Tyrant Oath

[Malhavoc]

Since Tyrant was printed, I have been toying with it trying to find an oath deck which could make good use of it. The main winning condition being of course the tyrant-2mox combo for infinite storm/mana, killing with a lethal freeze. When this is not possible, bouncing the most annoying permanents could be enough anyway to go for a slower beatdown kill, or just to take time looking for the cunning/freeze. Even against combo, a sided in chalice played for zero after bouncing most of their mana (lands included) could be really effective.

Thinking about the possible builds, mainly two seemed possible: a T1T-like, and a Gifts-like version:

Common cards:
Power cards, Tyrant, oath, orchard, cunning (for freeze and silver bullets), Deep Analysis, FoW, Drain

T1T-version:
AK, intuition, Duress/leak/rune snag

Gifts-version:
Gifts, Merchant, Misdirection

The fact that we already run the rainbow orchards make using more than just UG easier. Sure, the mana base will of course be a bit weaker, but the exchange in power is a good trade off: cards like demonic, yagwin, and a wishable vampiric are just too good to not be an auto-include (after all I always felt like a single fetchable U.Sea is more than enough for the splash). More debatable could be the choice to run recoup, but this card really does not need a volcanic to be used: it's mostly played after an oath activation (thus orchard is already in play), and it has proved well these months how can be powerful in both Gifts and T1T builds.

But here again: which of the two seems the better choice? I think it mostly depends on the metagame and the play stile; both are good options. The T1T version goes for card drawing, while the other for card tutoring. However, the Misdirections in the Gift version also make a first turn oath easier, and the merchants give a good way to quick-tutoring the lethal cunning when we've tyrant in play. These two reasons made me feel the Gift version more synergic with the deck, even if it lacks some of the late game control compared to the other one, which however is much less explosive.


So, here it is the list I'm currently playing with:

// Mana 24
      5 Mox
      1 Sol Ring
      1 Mana Crypt
      1 Black Lotus
      4 Forbidden Orchard
    2 Flooded Strand
    2 Polluted Delta
    1 Underground Sea
    2 Island
    1 Snow-Covered Island
    2 Tropical Island       
    1 Tolarian Academy
    1 Library of Alexandria
   
// Cards I can't play without 5
    1 Tidespout Tyrant
    4 Oath of Druids

// Permissions 10
    4 Mana Drain
    4 Force of Will           
    2 Misdirection
   
// Draw 8
    4 Brainstorm
    1 Ancestral Recall
    2 Gifts Ungiven
    1 Deep Analysis
           
// Tutor 3
    2 Merchant Scroll
    1 Demonic Tutor

// Recycle 4
    1 Recoup
    1 Regrowth
    1 Holistic Wisdom
    1 Krosan Reclamation

// Answers 4
    1 Chain of Vapor
    3 Cunning Wish

// Broken stuff 2
    1 Time Walk
    1 Yawgmoth's Will


**Sideboard**
// Kill
1 Brain Freeze

// Draw & Tutor
1 Fact or Fiction
1 Vampiric Tutor

// Permissions
1 Misdirection
1 Red Elemental Blast

// Removals
1 Echoing Truth
1 Rebuild
1 Rack and Ruin

// Alternative Creatures
1 Woodripper
1 Simic Sky Swallower

// Good against combo, but not only
4 Chalice of the Void
1 Ebony Charm



The way the deck works also depends on the hand you get: you can drop a turbo oath and kill second turn if you have the cards, or just hit with the tyrant and bounce the main threats, then kill just with beatdown, or oath the deck, flashback Krosan into YagWill and win with it (but only if you have good counter backup!).

Otherwise, you can just play the control plan: FoWing and draining their cards, going merchant into ancestral and gift, gift for things like: oath, demonic, regrowth, orchard to combo out; or walk/ancestral/holistic/drain to take control of the game.

In all my testing I've been really satisfied with the result. However, there are still some cards which I'm not too sure of, Holistic Wisdom being the main one: this card is absolutely god when it enters play, letting you recycle ancestral, walk, and drain when you need it, and with enough mana you'll be the only one playing, walk after walk.
However, it is also quite mana intensive, and even if the deck is filled with green, sometime that double green can be too much. Most of all, to improve gifts, there are already cards like regrowth and recoup which work on the graveyard; if the opponent manage to set up a serious grave hate, I would not want to find myself with too many dead draws.
On the other hand, Holistic can really be god, and against control decks can easily win alone.

Another concern is the amount of Tyrants: most of the times one has been more than enough, however there has been games in which I would have liked to run two. Having two into play let me upheaval the opponent's board with two mox if I don't have the kill right now, speeds up a beatdown race in the worst scenario, and most of all is a second oath target if the first tyrant is destroyed.
In my experience, if we activate oath in the mid-late game, one tyrant is more than enough: we usually have enough protections, or at worst we could quite safely oath another time into krosan-ywin. The only time when two would be better is in case of a first turn oath where we've got nothing more than a land and a mox: if the tyrant gets blasted, or worst (sworded), we need to build quite a lot before being able to oath again with enough confidence. Anyway, against decks which run swords (mostly aggro control), SSS makes his come in the second game, making a first turn oath a excellent play anyway.

Compared with a classic Gifts-Oath build, which used to run Colossus, or even worst Akroma, this deck isn't totally dependent on Oath to win: he can just hardcast Tyrant/SSS, particularly after a good drain, does not die against stupid cards like Stormscape, and even if sometimes takes a turn more to kill, it usually kills the same turn you oath, or allows much more board control beating. At the very worst, you can just cast YWill and being able to play a lethal freeze anyway, mainly thanks to the maindecked chain of vapor and maybe wishing for a rebuild first.

One of the most feared match up, however, seems to be Stax and variants of it. Particularly a chalice for 2 shuts off quite a lot of cards (have even thought about switching regrowth with recollect just to have less cc2 cards!), and that's the reason I play rebuild, R&R and even woodripper in side. In a artifact heavy metagame, however, I would probably try to find space in sideboard for some Energy Flux.

Depending on the meta, the chalice of the void could also be switched with some needle/tormod, but I've preferred chalice to improve the combo matchup, and due to its synergy with the deck: it's particularly strong with tyrant (we can bounce our chalice for zero, play the jewelry, and then drop it again) and we can also set it at one losing very little cards in the deck.

[Sextiger]

Props for having  new innovation

I have a few questions about the deck though
1. Did you ever have a problem with graveyard removal in testing, especially if Tyrant is in your hand or dead?
Say your opponent has a Tormod's Crypt on the board, Tyrant is in the yard, since you can't oath your library away, are you forced to find chain to bounce it?

2. Did you have any trouble testing against Control Slaver? They run md bounce, Tormods, and one mindslaver activation would probably screw you over.

3. How do you feel about your combo matchup? Pre Sb do you usually just try to drain a few of their spells and go off?

[Malhavoc]

Trying to reduce the problems with grave hate is the reason I'm tempted about taking Holistic out. Anyway, if Tyrant is not in the grave yet, graveyard hate is not a terrible problem; the main concern is that regrowth, yawin and gifts are less powerful, or useless, but the oath/freeze win is untouched. If instead Tyrant is in the grave, that's a really bad situaion; that's one of the reasons why running two tyrants could be good. I have also tried running a Research/development in side to wish for and put tyrant/ywill back in after a tormod, but in the end I never found myself in such situation, and put R/D away. The key is trying to protect the tyrant, particularly if you fear tormods are played.

In the situation you mentioned, however, I'll probably try to regrowth, or much better reclaim, the Tyrant: if he activates tormod, I can then oath the deck, flashback reclaim, and win with yawgmoth. In the end, it's not really the grave hate, but rather the Tyrant hate (rebs) which is dangerous: that's why if I fear my opponent could run Rebs, I usually side in SSS the second game. I once used to run reclaim (no, not krosan, I really mean Reclaim) in side to reclaim a dead Tyrant and oath it the same turn; even if reclaim can even give you good cards like yawin or walk, I end up using it quite rarely, and decided to cut if of for other cards.

Another way to play around the tormod could be trying a bounce on it, thus forcing him to activate it, and then oath into Ywill.


Pre side Slaver risks to drop an early welder to avoid drains, and then meet my oath, letting me win. Where it's really dangerous is post side, particularly due to its rebs, however that's one of the matches where Chalice shines, even much more if he runs duress also.



Combo pre side could be dangerous, but also depends on the combo type: something like Charbelcher could just combo out too soon, and misdi is most of the time useless. Post side, however, those decks are owned easily by chalice. The better combo decks, like TPS, grim long, pitch long, and similar, are a bit slower, and let you develop your gameplan better. When they see oath they will probably think to have a couple of turns before losing, and could even let you resolve it. Of course, if you manage to drain a good spell, you'll probably going to win; in the end however I feel the preside combo match to be quite balanced.

[brianpk80]

I have been playing Tyrant-Oath for about a month now and have a few observations.

First, one Tyrant is usually not enough because so much can go wrong with that set-up.  You may be tempted to pitch him to FoW, and StP/Diabolic Edict can and will end the game for you time and again.  It's healthy to have at least one back-up Tyrant especially because the infinite-bounce utility (which requires two) wins more games than I can count.  When you have an early Oath, the Tyrant is likely to be accompanied by few permanents on the board.  A land or two and maybe a Mox, Oath, and Sol Ring.  Perhaps less if you're playing Fish or Stax.  These are exactly the matchups where you would find yourself wanting another Tyrant in the library, to bounce Null Rods, Wires, Stacks, Meddlers, Erayos, and Dark Confidants that have an eerie way of turning over Swords/Edicts that you can't stop because you blew your countermagic and instants protecting the Oath in the first place.  Follow that up with a Wasteland and a Fish player with 6-7 cards in hand and suddenly Krosan Reclamation doesn't seem so attractive, and that's even if you can cast it, given your undeveloped mana base.  The second Tyrant then would be a godsend.   And even under different circumstances, he's not dead in hand either because, unlike the Angels, he can be hardcast or pitched if necessary.  The efficiency sacrificed is minimal and, given the random and chaotic nature of Magic, the security factor easily outweighs.  And let's not forget the common horror of finding the Tyrant in your hand and delaying your victory or escape route an indefinite amount of turns until Brainstorm can be found.  Two Tyrants should be an absolute minimum.

A further consideration is that the Tyrant provides Oath with the perfect opportunity to exploit one of the most underused broken spells in the litany of Urza's Saga disasters, namely Show and Tell.  I run 1 or 2 Show and Tells as the anologue to Tinker in Gifts, meaning that it's a bomb that usually ends the game when resolved.  (I also run 3 Tyrants instead of 2 and Gaea's Blessing).  Its "drawback" is negated by the Tidespout Tyrant's inherent ability, and the only real discretion required to use it is watching out for Duplicant, Mindslaver + 4 mana on table, and Yawg's Bargain.  Further, it's a great bait spell and can be used as preemtive protection for Oath, even if you have no creature in hand.  Here the scenario would be:

Play Show and Tell ,
It either gets countered, in which case you more freely then cast Oath of Druids,
Or it resolves, in which case you play the Oath.

Also, Show and Tell + Tyrant is also gives you an escape route from emergencies that will prove fatal if you had to wait for your next upkeep to Oath.  Common examples are a DSC that has attacked once, DSC with the looming threat of Time Walk, an onslaught of Fish/Goblin/Threshold/Gro creatures, a ramped Smokestack, critical Welder activations, an Ichorid family, Bazaar + Dragon, etc.  And with Show and Tell, there is even less disincentive against running multiple Tyrants because they both pitch to FoW and MisD, which is huge in today's meta, and again distinguishes the Tyrants from Angels which cannot be hardcast, another major difference.  By equipping the build with proper accelerants including Academy, I would say I've won 10-15% or so of my games from hardcast Tyrants, and another 10-15% from Showing them into play.  Show and Tell also happens to be a bomb that, for the time being, most players are not expecting and are unprepared for. 

Secondly, on Krosan Reclamation, while the trick is fiery when it happens, is too many eggs in one basket in my experience.  Not only do you open yourself to a game loss v. a standard ensemble of opposing countermagic, but you also subject yourself to losing to many commonplace cards such as Wasteland, Chalice of the Void, Tormod's Crypt/Leyline/Planar, Null Rod, Meddling Mage, Voidmage Prodigy, True Believer, Extract/Rootwater, Sphere of Resistance, Ancestral Recall, and the entire bucket of splash hate for increasingly prevalent combo: Orim's Chant, Stifle, Arcane Lab, Pyrostatic Pillar, etc. The calculus changes somewhat if you have the Tyrant in play, but if that's the case, you should already be at a near insurmountable advantage against every deck except Storm Combo such that you wouldn't need to hinge your victory on the vulnerable Krosan win.  And in that scenario, the second Tyrant would be equally as game-sealing, if not more, than the Krosan trick. 

Finally, whatever draw engine you choose (I use Intuition/AK), the most successful direction I've had with Tyrant-Oath is playing it as an Oath-Prison.  Rather than being seduced by the glamor of infinite mana and storm, I've found it more effective to complement the build with Chalice, Root Maze, Strip effects, and a singleton Life from the Loam which not only helps swing the mana equation (and wrecks the Oath mirror), but also helps ensure you have at least 1 spell to cast after exhausting the hand getting Tyrant into play.  To this end, I have included as my fourth creature the Grand Arbiter Augustin IV only after serious scrutiny and experimentation.  In this build, it's impossible to overlook the utility of an easily hardcastable, Oathable, Pitchable assymetrical Sphere of Resistance. 

Unfortunately, I'm leaving town for a few days and will be unable to follow up this discussion until early next week, but I plan to dedicate a post to it in the near future and wish you luck with your innovations.

-BPK

[yangtze34]

i fully agree with brian.  i played against him a few weeks ago and tyrant wrecked me.  its slower to deal lethal than razia/akroma, but i think its a much safter and much more control oriented build.  show and tell is deadly in that deck.  his build was very nice indeed.  u should post ur list up brian.  see ya on mws sometime.

[Imsomniac101]

I too can attest to the power of Tyrant. In fact, the Tyrant is much more powerful than the hasted angels against Drain and combo decks imo. It's almost a one sided 'geddon everytime it hits the board. Hint: The Tyrant can bounce lands!!!

Imo, to take full advantage of a tyrant that has hit the board, you need to play a deck with a low curve so that you can mass bounce your opponents board. Suggested changes:

    3 Polluted Delta
    2 Underground Sea
    1 Library of Alexandria ----> Strip Mine?
    1 Snow-Covered Island ---> Wasteland?

    2 Tidespout Tyrant

Protection:
    2 Misdirection --> up to 3?
    Duress?
   
"Draw" Engine:

A lot of this comes down to play style, I might have to come back to this later.
           
// Tutor 3
+Vamp Tutor
1 Merchant Scroll ---> maybe 0

// Recycle 4
    1 Recoup?
    1 Regrowth?
    1 Holistic Wisdom ----> cut
    1 Krosan Reclamation ---> gaea's blessing

// Answers 4
    1 Chain of Vapor ---> Rushing River? so that someboday can't bounce your creature.

Add 4x Chalice, so that you have more opportunities for mass bouncing.

Just some of my thoughts. Biggest thing glaring at me is the unnecessarily high number of basic lands, only 4 fetches and things like Holistic Wisdom and only one Tyrant.

Brian has a lot of experience with Tyrant Oath, so it would be prudent to listen to what he has to say.

[Malhavoc]

Show and tell was a card I considered, and surely it can be deadly in certain situations. Maybe the opponent could drop a colossus, or another big card, but tyrant can immediately take care of it. However there are some cards, like necropotence or bargaign, which I do not want to come into play for even just a second. But my main concern is that, unlike Tinker, with SaT I need to have the fatty in my hand, which would mean playing at least three, and that seems a bit too much: playing 2-3 Show and Tell and 2-3 Tyrant leaves not much space to the draw engine.

As running another Tyrant, I think too is a good idea, just looking for the card to take out, probably holistic. Regarding the chalice, they are indeed deadly (I see it when I play them from the side). However, to seal the game I need to have both tyrants in play, something that isn't needed with freeze.


What I will surely test is the life from the loam. This probably forces to switch krosan with gaea, cause milling the tyrants could be dangerous, but on the other hand gaea and loam doesn't seem very synergic. Plus, being able to flashback deep or recoup a timewalk or a ywin after oathing is something really powerful, and most of the time impossible with gaea. However the loam strategy seems interesting, and definitely good in the mirror, which isn't an easy match currently. I'll try it.


As a side note, chain was preferred to rushing for two reasons:

- If I have tyrant in play, there is no reason to use chain, so the drawback is negligible

- If I want to win through YagWin only, Chain is vital to upping the spell count to a good amount

[yangtze34]

Hmmm.  I also think you might not need 2 merchant scrolls.  I think playing 2-3 show and tells wouldnt be that bad of an idea, because they are pitchable to FoW and MisD.  If you play 3 tyrants, one benefit would be if you weren't able to set oath up or generate tokens and you had a show and tell, you could intuition for a tyrant and then SaT it.  But I see that gifts is your engine, not ak/intuition.  But that's something to think about, because those situations probably will happen from time to time.  If you cut some stuff, you could make room for ak/intuition.  Go down to 1 merchant scroll, take out gifts and DA along with wisdom, recoup, and take out a cunning wish.  With ak/intuition, I don't think you will need the drains.  I don't remember too well, but I don't think Brian played drains.  When I played against Brian, I believe he show and telled tyrants into play both games and didn't oath for it once.  His strategy was to counter-bait by casting oath and then wreck you with show and tell. 

[Malhavoc]

Switching to Intu/AK is definitely possible, but cutting drain is out of question: the mana from the drains is too much useful to cast intuition/gift or the Tyrant itself. On the other hand, I'm still not much convinced of Show and Tell: having one Tyrant into play is definitely a good thing, but it does not win the game alone: there have been games where I oathed it, had very few mana on the table, and just kept beating and bouncing some cards with it. In some of those games I risked to lose, or lost: bouncing 1-2 permanents each turn and beating for five could not be enough to win. This means that show and tell, even if it can make me play the tyrant, hasn't granted me the win yet: without a instant winning freeze, or a whole milled deck from which I can recoup a ywill, or flashback some deep analysys, the game is still open.

[yangtze34]

yea the drain thing is debatable, i understand why you want them in the deck.  However, there are gonna be times when you're gonna take huge burns for the unused mana.  Show and tell is good, because its better to get 1 tyrant into play rather than have none in play.  But i could be wrong.  I think you need a stifle and a shadow of a doubt in the board.  Stifle is just a good play against long variants as well as shadow.  Shadow is also great against decks that rely on searching the library like gifts and stops intuition as well.  I also think you could benefit from a gush and a hurkies as well.  And i think putting the angel duo in the board might be good, not sure.  For when you're against a deck that would benefit you to kill faster than with tyrant. 

[Malhavoc]

During my testing the decks I feared most where mainly two (ok, there are other not easy match, but these two seemed the more troublesome): oath mirror and friggorid.

Regarding friggorid, I think I've recently found a good answer: I thought about running caltrops, but I finally found that the mostly unused Silent Arbiter works great: you can either just tutor and cast it, or oath it out (however, activating oath vs friggorid is not easy if your opponent knows how to play it). If it hits the ground, it's usually immediately game over (maybe chain of vapor could save him, but I've rarely seen it played).

As for the oath mirror, the lack of strips effect makes this  an hard match.. I've even thought about running tinker+crucible/colossus in side, or using life from the loam + maindeck strip, but both options do not convince me too much.

[yangtze34]

i think show and tell will help you against oath mirrors where neither of you have orchards in play.  Also, I'm taking a guess, but I think colossus would help out against mirrors too.  If you had W in the deck, I would tell you to run a pulse of the fields SB.  That card has won me so many games against ichorid in extended.

[vartemis]

I have been testing this deck with my group, but it has been sitting on the back burner so I figured I'd post it and get some critique.

    1 Black Lotus
    4 Chalice of the Void
    1 Lotus Petal
    5 Mox
    1 Mana Crypt
    1 Mana Vault
    2 Sensei's Divining Top
    1 Sol Ring

    4 Oath of Druids

    2 Tidespout Tyrant

    1 Ancestral Recall
    4 Brainstorm
    1 Crop Rotation
    3 Cunning Wish
    4 Force of Will
    4 Mana Drain
    2 Misdirection
    1 Rushing River
    1 Vampiric Tutor

    1 Demonic Tutor
    1 Gaea's Blessing
    1 Time Walk

    2 Flooded Strand
    2 Polluted Delta
    4 Forbidden Orchard
    1 Strip Mine
    1 Tolarian Academy
    2 Tropical Island
    1 Underground Sea
    1 Island

**Sideboard**
1 Stroke of Genius
1 Darkblast
1 Chain of Vapor
1 Reclaim
1 Flash of Insight
3 Pithing Needle
1 Tinker
1 Darksteel Colossus
1 Simic Sky Swallower
4 Extract


Much of the card choices are fairly straight forward, so I will only go over the ones different than the lists above.

Mana Vault: puts out an early chalice if needed.  Also allows you to create infinite colorless mana with moxes and a tyrant out.  Also allows you to cast Wishes and wish targets faster.

Sensei's Divining Top:  Digs to find needed stuff, and turns every spell into a cantrip.  Tap to activate top, then cast your instants in response and bounce it.  Recast it and play another instant.  Allows you to draw your deck and refill your hand quite easily.

3 Cunning Wishes:  I have tested this with 2, but I like to see one as soon as possible.

Rushing River over Chain of Vapor:  I find I am more likely to want to bounce opposition, and chain will allow them to bounce the tyrant.

Sideboard:
Stroke: Alternative kill.  With 2 mana producing artifacts, you can produce infinite mana, and cause your opponent to deck themselves.

Darkblast: Welder and Monkey removal

Chain of Vapor: Used to target own permanents to get "combo" going

Reclaim: in case i need something I lost

Flash of Insight: tutor

Pithing Needle: extra artifact for tinker, and helps against slaver which is game over if activated.

Tinker: to get colossus

Darksteel Colossus: alternate win in oath mirror

Simic Sky Swallower: alternate win in control match

Extract: for combo and oath

I think the swapping of 4 Extract, 1 Tinker and 1 Colossus for 4 Oath, 1 Wish, and 1 Tyrant is the best way to play the mirror, not show and tell.  Let them try to get out the oath, and let them win the token war.  Force through an extract on them, and they will hardly be able to win the race against a colossus.  If you are still paranoid, you could always wish/side in the darkblast

j

[netherspirit]

@Vartemis: Why are you using Reclaim but not Regrowth? Regrowth just seems every way better to me.

[Harlequin]

Probly because its an instant, so he can get it with C-Wish.

[klu]

A friend of me is working on an auriok oath since a long time but had a lot of difficulties against stax or even graveyard hate like wretch or leyline. Since he tried tyrant with his auriok, the stax match up became highly favorable.
auriok is really a good beast since the deck runs intuition and cunning wish : you can intuition for auriok, pyrite and auriok and just cunning for the shallow grave.
It enables the tyrant in a great way even if you do not have any cards in hand.
All the auriok hates are soluced by a second activation of oath revealing tyrant.

// Lands
    1  Tundra
    2  Tropical Island
    4  Forbidden Orchard
    2  Flooded Strand
    2  Polluted Delta
    3  Island
    1  Underground Sea

// Creatures
    1  Tidespout Tyrant
    1  Auriok Salvagers

// Spells
    1  Mox Ruby
    1  Black Lotus
    1  Mana Crypt
    2  Merchant Scroll
    1  Mana Leak
    1  Sol Ring
    1  Mox Emerald
    4  Mana Drain
    1  Time Walk
    1  Ancestral Recall
    4  Force of Will
    4  Brainstorm
    4  Oath of Druids
    1  Mox Jet
    2  Misdirection
    1  Yawgmoth's Will
    1  Mox Pearl
    1  Mox Sapphire
    3  Intuition
    3  Deep Analysis
    1  Krosan Reclamation
    1  Demonic Tutor
    1  Pyrite Spellbomb
    2  Cunning Wish

// Sideboard
SB: 1  Misdirection
SB: 1  Echoing Truth
SB: 1  Chain of Vapor
SB: 1  Rebuild
SB: 1  Shallow Grave
SB: 1  Brain Freeze
SB: 1  Vampiric Tutor
SB: 3  Tormod's Crypt
SB: 1  Life from the Loam
SB: 1  Strip Mine
SB: 1  Thirst for Knowledge
SB: 1  Orim's Chant

Here is the list. The deck only weakness is his mana base but resolving a single oath doesn't need much resource.
merchant scroll is a really good card, i cannot imagine cutting them.

[vartemis]

@Vartemis: Why are you using Reclaim but not Regrowth? Regrowth just seems every way better to me.

Probly because its an instant, so he can get it with C-Wish.

Yup.  The other reason why is that with a top on the board, I can "regrowth" anything at instant speed for the same casting cost as regrowth.

Any comments on the decklist?

j

[Harlequin]

Have you considered running 1 Research // Development in the board.  with cunning wish it gives you access to SSS game 1 if your winconditions get removed.

[vartemis]

Have you considered running 1 Research // Development in the board.  with cunning wish it gives you access to SSS game 1 if your winconditions get removed.

It actually was on my short list, but I couldn't figure out what to remove for it.  Possibly 1 Extract.  All I would use it for is to put the creatures back in my deck.  I think it is useless for fetching anything else in the board, as I would want it in my hand, not in my library.

j

[klu]

My comments on your decklist would be : 1 creature seems not enough cause with the tyrant in hand in the early game or in the late game without back up  means you do not activate oath.

@Vartemis : your decklist may be quite good in a specific metagame (mostly combo and stax) but it's a lot slower than malhavoc's list or mine.
our 2 lists are combo oriented, mostly killing once the crea is on board.

gaea's blessing really is a bad card where krosan can wreck some early ywill or animate on combo. plus you do not run yawgmoth's will which is just too good not be be played.

In the topic's list, you already run regrowth so your gifts setup may not require recoup. Without saying adding red weakens the manabase.
i really prefer tfk in sb rather than fact because cunning wish costs 3 and you may not have the 4 mana to cast fact or the B to cast vampiric, wishing for a useless card
The cost of holystic wisdom seems too color expensive to me. i think you should replace it by something more operational.
i aggree with you for most of your other choices but i was just wandering how is your match up against standard oath? how do you deal with wastelands and opponents orchard ?

[vartemis]

@Vartemis : your decklist may be quite good in a specific metagame (mostly combo and stax) but it's a lot slower than malhavoc's list or mine.
our 2 lists are combo oriented, mostly killing once the crea is on board.

I fail to see how its slower.  Once the Tyrant is in play and I have a wish, thats game over.  All I need 2 blue sources and 2 artifact mana producers, which may be the blue sources.  Tap a mox, then play a mox and bounce the tapped mox.  Tap the new mox, then replay the bounced mox. Do this to create an "aribitrarily large amount" of mana, wish for the stroke and kill your opponent.

gaea's blessing really is a bad card where krosan can wreck some early ywill or animate on combo. plus you do not run yawgmoth's will which is just too good not be be played.

I dont need Yawg's Will in the deck.  Don't get me wrong, it's an amazing card, but it just doesn't fit with the deck plan.  All the combo needs is moxes, a tyrant, and a wish.  It also gets around the problem of graveyard hate.  I think I have enough counter to take care of animates.  Blessing is a triggered ability, so the only thing that can stop it is a stifle.  Reclamation can be countered, and then your screwed if your creature happens to be in the last couple of cards in your library.

In the topic's list, you already run regrowth so your gifts setup may not require recoup. Without saying adding red weakens the manabase.

Recoup can be gifted for and then cast from the grave.  If you gifts for regrowth and will and some other stuff, they can toss the will and regrowth in your grave, and then you cant combo out of your grave.  My deck doesnt go off that way, but I assume the list above should be operating like gifts.

i aggree with you for most of your other choices but i was just wandering how is your match up against standard oath? how do you deal with wastelands and opponents orchard ?

Are you talking to me?  If so, this is how I board against oath.  I side out all 4 oaths, 1 tyrant, 1 wish, and I side in 4 Extract, 1 tinker, and the Colossus.  I let them win the orchard war, because it gives me creatures to beat them down.  I extract out their creatures, and counter any oath they try and drop.  With drain mana and my artifact accel, I dont find it hard to hard cast the tyrant if I draw him, and I can still tinker out an early colossus.  If I have some serious problem with wastelands, I can always side out 2 tops and the lotus petal for 3 pithing needles on wasteland.

j

[klu]

@Vartemis : your decklist may be quite good in a specific metagame (mostly combo and stax) but it's a lot slower than malhavoc's list or mine.
our 2 lists are combo oriented, mostly killing once the crea is on board.

I fail to see how its slower.  Once the Tyrant is in play and I have a wish, thats game over.  All I need 2 blue sources and 2 artifact mana producers, which may be the blue sources.  Tap a mox, then play a mox and bounce the tapped mox.  Tap the new mox, then replay the bounced mox. Do this to create an "aribitrarily large amount" of mana, wish for the stroke and kill your opponent.

we'll say it explains to everybody who didn't understand the combo how it works, but thx, i knew

It's is slower because you first have to bounce your chalice and you have to have 2 accel on board where both other decks have stuff to play from graveyard or way to bring back the moxen.

gaea's blessing really is a bad card where krosan can wreck some early ywill or animate on combo. plus you do not run yawgmoth's will which is just too good not be be played.

I dont need Yawg's Will in the deck.  Don't get me wrong, it's an amazing card, but it just doesn't fit with the deck plan.  All the combo needs is moxes, a tyrant, and a wish.  It also gets around the problem of graveyard hate.  I think I have enough counter to take care of animates.  Blessing is a triggered ability, so the only thing that can stop it is a stifle.  Reclamation can be countered, and then your screwed if your creature happens to be in the last couple of cards in your library.

I really see no interest to stop blessing to trigger and in both case, once you got your crea on board, you do not fear having a few cards in library. Krosan also puts on top of library the cunning wish, the ywill or the black (for auriok) for the kill. It nearly never happened to me to loose cause of a counter on the krosan, because once I've oath most of my library, i've already drawn a lot of cards with the deep analysis and found a counter to ensure krosan will resolve.

In the topic's list, you already run regrowth so your gifts setup may not require recoup. Without saying adding red weakens the manabase.

Recoup can be gifted for and then cast from the grave.  If you gifts for regrowth and will and some other stuff, they can toss the will and regrowth in your grave, and then you cant combo out of your grave.  My deck doesnt go off that way, but I assume the list above should be operating like gifts.

If you gift for regrowth and will, the 2 other cards will probably be walk and the missing element of the combo (orchard/oath) and you've got the krosan to shuffle the will in the library

i aggree with you for most of your other choices but i was just wandering how is your match up against standard oath? how do you deal with wastelands and opponents orchard ?

Are you talking to me?  If so, this is how I board against oath.  I side out all 4 oaths, 1 tyrant, 1 wish, and I side in 4 Extract, 1 tinker, and the Colossus.  I let them win the orchard war, because it gives me creatures to beat them down.  I extract out their creatures, and counter any oath they try and drop.  With drain mana and my artifact accel, I dont find it hard to hard cast the tyrant if I draw him, and I can still tinker out an early colossus.  If I have some serious problem with wastelands, I can always side out 2 tops and the lotus petal for 3 pithing needles on wasteland.

"you" was still for the original list but your explanation is quite good too. Even if i really don't like extract : good players / decks don't care of at least the first one. but one thing is sure, you will loose the first game because of their land control superiority.
What i don't like in your list is that it relies a lot on the oath to bring the kill on board. ywill is a kill card and win nearly whatever happened during the game, giving you enough mana to hardcast what you want or simply giving you the possibility to wish for brainfreez without the creature on board.
that's why i really like the intuition + cunning wish way to win with the auriok in the mirror.
Plus, with the 2 crea, you can win easily even if you have removed lotus to will, no mox on board and no business spells in hand. (taking back pearl from grave, then ruby, then infinite mana then pyrite)

Edit : spelling

[Dnine]

 
Rushing River over Chain of Vapor:  I find I am more likely to want to bounce opposition, and chain will allow them to bounce the tyrant.

This makes no sense.  Why would you ever cast chain of vapor on one of your opponent's perminants with tyrant in play???  chain your own mox, use the tyrants ability to  bounce there card, then replay the mox and bounce something else.  Chain is so much better then river in a deck like this. 

[vartemis]

It's is slower because you first have to bounce your chalice and you have to have 2 accel on board where both other decks have stuff to play from graveyard or way to bring back the moxen.

I can bounce my chalice for 0 with any spell, even a mox.  I play the spell and put the two triggers on the stack, chalice first and then the tyrant.  I bounce the chalice, and since it isnt in play at the end of playing the spell, the mox resolves.  I can create the mana with just 1 mox and a chalice.  I can create the mana with any 0 casting cost spell and a mox. I have 14 artifacts that can be used to create infinite mana. Surely I can find 2 of them.  My deck goes off just as fast as yours, possibly even faster.  We are all on equal footing in that we need a creature in play to go off.  Technically Malhavoc and mine can go off faster because we are guaranteed that we are going to get the creature we need.  If you oath and get the Tyrant first, you have to wait another full turn to get the Salvager.  You also need a lotus or LED to go off (2/60), wheras I need 2 blue and a mana producing artifact and 1 of 13 other 0 cc artifacts.  I think my odds are better in getting what I need.

I really see no interest to stop blessing to trigger and in both case, once you got your crea on board, you do not fear having a few cards in library. Krosan also puts on top of library the cunning wish, the ywill or the black (for auriok) for the kill. It nearly never happened to me to loose cause of a counter on the krosan, because once I've oath most of my library, i've already drawn a lot of cards with the deep analysis and found a counter to ensure krosan will resolve.

Stifling the blessing trigger can be a serious pain in Oath' s ass.  I was watching a UW fish vs oath match a couple of weeks ago.  Game 2, Fish sided in Stifles.  Oath goes off and drops a bessing into the bin and then pops out akroma, dumping half his library in the process.  Fish forces through a stifle on the blessing, and oath is now half a deck short and has to seriously consider whether he should risk oathing out Razia.  I didnt watch the end of the game, but UW fish usually packs swords, so if akroma gets swords, and razia is in the bottom 3 cards, you will deck yourself before you're leathal.

Reclamation requires you to dump your entire library before you can "stack" a wish, will, or anything else for that matter, otherwise it's just shuffled back in with everything else.  To empty your library requires 3 oath activations; 1 for each creature, and 1 for the leftovers.  The original list is better in doing this because it only has to oath twice, beating you by 1 full turn.  I just need to oath once and get a tyrant, and then im pretty much set.  SInce I'm not using my grave for anything other than a wished for flash of insight, I might as well shuffle it back in.  There is also great synergy between oathing every turn with all your creatures out, and a top in play.  You get to look at a fresh 3 new cards every turn and pick the best one to draw.  You can't do that with a reclamation.

If you gift for regrowth and will, the 2 other cards will probably be walk and the missing element of the combo (orchard/oath) and you've got the krosan to shuffle the will in the library

Recoup lets you cast Will out of the grave right then, and to get a decent storm count (especially for brain freeze), you will need your graveyard.  If you are given time walk and orchard/oath, then great, you can oath, but your will is in the grave with no way to get it back, other than reclamation which, as stated above will take some time to get it back.  You either have to wait until you've oathed your entire deck, or you just shuffle it back in with the other X number of cards that make up what's left of your library.  What do you do if will ends up being your bottom card, and you've put all your tutors into the grave, along with all your other oaths?  if you loose your creature, your screwed.

If you are playing your auriok version, both are moot as you need the lotus and spellbomb in the grave/hand to go off.  If they are oathed into the grave, you are all set.  Using reclamation should be only used in the even you lose your salvager.

Your deck isnt "tyrant oath", its auriok oath augmented with tyrant.  Other than attacking, your main way to win is the auriok combo.  The Tyrant is the secondary creature to help protect your auriok combo.  The other two decks use the tyrant as their key to victory.  We are comparing apples and oranges.  Both decks have merit, but achieve victory through different combos.  Ideally I wouldnt even use my combo unless I needed to.  Id be just as content to sit back and swing away while they have all their perms in their hand.  I would also replace the oaths in your deck with 4 trinket mages and up the count of salvagers to 4, but then thats a different deck.

I guess we need to get clear which version(s) of the deck we are comparing.  I was originally comparing mine to the first one posted, not your auriok one.  Auriok would obviously want reclamation (if at all).  Id just as soon replace the reclamation with a legacy weapon in auriok.  You cant be decked with it, and with the lotus you can produce infinite mana of every color and remove all your opponents perms from the game.

"you" was still for the original list but your explanation is quite good too. Even if i really don't like extract : good players / decks don't care of at least the first one. but one thing is sure, you will loose the first game because of their land control superiority.

If an opponent casts oath, and im in no position to win the orchard war, im countering it.  My creatures are on color and I will have a lot easier time hardcasting it off drain mana before they can cast akroma or Razia (or Spirit).  If I was anticipating an Oath heavy meta, I would likely -1 petal, -1 vault, -1 trop isl, and +3 wasteland.  Oath is dormant right now where I live, so that affects my deck construction.

Extract hoses (or at least makes it difficult for) so many deck right now, including Long variants, salvagers, oath, gifts.  Seeing 2 isnt hard in a game with the draw, tutors, and the fact there's 4 of em in there.  Even if you just cast 1, it can severely limit those decks' options.

What i don't like in your list is that it relies a lot on the oath to bring the kill on board. ywill is a kill card and win nearly whatever happened during the game, giving you enough mana to hardcast what you want or simply giving you the possibility to wish for brainfreez without the creature on board.

First, this thread and deck is called "tyrant oath", so it obviously is going to rely on oath to win.  Do you think the Super Carpio Bros. oath decks are bad because they rely on oath?  It's an oath deck.  That's like saying you dont like a unicylce because it only has 1 wheel.  It's a unicycle, that's what it does. 

Will is only good if you have stuff in the grave.  If you want to go off quick, how do you plan to fill your grave?  How about Oath? 

Another matter I havent even touched on yet is the inferiority BF has to Tendrils without a tyrant.  If you want to use a storm spell as a finisher, tendrils is the way to go.  Tendrils requires you to play 9 spells before it to kill.  Even if your opponent has say 40 cards in their library (and im doubting that they have that few), you need 13 spells to be played for bf to be effective.  This would require 2 wishes in your build.  1 for the rebuild, and then 1 for the bf.  Your best case scenario is 3 moxes in play. cast rebuild and recast moxes. Play will, replay rebuild, replay moxes.  That's still only 9 spells.  You need another 4 before casting brainfreeze, and you need to find 1 of the remaining 2 wishes in the deck.

As well, there are too many decks that are yard friendly to make decking a viable solution, unless you can make them draw.  How many decks run Colossus? Gifts and Slaver do, so there are 2 decks that can be killed by brainfreeze.  Oath can't.  You might get stax game 1, but game 2 they could side in platz and weld it in response.  Now you've just filled their yard with goodies like they were emptying after trick or treating at the playboy mansion.

Plus, with the 2 crea, you can win easily even if you have removed lotus to will, no mox on board and no business spells in hand. (taking back pearl from grave, then ruby, then infinite mana then pyrite)

Not after I extracted your spellbomb

This makes no sense.  Why would you ever cast chain of vapor on one of your opponent's perminants with tyrant in play???  chain your own mox, use the tyrants ability to  bounce there card, then replay the mox and bounce something else.  Chain is so much better then river in a deck like this. 

I wouldn't cast a chain on my oponent's perms, allowing them to bounce one of my perms.  Rushing river allows me to bounce 2 (or 3 with a tyrant in play) permanents of theirs for 2 and a land.  Chain costs me , possibly one of my permanents, and a land.  You have to remember, this spell won't always be cast with a tyrant in play.  I may need to get rid of something, like a chalice or MedMage, and I dont want to lose my perms.  In a pinch, I can always side it in or wish for it.

As well, Chalices for 1 are a lot more common than chalices for 3.

j

[klu]

If you feel bad with the auriok, you can just switch it for a second tyrant and the spell bomb for an additional cunning wish, to feet better to the thread.
but there are real synergies between the 2 crea : auriok gives artefact to feed the tyrant, enabling the bounce ability even if you have no cards in hand and tyrant gives the auriok the way to kill without the lotus.


What i wanted to show in my "auriok oath augmented with tyrant" is not the way to kill with auriok but the core of the deck : Packing 3 intuition, 3 deep an, 2 merchant scroll, 2 cunning wish, 1 demonic, and some other cards like ywill that can all win once tyrant on board. What i wanted to show too is that once you've won a counter war to have your oath into play (because in control mirror, once your oath is in play, you don't have a lot of cards in hand) you can easily go off with your tyrant with some deep analysis or a recoup. Even krosan reclamation can be flashback to have a bounce.

wheras I need 2 blue and a mana producing artifact and 1 of 13 other 0 cc artifacts

i think you forgot the way to get the cunning wish

Auriok would obviously want reclamation (if at all).  Id just as soon replace the reclamation with a legacy weapon in auriok.  You cant be decked with it, and with the lotus you can produce infinite mana of every color and remove all your opponents perms from the game.

!! you really want me to argue over that?

If an opponent casts oath, and im in no position to win the orchard war, im countering it

the goal of those deck is to disrupt you efficiently in that way you can't counter it. If only you had run mana leak, i would say ok, but you run drain + fow, as does 95% of blue "control" based deck. Cards that a deck like icbm oath is designed to roll over.

Recoup lets you cast Will out of the grave right then

it costs 7 to play your ywill + 3 (cunning wish) + 3 (rebuild) !.

Not after I extracted your spellbomb

I see 4 kill condition  in malhavoc version, 4 in mine and only 2 in yours. I'll explain : to be able to cast a brainfreez for 15 in a game, you need either ywill, or a good draw engine... or both. Cunning wish on its own can't be counted as a win condition without one of these or the tyrant and the chalice version lacks a good draw engine, it has no late game.

As well, there are too many decks that are yard friendly to make decking a viable solution, unless you can make them draw.  How many decks run Colossus? Gifts and Slaver do, so there are 2 decks that can be killed by brainfreeze.  Oath can't.  You might get stax game 1, but game 2 they could side in platz and weld it in response.  Now you've just filled their yard with goodies like they were emptying after trick or treating at the playboy mansion.

3 Deep analysis.

Will is only good if you have stuff in the grave.  If you want to go off quick, how do you plan to fill your grave?  How about Oath?

intuition, merchant scroll...

The matter with oath is in fact not to win once oath can be activated but to have oath in play with orchard.
If you have more question about my specific build, i pray you to send me a pm rather than saying wrong things aboue auriok.

[vartemis]

i think you forgot the way to get the cunning wish

1 DT
1 VT
3 Wishes
Card draw

Shouldnt be too hard to find a 3-of.

!! you really want me to argue over that?

Nope, I was pointing out the better choices than reclamation in a salvager's oath deck.

the goal of those deck is to disrupt you efficiently in that way you can't counter it. If only you had run mana leak, i would say ok, but you run drain + fow, as does 95% of blue "control" based deck. Cards that a deck like icbm oath is designed to roll over.

I have 4 FOW, 4 Drain, and 2 MisD for counter wars.  would it appease you if I traded the chalices in for leaks?  I could also drop a chalice for 2 to stop oath.

it costs 7 to play your ywill + 3 (cunning wish) + 3 (rebuild) !.

Pay the 7 for a will (not that hard off drain mana and accell.  Remember that with a mox you can create infinite mana) and bounce some moxes, then cast rebuild. bouce em again, then cast wish.  It's not that hard to do.  Besides, Cunning wish in a salvager's build should be for utility, not comboing out.  If you look on SCG for salvagers oath, 6 out of 8 decks dont even run Will, and of the two that do, 1 uses it for utility, and the other one is some sort of combo deck with Mind's Desire, burning wishes, and tendrils which makes it an entirely different deck.

I see 4 kill condition  in malhavoc version, 4 in mine and only 2 in yours. I'll explain : to be able to cast a brainfreez for 15 in a game, you need either ywill, or a good draw engine... or both. Cunning wish on its own can't be counted as a win condition without one of these or the tyrant and the chalice version lacks a good draw engine, it has no late game.

I have 4 brainstorm, 2 Tops, DT, VT.  I may even cut a chalice for another top.  A top with a tyrant in play is a draw engine.  Opponent plays a spell.  In response I activate the top. I look at the top 3, decide which one I want, and then tap it to draw.  In response to the top's ability, I FOW or drain or whatever, triggering the tyrant, and bounce the top.  The top comes back to my hand, and then I draw a card.  It turns every single one of my instants into a cantrip.  It also works well with fetchlands.  I look at the top 3, draw the one I want, crack a fetchland and get a fresh 3 next turn.  Late game with an oath out, I am looking at a fresh 3 every turn.  My "draw engine" is about quality, not quantity.   I also dont nessessarily need the wish.  With the tyrants, I can pretty much bounce all of my opponents permanents, and swing away.

3 Deep analysis.

Well, first you said you were going to draw a bunch of cards using this, likely to find a wish or will (assuming you didnt dump in into the grave).  If you've used them all digging, what then?  Or if you save them for your opponent, then it isnt really a draw engine, it's part of the kill.  Even if you only use 2, seeing 4 extra cards isnt as useful as say impluse (each one digs 4 deep) or thirst (you have lots of artifacts to dump, and it digs 3 deep).

intuition, merchant scroll...

You will likely be intuitioning for either orchards or oaths, and those are useless when comboing out using will.  If you are not using intuition to set up oath, then you are wasting the tutor and should be playing bomberman, not aurioath.  Merchant scroll does not fill your yard, it puts an instant in your hand. 

As stated above, Will should be used as a super regrowth, not for comboing out.  Salvagers by nature gets a high storm count with the lotus or LED.  Why do you need Will?  It seems like a win-more card in this case.  Just recycle the lotus, and then brainfreeze.

As for Malhavoc's deck, he has 2 gifts and 2 scrolls.  I think gifts might be the better choice for filling the yard over intuition.  You can get 4 moxes, or lotus, LED, will and recoup (you really need LED in an auriok combo deck).  The latter only requires 1 colorless mana to cast the will, and then you start of with 6 mana of any color to work with.  if you cant go off with 6 mana, your screwed anyways.  You should also consider some chromatic spheres.  Combined with lotus, you can draw your entire deck to find the wish.

The matter with oath is in fact not to win once oath can be activated but to have oath in play with orchard.

every deck has something that has to happen in order for you to win.  The hard thing about belcher is getting the belcher into play and then activating it, but that doesnt stop people from playing it.

If you have more question about my specific build, i pray you to send me a pm rather than saying wrong things aboue auriok.

 

Nope, no questions.  I prefer my salvagers in a bomberman style build.  To each his own.  If you like your deck, and it works for you, then all the power to ya (preferably black bordered)

j

[Malhavoc]

Klu, your decklist is interesting, but I've never been a fan of Salvagers too much. It's easily hated, and even if Tyrant can help removing cards like null rod, needle, or similar, something which hates the graveyard can really ruin your day. The deck can also finish the opponent with the brainfreeze powered by Tyrant, but I would prefer two Tyrants everyday. Just my game style, however, the deck has indeed its value.



As for the regrowth-recoup discussion: regrowth is indeed powerful, particularly if you can merchant an ancestral soon, or if you gift a regrowth in the 4 cards. However, when you activate oath recoup is absolutely better. While you need to have regrowth in hand to play it, recoup can be cast after it has been milled, and has wonderful targets: yagwill, walk, demonic, merchant(for cunning) as the main ones. One of the reasons I used to play with one Tyrant is exactly to have more odds to mill deep analysis and/or recoup. However, I've ended up thinking it's quite risky running only 1 tyrant, and swapped holistic for the second one. Holistic is a great card, but shines mostly in the control matchup, since it's a regrowth for 5, and becomes broken only the turn after. Would still keep it in in a metagame full of control decks, but otherwise it could go to the side, or out of the deck entirely.

Vartemis, the sensei trick is really nice, I like it, and chalice has proven to be awesome in the deck (even if you have a bit more 1cc spells than me), but it seems like your deck lacks both card drawing and tutoring power, at least before Tyrant hits the ground.

The match up with the standard oath isn't good right now. I'm thinking about using tinker+colossus from the side, probably the best option in the end. However, finding a way to oath, even if after the opponent, would be even better: tyrant can easily get rid of akroma&company quite easily: that's the way why show and tell could be an interesting choice as well.

[LizardCZ]

It's is slower because you first have to bounce your chalice and you have to have 2 accel on board where both other decks have stuff to play from graveyard or way to bring back the moxen.

I can bounce my chalice for 0 with any spell, even a mox.  I play the spell and put the two triggers on the stack, chalice first and then the tyrant.  I bounce the chalice, and since it isnt in play at the end of playing the spell, the mox resolves.

Keep dreaming, it doesn't work. Once the Chalice of the Void ability is on the stack, it will resolve even if the CotV is no longer in play. Removing the source of an effect will not negate the effect itself, it's a basic ruling.

[adrienger]

It's is slower because you first have to bounce your chalice and you have to have 2 accel on board where both other decks have stuff to play from graveyard or way to bring back the moxen.

I can bounce my chalice for 0 with any spell, even a mox. I play the spell and put the two triggers on the stack, chalice first and then the tyrant. I bounce the chalice, and since it isnt in play at the end of playing the spell, the mox resolves.

Keep dreaming, it doesn't work. Once the Chalice of the Void ability is on the stack, it will resolve even if the CotV is no longer in play. Removing the source of an effect will not negate the effect itself, it's a basic ruling.

False, it actually work.

Challice triggers at the end of the resolution and at that time it won't be in play!

[vartemis]

It's is slower because you first have to bounce your chalice and you have to have 2 accel on board where both other decks have stuff to play from graveyard or way to bring back the moxen.

I can bounce my chalice for 0 with any spell, even a mox.  I play the spell and put the two triggers on the stack, chalice first and then the tyrant.  I bounce the chalice, and since it isnt in play at the end of playing the spell, the mox resolves.

Keep dreaming, it doesn't work. Once the Chalice of the Void ability is on the stack, it will resolve even if the CotV is no longer in play. Removing the source of an effect will not negate the effect itself, it's a basic ruling.

As per gatherer on chalice:

10/4/2004 It has to be in play at the end of the playing of a spell to trigger. If you sacrifice it during the playing of a spell, it will not trigger.


j