If I were to play Lodestone Golem

[TheShop]

On the skullclamp issue:  I think I would rather have spawning pit and run a lower risk of oath triggering than skullclamp.  It doesn't look bad,  i just believe keeping the trigger away is more important than the limited ability to answer after.

[Neonico]

Crucible + god's eye allows you to freely up the stack to 2, but it's also free to up it to 3, costing only a permanent each turn until you sac smokestack, loosing only god's eye and smokestack.... Which is absolutly nuts. I often used Smokestack as a reset button more than to control my opponents board, and i often had nothing in play after i blew up the stack. The situation is clearly different there....

As for all other arguments, i think Evenpence made all my thoughts about the card, nothing for me to add.

[meadbert]

Gambit just split for first with a deck that is two cards off from the original maindeck I proposed.  You can find his report in this thread:
http://www.themanadrain.com/index.php?topic=40275.0

He was fortunate in that he never faced Oath or Predator, so his strong showing might have partly been good matchups.  I am still not sure how best to handle those however Menendian has proposed a solution for Oath in the Mud Thread.

Steve recommends High Market.  It is a land with two abilities.
First it can tap for a colorless mana.
Second you can tap it and sac a creature to gain 1 life.
It is an interesting way to fight Orchards.
One question is if High Market is used, should it be moved to the main.  While worse than Factory and Ancient Tomb, it might be close enough that it is worth saving the extra space in the sideboard.

I am not convinced that High Market is better than Powder Keg since Keg can sort of serve the same purpose.  The advantage of Keg is that even if you play it two turns after Orchard hits you can still wipe all of their tokens from the board.  Also Keg answers Vault/Key, Moxen, Warrens, and crucially Welder.  Keg can in theory answer Predator, but that is unreliable.

The disadvantage of Keg is that it is a one shot deal so without Wasteland they will just create another token the next turn so High Market may be better.

[Evenpence]

Run a singleton High Market.  Couldn't hurt.

[meadbert]

Run a singleton High Market.  Couldn't hurt.

A token High Market in the main is a solid idea since it can be Tutored up!
Then either 3 more could be run in the board or the Kegs.  For now I will stick to the Kegs.

Has anyone come up with a Predator plan?  Does Tangle Wire just need to be added to the maindeck to deal with Predator?  I find Tangle is not great for stopping Vault/Key or Oath or much of anything, except it is great at stopping Predator.


If other mud decks are running Dups/Trike/Razormane then they may keep Predator down for us, but looking at recent top 8s that does not seem to be the case.

[Troy_Costisick]

I like Dupes and Razormane.  Not so much Trikes w/o some kind of recursion like Welder or Scarecrone.

[meadbert]

Okay, so I have tested about 40 games with Noble Fish where they automatically start with Predator in their opening grip.  This is pre board so no Kegs.
What I am seeing is that Predator is not that bad of a problem.  First, Fish is not thrilled to have to pay 3cc for any spell to begin with.  That they want to use Wasteland on Shop or Factory would make this hurdle tougher, but in reality they are probably better off keeping Wasteland to get enough mana to play Predator.  With Lodestones, Resistors, Wastes, Strip, Smokeys and Maps denying mana (not to mention Karn eating an occational Mox) fish cannot consistently get Predator down.  Basically that was 23 cards I just listed so you figure 4 of your first 10 cards are going to deny mana meaning Fish is looking at possibly 7 mana sources + counters needed by turn 3 which is pretty tough.
Predator definitely helps the matchup for Fish, but I actually found Tarmogoyf to be scarier just because of the easier casting cost.  Post board Goyf is shut off by Chalice@2 and should be removed in time by Keg so Goyf is already handled well in the sideboard.

[Troy_Costisick]

Okay, so I have tested about 40 games with Noble Fish where they automatically start with Predator in their opening grip.  This is pre board so no Kegs.
What I am seeing is that Predator is not that bad of a problem.  First, Fish is not thrilled to have to pay 3cc for any spell to begin with.  That they want to use Wasteland on Shop or Factory would make this hurdle tougher, but in reality they are probably better off keeping Wasteland to get enough mana to play Predator.  With Lodestones, Resistors, Wastes, Strip, Smokeys and Maps denying mana (not to mention Karn eating an occational Mox) fish cannot consistently get Predator down.  Basically that was 23 cards I just listed so you figure 4 of your first 10 cards are going to deny mana meaning Fish is looking at possibly 7 mana sources + counters needed by turn 3 which is pretty tough.
Predator definitely helps the matchup for Fish, but I actually found Tarmogoyf to be scarier just because of the easier casting cost.  Post board Goyf is shut off by Chalice@2 and should be removed in time by Keg so Goyf is already handled well in the sideboard.

Just a thought.  Have you tried Noble Fish with Trygon 3 cards down instead of in the opening grip?  Would that make much difference if they have a different card in their opening hand?

[meadbert]

Just a thought.  Have you tried Noble Fish with Trygon 3 cards down instead of in the opening grip?  Would that make much difference if they have a different card in their opening hand?

I have not tried.  Predator is rarely a turn 1 play, but without disruption is actually a reasonably likely turn 2 play thanks to Hierarch and Moxen.  A lot of times Predator comes down before your disruption is ready.

A common example is Fish starts with turn 1 Land, Hierarchy.  Stax then drops turn 1 Smokey.  Fish then comes back with turn 2 land, Predator.

For the reason above, I think Fish does want Predator by turn 2, but in the opening hand it would rather have acceleration or a counter.

[Explosive Engineer]

I took Meadbert's decklist (with a few minor alterations and sideboard metagaming) to the Myriad tournament this past weekend, and took first place that afternoon.  I thought id share my thoughts on the list, and raise my discussion topics.  Foremost, here was the list i ran:

60   DECKLIST
   //CREATURES
2   Karn,Silver Golem
4   Lodestone Golem
   //ARTIFACTS
1   Trinisphere
4   Sphere Of Resistance
4   Thorn Of Amethyst
4   Smokestack
4   Crucible Of Worlds
3   Expedition Map
4   Sculpting Steel
4   Serum Powder
1   Black Lotus
1   Mox Ruby
1   Mox Jet
1   Mox Sapphire
1   Mox Emerald
1   Mox Pearl
1   Sol Ring
1   Mana Crypt
   //LAND
4   Wasteland
4   Mishra's Workshop
4   Ancient Tomb
3   Mishra's Factory
1   Strip Mine
1   Tolarian Academy
1   Phyrexian Tower
   
   //SIDEBOARD
3   Razormane Masticore
4   Chalice of the Void
1   The Tabernacle at Pendrell Vale
1   Karakas
1   Tower of the Magistrate
2   Pithing Needle
3   Bojuka Bog

My overall match record for the day was 6-2-0 (4-1 vs. Tezz, 1-0 vs. MUD, 1-0 vs red burn homebrew, 0-1 vs. Oath).  I had expected a field of oath and shops, but instead met a field dominated by Tezz.    The necessity of null rod in today's metagame has been a subject of debate on these boards recently, and everyone seems to offer his/her opinion based on anecdotal evidence or posturing.  My match results suggest that this deck has a favorable matchup versus the powerful planeswalker without the presence of null rod (in main or board). Rather, the key weapons for me on the day were Chalice of the Void and Sculpting Steel (let's not state the obvious sphere effects or loaded golem).  While chalice for (1) does cut off expedition map, the benefits heavily outweighed the costs on the day.  Nature's Claim was rampant; appearing as maindeck and sideboard hate alike.  Additionally, the ability to cut off a significant population of my opponents card advantage and filtering lead to tangible wins (evidenced by post-game chatter with opponents).  Sculpting steel offered the flexibility to copy any threat in the deck (sphere or otherwise), as well as answer Tinker.  I vividly remember a game in round 5 vs. Bill (team car?) where his tinker->DSC was answered by (2) sculpted robots on MUD's team. I had already cut off voltaic Key (with chalice at 1), so he could have opted to tinker for the key with hope to topdeck a vault, but fetching a robot did seem like the strongest play at the time. Nonetheless, holding back what may be sculpting steels forced my opponents attempt to play around the card all day.  

I was disappointed with Serum Powders all day.  It felt as if every sub-optimal opening grip didn't have a serum powder, and every good to plus hand had one as a dead card.  In Meadbert's main post, he suggested the inclusion of serum powder to buoy the mana denial plan by allowing you to mull into a shop and dump your spheres.  In a vaccuum, i dont disagree with this theory.  In practice, i just wished it were a chalice of the void every time. The problem that i faced playing serum powder in this deck was simply that the deck has a lot of good opening hands.  This is not your father's workshop->trinisphere deck.  The threat density of this deck is high compared to previous incarnations that may have wanted serum powder, and there are many playable hands that will contain serum powder.  Moreover, the card is a terrible mid->late game draw for a deck whose gameplan is to extend the length of the game and win by attrition.

Expedition Map was great.  After its first use on the day, Expedition Map turned into an early must-counter in nearly every game.  When you play Map, opponents must assume that you have a crucible in your hand (or have nature's claim at the ready) or the game can end quickly.  Beyond a strip mine/Tolarian lackey, i used the map to bait counterspells and resolve more crucial threats (spheres/stack).  

Special thanks to Meadbert for his innovative spirit.

Cheers

[madmanmike25]

I know exactly what you mean about Serum Powders.  MUD already has pretty consistent hands and many times it's like -1 to an already keepable hand.  They seem easily replaced by Tangles to me.

How was Tower of the Magistrate?  Was it just to see if Lodestone could race through an opponents Tinker?

I would be interested to hear if anyone has tested a singleton Bazaar with that many Maps.  That seems very powerful mid-late game and has synergy with Crucible.

[Explosive Engineer]

How was Tower of the Magistrate?  Was it just to see if Lodestone could race through an opponents Tinker?

  Tower of the Magistrate does a few powerful things in the MUD matchup.  It makes your threats immune to their masticore/trike, grants your threats evasion, or can delay a MW/Staff combo for a turn or so.  If they're running SoFI, Tower can buy you some time there, too.  In a mirror match with so many dead cards, each advantage is amplified.

[Bill Copes]

Sculpting steel offered the flexibility to copy any threat in the deck (sphere or otherwise), as well as answer Tinker.  I vividly remember a game in round 5 vs. Bill (team car?) where his tinker->DSC was answered by (2) sculpted robots on MUD's team. I had already cut off voltaic Key (with chalice at 1), so he could have opted to tinker for the key with hope to topdeck a vault, but fetching a robot did seem like the strongest play at the time. Nonetheless, holding back what may be sculpting steels forced my opponents attempt to play around the card all day. 

Double Sculpting Steel was definitely a beating -- an unexpected one at that!  I didn't recall you casting any sculpting steels in game one (and didn't pay much attention to your previous matches), so I assumed you were holding 2 lands or tangle wires.  I blindly tinkered into Darksteel, thinking that it would end the game quickly.  And it sure did.  Chalk that game loss up to inexperience against the new breed of MUD.  The workshop landscape has changed dramatically since I last picked them up (Aug/September of last year).  It's not the mediocre deck it used to be.

[credmond]

I was disappointed with Serum Powders all day.  It felt as if every sub-optimal opening grip didn't have a serum powder, and every good to plus hand had one as a dead card.  

The lackluster performance of Serum Powder may have something to do with your taking Leylines out of the sideboard. I personally would only have maindeck serum powders in a MUD deck that 1) had no null rod and 2) had maindeck or sideboard Leylines. As strictly a workshop finder Serum powder isn't that good.

[TheShop]

Since this thread refuses to die...if I were to play lodestone I would play:
1 trinisphere
4 chalice
3 rod
4 crucible
4 smoke
4 wire
4 lodestone
4 welder
2 duplicant

4 shop
4 waste
1 strip
1 academy
4 b-ring
3 mountain
4 bazaar

9 artifact mana

....not claiming to be original with this

[Cyberpunker]

I have a question about Expedition Map to the winner of the Myriad Tournament.

What happens if the opponent lets the Map through but decides to just counter your Crucible? That is what I would do...unless you trick me into letting Crucible resolve first before casting Map. Which in that case, I would counter Map.

[Explosive Engineer]

I have a question about Expedition Map to the winner of the Myriad Tournament.

What happens if the opponent lets the Map through but decides to just counter your Crucible? That is what I would do...unless you trick me into letting Crucible resolve first before casting Map. Which in that case, I would counter Map.

The answer to your question is that crucible gets countered.  Realistically, if all my hand can do is cast a map into crucible, or visa verca, i would mulligan.  The sequence of plays will vary depending on whats in MUD's hand, but take this opening hand for example: [workshop, mox emerald, expedition map, thorn, crucible, sphere, wasteland].  The goal of this hand is to get a strip lock, but just running the crucible out there to get countered would be foolish.  Rather, you play smaller threats first (resistors) to bait counters.  If these threats resolve, it will be difficult for your opponent to counter the either map or crucible.  If map resolves early but my opponent has the board position to Force a counter through the spheres, it may make sense to slow roll the crucible.  Just about every permanent in this deck is a threat, especially in the early game.  You cant counter everything.

[nineisnoone]

I have a question about Expedition Map to the winner of the Myriad Tournament.

What happens if the opponent lets the Map through but decides to just counter your Crucible? That is what I would do...unless you trick me into letting Crucible resolve first before casting Map. Which in that case, I would counter Map.

The answer to your question is that crucible gets countered.  Realistically, if all my hand can do is cast a map into crucible, or visa verca, i would mulligan.  The sequence of plays will vary depending on whats in MUD's hand, but take this opening hand for example: [workshop, mox emerald, expedition map, thorn, crucible, sphere, wasteland].  The goal of this hand is to get a strip lock, but just running the crucible out there to get countered would be foolish.  Rather, you play smaller threats first (resistors) to bait counters.  If these threats resolve, it will be difficult for your opponent to counter the either map or crucible.  If map resolves early but my opponent has the board position to Force a counter through the spheres, it may make sense to slow roll the crucible.  Just about every permanent in this deck is a threat, especially in the early game.  You cant counter everything.

Let's also not forget that there is absolutely nothing wrong with using Map without Crucible in play.  You can still get that Strip Mine or even something as boring as another Workshop. 

[Mantis]

To the people who tested this deck: Does it have a good matchup against MUD and Stax? How does the match play out?

[meadbert]

To the people who tested this deck: Does it have a good matchup against MUD and Stax? How does the match play out?

No.
Goblin Welder is a beating because he messes you up and gives you all your bad aritifacts.
Metalworker is a beating since he dodges the mana denial plan.

I have tested the Null Brooch Uba Stax vs This Deck matchup a ton.  This will never happen in a tournament since no one plays Null Brooch, but there may be some useful information here.

Ensnaring Bridge is a huge pain.  If that hits, then Expedition Stax must get Smokestack out to remove it, keep an active Welder off the table and win the permanent war.
Welder wrecks the whole plan by Welding out Smokestack.  Both sides have Crucibles, but Null Brooch Uba Stax abuses its Crucible better with Bazaar.
Uba Mask + Bazaar = 0 Chance of winning permanent war.
Null Brooch = 0 Chance of winning permanent war.

For all those reasons Ensnaring Bridge leads to game loss almost every time.
Throw in Uba Locks, Welder in general, Ramping Smokestack + Brooch or Crucible or Crucible + Bazaar and it is just a terrible matchup.

[serracollector]

This was just an idea i had, but is teferi's puzzle box an idea for a version like yours?  With the map/crucible idea.  I may be incorrect, but some affects that Teferi's Puzzle box can have on opponents:

1.) Messes up regrowth plans if not enough mana to play whatever they returned.

2.) Can mess up top deck tutors.

3.) Mess up metalworker hands.

4.) Can help you shuffle in non-threats (multiple maps for example), for possible threats since the majority of the deck is.

Also, this card makes your opponent have to try and be on the offensive constantly, because they have no idea what they will have in their hand next turn. This can majorly disrupt a control player. They won't know what to do.  

Anyways, its at least a sideboard option I think, IF it works the way I think it does.  Anyways, for the deck right now, for the 4 serum powders I would throw in 2 grim monolith 1 grim monolith, and 1 mana vault, and 2 voltaic Key. I just noticed you didn't have mana vault.....why not?  Grim/vault is an instant mana boost and with key is just really, on top of so many people playing this silly time vault card for you to copy. Also a first turn grim/vault can be dropped to crack an early map.

[meadbert]

I am pretty sure Puzzle Box would be really bad.  Basically you want to mana shaft them and get them stuck with a bunch of card in hand that they cannot play.

Allowing them to filter out high cc uncastable cards and replace them with low cc cards or, even worse, mana sources is just bad.

Meanwhile you are likely to have dumped most of your hand so while you may be able to filter out a Serum Powder here or there in generall Puzzle Box is helping your opponent more than it helps you.

I left out Mana Vault because I do not like the 1 time effect and I would not run Voltaic Key just increase it might mini combo with Mana Vault produce ... 2 mana a turn?  I mean 2xSerum Powders also "combo" to produce 2 mana a turn and those are basically the worst card (after mulliganing) in the deck and they do not rely on each other.

Mana Vault might belong because the acceleration is nice, but I the reason I left it out was the the 1 time effect.  Given that this deck is mono colored it is only slightly worse than Lotus so I could be wrong on that for sure.

[Smmenen]

my article on monday references this thread.

FYI, this thread belongs in the Workshop forum, not here.  this is a thread about a MUD deck. 

[Smmenen]

FYI, the original MUD list developed by Arthur and Koen ran 3 Petrified Field and 4 City of Traitors (no Ancient Tomb).  The emphasis was strong on recurring your mana base. 

In regards to your original post, which I read for the first time last night, I think Petrified Field serves a similar function to what you want Crucible and Expedition Map to do.   

[meadbert]

I had actually mentioned Petrified Field in the original post and I went back and tested it later.  I compared it against Crucible and Map just as you suggested.  I also compared it and Null Rod together against Ancient Tomb and Map.  The idea was that without Map, Rod became good again.  This was a while ago so my memory is somewhat hazy.

Essentially dropping Ancient Tombs does not work for mulliganing reasons.  Uba Stax can open with Red Source/Welder on turn 1 and Bazaar on turn 2 so it does not need Shop and can mulligan more aggressively to Shop or Red Source + Welder + Bazaar.
Without Tomb this deck does not have such an alternate opening.  You are stuck keeping some bad hands which usually result in game losses or mulliganing Dredge style into Shop which leads to potentially even worse hands that also lead to game losses.  In order to have good enough hands often enough, Ancient Tomb is needed.  Perhaps four are not needed, but zero definitely does not work.

That pretty much rules out bringing in Petrified Field and Null Rod for Map and Tomb.

What about pulling just Crucible or just Map for Field?

The issue here is what is the nature of those decks running Wasteland?

Basically the most likely possibilities are Stax, Shop Aggro and Fish.

Against Stax, Crucible is obviously vastly superior since it provides a permanent advantage every turn while Field actually delays the dropping of permanents and provides no advantage.  Dropping Crucible from this list severely hurts the Stax (or Mud with Smokestack) matchups.  For that reason alone dropping Crucible is scary.

The above argument can also apply to Shop Aggro with Crucibles.
Fish and Shop aggro have a clock.  A downside of Petrified Field is that it costs you two land drops and takes 2 turns to get Shop back.  This loss of tempo is bad in general, but becomes especially severe if your opponent is beating you down with creatures.  Basically your plan in this case is to wipe the board with Smokestack.  Crucible is much better here than Field.  Field is still worse than Map because you essentially lose a land drop.  I still prefer Field over Map in these matchups because Map also usually costs tempo and can be shut off by opposing Rods but the advantage is not great.

In other matchups Field is not good at best and in some cases it is terrible.  Basically drawing Field with no land in the yard is weak, while Map in the same situation might lead to a Strip Lock, so you go from getting your second worst card to instead getting your best.  This is especially painful against Dredge where you can drop Map on turn 1 and then activate for Strip on turn 2.  That Map is so much better than Field in all of the non Waste matchups more than offsets its slight weakness against Fish and Shop Aggro.  At least that was my conclusion months ago.  Since then the metagame has shifted towards more Fish and Shop Aggro so this may be dated.

[Smmenen]

Again, mods, this is a MUD list, and should be in the Workshop forum.

THe original MUD lists ran 4 City of Traitors and 4 Fields, and zero Ancient Tomb.  But that was a very different metagame, where decks like Suicide Black, mono red sligh, etc were far more prevalent.   Even Legacy decks, with plenty of burn in the field, run 4 Ancient Tombs in their artifact decks.

I don't have any doubt that 4 Ancient Tomb is correct regardless of the circumstances.   And not just because of mulliganing, but because it's the next best unrestricted land after Workshop and Wasteland.   It produces maximal mana with the least drawback of anything available.   

I remember playing MUD back in the day, and Petrified Field was very powerful.   The problem with field is that it's slow.  It's two land drops to work.   The turn you play Field, then the next turn you play the other land.   Petrified field is VERY powerful with Strip Mine, though.   I think Field is probably better than Map, but worse than Crucible. 

[TopSecret]

If you want to compare Petrified Field and Expedition Map, another problem with Field is that it's worse than Map when you haven't drawn a land to recur. I think that would be a big deal. Expedition Map also allows for a silver bullet strategy, while Petrified Field does not.

[meadbert]

If you want to compare Petrified Field and Expedition Map, another problem with Field is that it's worse than Map when you haven't drawn a land to recur. I think that would be a big deal. Expedition Map also allows for a silver bullet strategy, while Petrified Field does not.

Exactly.  The trouble with Field is that without Map, you have no way to tutor for Strip Mine so you are unlikely to be recurring it.