Travelling Time with TimeBandits.dec

[heiner]

First of all here is the deck list:

TSR - TimeBandits.dec

4 Time Vault
4 Time Bandit (aka Lodestone Myr)
3 Flame Fusillade
4 Smokestack
3 Crucible of Worlds
4 Chalice of the Void
1 Trinisphere
4 Juggernaut
4 Goblin Welder
2 Mox Monkey

9 SoLoMoxenCryptVault
4 Mishra’s Workshop
4 Mountain
3 Bloodstrained Mire
1 Barbarian Ring
1 Tolarian Academy
4 Wasteland
1 Strip Mine

Sideboard:
3 Red Elemental Blast
2 Viashino Heretic
1 Rack and Ruin
3 Pyrostatic Pillar
2 Tormod’s Crypt
2 Jester’s Cap
2 Spawning Pit ( Should be bombardements because of Null Rods)

Why did I play this deck?
Looking at the T8 from last month’s Karlsruhe tournament I realized that I don’t want to face birdshit all day with the gifts I play normally. I wanted some fat creatures. Fish/birdshit looses vs. workshop aggro so I chose to play my TimeBandits.dec.

Why should you play this deck?
First of all comboing with Time Vault is incredibly fun. Secondly it also wins some games. The deck plays the best lock cards of the format: Smokestack, Crucible, Chalice (soo much better than resistor and tangle wire) and 3sphere of course. Juggs and the Time Bandits aka Lodestone Myr offer savage beatings. Myr is as strong as Jugg in this dec and beatz for 5 or 6 most of the time. And of course there is the combo part. 4 TimeVaults, 4 Myrs and 3 Fussillade make it possible to combo out quickly and consistently. Every fourth game is simply won by dropping 1st turn Myr and 2nd turn TimeVault. In testing I could easily race other combo decs like Dragon. Another strategy is to slow the game down and beat or combo out at a later point.

Why mono red?
An obvious modification would be to play 5c to maindeck the 3 black tutors and other goodies. The deck is tight and you have to replace the Juggs (which are the weakest cards in this dec) . I wanted to play them but it was a meta game decision. Secondly I rather wanted to draw threats directly than skipping a turn having to tutor. Furtermore the mana base is resistant to wastelands and fetchies are nice with crucible some times. The barbarian ring completely sucked by the way. I didn’t use it once.

Aren’t Time Vault and Fusillade crappy cards on their own?
Vault combos with Fusillade, Myr, Smokestack and allows some nice plays in the control and stax matchup. Its definitely a four of and I never regret drawing into one.
Fusillade is actually kind of weak because of its high non workshop casting cost. It helps to remove welders and I killed with it once without using vault. It is very hard to cast without lotus, mana vault, mana crypt or tolarian.


So I took the deck to Karlsruhe hoping to play a lot of small creature decks. The turnout was 30 players most of them full powered as usually and the rest played FCG or birdshit/fish. . That’s how I played:

1st match Ole Krieger with Meandeck Gifts
1st game:
Ouch, a bad matchup. I have the advantage of him thinking I would play gifts too, though. He wins the dice roll and starts with land, lotus, gifts. I give him the two 4cc spells as I have chalice in my hand which I drop first turn @zero and follow it up with a Jugg first turn. He has to tap out in his turn to scroll and has no drain mana up so I can drop a myr and waste one of his lands. He dies to my three turn clock.
2nd game:
SB: Out: Juggernauts, Fusillade, In: 3 REBs + 2 Jesters Cap
He gets some mana out and scrolls and I can resolve a smokestack. He counters a myr and the smoke stack @1 slowly clears the board. I drop a time vault and give him an extra turn to finally wipe out his board. My hand is pretty weak and I can do like nothing. He drops huge amounts of mana but has no business either. I draw chalice but do not want to play it because of his drain mana. He EOT gifts and I use my Time Vault to take an extra turn. He is tapped out so I can resolve chalice @3. He takes his turn and does nothing. I let him take an extra turn with vault. He now has about 15 mana in play and simply tutors up Collossus and hardcasts it. I drop the welder I was holding and he blue blast it. I take an extra turn and draw into: Welder ï?Š. I resolve the second welder and he beatz my for 11. In my turn I welder out his colossus and he plays an EOT Fact. It shows Force, YWill, Tinker, land and Colossus. The crowd murmurs as I stack Force into one pile and the rest into the other. He asks if I am sure and greedily takes the four cards. Everybody gets it as he plays Will into my chalice. He still has enough mana so he hardcasts colossus again. I welder in my Time Bandit EOT and proceed to attack with a 1000/1000 trampler. He tries to Hukyl it but I have the REB.

2nd match Tobias Schein with blue Belcher.
1st game:
I win the dice and keep the optimal anti control hand with chalice zero, shop, crucible and strip mine. He mulls to 6. I think he plays slaver but he doesn’t. Chalice zero still messes up his game plan as he shows me his hand with land grant consisting of, mox jet, belcher, ESG, mystical, tinder wall. He lays a tropical and esg outs the tinder wall. I strip his land which forces him to mystical up another land grant instead of Ancestral. He does nothing in consequence and I drop smoky which eats his tinder wall. I keep the stack at one soot and draw shit for about 5 turns. I can resolve a mox monkey but I need more beatz to end this game. At some point he drops his bayou, rituals, plays necro and draws 15 cards. I am a little worried but with chalice @zero and no more lands left there is actually not a lot he can do anymore. Mox monkey goes for the kill.
2nd game:
SB: Out: ? In: Rack and Ruin and 2 heretic lol.
He has a good start and I have to mulligan. He comboes me out turn two.
3rd game:
I have the god hand with chalice, chalice, mana crypt and crap. I drop chalice @zero and @one and he looks disappointed. Time Bandit comes down turn two and combos him out a turn later.

3rd match: Paul with Muddle Oath
1st game:
He wins the dice and plays island, go. I try to resolve chalice @2 but he forces. I plays land, go. I try to resolve smokestack and he drains. He untaps, plays merchant scroll getting Ancestral, cast it and finds Orchard+Oath in it. Ouch!
2nd game:
SB:
Out: Juggs + ??? In: 3 REB, 2 Jesters Cap, 2 spawning pit
I start with lots of mana and a chalice @2. He forces again. Shit! He plays land + Ancestral. I have nothing big left and play a Time Bandit. Myr would beat down for 7 next turn but he muddles up null rod. He drains another of my threats and resolves oath. I lament his luck having drain, FOW, Ancestral and Null Rod in the first two turns of both games but he just smiles and shows me a hand of another two drains and a rebuild.

4th match: Oliver Salten with Dragon
1sr game:
He wins the dice and duresses my smokestack, making my hand complete crap. I now only have 2 wastelands and try to slow him down until I draw into my second combo part or chalice. He lays a Bazaar and discards two lands, ok the mana screwing plan should be obsolete now. I wast his bazaar but he has another one. He has two mana in play and BoB but seems to find no animate spell. I am stil pretty sure he will win next turn but I topdeck chalice@2. I get two more turns which allow me to constantly beat with a previously resolved Myr and goblin welder. The last turn before he would win I attack for 3 then welder out a mox for black lotus which allows me to cast fusillade for the remaining 3 life he has. He drew like 12 extra cards but couldn’t find an animate spell. I needed like 7 turns to get him to zero life. How lucky!
2nd game:
SB: Out: ??, In: Tormods Crypt+Jesters Cap.
I can get out smokestack + crucible + strip mine but he resolves his single sacred ground he sideboarded. I can do nothing as he builds up and comboes me out.
3rd game:
I play first turn mox monkey and have 2 wastelands to mana screw him. He plays mox, needle naming wasteland and drops bazaar. Dragon and squee go to the graveyard. I eat his mox and play a crucible. He bazaars and drops a land. Next turn he will be at two mana and combo me out. So I say to myself draw that lotus, which I do in consequence. This lets me eat his, needle, waste his bazaar and his land. As he plays no basic lands I have him in crucible/waste lock. I resolve a clock and he decides to draw the game by dropping mox, land and animating his dragon with no other creature in the graveyards.
4th game:
I have to mull to 5 and start with wasteland+chalice @zero. I have got crucible and time vault in my hand. He drops bazaar and discards dragon. I topdeck Shop which is really good right now. I waste his bazaar and drop crucible. He somehow gets his sacred ground into play with sol ring I guess. I draw a Time Bandit and smile seeing the vault in my hand. He drops another bazaar and mills his win condition, he doesn’t seem to have an animate spell. After some thinking he says go and I resolve my Time Vault. He is kind of pissed as he would have won the next turn definitely.

5th match: Manuel Mur with Oath
He plays Oath and I want to make T8 so I offer him a draw. We play it out though.
1st game:
I resolve first turn chalice @2 as he doesn't have the FOW.. How lucky! Without oaths and mana drain this is an easy matchup and Juggernaut beatz him down in four turns.
2nd game:
SB: see above
I am pretty confident as I can resolve smokestack and crucible. Sadly he drops sacred ground which make my board completely useless. I can drop chalice 2 again but proceed to draw NOTHING for 5 turns. Finally i can then resolve a Jesters Cap. He doesn’t scoop which means he has Akroma in his hand. Two turns later he hardcasts Akroma and beatz me down.
3rd game:
What’s my fist turn play? Resolving chalice for 2, heh! We do nothing for about two turns and then I resolve Jester’s Cap which I activate immediately taking out his two creatures. He scoops.  Hey dude, where were your Forces? U need to play them, pretty good cards..

[49 Cents]

He plays land go and I can resolve chalice @2 again!! I am pretty confident as I can follow up the chalice with smokestack and crucible. Sadly he drops sacred goung which make my board completely useless. I draw NOTHING for 5 turns but then resolve a Jesters Cap. He doesn’t scoop which means he has Akroma in his hand. Two turns later he hardcasts Akroma and beatz me down.

So that means he had an anwser?
Cool deck, but wasn't this 'invented' by Hero 't Mannetje?

[Masticor]

I would say severals Teams have been testing some Decks trying to abusing Time Vault. But I haven`t seen a decklist with more than 1 Fussilade online so far, so i can say nothing about the dutch version Hero 't Mannetje is testing.

[heiner]

So that means he had an answer?

I messed that part up, but its fixed now.

Cool deck, but wasn't this 'invented' by Hero 't Mannetje?

I never claimed having invented the myr/vault combo. I played many variations of this deck since myr came out including mono brown versions similar to the ones Hero Top 8'ted with. Nevertheless I believe that this deck is the best version. If you don't like the first part of this thread, just skip it and read the report.

[rvs]

He plays land go and I can resolve chalice @2 again!! I am pretty confident as I can follow up the chalice with smokestack and crucible. Sadly he drops sacred goung which make my board completely useless. I draw NOTHING for 5 turns but then resolve a Jesters Cap. He doesn’t scoop which means he has Akroma in his hand. Two turns later he hardcasts Akroma and beatz me down.

So that means he had an anwser?
Cool deck, but wasn't this 'invented' by Hero 't Mannetje?

It's an invention by Dicemanx, and called Hyper-Mud.

[Chamelet]

This deck has nothing to draw cards. Don't you feel it should have? I mean, once your hand empties, how do you get online again? Suggest taking the Juggies out for TfK's

[49 Cents]

I would try Top out, since it improves all your draws..

[Chamelet]

I would try Top out, since it improves all your draws..

I really stand for Tfk. Top is not CA, and witha  deck that needs to keep it's threat count high, drawing more cards is always the way to go. And TfK helps Welder to be more powerful. It also makes 3 fusillades too much, since you can draw them.
In fact, I just realized the deck's mono-red. That makes TfK not an option... But since this is a prison deck, maybe Sphere of Resistance could be a on-color option.
The thing is: Is adding a 2nd color a viable option or not?

[Masticor]

The Hypermud is similar, but on the whole this is a different deck. We don`t use Metalworker and Staff Combo and so and nearly 1/3 of the Deck is different.

The Problem was going for pressure stuff or card drawing. Laying down multiple threads fast enough should be enough against most Decks. Carddraw would be fine but the options are limited if u want to stay mono red. Grafted Skullcap sux with all the rebuilds being played and Mind`s Eye has has a cc of 5. Well of Knowledge only works well with Metalworker.
So we said playing more threads should be the way. The top is an interesting card we wanted to test after the Tournament, with 4 fetchlands and crucible it should improve the cardquality and help against those i draw 5 rounds nothing of relevance.

I tested many different versions of the Deck, even trying Mask and dreadnought to maximaze early broken play possibilities. I also played with blue using tfk and the restricted goodies, which worked fine for me (cutting the juggies and monkeys). But Heiner wanted to play a Mono Red version for the reasons he mentioned at the beginning of his article. 
 

[Imsomniac101]

Looking at the T8 from last month’s Karlsruhe tournament I realized that I don’t want to face birdshit all day with the gifts I play normally. I wanted some fat creatures. Fish/birdshit looses vs. workshop aggro

The above statement is wrong, wrong, wrong. If BS is the reason that you're playing WS aggro then you are going to lose. There is nothing wrong with playing WS aggro itself, but playing it for the purpose of defeating BS is well silly.

Other than that, nice list. Too bad you only played powered decks. Would have been interesting to see how you would do against Fishies.

[dicemanx]

The Hypermud is similar, but on the whole this is a different deck. We don`t use Metalworker and Staff Combo and so and nearly 1/3 of the Deck is different.

Just out of curiosity, why the more aggro route with Juggernauts rather than having greater combo potential with Metalworker/Staff? I haven't done much work on hyperMUD lately, and I'm wondering if this offshoot tested better. Were the Juggernauts there mainly because of BS?   

[Lunar]

At the risk of getting yelled at, I might guess that with Juggernaughts in there you have an easily playable win with null rod on the board that also does well against little aggro stratagies.

*capt obvious says "nice one there lunar"

but hey, thats the reasoning I might have to run juggernaughts there rather than the combo (I probably wouldnt run the deck at all if that was really my major concern, but at least this set-up gives greater game against what he was trying to meta against...whether that was the correct meta call is apparently up for debate, but the changes are understandable)

EDIT - leave your personal things out.  Dante

[Imsomniac101]

Juggernaut is weak against BS. Just so you know.

[heiner]

I would try Top out, since it improves all your draws..

I have tried two Tops for like 10 games exchanging one welder and a JUGG as I thought they could be good with all the fetchies, but they weren't. They are much too slow in the early game, no CA without welder so I rather had two more threats. Most games with this deck are either won or locked down by turn 3-5 anyway. Normal stax needs draw (even that is debatable) as it plays weak lock cards like wire and sphere which only slow the game down but do not win. 

@Imsomniac:
I have tested the birdshit matchup in depth and it is much worse than fish but still a good matchup. If BS can't resolve Null Rod on turn 2 its over. Point. crucible/wasteland, chalice 1, smoky, or a fast combo win are just huge bombs vs. BS. Even a 1st turn Jugg can be fast enough ot deliver at least 15 damage if BS cannot draw into mishra early. I wouldn't side them out.

@dicemanx:
FIrst of all including red is a huge benefit over mono brown. Fusillade improves the combo part without adding another combo. Mox monkey is house vs. so many decs right now and welder is just needed to win the stax matchup and improves the control matchup. As you probbly know a resolved welder vs. mono brown usually means you will loose. This deck is MUCH more consistent as the brown version and has almost the same explosiveness. The mulligan rate dropped dramatically as staff is just a dead card in your hand and metallworker sucks anyway in my opinion. Say you have metalworker in your hand and two threats. Playing metalworker turn one lets you play two threats turn two with getting only one drained. Id rather play this threat directly turn one and dont feed the drain at all. At last it can be really hard to get metalworker and staff into play with having 4 artifacts left in hand at the same time.

[Imsomniac101]

@Imsomniac:
I have tested the birdshit matchup in depth and it is much worse than fish but still a good matchup. If BS can't resolve Null Rod on turn 2 its over. Point. crucible/wasteland, chalice 1, smoky, or a fast combo win are just huge bombs vs. BS. Even a 1st turn Jugg can be fast enough ot deliver at least 15 damage if BS cannot draw into mishra early. I wouldn't side them out.

BS doesnt play with factories. And I said that Juggernaut is weak vs BS, not the deck itself.

[Fantaman]

Hi Heiner! Here's your italian friend Enea!!!

I look you top8 soooo nice in Karslrue and your list is sooo fast:

One question.... this deck made TOP 8 on DOOMSDAY last september in italy ( over 350 players ) and was played bye one my spanish friend.... inside were spheres.....

don't you think that only 4 chalice are not sufficients against rest of strong type 1 decks?

spheres are incredible...but I think that there's no space in this list.....

spheres are the life of artifact!

[LotusHead]

Hey! Congrats on your top 8 performance, with a newish decklist. I like it.

Heiner was in San Francisco (or therabouts) for a while while my SlapJack (Auriok Salvagers, TriketMage deck) was running rampant in fall 2005. And I first met him when he was playing 2Land Belcher.

I won 2/3 games.  We both were playing combo.  Game one, I resolve 1st/2nd turn Trinket Mage, 2nd/3rd turn Salvager for the win. (he won 1st or second game Belcher style).

Anyways, my two victories involved the same actions. Land, Mox, go.  then Land, Trinket Mage, Lotus, Salvager, Pwn your face, GG?

He hadn't faced that deck before and asked me if my deck always comboed off that consistantly.

I answered: "Hell yes!"
"As long as you aren't playing Null Rod, Force of Will or Chalice of the Void!"

A type 1 moment by LotusHead and Heiner.  Enjoy.

[heiner]

Thanks Enea and Lotushead!

I feel so international now! (writiing this post from a spanish internet cafe on top of it 

Chalice is the strongest lock piece despite of smoky. So they are definitely a four of. I prefere sphere over tangle wire and I will test them replacing the JUGGs. The deck is too high on 4cc spells anyway! I will have a look at Doomsdays T8 too.

Did anybody try this deck out?

[Fantaman]

Mhm Nice nice a great Heiner ehhehehe!

So 3 or four spheres? witch cards will you remove main deck?

---

at doomsday TOP8 a spanish guy plays this deck. He made top8 a greattttt deck!

In spain artifact is favourite deck I think!

[heiner]

@fanta: spheres really get anoying if there are two in play. combined with mox/land destruction this can lead to powerfull soft locks. So I think you should either play 0 or 4.

One Welder and 4 Juggs are free to leave the dec so there is even one more free slot! 

[Fantaman]

So if one slot it's free try a Wheel....! It's the only card I think it's good...!

+ 1 Wheel of Fortune
- 1 Welder

[heiner]

Wheel sucks IMHO, bt it finds Time Vault which should be easily castable in the same turn wheel resolves which would end the game immediately without giving an advantage to the oppponent. I m gonna try it out.

[Fantaman]

Yes Wheel Sucks now but I think is the only card.... you may put in one copy instead of other red cards....

a 7draw card.... but a strange card that sometimes kill player that play it!

See u!

[LotusHead]

Did anybody try this deck out?

I commited myself to TimeBandits.dec for a TimeTwister tourney in Sacramento.

I played the same decklist as Heiner with these changes.

-4 Juggernaut
-1 Barbarian Ring
+4 Sphere of Resistance
+1 Sensei's Divining Top

Sideboard: -1 Viashino Heretic
                +1 Price of Progress (cuz I only had 1 Heretic on hand...)

With the 4 maindeck Spheres, the deck plays a lot like Stax does.  Throw stuff out.  Your opponent can deal with them or not. The Flame Fusilade part of the combo comes up rarely.

I came in 5th place out of 24 players (12 proxy for a TimeTwister. TimeBandits, get it?)

Round 1: Bad Deck vs Timebandits 2-0

Round 2: Paired against my 1 teammate (who came in first! Go Alex and his Oath deck!) Intentional Draw 1-0-1

Round 3: MonoRed Vroman UbaStax: I won game 1 due to his 1st turn Trinisphere, and my Waste, Shop-TimeVault, Shop-LodestoneMyr, AttackstepTrinisphereCover go. I lost game 2 due to Vroman being a great deck builder, 4 Viashino Heretics and 4 Null Rods. (ouch!).  I lost game 3 due to Welder/ViashinoHeretic beatdown.  I capped 3 NullRods away deciding that Sphere of Resistance wont do sqaut against Stax and Jesters Caps, if things go my way, at least make the Rods go away. (which brings me to why I am posting on this 1 month old thread) 1-1-1

Round 4: Burn.dec Game 1 and 2, 1st turn Trinisphere by me. 2-1-1

Round 5: MonoBlue.PhidB2BEnergyFlux.de c.  Game 1: Back2Basics>>>Tapping out to play something that gets Drainded.  Game 2:  I resolve a SmokeStack (ramping to 1) and a TimeVault.  I skip my turns until my opponent loses all his permanents. Awesome. Game3: His Energy Fluxes would own me, but for my resolved 1st turn Welder doing Welder tricks to keep stuff in play.  1 Red Blast kills Energy Flux #2, and I am able to not die until I can discard to 7, putting Lodestone Myr and TimeVault into the graveyard, leaving Sphere of Resistance in play for one out of 2 turns.  This was a tough match, actually, but I eventally attacked with Lodestone Myr, welding in Vault for lotsa damage (with Sphere protection). Whee! I made top 8!

Top 8: WU Fish w/3 maindeck Annuls

He beat me 2 games in a row.  His deck was geared to deal with Stax, and this deck is very StaxLike.

Why I brought this thread up again:  I have been playtesting this deck for 1 solid month, but I neglected to playtest this against actual Stax decks, since THIS deck is "Stax-like"(that is, it was my Stax Archetype deck to play with/against, and I rarely played my 55proxy VromanBuild deck against Timebandits. Doh!), and I found myself unprepared for a Stax Environment. ( only had 1 Viashino Heretic in my sideboard, since I didn't own 2 (uh...12 proxy, I only needed 8 for this build... I know...))

How could this deck be better suited to deal with opposing Stax decks, given that Stax is a really really good/broken deck? (even WITH the Restriction of Trinisphere!)

I assume that I need to deal with 4 archetypes at the moment:  Gifts/Drain.dec, Stax.dec, Combo.dec, Oath.dec.

I feel this build has game enough versus Gifts/Drain.dec pre or post board.  Same with Combo or Oath.  But the Stax Matchup has baffled me.

Any suggestions for this build to shore up the Stax Matchup? I died to 4 Heretic/4 Null Rod.

The full list for reference:



// Lands
    1  Tolarian Academy
    1  Strip Mine
    4  Mountain
    4  Wasteland
    4  Mishra's Workshop
    3  Wooded Foothills

// Creatures
    4  Goblin Welder
    2  Gorilla Shaman (2)
    4  Lodestone Myr

// Spells
    4  Time Vault
    1  Mox Sapphire
    3  Flame Fusillade
    4  Smokestack
    3  Crucible of Worlds
    4  Chalice of the Void
    1  Trinisphere
    1  Mox Ruby
    1  Mox Jet
    1  Mox Pearl
    1  Mox Emerald
    1  Sol Ring
    1  Black Lotus
    1  Mana Vault
    1  Mana Crypt
    4  Sphere of Resistance
    1  Sensei's Divining Top

// Sideboard
SB: 2  Jester's Cap
SB: 2  Tormod's Crypt
SB: 2  Red Elemental Blast
SB: 1  Rack and Ruin
SB: 3  Pyrostatic Pillar
SB: 1  Viashino Heretic
SB: 2  Goblin Bombardment
SB: 1  Pyroblast
SB: 1  Price of Glory

Keep in mind, I am easily able to lose 3 Flame Fusilades and maybe 1 Top to fix up this deck.  TimeVault is fun and almost kind broken, and Lodestone Myr is a decent beater without Vault.