It's the same discussion I was having with Hakeem when the deck was being created. In that case it was over Blasting Station. Any Station after the first becomes a terrible draw and I had been looking to drop to 2 copies. The concern though is frequency of draw. The same can be said here for archaeomancer. I don't really want to have two or even three of them usually but I do want to have one of them almost every game. Because of that, I will carry as many as I can to give my self the best chance of drawing it.


I hope my post(s) aren't coming across as though folks can't make changes. It's of course their choice on the changes they make. It was only a counter point to 2bestest's post and the logic behind my choices (and generally the point we post - to discuss and debate). I'd also assume that 2bestest and I have been at it long enough that he knows where I'm coming from regardless of the way I may have presented it. Sometimes my posts come across a little dry or direct or even gruff when they really shouldn't be that way. It's part of the problems when writing responses. They don't have the same tone or inflection my voice would have (where you'd know I'm joking around or for sure not being an arse about it).

elk

it do not think you post things in a declining way. not sure if that's the correct wording. you get my point, i hope.

Yeah, I have absolutely no concern in my mind at all about the tone in elk's posts.

I do get where you're coming from with blasting station and condone it as a 3 of here simply because it's power is absolutely great here and you need the removal it grants. But my counter argument is that you can still have a solid standing even if you don't have archeo drawn. (Obviously we can both understand the potential he offers here) Wasn't saying it's the right decision, just saying I think it is justifiable to drop one if you needed room for something else. Though it isn't the FIRST place I would personally start dropping cards at either

Regardless of the great Archeo/blasting/wand debate. I stand VERY FIRM in my opinion of treason.

And just to be clear I haven't ran the build myself this is just speculation based on my extensive playing of Duels 2015.

i said i wont but i just give that deck a try and play a couple of games with it. lets see where this deck struggles and shines

well if you do, be sure to include the recent testing changes.

-2 Chasm Skulker
-1 Act of Treason
+2 Raid Bombardment
+1 Traumatic Visions

elk

Awesome 1 treason down and 3 to go!

3 Stations and 4 Cloudshifts disagree with you!


elk

your deck must be scary... it's the first time i saw some1 using angelic edict on a raise the alarm token. no kidding...

he actually used it twice for both tokens..

edit: played 4 games so far and i could win 2 of them because of treason + cloudshift. act of treason actually seems to be more important than i thought. maybe it's just luck because 4 games do not give much information. had to play against a tower of power after the guy double edicted my tokens...

edit: from the 10 games i've played i only lost to aggro or decks that were able to get a stable board against me. it is really difficult to come back if you are behind when they go wide. i really think anger of the gods wouldn't be too bad. sucks because everything we have in this deck dies to it (baneslayer excluded) but i don't see much against them. every aggro deck i lost to i had no station but it isn't a given anyways.

Am I the only one who really wants better early tempo / removal options in this deck? My example vs. the AI was not meant to show how great boros tokens is. The hand I drew had every key card this deck needs. Everything I had in my hand had the potential of doing amazing things - eventually. And what really wrecked me that game was not some exotic draw by the AI, it was goblin rabblemaster, a card played in virtually every red deck.

I have run other decks that rely on blasting station / treason as their only removal options. I am comfortable with doing that in these decks because A) the decks are fast tempo-wise, if I don't draw blasting station I just try to zerg rush my opponent and B) they produce a **** of tokens very rapidly, meaning I get to use blasting station right away if I do draw it.

This deck has a better late-game plan than most token decks. Eventually, you can pump out tons of tokens, activate blasting station a number of times, and draw a bunch of cards. Eventually. You can play talrand with cloudshift mana open, so that you can start producing even bigger tokens. Eventually. I had a fistful of cards that promised to do amazing, wonderful things in a few turns time. But I had nothing to slow the game down / help me survive for those few turns.

I think you have two options. Option A) is to cut out archaeomancer and add some cards to close the game down faster. This is boring and conventional.

Option B) is to keep the archaeomancer combo in, but make some concession by adding more cards that have a significant and immediate board impact the turn the come into play without requiring several other cards to work. I would suggest Shock. This is a boring card that does not have synergy with tokens, but it does count as a spell trigger for Pyromancer/Talrand, and it is very inexpensive. Or run a 2/1 shock/banefire split That extra two damage can help you take down bigger targets, so that you can hold act of treason in reserve. Triplicate Spirits is honestly a bargain, it should usually be 3-4 mana in this deck, tops, and it gives you a ton of evasive tokens that can also chump big fliers. Finally I wouldn't consider some sort of board wipe wholly out of the question, since it will allow you to stabilize and drop pyromancer / talrand with cloudshift mana open. The standard azorius wand combo deck generally stalls the game with multiple board wipes, accumulating a huge amount of mana and wiping the board multiple times because of archaeomancer. After all of this stalling the deck can play its entire combo in one turn, with counter mana up / a time warp.

I encourage you to stick with the Archaeomancers, but I think you can squeeze still more value out of them. Any source of recursion makes singletons relatively more valuable. A single Peel from Reality often finds its way into my builds that run multiple archaeomancers because of the six mana repeatable bounce combo. A single negate will find a use in most matchups, and against counterspell happy opponents it can ruin their plans and help your stuff hit the board. A single Quicken can be used with act of treason to potentially steal an opponent's creature during combat, block, and sac to blasting station / use cloudshift. Just keep mana open and you can recur these spells at any time by cloudshifting archaeomancer. I am not saying that these are 100% the best things you should include, only that you can do some pretty awesome things with 4 archaeomancers.

@HenWen - I think that you're wanting the deck to be something it's not (at least it seems to read that way to me). Check out the Khans of Tarkir Pro Tour that was just on this weekend and specifically look at the Jeskai Ascendancy combo deck. It's completely built to just find the parts of the combo and then go off. It doesn't seem to have any immediate impact cards or other removal options etc (although they do get a sideboard which we don't - also note that card draw is considered tempo altering). Combo decks typically are built to find their pieces and stall until they do. The idea behind the deck is to stall with tokens and draw into pieces (either a token generator or a blasting station and hopefully a cloudshift combo to compliment either although it should work without too). If you're wanting to tweak the deck according to your tastes and spin it to check your results, please do so and post your results so we can discuss it further. I just keep reading your posts though as if you want the deck to do something other than what it's intended to do (which I think is more of an aggro-ish to mid-range type shell that your suggesting).

elk

Elk - you referred to your combo in previous posts as an infinite one, and now make this comparison to a paper infinite combo deck. Ascendancy combo can go off on turn 3-4, drawing its entire library, producing infinite mana, pumping its guys up an infinite number of times, and swinging for the win. This is a combo deck in the strict sense because it outright wins the game when the combo goes off. This sort of effect has a "critical mass" where you want to draw cards that will allow you to draw more cards that will allow you to draw more cards, which will eventually win you the game. If you started replacing the draw effects with removal etc. you would start to dilute the strength of the combo.

Hulk / Flash is a combo deck that can go off on turn 0 or turn 1 and do 32 damage to an opponent. No reactive cards are needed there, although I saw Pact of Negation in most decklists.

Archaeomancer/cloudshift isn't an infinite combo. It costs mana. White mana, in a three color deck. You can produce tokens / draw cards / blast enemies without having to spend a card in doing so. This is a major source of card advantage. But synergy is not the same as an infinite combo.

I am not saying this to try to convince you to to cut 'mancer/'shift. I raised a number of possible changes in previous posts, but in my last post I separated my advice into options A (remove shiftmancer) and option B (give the deck a few better tempo/removal options). Shiftmancer is good, but it can use a bit of support since it takes time to set up. Just make add some resilience to the deck, more cards that can help you win from behind. The card I advocated cutting was Chasm Skulker, and the cards I recommended adding were shock and triplicate spirits. Triplicate Spirits hardly changes the character of the deck now does it?

HenWen - I'm not sure where you're headed with this. The Jeskai deck comparison was based on your comments indicating to add cards that have "a significant and immediate board impact the turn the come into play" and I referred to a current combo deck that excludes this sort of option. That was the only thing to take from the reference. Again if you believe that Shock has a significant and immediate board impact, by all means make the adjustment, spin the deck some more and let me know your findings. I'd be happy to hear the input. I agree that Triplicate Spirits could be an interesting inclusion in the deck and it would offer some additional evasive damage (and that too should involve some testing). You mention Negate and it was in the deck at a certain point (I think I mentioned it above at some point?) but it got cut based on discussions (that being outside of Anger, it doesn't answer anything cloudshift couldn't answer already and the deck shouldn't be over diluted. Cleansing can be a problem but it has the chance to be hit by Visions). It may still have merit though since it's additional overwatch option (but moves the deck back towards a defensive/control shell which is already common with the combo).

You're right too. Even though I repeatedly indicate the infinite combo is mana restricted (and our pool has no way to generate infinite mana nor can we float mana) you're absolutely correct that it's not infinite. It's definitely a poor choice of words on my part.

So in short your suggestions are:

Shock
Triplicate Spirits
a couple other maybes - Negate & Peel

If correct, what are your cuts?


elk

The easy cuts are 2 chasm skulkers and 1 act of treason. Beyond that, I might cut 1 archaeomancer for either krenko's command or triplicate spirits. I realize this is a sensitive topic, but the advantage of the shiftmancer combo isn't speed, its card advantage. Double archaeomancers in hand just feels kinda slow.

I might also go -2 island +2 azorius guildgate. Taplands are a necessary evil for tricolor decks. This is sorta the reverse of what I was advocating earlier. While I like traumatic visions I think it might just be better as another plains.

A lot of the changes I proposed were intended as trial balloons. I do not want you to think that I am demanding you tear your deck apart and make all of these changes at once. The change I am the most sure of is what I outlined above.

Sitting in the hospital as I write this, awaiting the birth of my second son. Wish my wife and me luck.

elk already cut skulker. his updated deck version looks like this:

Not sensitive at all. Is it a debate...sure but it's not sensitive. If I had a mantra for the forums, It'd be something like "if you can't take some feedback or criticisms then don't post up your deck or thoughts."


Similar to above. It's all with a grain of salt. You can provide suggestions based on testing and I'll weigh it accordingly. As builders sometimes we miss things or don't consider things or forget things and this part of the process is to vet the deck and the feedback.

Congrats! All the best to you and the wife. I've got three myself, two of which are entering into their teen years


elk

Teenage elk? God help us all. They don't drive yet do they? Driving with hoofs/hoves sounds really bad for other motorists.. I can only imagine the car insurance bills.

and I'm a audiophile so of course my car has some excessive tunes added which means I'm bound to have other issues too (noise violations, theft etc). On top of that, one of them is female which; as a father, scares the bejebus out of me. I know with my boys I have one prick to worry about. With my girl I have every prick to worry about.
Lets just hope they were raised half decent (by their mother of course ) and have a fighting chance!


elk

jeese elk not all girls are like that >_> not saying I wasn't but I'm sure some turned out good <_<

it's refreshing to see how fast a discussion about a deck can turn into... this. congrats henwen. if it's a boy name him Jace. Chandra if it's a girl ofc!

I think there may be a misinterpretation there of my post (or at least the meaning I was going for) ....girls aren't the problem...BOYS are the problem


elk