[Deck Discussion] Meandeck Ichorid

[UR]

4. Shuts down Withered Wretch, AND Welders. Does it help against Tormod's Crypt, though? Based on the wording, I doubt, but maybe someone could confirm this...

Tormod's Crypt targets you, not your graveyard or the cards in there. So that doesn't work.

[zREIGNz]

This deck is amazing,

My current maindeck actuallly looks quite different from the first post in this thread.  But I may have teammates who want to play it at Richmond (including myself), so I've been forbidden from posting my current list. 

i was wondering what the changed decklist is now, with the inclusion of unmask...

[Dominik]

These are the Ichorid builds that were played at the recent SCG tournies.

I'm assuming that either the build by Lyle Hawkyard (no Brainstorms?!?!), or the one by Jeremy Riccione are the new builds, as they were the only ones to run Unmask. Anyways, Ichorid placed horribly at the SCG tournies, I think it just took high places before because it was a surprise and it was piloted by a player who would probably T8 regardless of what deck he played. Here's a quote from Michael Lydon (from his recent article), explaining why Friggorid's results were poor:

Friggorid seems somewhat unimpressive. Based on just what I had seen online, I was under the impression that very few people showed up Friggorid, but as you can see, given that there were ten people playing this deck (including a number of well known Vintage players), only getting a single player into the Top 8 - who lost in the first round of the Top 8 - doesn't seem that impressive. This deck had everything going for it: a field full of its best matchup, solid numbers, competent players playing the deck, and the surprise factor of being a new deck… and it still only got one player into the Top 8. This pales by comparison to the strong performance of Intuition/Tendrils or Control Slaver.

[zREIGNz]

undiscovered paridise seems good,
the only downside would ba a situation in wich you enter you turn with it tapped, no cards in hand(or cards that are better than u.paradise), and need to activate bazaar on oiupkeep.

its a narrow situation but it could still be a factor. i wonder if Jeremy Riccione encountered such a situation.

[BreathWeapon]

These are the Ichorid builds that were played at the recent SCG tournies.

I'm assuming that either the build by Lyle Hawkyard (no Brainstorms?!?!), or the one by Jeremy Riccione are the new builds, as they were the only ones to run Unmask. Anyways, Ichorid placed horribly at the SCG tournies, I think it just took high places before because it was a surprise and it was piloted by a player who would probably T8 regardless of what deck he played. Here's a quote from Michael Lydon (from his recent article), explaining why Friggorid's results were poor:

Friggorid seems somewhat unimpressive. Based on just what I had seen online, I was under the impression that very few people showed up Friggorid, but as you can see, given that there were ten people playing this deck (including a number of well known Vintage players), only getting a single player into the Top 8 - who lost in the first round of the Top 8 - doesn't seem that impressive. This deck had everything going for it: a field full of its best matchup, solid numbers, competent players playing the deck, and the surprise factor of being a new deck… and it still only got one player into the Top 8. This pales by comparison to the strong performance of Intuition/Tendrils or Control Slaver.

I don't think a single event can write off Ichorid as a bad deck, one of the things people need to understand about Ichorid is that it is as disruptive as it is fragile and it is going to have its on and off days based on being a deck that uses a number of otherwise bad cards with good synergistic effects, the grave yard, the combat phase and creatures with one toughness.

I don't understand the decision that lead to removing Brainstorm, either it or Careful Study needs to be in the MD if you want to be able to win with Putrid Imp in a timely manner.

[mistervader]

Given my meta, and given that my cardpool allows me to only play Doomsday OR Ichorid, I decided to continue playing Ichorid because any matchup Doomsday is good against, Ichorid is just as good against, or even better than.

Furthermore, Ichorid is almost going to take byes against Stax, from my experience, and gives a few control decks headaches, especially when they don't have power (Non-proxy.), allowing me to run four cards in place of Chalice. Leyline stays in the board, though. I can't begin to squeeze it into my maindeck...

The only thing my combo deck is good against is fellow combo decks that don't win on turn 1 (Sorry, Grim Long doesn't exist here. Non-proxy, remember? ), and well, since I'm often the only one who puts up with combo in tournaments, I don't bother thinking about that matchup, if at all.

That being said, Ichorid is pretty good at sidestepping a lot of decks. In my tournaments, it's only on game 2 when I worry about losing. Usually, I win game 1, then just anticipate what they're boarding in, and adjust accordingly. Chains, Needles, Rods, Leylines, and so forth.

[MuzzonoAmi]

These are the Ichorid builds that were played at the recent SCG tournies.

I'm assuming that either the build by Lyle Hawkyard (no Brainstorms?!?!), or the one by Jeremy Riccione are the new builds, as they were the only ones to run Unmask. Anyways, Ichorid placed horribly at the SCG tournies, I think it just took high places before because it was a surprise and it was piloted by a player who would probably T8 regardless of what deck he played. Here's a quote from Michael Lydon (from his recent article), explaining why Friggorid's results were poor:

Friggorid seems somewhat unimpressive. Based on just what I had seen online, I was under the impression that very few people showed up Friggorid, but as you can see, given that there were ten people playing this deck (including a number of well known Vintage players), only getting a single player into the Top 8 - who lost in the first round of the Top 8 - doesn't seem that impressive. This deck had everything going for it: a field full of its best matchup, solid numbers, competent players playing the deck, and the surprise factor of being a new deck… and it still only got one player into the Top 8. This pales by comparison to the strong performance of Intuition/Tendrils or Control Slaver.

The quote pretty much nails it. Ichorid reams the unprepared, even with a weak pilot. If you force interaction in any way, the deck becomes extremely descision intensive, and all but the best players will lose with it. And even the best players are unlikely to consistently beat Combo, CS, or postboard Workshop decks provided they have compotent pilots.

[BreathWeapon]

I haven't found that to be the case,

Combo isn't a difficult match up, because it's determined via the coin flip, whether or not Leyline or Chalice is in the oppenning grip and either the speed of your beats or the amount of discard in hand. Both of the decks effectively ignore one another and Ichorid gets stronger after the SB when Rod comes in. Whether or not the match up is favorable is arguable, but the games themselves are usually on auto pilot.

Stax actually has to have dedicated hate to deal with Ichorid, either Ensnaring Bridge, Granite Shard, Engineered Plague or possibly Darkblast (which is "meh" because Leyline shuts it off). Most Stax lists I've seen aren't using these cards in sufficient number in the SB to matter and Unmask, Cabal Therapy and Chain of Vapor usually provide the window of opportunity necessary to win the game.

I'm not scared of CS at all, even if I were sitting across from Rich Shay. My match up is ridiculous against that deck, Leyline and Chalice of the Void, Unmask and Cabal Therapy, SB Null Rod and Darkblast give you such a tremendous advantage against that deck.

One of the mistakes I think each of the SCG decklists made was the number of mana sources each one was running, I'm at 4 Delta, 4 Underground, Lotus, Petal, Jet, Chrome and Strip and haven't had any problems with it.

[GrandpaBelcher]

... Ichorid gets stronger after the SB when Rod comes in.

I can definitely see situations where Null Rod would be a good play in Ichorid, and Ichorid may get stronger against combo with Rod, but I've found that one of the most effective ways to stop Ichorid is with Null Rod and mana denial.  The deck wants to remain as fast as possible, and without artifact mana to accelerate its draws and pop Ashen Ghoul out of the yard, it's so much less threatening.  Not to mention that actually playing Null Rod means using two mana that could be spent taking a third of the opponent's life or having a huge dredge for next turn off draw spells.

If I played Ichorid instead of against it, the only things I would even consider running that cost more than 1 would be Time Walk and Balance, both of which have "Win the game if you're playing Ichorid" appended to their text.

[BreathWeapon]

... Ichorid gets stronger after the SB when Rod comes in.

I can definitely see situations where Null Rod would be a good play in Ichorid, and Ichorid may get stronger against combo with Rod, but I've found that one of the most effective ways to stop Ichorid is with Null Rod and mana denial.  The deck wants to remain as fast as possible, and without artifact mana to accelerate its draws and pop Ashen Ghoul out of the yard, it's so much less threatening.  Not to mention that actually playing Null Rod means using two mana that could be spent taking a third of the opponent's life or having a huge dredge for next turn off draw spells.

If I played Ichorid instead of against it, the only things I would even consider running that cost more than 1 would be Time Walk and Balance, both of which have "Win the game if you're playing Ichorid" appended to their text.

I wanted Time Walk and Balance to work out so bad, but both of them are just too unwieldly to make them good choices for the main deck, so I put Strip Mine back in. Null Rod as a 2cc card out of the board is worth it, I think it does more to advance your game state than either Balance or Time Walk for its casting cost against Gifts, Slaver and Tendrils. The draw back of cutting off your own mana acceleration is minimal to cutting off the opponent's, as well as a Tormod's Crypt.

However, I will agree that if the opponent has a Chalice and Wasteland hand on the play against Ichorid it can be nothing short of brutal. Null Rod isn't that intimidating because it can be Unmasked or Therapied, even on the draw, against Fish. That said, i'm 99% sure that Chalice@1 and Waseland is even worse in most situations.

I've also found Stifle to be quite irritiating now that I've gone to the U/B manabase.

[GrandpaBelcher]

Maybe it's just because my opponent hasn't started running Unmasks or Therapying for Null Rods, then.

It just seems like Ichorid should run more like a combo deck than an aggro one (i.e. it should win fast and be hard to disrupt).  The difference is that Ichorid needs to both drop and use its artifact mana, whereas storm combo can get into a position where just playing moxes for storm count is effective enough.  Combo doesn't like to see Chalice or Rod, but it can play around them because it will keep a large hand until its ready to go off.  Ichorid is slightly better about Chalice or Rod (especially Chalice not on the play), but if they hit at the wrong time, the deck will have a harder time getting out from under it.  Why make that worse by dropping your own Null Rod?

Like I said, I've only played against Ichorid, so this is just what I've noticed, but my opponent has been playing nothing but Ichorid since Menendian debuted it, and I think he's an able pilot.  He seems to really struggle if Null Rod hits against him.

For what it's worth, going to a UB manabase seems to make the deck a lot stronger even though it cuts some of the available tricks (namely Balance and Crop Rotation).

[Prometheon]

I don't really see the point of going to a UB manabase. With the amount of lands Ichorid runs, why bother? Is Underground Sea and fetches really better than Gemstone and City? Do we really wanna bother running Basics and then risk drawing them and needing the other color? It'd suck to draw an Island and have a Pimp in hand, or draw a Swamp and have a Brainstorm. And if we're running non basics like Underground Sea and Watery Grave, what advantages do they have over City?

[BreathWeapon]

I don't use Balance or Crop Rotation, so there's no point in maintaining a 5 color manabase that either deals one damage a turn or sacrifices a land every three turns. Fetchlands and Underground Seas are all that I'm using at the moment, and Fetchlands either thin the deck, shuffle after a Brainstorm, protect against Wasteland or give me the option of replacing acceleration with basic land. I fail to see the marginal utility in maintaining a 5c mana base when you are only using 2c.

The 5c manabase isn't a significant loss,

[MuzzonoAmi]

I haven't found that to be the case,

Combo isn't a difficult match up, because it's determined via the coin flip, whether or not Leyline or Chalice is in the oppenning grip and either the speed of your beats or the amount of discard in hand. Both of the decks effectively ignore one another and Ichorid gets stronger after the SB when Rod comes in. Whether or not the match up is favorable is arguable, but the games themselves are usually on auto pilot.

Stax actually has to have dedicated hate to deal with Ichorid, either Ensnaring Bridge, Granite Shard, Engineered Plague or possibly Darkblast (which is "meh" because Leyline shuts it off). Most Stax lists I've seen aren't using these cards in sufficient number in the SB to matter and Unmask, Cabal Therapy and Chain of Vapor usually provide the window of opportunity necessary to win the game.

I'm not scared of CS at all, even if I were sitting across from Rich Shay. My match up is ridiculous against that deck, Leyline and Chalice of the Void, Unmask and Cabal Therapy, SB Null Rod and Darkblast give you such a tremendous advantage against that deck.

I'm a sub-par CS player, and even with Unmasks and Leyline's I've never had too much trouble take 2/3 from Ichorid. Then again, I play against it a fair shake, and do have hate of my own out of the board.

Any Shop player not boarding hate for Ichorid should lose horribly, tear up their cards, and scoop on life. With my current deck, I want to be paried against Ichorid all day becase it's slightly favorable game 1, and with as many as 10 SB cards (though usually just 7) it becomes a near auto-win because of the sheer quantity of hate I can support (at varied CC's, no less).

[Neonico]

Your build should be very special. I didnt loose that much games against any control deck (Beside perhaps some very brutal gift lists played here in france) especially Slaver, with updated Ichorid lists.

[BreathWeapon]

How is Stax favorable against Ichorid game one?

[MuzzonoAmi]

I said "Shop" first off. I'm referring to my WSA build, which is favorable because:

1. It's difficult to disrupt with discard
2. 4 MD Pithing Needle + 5 Strips = Really Good against Ichorid
3. All of my non-utility guys are bigger than yours, and they come out just as fast.

[Harlequin]

I said "Shop" first off. I'm referring to my WSA build, which is favorable because:

1. It's difficult to disrupt with discard
2. 4 MD Pithing Needle + 5 Strips = Really Good against Ichorid
3. All of my non-utility guys are bigger than yours, and they come out just as fast.

4. Shop Agro may run Eon hub in the sideboard.

[MuzzonoAmi]

Eon Hub costs 8.

Orb of Dreams and Caltrops cost 3, and Granite Shard costs 4, and are just as good.

[goobafish]

Eon hub costs 5, and Granite shard costs 3. Its very effective.

[Harlequin]

Granit Shard doesn't stop the 2 "problem enchants" for shop aggro.  Oath of druids (however it does stop oath in stax, because you can afford to not have creautres in play, but remeber we're talking about shop aggro... that needs to play creatures to win).  And Energy Flux.  Eon hub stops both and has the fringe benefit of shutting down Ichoid in a single card, and slowing Stax in some reguards.

[MuzzonoAmi]

Eon hub costs 5, and Granite shard costs 3. Its very effective.

I always get Eon Hub and Posessed Portal confused, don't ask me why.


I know on Shard I was counting the R to use it that turn.

Energy Flux is more of a nuisance enchantment than a problem enchantment in most cases. But let's stay on topic.

[Disburden]

I really like the new list. Brainstorm was good, but I always wished I got into something else when I drew it past the first two turns. Here is Menendian's newest list, I feel it's appropriate to be in this thread:

Maindeck:
Artifacts
1 Black Lotus
4 Chalice Of The Void
1 Chrome Mox
1 Lotus Petal
1 Mox Jet
1 Mox Sapphire

Creatures
4 Ashen Ghoul
4 Golgari Grave-troll
4 Ichorid
4 Putrid Imp
4 Stinkweed Imp
 

Enchantments
4 Leyline Of The Void

Instants
1 Ancestral Recall
2 Chain Of Vapor
1 Crop Rotation
1 Vampiric Tutor

Sorceries
4 Cabal Therapy
1 Imperial Seal
4 Unmask

Lands
4 Bazaar Of Baghdad
4 City Of Brass
4 Gemstone Mine
1 Strip Mine

[BreathWeapon]

The new list is alright, tho' I still feel Mox Sapphire is terrible, especially with out Brainstorm or Careful Study. I haven't figurd out what he keeps using Chan of Vapor MD for, it pretty much just says "let the opponent return Leyline or Chalice to my hand" if it isn't addressing hate out of the SB. It's not like Colossus or Dragon are that much of an issue.

@Workshop Aggro

I'm going to have to test that match up and see for myself, I wasn't aware people still played beats out of shops. That said, I'm not certain how much of a concern this is, as conventinal aggro is preyed upon by Oath and if you're dedicating that much hate to Ichorid your losing the fight against the first deck you should be concerning yourself with

[Disburden]

How is a mox that's on color terrible?

[Prometheon]

There's just not enough blue cards to justify it.

[BreathWeapon]

How is a mox that's on color terrible?

Consider the original build had 4 Brainstorm, 4 Careful Study, 1 Time Walk, 1 Ancestral Recall and a Chain of Vapor and then compare that to the number of blue cards in the most recent version. I'm of the opinion that any mana source that doesn't activate Ashen Ghoul doesn't belong in the deck.

It really is ammusing how little acceleration does for this deck.

[houseplant]

Yeah, I agree, I took out sapphire main because I found it useless most of the time. though I put it in my sideboard so when I bring in the chains I have more of a chance to actually have the U to use one.

[Disburden]

I think there's plenty of reasons to still run Mox Sapphire in the deck.

1) The deck still runs blue spells. Some of the blue spells go into the board. The deck currently runs 2 Chain of Vapor main, two Chain of Vapor in the sideboard, and Brainstorms in the sideboard for decks that do not abuse the graveyard as much. Decks like this are aggro control/ Fish decks where Leyline does not really corrupt their gameplan. The deck should definitely run Chain of Vapor in a four of as some point in the deck. That card is sick tempo and this deck is sick tempo.

2) The point of this deck is to abuse tempo, that is the best thing about Vintage. This format crushes all others in power level not only because of the cards themselves but because of the amount of ways you cheat the way tempo was meant for the game in theory. How is getting a mox that is on color bad at all?

 Say you run deck X, even if you run 8 spells that are blue instead of 14 like that last build of the deck, and the deck is one half blue one half another color; why wouldn't you run it to boost your plays? (this is an example, I'm not using exact number)?

3) Mox sapphire on turn one still helps you bounce a Tomord's crypt in game 1  with Chain of vapor while you use your lands for other purposes. Such as putrid Imp or returning Ghouls during your upkeep after using chain of vapor.

4) The deck should be customized for your meta and the deck is blue/black based with splashes. If you feel you see more fish then you run Brainstorm in the deck.

Why would you waste a board slot for a mox in a deck that isn't Grim Long?

On a different note, I really like how Leyline works with Unmask in this deck. The problem of it becoming a dead draw isn't that bad anymore.

[houseplant]

Why would you waste a board slot for a mox in a deck that isn't Grim Long?

I actually have 4 slots open in my sideboard, I was running 3 chains, 4 null rods, and 4 pithing needles. so i had 4 slots to fill. so I went with 1 sapphire, 1 darkblast and 2 thugs, for when I run into decks that don't have a lot of hate I can speed the deck up throwing that stuff in. can swap out the 4 laylines out for that nicely.