5-color, 9-strip fish

[RecklessEmbermage]

After reading Menendian's Scars walk-through (http://www.quietspeculation.com/2010/10/so-many-insane-plays-scars-of-mirrodin-ultimate-vintage-set-review-with-complete-vintage-checklist/) and discussing manabases to incorporate leonin arbiter in multicolour fish, I started playing with the idea of a 5-colour, 9-strip fish build. I'd like to discuss whether it is doable at all and whether there is enough upside to it compared to running a 2-3 colour build. The deck builds on a list championed by Guli.

Moderators: This deck does not include null rod and I'd claim that it is creative. Still, it is fish and I found it natural to post it in this forum. Feel free to move it if you disagree with me.

Take a look at this decklist:

Manabase:
4 wasteland
4 ghost quarter
1 strip mine
4 city of brass
4 glimmervoid
5 moxen
4 mox opal
1 lotus
1 petal
1 sol ring

Supporting artifacts:
4 aether vial
3 skullclamp
2 sword of fire and ice

Creatures:
4 gorilla shaman
4 leonin arbiter
4 tidehollow sculler
3 tarmogoyf

Instants/sorceries:
4 thoughtseize
1 demonic consultation
1 ancestral recall
1 time walk

It has some obvious challenges:

It needs to make glimmervoid playable. This is ensured by the high number of low-cost artifacts.

It needs to make mox opal reliable: This is quite hard. According to Menendian, any deck that want to hit metalcraft consistently should have 33 artifacts. This list currently only sports 25 and six of those (scullers and sofi) can not be expected to be playable on turn one every time. Hence, the list will have to mulligan some hands with mox opal from time to time and it is pretty weak against artifact disruption. This is the main problem with this set-up.

To get a high artifact-count, some questionable inclusions must be made: Chalice is decent on the play but potentially horrendous on the draw. It can be played for 0 only to support opal and glimmervoid and it can be welded out. Vial and clamp are not fantastic in multiples, but the first one of each is and subsequent copies can be welded. Sol ring might look bad, but I’m pretty certain skullclamp will make it worth the inclusion. Scullers are potentially weak for a number of reasons. They are taxing on the manabase and puny. On the other hand, they carry clamp admirably and have good synergy with welder and vial.

Most cuts had to be made among the non-artifacts. I’d like 6 duress effects, but there is not enough space. Vampiric tutor would be nice as well as some creature removal. There were confidants in the list, but something has to go and clamp were a  Hopefully, the disruption is enough to stop tinker and clamp and goyf make aggro and MUD not hopeless. Oath needs particular attention when sideboarding, but the options are many and powerful, so I see no reason to fear the match-up too much.

15 creatures is not really enough to warrant vial. Does anyone see a way to resolve this without cutting the vials?

What do you think? Does this have any merit?

[Ten-Ten]

whatwould you set the chalice at? where is the 9th strip?

[RecklessEmbermage]

whatwould you set the chalice at? where is the 9th strip?

Chalice is set at 0 on the play and 0 or 1 on the draw, depending on match-up. Both are pretty problematic and I don't like them one bit.

9th strip was cut to make room for an artifact. I'd like to put it back in if it can be done without reducing solid (non-lotus) coloured mana sources below 13 for each colour and without reducing the artifact count.

EDIT: I cut 4 chalice (because its bad) and 2 welders (because I believe it is too conditional) for strip #9, 1 monkey, 1 thoughtseize, 1 petal, 1 sofi and 1 sculler.

[FlyFlySideOfFry]

Did you just rape your mana base for 2 blue cards and 1 green card none of which helps your main strategy? Go straight W/B at the most splashing Red and then you can get rid of all the shitty supporting artifacts. You also lose all the inconsistancy that Mox Opal forces. Then you can run real removal to deal with the fact that almost every deck in Vintage now has creatures in it.

I don't see why people are destroying their mana bases for a single card. If you were also running Suppression Field I could understand but you won't see Arbiter in your opening hand 60% of the time and the odds of having Arbiter+3 fetches as your only mana sources in your opening hand have to be so miniscule that it doesn't even matter. I mean seriously your curve tops out at 2...

[RecklessEmbermage]

Did you just rape your mana base for 2 blue cards and 1 green card none of which helps your main strategy? Go straight W/B at the most splashing Red and then you can get rid of all the shitty supporting artifacts. You also lose all the inconsistancy that Mox Opal forces. Then you can run real removal to deal with the fact that almost every deck in Vintage now has creatures in it.

I don't see why people are destroying their mana bases for a single card. If you were also running Suppression Field I could understand but you won't see Arbiter in your opening hand 60% of the time and the odds of having Arbiter+3 fetches as your only mana sources in your opening hand have to be so miniscule that it doesn't even matter. I mean seriously your curve tops out at 2...

Yeah, I know. Slowly realizing this was a shitty idea. Anyone who thinks this has any merit at all should feel free to take over. Or just close the thread. Whatever works.

[Guli]

Don't give up that fast

Opal is legendary btw, which means you should probably  play things like TFK or riddlesmith

[meadbert]

You could run the Bazaar of Baghdad/Life from the Loam draw engine.
Loam helps a strip lock.

Both grow Goyf.

Bazaar pitches extra Opals.  Also if you go back to Chalice you can discard chaliced out cards.

Root Maze is really good with Gorilla Shaman and in a deck with no Fetchlands.  It also introduces an ESGless lock.

You can play games Root Maze and Ghost Quarters.  Basically Ghost Quarter their land on upkeep.
When they fetch a new one it comes into play tapped.   That is not great but delays them at least a turn.

[RecklessEmbermage]

Tfk and riddlesmith sound strong. Maybe in a more traditional WU fish deck with stifles?

I have been fooling around with a casual list that uses weathered wayfarer to fetch strip mine for a more reliable striplock (with lftl). Ghost quarter is a great way of turning wayfarer on (along with path to exile), but I don't expect the combo (if you can call it that) to be competitive. In any case, such a deck shouldn't need more than 2-3 colours. I'm looking at WG with a tiny red splash for artifact destruction.

Bazaars are strong, but how would you work out the manabase? Skimp on wastelands or skimp on coloured mana?

The title of the thread promises 5 colours, but I just don't see what merit there is to it. Even after opening the list up completely to kataki and rod and including some sub-par artifacts, I couldn't saturate it sufficiently.

[pierce]

I played a 4c vial fish deck at a tournament recently, and vial is very very good right now. It allows you to beat a t1 lodestone when shops is on the play. However, gorilla shaman seems too fair, and clamp doesn't excite me in this build. also, i played with tidehollow sculler and it was terrible--even with vial.
3 goyf is obviously a sin.

a good concept, but this seems to be a rough draft.

[Guli]

pierce, can you post your mana base?

You don't HAVE to play 5 colors just to play 5 colors... Let me help out to give this thread more direction.

Let us ignore the color factor for a second and assume that our mana base will work. The concept is to play creatures, so what creature base would you play? This is a worthy theme I think to discuss about. Next to the creature base what general strategy would you play? Would you like your creature base to strengthen that general strategy or would you like your creature base to compensate for the weak spots? With general strategy I mean mana denial or spell denial or combinations.

[Tha Gunslinga]

Ethersworn Canonist is pretty good, and is an artifact.

[RecklessEmbermage]

Ethersworn Canonist is pretty good, and is an artifact.

I don't like canonist and arbiter together, because arbiter strangles mana and canonist prohibits the brokenness that may ensue if you don't strangle mana.

The ghost quarters and wastes can be lost however, if there is a better deck to be found that combines canonist and mox opal. For instance:

What do you think of the interaction between canonist and erayo? A deck that unloads heaps of artifacts on the first turn and finishes with either or both could possibly curbe the opposing deck's development enough to stabilize with a superior board presence? I'm thinking chrome moxen and blue restricted cards, possibly riddlesmiths.

[Guli]

Ok, i didn't forget about your thread Reckless.

Here is what I pulled together and play tested this week.

// Lands
    4 Ghost Quarter
    1 Strip Mine
    4 Wasteland
    4 City of Brass
    3 Undiscovered Paradise (trying this out, with vial and cheap one colored spells the land count doesn't need to be high at all)
    4 AEther Vial
    1 Black Lotus
    1 Mox Jet
    1 Mox Pearl
    1 Mox Emerald
    1 Mox Sapphire
    1 Lotus Petal

// Creature base
    4 Leonin Arbiter (mana denial)
    4 Dark Confidant (draw engine)
    4 Kataki, War's Wage (mana denia, early chalice@1)
    4 Tarmogoyf (musclepower)
    4 Gorilla Shaman (mana denial)

// Amazing
    1 Demonic Consultation
    1 Ancestral Recall
    
// Super good & cheap

    4 Swords to Plowshares
    4 Duress (blue, tinker)
    4 Nature's Claim (oath)


// Sideboard
2 Thoughtseize (oath, blue, tinker)
2 Hurkyl's Recall (chalice, tinker)
4 Trygon Predator (oath)
3 Yilid Jailer (dredge)
2 Ravenous Trap (dredge)
2 Jotun grunt (dredge)
 

[LotusHead]

this deck fucked up my deck.

I might have maybe gotten a chalice for 1 out once, maybe, but every one of my permanents just added to Goyfs p/t.

[TopSecret]

Vedalken Certarch is really good in a mana denial deck. Take out something for Certarch. You aren't playing enough creatures to make Vial or Skullclamp good.

[xerxes]

Goblin Vandal +Ancient Grudge for Stax

I'd include a Root Maze as well. When you play 5c, one of disruptive bombs work

[Guli]

Tarnished Citadel is an interesting card that I am trying out for 4/5 color fish-vial. It can give you colorless mana for vial and shaman activation and alongside city of brass. But when you really need a color you can take the 3 damage.

The thing is with 5 color and all the strip effects, you need city of brass and a likes to avoid mana problems. If Shop starts wasting your lands and you have vial, eventually they will lose the mana denial battle because of Kataki and your own strip lands. I believe this is a very effective Kataki strategy against MUD or Workshop overall. Combine this with cheap Golem/MetalWorker removal spells like Swords and Claim's and you got a very solid match up.