Spinning in infinity: Dreidel.dec

[Jacob Orlove]

Aside: this name may have been used before by a Legacy sensei deck that doesn't actually exist. Since we know that Hannukah is all about the Maccabees beating down on the Romans (and that whole miracle thing), I decided the name fit here. Besides, that deck was just helm/top/sight--there was no need for a new name.

So anyway, I was sitting around yesterday thinking about what to play, and I realized that my WTF list was like a month old, and I didn't have the cards with me to change it (sanctioned t1 = no proxies). So, remembering all the fish that showed up last time, I decided to bring workshop aggro. I looked at Rico's build, and saw a lot of stuff I liked (including the suggestion of running Top), but I'm not a fan of the Thirst/Welder approach to workshop decks. I looked back to my old Hanna's Custody list, and decided to once again throw two lists into each other and see what happened. This is the list that resulted:

Dreidel.dec
4 Mishra's Workshop
1 Ancient Tomb
1 Tolarian Academy
2 Polluted Delta
2 Flooded Strand
2 Underground Sea
3 Tundra
1 Strip Mine
4 Wasteland
1 Mox Sapphire
1 Mox Jet
1 Mox Ruby
1 Mox Emerald
1 Mox Pearl
1 Sol Ring
1 Mana Crypt
1 Black Lotus

4 Juggernaut
1 Razormane Masticore
3 Triskelion
1 Platinum Angel
1 Sundering Titan

4 Chalice of the Void
3 Crucible of Worlds
3 Sensei's Divining Top (signed in silver!)
1 Trinisphere

1 Ancestral Recall
1 Time Walk
1 Tinker
1 Timetwister
1 Demonic Tutor
1 Demonic Consultation
1 Vampiric Tutor
1 Balance
1 Mystical Tutor
1 Yawgmoth's Will
1 Swords to Plowshares

sideboard (only part of it was good):
1 In the Eye of Chaos
1 Triskelion
1 Aether Spellbomb
1 Aura Fracture
2 Seal of Cleansing
2 Swords to Plowshares
2 Arcane Laboratory
3 Tormod's Crypt
1 Kira, Great Glass-Spinner
1 Jester's Cap

I really like being able to randomly win games by being broken, and including a lot of broken cards means I can usually do something silly before my opponent has drain mana up. The Yawgmoth's Will was definitely subpar, though, since it doesn't do broken things on turn 1. It should definitely have been something else--probably a seal of cleansing, since I sided those in roughly all the time.

Anyway, on to the matches:

Round 1, Michael: instead of describing the match, I'll just tell you that he was running Timberline Ridge, Reckless Abandon, Ornithopter, and Rogue Elephant. Oh, and I tutored for Trinisphere at least once.
2-0 me

1-0 matches

Round 2, Rasmus: this was against some gifts deck that apparently transforms into TPS, or just overlapped a lot. Anyway, game 1 takes forever and I fall behind, he gets active library and mysticals for Tinker, so I decide to Consult for Timetwister, since that both restores card parity and deals with the Tinker (I didn't have quite enough mana for will to do anything, and balance would have let him just tinker for the win. Tinker itself had been countered earlier). So I proceeded to remove all my win conditions (top 4 cards in my deck were ALL juggernauts) and lose. Game 2, his life total shows some early one point increments from fetches or forces, then it starts going down by fives. I won on turn 3 of the extra turns, despite his hardcast Colossus.

HOWEVER, the judge informs us that we will now have two turns to complete game 3. There's no one to appeal to, so I figure we're just going to get a 1-1-1 draw instead of a 1-1 draw. How wrong I was. My opponent opens with Underground Sea, Mana Crypt, Black Lotus, Dark Ritual, Brainstorm, Dark Ritual, Demonic Tutor, Yawgmoth's Will, (replay manas), Demonic Tutor, Tendrils of Agony. Then he shows me the last card in his hand, that he didn't bother to play: Mind's Desire. Heh.

1-1 matches

Round 3, Mourad: he's playing a more traditional U/r shop aggro. Game 1, he wins the roll and gets out Chalice 0 and Crucible/waste. My manabase folds, and I follow shortly thereafter. I should have held on one more turn, in case tinker/plat came up and he couldn't deal with it, but I checked my top card, and it wouldn't have helped. Hooray for bad play not mattering. Game 2, the tables are turned, as I open with Chalice 0 and quickly get my own Crucible/waste going. My life total drops from his early Cathodion, but I get out a pair of Triskelions, and stabilize. On to the decisive game 3! Well, he double mulligans. I do broken things, and he can't keep up. Trikes are good in the workshop mirror.

2-1 matches

Round 4, Malte: Game 1, he opens with trop, brainstorm, go. I had to mulligan, so I decide to get a new hand with land, mox, demonic for lotus, timetwister, which resolves. I somehow get the lotus back, with my Trinisphere, so I play both. He discards for a few turns, until I finally play some creature and he scoops. Game 2, I find out that he's with Meandeck Tendrils, as he quickly wins on the first turn with heavy mana into a Brainstorm into a few more cantrips and a Tendrils. At this point the life total matrix looks something like:

Me   | Malte
20    |  20
win   |         
20    |  20
       |  win

Game 3, I open with Chalice 0, but he Forces. He then attempts to go off, but ends up manaburning for 5 when he can't find any gas. I Tutor up another Chalice and then a Juggernaut goes to work on his life total.

3-1 matches

Round 5, Martin: I finally win the roll (first time of the tournament), and manage to open with a turn 1 land mox mox Trinisphere, which I follow up with I think mystical into whatever. His life total shows that I won with a Juggernaut, anyway. Game 2, I tinker up a Sundering Titan, but he nails it with StP, and I can't put up enough pressure while he rebuilds his manabase. I kill a scepter-chant with a seal of cleansing, but exalted angel does me in. game 3, all I know is that he scooped after two hits from a Juggernaut.

4-1 matches

Now we play round 6, despite this being a 30 man event.

Round 6: Bjorn (only with one of those "o"s with a line through it, that I can't type on this keyboard): I get paired down, so I can't draw in. He's playing WTF. Game 1, his Jitte and Chalice are no match for Juggernaut, Trike, and then Tinker. Game 2, his mongrel eats my razormane masticore (vial dodged the 3 upkeep damage), and then a second mongrel comes out, while I can't draw blue mana to play good cards with. Game 3, he's the one who can't draw blue mana. Two StPs take out two factories, while my turn 1 juggernaut (off lotus) keeps hitting. I tinker up a trike to kill something, and on his last turn he vials out Gilded Drake to steal my Juggernaut. I'm at 19, though, so I just let him attack me, and then swing with my 3/3 drake and 3/3 trike to his 4 life.

5-1 matches. Somehow I'm the 3rd seed. Do these people not know how to ID?

Top 8: Dennis, with TnT. I win a quick two games, thanks to a Tinkered Sundering Titan the first game (my first turn was actually fetch, mystical, crypt, sol ring, trinisphere), and him double mulliganing in game 2, into my Seal for his Survival, and Juggernaut/Trike beatdown team. We play some fun games afterwards, and his blood moons wreck me, in part because I keep awul hands rather than waste time mulling.

Top 4: Martin again. Game 1, he swords an early Juggernaut, but I get out another one. He drops a face up angel. I drop a second Jugg, and prepare to race. He plays another swords. That's okay, because top finds me my third juggernaut. Then he plays a second angel. I can still race, though, because I'm doing my 10 damage before he's gaining his 8 life, so I only have to survive a couple of turns until he goes from 14, to 4, to 12, to 2, to 10, to 0. Unfortunately, he has the third plow, but it gains me a turn's worth of life (I go from 13 to 18), so I can play my fourth juggernaut and kill him with the Trikes my top is finding. Then he drops his third angel. If I'd played an earlier chalice on 1, to stop his swords and the ancestral he played, I would have won the game, but I'd seen mostly two drops from his deck up to that point (seal, scepter, drain, etc). I quickly win the second game with a tinkered Titan, but in game 3 he scepter-chant locks me, and I'm out. T2 would have been high enough to split the walk, but t4 gets nothing. Sigh.

The deck itself was pretty awesome, with all the tutors usually getting Tinker or Ancestral. Tops were often amazing, especially with all the shuffle effects. I never used my SB labs, crypts, cap, or spellbomb, but that was due in part to the matchups I got. The rest of the SB was pretty hot, although I'm still not sure exactly how good Kira is.

[Limbo]

I won on turn 3 of the extra turns, despite his hardcast Colossus.

HOWEVER, the judge informs us that we will now have two turns to complete game 3.

If you had known this, would you have been able to survive his additional turn to kill him in the last extra turn, thereby preventing his lucky T1 kill?

Congrats on reaching top 4 btw.

[rvs]

I won on turn 3 of the extra turns, despite his hardcast Colossus.

HOWEVER, the judge informs us that we will now have two turns to complete game 3.

If you had known this, would you have been able to survive his additional turn to kill him in the last extra turn, thereby preventing his lucky T1 kill?

Congrats on reaching top 4 btw.

He couldn't have known this, since it's BS.

[Jacob Orlove]

He actually died on his turn, to a Mana Crypt. Even if he'd survived and I'd killed him on my turn (#4), he would apparently have still gotten the one turn he needed to win. It certainly wasn't my opponent's fault, and I certainly don't mind losing to a broken first turn like that one. It was pretty funny at the time, actually. The only difference a loss versus a draw made was that I couldn't draw into t8 in round 6, and if I hadn't been paired down, that wouldn't have been an issue.

[Anders Noer]

I was at the tournament myself and I was quite puzzled at the judges decision too. I am not a certified judge though, so I didn't want to intervene.
 
I later asked someone who usually knows stuff like this due to 10 years of high level tournament magic (he's good). He agreed with the judges decision, having had the same ruling against himself earlier.
Weird I think - but I would guess that it may seem odd to us all because of the fact that it never really matters. In this case it mattered a lot. Especially since game 2 was very well played out with Jacob and Rasmus giving their best. A draw seemed like a nice ending to that game. When Rasmus went lucksack-broken on the extra extra turns, you couldnt really do anything but shake your head and smile... Soo lame.

Judge: "Can any of you do a first turn kill or is this a draw?"
Rasmus: "Theoretically I can"
...

I also watched the semi between Jacob and Martin.
Game 3 really should have been Jacob's as well.. He goes for a turn 1 Crucible (with Waste in hand), but it get's get's forced. Martin Recalls in his first turn. Jacob then goes turn 2 Platinum Angel, with Kira in hand to seal the game in turn 3, if he can find a blue mana source. Martin then Plays Scepter-Chant with 2 mana open due to a topdecked Academy, and Jacob never get to play another spell.

Interesting deck - I didn't know how to describe it when people asked what decks had made the top 8. I think my description on another forum was: "weird controlish aggro-deck-thingy with workshops".

[Jacob Orlove]

Here's the relevant text from the magic floor rules:

116.   End-of-Match Procedure
If the match time limit is reached before a winner is determined, the active player (as defined in the Magic game rules) finishes his or her turn and five total additional turns are played. For example, time is called on player A's turn. Player A finishes his or her turn. Player B takes his or her turn, which is turn 1. Player A takes his or her turn, which is turn 2. Player B takes turn 3, player A takes turn 4, and player B takes the final turn, which is turn 5.

Players take any extra turns granted to them by card effects as they normally would during the course of the game, but any extra turn counts as one of the five end-of-match turns. Once the fifth turn is completed, the game finishes regardless of any remaining card-generated or end-of-match extra turns.

If the game finishes before the fifth turn is completed, the match is over and no new game begins.

If a judge assigned a time extension (because of a long ruling, deck check, or other reason), then the end-of-match procedure does not occur until the end of the time extension.

[Outlaw]

Jacob, have you tried out Welders in the deck??  I imagine you could do some stupid tricks with the top and welder, activate the card draw ability and weld it out on the stack, get a titan and draw card  Its in interesting idea I believe in the least.

[Jacob Orlove]

Red would mean dropping white, which actually offers a lot to the deck, but it's something I'll look into.

[Lunar]

1 balance and 1 swords MD is all you would lose, and why would you really have to lose them, couldnt some combination of lands including volcanics/tundras/undergrounds be just about as good as just tundras/underground??? It only makes the SB choices iffier...alternativily might city of brass/gemstone mine be okay...I understand the uses of fetches with top, but a couple of the 5-color lands might not be too bad...just a thought if you really are looking to run welders...

[LotusHead]

This was a fun report to read.  I wish more tourney reports were posted, by godlike TMD moderators or otherwise.

That's how we keep on top of the metagame.

This decklist had tons of tutors and TIMETWISTER!!! (my favorite card ever) and looks fun to play.

How big was the tourney? Being from NorCal, anything over 4 is big news.

How did Demonic Consultation do for you? Yeah, it's restricted (and I love it in Storm Decks).  Just thought it looked odd in a Shop Aggro deck.
(although, Consult for Chalice/Shop/Trike is kinda hot....)

[Matt]

Did you ever consider Enlightened Tutor? It finds Trinisphere and your unrestricted cards game one and it can pull out Custodies and In The Eyes and such game two.

[Jacob Orlove]

This is generating enough discussion for me to move it to open T1.

To answer Matt's question, I didn't consider enlightened, because there aren't really any targets that are worth spending a turn and a card to get, unlike the regular tutors, which can get Tinker, Ancestral, etc.

[Zeke]

Well, you can EOT Enlighten Tutor up a win condition, like a Juggs or a Trike/Titan....

[Jacob Orlove]

Well, you can EOT Enlighten Tutor up a win condition, like a Juggs or a Trike/Titan....

Between the tops and all the broken card drawing, the deck has no problems at all with finding win conditions. Even if I did, I'd rather run another random artifact like Trike or Top or Crucible over enlightened tutor, because one average threat is better than losing a card to get basically another average threat.

[shade88]

Interesting looking deck. It's nice to see dradles being used. For a fish metagame, the deck looked solid. However, with all the meandeck gifts that will be popping up, I might suggest following Lunar's suggestion of running welders--not only for all the great tricks in the deck, but because recurring early titans destroys the manabase on gifts--one of its only weaknesses.

[NWI Team_Zilla]

Nice report Jacob.  I find that it's kind of sad that with 30 some people, top 4 didn't get at least something out their finish.  Ohh and I thought you might want to put some Hanna's Custody's in your SB, partly because you had some problems with StP and partly because half of your SB didn't even see play.  It seems like Hanna's Custody is one of the best reasons to play White over Red in Workshop aggro, though they would suck against another non-red Workshop aggro deck.

[Lunar]

I think hannahs custody OR goblin welder would be solid...with custody not hurting the mana base...however kira is a nice trick for protecting your big guys just about as well as custody (plus she/he/it can beat down too)

Sensei's Divining Top is the hotness...

[Jacob Orlove]

I ran Custody before, and its best use was to shut down welders on the other side of the board. These days, I'd rather run other answers to the little CS I'm going to see.

I'm currently testing two welders and a rack and ruin over the white cards (I had previously replaced Will with a MD seal). I'm not sure what that's going to do to the SB, but results are promising so far.

[Lunar]

I like the welders...with the reduced amount of CS it also means a reduced amount of welder hate...they can be pretty amazing in this deck type...

Ive been testing more with tops and they are looking pretty sweet. Ive heard complaints that they are mana intensive...but I can usually get away with only filtering when I have the extra..ie I dont force myself to filter with them every turn, and the trick with welder is pretty hot.

[jeremy_78]

I have dont some play testing with this deck on MWS and it seems pretty solid.  Top is almost like the artifact equivalent to brainstorm.  The changes I made, were basically the same that were recommended all ready in this thread:

-1 Will
-1 Balance
-1 swords
-1 consultation

+2 Welders
+1 Rack n Ruin
+1 Engineered Explosives

When I built the deck I didn't realize that I forgot to put consultation in the deck.  I am going to add it tonight and see if I like it.

I played against Ultima online when He was playing some version of GAT.  We played a few games and most were decided by an active top.  Titan wrecked his multi color manabase.  Top needs to be a four of in the deck.  I did like how top enable me to draw ReB for the turn then top into the ruby that I had underneath it.  Even when you can't reshuffle digging a card deeper during your upkeep is pretty key to grab a lock component or big man.  I will probably cut twister, bc/ the times when I have it could easily be top or something else, against combo I am always afraid to refill their hand and the same goes for control.  The E.E. has proven to be pretty solid.  Being able to cast it off shop for whatever, you need is pretty good.  The only matchup that it can be a dead draw against is null rod based decks.  But the flexibility of being creature, enchantment and artifact removal makes it hard to take out of the deck.  The welders have been useful, but I feel that two is plenty.  Most of the time you don't need them to win anyway.  I haven't used the md R'n'R yet, but I feel its inclusion is necessary.  I played one U/R fish player, he got down a turn three null rod, but I had top active in the first two turns and had his mana base beaten down by crucible strip/waste, and had a Juggy on the board.  The testing results against combo have been good.  4 MD chalices usually beat combo.  Post SB is usually a good matchup as well.  So far I have played against MD SX(the deck usually dies to itself, and chalice for 1, 0, Death Long, about the same,Chalice and belcher which was more resilient then the other two, but chalice was usually enough to slow them down).  I havent found anyone playing gifts to test the deck yet so I do not know how it will do against probably the most popular deck in the format right now.  From what I have heard from Pheldegraph, the maker of the claw, it is a hard matchup.  But the changes I will try later will be:
-1 Twister
-1 R'n'R or E.E.

+1 Top
+1 Demonic consultation

Hopefully I will find time to try these tonight.  Another note, Orb of dreams has been good in the sideboard for added help against combo, it is usually enough to end the game.

[Zeke]

I checked the rules, and didn't see any rules against rec-suring old topics.

I've recently grown tired on MonoU and once again want to return to my old habits of turning Juggernaut's sideways.

Plus, I gots me 4 DCI ones.  It pains me to see them sitting in my binder doing nothing.

Jacob: I was wondering if you had done any work on this deck recently.  Your last post indicated that you had been testing red over white, what were your conclusions? 

[Jacob Orlove]

The relevant rule is here.

Also, you can see the results of adding red here

Topic Closed.