Turboland deck wins Lotus in Minneapolis

[monotone]

The following Turboland deck just won the 54 person Lotus tournament in Minneapolis.  Brian Cox designed it and has been play testing it for months.  It was well built, extremely consistent and surprisingly resilient.  This build has been discussed for a while on brainburst in the following forum: http://www.brainburst.com/forum/topic.asp?TOPIC_ID=129390
The version presented below represents the most current of its many itterations.

Animal Farm
Mana/Land:
4   Tropical Island
4   Fetch
2   Underground
3   Mishras Workshop
3   Wasteland
2   Undiscovered Paradise   
1   LOA
1   Stripmine
1   Barbarian Ring
1   Tolarian Academy
1   Black Lotus
1   Mox Jet
1   Mox Sapphire
1   Mox Emerald
1   Glacial Chasm

Spells:
4     Brainstorm
4   Crucible of Worlds
4   Horn of Greed
4   Exploration
2   Living Wish
2   Engineered Explosives
1   Ancestral Recall
1   Timewalk
1   Fastbond
1   Yawgmoth’s Will
1   Tinker
1   Time Twister
1   Trade Routes
1   Regrowth
1   Memory Jar
1   Vampiric Tutor
1   Demonic Tutor
1   Zuran Orb
1   Crop Rotation

SideBoard
       1   Gorilla Shaman
       4   Damping Matrix
       4   Null Rod
       1   Xantid Swarm
       1   Wasteland
       1   Veridian Zealot
       1   Wood Ripper
       1   Glacial Chasm
       1   Tabernacle at Pendrill Vale

This build wins by reoccurring Barbarian Ring an infinite number of times.  The mana development is staggering and is amazingly consistent.  It does not always go off quickly (turn 3.5 average) but with Glacial Chasm, and Engineered explosives it can set up and protect the win very effectively.  I even watched a victory with a chalice for 3 on the board.
In watching and speaking with (at extreme length) the builder I learned that Gush was considered a win more card and was unnecessary. Also, the Xantid Swarm in the SB is not necessary.  The deck is redundant enough plow through some counter and fetching it just wastes a turn.

Discuss.

[Nantuko Rice]

Exactly what was the metagame lik and what were the matchups? Did he have any losses?

How do things like Glacial Chasm and Engin Explosive protect the win from something like.... Force Of Will your Crucible, Mana Drain your Crucible, Disenchant your Crucible, or Artifact Mutation your Crucible, etc. I'm guessing Regrowth and Timetwister can do their thing, but they could just meet another counter or answer.

Most combo decks run 4 force of wills, this runs no counter magic at all but instead relies on sorcery-speed permaments?

The best combo I see in the deck is Crucible/Wasteland.

[Dr. Sylvan]

Congratulations to him. I would be especially interested to know what matchups he fought through on his way.

The deck looks vulnerable to graveyard hate (without the ZOrb, I don't see a maindeck win condition). I'm also curious as to whether you can play a land from the yard with Crucible in response to, say, Coffin Purge. If not, RFGing the Barbarian Ring is another vulnerability. Living Wish is okay, but decks can definitely deal with Woodripper/Viridian Zealot. Is there a workaround for this I'm not seeing, or was there an absence of graveyard hate in ME?

(Also, spelling error in topic corrected. :) )

[MrZuccinniHead]

yeah, why not a barbarian ring in the SB to wish out for emergencies against tech.

[Zelc]

From what I can tell, the decks that he played that weren't already byes are Gay/r (2), 4cC (odd build, has Chains of Mephistopheles and Exalted Angel), FCG (2), Dragon, and The Man Show.  He lost once to a Gay/r deck, arguably due to a play mistake.  It seems that a great deal of the matches were won on the strength of Crucible + Wasteland.  It could also have had the element of surprise on its side.  This deck seems to be light on threats, with only 1x Jar, 4x Crucible, 4x Horn of Greed, 1x Timetwister, 1x Yawgmoth's Will, and maybe 2x Living Wishes as threats (total: 11 - 13), 8 of which can be dealt with artifact kill.  However, this is not enough to discount the deck, as it did take first in a seemingly decent metagame.  Time will tell if this only makes a one-time splash or if it'll have a lasting influence.

It would be great if someone could test this deck against the major archetypes and post the results.  I'll be happy to test this deck vs. someone on Apprentice or MWS after I get back from camp (Aug. 11).

EDIT:

The deck looks vulnerable to graveyard hate (without the ZOrb, I don't see a maindeck win condition). I'm also curious as to whether you can play a land from the yard with Crucible in response to, say, Coffin Purge.

You can't play a land when there's something on the stack.  However, if he finds one of the two Living Wishes, he can get the land back.  Also, stopping the Orb isn't foolproof, as he has Will and Timetwister to get them back, along with Horn of Greed.  I'd go after the artifacts against that deck.

[wuaffiliate]

holy shit, congrats. i would be interested in reading a report.

[Jhaggs]

holy shit, congrats. i would be interested in reading a report.

Brian has been testing this build for months now.  He has really been putting the time in and he has gone through numerous verisions of the deck.  Its great to see someone succeed like he has in winning that lotus espically when you have helped in testing.  Brian has been opened to A LOT of ideas and critics and it is great to finally see him make some critical decisions with the build.

I believe he is writing an article about the build and tournament soon.  I'll update this thread with a link to that article for anyone who is interested.

[Moxlotus]

It looks like an intersting deck.  I wonder how it would've done if it would've played against a non-aggro workshop deck.  It was obviously a surprise to everyone and the synergy between the cards is really good.  However it does look to have HUGE problems with 7/10 or stax.

[Mon, Goblin Chief]

For those looking for a report, it can be found on the second page of the threat linked in the starting post.

As for the deck, I really like the looks of it, I had goldfished something similar, but my version had major flaws compared to this listing (like missing Wishes, Explosives and Chasm, for example) and I lost interest.

As my version was quite capable of setting up early Wasteland recursion, but sometimes had problems actually winning fast, I'd be interested how often this effectively wins by strip-recursion in testing as compared to actually comboing out before, say, a Juggernaut beats your head in (as this would be extremely interesting for aggro-matchups, obv).

The missing FoWs should only really be a problem vs Combo, as vs control threats will often fill FoWs role better in a combo-deck with as big a manabase as this has. Mana Drain-> Mind Twist and similar plays would still scare me, though, but considering FoWs where tested and found superflous, leaving them out might be a correct choice.

Especially considering the US metagame atm seems to become everything vs Fish (and to a lesser extend 4CC), which should hate out speed combo pretty much, no FoWs could be a good choice there atm.

Some points I'd like to have more information about:

How was Gush bad? Even with only one, it should be just great whenever it turns up, like one loved every single one in TurboNevyn. Or did you just have problems getting the 2 Islands online?

How do you win after SBing Null Rods? Do you regularly manage to assemble the multi-card combo of Fastbond, Chasm, Crucible, Trade Routes + Academy to combo out with Fastbond + Ring (so that you can get infinite Red mana) or do you just manascrew them and Wish out a Beatstick?

However it does look to have HUGE problems with 7/10 or stax

7/10 maybe, because of how fat titan is, though I'm not even sure about that. But Stax? This deck drops tons of permanents during the first turns, can attack stax mana & permanent supply with wastes and explosives and has a natural anti Smokestack engine in Crucible + Exploration.

Pardon me, I haven't tested this build but if I had to name this decks probable major problem-matchups, I'd go with Belcher and Draw7 simply because those are faster and not hindered too much by strips. Even post SB both have a good chance of winning one game despite the presence of 4 Null Rod.
To bad Fish is that good vs Belcher.

If I have to get an account and post this at BB to get answers let me know :/

btw, the build postet here is running 5 Wastelands between MD and SB. Might want to correct that.

[Ender]

4 wastes in main and 1 in sb?  :shock: .

One line posts redundant with the last line of the previous post are officially Not Good. Please put more thought into your posts. Consider this a verbal warning. -Dr. S

[Methuselahn]

First, it looks like the MD list here has 61 cards, so I assume there are 3 MD Wastes and 1 SB.  4 MD *has got to be* a typo.

First, I'll say that Brain Cox (Browser) is a good magic player and really understands the fundamentals of all around good play.  (despite the occasional "brain fart")  I really think one of the reasons that the deck did so well is because of player skill and repeated testing of the deck.  I'm not going to comment on the quality of the deck, because in all fairness, I haven't tested it or had seen his matchups.   I was too busy making Top 4 at the time.     Surprise definetly gave him an edge, and hard earned this surprise was.

From what I did see, the deck isn't a based around a 3 card or 4 card combo, but many interwoven 2 card combos that lead to an inevitable lock or extreme tempo advantage.  Exploration is a green ritual.  Example: Tropical, Exploration, Workshop, Crucible is backbreaking.  You are playing your own lands while taking away theirs.  Exploration pushes Crucible over the edge, maybe more effectively than MUD decks, maybe not.

Actual winning involved having Fastbond, Crucible, Chasm in play then:
tapping Undiscovered for red, using Barbarian Ring for damage, stripping his own Undiscovered, then replaying those 3 lands.  Do this until dead.

Anyway, congrats again Brian.

[monotone]

Yeah the 4 wastes + 1 in the side was a typo.  Its fixed in the original post.
 Now to answer some questions:

I'd be interested how often this effectively wins by strip-recursion in testing as compared to actually comboing out before, say, a Juggernaut beats your head in

Whenever possible this deck attempts to slow the opponent down through waste/strip recursion, but olny as a means to push through the combo.  Also, beats are generally not a problem.  Many of the decks that rely on creatures for a win condition cannot kill fast enough.  If a Juggernaut hits the board that still means that you have 3-4 turns to win and that should be enough 99% of the time.

How was Gush bad? Even with only one, it should be just great whenever it turns up, like one loved every single one in TurboNevyn. Or did you just have problems getting the 2 Islands online?

I believe that gush was bad because it did nothing to help further the combo in they early game. It was not another combo piece nor was it a tutor/broken card.  It drew more cards but the card draw had no synergy.

How do you win after SBing Null Rods?

Brian sided out all his moxen and his lotus to bring in the null rods and the Zuran Orb does not matter.  All you need it Glacial Chasm + Fastbond then you can still play an infinate number of lands per turn.

Do you regularly manage to assemble the multi-card combo of Fastbond, Chasm, Crucible, Trade Routes + Academy to combo out with Fastbond + Ring (so that you can get infinite Red mana) or do you just manascrew them and Wish out a Beatstick?

The kill generally needs Glacial Chasm, Fastbond, Crucible of Worlds, Barbarin Ring, Undiscovered Paridise & Wasteland.  Then you produce red mana, sac the ring, waste the undiscovered and replay all three.  Wash rinse & repeat.  You can also win with just a Barbarian Ring & a Wasteland by using the ring to produce red mana then wasting it and replaying them.
Brian never once wished for a beatstick.  He did have to get a Gorilla shaman to destroy a pesky Chalice but he always killed with a Barbarian Ring.

The deck looks vulnerable to graveyard hate (without the ZOrb, I don't see a maindeck win condition).

The ZOrb is not needed to win at all.  The two cards that it is most vunerable to losing are Fastbond and Barbarian Ring.  It can wish the Ring back in the game if it looses fastbond it is forced to go for a more inelegant kill.  It uses the ring up to five times a turn with exploration + Trade Routes and takes two or more turns to kill instead of just one.

How do things like Glacial Chasm and Engin Explosive protect the win from something like.... Force Of Will your Crucible, Mana Drain your Crucible, Disenchant your Crucible, or Artifact Mutation your Crucible, etc.

They don't.  The deck is stupidly redundant and has tons of was to get combo pieces from the deck itself or to recur them from the graveyard.

[rvs]

Congrats on the win. I have a similar listing as a testdeck.

[urza_insane]

Sorry to be cynical, but I'm somewhat confused about how this deck expects to win against control (when the control player knows what it's playing). After you've seen the decklist all you need to do is hold your counters for the Crucibles and you win. If one slips by just Cunning for a disenchant effect and you win. It seems really vaulnerable without some form of protection. And I know he played against control, but 4cc with chains?! I don't think that counts as a good 4cc player/decklist.

[defector]

I watched this deck in the swiss, the semis and finals.  It is really hot, and aggro is not as big a threat as youd think.  With fastbond and Zuran Orb ne simply gains 2 million life and then says go.  I watched the deck get crypted once and still win.  There are several two card combos inside this deck that either lock, win, or give 'inifninite life".  the card that tsi deck breaks is exploration, not crucible.  crucible just allows ridiculous things to be done with exploration.  The wasteland x3 main and stripmine with 1 in sidebaord means that with living wish you have six total strip effects in the deck, you will get one of them.  This deck was also piloted by a very good player that had tested the hell out of it.  Suprise was on his side as well.  Excellent play and day.
defector

[Browser]

From what I did see, the deck isn't a based around a 3 card or 4 card combo, but many interwoven 2 card combos that lead to an inevitable lock or extreme tempo advantage.

Pay very close to that sentence.  That expresses why the deck works so well.  Probably better than I could have said it myslef.

(Ok...fine...I'll post on the mana drain...)

The reason most people immediately dismissed turbo land when Crucible was printed, was that "we all know 4 card combos don't work".  And generally speaking, that is true.

But if a deck doesn't really need any particular part to win...and having any two of them nearly guarantees a win, couldn't it break the rules just like Dragon does?

Dragon needs a Dragon, a way to discard it, an animate spell, and a win creature or a way to draw and discard the deck.  It needs more combo pieces than most people will willingly build into a deck.  The difference is it works because of redundancy.

It's kind of funny hearing people say, "Anyone who knows the deck would just counter all the ________"

The last one I remember reading on here was Crucible.  Ok, so you counter all my Crucibles...and you allow 1 Exploration and 1 Horn to resolve...   Do you think you're going to win?  What happens when I play another Horn?  Or, better yet, another Exploration.  You don't think you're still going to counter everything that stops me, do you?

I would encourage people to playtest Animal Farm.  It actually DOES work.  Even when people are prepared for it.

I've playtested COUNTLESS games vs. Tog and 4CC.  I have a positive playtest record vs. both.  That's precisely why I've played it.  Animal Farm handles countrol better than any other combo deck I've seen.

The wasteland x3 main and stripmine with 1 in sidebaord means that with living wish you have six total strip effects in the deck, you will get one of them.

And 1 Crop Rotation, which mostly grabs Strip Mine vs. Control.  That makes seven.  7 Wastelands.  That's very important.  (Not including DT and VT)

Also, to understand the deck better you have to understand something very important.

It's Combo-Prison.  

It does not win faster than any other combo deck.  It can win Turn 1.  But that's not very common.  It's far more likely to draw all the counter from the opponent with early threats...then drop something that gains a HUGE swing in tempo.

Unlike other combo decks, Animal Farm is more likely to win a match of attrition against 4CC, Tog or Landstill.

Most other combo decks hope to throw all their power at you in one big turn.  That's NOT how this plays.

Against aggro it does, sure.

But against control it's a careful duel for advantage.  And it can usually achieve it.

I'm not saying it's some god deck.  It has holes like anything.  Mostly it's losses are to Fish and other combo decks.  Though I've had 2 big wins against my only combo opponents this weekend.  And I'm 1-1-1 against Fish for the weekend.

I've played 15 matches in 2 tournaments this weekend.  With only 2 losses (Fish and Tog), and only 1 Intentional Draw (against FCG today).  Not bad for only it's first 2 times in public.

[urza_insane]

The reason I said just counter crucibles is because you CAN'T win without them, its impossible. Except of course to deck them. But chances are you'll run out of cards first. Just keep crucible away and you win. Seems rather unstable to me. Just my 2 cents. And congrats on the big win!

[Browser]

The problem with this deck reading you're doing is that you are not being practical.

Let me be more specific.  Imagine this...you adopt your strategy and by turn 4 there is 1 Exploration and 1 Horn of Greed on the table.  This will easily lead to 2 Explorations by turn 5.  Now on turn 6, let's say I drop a Horn.  

I am completely out-drawing you.  I play 3 lands, draw 6 cards...and I play fastbond.  Do you counter it?  If you don't, I'll draw my whole deck.  Now, assuming we're still using your strategy...  you MUST counter all 4 Crucibles, and Regrowth, and Yawgmoth's Will, and Timetwister...but you have to do that all on THIS turn.

See, it sounds great when you type it...if you use that as your strategy...you'll likely be out-drawn if you don't pay attention to what's happening in the actual game.

Have I lost to people using that strategy?  Sure.  But playtesting has proven that it's really only as valid as any other strategy.

[hellswarm]

cruciable might be the key as u say to stopping it cold, but what about the other cards that allow it to achive tempo? u cant simply  state stoping one card ends it all

test it, turn 1 explore into workshop horn/ cruciable. followed by tutor and or draw  effects into wastelands and such will allow this deck to over come counter spells more easily then it appears. how can u counter everything u cant when u are losing land ?

in testing u basically have 3/4 turns to stop it from gaining too much tempo off horn exploration that made turbo nevy work. thats does not give oppsing decks alot tiem to darw find counters or destruction effects

u can still over come that disadvantage by gaining more cards then they have, and essentally that is what this deck strives to do.

things that hurt it are turn 1 chailce set at 1
1 to nail explorations and fastbond
3 to hit cruibale and stop ld recursion. also hurts horn.
2 is the final nail takes away the wishes
horn is effective but not as much as it can be with explorations .

[Browser]

things that hurt it are turn 1 chailce set at 1
1 to nail explorations and fastbond
3 to hit cruibale and stop ld recursion. also hurts horn.
2 is the final nail takes away the wishes
horn is effective but not as much as it can be with explorations .

My Engineered Explosives have made a hoby of laughing at Chalices.

Also, Chalices for 1 and 3 are often not good for decks that like to use Chalice.

[hellswarm]

i know that as well

but considering decks that do play chailce for low numbers are desided to play around those numbers as well.

yes i know explosives is an answer to it

Im basically saying to hurt the deck stop the key parts and those are the ones that gain tempo advantage. ones that let u gain lots of land faster or cards at the same time. so chailce for those numbers then all u have to watch out for is the explosives and counter that to win...

i like this deck im playing somethign simialar to it for a long while now.. props to the win !

[MrZuccinniHead]

after looking through the deck list, im quite suprised noone actually plays this deck.  It is seriously quite well constructed.  Nice work.

[urza_insane]

Just so you don't get the wrong idea, I am in no way saying this deck is bad. I am currently working on a Crucible deck with explorations also. However when constructing my deck it branched into a different direction and went for control instead of combo. And in my testing I have found that all you have to do to win with a crucible deck is get the crucible into play. That is the main reason I choose to go with control. Playing a crucible with counter back-up will simply win you games, lots of games. But this build seems to be performing nicely for you. I'm glad crucible is finally ganing some respect, it is obviously insanely powerful. Lets just hope it doesn't get restricted!

[wuaffiliate]

This deck played by the same guy went 3-1-2 losing in round 1 of t8 after 5 rounds of swiss.

Round 1: Draw Gay/R
Round 2: Win 4CC
Round 3: Win Tog
Round 4: Win Egg Academy
Round 5: ID with FCG
Round 6(T8): Loss Tog

So he beat Tog and 4cc both in 3 games. Egg Academy doesnt matter, and he drew 2 games.

[rozetta]

From my experience playing a lot of TurboNevyn back when Gush was unrestricted and there were a lot more Mono-U-esque control decks around (you know, the 16 counter variety), I can definitely say that this sort of deck completely overpowers counterspell strategies.

What Browser explained is spot on. You can't counter everything and there are so many 2-card synergies there that focussing on preventing one card is pointless. I'd say that if you want to focus on one card, it's exploration or fastbond, since they make the Horn of Greed and Crucible unsymmetrical. Crucible is a must-counter only if there are already explorations in play or if it threatens to pull them into an unbeatable position by wastelend recursion.

Funnily enough, since the printing of Crucible, this deck now _wants_ to run Workshops and is consequently less hosed by things like Sphere of Resistance and Trinisphere, which are traditionally known for hosing combo (and made life a little more difficult for 4-Gush TurboNevyn).

The only bad thing I can see for the deck right now (the thing I found the last time I played TurboNevyn in a tournament) is that Rack and Ruin is a very potent card against it and a very common sideboard card/wish target currently.

The deck looks fun and I now wish I hadn't traded away my Explorations and Horns of Greed to a friend who plays Extended after Gush got restricted and Chalice got printed

[Klep]

What does this deck do to prevent from decking itself in a protracted game?  I just ran 4cc up against it, and I discovered that if 4cc saves it's control cards for Crucibles and nothing else, it can force the Turboland player into continuing to play lands and draw off the Horns to find a way to get another Crucible into play.  Since the win condition absolutely requires both 7 other cards in the graveyard and a Crucible and Fastbond in play, this sort of attrition game can leave Turboland with a very depleted library.  In this case, 4cc was still at 16 life, but Turboland had 18 cards left with 3 Horns in play and hadn't even started playing the Ring.

[urza_insane]

What Klep just said is exactly what I was getting at. Who cares how many Horns of Explorations you get into play if you can't win? If the 4cc player counters the first crucible, at best on turn 1 you probably wont get another until about turn 4. By then the 4cc control player should have at least 2 more counters in there hand. The next crucible you get will get countered by the second one in your hand, all the while giving them 3 mana for each CoW if the Drain it. This leads to scrying, which leads to more counters/cunning wish. This doesn't mean the deck is horrible, it just has some obstacles to overcome. Once I post my list I'de love to disscuss the differences in our builds.

[leviat]

I'll admit that I haven't played in a large-scale magic tournament for almost six months, but I still don't understand how a deck like this can win against a single Bloodmoon. With not protection or answers to enchantments, I would imagine this deck would be somewhat of a high-risk to play.

I think it's cool that it won since I'm sure all of us considered a similar deck when we first layed our eyes on Crucible, but I feel this deck will have to evolve some more in order to stay competitive.

[Soupboy]

What does this deck do to prevent from decking itself in a protracted game? .

Old School TN-- Timetwister recurrsion.  So if you counter the Crucibles, the Timetwister, the Yawg Will, AND the Regrowth you win.  That's pretty much the way all combo works.  If you have enough counters you win, otherwise combo wins.

But keep in mind that especially against 4cc, 7 strip effects can make UU for drain a bit difficult.

You have no idea how happy I am to see TurboNevyn-style decks do well!  I do have to inquire as to why "Animal Farm" however.

Congrats for pushing through the flak and criticism and not giving up.  I played with a vaguely similar build when CoW was still called the whatever Plow, and quickly gave up.  

TN for Life!  (Bah, now I finally have to find some workshops...)

The Soup

[VGB]

Back when the card was still called Gazarsgo's Plow, I dreamt up a deck very similar to this one, that abused the synergy of Exploration+Wasteland with the ability to recur lands.  That list has since long been lost due to the death of the old TMD, but I see a lot of similarities in your train of thought to what I concieved back then, such as utilizing Living Wish.  I commend you on a job well done in bringing the list to success.

Have you considered the following cards:

Channel/ESG
Enlightened Tutor (only slightly weaker than Vampiric Tutor in this deck)
Krosan Reclamation/Gaea's Blessing (KR is counter-resistant, GB is tech versus Dragon, and both offer Crucible recursion).
Sylvan Scrying (Strip is the strongest card in the deck, especially with Crucible)
Bazaar of Baghdad (very synergistic with Horn and Crucible, fetchable with Sylvan Scrying/Living Wish)
SB: Auramancer (weak, but a possibility)
SB: Academy Rector (can be popped with Ring or Tabernacle   )
SB: Eternal Witness
SB: Shivan Hellkite (or any other sideboarded kill condition once you have the loop - and something not dependent on Threshold like Ring)