Black Lotus not good enough for MUD?

[Razvan]

A small note about this. I only have limited, mostly anecdotal proof, but Black Lotus, more than any other card in the game, comes up first in the category: "The only card that can make me win/not lose the game right now", at least in my experience.

Also, it is the most included card ever in terms of "optimal deck" decks. There have been few decks that didn't include Lotus (Ichorid, for one, in some builds, although Shaarum changed this). The argument made for mana flooding are not very good, given that ANY mana is bad at that point.

In fact, I think the only good argument made for Mana Vault is that it remains after being tapped, so it can be weldered (although with 2 welders, you can make far more mana with lotus because of the sacrifice ability), or smokestacked out.

Also, while I understand why MUD or Stax would want Chalice for zero, Chalice at any other number (1, 2, or even 3) is more effective in a lot of situations, and I cannot really agree that Chalice for zero is a good enough argument to not include Lotus.

[TheShop]

It is odd to me that the decks that are winning are not running lotus, yet we are still discussing this.  If vault was not in the deck would we be discussing this?

Other points:

That single life point is negligible now in comparison to the 0 since the deck has a 5/3 beater sphere.
Chalice at 0 on the play has been and will always be amazing and absolutely warrants at least consideration of dropping 0 mana artifacts

final point- it is so strange to me that others here act like getting such high mana on turn one is so necessary.  The deck can drop multiple lock components simply by dropping chalice + anything else.  Often, it will not even be a good play to drop lodestone on turn 1 when you can bait with spells with a lower cost that still lock out the game with equal or greater effectiveness.  The fact that 6 mana comes from shop + lotus seems like a rare enough event to keep you from kicking yourself over drawing dead randomly and improving the chances you will draw dead.  breaking the curve on mana costs for spells in this deck isnt really necessary...the deck is supposed to drop low cost threats and then build out of it while your opponent draws dead...if no lotus contributes to the game plan enough that the winning players are doing it...whats the issue?

[Thegreatgonzo]

I’am not a MUD expert, so I really dont know if Lotus should be out.
But there’s a story I remember.

During the gifts era, I once played in a large tournament in Paris. 90 people or so.
The tournament was proxyless, but included a special prize for the best performing unpowered deck. (no moxes, no lotus)
One of my losses came from an unpowered monobrown deck. Stax shell with metalworkers and staffs.
Believe it or not, from my point of view, (playing gifts) ancient tombs seemed way better than moxes. They acted as workshop 5 to 8 to power out first turn sphere.
Note that aside from smokestack, they were no 4CC spells in the list. So going Shop-Mox-lock was not mandatory.

So, maybe we should forget 1 shot mana boost in favor of something more permanent. I don’t know if it’s right, but I can see why it’s worth arguing about it.

[Delha]

It is odd to me that the decks that are winning are not running lotus, yet we are still discussing this.  If vault was not in the deck would we be discussing this?

Shrug. Lotus is such an iconic card that I think it's largely viewed as a sacred cow. If you're running a monoblue deck, I think you'd similarly have to justify why you're NOT running FoW.

I’am not a MUD expert, so I really dont know if Lotus should be out...

...So, maybe we should forget 1 shot mana boost in favor of something more permanent. I don’t know if it’s right, but I can see why it’s worth arguing about it.

I'm no expert w/ Shops either, but I do know a long running problem with Stax type prison decks was lack of a fast clock. The reason Golem is so huge is that he provides this without having to dilute the number of lock parts you run (ie. Juggernaut). Considering how valuable it is to land him on turn 1, I personally consider it a mistake to cut Lotus, if only to bump the odds of that play.

[FlyFlySideOfFry]

I’am not a MUD expert, so I really dont know if Lotus should be out.
But there’s a story I remember.

During the gifts era, I once played in a large tournament in Paris. 90 people or so.
The tournament was proxyless, but included a special prize for the best performing unpowered deck. (no moxes, no lotus)
One of my losses came from an unpowered monobrown deck. Stax shell with metalworkers and staffs.
Believe it or not, from my point of view, (playing gifts) ancient tombs seemed way better than moxes. They acted as workshop 5 to 8 to power out first turn sphere.
Note that aside from smokestack, they were no 4CC spells in the list. So going Shop-Mox-lock was not mandatory.

So, maybe we should forget 1 shot mana boost in favor of something more permanent. I don’t know if it’s right, but I can see why it’s worth arguing about it.

MUD lists already run the maximum amount of high-mana lands they can. Black Lotus is being replaced not by Ancient Tomb but by stuff like Mishra's Factory. Black Lotus is 3 Time Walks worth of Mishra's Factory up until like turn 5.

As for people saying that tournament results speak for themselves, all 4 MUD lists from the BoM (you know that really huge tournament) top 8 were running Black Lotus.

Black Lotus being a dead draw late game when you already have tons of mana is pretty much the worst argument I have ever heard. Yes even worse than "Chalice at 0 makes it a bad draw", which by the way is a really stupid argument also as long as you have any sort of artifact acceleration in your deck. (or if you're on the draw or if Chalice at 2 is possible or if you don't draw Chalice etc. etc. etc. etc.) Any mana source at that point is horrible.*

Seriously all the arguments so far presented for cutting Lotus could be applied to any sort of artifact acceleration. Nobody has provided a good reason for why 59 permanents and the best mana source in all of MtG is worse than 60 permanents. MUD doesn't have a draw engine so what exactly are you having mana problems with? Past turn 4 your hand is empty and if you're lucky enough to draw Lotus you could have no hand and a field of lock pieces on turn 3.

Seriously people, they didn't win tournaments because of the lack of Lotus they won despite it.

*Actually no, Chalice@0 cutting off Lotus is even more stupid than Lotus being a dead draw late game because of the hypocrasy of saying "artifact acceleration is so powerful I need to stop my opponent from playing it, but I won't play it myself because it sucks."

[voltron00x]

FWIW, I played Lotus in my MUD deck in March and replaced Mana Vault with Metalworker, and was pretty happy.  I replaced Metalworker with City of Traitors in the list I have at the moment b/c Oath's popularity makes Metalworker a bit of a downer.  Of all the Vintage decks I've played outside of Dredge, Lotus felt least necessary in MUD, but its still pretty damn good when you have it in your opener.

[Neonico]

A small note about this. I only have limited, mostly anecdotal proof, but Black Lotus, more than any other card in the game, comes up first in the category: "The only card that can make me win/not lose the game right now", at least in my experience.

It's true in many decks, but not in MUD. I play the deck for a long time now, and i never faced a situation where i needed to draw lotus or loose.
The fact that you play 4 multi-usable loti, + all the 2 mana lands etc.... makes that this situation will not/should not happen. And i don't even speack of Metalwoker.

In fact, for the french players, metalworker was the only reason to play black lotus (1 more way to be sure to land it on turn 1, and metalworker immunes you to mana denial on the only land you can have) but we all cutt it for more lands (and also we cutt lotus for 1 more land too) because of Noble fish being alot played in our metagame.

The situations where you could possiblu need lotus or die are lategame situation. And i don't even speack of situations where you will need it and can't play it anyway because you allready landed chalice for 0 (an early game situation)

The fact that it's not as needed as in any other deck lead us to cutt it... Possibly we are wrong, i don't know.

What I do not understand is how cutting of access to your opponent's Moxen and Black Lotus is so important, yet you eagerly cut off your own access to Black Lotus by not running it.  If Black Lotus is bad, then it is hard to justify dropping Chalice@0.  Fish plays around it.  Dredge plays around it.  Tez easily tutors up Vault/Key or drops Bob without Moxen.  Oath can tutor up Vault/Key or drop Oath easily without Moxen.  Cutting of Moxen and Lotus is not as important as it once was.

I agree with all of your examples about Chalice@2 being a strong play, but Black Lotus allows an early Chalice@2 and is not shut off by Chalice@2.

I don't agree at all here....
Okay, chalice@0 is bad against ichorid, like the whole deck anyway, and fish. And of course any unpowered deck.

But, whatever your list of MUD is, Aggro ou Prison, Chalice@0 on turn 1 on the play remains a free really strong play, whatever deck you're facing.
In an aggro MUD list, it's important to slow your opponent enough to have the time to kill with your creature. Cutting the moxen makes that. CHalice is a really strong tempo element.
In a prison MUD list, the centerpiece of your strategy is Smokestack. Avoiding your opponent to play moxen = minimzing his board developpement = making your stacks more effective. I can't agree a strategy that let my opponent developp enough to makes my strategy more symetrical.

Sphere of Resistance/Thorns makes it even better. Sphere alone only wins you the turn for your opponent to play all his moxen..... SPhere + Chalice gains you a turn by making all free spells costing 1 more but also avoids your opponent to developp enough to negate it.

The main point is how unsymetrical the developpement will be. And chalice@0 really helps that way.

[Delha]

A small note about this. I only have limited, mostly anecdotal proof, but Black Lotus, more than any other card in the game, comes up first in the category: "The only card that can make me win/not lose the game right now", at least in my experience.

It's true in many decks, but not in MUD. I play the deck for a long time now, and i never faced a situation where i needed to draw lotus or loose.
The fact that you play 4 multi-usable loti, + all the 2 mana lands etc.... makes that this situation will not/should not happen. And i don't even speack of Metalwoker.

If you were given the opportunity to play a 5th Workshop, would you do it?  Lotus is probably the closest thing we will ever see. How about a 6th Mox or second Mana Vault?

The situations where you could possiblu need lotus or die are lategame situation. And i don't even speack of situations where you will need it and can't play it anyway because you allready landed chalice for 0 (an early game situation)

I think you are looking at this situation too narrowly. MUD is all about dropping lock pieces and a quick clock, right? Lotus enables that game plan magnificently. Strip, Lotus, Golem will win you plenty of games where the opponent would have otherwise landed T1 Oath, T1 Vault/Key, T1 Tinkered Bot, or otherwise. In all these cases, you were probably dead if you didn't have Lotus, and Shop + Strip is a turn too slow. They just aren't readily apparent, because when the deck is running optimally, the opponent is starting at a hand full of cards he can't play.

Regarding the comments about Chalice at 0 cutting off Lotus: I'll second what the other people have been saying. Chalice at zero also cuts off all your Moxen and Crypt, but those are presumably still being run. Running full Moxen but no Lotus feels to me like TPS replacing all it's Rituals with Swamps. Yes, you are gaining tons of stability, but the loss of explosive openers means you will encounter many more cases where you just get blown out by the opponent's bombs.

[Smmenen]

The far more interesting question is: Why don't so many MUD lists run Trinisphere?

So far, about 30% of the MUD lists I've seen don't run Trinisphere.   Check out the four MUD decks in this tournament:
http://www.morphling.de/top8decks.php?id=1248

2 of them ran trinisphere.  2 didn't.  The one's that did finished in the bottom half of the Top 8. 

[aosquirrels]

The far more interesting question is: Why don't so many MUD lists run Trinisphere?

So far, about 30% of the MUD lists I've seen don't run Trinisphere.   Check out the four MUD decks in this tournament:
http://www.morphling.de/top8decks.php?id=1248

2 of them ran trinisphere.  2 didn't.  The one's that did finished in the bottom half of the Top 8. 

This one has me scratching my head too.  They replaced Trinisphere with a 4th Trike.  If I wanted a 4th Trike I'd cut a Thorn over 3sphere.  Since my metagame is aggro heavy I have chosen to put the 4 Thorns in the board and run 2 Razormanes and 2 Duplicants maindeck.  This leaves me with 9 sphere effects which seem sufficient enough.

[meadbert]

If you are trying to keep Time Vault or Oath off the table then Thorn is just as good as Trinisphere and if you already have one Sphere effect, then Trinisphere does nothing anyway.  Also Trinisphere does not effect Tinker.
I would still play Trinisphere because it is just way too good on turn 1.  It is WAY better than Chalice@0.

[Neonico]

In fact, trinisphere affects less than thorn/2sphere the fundamental spell you want to avoid : rebuild (and to a lesser extend, tinker).
And it does the same for Hurkyl's Recall. but it's easier castable on turn 1 with tomb and city of traitors, meaning that you can protect your shops from wasteland to avoid the autolock.

that's the main reason beside the cutt of trinisphere.

I would still play Trinisphere because it is just way too good on turn 1.  It is WAY better than Chalice@0.

I hope that it's not an argument to not play chalice for 0. Because it's really a abd one, it's like comparing apples and oranges.

Regarding the comments about Chalice at 0 cutting off Lotus: I'll second what the other people have been saying. Chalice at zero also cuts off all your Moxen and Crypt, but those are presumably still being run. Running full Moxen but no Lotus feels to me like TPS replacing all it's Rituals with Swamps. Yes, you are gaining tons of stability, but the loss of explosive openers means you will encounter many more cases where you just get blown out by the opponent's bombs.

Question is : Is that explosivity really needed ? Why alot of people cutt metalworker than ? It's the most explosive mana source you can play in the deck, and it has never been that much unplayed in MUD ....

The fact that Fish and MUD are alot more played actually tends to force MUD builders to go for more stability imo.
A side note about chalice@0 : It's not just the chalices you play. it's also the chalice you could face in mirror match.

[And11]

Question is : Is that explosivity really needed ? Why alot of people cutt metalworker than ? It's the most explosive mana source you can play in the deck, and it has never been that much unplayed in MUD ....

Because Metalworker does NOT enable first turn lock(s), and because Oath of Druids is out there. If you can't play a lock the first turn, shuffle up and draw 6 new cards. That's why both Black Lotus and Trinisphere should be there - 1 extra lock component and mana to power it out. End of discussion.

[Neonico]

Okay, i think this doesn't need anymore answers, you won this thread sir, good game.

[LotusHead]

Has anyone contacted the 1st/2nd place players and gotten their feedback?  Maybe they had to lend their Loti to others that needed it more?

I know, unlikely.  But maybe they didn't own THAT piece of power.  Who knows?

[RTG]

Has anyone contacted the 1st/2nd place players and gotten their feedback?  Maybe they had to lend their Loti to others that needed it more?

I know, unlikely.  But maybe they didn't own THAT piece of power.  Who knows?

It was a 15 proxy tournament. They didn't use all of the possible proxies. Availability isn't the issue at all.

[Tempus]

Question is : Is that explosivity really needed ? Why alot of people cutt metalworker than ? It's the most explosive mana source you can play in the deck, and it has never been that much unplayed in MUD ....

Because Metalworker does NOT enable first turn lock(s), and because Oath of Druids is out there. If you can't play a lock the first turn, shuffle up and draw 6 new cards. That's why both Black Lotus and Trinisphere should be there - 1 extra lock component and mana to power it out. End of discussion.

MUDs biggest chance to win vs. Oath is not letting Oath resolve, which is kinda hard given it's a cmc 2 enchantement or just remove all the oathed up creatures with duplicant and punish them for running such big creatures. Metalworker enables you to play a duplicant/trike (vs. other decks than oath) 2nd turn, which is huge.

Has anyone contacted the 1st/2nd place players and gotten their feedback?  Maybe they had to lend their Loti to others that needed it more?

I know, unlikely.  But maybe they didn't own THAT piece of power.  Who knows?

Afair did one of them win the nonproxy prize in the last tournament, so proxies/availability shouldn't be an issue...

[Miaou]

For me what it boils down to is this: do the benefits of having Lotus in your opener outweigh the disadvantage of drawing it later? (I assume in this post that the Lotus is being replaced by a land)

I'm sure we can all imagine the good hands with Lotus, that enabled a broken start sealing the game before it has even begun. But what does drawing it later mean?
Well first of all, late game when you are in top deck mode, it is obviously a dead draw. However pretty much any mana source isn't going to be of any use to you (again, assuming you replace the Lotus with a land), except maybe a Mishra's Factory. So I feel that in this scenario it's a toss up since your mana base is already developed and you need a threat not mana.
What about drawing it mid game, when you have pressure on your opponent and need additional pressure? There again it is a dead draw, but I'd argue that almost any other mana source would be just as useless once again (Factory possibly being a live draw).
The only time where I think a difference matters is when you are facing a mana denial deck and they waste your land. In that case drawing a Lotus is a horrible draw (due to Null Rod and/or spheres) and a land would have been a lot better.

However this scenario isn't enough for me to justify taking out the best mana acceleration in the game in favor of a land. The ability to steal games at such a low risk, leads me to think that Lotus should be included systematically.

I may be overlooking some scenarios, in which case someone will point them out I'm sure

[SnoopTrog]

In looking at the Mud lists that dominated the tourney, I think that they both made the right choice in cutting black lotus.

They had to make room for 4 serum powders to assure a fast opening hand that would control thier opponent.
What to cut?  Chalices,Thorns,Crucibles,Trinisphere,Kegs,Stacks,Golems,Wires,Vault or Lotus.

What opening hands do you wish to get constantly?  Workshop and lock (or) Lotus and lock.

[honestabe]

In looking at the Mud lists that dominated the tourney, I think that they both made the right choice in cutting black lotus.

They had to make room for 4 serum powders to assure a fast opening hand that would control thier opponent.
What to cut?  Chalices,Thorns,Crucibles,Trinisphere,Kegs,Stacks,Golems,Wires,Vault or Lotus.

What opening hands do you wish to get constantly?  Workshop and lock (or) Lotus and lock.

Then why not cut vault?

[Cyberpunker]

Then why not cut vault?

They don't want to lock themselves out from their own Chalice @ 0? Maybe I don't know but that is the only reason I can think of. And if they play Chalice @ 0 almost all the time they get Chalice opening hand, then they would have a good reason to prevent themselves from killing their own topdecks towards the end of the game.

[honestabe]

Then why not cut vault?

They don't want to lock themselves out from their own Chalice @ 0? Maybe I don't know but that is the only reason I can think of. And if they play Chalice @ 0 almost all the time they get Chalice opening hand, then they would have a good reason to prevent themselves from killing their own topdecks towards the end of the game.

Yeah, thats the only reason I can think of

[RTG]

Then why not cut vault?

Read the thread. That is what this thread is all about.

[Far]

(Ichorid, for one, in some builds, although Shaarum changed this).

Sharuum hasn't changed anything.

[median]

Lotus is really great with welder, these didn't run him. The ability to drop several threats on your first turn using a large amount of mana makes Workshop decks very similar to long and belcher in my opinion. However, mud wins over several turns. If you put in things like vault and lotus, you could make and argument for dark ritual.
Obviously lines have to be drawn, some people cut vault, most people dislike ritual. These people cut lotus; without welder it seems like a very rational thing to do.  

[Adan]

The far more interesting question is: Why don't so many MUD lists run Trinisphere?

So far, about 30% of the MUD lists I've seen don't run Trinisphere.   Check out the four MUD decks in this tournament:
http://www.morphling.de/top8decks.php?id=1248

2 of them ran trinisphere.  2 didn't.  The one's that did finished in the bottom half of the Top 8. 

http://www.morphling.de/top8decks.php?id=1276

This is a better reference, Marius and Fabian both didn't run 3Sphere.

The reasoning behind not reunning 3Sphere was that it's onloy good if you play it in your 1st Turn when on the play. Otherwise the opponent will already have dropped Moxen and/or Dark Confidant which make things slightly complicated for MUD.
So basically 3Sphere doesn't shut off spells efficiently if you drop it on Turn 2 or 3. From that point, it boils down to be something between Arcane Laboratory and Defense Grid.
And yes, it doesn't affect bombs (Yawgmoth's Will, Tinker, Gifts, etc. although Will becomes worse obv.).

[Meddling Mike]

If you put in things like vault and lotus, you could make and argument for dark ritual.
Obviously lines have to be drawn, some people cut vault, most people dislike ritual.

Maybe if Dark Ritual was free or cost  instead of you could make that argument.....

Just the fact that it would require you to retool the mana base just to reliably cast it makes it a non-consideration.

For me what it boils down to is this: do the benefits of having Lotus in your opener outweigh the disadvantage of drawing it later? (I assume in this post that the Lotus is being replaced by a land)

I'm sure there's some lists out there somewhere that run 1 fewer mana source than I do, but when I compared them there were the same number of permanent mana sources and no mana producing replacement cards for lotus.

I also saw the suggestion made that Trinisphere should not make the cut in the shop decks and I get the logic, two sphere effects and the trinisphere turns into kind of a dead card, but I thought it's use as the best turn 1 sphere effect made it worth inclusion easily.

Is that explosivity really needed ? Why alot of people cutt metalworker than ? It's the most explosive mana source you can play in the deck, and it has never been that much unplayed in MUD ....

The explosiveness is needed, but on turn 1, not on turn 2. Giving your opponents the opportunity to have a turn 1 with no lock component is terrible, which is the main problem with playing a turn 1 metalworker.

[Adan]

The explosiveness is needed, but on turn 1, not on turn 2. Giving your opponents the opportunity to have a turn 1 with no lock component is terrible, which is the main problem with playing a turn 1 metalworker.

No. Just no. A 1st Turn Metalworker is good because it provides ridiculous brokeness on Turn 2. You might not have dropped a lock-piece on your 1st Turn and the opponent therefore could have gone Land, Mox, Mox, Confidant or something similar, but in exchange, Metalworker allows you to blow out fast Trikes and Karn to rip off these resources in exchange which open up a great timing for Spheres again (or vice-versa, to blow out Trikes and Karns under Spheres which protect you from countermagic!).
This is why every MUD should play 4 Metalworkers. I've actually never seen a MUD deck that lost after it successfully got a active Metalworker on Turn 2.

Oath may be an exception, but there you need other lines of play. And it's a bit of a coinflip matchup.

[Neonico]

Every list should play metalworker, no, not if fish is played alot in your meta....
But i agree 100% with everything else you said, and my list with metalworker is really more than okay against oath. (and i don't side out my metalworkers)

[Adan]

Every list should play metalworker, no, not if fish is played alot in your meta....

Could you elaborate on that please? I mean, sure, Fish has got more outs to a Metalworker than other current Vintage decks, but does this make him suck against Fish?