Melira Combo

[MaximumCDawg]

It's still a three-card combo, brah.  GSZ helps a little bit, but it can't fetch your sac outlet (there are none in green except a terrible Thrinax creature from Aalara block, I checked), and it can only fetch an infinite life Persist creature.  That's good enough against aggro or storm, but basically pointless against blue lists with VaultKey or TinkerBot.

Have you done any goldfishing?  How fast is this deck, seriously?  

[Protoaddict]

Have not goldfished yet, but will when I get some time. I wanted to brainstorm it here first to work out any obvious kinks first.

You are wrong about a lot of this list though.

It is a 3 card combo, however melira and Finks alone can be enough to stop some strategies dead until you get the next piece and with the amount of life people already spend in vintage getting the redcap on the table can also be game.

If your combo is online you don't need to fetch anything else with GSZ as the combo lets you scry to anything in your list. You also have black tutors to get whatever.

Tinker bot does care about the combo because if melira lives they cannot kill you with blightsteel unless they take her out. Vault does not care about it, save that you are running abrupt decays.

[TheWhiteDragon]

Tinkerbot doesn't care, and blightsteel CAN kill you...it just takes two swings to do 22 damage instead of 1 swing to do 11 poison. Even if you get a finks to gain you some life, you'll lose 11 faster than you'll gain life on each swing/block.

[Protoaddict]

Unless you have gained infinite was my point against tinker. If you have infinite then vault still gets their but blightsteel becomes a big tarmogoyf until melira is gone.

[TheWhiteDragon]

Unless you have gained infinite was my point against tinker. If you have infinite then vault still gets their but blightsteel becomes a big tarmogoyf until melira is gone.

And a deck running tinker SHOULD have some answer for a creature with counter backup. I'd imagine at least a singleton etruth or repeal if not more....or even EE or spellbomb depending on the list.  If they splash red for bolt (with snapcaster) or white for plow...your in deep shiznit.

And again, that's predicating you have managed to stick an infinite combo through counters, removal, and possibly main grave hate. That's quite a tall order honestly.

[MaximumCDawg]

Unless you have gained infinite was my point against tinker. If you have infinite then vault still gets their but blightsteel becomes a big tarmogoyf until melira is gone.

Okay, sure, if you assemble your three-card, six mana combo before they can assemble their one card, three mana combo, you won't lose until they remove a green weenie from the battlefield.  Seems.... good?

I'm happy to see some data on this deck, I just don't see how it can possibly cut the mustard in Vintage.

Then again, I'm a huge fan of Food Chain / Griffin, so shows you what I know.

[psyburat]

Infinite life doesn't beat Jace, the Mind Sculptor.

[Vennie]

Infinite life doesn't beat Jace, the Mind Sculptor.

Yes it does not, but if you can combo out to infinate life you have 3 creatures in play. Jace usually does not survive that easily since you had no removal in the first place else the combo would have no occurred in the first place.

[vaughnbros]

Infinite life doesn't beat Jace, the Mind Sculptor.

Yes it does not, but if you can combo out to infinate life you have 3 creatures in play. Jace usually does not survive that easily since you had no removal in the first place else the combo would have no occurred in the first place.

There seems to be a lot of ifs and usuallys being brought up in order to win the game after you've already comboed.  Even something like griselbrand, wurmcoil or batterskull post combo could cause serious problems if murderous redcap is kept off the table.

To summarize this is a 3 card, 6 mana combo that is fragile to both spot removal and graveyard hate that doesn't necessarily end the game or even place you in a good situation to do so.  We don't have to look far to find better combo options in vintage out there that see almost no play at all. 

This is however posted in the creative forum, and as such we shouldn't harp on its competitiveness too much.  If you really want to play it, I'd strongly suggest going for a more BUG fish route.  That shell is strong enough that you may actually be able to top 8 with this.

[MaximumCDawg]

Creativity doesn't mean you don't strive for competitiveness.  The point of creative, off-the-wall decks is to have fun, but getting curbstomped repeatedly isn't fun.  I don't think it's too much to ask of a creative deck that it can at least interact with Vintage opponents and occasionally win a match.

While this deck sounds like a three card combo, GSZ and interchangable parts might give it enough redundancy.  So, I'm not convinced its a worthless exercise.  I'm skeptical, though, and no one is doing any testing to generate data, soooo...

[vaughnbros]

While this deck sounds like a three card combo

Because it is.

GSZ and interchangable parts might give it enough redundancy.  So, I'm not convinced its a worthless exercise.  I'm skeptical, though, and no one is doing any testing to generate data, soooo...

A card that increases the decks vunerability to grafdigger's cage doesn't seem like a great choice to begin with and personally makes me more skeptical about the list.

[psyburat]

Infinite life doesn't beat Jace, the Mind Sculptor.

Yes it does not, but if you can combo out to infinate life you have 3 creatures in play. Jace usually does not survive that easily since you had no removal in the first place else the combo would have no occurred in the first place.

If I don't find your combo threatening then I won't try to answer it.

[Protoaddict]

I don't like to think of it as a pure combo, because as people have been pointing out, there are other combos out there. I like to think of it as a synergistic list, where each piece can interact favorably with the meta.

I mean Salvagers is a 3 card combo right, one of which is restricted, one of which is narrow, and one of which is an inefficient creature. At least in my combo you get a good creature in finks, a hate bear in melira, and a limited tutor in seer.

If the deck never combos off you can still threaten the aggro plan, and the creatures do still interact with other lists to some extent. GSZ means you can run a toolbox. Scavenging ooze and finks means you can win a race with on board dudes, etc.

I'm not saying this deck is suddenly the end all be all, but if we dont try something new sometimes the format would stagnate. I mean look at that affinity list that ran genesis chamber at NYSE. How many "useless" cards are in that list that did really well?

[MaximumCDawg]

I don't like to think of it as a pure combo, because as people have been pointing out, there are other combos out there. I like to think of it as a synergistic list, where each piece can interact favorably with the meta.

I mean Salvagers is a 3 card combo right, one of which is restricted, one of which is narrow, and one of which is an inefficient creature. At least in my combo you get a good creature in finks, a hate bear in melira, and a limited tutor in seer.

If the deck never combos off you can still threaten the aggro plan, and the creatures do still interact with other lists to some extent. GSZ means you can run a toolbox. Scavenging ooze and finks means you can win a race with on board dudes, etc.

To be fair, Salvagers lists often don't even run Salvagers anymore.  When they do, it's a one or two-of, not a four-of like Meleria.  The other combo pieces (Lotus and Spellbomb) have more utility than your other combo pieces (Finks, Seer, etc)

I'm not saying this deck is suddenly the end all be all, but if we dont try something new sometimes the format would stagnate. I mean look at that affinity list that ran genesis chamber at NYSE. How many "useless" cards are in that list that did really well?

Yeah, never give up looking for secret tech.  What I don't get is why you still have no goldfish or testing results to see whether Meliera is such tech!

[brianpk80]

It's worth investigating, I suppose.  Most standout Modern/Legacy/Standard cards turn out to be Vintage playable on some level once the initial reluctance wears off.  I'm thinking of the Geist, Thalia, Cavern of Souls, Stoneforge Mystic, Restoration Angel, etc.  That said, I'd consider minimizing the infinite combos and playing more value creatures, and probably full accel. + Mana Crypt and Birthing Pod.  Something like Deathrite Shaman into Stoneforge Mystic into Trinket Mage into Restoration Angel is a lot of card advantage and all of the pieces are strong on their own. 

[vaughnbros]

It's worth investigating, I suppose.  Most standout Modern/Legacy/Standard cards turn out to be Vintage playable on some level once the initial reluctance wears off.

Some cards make there way in.  Rarely does an entire combo though.  Survival of the fittest was a graveyard based archetype that demolished legacy for the better part of a year.  We have yet to see anything come of that so I don't think a weaker graveyard based combo is really going to cut it.  Id of course be happy to be wrong, but he needs to play the deck first...

[Vennie]

It's worth investigating, I suppose.  Most standout Modern/Legacy/Standard cards turn out to be Vintage playable on some level once the initial reluctance wears off.

Some cards make there way in.  Rarely does an entire combo though.  Survival of the fittest was a graveyard based archetype that demolished legacy for the better part of a year.  We have yet to see anything come of that so I don't think a weaker graveyard based combo is really going to cut it.  Id of course be happy to be wrong, but he needs to play the deck first...

Survival only demolished legacy because nobody in the US actually played hate for it main. In Europe it never took off quite that much. Another thing that might have worked against Survival in Europe was that in Europe people played more combo as well which had quite the good MU in the pairing against survival...

[MaximumCDawg]

Yeah, Survival probably should not have been banned.  But, now that it is, we have this really bizarre situation where Survival (not played in any format) sells for just as much as Oath of Druids (Vintage staple). 

Why do you price inertia, casual players?

[Wagner]

Yeah, Survival probably should not have been banned.  But, now that it is, we have this really bizarre situation where Survival (not played in any format) sells for just as much as Oath of Druids (Vintage staple). 

Why do you price inertia, casual players?

Survival sells for 15-20$ as where Oath sells for 5-6$. Not really as much.

[Vennie]

Yeah, Survival probably should not have been banned.  But, now that it is, we have this really bizarre situation where Survival (not played in any format) sells for just as much as Oath of Druids (Vintage staple). 

Why do you price inertia, casual players?

I think this has to do with commander being so popular where survival is just a bomb as in it is multiple tutors in 1 card.

[Guli]

Survival is a bomb in Vintage too. Have you ever played against a deck that resolves one? Things go down hill pretty quickly. There is just nobody taking up the card to design a nice deck with it.

[AmbivalentDuck]

Survival is a bomb in Vintage too. Have you ever played against a deck that resolves one? Things go down hill pretty quickly. There is just nobody taking up the card to design a nice deck with it.

Because it's slower than Tinker and Green Sun's Zenith.

[MaximumCDawg]

Survival sells for 15-20$ as where Oath sells for 5-6$. Not really as much.

Yesterday, I was right.  Today, you are.   Check the Black Lotus Project.  Either way, this makes the price of Survival even more stupid!

[vaughnbros]

But, now that it is, we have this really bizarre situation where Survival (not played in any format) sells for just as much as Oath of Druids (Vintage staple). 

Why do you price inertia, casual players?

EDH > Vintage for demand.  Why do you think the price of imp seal sky rocketed out of no where?

This is getting kind of derailed from the original thread now though.  My point was not specifically why is survival not played, but that combos that see success in other formats do not translate into vintage.

[Guli]

Survival is a bomb in Vintage too. Have you ever played against a deck that resolves one? Things go down hill pretty quickly. There is just nobody taking up the card to design a nice deck with it.

Because it's slower than Tinker and Green Sun's Zenith.

So what, it still has a lot of potential. Tinker and GSZ have their downsides too.

[AmbivalentDuck]

Survival is 5 mana and two cards to get the first tutored critter into play. It simply fails to be better than Tinker/GSZ/Natural Order. As a deck engine in Legacy, it was more interesting on account of graveyard hate not being completely ubiquitous (thanks dredge!) and the grindier nature of the critter v critter games.

[Guli]

Survival is 5 mana and two cards to get the first tutored critter into play. It simply fails to be better than Tinker/GSZ/Natural Order. As a deck engine in Legacy, it was more interesting on account of graveyard hate not being completely ubiquitous (thanks dredge!) and the grindier nature of the critter v critter games.

I don't look at it that way. Some cards do such unique things, that mana cost is not enough to judge them. Survival enables a stream of lines of play for the upcoming turns.

[AmbivalentDuck]

Survival is good because it's both a draw engine and a selection engine. That said, it's just not fast enough for Vintage. In other formats, being intensive isn't as damning. But here, colorless mana is abundant and colored mana is scarcer. Worse, the primary combo (Loyal Retainers Emrakul into play, then drop Anger into the grave) costs at least 5 mana in a single turn. That's a bargain in Legacy, but you can just cast Yawgmoth's Bargain instead here.