Deck Discussion/ Optimizing Dragon

[TheLegendOfMagic]

Greetings all, after the strong finish at the Library of Alexandria tournament at Who's On 1st, Ive decided to start a thread on how the current metagame effects dragon and how to modify dragon to help against these bad match up's.

TheDecklist I took to LoA tourney was this:

4 bazaar of baghdad
3 necromancy
3 animate deads
2 dance of the dead
3 compulsion
4 intuition
4 Force of Will
1 ancestral recall
1 time walk
1 demonic tutor
1 vampiric tutor
3 duress
1 ambassador laquatus
1 shivan hellkite
4 squee goblin nabob
4 world gorger dragon
4 polluted deltas
3 underground seas
1 bayou
1 volcanic
1 tropical
1 swamp
2 gemstone mine
1 mox jet
1 mox sapphire
1 mox emerald
1 mox ruby
1 mox pearl
1 black lotus
1 mana crypt

SideBoard:

3 pernicious deeds
3 chain of vapors
2 stifle
3 tormods crypt
4 xantid swarm

Ill start off with the unfavorable match up's.
Decks you would hate face:
1) Prison
2) Fish
3) 4cControl
4) Crucible control
5) dragon mirror
6) draw 7.dec

This is just a short lift of decks that I've played against and have found to be quite a problem for dragon.

Versus prison decks: Sphere of resistance, trinispheres, smokestack and even tanglewires can spell trouble for dragon. The die is so important versus prison I cant even begin to start listing how many matches versus prison were decided on the die roll. No matter what the build, if dragon loses the die roll, the threat of a turn 1 sphere can almost force the issue of aggressively mulliganing until you get a FoW. On the other hand, if the dragon player is playing first, the threat of a turn 1 sphere isnt as bad since, you can either duress early, play early moxen or establish a stable mana base for a turn 3-4 attempt for comboing out.

Versus fish decks: The threat of stifle, daze, FoW, 5 strips and a active library can spell trouble for dragon. Some people would argue that null rod can be a factor versus dragon, but I have found that null rods are only moderately anoying and often times the fish player boards them out game 2. Idealy the hand you would want versus fish would be something like: Duress, delta and bazaar, but that is only wishful thinking. Often times you can get iffy hands such as: FoW, Compulsion, Squee and the rest mana. When I play versus fish I often take gambles of mulliganing until I get bazaar, through my own experience I have discovered that unless you have some way of digging through your deck via Bazaar or compulsion, you will most certaily be out drawn and outcountered when you attempt to combo off. In essense the longer the game drags on without any card drawing the worse it gets for dragon.

Versus 4cControl: Like any other control deck, this deck has the potential of totally destroying you with a stifle(via wish), a StP, strip effects and counter-magic. I have found that in this match up, the dragon player has to play a control game through attempting to get the squee bazaar engine active long enough to establish a safe window to combo off. OTOH, there are the occasionally turn 1 kill that is always worth gambling on.

Versus Crucible Control: The die roll is crucial. The main two reasons I can think are: Either attempting to combo off turn 1 if granted, or at least hitting them with a early duress to see whether they have a prison card in hand such as a trinisphere or even a chalice, then after seeing their hand you can decide whether to go for a stable mana base for the next few turns or attempt to combo off in the next few turns. If you lose the die roll, it is almost forced that you must mulligan to a FoW hand, since a turn 1 trinisphere is pretty much game over, since the Crucible Control player may drop a crucible and wasteland at anytime and you cannot FoW because of trinisphere.

Versus the Dragon Mirror: This is dumbest match up you can ever expect to face. In this match up he who drops dragon in yard first loses. Or perhaps whoever has the most necromancies wins the war of animation. This is where I think the Shivan Hellkite can be a house, simply because you can bait with the hellkite seeing if they will animate it, then you can go for the combo after they have burned an animate spell on hellkite. The hellkite can create a window because you can always threaten to animate the hellkite and simply beat them to death with it. Game 2 I would probably board out some worldgorgers and some animate deads, since this match up is revolved around necromancy.

Versus Draw 7.dec: The die is important as always. If you hit with a turn 1 duress you can see whether how explosive or how crappy his hand is, thus allowing you to plan your course of action for the next few turns. If the player playing draw7 doesnt kill you within a timely manner, the scales will tip in favor of the dragon player. Since the longer the game drags on the more the dragon decks starts to do what it is suppose to do, which is eventually get the squee-bazaar engine going thus spelling game over for the draw 7 player very shortly.

Maindeck modifications:
-1 timewalk, +1 lim dul's vault. I have found timewalk to be very useless for most occassions when I draw it. It simply does not seem good or useful, I would rather have another card that can dig for my combo, which is why I am opting for the lim duls vault instead. Stacking your deck, looking for your combo is always nice.

+1 badlands -1 swamp. This is to add another fetch target that gives you another red source to power the shivan hellkite. The swamp is useful versus bloodmoon or wastelands, but I feel that the addition of a badlands helps stablize the mana base in the deck.

SideBoard modifications: Optimizing the the board

1 shivan hellkite
4 stifles
3 pernicious deeds
2 chain of vapor
4 xantid swarms
1 BEB

I feel that this experimental board can help against many of the decks I explained above. The shivan hellkite in the board is to brought in versus the Fish match ups and the goblin welder match ups. The mana modifications with the +1 badlands will help get an active hellkite more consistantly versus heavy strip effect decks. Having an animate being stifled that was targeting a hellkite is much an easier gamble than the hard gamble of trying to go the gorger combo.

The 4 stifles is crucial to having good winning chances versus crucible control, since it may buy you the window of stifling a chalice for 2 or 3 in order to win. Or even to protect an early bazaar or your early mana sources from their strip effects. The stifles can also help greatly versus Draw 7.dec as it it will neutralize their storm spells.

The 1 blue elemental blast seems irrelevant, however it can be very life saving versus a blood moon or even if your lucky enough hitting a early lackey game 2 versus Food Chain Goblins.

The alterations in the Maindeck and Sideboard are very minimal, which is a consequence of a combo deck as if take too much out the combo in the deck itself maybe destablized. I know even after this changes in the deck itself, certain problems just cannot be completely fixed. Versus 4cControl or any control deck, there is nothing more I can think of to add that can assist in those match ups other than: FoW, Duress and xantid swarms. Certain bad match ups depend on how well you know what your playing against and how confident you are about your ability to play against unfavorable match ups.

I hope this analysis helps otherwise, feel free to add your thoughts on the current state of dragon.

[everythingitouchdies]

I have been playing dragon in an environment that is comprised primarily of Fish and 4cc (I am a glutton for punishment.) But also found in my meta are TnT, FCG, Draw7, Prison and Tog.

I will post my decklist, which does not include green, even though it probably should, and explain some of my reasoning (especially on SB choices.)

The Deck:

Creatures:
4 WG Dragon
4 Squee
1 Ambassador Laquatus
1 Sliver Queen

Animation:
4 Animate Dead
3 Necromancy

Control:
4 Force of Will
3 Duress

Tutors:
4 Intuition
1 Demonic Tutor
1 Vampiric Tutor

Draw:
1 Ancestral Recall
2 Deep Analysis

Utility:
1 Time Walk
2 Compulsion
4 Bazaar of Baghdad

Mana:
1 Black Lotus
1 Mox Jet
1 Mox Sapphire
1 Sol Ring
1 Mana Crypt
4 Polluted Delta
4 Underground Sea
4 Island
3 Swamp

Sideboard:
4 Chalice of the Void
4 Stifle
3 Verdant Force
2 Echoing Truth
2 Coffin Purge

Breakdown:

The Deck:

Kills:
Ambassador is staple and speaks for itself.
Sliver Queen vs. Caller vs. Hellkite: I prefer sliver queen for two primary reasons. One is her capacity to be pitched to FOW. Second is that she can be animated on her own for harsh beats (so can hellkite, but she doesnt require red at all.)

Animate Spells: Seven has always worked for me. I have experimented with 8-10 and it didnt make a miraculous difference.

Deep Analysis: Good against control, also doubles as a finisher with Ambassador on your turn, not giving your opponent a chance to untap and do anything unexpected. Good synergy with both bazaar and Intuition.

Mana: I only play two moxes because I only own two moxes and we dont play proxy. I will happily cut basic lands for moxes when possession allows.

Sideboard:

Chalice of the Void: I primarily side this against 4cc and Fish. Most of the answers these particular decks have to Dragon are 1 mana cc, and they cannot let a COTV sit there long. It helps in the draw7 matchup as well.

Stifle: This is the weakest piece of my sideboard.

Verdant Force: This is how I beat Fish game 2 most of the time. Its a bomb against tog and Tnt as well. THIS makes the Stax matchup fun.

Echoing Truth: A versatile piece that has saved me against many decks, in particular Tog and FCG. It helps also against random board hate like ground seal, root maze, ankh, goblin ss, etc.

Coffin Purge: I play this against welder decks packing platinum angel or the occasional single sided in gaea's belssing. Not as useful as it once was, changes in meta game dictate that it will soon go.

Other Cards to consider for SB:

Sundering Titan: Against 4cc, it should be as good as verdant is against fish.

Xantid Swarm: I realize that this card is necessary but have just not found my way to it. The problem I have is that I would normally side this in against decks that I usually pack COTV and VF against and dont know what to take out.


Match ups:
Prison: It helps to go first game one, and it helps even more to win it. Then you side in Verdant Forces and should be able to chomp one of the next two victories without too much trouble. I loved this matchup before somebody made up Trinisphere. Its a worthy FOW target.

Fish: I never have alot of difficulty with this one. Its all about animating Fatties.

4cc: I almost cry at this one. If you can win the first game (early duress, combo by turn 3 with FOW in hand) then the round is not as drastic. Resolving a Chalice for 1 post sideboard seems to be the only way I can win this. I intend to try to help that theory along with the help of Sundering Titan. If you can win before they will its good. Forcing their Angel and animating it is fun too. At worst it gets StP'd.

Draw7: this is the most random feeling matchup for me. I sometimes steal it with ease, and other times curse at the close proximity that winning offers. Chalice helps here too, it slows them down (hopefully) so that you can combo.

As for the other listed bad matchups, I dont see Crucible and rarely play the mirror.

EITD

[wuaffiliate]

I have 2 questions.

1) everythingitouchdies, Why do you run time walk?
2) Were are your maindeck Xantid Swarms?

[Unearthly]

1) everythingitouchdies, Why do you run time walk?

Time Walk is an incredible card in Dragon.  The deck uses a land drop for card drawing, so advancing a turn is big.  You get to lay another land and either get more uses out of bazaar or compulsion.  This deck does not try and win on first turn, and it runs blue, there is absolutely no reason not to run time walk unless you don't have one and there are 0 proxies.  I'd proxy it before a mox in this deck, most definately.

As for the kill conditions, everythingitouchdies, you have a very great idea.  I never thought of Deep Analysis as a 'win now' card, usually looking at hellkite and thinking 'meh'.  Because he isn't worth the splash, at all.  The mana base is extremely tight as is, adding a 4th color would destroy it.  However, running 1-2 Deep Analysis seems like an interesting (and good) idea.  Though truth be told, I have only lost one match where an instant win would have saved me.  However, they also have good synergy with bazaar and can be found after going off (as long as you have 3 life or a compulsion).

Here is my current build of Dragon:

Mana
4 Polluted Delta
4 Underground Sea
2 Bayou
1 Island
1 Swamp
5 Moxen
1 Black Lotus
1 Mana Crypt
1 Sol Ring

Kill
3 Necromancy
3 Animate Dead
2 Dance of the Dead
4 Worldgorger Dragon
1 Ambassador Laquatus
1 Sliver Queen

Search/Draw
4 Bazaar of Baghdad
4 Compulsion
2 Intuition
1 Demonic Tutor
1 Vampiric Tutor
1 Ancestral Recall
4 Squee, Goblin Nabob

Awesome
1 Time Walk

As for the matchups:

4cc - This is what xantid swarm is for.  The 4c player must use their removal or counterspells on him first if they want to be able to do anything else that matters for the rest of the game.  Play your xantids early and do as much as you can under them.  I wouldn't recomment attempting to go off against 4c unless I am under a swarm, they have 0 mana open or I have multiple forces.  The threat of losing your permanents is more than enough reason to do so.

Fish - They have wastes, but they also don't have mana drain.  They also don't have any targeted removal for the dragon.  Therefore, your plan against them is to go off as fast as possible and that plan actually works well.  Because their wastes have to target bazaars, use that to your advantage to build up a mana base and using your other draw spells.  This is definately a winnable matchup.

Prison - This can go down to a card analysis of what cards really hate this deck:

Trinisphere - If played on turn 1, it is devastating to the quite moderate artifact count.  It also slows down casting card draw and tutors, and gives the workshop deck tremendous tempo.

Tangle Wire - Actually, not that big a problem.  You can do almost anything at instant speed, cast card drawing and most of your tutors.  And  you can win with necromancy at instant speed too.

Smokestack - This one is more of a problem since this low permanent deck will quickly run out of mana if it can't win fast enough.  Simply, if they play a smokestack, its time to make risky plays because in a few turns you won't even have the chance to do that.

Sundering Titan - A nightmare for this deck.  It destroys all of our duals in one fell swoop.  If it drops and you don't have the appropriate moxen out or plenty of extra lands in hand, you might as well scoop up what is left.

Crucible - You thought wasteland was bad huh?  Now they get one every turn? Yeah, this card sucks for Dragon. A lot.  I don't really need to discuss it, its just a house anyway, and against us it is a game winner.

I had the pleasure of playing against a deck in Pittsfield that sported: Force of Will, Sundering Titan, Trinisphere, and Crucible.  You can guess who swept who.     Needless to say, the new incarnations of 7/10 destroy this deck.  It's the one matchup of the day where I didn't feel like I wasn't "the beatdown" anymore.

[Astro]

I have a really good question.  I'm seeing a bunch of decklists here that run 3 Animates and 2 Dances or 4 Animates and 1 Dance, ect...  

My question is why?  Dance is so much better than Animate.  Of the 3 reanimators it should go in this order:  #1 Dance,  #2 Necromancy and #3 Animate.  The extra +1 / +1 isn't exactly vital, however it will save your life versus meat.  No questions asked, Animate is inferior to both Necromancy and Dance.  Is there a reason you guys are running oddly mixed numbers like 2 Dances and 4 Animates, ect...?

[Mixing Mike]

Time Walk in this deck, depending on your matchup, may be like drawing 6 cards in your first hand.  Quoteing from Diceman's primer...

Time Walk
Included in the search category, because it helps you to dig one card deeper while both accelerating and/or re-setting your mana. However, Time Walk could actually have a drawback in this deck: if you see it in your opening hand, it is effectively a placeholder for the next card in your library that you don�t get to see. This can affect mulliganing decisions, as a Time Walk does not help you with evaluating your starting hand. Still, you cannot underestimate the potential strength of this card. In fact, Time Walk really shines in Bazaar-Squee builds, where it could allow you to draw more cards if your Bazaar engine is going. Rating: poor-excellent

It's really a personal playcall, but it's understandable if somebody doesn't play it.

[Komatteru]

No questions asked, Animate is inferior to both Necromancy and Dance.

Wrong.  Let's go over this...

The real deal with Dragon is to get infinite mana combo with Worldgorger Dragon, then use Laquatus to mill away the opponent's library.  That's really the win condition it hopes for (hence the title of "combo").  Since this is the goal, it doesn't really matter which animate spell you use.

Now, Dragon's other way of winning is to animate some huge monster (like Verdant Force) and beat the opponent down.  Here's where Dance of the Dead sucks.  Yeah, so Dance gives +1/+1.  Big deal.  That won't make any difference: If you animate, say, Verdant Force, it still takes 3 turns to kill.
Animate Dead: animate the Force, you now have a 6/7 creature. Next turn, attack for 7 (1 token).  Then 8, then 9.  Opponent is dead.
Dance of the Dead: animate the Force.  Next turn, attack for 9, then 10, then 11.  Again, 3 turns.


Granted, if your opponent has used a fetch land or Force of Will (which is very reasonable), then the Dance of the Dead kills a turn faster.  Swell.  If you use something other than Verdant Force (like, Sliver Queen or something equally large), then it will always take the same amount of turns to kill, assuming that your opponent has nicked a couple points off his life, which is quite reasonable.  But here's the problem: Dance of the Dead requires you to pay to untap the creature.  Having to waste mana for something that's really unnecessary is not a good idea.  Say your opponent manages to strip or waste out all your black mana (and you don't have a Jet), or uses Null Rod to shut down your Jet and kills your swamp.  Then what?  Your black mana supply is not infinite nor untouchable, and that +1/+1 is simply not worth having to spend each turn.  You could be saving that mana for Compulsion or other card drawer in the event your opponent drops a StP, Balance, or other removal spell and you don't happen to have a Force of Will (or blue card to go with it).  Hell, eating two mana on your upkeep might cost you the ability to hard cast Force, when you don't have a blue card available.

Necromancy is better than Dance as well.  While it costs one more mana, it doesn't require you to pay each turn to untap, which is good if you going to use the fattie beatdown method of victory.

That's why Dance is not better.  First of all, it doesn't really matter, since the real goal is to use Laquatus anyway.  In that case, it makes no difference what animate spell you use, except that Animate and Dance cost less than Necromancy.

[Justinsane]

The reason necromancy is run is becuase it can be played as in instant, and it gets around chalice for 2.  Running 3 different animates also protects against meddling mage (if it matters) and cabal therapy (if it matters).

[wuaffiliate]

1) everythingitouchdies, Why do you run time walk?

Time Walk is an incredible card in Dragon.  The deck uses a land drop for card drawing, so advancing a turn is big.  You get to lay another land and either get more uses out of bazaar or compulsion.  This deck does not try and win on first turn, and it runs blue, there is absolutely no reason not to run time walk unless you don't have one and there are 0 proxies.  I'd proxy it before a mox in this deck, most definately.

Nah time walk isnt very good at all, play the deck alot and you will come to the same conclusion most people come to. You just need more experence with the deck to understand why walk is terrible.  There are plenty of better choices such as Lim Dul's Vault.

Also Animate is superior to Dance because you want to be able to reanimate swarm, with no drawback. Dance is the last animation spell to add.

-Dance is terrible in any situation that doesnt involve a combo out
-Animate has no drawbacks, perfect for reanimating swarm
-Necromancy allows you to combo out at instant speed and dodge chalice

I suggest dropping one compulsion for a 3rd intuition, you dont want to keep drawing compulsions, and intuition should be a 3 of.

I've had no problems with any shop decks with this deck, you should be mulling aggresively into quick wins, you have a SB of artifact hate and bounce at your disposal, there is no reason to lose to 7/10 or anything that resembles it.

You are also missing alot of cards in the build you posted, there are only 50 some odd cards.

[Shock Wave]

1) everythingitouchdies, Why do you run time walk?

Time Walk is an incredible card in Dragon.  The deck uses a land drop for card drawing, so advancing a turn is big.  You get to lay another land and either get more uses out of bazaar or compulsion.  This deck does not try and win on first turn, and it runs blue, there is absolutely no reason not to run time walk unless you don't have one and there are 0 proxies.  I'd proxy it before a mox in this deck, most definately.

That's just, well, absolutely wrong. Time Walk is of mediocre potency at best. If you have Bazaar action going, it's great. If not, it cantrips. The notion that Time Walk is standard in *every* blue deck is not true. While it is true that it should be an inclusion in *most* blue decks, there are a select few where it is of minimal importance.

[VGB]

@TheLegendOfMagic - you are overestimating Prison against this deck - the matchup really doesn't hurt that much unless you have a lot of mana artifacts in hand when they get the first turn Sphere.

It's been a while since I played Dragon, but I thought I'd let ya'll look at my latest list.

Bazaar Dragon

It barely supports FoW (at 14 blue cards), and a couple of the card choices may look odd, but it trades flexibility and a more consistent third turn rather than going after the nutz second turn win percentage.  My build is a little more susceptible to Null Rod and Sphere of Resistance with the high mana artifact count, but really no more so than many other builds, and my build is really tailored to putting a Bazaar in play.

I personally prefer Time Walk, but that's also because I use Will (and dumping cards with Bazaar is made that much more brutal with resolved Will).

[everythingitouchdies]

I put time walk in (I did not originally play it) as a sort of guess, and it has done many great things for me. The bottom line is that I only own two moxes, so I play this deck at a defficiency. Time walk helps get the land drop, helps get an extra use of bazaar, and sometimes affords me a win easier when I go beatdown. If I was fully powered the need for time walk would probably fade, and it may get cut for a 3rd compulsion (which is what I cut for the time walk) or a Lim-dul's vault (which I cut for the 4th intuition.)

As for the animate spells, I used to play 2 animate dead and 2 dance of the dead. The primary reason was not meddling mage (which I have seen once in the last 4 months) or cabal therapy (never been hit hard enough by this card to fear it) but simply because I only had two bb animate deads. As bad as that rationale was, I didnt think it would matter very much. Then I lost a game where putting verdant force into play untapped would have saved me and putting him into play tapped cost me the game. That actually happened twice in the same tournament, so it got cut. I only run seven animate spells so there is no reason for me to run dance at all.

I have decided to add xantid swarm to my sideboard. I hope that it will work better for me against 4cc than COTV has.

New Side Board and the Reasoning:

4 COTV
3 Verdant Force
2 Sundering Titan
3 Xantid Swarm
2 Pernicious Deed
1 Coffin Purge

4 COTV: this card has not done me wrong, it allows me the needed time to beat drraw7 and doubles as a stronger play against fish than swarm (which gets lavamancered or fire/iced.)

3 Verdant Force: Same as before, the ultimate beatstick.

2 Sundering Titan: The beatdown creature against 4cc. Hits their lands, and if he dies does it again. They usually have the same b/u down as you so you dont hit your own.

3 Xantid Swarm: I finally did it. My initial fear is that it diversifies my land base, but seems like a worthy decision.

2 Pernicious Deed: This is a test card. I chose it over echoing truth as a way to remove permanent hate.

1 Coffin Purge: Against Welder decks, in particular slaver and TnT.

Unearthly: How does running 4 compulsions work for you? Have you considered increasing your intuitions (at least 3 and 3?) It seems like you would draw it when you dont want it, and if it was intuition it could help considerably.

wuaffiliate: You are running your maindeck swarms essentially where I am running deep analysis and the 4th squee. While those become the cards I will sideout for swarms, I think the benefit of having the extra draw when I need it is worth the current build. It helps keep my blue count up as well, making my FOWs good. There was a time when my blue count was 13 and I was having trouble coming up with the second card.

My question about this deck is this:

Is there an established amount of mana sources that should be in here? I run 20, and sometimes it seems too few in the late game against any deck with wasteland, especially do to the lack of pearl, emerald and ruby. I see that wuaffilitate has 22, but TheLegendOfMagic only runs 20.

EITD

[wuaffiliate]

wuaffiliate: You are running your maindeck swarms essentially where I am running deep analysis and the 4th squee. While those become the cards I will sideout for swarms, I think the benefit of having the extra draw when I need it is worth the current build. It helps keep my blue count up as well, making my FOWs good. There was a time when my blue count was 13 and I was having trouble coming up with the second card.

I dont see any reason to play DA. You have access to Lim Dul's vault which if resolved basically sets up a win, and it is pitchable, and allows you to run one less squee. I have never wanted to run more expensive draw, i would much rather spend that mana tutoring and winning.

The mana source count is usually 21-24 depending on preference and how strong your aura of power is.

[dicemanx]

I have a really good question. I'm seeing a bunch of decklists here that run 3 Animates and 2 Dances or 4 Animates and 1 Dance, ect...

My question is why?

Animate is better if you run Xantids, so you don't have to pay to untap.

Dance is better if you want to animate up a Verdant and beat down with it without casting anything else. A Danced-up Verdant deals 20 damage over two turns (turn 1: 8dmg + 1 token; turn 2: 8 dmg + 3 tokens), while an Animated Verdant beats down for only 16 damage over two turns. The difference can be huge if you face a deck that is trying to race you (Gay/r) or is trying to find an answer (Germbus).

Dance used to be important because of the Fireblast/Bolt issue (when Goblin Sligh was rampant) but that is no longer a consideration.

Conclusion: I'd side with Animates for now, because Xantids are too strong not to run.


The Time Walk issue: This card is weak because it's usually just a glorified cantrip that will occasionally affect mulliganing decisions and it gets shut out by a Chalice for 2. I wouldn't bother with it.

[everythingitouchdies]

I run two compulsions and I seem to see it when I need it. It doesnt usually get countered, but occasionally gets dumped early to bazaar or force. Against decks not running wastelands it gets sided out most of the time.

If I cut time walk, the first inclination is to put the third compulsion back in, which is what originally filled that spot for me. But if I stayed at two compulsions I could add a 3rd deep analysis (good synergy with intuition) or return lim-duls vault to the deck.

On the other hand, the two deep analysis and the time walk could be cut for cunning wish. By placing a handful of wish targets in the sideboard (stroke, stifle, coffin purge, echoing truth, etc) it seems that it could strengthen the deck.

Debate:

2 deep analysis and 1 lim-dul's vault and 2 compulsion

or

3 cunning wish and 2 compulsion

or

3 compulsion and two deep analysis

Or perhaps another land should be added, taking the mana count to 21?

EITD

[wuaffiliate]

No Wish, No DA

[Purple Hat]

I like the idea of one DA either main or board because you can use it to just win now if you go off on your turn and you're worried about it, but I don't see why you would run more then one or why you would run wishes in this deck.

[JACO]

I have a really good question.  I'm seeing a bunch of decklists here that run 3 Animates and 2 Dances or 4 Animates and 1 Dance, ect...  

My question is why?  Dance is so much better than Animate.  Of the 3 reanimators it should go in this order:  #1 Dance,  #2 Necromancy and #3 Animate.  The extra +1 / +1 isn't exactly vital, however it will save your life versus meat.  No questions asked, Animate is inferior to both Necromancy and Dance.  Is there a reason you guys are running oddly mixed numbers like 2 Dances and 4 Animates, ect...?

As dicemanx pointed out earlier, Dance is generally only better if you plan on animating something like Verdant Force to beat down with after sideboarding. I run 3 Verdant Forces in my sideboard currently, and they have proven time and time again to be tight against any prison type deck, as well as something unexpected like Fish (as BEB can't target them, and they create a large army in short order). If you play Xantid main though (I play it in the sideboard), Animate is definitely superior. Also as was previously mentioned, people typically play both because of bogus cards like Meddling Mage and Cabal Therapy.

Necromancy is superior to both though, and even though it's casting cost is higher (which is sometimes an issue, but not very often), I personally will probably never play with less than 4 of these. It is your best friend against so many decks and individual cards.

In my experience Time Walk has been mediocre at best. I would almost always have something else, like another Necromancy, or Duress/Force of Will/Lim Dul's Vault/Xantid Swarm. You know, something to actually push through the WIN, rather than dicking around.

[TheLegendOfMagic]

Drawing time walk is only good in two scenarios. Scenario 1: It allows for you to set up the combo and combo off next turn thanks to time walk. Scenario 2: time walk is awesome if you got the squee/bazaar engine going, thus time walk is like another ancestral recall since it allows for another turn to abuse the draw engine.

However, these scenarios are the optimal scenarios we would always want to see, but that is only wishful thinking...

I cant even count the multiple times where I draw timewalk in the opening and forced to mulligan since time walk by itself is garbage. I would almost always welcome a Lim Duls vault in place of walk in most cases. Or even a 4th duress, at least that allows for you to disrupt your opponents plans for the time being. Having another card that allows you to dig for the combo is better than wasting the slot for time walk. As of now Lim Duls vault seems a better choice for the Time Walk Slot. This is my oppinion Im sure other people can justify walk, but it just seems too dubious of a card to hold a maindeck slot.

[dicemanx]

OK, so the Time Walk and Animate>Dance issues have been worked out.

Here's some free "tech" in the meantime. It's not much, but it's something to consider: replacing the Ambassador with Eternal Witness as a "kill condition". In BUG Dragon it leads to an elaborate way of winning provided that you run FoWs and at least one Duress (or Cunning Wish, or a Sliver Queen, but a Duress leads to a much more bizarre win).

I wonder if anyone is able to determine how the win is achieved .

[Marton]

I will attempt to guess dicemanx's challenge Here is my first take:

1-have a compulsion/bazaar either in play, or compulsion in your hand.
2-animate a dragon
3-generate infinite mana / dump library in graveyard
4-stop the recursion by reanimating the eternal witness. getting to this step depends on wether you had a bazaar or compulsion into play or in your hand. if you only had a compulsion in your hand, then now cast it and draw/dump your library.
Note: the eternal witness target doesnt really matters at this point
5-cast ANOTHER animate dead, this time on a dragon
6-each dragon recursion will allow you to re-draw a card from your graveyard, effectively drawing your entire graveyard.
7-find another creature to stop the infinite loop
8-play the duress
9-your hand should be full of force of will at this point, so cast your cunning wish and get that stroke of genius and win.

note: I must have gotten something wrong. I figure theres a way to re-play that duress many times over, but I must have missed it.

Note: if you want random tech, then try aerial caravan It's always fun to get to own your opponent with the worst cards ever -- go flying soldiers ! lol

[wuaffiliate]

replacing the Ambassador with Eternal Witness as a "kill condition"

ahahahah that is so good. im going to so try that for fun.

[dicemanx]

Marton: If you are including Cunning Wish, that simplifies things. However, let's not put the Wish into the Dragon build; instead, let's just swap the Ambassador with the Eternal Witness and include a Duress. Here is a sample build:


combo (16):
---------------

4x Animate Dead
3x Necromancy

4x Worldgorger Dragon
1x Eternal Witness

4x Bazaar of Bagdad


disruption (8):
---------------

4x Force of Will
3x Xantid Swarm
1x Duress


tutors/card drawing (14):
-----------------------------

4x Squee, Goblin Nabob
3x Compulsion
1x Ancestral Recall

3x Intuition
1x Lim-Dul's Vault
1x Vampiric Tutor
1x Demonic Tutor


mana (22):
-------------

7x SoLoMoxen
1x Mana Crypt
4x Polluted Delta
4x Underground Sea
2x Bayou
2x Tropical Island
1x Swamp
1x Island


Another option: Swap the Duress for a Time Walk.

So what is the kill in both cases?

[VGB]

So what is the kill in both cases?

Since you only have one immediate kill card, that kinda makes the reasoning moot.

Ancestral Recall.

[everythingitouchdies]

What a pleasantly obnoxious way to win. Imagine the player that usually complains about dragon at the start of your match and the look on his face when you pull this off. heh heh.

EITD

[wuaffiliate]

it so much fun, they quit on MWS alot faster now

[dicemanx]

So what is the kill in both cases?

Since you only have one immediate kill card, that kinda makes the reasoning moot.

Ancestral Recall.

Well, it's not that simple. You can't just keep Ancestraling them, because certain decks could break out of the cycle (like Germbus) once they draw enough cards. Plus, with the Time Walk version, your kill card is not the Recall .

[wonkey_donkey]

Squee beatdown?

Tom

[dicemanx]

Think bigger.

What's nice about the Time Walk version is that you can generate infinite mana, take infinite turns, deal infinite damage, force your opponent to draw an infinite number of cards, AND you can play every spell in your deck an *infinite* number of times. Wow .

(infinite = an arbitrarily large number)

[wonkey_donkey]

Think bigger.

Well, dragon beatdown then. I imagine Squee beatdown might be a whole lot more fun, however   .

Tom