Shopless Survival

[Covetous]

Are Gorilla Shaman and Quirion Ranger really better than welders 3 & 4, considering that Welder-->Fat is your primary win condition (i.e. you don't have madness creatures as backup)?  The monkey is best when you can work him into a plan of mana denial, or blow up annoying chalices.  However, mana denial isn't your game plan and Chalice for 1 is your biggest chalice fear, making the idea of using monkey to kill chalice a little weak.  On Quirion ranger--he has three major functions in most decks:
1.  save duals from wasteland/B2B-->you have 7 basic lands and 4 fetchlands, so you don't need him for this.
2.  re-using mana birds to provide a lot of mana on a short manabase (i.e. ninjamask)--> you run a lot of mana sources, and most of your spells are very cheap unless you intend to hardcast titan/plats.  
3.  re-using welders-->in this way, ranger is only good with welder in play already, so more welders might be better than the ranger
There is also the use of ranger to untap your fatties to block.  This is probably the most useful possibility for ranger in this deck, but I'm still not convinced that it's better than welder #4.  Just a few thoughts.  Incidentally, Razormane masticore might be better than genesis as genesis is slow and masticore can be welded.

[garlick]

Hi, I tested the new decklist with skullclamps in a few match against control (4-5), in particular against a MonoBlue version with Ophidian, Back to Basic and a ton of counters; this deck is excellent againt this archetype. With maindecked Swarms, Survival, Genesis, Skullclamp, Witness, they simply can't compete with your treats. If you play your Survival and they counter it, you have 4 eternal witness which let you replay it. I won easily these matches. Also, with the stabilized manabase, their wastelands and B2B aren't so scaring.

From other tests, I've come to the idea that Genesis is really strong, both versus Control decks, in order to replay countered welders or swarm, and against decks with many spot removal such as Fish or Sligh.

Also, I'm running a budget version, with the use of a Shield Sphere, two Tree of tales and 4 Wild Grown in order to accelerate the green sources of mana for the survival chain and for the Witness and other more expensive spell, and they are working pretty well for me.


This is obviously only a small contribution to this deck, but I feel that I post this as a sort of thanking for sharing your work.

Bye, Fabio

[glenchuy]

Have you tried during the testing including the madness creatures? even fiery temper to remove opposing welders could work... (haven't tested them).

temper, with the only viable outlets being 4 mongrels?  :shock:.

btw, the more i play the deck, the more times i find that i have survival and goblin in play, AND have nothing to weld out.  i'm starting to like shield sphere too.  but i still can't figure out what's the "weakest" link in the deck to cut!

[Serin]

Mine was a budget version and I ran 1 ornithopter. To block those curious faeries, because with shield sphere, if you block a juggy it still dies, and for blocking a titan its the same

[Sammy]

I too ran Thopter, but it was in a 1.5 tourny, which is about the equivilent of a budget deck except you can run 4 Petals, which I did. Thopter helped out a lot.

[raye]

I ran the deck at SCG Chicago with the following minor changes listed below.


Shopless Survival

Mana (30)
6 Forest
1 Mountain
4 Taiga
4 Wooded Foothills
1 Black Lotus
1 Mox Emerald
1 Mox Jet
1 Mox Pearl
1 Mox Ruby
1 Mox Sapphire
1 Sol Ring
4 Elvish Spirit Guide
4 Birds of Paradise

Win (6)
2 Goblin Welder
1 Duplicant
1 Triskelion
1 Platinum Angel
1 Sundering Titan

Engine (8)
4 Survival of the Fittest
4 Skullclamp

Resiliency (8)
4 Xantid Swarm
3 Eternal Witness <- I only found 3 to borrow

Toolbox (8)
1 Gorilla Shaman
1 Squee, Goblin Nabob
1 Anger
1 Quirion Ranger
1 Druid Lyrist
1 Viridian Shaman <- I ran the Monkey version
1 Genesis
1 Myr Retriever <- I ran Elf Replica because I couldn't get the Myr.
+1 Viashino Heretic <- I expected lots of big artifacts to blow up

Sideboard
4 Pyrostatic Pillar
3 Blood Moon
4 Artifact Mutation <- 3 mutation + 1 Naturalize because I only could find 3 mutation
4 SIMOON <- 4 fire/ice because I didn't have simoon and I think it provides a bit more utility


I ran the deck with little testing prior but I figured I would pretend it was TnT with a survival hand. A mini report follows.

Rnd 1 - Brian Denars w/ Control Slaver

I win the roll for the only time of the day and just get blowed up both games. I have no answers for his welders and couldn't do anything useful fast enough.

Rnd 2 - Bill Dicks (Dante) w/ Artifact Prison

I lose the roll and Bill mulligans to 6 first game. He lays down a few Smokestacks but I crap out more weenie permanants than he does and my weenie green creatures beat for the win.

I side in some Fire/ice for game 2 and some Mutations. Bill mulligans to 5 and I pop Survival down. Bill was not at all happy about his deck's performance so far and getting killed by little green things.

Rnd 3 - David with a storm deck (Deathlong I think)

I think I lost the roll and pop some weenies out. After a few turns I lose a lot of life to Tendrils. I spent the game trying to get P. Angel on my board but I wasn't even close.

I sided in Pillars and Blood Moons for game 2. I saw none after I took 6 cards instead of 7. David popped a Twister or a Jar and gave me a turn after that and I still saw no Pillar. I had pleanty of time to be a difficult opponent (he gave me way too many turns) but never found anything.

Rnd 4 - Ryan Brinn w/ Fish of some type or Gay/R

I lose the roll. I get survival and cast a lot of weenies to go against his Bouncer and Gilded drake combo thing. I get a Trike out but can't recur or win quickly as I couldn't find a red source. I overpower him with weenies.

I side in some Fire/Ice and we engage in crazy weenie creature combat. My slightly better creature and volume of creatures overpower him in a long game.

This game I was wanting a Sharpshooter in my toolbox. So much synergy with Skullclamp and Ranger.

Rnd 5 - No show

Rnd 6 - Bushman with some kind of slaver deck

I lose the roll and he wrecks me. I have nothing for him. He goes crazy round 2 and slaves me for like 10 turns after he has lock to do silly things with my deck. Amusing.

Rnd 7 - Josh Hall with Artifact Prison

I lose the roll and lose but don't remember how.

I side in mutations and Fire/Ice. I bust out a bunch of weenies and I think I nail some large artifact with mutation.

Game 3 was similar to 2.

Rnd 8 - Pete Endicott with Aggro workshop

I lose the roll and first turn Trinisphere was enough for me to lose.

In come the fire/ice and Mutations. I have a good hand. I put down Survival and Heretic. I think he misunderstands what Heretic does at some point but I had the game locked down.

I win the last game too with a early Heretic I believe.

-------------------

My thoughts on the deck as whole is that it feels underpowered. I didn't like Skullclamp because I never felt comfortable clamping my 1/1s since they were the only thing I had attacking often. I never saw Survival enough for it to win quickly. I would have been satisfied to go 3/5 but ended up 5/3 so I am pleased. I don't know how I could beat combo decks and didn't see enough control decks to have a useful opinion. I seem to do well against Workshops. The high basic land count was great - at one point I sat opposite 4 Wastelands and a Crucible and did not lose a land.

I would rate the deck as moderately fun to play. Most of that is just beating someone down with Elf things. I never felt powerful or in control with the deck. If I were to play it again, I would add Sharpshooter maindeck.

[rologa]

I have played quite a few games with this deck and I found that often the initial hands aren't so good. Basically you need one survival on it or one skullclamp and some creatures to draw enough to find it. But sometimes you don't have it or it is countered and you loss to many turns to be into the game again.

I found very useful the inclusion of 3 Scrolls Rack. They allow you to digg into your library and to find much more early your business spells. I also added 2 more fetchlands to have more sinergy with the scrolls.

I found also useful the inclusion of 1 Orcish Lumberjack. This deck is very many intensive the turns you  have the Survival active. This critter allow you to gain a turn, that sometimes is the time you need for the win, more apreciated when playing agains combo.

My last comment is about Genesis, I don't find it very useful. It is only good when you have the survival on the table and then you have all you need for the win.

I think the deck is very interesting and very fun to play, a good altenative to the control decks I normally play. I think it deserves more testing to try to find the optimun configuration.

Just my two cents about this deck.

Roberto.

[Zeke]

I remember back in my early days of type 1 i became fascinated with Full English Breakfast, and a recent article by Mike Flores on SCG rminded me of this deck.  Then I came here and saw this deck, and after really liking it an idea struck me that I haven't seen posted here.

It might be just because the card would not be good, or because it isn't needed, but would Wall of Roots be beneficial to the deck?  It's ability to give you a green mana on each player's turn could help in maximizing the use of your SotF.

But perhaps it being a 0/5 wall may mean it has no relevance in the current meta, as it doesn't stop the biggest attacker at the moment, Juggs, at all.

Just a thought, I reall like how the deck is going.

[Negator13]

I haven't played or really thought about this deck in awhile, mainly because it just scoops to combo and loses to Trinisphere.

Wall of Roots is good in T1.5 Survival, I suppose it could be good here but as you said it doesnt really hold off any relevant attackers in T1, it just adds green.

[Alfred]

This is such a cool deck! I MWS'd this deck up yesterday and beat Meandeck Oath 3 times in a row! Skullclamp is very key in this matchup, as I found that it stopped oath from getting both spirit of the night and Akroma into play while digging to find Platinum Angel. The manabase is solid, and the plan is very similar to the Survival welder idea that I have been testing in 1.5. Skullclamp adds and extra broken engine to the deck, which I like a lot. I have also found that the deck needs an extra discard outlet, with enough copies (3-4) so that it can be consistantly found.

[Negator13]

You can trying running 4 Bazaar of Baghdad with 2 or so copies of Riftstone Portal for increased discard. You might also want to make room for 3 more Squee.

[Negator13]

Double post

[Negator13]

As you can see from my post above this one, I suggested adding Bazaar of Baghdad to increase consistency and provide more discard outlets to people still interested in my deck. That got me thinking about doing so, and I tried it out. Surprisingly, a new build with BoB and more Squees works really well!

Here is the deck as it stands now, with changes in bold:

Mana Sources
        1 Mountain
        5 Forest
        4 Taiga
        2 Riftstone Portal
        4 Wooded Foothills
        1 Black Lotus
        1 Mox Emerald
        1 Mox Jet
        1 Mox Pearl
        1 Mox Ruby
        1 Mox Sapphire
        1 Sol Ring
        1 Mana Crypt
D00ds
        4 Birds of Paradise
        4 Xantid Swarm
        1 Anger
        1 Eternal Witness
Win
        4 Goblin Welder
        1 Duplicant
        1 Triskelion
        1 Platinum Angel
        1 Sundering Titan
        2 Blood Moon
Engines
        4 Bazaar of Baghdad
        4 Squee, Goblin Nabob
        4 Survival of the Fittest
        4 Skullclamp

Sideboard
2 Ray of Revelation
3 Lava Dart
2 Blood Moon
4 Artifact Mutation
4 Sphere of Resistance

Basically, I took out most of the random dorks that always clogged my hand (3 of the Witnesses, Ranger, Shaman, Genesis) to make room for more Squees and Bazaars. Riftstone Portal is surprisingly good and really important as it makes your Bazaars tap for green. If you've ever played this deck, you know how important it is to have 3-4 green sources out. I dont think you could play Bazaars in this without the Portal; missing a land drop is way too much for it to handle. I might even consider going up to 3 Portals.

This may come as a shock to those of you who have picked this deck up but with the addition of Bazaar I am strongly considering cutting Skullclamp ( :shock: ). Since I cut alot of the random dorks and added BoB, you don't really have the critters, the time, or the need to Clamp guys for cards. In fact, I'd go so far as to say the strongest thing Clamp has going for it at the moment is that it's an artifact. I think I am probably going to cut the Clamps, adding an artifact creature to search for, a Rofellos to accelerate SotF, and some MD removal (probably Sharpshooter and Viridian Zealot). I'm going to keep the Swarms tho, even though you can't cash them in for cards anymoer. They just win vs. control and they can be pitched to SotF (keep the critter count high).

Anyway, I think these changes make the deck passable again and I'm going to start testing it. I hope you like it.

[Mark_Story]

I've just finished reading the whole thread, and was surprised no one thought of rofellos before.  He is ridiculously abusive with quirion ranger and survival.  I've been playing ATS in 1.5 for a while and rofellos is one of the dudes you survival for first, as he effectively doubles or triples your mana depending whether or not you have a quirion ranger.  Sure he can get smoked by most anything, but so can welder.  I think finding room for rofellos is a good idea.

In the non-bazaar versions I would suggest cutting a witness for rofellos.

[xDeathwishx]

You made a very interesting idea, especially with the chain of creatures you get with survival. Some questionable card choices for me are:
SB:
4xSimoon
I'm not absolutely what you plan to do with the simoons, I presume for other workshop-based decks, or fish. However, I believe that lava dart, or maybe even fire/ice would be a better option. This is mainly due to the fact that their mana costs are less strenuous on your mana base.
MD:
1xDruid Lyricist
I'm not absolutely sure about this guy, he wont help you in many match-ups. The main I can think of is only Oath, but your current deck should easily have game against Oath anyways due to your Welders. Probably he is a better SB option if anything.
4xTaiga
I am not saying remove all of them, but I think that you should increase your mountain count in order to better protect yourself vs. Wasteland.  Maybe one or two more mountains?

And to follow-up on the ESG debate, BoP is much more superior in a aggro-control deck like this, since the amount of mana BoP builds up eventually will out do the ultility of ESG.

Anyways, A very interesting idea you posted, I hope it sees some more work.

[booclarke]

I ran a shopless survival deck at a local tourney last night, I haven't played there in awhile but I made it to T8, lost in quarterfinals to control slaver (this guy had ninja skills in deck cutting, i either drew all mana or no mana).  Here is the deck list I took:

4x Bazaar of Baghdad
2x Riftstone Portal
4x Taiga
4x Wooded Foothills
5x Forest
2x Mountain
1x Mox Jet
1x Mox Emerald
1x Mox Ruby
1x Mox Pearl
1x Mox Sapphire
1x Mana Crypt
1x Sol Ring
4x Skullclamp
4x Survival of the Fittest
1x Llanowar Elves
3x Birds of Paradise
3x Xantid Swarm
1x Anger
4x Squee, Goblin Nabob
4x Goblin Welder
2x Basking Rootwalla
1x Duplicant
1x Triskelion
1x Sundering Titan
1x Platinum Angel
2x Blood Moon

Sideboard
4x Artifact Mutation
3x Sphere of Resistance
4x Ray of Revelation
4x Pyrostatic Pillar

I tried to stick to the bazzared decklist as best I could, but had to make substitutions where I didn't have the cards, such as the 2 Basking rootwalla for the xantid and eternal witness.  I also didn't really know the meta I was going into, so I sideboarded Pyrostatic Pillar incase of combo.  

Round 1 vs. Mono Black Tomfoolery
Game 1: 2nd Turn Titan made me a happy boy.
Game 2: He was able to stall me long enough to cast a life ending consume spirit
Game 3: Trike took care of Withered Wretch and Titan won it again.

I had sideboarded in Artifact Mutations.

2 - 1 - 0

Round 2 vs.  "4x Kokusho the Evening star and a lot of reanimate"
Game 1: He won.  Claws of Gix saved him.
Game 2: I won.  2nd Turn Titan stunted his mana growth enough for the win.
Game 3:  He won.  I have no sideboard answers.

3 - 3 - 0

Round 3 vs. A Goblin Deck
All two games go "duplicant + trike + platinum = good game", I think I sideboarded in Sphere of Resistance to add more artifacts and to slow his clock a little.

5 - 3 - 0

Round 4 vs. Oath
This is the first Oath deck I've played against, and I was in 9th place and he was in 10th going into this match.
Game 1: He got oath out before I could kill him and he killed me.
Game 2:  He couldn't find an oath and I attacked him to death with big artifacts
Game 3:  I get a Ray into my g-yard first turn and kill his first turn oath.  both of our boards develop.  He removes my graveyard from the game with Tormod's Crypt, removing 2 squee and anger, among other things.  He also plays cursed totem.  I clamp all of my now useless creatures because I'm not playing artifact mutation and the game continues.  We go past the time limit and we're on our last 5 turns.  He has Akroma and Colossus out.  I have platinum angel out and I'm at -5 life.  I try to hardcast duplicant but it's countered.  His turn 3 he casts fact or fiction, thinking he has 3 echoing truths in his library.  He only had 2, so for his third card he picked wrath of god.  I chose wrath, he only had 1 white source available.  Turn 4, I cast two sphere of resistance (one is countered) in an attempt to keep WoG from being able to be cast.  He lets it be known that if the top card of his libary on Turn 5 is not a white producing mana source, then it's a draw.  It was not a white producing mana source, and so we drew.  Phew!

I had sideboarded in Ray of Revelations and Sphere of Resistance both games.  The Sphere was questionable, and I was questioned about it's choice, but I needed something and had nothing in my board.

6 - 4 - 1

This put me in 7th place.  I then played against Control Slaver in the quarterfinals and lost.  I had sideboarded in Artifact Mutations but they weren't enough.

Thoughts:  I think Gaea's Blessing could probably be a good sideboard choice.  It can serve a dual purpose, saving your guys from a Tormod's or putting annoying cards (like those damn Kokushos) back into their library.    A little burn would have been helpful against opposing welders as well.

Just my 2 cents.  I love this deck though, great idea.

[Negator13]

That's really great to hear that you made T8 with it. Thanks for trying it out.

How were the maindeck Blood Moons? I liked them at first but shutting off BoB made me move them to the board.

Did you ever get "Engine flooded?" I was worried about running 4 SotF, 4 Clamp, and 4 BoB. Was it ever a problem?

Do you think the Riftstone Portals are worth it?

Did you ever wish you had a Rofellos in there?