Meadbert Manaless Ichorid Primer

[hvndr3d y34r h3x]

I think you have failed to take in to account the already favorable game state needed to get kelpie into play. Not to mention the EXTREMLY favorable postion  needed  to get kelpie into play with multiple cabal therapies on line( and for some reason not needing the therapies to protect the return). This type of game state is typicly already a blow out for ichorid.
As far as using kelpies abilities over a couple turns, this in very risky with the amount of chain in the meta, not to mention kelpie being less effective than targeting cephalid sage and winning imodiately( no other therapies required). I've thrown this guy on a few list inh free time, and am always extremely displeased with it in comapirson to other options.

[feyd]

How favorable a game state do you need to get sage into play?  How many therapies do you need in the first place?  Dredge is usually in a favorable position after the first therapy, whether by hardcast or flashback.  You would probably have to therapy for force trying to return sage anyways so why not for kelpie?
All things being equal any dread returned target is a "win more"; this new member who runs force of will has eschewed the use of dread return completely, seeing it as a "win more" card.  You waste creature power that you have now for the possibility of resolving return to get a greater effect.  Kelpie differs in the effect that he gives; he trades the immediate draw/discard effect for a much possibly more potent and more powerful effect in the long term.  And "long term" for dredge could mean later in the turn or the following turn.

[hvndr3d y34r h3x]

this is exactly the favorable game state I am talking about. Snaging some sort of control with the first therapy you come across, the casting d return. You could target kelpie, and hope you roll over something relivant three times, or target something like sage and just blatantly dedge three draws. Why not make the certain play with sage?( in response to you question, this why you don't go for kelpie)
 
If you cosider the cabal therapy couple critters and typicaly 2 BFB's being a good senario for getting kelps into play, your odds arn't too great at getting 3 draws to begin with. On top of that just dredging the sage draws should run over the relivant cards kelpie would without the risk on getting nothing in the first dredge and being done.
river kelpie is usualy bad as an early game play, and unnessisary as a late game play.

You talk about all he return targets being win more when equally considered. I think you might misunderstand the purpose of the most popular targets. The most popular targets are: flame-kin, sage, and angel.

flamekin is a necisary target so that you can win  imidiately. Winning imidately is much different than winning more, because you no longer run the risk of passing the turn and getting combo' d out, our your opponent ripping echoing truth. This is not winning more, but many times the difference between winning and losing.

sage has a couple of options, it imidiately turns a bad yard into a good yard ( or saves you time where kelpie would not), or  three draws to retrieves a target/BFB  (something kelpie needs extra pieces and luck to do.

angel is removal. A lot of people will tell you that the worst player at an event is the player who comes unprepaired. This card provides you with ansewers as well as possable tempo advantage.

As you can see, none of these targets are equal, nor are they "win more". The only comparable card to kelpie in function is sage, and kelpie is at its best just needlessly complex and unreliable at performing its functions.
another thing you need to keep in mind is that ichoid is not a long term deck. Its a liniar fast deck that is VERY resistant to control with an interesting take on card advantage.

[saradoc]

flamekin is a necisary target so that you can win  imidiately. Winning imidately is much different than winning more, because you no longer run the risk of passing the turn and getting combo' d out, our your opponent ripping echoing truth.

I don´t agree with this. Please count the games on which you win dred returning a a Zealot and you would also have won next turn attacking with ichorid and zombis. Maybe a 5% (this could be too high) of the games you win dread returning could be lost without it. In my opinion is much better to have real good cards in your hand (Unmask, FoW, whatever) than having on your starting hand cards like dread return, angel, sage or zealot. If you open with a bazar, activate, and you have dredgers, ichorids and dreads in hand, what is the best to discard? For sure dredgers and ichorids, but if your bazar gets wasted your second turn will be incredible stupid, just having some dead cards on your hand you cannot discard.

I think that disruption like Unmask, chalices, leylines, FoWs, or even Duress o Tgz win more games in ichorid than the games that dread return wins. Not to mention the waste of therapies naming FoW or Drain to ensure that the dread return is played. If you waste 2 therapies naming counters to get a sage into play and have bad dredges without  finding the combo to win that turn, you have high probabilities of losing that game, because you haven´t disrupt opponents game development by naming his draw engine or his responses to your game plan. The great advantage of ichorid is that you do not have to worry about countermagic and with the combo you are wasting that advantage.

How many of you side out the combo in games 2 or 3? So why do you still play with it maindeck? Without the combo 1st game winning percentage is more or less the same.

[hvndr3d y34r h3x]

honestly, with out he use of zealot how many games would I have won next turn? Honestly there is  no way to accuratly tell you. The ansewer to this is VERY meta dependent, but honestly I'd guess it to be a  minimum of 40%, I've been playing a lot of combo. Either way, this point is mute in regaurds to kelpies usefullness, no disrespectent.
as far as sbing the combo put game 2, game to is a much different game than game one, with different tool and game dynamic on both sides. Personaly, I wouldn't exclude the combo from my deck game one to accomodate ansewers to problems wich are not there.

[wiley]

On dread return:

As many have said, returning a zealot is often the same as returning an angel/titan/chosen/witness.  The games when the zealot was the only option for victory are few and far between.  This has led some people to say that dread return is a "win more" card.  I cannot disagree with this more.

Zealot is often a "win more" strategy as it requires you to reduce your amount of proactive control (disruption, if you want to call it that), this is why I and others (notably the starter of this thread) have chosen to go with other routes, and indeed plans for designing the deck.  Dread return as a card has never been a "win more" card when properly used, instead it is an "other win" card.  What I mean by this is that when your opponent successfully attacks your core strategies (say by removing bridges or playing out multiple powder kegs/triskelions), you can sometimes win in a way that would not be capable to you otherwise, by returning a creature they cant deal with (chosen was once great for this role thanks to first strike, since it could knock around most creatures all day long, and it gave you time against ones that it couldn't).  Often my game 1 strategy against MUD is to try and return a troll, granted even this can be gotten through if they have trisk and ravager out on the field. They efficiently take out my bridges by sacrificing retrievers or divers to ravager then taking out any ichorids and narcs with trisk after they stabilize.  The only real chance here is to return troll before they get to that game state and produce a threat they can't deal with.  Without return you completely give this match away, as well as any other deck that can attack you on 2-3 fronts (your three fronts that need to be addressed are creatures in play, creatures/bridges in the yard, and bazaar in play.  The average deck only goes after one of these, which is why ichorid survives so well).

I think I've rambled a little bit as I have had a 3 year old jumping on me as I type this, but I hope that I have conveyed my thoughts on dread return.  While it is easy to abuse its power to a point that you harm the rest of your deck, it is still something that I feel is vital to have in any given field of battle.

[wiley]

In regards to my latest build/mana denial in ichorid:

I firmly believe that sundering titan should be in this deck, especially now that cards like gush can no long protect mana bases everywhere.  I think he should remain a 2 of to maximize the chance of getting him by turn 3, as a 1 of you won't see it often enough.  This means excluding other options like angel and chosen, I believe this to be acceptable as the only thing either of those can do that titan can't is instant kill a platinum angel/oath of druids. 

In direct contrast to the above I believe wasteland needs to be changed back to petrified field (which means I need to track down more foil petrified fields ) as wasteland and strip mine should see a drastic increase in play.  The decks that wasteland was best against were gush based decks, as you could color screw people just long enough to steal the win.  This is easily done with titan, and indeed you rarely get a waste unless you're no longer dredging (ie no bazaar).  Therefore field is the choice that I will be testing until my next tournament.

Chalice is an absolute must have in this deck.  It not only protects you from things like bomberman and deez nought who can recur tormod's crypt (with salvagers or ruins respectively) but also shuts people off moxen.  There are fewer early turn spells now, moxen will have to be run to make up for higher curves, if you retard your opponent's fundamental turn then you almost automatically win with this deck.  I found this to be true before, during gush era, and can gaurentee that it will remain true and become even more rooted in the meta to come.

In regards to ichorid in general:

This deck has gotten a big power boost.  People have become complacent and believe the best way to fight this deck was to race it, very few decks coming up can perform that action any longer.  There should be a period of time where this deck is pretty much the best deck to take anywhere you go.  Eventually it will get back to the point it was recently, where ichorid is a meta choice picking it up whenever people least expect it and I am happy with both options.

Ichorid is practically the evolution of sui black in that we have heavy discard and mana denial backed up by an extreme clock (bridge from below).  These elements propelled sui decks to great heights the last time the format looked the way it is now and I look forward to seeing it again.

[meadbert]

Good comments Wiley!  I agree about Titan for sure.  That could be amazing now.

Something else to consider would be a token Strip Mine.  It is solid in the mirror and with Petrified Fields you can sort of tutor for it.  It is very common that using Field to get back Strip Mine is actually better than getting another Bazaar.

I will have to start testing against, but for now I do not really know what to test against.
Restricting Brainstorm really helps the Unmasks and Therapies be better so I expect Dredge to be better than ever.

[wiley]

Our worst match ups don't change much.  You still have certian versions of MUD stax, DeezNoughts/Dark Illusions and bomberman as the only 3/4 that cause real problems.  Goblins sees no play, and with the current work for the new format shaping up it seems that FCG would be the better deck for the meta (I don't fear FCG).  Oath is going back to a route that doesn't combo out (though we still might have a harder game 1 thanks to platz), and the only other decks that have a good chance against ichorid are severely underplayed (as in only 1-2 even in large tournaments).

I am shocked at how little of my testing for this deck (not so good for others) has actually been invalidated due to these restrictions.  I consider this the current noah's arc deck, almost everyone else has been caught in the flood, but we who have practiced with this deck and know all the minute timing tricks and plays are safe.  I must say though that I am glad I have been testing some against control slaver and tyrant blue, or I might have been in anunfavorable position for all the 'new' control decks that will be cropping up.  (experience with sui against "The Deck" helps some too )

[mogz]

Always been a fan of the Icohorid decks in every format and now even more after the restrictions to the point where I'm ready to get rid of my powers and all the blue cards and play Ichorid forever.

So with the addition of Titan, is there any current decklist that you guys might be able to provide? There's a tourney in two weeks time and I'm really eager to jump on it with this deck.

[sorcutt]

I firmly believe that sundering titan should be in this deck, especially now that cards like gush can no long protect mana bases everywhere.  I think he should remain a 2 of to maximize the chance of getting him by turn 3, as a 1 of you won't see it often enough.  This means excluding other options like angel and chosen, I believe this to be acceptable as the only thing either of those can do that titan can't is instant kill a platinum angel/oath of druids.

This is a great point wiley.  Currently my dread return targets are 1x FKZ and 1x Ancestor's Chosen.  This was optimal vs Painter, Gush Storm, and even Flash pre-restrictions because the two targets gave you the choice to either win now, or gain an assload of life so that you don't have to worry about dying now (vis a vis the Tendrils kill).  Post-restrictions, I think the meta is undoubtedly going to slow down by at least 1-2 turns which consequently means that the straight aggro/disruption kill is the right choice for ichorid at this point.  The aggro kill is more stable and it's usually less of an "all in" strategy than the combo FKZ kill.  Ancestor's Chosen isn't really necessary anymore because Tendrils based decks got kicked in the nuts from losing Brainstorm, Ponder, and Merchant Scroll.

However, I would argue that Angel of Despair is going to be more valuable with the prospect of Slaver and Platinum Angel potentially showing up in greater frequency.  Having an out vs Platz is always a good choice.  Post-restrictions my dread targets are 1x Sundering Titan and 1x Angel of Despair.  So far they seem to be the right configuration in the new meta.

Good comments Wiley!  I agree about Titan for sure.  That could be amazing now.

Something else to consider would be a token Strip Mine.  It is solid in the mirror and with Petrified Fields you can sort of tutor for it.  It is very common that using Field to get back Strip Mine is actually better than getting another Bazaar.

My qualm with adding a Strip Mine is that I doubt I'd use it past starting with it in my opening hand.  First turn play is lay down Bazaar 99.9% of the time.  Second turn Strip Mine is pretty saucy but how many times are you going to come across it where you start with it in your hand or see it in the first two Bazaar draws?  Not enough to merit its presence.  You bring up the fact that Petrified Field is like a tutor for Strip Mine, but in actuality it's a pretty crappy tutor.  Playing Petrified Field with Strip Mine in your yard isn't that great when you think about it.  Chances are by turn 3 (provided you have Bazaar turn 1 and P field turn 2) you'll have a Bazaar in you yard from dredging a couple of times.  If I have to choose between grabbing Bazaar or Strip Mine off a Petrified Field activation my choice is always going to be Bazaar.

[wiley]

However, I would argue that Angel of Despair is going to be more valuable with the prospect of Slaver and Platinum Angel potentially showing up in greater frequency.  Having an out vs Platz is always a good choice.  Post-restrictions my dread targets are 1x Sundering Titan and 1x Angel of Despair.  So far they seem to be the right configuration in the new meta.

My problem with splitting the target up is this:  if you are properly randomizing your deck you should have more than 15 card between your dread return targets the majority of the time.  15 cards is typically more than 1 turn, and that is unacceptable.  You will find yourself in many situations where one is better than the other and you have the wrong one.  This increases your aggravation at the deck, which is not a good idea since your going to be on edge having to fight through super efficient hate round after round.  In addition to this there is the fact that you have an answer to slaver in darkblast and a wide range of discard.  Here's a hint, don't let welder come down.  Against platz you have a very good chance to win games 2-3 thanks to a much better clock and a good amount of bounce (and if platz becomes really popular you can put in some ingot chewers in the side.  As it is now wispmares already take out oath.).  These are the two biggest reasons to run angel, and they are already covered.  The only other reason to run the angel is evasion, and I believe that unless your going up against an emptied warrens or 12/12s mister 7/10 does perfectly fine there, especially since he has a built in retard function where he hits your opponent with a brick ... twice.

Ancestor's Chosen is back to it's glory days, it's purpose wasn't really to stop combo, which got screwed by discard anyway, it was to stop "better aggro".  You see, meadbert's build of ichorid is aggro-control, according to the rock paper scissors philosophy better aggro beats aggro-control.  Goblins and fish and bombing men couldn't handle a 40 point swing in life and so chosen stole many games that they would have won.  With the rise in aggro expected ancestor's chosen is not a bad choice, however getting rid of the opponents ability to win is just as/more effective than buffering yourself against their win.

My qualm with adding a Strip Mine is that I doubt I'd use it past starting with it in my opening hand.  First turn play is lay down Bazaar 99.9% of the time.  Second turn Strip Mine is pretty saucy but how many times are you going to come across it where you start with it in your hand or see it in the first two Bazaar draws?  Not enough to merit its presence.  You bring up the fact that Petrified Field is like a tutor for Strip Mine, but in actuality it's a pretty crappy tutor.  Playing Petrified Field with Strip Mine in your yard isn't that great when you think about it.  Chances are by turn 3 (provided you have Bazaar turn 1 and P field turn 2) you'll have a Bazaar in you yard from dredging a couple of times.  If I have to choose between grabbing Bazaar or Strip Mine off a Petrified Field activation my choice is always going to be Bazaar.

I partially agree with this, however there are many situations that arise where pinpoint ld is really good.  My problem with running mine is consistency, as a one of you will rarely ever see it come down (I rarely saw a strip effect when I ran 3, and still less than half the time when I ran 5).  As I said, petrified field is best when bazaar has been destroyed, which I predict will happen more and more often.  If you play down a field (if I rand field and strip in my build I would only have two fields) then you either A)had it in your opening 9 (unlikely) and played it on your second turn or B) have had bazaar wasted.  If it is option A) then I should have flipped over another bazaar by turn 3, and possibly 1 strip mine.  My plans for turn 3 are typically going to be returning a titan and raping the opponents hand so they have a dead turn 3/4 and I win next turn, the best way to ensure this is accomplished would typically be to return a bazaar and dredge 2 more times.  The few times where this would not be the correct play are when you already have everything you need to return titan but the opponent has 3 basic lands of the same type out (you can sac titan to a therapy if they have 2 of the same type out, remember that your setting them up for a dead turn so having titan on the field isn't always necessary).  This is a very narrow situation and not worth hurting the consistency of a second bazaar on turn 3.

These are my opinion and I am certainly interested in hearing others, I may be wrong but I try to build this deck to have the highest resiliency over all 3 games as possible (something many people forgo in order to play the "cool" combo version of the deck).

[meadbert]

I would like to comment on some of the new Dread Return targets that have been proposed.  I reviewed my notes from almost two years ago and found some interesting observations that I had made before.

Platz is terrible:
1:  It does not speed up your kill.  In fact it can slow it down if you sacrifice 3 Bridge tokens to Dread Return.  It's ability goes away once it leaves play and it is easily removed by artifact bounce and Welder.  The only advantage is it saves you from being decked.  Also, Dragon can animate your own Platz and in that manner you just lose.

Titan is somewhat risky in that it also can be Welded out and animated from your yard by Dragon.  Each is less risky than Platz.  If Dragon animates your Platz then you lose unless you have removal.  If Dragon animates Titan then he loses his own lands and you can easily chump block wiith Bridge Tokens.  Unlike Platz, who's ability goes away if Platz is removed, Titan's ability is doubled if it is removed by Welder or artifact bounce.

In those ways Titan is much better than Platz.

[wiley]

I'm trying to find where people put forth platinum angel as a dread return target, if you were confused about me simply saying angel I apologize.  Whenever I mention angel in the context of dread return targets I mean angel of despair.  My testings for platinum angel concur with yours, though I never tested against dragon I found that she took a heavy hit from welders and artifact bounce that was already prolific in the format.

Whenever I am referring to platinum angel or angel in any context other than dread return targets it is almost universally how to get rid of her.  Currently we have bounce and discard, however, we might need to include ingot chewer if meandeck oath 2.0 becomes extremely popular (boo chalice at 1).

Current list of dread return targets for consideration (titan gets my vote): [all assuming you sac 3 zombies to dread return, ie worts case scenario)]
Sundering titan: +1 total power, huge butt for defense, requires less chump blockers, destroys worlds when he enters play and when he gets answered
Angel of Despair: -1 total power/toughness, flying (no attacking with platz or tyrant for you), crushes dreams when it enters play
Ancestor's Chosen: -2 total power/toughness, first strike (take that trike, juggs, piledriver etc.), gives opponent a reality check when it enters play (woah!? life gain works in competitive?!)
Eternal Witness: -4 power, -5 toughness, can be chumped, dies to everything, turns into a BAZAAR OF BAGHDAD
2 cephalid sage + 2 dread return + 2 flame-kin zealot:  Wins faster, takes up a lot of space
Grave Troll: He's here anyway and he's big, like 12/12 big hint hint.

I have the feeling all that has been said before, but I felt it needed repeating for anyone looking at only the last page.

To the guy way up there asking for a recent deck list you can look here http://sales.starcitygames.com//deckdatabase/displaydeck.php?DeckID=24882 for the build of ichorid discussed in this thread and here http://sales.starcitygames.com//deckdatabase/displaydeck.php?DeckID=24894 for the more combo'ish version that many people in this thread have passed over for the most part (though it certianly has its merits)

[nataz]

My initial reaction is that Flame Kin is even less needed since the format should slow down a little now. I really liked flame kin's ability to end the game in one turn, closing the door on an opponents gush/bond, flash, whatever. If I was going to choose a dread return target, I still like angel since you'll get to snag a problem perm, and have a 5/5 flyer for them to deal with.

[meadbert]

I must have been confused between Angel of Despair and Platinum Angel.

I think the targets you listed are good ones.  Note that Lou's list is only 1 card away from the list that top 8ed at Gencon.  Obviously that list has proven that it is powerful so it certainly should not be dismissed.

I could definitely see running 1 Angel of Despair and 1 Sundering Titan.

Angel of Despair does have the weakness of being a pretty good Animate target for Dragon.  Removing your Leyline of the Void or Bazaar could be annoying.  That is still only one matchup though.  Answering Platinum Angel or Oath of Druids is huge!

[sorcutt]

Animate Dead on your Angel of Despair is a pretty dirty play. 

I haven't had the opportunity to test against dragon in about 2 years but I'm sure it will see some play now post restrictions.  What are your testing results with Ichoid vs Dragon?

[sorcutt]

Post restrictions I think the sideboard needs to change a little bit.  Here's what I'm going to run:

4x City of Brass (I run Gemstones in the main)
4x Chain of Vapor
4x Wispmare
2x Shattering Spree
1x Darkblast

I cut emerald in favor of Wismare and Shattering Spree.  I think the evoke creatures are going to be valuble because chances are with less Flash and combo in the meta Stax varient decks will start showing up - Stax decks most likely means Chalice for 1.  Wispmare and Shattering Spree obviously dodge that so I can see them being pretty useful.

Opinions?

[meadbert]

That is an interesting idea.  As I mentioned earlier in this thread, I would be more inclined to run Ingot Chewer rather than Shattering Spree.  Ingot Chewer removes Chalice@1 for R instead of RR and he can be Dread Returned to remove Platinum Angel.  Also, if you have Bridge from Belows in the yard it is nice to bring out a few tokens.  He also dodges Thorn.  The main downside is that you cannot remove multiple artifacts with him.

[sorcutt]

As you could probably tell, I definitely meant Ingot Chewer over Shattering Spree.  Evoke is pretty great at dodging Stax shenanigans.  Sorry, that's what happens when you post at work. 

[wiley]

My opinion is that you have gone down to 8 leyline removal spells.  This in of itself isn't terrible since I typically only want 7-9 post board anyway, however the ones that I want change depending on the matchup.  For instance against storm combo you want the charm because a)you don't have to worry about chalice @ 1 and b) it untaps bazaar, giving you more of a chance to race them.  By restricting yourself to only chain and mare you no longer have this option, I would say that platinum angel will have to become much more commonplace before I would take this route (and even then I would drop 1 sideboard land and 1 mare for 2 chewers.

[meadbert]

So I was running 12 at the last SCG, but that may have been a lack of discipline on my part.  Basically I do tend to want 10 Leyline removal spells.  Just as Wiley said though there are times where I want 4 Wispmare (Stax) and there are times that I want 4x Emerald Charm (Combo) and I always want 4x Chain of Vapor.

I may end up dropping to two Emerald Charms, but I will continue to run at least 10 Leyline removal spells.

I may start the run the same list I did in Richmond, but use only Angel of Despair as my Dread Return creature and then add Darkblast #2 to the main.
Then the sideboard would be 10x Leyline removal, 4xGemstone Mine and 1xDSC (Painter).
This is all preliminary.  Despite its power Dredge is still very much a hate and anti hate deck and thus I expect optimal lists will remain more meta-dependant than other other archetypes are.

Here is the proposed full list:

Bazaar stuff:
4 Bazaar of Baghdad
4 Serum Powder
3 Petrified Field

Dredgers:
4 Golgari Grave-Troll
4 Stinkweed Imp
4 Golgari Thug
2 Darkblast

Beaters:
4 Bridge from Below
4 Narcomoeba
4 Ichorid

Fast Disruption:
4 Leyline of the Void
4 Unmask
4 Chalice of the Void

Flashback Stuff:
4 Cabal Therapy
2 Unmask
2 Dread Return
1 Angel of Despair

Mana used post board:
4 City of Brass

sideboard:
4 Gemstone Mine
1 Darksteel Colosus
4 Chain of Vapor
2 Emerald Charm
4 Wispmare

[bronxie]

ok so, as a player looking at how to best hate out ichorid this weekend at Cary Cup, what is best way to do it? tormod crypt good or extirpate is better?  If i extirpate bridges, can you do anything about it?

[hvndr3d y34r h3x]

@bronxie
Extirpating bfb only buys you time, the ichorids will still kill you (If your lucky enough to get a 2nd extirpate, this is where it goes). Typically I will extirpate bfb and then race the ichoirds, this obviously doesn't work for all archetypes.

[wiley]

The problem with crypt against this deck is as follows;
1.A good Ichorid player will often keep a dredger in hand if at all possible, thereby able to recover from crypt faster than you can race.
2.Even without the dredger in hand, if bazaar isn't touched Ichorid normally recovers in 1-2 turns anyway.
3.Unless Ichorid is crypted 3 times (without bazaar being touched) Ichorid will recover, often in time to race anything you can put out.  Even a crypt on turn 1 with you going first is only slightly scary because I know I can force you to crypt me without putting all my resources forth.
4.In addition to this Ichorid has maindeck chalice of the void, whic convieniently stops your from recurring crypt through any means other than welder which I have discard and darkblast for (welder is always my first pick against workshop decks for therapy).


Crypt certianly helps, don't get me wrong.  It's just that I am so used to facing it that I have learned to play around it even before I ever see it come down.  Leyline hurts worse but is answered easier, the choice ultimately is what youthink your deck can handle.

[meadbert]

I do not think Extirpate is particularly good against Ichorid.  I get Extirpated frequently and still win anyway.  When I do lose to Extirpate it is because two or even three of them are used.

I know that Eric Becker in general advises hitting Grave-Troll, but I would advice hitting Bridge from Below.  Really, the problem is that either causes a trouble.

If you hit Grave-Troll then the Ichorid player will dredge slower but you will soon face the same army of Bridge tokens.

If you hit Bridge from Below then the Ichorid player will Dredge as fast as ever and then quicky Dread Return a Grave-Troll.



Ways to hate out Ichorid:
Leyline of the Void is the best hate because it dodges Chalice and Unmask.

Yixlid Jailer is probably next.  It surivives against most Leyline removal and can come out on turn 1.  The trouble is that Chalice usually means it comes out a turn later and is Therapied.

Planar Void is next.  It takes splash damage from Leyline removal, but it is still very good.

Pithing Needle is probably next since it Shuts of Bazaars and even prevents the first activation.

Tormod's Crypt is next.  It's effect is incredibly powerful but it is stopped by both Chalice and Unmask.

Finally you have Wasteland which is immune to all anti-hate other than Petrified Field.

Echoing Truth is decent.

I have found that the most effective strategy for combo/control decks in general is to board out your counter magic and then board in 4 Leyline and 4 Needle.

[sorcutt]

@ meatbert

That maindeck list seems pretty optimal both pre and post restrictions, minus the fact that you're running 6x Unmask main . 

Post restrictions I'm definitely going to drop the DSC in the board (because painter as the deck is now, will be garbage) and cut 1x charm for 2x Ingot Chewer.

The only deck that I've run into post restrictions that is a REALLY tough matchup is a DeezNauts with the Painter combo + Trinket Mages thrown in.  Post board it runs Jailer, Crypt, Extripate, and Pithing Needle.  It beat the crap out of Ichorid unless Ichorid gets EXTREMELY lucky.

[Eastman]

Many of you have put a lot of good thought and work into this deck.  Meadbert I really like your approach (realizing that matches are predominately played with the SB in) and the resultant deck.  I have a couple of questions:

Meadbert (or anyone else) have you ever tried crop rotation?  Seems like it would reduce the (already small) number of hands where you mull to oblivion.  Isn't that worth it?

And why are cephalid sage/flamekin mixed and treated as a 'large package'.  Can't just a single flamekin/return be enough to pull the 1-turn win?  I see this as a useful out as must-win situations arise frequently in this format.  You'd definitely want it to combo with DSC against Painter.

Finally, has anyone tried Hermit Druid? It would be a game-ending return target and could also be hard cast for a non-bazaar win.

[meadbert]

Meadbert (or anyone else) have you ever tried crop rotation?  Seems like it would reduce the (already small) number of hands where you mull to oblivion.  Isn't that worth it?

I actually have not looked at Crop Rotation since back when I did not want to include Cities in the main.  Generally here is what I noticed back then.  When you had a large hand of 6 or 7 then Crop Rotation was not helpful, because you are generally better off mulliganing than keeping a hand that basically autoloses to Force of Will, Duress, Thoughtseize and so many other common vintage cards.
Once you mulligan down to about 5 you want to keep hands with Crop Rotation + City of Brass, but it becomes unlikely that you have both in such a small hand.
After sideboarding Crop Rotation actually gets much better because you may be running as many as 8 Rainbow lands, thus is functions more like a 5th Bazaar of Baghdad.  Also, opponents should board out counter magic, although I have noticed that they do not.  If they did then you would not have to worry about running Crop Rotation into Force of Will.
This is a promising idea and I will consider it some more.

And why are cephalid sage/flamekin mixed and treated as a 'large package'.  Can't just a single flamekin/return be enough to pull the 1-turn win?  I see this as a useful out as must-win situations arise frequently in this format.  You'd definitely want it to combo with DSC against Painter.

Generally when folks run that combo they run 3-4 Dread Returns and 2 each of Sage and Zealot.  That takes up 7-8 slots which is more than the 4 slots that I recommend.

I actually just ran my newest list this weekend in Cary.  Results are mixed.  Basically I found that I wanted better Dread Return targets, but that was only post board when I probably would have boarded them out anyway.
The two matches I lost were to Ryan Quick, the eventual winner, and Eric Becker, the runner up.
I lost to Ryan when he opened up with a busted hand in game 1 that included his only Pithing Needle and his only Tormod's Crypt.  Then, in game three he opened with Land, Sol Ring and on turn 2 played Land, Trinket Mage->Needle.  The following turn he used another Trinket Mage to find Tormod's Crypt and it was basically all over for me.

I lost to Eric Becker because he had two turn 1 wins and a turn 1 Necro.  Game 1 I was on the play and fortunately was able to disrupt his turn 1 win with Unmask.  Game 2 I lost before I ever had a turn.
In game 3 I mulled to 4 or 5 and had no disruption.  Eric then opened with turn 1 Necro and mini necroed for 4.  I did some substantial dredging and dredged into Therapies and Dread Returns, but I did not hit a Narcomoeba thus I had to pass the turn.  Eric proceeded to do a large Necro for maybe 10 and then pass back to me with Scrubland untapped.  At this point I felt good because I think I could win if I just swung in with my Ichorids, but if not I could at least use multiple Therapies to disrupt and possibly Dread Return Witness and dump Chalice in play.  Anyway, Eric used that Scrubland to Orim's Chant me on my upkeep and then he comboed out easily on turn 3.
Orim's Chant is solid in long!

In neither loss did I feel the deck gave out on me.  Losing game 1 to Needle + Crypt is just something that Dredge does and it should be very rare that I run into that sort of busted hand.
Long is fast enough to race Dredge and the matchup against Eric showed this.  If anything I will be more likely to run 4 Emerald Charm and only 2 Wispmare since it the short term there seems to be far more combo than Shops.
I may have mis-sideboarded because I boarded out two of my four Leylines.  Perhaps I should have left all 4 in and cut back on Chain of Vapor.  I am just not sure.

Finally, has anyone tried Hermit Druid? It would be a game-ending return target and could also be hard cast for a non-bazaar win.

If you Dread Return Hermit Druid then you must pass the turn.  You can activate him next turn to bring out all of your Narcomoebas, but that is still winning the next turn and it is conditional on having City of Brass in play.

[c dizzle]

Finally, has anyone tried Hermit Druid? It would be a game-ending return target and could also be hard cast for a non-bazaar win.

Hermit takes a turn to activate (summoning sickness) and then mana to activate. You can get around the summoning sickness issue with FKZ, but If you want the fast kill, just go FKZ & Cephalid Sage and not get handcuffed waiting for a land that produces mana.