Revisiting Lotus Cobra

[Onslaught]

Why Lotus Cobra? I dunno, it's fun to play. Cobra sorta burst onto the Vintage scene for a while, and now it has all but disappeared. In theory it makes you the best pure Gush deck against Workshops. Also, as proven by Confidants, having a 2/1 engine gives you a semi-relevant beatdown angle. To justify using Lotus Cobra over Bob, you have to maximize its effectiveness by doing something dynamic. There are a few options for this...

Three main schools of thought inspired me when working on this deck:

-The old "fast Gush deck" lists using Lotus Cobra, such as the one used by Paul Mastriano here
-Kevin Cron's deck that was mentioned a few times on the podcast, featuring Lotus Cobra powering out a turn 2 or 3 Jace with Spell Pierce backup
-Rich Shay's elegant "Mental Misstep Gush" deck from Champs (with explanation here)

So, what did I want to take from each different build? From the original Gush Cobra decks with stuff like Necropotence, I wanted that aggressive speed and general combo feel. In a perfect world, Imperial Seal would have fit to emphasize the speed, but combining different strategies ate up a lot of space. I was also certain that I didn't want Vault/Key, which was reinforced by the dominating performance of Rich Shay's list at Champs. From the Shay list, I wanted to incorporate the Missteps for sure, and potentially even snag the Mana Drains. That's the main branching decision for this deck: Drains vs. Spell Pierce. Both strategies are based around Jace, but in different ways. If you are turboing out a Jace off Cobra's free mana, you obviously want Spell Pierces to protect him a turn faster than Mana Drain can. Spell Pierce is just faster in general...and since Lotus Cobra is at its best in a shorter game, it might indicate that Spell Pierce is the way to go. On the other hand, Mana Drain is easily used on your opponent's turn off a single fetch. Drain also lets you transition into a control deck in games where you couldn't quickly go off. In combination with Misstep and FOW, Drains guide you through the late game where the inevitability of Jace kicks in (as pointed out in the post linked above). With Spell Pierces, I'd be more inclined to run a high Jace count, maybe even going to four copies. Since this deck is already pretty tight on space, I'm gonna move forward with the 2 Jace/3 Mana Drain/4 Misstep shell, but I'm not ready to disregard a 3 (or 4) Jace/4 Spell Pierce/3 Misstep route. Ultimately this gives the deck two identities: explosive early game with Lotus Cobra mana to combo out and win, or a transition to mid/lategame control.

After playing a lot of games with/against Vendilion Clique, it made me appreciate builds that can "go broken" while also threatening with a steady stream of beats. Clique is so stupidly good (thanks a lot Modern for making it $25 btw), so I figured Cliques + Utility Creatures in a normal Tinker deck would be solid. The Bob/Gush deck from Vintage Champs T8 has a large attacking army by T1 standards, so it fits right in with the idea of "dudes + broken stuff" that I've been wanting to expand on. One of the ways I'm trying to increase the justification of using Lotus Cobra is by hoping that it can attack enough to be threatening. Other Gush decks spend 1 or 2 slots on Duress to clear the way for Tendrils, and I put Clique in that slot instead. In the end, I didn't quite reach a point where I have a small beatdown army (though one day I'd love to try 4 Lotus Cobra and 2 Clique) - but there is enough life loss from your attacks that you can win with a mini-Tendrils. This gives Tendrils extra utility, since you can easily fire one off for 8 or so without needing a Yawgmoth's Will.

3 Lotus Cobra
1 Vendilion Clique
1 Blightsteel Colossus

4 Force of Will
4 Mental Misstep
3 Mana Drain
1 Hurkyl's Recall

1 Ancestral Recall
1 Brainstorm
4 Gush
3 Preordain
1 Merchant Scroll
1 Demonic Tutor
1 Vampiric Tutor
1 Mystical Tutor

1 Time Walk
1 Tinker
1 Timetwister
1 Yawgmoth's Will
1 Tendrils of Agony

1 Fastbond
2 Jace, the Mind Sculptor

1 Black Lotus
1 Mox Emerald
1 Mox Sapphire
1 Mox Ruby
1 Mox Pearl
1 Mox Jet
1 Sol Ring
1 Mana Crypt

4 Scalding Tarn
4 Polluted Delta
3 Underground Sea
2 Tropical Island
1 Island

Stuff that hurt to cut:
-Regrowth: You have so much mana when Lotus Cobra is online, so Regrowth into whatever is usually pretty easy
-Imperial Seal (kinda)
-Library of Alexandria: Considering going down to 7 fetches to fit this
-A 4th Lotus Cobra and 2nd Clique: for more beatdown

Alternate build:
-3 Mana Drain, -1 Misstep, -1 Something, +4 Spell Pierce, +1 Jace

For the sideboard, I'm really liking a red splash. Completely viable against other blue decks (and the REBs make you even more controllish), but I may be getting greedy with the Ingot Chewers (can easily be swapped for Nature's Claim though).

Sideboard: 4 Leyline of the Void, 1 Yixlid Jailer, 3 Ingot Chewer, 2 Hurkyl's Recall, 2 REB, 1 Pyroblast, 1 Darkblast, 1 Volcanic Island

[Shax]

If Trygon Predator and Dark Confidant work together well. Why can Dark Confidant and Lotus Cobra work together well in Gush Cobra? Or even Trygon with the bunch?

[Onslaught]

I really should fit a Regrowth in this, it needs more cards to help it "go off" once you generate the absurd amount of mana with Lotus Cobra/Gush. Any suggestions? No love for Lotus Cobra anymore?

[yankeedave]

Hi guys

I wanted to discuss my new build of Gush Storm, but I couldn’t find a thread that was exactly what I was looking for, so I thought I would add to this one and see if anyone could help me out with changes to my deck.
The premise behind this deck was to abuse the unrestriction  of Fact or Fiction with the mana production of the Gush/Fastbond engine along with Lotus Cobra to either draw or tutor into one of 3 sets of win cons:

1)   Either chain spells to finish the game with a large Mind’s Desire or Tendrils of Agony.
2)   Search for Tinker into BSC
3)   Go infinite with Vault/Key.

I began with 4 Fact or Fiction, but reduced the number to 3 and now 2, as whilst it can be a game breaker, I keep ending up pitching them to Force rather than drawing cards with them. I am beginning to suspect this is not the correct deck for them, but would appreciate some ideas. Would JTMS be better?

I haven’t posted a sideboard, as I want to get the Maindeck right before posting anything that will be the most flexible part of the deck, making changes as needed.

Utility

4 Gush
1 Brainstorm
1 Ancestral Recall
1 Time Walk
1 Mystical Tutor
1 Demonic Tutor
1 Vampiric Tutor
1 Yawgmoth's Will
2 Fact or Fiction
1 Fastbond
1 Timetwister
1 Noxious Revival
2 Hurkyl’s  Recall
1 Merchant Scroll

Counters

4 Force of Will
2 Mana Drain
2 Mental Misstep

Win Conditions

4 Lotus Cobra
1 Tinker
1 Blightsteel Colossus
1 Time Vault
1  Voltaic Key
1 Mind’s Desire
1 Tendrils of Agony

Broken Stuff

1 Sol Ring
1 Mana Crypt
5 Moxen
1 Black Lotus

Lands

3 Tropical Island
3 Underground Sea
4 Polluted Delta
4 Misty Rainforest
1 Island

I am quite enjoying playtesting this at the moment, although my 3 Goldfish aren’t very good and keep making elementary play mistakes. Any helpful tips etc would be appreciated.

Thanks

Dave

[marcb]

I definitely think that you should exchange the fact or fictions for 1 Jace and 1 gifts ungiven. I think you have to try gifts if you have vault, key, noxious revival, and Y. will in your deck. Where are the preordains?

[yankeedave]

I definitely think that you should exchange the fact or fictions for 1 Jace and 1 gifts ungiven. I think you have to try gifts if you have vault, key, noxious revival, and Y. will in your deck. Where are the preordains?

I would love to fit Preordain in, but I have absolutely no idea what to cut to do it! I really like the idea of Gifts tho, it makes for some sick piles! Thanks for that.

Another card I would like to fit is Flusterstorm, but again, what to cut!

[metalhead]

To support gush you want to keep your curve really low. Yes cobra let's you produce a lot of mana, but seeimg as storm is an important part of your deck chaining multiple cheap spells will ger u farther than something like fact or fiction. Vault/key, tinker/bot, and storm seems like too manyy things your trying to do.. ide suggest cutting at least one of these from the main.  Cutting tinkerbot would also allow you to cut some of the off color moxen opening room for the full set of preordains.

[withmangone]

Both of the decks in this thread cut necro without really giving a reason why. It seems so strong and reliably castable with 3~4 cobras and 8 fetches. Is the concern gushbond damage and necro playing together poorly? I would think the skull makes the cut over a mind's desire/fact or fiction/vendilion clique (i understand the OP wanted to make a beats deck and prob made cuts to support that, but with only 3 cobras and 1 clique i would probably give up the ghost).

Full disclosure: I have no playtest experience with a cobra gush deck. If my instinct is wrong, please tell me as much/why.

[TheProfessor]

I have been playing Cobra Gush for the last few weeks testing it out against a few decks (haven’t tested the Shops matchup but I am sure its really good) and I feel that the deck is insane.  This is the list I have been running.

Lands:
2 Underground Sea
2 Tropical Island
1 Volcanic Island
2 Misty Rainforest
2 Scalding Tarn
2 Polluted Delta
2 Flooded Strand
1 Island

Creatures:
1 Blightsteel Colossus
2 Lotus Cobra

Instants:
1 Ancestral Recall
1 Brainstorm
1 Gifts Ungiven
1 Hurkl’s Recall
1 Mystical Tutor
1 Vampiric Tutor
1 Red Elemental Blast
1 Flusterstorm
3 Mental Misstep
4 Force of Will
4 Gush

Sorceries:
1 Demonic Tutor
1 Duress
1 Merchant Scroll
1 Ponder
1 Tendrils of Agony
1 Timetwister
1 Time Walk
1 Tinker
1 Yawgmoth’s Will
3 Preordain

Enchantments:
1 Fastbond
1 Necropotence

Other:
2 Jace, the Mind Sculptor

Artifacts:
1 Black Lotus
1 Lotus Petal
1 Mana Crypt
1 Mox Emerald
1 Mox Jet
1 Mox Ruby
1 Mox Sapphire
1 Sol Ring

Sideboard:
1 Ancient Grudge
2 Flusterstorm
4 Leyline of the Void
1 Lightning Bolt
2 Natures Claim
1 Pithing Needle
1 Rebuild
1 Red Elemental Blast
1 Snow-Covered Island
1 Tormod’s Crypt


Let me know what you think about the list!

[shrewarmies]

I just took my Cobra Storm list to 2nd place at a tournament today. I am not a fan of posting list after list on a thread so I will comment on yours and how we differ.

Your list is a little strange from my point of view. Only two Lotus Cobras means you are not going to hit them early with any reliability. That coupled with your main deck REB, missteps, Jace, Flusterstorm and Gifts lead me to thinking your are going for a controlling build, but your Timetwister, necro and the fact you have chosen Cobras over Bob lead me to thinking you are a storm deck. It just seems a little too 50/50 to me. I can see trying to control the game until you have that critical turn, in which case would your purposes not be better served by Spell Pierce over REB/(?Missteps?) (REB more than Misstep which serve a different purpose but could still be replaced by pierce I think)

I think Cobra is at its best in a dedicated Gush storm build rather than a gush control build. The gush control builds I would feel safer running bob as my 2 drop creature. Its a steady source of card advantage and when it come down to it, when a control deck decides it want to win through a Will, it should have the mana by that point to do so without the Cobra. A storm build on the other hand, will use its Cobras mana to their fullest extent. Gushing(Alt cost) to draw cards and make extra land drops adding even more mana to your mana pool leads to incredibly explosive turns and a higher amount of draw 7's (twister, Memory Jar, Wheel) to continue making those land drops and casting all the spells in your hand off all the extra mana will create a very high storm count very quickly.

As for the shop matchup, I would think that your G1 is quite bad as the counters you have chosen (REB/MM/Flusterstorm) and they are all negated leaving you with quite a few dead cards (Spell Pierce again would not be as dead as it can still counter spheres etc.) The Cobras do help but as you have only two, your ability to leverage that extra mana is obviously cut short.  Gush obviously becomes worse when you have to start paying for them but thats nothing new. To make your shop match up better I would probably up the number of cobras and change some of the MD countermagic to Spell Pierces.

[End3r000]

I agree with shrewarmies that cobra belongs in a dedicated storm deck without all of the extra fluff.  I've been playing this archetype for about a year, and in that time I've cut Time Vault Key, Jace, and Tinker.  I've found that my matchups outside of shops are pretty good, and I just have to board heavily for the shops matchup and it's fine.

[shrewarmies]

The Cobra Storm deck I took to 2nd place to a small (11 man, our monthly tournaments almost never get to proper sizes) tournament is here:

Lands:
1 Flooded Strand
1 Polluted Delta
4 Misty Rainforest
4 Scalding Tarn
1 Island
2 Tropical Island
2 Underground Sea
1 Volcanic Island

Creatures:
4 Lotus Cobra

Artifacts:
1 Black Lotus
1 Lotus Petal
1 Mana Crypt
1 Memory Jar
5 Moxen

Spells:
1 Ancestral Recall
1 Brainstorm
1 Demonic Tutor
1 Empty the Warrens
4 Force of Will
4 Gush
1 Hurkyl's Recall
1 Merchant Scroll
1 Mind's Desire
1 Ponder
3 Preordain
1 Regrowth
1 Tendrils of Agony
3 Thoughtseize
1 Timetwister
1 Time walk
1 Tinker
1 Vampiric Tutor
1 Yawgmoth's Will

Enchantments:
1 Fastbond
1 Necropotence

Sideboard:
4 Leyline of the void
2 Nihil Spellbomb
1 Pithing Needle
1 Blightsteel Colossus
2 Diabolic Edict
2 Natures Claim
2 Mental Misstep
1 Hurkyl's Recall

There are a few card choices that I need to make note of:

4 Lotus Cobra- This deck REALLY want an early Cobra to capitalize on the mana boost he provides, He is the sole reason I am running 10 fetchlands and only 6 actual lands capable of producing mana (it was originally going to be 5 but I am testing the Volcanic for Warrens). 4 Cobras  was obviously the way to go for this, if you were not running such a dedicated storm deck 3 would probably be a better number.

No BSC/Bot in MD- This was a personal preference mostly, I wanted a dedicated storm kill G1 and replacing my bot with Memory Jar seemed the best way to do this. My main two Tinker targets are Lotus (+2 storm, 0 mana,+mana fixing) and Memory Jar (fresh hand= more storm, + mana.  I also personally dislike BSC and what it did to the format plus I did not want to ever draw the card when I was storming off. When I side in BSC he usually takes the place of memory Jar if I don't think I am going to get the storm kill as easily or either Warrens or Desire if the match up means that they are not as good as the other storm wins.

3 storm win cons: I decided to run all three win (Warrens/Tendrils/Desire) cons Game 1, one of them may be cut but I felt that with the redundancy of tutors and the mega draw I was going to more reliably draw at least 1 every turn I tried to storm off through a Jar or a Twister. Often I either had the choice between 2 storm win cons or was able to tutor for a second if the one in hand was not the best win con. They all served me well during the day, I was able to use Tendrils in games where I went of early, Desire helped to storm though opponents and warrens came in handy against an active Oath and if he had not drawn a black source for his YWill the tokens would have allowed me to survive the anhialator trigger and swing back for lethal. Speaking of which I don't think I fired off Yawgmoth's Will the entire day. This deck can certainly function to its fullest even if they manage to discard your Will

3 Thoughtseize- I was finding in testing that 4 Thoughtsiezes were a bit too much, the life loss and drawing multiples of them when storming clogged up hands. I went to 3 Thoughtseize, 1 Duress but then dropped the duress because often I am finding that other than turn 1, the only time I am thoughtseizing them is the spell before I play my lethal tendrils or Warrens for 17. Turn 1 Thoughtseize is better so I kept the 3 of them. If i were to play again I would probably take out 1 Nihil Spellbomb and maybe the Missteps or Needle for the last thoughtseize and pyroblasts for blue decks.

If you are interested, I wrote a small tournament report here:
http://shrews-on-u.blogspot.com/2012/01/good-games-dandynong-7-jan-12.html

Hope that helps

Edit: P.S. it seems to weird to talk about a dedicated storm deck whose only blue control is 4 FOW in the Blue based control Forum