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2 years ago ::
Nov 08, 2011 - 3:19PM
#1
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This thread is for discussion of this week's Building on a Budget, which goes live Wednesday morning on magicthegathering.com.
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2 years ago ::
Nov 08, 2011 - 9:10PM
#2
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Gee thanks, like I needed to play against more poison decks. Every time I lose to one, I scream Maro's name in frustration and horror.
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2 years ago ::
Nov 08, 2011 - 9:21PM
#3
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Date Joined:
Mar 15, 2011
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Not trying to drift from the original topic at hand, but is there a more budget-friendly option to....well, most of the deck? It seems like Inkmoth Nexus's are $20 a pop, with Skithiryx at around $10, the P. Crusaders about $8, and the Lashwrithes rounding out the "high cost" curve at about $5.
Or is that not possible with an infect-based deck?
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2 years ago ::
Nov 08, 2011 - 9:36PM
#4
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Two things to say. First: This deck is remarkably similar to the Phyrexian Crusade deck in the article "Knight of the Living Dead" from just a month ago. I guess that's because there isn't a lot of variety to what you can play in Monoblack Infect, and it's not like we've gotten any new cards for the archetype, it being Scars-only and all. But second is in response to this: I feel compelled to speak for a moment about this deck's "budget-ness." It's very difficult right now to build a worthwhile Constructed deck without at least some number of cards that are relatively difficult to acquire. I've made a conscious decision to value the quality of my decks over their accessibility. The decklists I present are still significantly easier to find the cards for than other mainstream decks. Most importantly, these decks are very capable of winning tournaments and letting you have a good time while playing and learning the tenets of deck building. These decks still qualify as budget. Budget is a subjective concept, and I feel it's unreasonable to give it a concrete value.
It's nice that you (finally) replied to the feedback you've been getting every week for as long as I've been reading this column. Unfortunately, you chose to respond by dismissing it. What really annoys me is your refusal to quantify what you consider budget, as that would vastly improve the column and head off a lot of the haters.
I post this to say that you've lost at least one reader in your refusal to heed the feedback, instead of just replying to it. Good bye.
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2 years ago ::
Nov 08, 2011 - 9:49PM
#5
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Date Joined:
Sep 21, 2010
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Skithiryx doesn't strike me as all that essential to the deck.... I'd spend the money for the Nexus's though, it's a very strong card. You can probably use it in many different decks over the next year to get your money's worth. On the other hand you could probably find an decent replacement for the Crusader, it's essentially a Black Knight with infect (and pro-red). Lashwirthe is one of the key cards in the deck though, so you'll probably be needing them.
On a seperate point, Is it just me or does the deck have a strange amount of singletons? it's not a toolbox deck, since there's no way of pulling out the appropriate tool, so the numbers seem very odd to me.
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2 years ago ::
Nov 08, 2011 - 10:10PM
#6
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Date Joined:
Apr 16, 2011
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I, too, am confused by the lots-of-singletons. I'd rather have a more evenly distributed mix of the removal spells anyway. Any why no Tribute to Hunger (or Geth's Verdict) in the sideboard?
I do like the idea of trying out the Trigons (and they seem like they'd be better if you played more Tezzeret's Gambit), and the Curse of Death's Hold is nice tech.
But...due to the way that formats tend to morph...what would you suggest to avoid Oops, Lose to Control other than sticking Whispering Specter?
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2 years ago ::
Nov 08, 2011 - 11:05PM
#7
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Date Joined:
Oct 11, 2005
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Not trying to drift from the original topic at hand, but is there a more budget-friendly option to....well, most of the deck? It seems like Inkmoth Nexus's are $20 a pop, with Skithiryx at around $10, the P. Crusaders about $8, and the Lashwrithes rounding out the "high cost" curve at about $5.
Or is that not possible with an infect-based deck?
As much as I hate to say it, investing into those Inkmoth Nexuses are almost a necessity at this time, being one of two ways of attacking with creatures without having to cast a spell (The other being the more narrow Moorland Haunt). If you are planning on playing long term and in winning Tournies, picking up one a week isn't too outrageous, and it'll fit in just about every deck you're going to play well into next year.
The Crusader actually is very necessary to this particular deck, too. I wouldn't skimp on those. Although you probably could subsitute the Skithie and Lashwrites for... well.. whatever and Trepanation Blade.
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2 years ago ::
Nov 08, 2011 - 11:32PM
#8
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Date Joined:
Aug 25, 2003
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It's nice to finally get a response to the feedback we've been giving for ages, but "it can't be done" is a bit of a weak response. Just give a possible replacement for each rare or expensive card. It doesn't have to be as strong, it just has to fill the same role. That way, people can decide for themselves what they do and how much they buy.
*sighs*
Personally, I just wish back for the days when Building on a Budget was about more than just Constructed play. That was so much more conducive to long-term building.
Zindaras' meta is like a fossil, ancient and its secrets yet to be uncovered. Only men of yore, long dead, knew of it.
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2 years ago ::
Nov 08, 2011 - 11:34PM
#9
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Date Joined:
Jun 28, 2010
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Building on a budget.. if your budget is about $110,00... sheesh.
Please change this Article's name to a more fitting one. This is not building on a budget! not even CLOSE!
Who has $100,00 lying around to build a budget deck?
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2 years ago ::
Nov 09, 2011 - 12:08AM
#10
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Date Joined:
Oct 13, 2009
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html_removed ...
But second is in response to this:
I feel compelled to speak for a moment about this deck's "budget-ness." It's very difficult right now to build a worthwhile Constructed deck without at least some number of cards that are relatively difficult to acquire. I've made a conscious decision to value the quality of my decks over their accessibility. The decklists I present are still significantly easier to find the cards for than other mainstream decks. Most importantly, these decks are very capable of winning tournaments and letting you have a good time while playing and learning the tenets of deck building. These decks still qualify as budget. Budget is a subjective concept, and I feel it's unreasonable to give it a concrete value.
It's nice that you (finally) replied to the feedback you've been getting every week for as long as I've been reading this column. Unfortunately, you chose to respond by dismissing it. What really annoys me is your refusal to quantify what you consider budget, as that would vastly improve the column and head off a lot of the haters.
I post this to say that you've lost at least one reader in your refusal to heed the feedback, instead of just replying to it. Good bye.
You are being unreasonble, he gave you quality measure of budget instead of quantifyable. Or using the magic demografic, he straigth out told you that he presents/builds budget spike decks instead of budget timmie. He straigth out told you that the competiveness is more important for him than just budget. Then he told us that many of the competive strategies in standard and other formats will exceed what most call budget as many of the cards that makes it competive, is rare/expensive. The last point you can agree or disagree with, but I believe it holds some truth. If you don't want to be competive in standard (obviously his favorite format) then this column isn't for you (anymore) that doesn't make it bad.
That said, I do think his articles could become better. He could try to squees in more budget thinking in them by presenting which expensive cards you swap out and which nonbudget cards you could use if you have them, and perhaps most importantly; which cards you can't swap out. He could also improve the match-reports by showing more of them, showing some where the deck does it's broken stuff and where it falls short and where it's a good/bad metagaming deck.
I love when he does just that and the articles feels too short without them. I feel that he is rather good at explaining why the decks he presents is good in the metagame, but i often misses to explain why, and why it isn't a good metagaming deck.
If he needed more space for all that, then he could split his articles into two which could also give him a little more room for showing an evolution to a deck.
Upon the actual deck, it seems very good. Not original but with some originality to it, mostly the trigon of rage which is interesting. I believe the deck can become more budget without the crusader and the vatmother (sideboard), but that would obviously come at a great cost for the metagaming.
I know that Niche used the same kind of deck with great results in States so here is what he had to say about the deck [you can find the thread here]:Spoiler:
Show
Sorry for not hammering it out last night but I was mentally wore out from playing some epic battles all day. I didn't sweep any of my opponents and I used some heavy Jedi mind tricks because my deck had some subpar choices. In my defense I built it at midnight Friday night and made some more last minute changes before registering. I also have a 50 hour work week, a wife, and 10 hours of commuting so my play test time is zero.
Luckily I don't care what anyone says but I'm really damn good at playing mono black and I can slide behind the wheel of any mono black deck and push it to the limits.
Without further ado, the deck:
4 x Plague Stinger 
4 x Whispering Specter 
4 x Phyrexian Crusader 
2 x Skithiryx, the Blight Dragon 
3 x Virulent Wound 
3 x Tribute to Hunger 
2 x Doom Blade 
2 x Contagion Clasp 
4 x Tezzeret's Gambit 
2 x Postmortem Lunge 
3 x Lashwrithe 
2 x Batterskull 
1 x Karn Liberated 
4 x Inkmoth Nexus 
20 x Swamp 
Sideboard
4 x Despise 
4 x Ghost Quarter 
1 x Virulent Wound
2 x Gruesome Encore 
3 x Surgical Extraction 
1 x Karn Liberated
I'll post the perfectly tuned list at the end of the report.
Round 1: The Suck Pairing. (Mike Handley)
Buddy from my LGS. He plays UB infect control. I won the dice roll and pushed him under with Skithiryx game 1.
Game 2 he showed me his skithiryx.
Game 3 I showed him turn 2 stinger, turn 3 whispering, turn 4 lashwrithe onto whispering forcing him to discard 5 and putting 5 infect on him. He drew and scooped.
2-1
Round 2: Burning Vengeance (Another Mike)
Game 1 Details are sketchy but I don't draw into any crusaders or skithiryx and I can't proliferate out the win before he gets double vengeance online and yadda yadda.
Game 2 I lay out a stinger and whispering specter + lashwrithe him for the 5 infect and hand rip. He cannot find a vengeance.
Game 3 is close and he pushes me down to 6 but double crusader pushes him under.
2-1
Round 3: Humans splashing blue (Adam)
Game 1 We go back and forth but he's able to play beatdown better than me. I make some bad board decisions because of no testing (and the board wasn't properly set up for this anyway).
Game 2 he nut draws out Champ into Champ + Traveler into Crusader. Ouphe.
0-2
Round 4: Wolf Run (John Spencer)
Game 1 is an uphill battle the whole way. He had maindeck geistflames because he told me later he'd tested the matchup and knew it was awful. Weird. He crushed me pretty hard because I had no removals and my creatures got outclassed.
Game 2 I reach for the 8 card board in, Despises and Ghost Quarters. This was an epic battle. I lead off with a Despise and rip a Thrun, noting Slime, 2 Land, Beast, and a Rampant. I didn't note a mulligan on him so maybe this was my turn 2 play and I held back to virulent wound in case he laid a bird. Again, notes aren't really detailed. We do some tough back and forth and I sneak in some infect and begin working to proliferate it up because he's rocking geistflames everywhere and has the beast for crusaders. At the most pivotal moment in the game I'm holding double Doom Blade and move to win with a plague stinger. He activates inkmoth... I blade it. He activates another inkmoth... I blade it. This crushes him badly and puts him at 9 counters. He scoops after flipping a land from the topdeck.
Game 3 I go inkmoth for a poison on 2, into specter on 3, lashwrithe on 4 for his hand. I win easy from there just ignoring his resolved emissary.
2-1
Round 5: Burning Vengeance (Earnest)
Game 1 I blow him out with crusader carrying a lashwrithe.
Game 2 he boards in a lot of permission and I cannot get him past 4 poison.
Game 3 I introduce him to specter into lashwrithe.
2-1
Round 6: Wolf Run (Stephen Strange... I know)
Game 1 I play swamp and pass, he plays forest bird and I virulent wound it. I stick a stinger and then a crusader... he slagstorms to trigger his emissary and solemn.... but draws poorly and when I play the lashwrithe he scoops.
Game 2 I get him to 5 infect but he gets double primeval titan off the top after I double despise and rip his Garruks. No P-Tits in hand.
Game 3 we shuffle up like mad and present to cut. I shuffle his deck and hand it back. We draw 7. He looks down and picks up 2 cards off the floor. I wasn't sure of the ruling... because I don't play much... but I'm pretty certain I was over 50% to get a game/match win from this. I call the judge because well.. you have to... and he says you guys presented to cut? And we confirm. he game losses the Wolf Run player and that's the match.
2-1
Round 7: WU Aggro (Moe)
With us both being X-1 we check standings and there'sa lot of X-1s... and the consensus no X-1 can draw in. That's brutal.
Game 1 we race hard but he cannot answer Crusader into lashwrithe.
Game 2 he has the counter for crusader and lands a Gideon. Mirran Crusader has me on a fast clock.
Game 3 I've got tributes for his mirran crusaderS and I give him the ole whispering specter + lashwrithe... via postmortem lunge. He struggles to find a blue from there and I finish him quickly. We finished this match in like 20 minutes tops because of how hateful crusaders are for the opposition.
2-1
Quarterfinals: Gavony Tokens (Stephanie)
Poor girl was a nervous wreck. I did my best to calm her down and encourage her to smile but the fact she Top 8'd put her on bad tilt.
Game 1 we have a pretty epic struggle. I race her haunting tokens which are very effective against me and sneak crusader by. I tribute these tokens (which were 4/4s and 5/5s) to keep racing. I work her to 8 infect... she throws out a timely reinforcements which gets parallel lives-ed into 18 power against my 14 life from 2 pump spells. I'm thinking... 'so...'... and she's about to pass turn... but drops an Avacyn's Pilgrim. My crusader looks up at me and says , 'That seems really good right now.' I untap... I've got 4 lands in play, skithiryx in hand, batterskull, and a tezz gambit. What an apt name. I pay 2 and tap 3 to gambit knowing I can rip wound for the pilgrim, or land + blade and win. I rip double land.
Game 2 I show her my whispering specter + lashwrithe while she's stacking pump spells. I win.
Game 3 I mull but sneak in some fast infect from Plague Stinger and inkmoth. She taps out for more pumps and I cast Skithiryx with haste. She draws the top card and scoops.
2-1
Semifinals: Humans, splashing Gavony (Zack)
Game 1 We have a good race... losing the details badly here. I get him to 7 infect but he beats me the turn before I could get him. That's how it goes.
Game 2 I double mulligan to 5. He said to the crowd that he felt pretty good about his hand after that. ****. I showed him whispering specter into lashwrithe and took it from him. Then I activated inkmoth next turn, paid 4 to writhe it and killed him.
Game 3 he unloads his hand quickly, showing a lot of green creatures. That's really good against me. Including double mayors. Which is really good. I doom blade a mayor and use crusaders to whittle down big werewolf... he starts gassing out and I begin inkmothing him carefully. He has a gideon's lawkeeper out and I throw skithiryx down and he panics a bit holding back from swings with a considerable board. I drop a lashwrithe and get ready to finish him handing it to an inkmoth and swinging with both... still need another turn and lashwrithe is a great blocker here. He untaps and crashes in with a considerable amount of pump and hero of bladehold and captains and battle cry and after doing the math for like 3 minutes and considering blocks in multiple ways (big wolf... then hero or captain to first strike away human pumps) I ultimately to the conclusion he has 15 damage for my 15 life after he lawkeepers down my lashwrithe germ.
1-2
I take a box home and the sweet playmat.
Here's a better deck:
4 x Plague Stinger
4 x Whispering Specter
4 x Phyrexian Crusader
3 x Skithiryx, the Blight Dragon
4 x Virulent Wound
3 x Tribute to Hunger
3 x Doom Blade
4 x Tezzeret's Gambit
2 x Postmortem Lunge
4 x Lashwrithe
1 x Phyrexian Metamorph 
4 x Inkmoth Nexus
20 x Swamp
Sideboard
4 x Despise
4 x Ghost Quarter
4 x Sever the Bloodline 
3 x Surgical Extraction
The basic premise post board in this deck is now critical to your ability to determine if you're the beatdown or the control deck. Once you establish that you can determine if you need to bring in removal for faster decks... or disruption for slower decks. Once you know that the boarding gets easy and determining keep-able hands becomes trivial.
TL;DR, neener neener S1.
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] 
] Azorious Turbo Fog (Modern)
