Everything is Standard-legal except some unimportant lands, which I just sideboarded. I personally don't generally play Standard though. I just play casual anything-goes type games with friends. :)
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Agreed that the parts are fairly easy to counter, but with so many possible combos it's difficult to shut them all down. It's definitely not perfect, but it certainly shows a significant advantage in Standard.
Yep, the combo requires 2 Decoction modules...sorry, wasn't clear about that.
Good idea, much more helpful than the conditionally useful Workshop Assistant. :)
Turn 1 is not possible with this deck. At best, it can do turn 3.Card 1: ForestCard 2: FastbondCard 3: Any land (via Fastbond, lose 2 life - 18)Card 4: Any land (via Fastbond, lose 2 life - 16)Card 5: Any land (via Fastbond, lose 2 life - 14)Card 6: Squirrel Nest (Can't use without untapped land) / Earthcraft (Can't use without creatures)-- next turn --(Should have remaining Squirrel Nest/Earthcraft card in hand, or draw it)Card 7: Squirrel Nest / Earthcraft (Whichever has not been played already. You can now use the combo)Make squirrels and untap lands to keep making more, infinitely-- next turn --(Should have Banefire in hand by now, or draw it)(Must have played a mountain by now)Card 8: BanefireFor first turn, you'd need 9 cards (6 lands) to even be able to get Squirrel Nest/Earthcraft on the board, due to all the tapped lands not being useful until you can get both parts of the combo out. You'd also need one extra untapped land to be able to activate the combo. In addition, the Squirrel Nest/Earthcraft combo requires tapping the lands for squirrels, which prevents them from being used for floating mana, and the squirrels are already tapped to keep the squirrel generation combo going and thus can't be used to untap extra times for more mana. With a turn rollover, you can reuse the lands and get it off on turn 3, but that would require 8 exact cards between your hand and the top two cards of the deck.Other notes:- Vitalize would allow you to get the infinite mana combo off on turn 2, but there would not have been enough cards drawn at that point to have the Squirrel Nest/Earthcraft combo out and have a Banefire in-hand.- If you do Earthcraft on turn 1, you can shift one of the land drops to turn 2. It allows some room to draw the needed fourth land on the second turn, if you don't have it already.- Elvish Spirit Guide can't really be used to replace any of those land drops, as the lands need to be reusable to be useful to the combo. It also still takes up a card, so just drawing another land would be strictly better, with Fastbond on the board.
Also sunbond, which is easier than archangel. The archangel is just my big, smashy backup plan.
The deck is not done yet.
I found both those to be too slow. Thornbite Staff is only really useful if you are attacking creatures, but I just ping the user and bounce any creatures they happen to get out with Sigil of Sleep. Umbral Mantle isn't very repeatable, costing 3 each time, and the power/toughness bonus doesn't really help the deck do what it's meant to. I have the Thornbite Staff and Basilisk Collar combo in another deck too. It'd be kind of boring to build basically the same deck, just in blue. I find I tend to just get one pinger out, strap Sigil of Sleep and Pemmin's Aura or Freed From the Real on it, then just use all future mana to untap it repeatedly. Suq'Ata, being untargetable by red, deals with most of the creature hate I've encountered so far, so I usually play those first whenever I have them. I'm contemplating taking one of the creature sets out and just adding 4 more islands to accelerate Freed from the Real or Pemmin's Aura once they get out. Curiosity so far has just filled my hand with a bunch of creatures I don't play because buying untaps has more value.
Good suggestion. Used it to replace Body Double.
I think that is kind of overkill. I mean, you are probably already going to have 24x 25/25 creatures out.
Gaea's Cradle and Doubling Season are sadly a bit out of my price range at the moment, still great choices though. Much of the stuff in this deck is just stuff I already had a bunch of. I only actually bought one more Fable of Wolf and Owl and two more Wren's Run Packmasters.
Hmm...good point. I forgot Emrakul gets shuffled into your library like that. I never really use Emrakul; I always go for It That Betrays, since it can steal permanents. I'll change the description to use It That Betrays, since it makes more sense that way. That'll teach me not to do stuff that involves thinking at 4AM. The Fauna Shaman/Elvish Piper combo works though, which is pretty awesome.
Uhh...saved it as "finished" before it actually WAS finished. >.>
I've got the Devoted Druid / Quillspike combo in my token deck. It plays brilliantly into Flourishing Defenses, for infinite 1/1 elves. :)