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This deck was insipired by a deck that Suitangi made with a similar name. It has the same idea, but has a slightly faster, consistent, and risky build (as it does fail to a single counterspell).
Ideal hand would have two lands and a fluctuator along with a whole bunch of cycling creatures. Basically, you play as follows:1.) Mull until you have a fluctuator/Muddle the Mixture or have 3-4 cards left in hand.2.) Play fluctuator and keep cycling cards until you have a hand of cards that you can't cycle.3.) Play Dromar's Cavern if you have it to bounce a land and keep cycling (it might be a good idea to play Songs with mana from the Cavern so you have enough Black left in your pool to keep going).4.) Drop Restless Dreams to change the fodder from your hand into cycle-able creatures that you can draw more cards off of. Once you've done this as much as you can, generate a whole tun of mana using Songs of the Damned and drop a giant Exsanguinate.As noted in several comments, this deck is very vulnerable to one counterspell. Besides Miscalculation, not many counter cards really fit in to here well. Some options to make this deck more consistent are in the sideboard, including Pact of Negation. These cards may bring the deck out of the true Budget range, but should be considered if you want to make this deck slightly more competitively viable. Muddle the Mixture should probably be used in the maindeck, but I'm not sure what to take out for it- without Muddle, getting Fluctuator in hand can be a tricky business. Note that a very good version of this deck can be made by siding out both Restless Dreams and two Dromar's Caverns for the 4x Street Wraith. This means that you have less than 7 cards in the deck that can't cycle.
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I'd drop the dromar's caverns for two lotus peddles. This will help you go off on turn one more often. I'd also drop the muddles and restless dreams for streetwraiths. The sideboard should run pact of negation x1, misdirection x1, and pact of summoning x1. I like your variation because it avoids targeting the player and plays huge in group. Great deck!
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Those cards will easily triple his deck price...notice the budget tag...
Interesting points- here are my thoughts on each of those:Dromar's Cavern is preferable to Petals because it bounces a land that I can use to keep cycling. I only really need the black most of the time, and the Cavern produces all the colors I need anyway. Your point about starting the combo one turn earlier is very valid, but I think that the extra card draw outweighs in a combo deck.Street Wraith is excellent, but Muddle The Mixtures are there to make it easier to find a Fluctuator, and the deck simply would not work without the Restless Dreams because you will run up against dead hands when drawing through the deck. I will add Street Wraith to the Sideboard.I really do like the ideas of pacts and misdirection, but they're a little out of budget. I do agree strongly that this deck does need some aggressively costed (hard) counters. Any suggestions?
The reason this deck isn't viable in Legacy is due to it being shut down by a single card. If the deck could use counterspells it would be at the cost of drawing them when it needs to combo out for the songs of the damned. The eventual conclusion it isn't a viable deck archetype. So where to play it? My friends and I have created a drinking game where we play purely agro combo decks (ex. Flash Hulk, Sneak Attack, Channel Fireball) and drink for each end of our turn phase. The winner then gets to hand out five drinks. Listen, I've played this deck for six years... if your deck can't win on turn one then your not going to make top eight in a real tourney. I get the idea for muddle... but its just too slow. If your going for the best cheap version of this deck then run all the cycle lands, four flux, two songs, one kill card. Then all cycle creature cards. Its that simple. Every card you add is a turn you'll have to wait before you combo out. The restless dreams are cool. I used to run a version with one copy of life from the loam. It was good... Sorry if I sound negative and I think the deck archetype could be retooled... but I wouldn't doubt "enter the infinite" or whatever new card could make the deck. But as to this archetype, I just don't think it can be improved. I used to run miscalculate but besides that... there isn't room for spells that do not cycle. Goodluck!
I appreciate this comment much more than your last one- this gives me more of a background on what your expectations are. My goal when making this deck was not to Top 8 in irl tourneys- my friends and I enjoy making combo decks and playing them, just as you and yours do the same. I will add cards to the sideboard and add a note that they should be added in to make the deck "tournament viable" but not necessarily budget. Some other people have been saying similar things to what you said, and I can see from which angle you are coming. However, I don't believe that any budget/cheap deck will really be able to compete with really expensive T1/Tournament level decks. There's a reason that tournament level decks are very expensive, and that's because they're very good. Muddle the Mix is there because Fluctuator draws can be very inconsistent- it's just there to up the chances of functionally drawing a Fluctuator in the instance that you have to mull down to 3-4 and still don't draw a fluctuator. The abbreviated deck that you suggested looks very good, but without a Fluctuator in opening hand, I believe that this deck with the Muddles is slightly better. I really do like Miscalcualtion- so what I'm going to do is sideboard the muddles and put miscalculation in the maindeck. Thank you very much for your comments- I really appreciated your feedback!
Interesting concept and budget wise of a deck, the cards I would try to implement in this deck are a couple of forbidden crypt and maybe Jotun Grunt.
I think that Forbidden Crypt wouldn't be the best addition here. Since the replacement effect isn't optional, it would be very hard to use it in an effective manner. I could see a scheme where you could recur Songs and Restless Dreams, but that would probably just reduce the chance of starting the combo on its way because it takes up an extra card slot and has a cost that I probably won't be able to pay until I actually do play Songs. If there's something I'm overlooking about a way this card could be used, please let me know.I'm not sure what Jotun Grunt would accomplish here- I want as many creatures in my grave as I can get, and usually (using some discretion) you can be safe from mill decks by leaving some number of cards in your deck. This card doesn't cycle and I wouldn't like putting it in here.
Yeah, I don't know why I suggested either of those cards, I probably should stop posting stuff while trying to "multitask" and study for school as well.
you could throw in pact of negation for counterspells. or perhaps complicate?
Yeah, Luttersign also mentioned that putting those in would be a good idea- I'm going to put them in the sideboard with a comment about making the deck viable for larger play.
I like this deck, I decided to copy it and tweak it to my likings. I found using a Lotus Petal or two with a few dark rituals is great, it gives you the 2 for the Fluctuator and an open black to use out your Songs/Restless Dreams/other Rituals.Basically a starting hand w/ a Petal/Ritual/Fluctuator sets you up for a possible turn 1 Exsanguinate for the win.
Yeah, some small variants on the decklist can make some cool changes. I usually tried to stay away from more cards that don't cycle because hitting an uncycling card when trying to combo can really mess up your plans, but the possibility of a turn one win sounds awesome! Lotus Petal and Ritual sound like interesting additions- you could post your decklist here if you liked, so that other people can see it too- It's nice to know that this deck inspired you!
Street Wraith seems good here.
Yep, it's already in the board. I personally like Gitaxian Probe better, but they both have their advantages.
I can really appreciate this deck thanks to your reply. I would agree that most pauper decks are not tier one viable. However, there are some exceptions, like the mono-blue classic "Fish" and red's "red deck wins" both of which can be quite good in the right metagame. However, I think your comment on big money cards in magic is completely understandable. If i hadn't been playing back in 1997 then I wouldn't have been able to trade or buy most of these big money cards for peanuts... or should I say candy bars. I once traded a candy bar for a survival of the fittest during lunch period in high school. Still got it. Cheers and goodluck!!
Haha, it's good to know that I made some sense ^.^ I'm not going to pretend that I know what those decks are, but I'm probably going to check them out pretty soon. I'm a fairly new player- was introduced to the game two years ago and only actually owned my own cards about a year ago, so older cards are really cool for me to have/see/think about. If you don't mind me asking, could I trade you two candy bards for your Susvival of the Fittest? You'll get a 100% return on your investment- how about that? Anyway, I hope you have a lot of fun playing Magic and keep making insightful comments on peoples' decks- it helps a lot!
Thank you, sir! I decided to steal from this (http://www.mtgvault.com/spudshaver/decks/deathcycle/). Mine is not as good, but I enjoyed reading yours and trying to alter it, so, thank you.
Your deck looks pretty cool! The double white on the Debt might be a little hard to get, but It'd still be an awesome deck to show of to your friends ^.^ Glad to know that I inspired someone!
Since you need a Fluctuator in your satrting hand and since you plan to mulligan aggressively, I suggest Serum Powder. I suck at math, so I can't tell you if that helps you actually out (since it doesn't cycle) but I bet you have to take alot of mulligans so this might actually make the deck more consistent.
This is an interesting idea- I like the idea of being able to mull that aggressively, it could also trip you up if you get it in a hand where you don't need it or draw in to it when you're just about out of combo material. I'm okay at math, but this requires too much thought >.< Would a more intelligent player care to help up out?
I'm not really sure how Serum Powder works (my math level isn't there yet) but calculating the probability of a Fluctuator being in your hand might be able to help...[This is a little math, feel free to skip to the end conclusion where I give the % chances...]So the odds of getting one particular card in a 60 card deck is 1/60.Since there are 4 Fluctuators in the deck, the odds of getting it (when you pick one random card) is 4/60, and the odds of NOT getting it is 56/60. After you picked out a card, there are clearly 59 cards left in the deck. So if the card you drew isn't the Fluctuator, the probability of NOT drawing it would be 55/59. And it goes on and on...Since your opening hand consists of 7 cards, we will find the probability of NOT getting a Fluctuator in 7 cards:(For those of you that know nCr, this might seem cumbersome, but bear with this "simplified" solution)Card #1: 56/60 (Chance of card not being Fluctuator)Card #2: 55/59Card #3: 54/58Card #4: 53/57Card #5: 52/56Card #6: 51/55Card #7: 50/54(56 x 55 x 54 x 53 x 52 x 51 x 50) / (60 x 59 x 58 x 57 x 56 x 55 x 54) = 60.05% chance that it won't be in your hand100% - 60.05% = 39.95%So there is a 39.95% probability that Fluctuator will be in your OPENING (Card x7) hand.After some math calculations....If you mull down to 3, there is an 83.38% chance that you will get a Fluctuator in your hand!I don't like mulling below 3, but if you were to mull to 1, there is an 86.50% chance that you have it in your hand.Now if you want lands to accompany that as well... The probability of having two land and a Fluctuator in your opening hand is around 52%... I think[CONCLUSION]In your opening (7 cards) hand, there is a (about) 39.95% chance of Fluctuator being in your deck.If you mull down to 3, there is an 83.33% chance that you will get a Fluctuator in your hand!If you mull down to 1, there is an 86.50% chance that you will get a Fluctuator in your hand!Disclaimer: I make a lot of math mistakes on a daily basis... this post might very well be wrong...
The math on that has been done already and could be looked up, however, what we have to weigh this against is the probability to draw a Serum Powder later in the game and then getting stuck. And I guess from Hawkings aside nobody could calculate that, I recommend the good old goldfishing method to test the waters :)
Puschkin- from a link on the Gatherer page of Serum Powder (http://www.starcitygames.com/magic/vintage/13443_Crushing_Vintage_Without_Power_Nine_The_Manaless_Ichorid_Primer.html) I found a deck that had already calculated the chance of simply ruthlessly mulling down until a single card made it to your hand. The chance that this strategy will work out for you is 93%. I still have some concerns- sometimes, a hand with Serum Powder may not be a hand that you want to mull because it may remove a Songs. Even then, if more than five creatures are removed, it may be tricky to generate the amount of mana needed for a killing Exsanguinate. All in all, I feel that the number of downsides in having an extra noncycling card in the deck outweigh the benefit of being able to mull a little more aggresively.
Here's an interesting link I found...https://github.com/Dritte/VintageDredge/blob/master/mulliganToBazaar.py