[Free Article] Dredge: The Once and Forever Boogeyman

[voltron00x]

Since I know everyone loves playing against Dredge so much, I figured I'd write about it. You're welcome!

Free Article - Vintage Dredge, The Once and Forever Boogeyman

In this article I talk about Dredge in general, what an optimal list pre-B&R changes looked like, some of the new cards seeing play, and how to construct a Dredge deck for the new environment.

Also Cthulu, James Cromwell, and more.  Obviously only a deranged and broken mind would play Dredge for 6+ years...

Hope you guys enjoy this one, I had some fun writing it. Note that I formatted this like a "real" article with hover to view card names and formatted deck lists. I'll be going back to the previous two I wrote to do the same thing.

[vaughnbros]

Always love your articles and this one was no exception!  Even if I disagree with that the optimal build of dredge is

[Oath of Happy]

Fit 4 Gitaxian Probes in there before you start calling your lists "optimal."

Also, what art is that with the caption "No hope, no resistance, only Dredge?"

[H]

Also, what art is that with the caption "No hope, no resistance, only Dredge?"

Reverse image search is your friend: It's an HP Lovecraft image.

[ajfirecracker]

Very nice! Keep 'em coming!

[data]

Great article Matt.  One constructive criticism is your language concerning Kolaghan, notably the passage "provided you’re swinging into a clear or mostly clear opponent, the math for Dragonlord is favorable," is, in my opinion, a bit misleading. 

Kolaghan is only more damage than Flame-Kin Zealot when you have fewer than three other creatures on the board after he comes into play, assuming no others enter later (Flame Kin is 3/3 after trigger resolves, and adds 1 power to three other creatures = 6 power of Kolaghan).  That is rarely the case, as most dredge pilots will attest, because you usually have more than three other creatures.  Moreover, there are a not insignificant number of situations where Kolaghan cannot end the game, and the Zealot can (say you have five 2/2s and Kolaghan = 16 damage, versus 5 3/3s and Zealot = 18 damage).  And certain non-clear opposing boards probably swing the calculations even more in Zealot's favor.  All told, I'd probably have used a word such as "comparable" over favorable.

That being said, your insight that Kolaghan's ability requires him to remain in play is something that hand't occurred to me and advanced my understanding of the card.  Thanks for that.

[voltron00x]

Great article Matt.  One constructive criticism is your language concerning Kolaghan, notably the passage "provided you’re swinging into a clear or mostly clear opponent, the math for Dragonlord is favorable," is, in my opinion, a bit misleading. 

Kolaghan is only more damage than Flame-Kin Zealot when you have fewer than three other creatures on the board after he comes into play, assuming no others enter later (Flame Kin is 3/3 after trigger resolves, and adds 1 power to three other creatures = 6 power of Kolaghan).  That is rarely the case, as most dredge pilots will attest, because you usually have more than three other creatures.  Moreover, there are a not insignificant number of situations where Kolaghan cannot end the game, and the Zealot can (say you have five 2/2s and Kolaghan = 16 damage, versus 5 3/3s and Zealot = 18 damage).  And certain non-clear opposing boards probably swing the calculations even more in Zealot's favor.  All told, I'd probably have used a word such as "comparable" over favorable.

That being said, your insight that Kolaghan's ability requires him to remain in play is something that hand't occurred to me and advanced my understanding of the card.  Thanks for that.

Thanks, great feedback. I just rewrote that section to clear up a couple of points and added a damage charge for each, based on quantity of Bridge tokens.

[inkmothnexus]

on Kolaghan:

She pitches to ichorid, which is something FKZ has never done.

she does the most damage relative to FKZ when you have 0-1 bridges. she gives you the option to do a baby DR for just her and deal 6-8, which FKZ doesn't, giving you the kill next turn off all the new creatures having haste.

Her ability does go away with removal, but that isn't the biggest issue. any removal cast after the turn we get her is equivalent to FKZ's trigger ending at end of turn. Most spot removal is either swords, which hits an ichorid or narc on draw step, or bolt, which kills their own dude in response to DR. between that and therapies, the only stuff that is likely to happen to kolaghan is karakas, which you can just not play into, or an active forgemaster for duplicant, which is already bad in the FKZ scenario due to breaking bridges to find a hellkite or wurmcoil or whatever.

[ajfirecracker]

The one caveat in your analysis is probably Karakas, which is seeing a historically high level of play right now (from what I've seen)

"Not playing into it" is a real cost

[voltron00x]

I feel like the removing to Ichorid piece is a little bit overstated too; in Game 1 I'm expected to get my creature into play, not feed it to Ichorid, and except for certain cases, I'm likely siding it out in post-board games. I'm trying to think of a single game in the thousands I've played with Dredge where not being able to bring back Ichorid while having a DR target in the board cost me a game, and I'm not coming up with any... though in fairness I suppose that's not exactly the type of thing I'd be looking for. 

Then again, for a while we did play Sadistic Hypnotist as like a 3x DR target and those all fed to Ichorid, so there's that.

[desolutionist]

Hey Matt I had an idea to combat Cage: Squee

The idea is that Cage doesn't stop the dredge mechanic or squee from coming back, so you'll be able to generate card advantage off Bazaar of Baghdad and build up an arsenal of removal to fight through counterspells or lands to hard cast Grave Troll.  I'm trying them in the maindeck over the 4th Serum Powder, a Thug, and 2 Ichorids.  It's also something you can just cast and hopefully have it die to trigger Bridge.

Squee could also help in making a mana version of dredge more viable.  Having more mana to put cards like Null Rod into play could really help those difficult matches.   

[voltron00x]

Hey Matt I had an idea to combat Cage: Squee

The idea is that Cage doesn't stop the dredge mechanic or squee from coming back, so you'll be able to generate card advantage off Bazaar of Baghdad and build up an arsenal of removal to fight through counterspells or lands to hard cast Grave Troll.  I'm trying them in the maindeck over the 4th Serum Powder, a Thug, and 2 Ichorids.  It's also something you can just cast and hopefully have it die to trigger Bridge.

Squee could also help in making a mana version of dredge more viable.  Having more mana to put cards like Null Rod into play could really help those difficult matches.   

Interested to see how you like that, though I strongly advise against cutting the 4th Serum Powder.

[TheBrassMan]

Amusingly, that might also give you some resilience against Wastes. If your initial Bazaar gets Wasted after one activation, you can be stuck drawing cards for a few turns before hitting 8 in hand to discard a big dredger each turn (this is not a great position to be in, but sometimes it's your best option). If you've mulligan'd you might have to spend 4+ turns doing nothing - each Squee you hit cuts down that number by one. It's not a big advantage, but I could definitely see it mattering in some matchups.

I'd like the plan a lot more if it happened to be a black creature.