturalize(green disenchant), Monk Realist* and Uktabi Orangutang*.

* Personally, this situation has occured to me few times:
I get down a moat to stabilize, after opponent has hitted me once with a Multani,MaRo Sorcerer. Then he just Entomps for a Monk Realist, animates it destroying the Moat and hits again. Lost. But ofcourse this is just one situation.

1. In general what do you think about this deck?
Tuned/Good Re-animator is not as bad in "random" T1 metagame. It is quite easy to hose, but if no-one excepts it, it may hit hard and fast.

2. Sideboard help:
As I mentioned, adding a color will make your life easier against graveyard hosers, and gives more options.

3. Combos mentioned above: What do you think?
Yes, that squee infestation looks a bit unfocused there. But of course, that seems to be the only reasonable way to discard creatures drawn. (always possible to Hymn yourself, but...) And the other important factor is, that they give you a way to figth against deck full of edicts!

4. Last and most important, what am I missing?
Way to get rid of problem enchantments,
Planar Void, Worship,Circles of protection, Moat, Abyss. (even though the latter two are not so difficult, because you can get through them quite easily. And the Circles are not so good, because of the diversity of colors.)

Nuorukain

Hopefully this view helps at least a bit...

[taion]

Yeah, but if there isn't any graveyard hate, why not just play Dragon? It's rather more winning against Aggro, and gets hosed by more or less the same things as Reanimator.

Well, unless you hate Dragon mirrors, for some reason, like most sane people.

Heck, you could even somehow merge the two — post-SB Dragon generally has a reanimator backup win condition.

[Grand Inquisitor]

Quote Add some more search - Tainted Pact and Vampoiric both would be good. This is a combo deck. If you use Pact add Snow-covered swamps.

Get some Polluted deltas. They help.

Here is some heresy. You don't need Reya. You probably don't need Avatar of Woe either. I notice people play too many creatures in Reanimate decks. I would add an Infestation for one and another Buried for the other ( many loike thre but i like four) but Infestation is the most important card.

Krovakian Horror belongs in decks with Infestation.

Put Negators and Cursed Totems in the side along with a few other control hosers like an extra Squee and Co0ntamination

this is from bebe in the vintage forum.  i thought it might help...

[paulb]

What I've learnt from extended testing is this: Without Krovikian Horror, Zombie Infestation is too slow. With 2 squees you can make 1 zombie a turn. With 1 squee and a 2 horrors you can make 2 a turn. Either add 1 or 2 infestations and 2 horrors or ditch them all together.

If you decide to remove the zombie engine altogether, you need to add things which will allow you to dump any fatties you get in your hand. This can be done with cabal therapy (you can target yourself) or splashing blue for careful study and brainstorm.

Graveyard hosers can be dealt with by having negators etc in the sideboard to transform into an aggro deck.