Dang, Assassin's Trophy does well here!

Dumb question I'm sure, but any reason for snow covered lands? I don't see any issue running normal basics (no concern with singleton normal basics and Tainted Pact. Thanks!

zwells3

For the snow lands, not really. I guess it's some Lens insurance beyond just being kinda neat. They also don't share a name so if you'd like you can play more.

Thanks, AlwaysSleepy. I have another question, as well. As the win-condition of the deck is to loop spells like Swan Song and Nature's Claim, the tricky part is making it around the table once in order to swing in. One of the key components seems to be drawing (most of) your deck on your first opponent's upkeep, and stopping them (and everyone else) from doing anything.

Where I'm confused is that, without Timetwister, wouldn't you have drawn and discarded most of your library on your own turn while going infinite with Thrasios and looking for all your non-land permanents and spells like Swang Song/Nature's Claim, etc.? If you were unlucky and had to dig deep, you have nothing to reset your library after discarding in your clean up step. Is there any way to "restock" your library without this (expensive) card? Memory's Journey can only do so much if you still want to have things like Silence, Force of Will, and Pact of Negation on each of your opponents' turn. Thanks!

zwells3 can't you loop your deck with Noxious Revival putting Memory's Journey top top, drawing it, shuffling noxious and two other desired cards into your deck, drawing them, rinse and repeat?

Yes, that is certainly the way to do it SynergyBuild. However, my understanding is that you would do this on your own turn to loop the aforementioned Swan Song and Nature's Claim. What if, and I'm likely just missing something obvious here, you had to dig deep off of Thrasios/Infinite mana in order to first get to either or both of those pieces. You can certainly then loop them on your own turn, but eventually you pass and go to your cleanup, pitching down to 7. What does this hand look like in order to stop your (let's say, 3) opponents from playing anything?

If you have more than two desired cards you'd like to shuffle back in (e.g. Silence and two pieces of countermagic in case your opponents have interaction) do you Noxious Revival your Memory's Journey, grab two useful cards + NR, and stack your hand with however many cards you need in each opponent's upkeep? Basically, you don't care if nearly your entire deck is in your graveyard when you pass your turn? As I wrote this out, I think I began to understand it. But please let me know if I'm on track haha. I'm mainly confused as the primer discusses resetting your library with Timetwister before it goes to your opponent's turn, which you obviously can't do with Memory's Journey. What I think is the difference here is that you just need to take a more convoluted route with MJ than with TT.

zwells3

You are right on track. You can sculpt and hold up a bunch of countermagic if you have to pass. If you don't have Timetwister, Memory's Journey will let you shuffle back in Silence + Noxious Revival + Something else and go from there. It's rare for everyone to be able to fight through that. You also get an overloaded Cyclonic Rift the turn before, plus many other things.

It's even stronger now with Memory's Journey since you also get to loop Assassin's Trophy and gut everyone on permanents, so your Journey/Silence line is even harder to break

Hope this helps clarify. You are right though that Memory's Journey does only loop a few cards and you library will mostly be in the graveyard after. Thankfully, with such strong outlets, most decks are simply too paralyzed to do anything.

Hey AlwaysSleepy or ShaperSavant, I really would like to know why you don't run Pull from Eternity. I have personally found it a good card in many situations with a sweet loop at instant speed with Memory's Journey to loop your deck, and with the addition of Noxious Revival in the loop you can easily get back cards from exile.

SynergyBuild

Mostly because it isn't quite needed here with Timetwister, and it's okay to just run Memory's Journey.

I haven't run that card much since needing to pull something back from exile has been really uncommon, and since it isn't needed for the loop, we can play another card.

Though I do agree pretty neat loop!

Hey AlwaysSleepy, I've been enjoying getting know this deck, playing mainly against bloodpod, Gitrog, TCV, and occasionally Tazri FC. The lack of dead cards is fantastic, and you're right in that you can afford to play many outlets early on if necessary, and grab them for use later on. Although I'm no where near proficient piloting, I've hit infinite mana turns 3/4 a reasonable number of times.

One question I have is, should there be one solid "same turn" win? I generally loop outlets to swing for lethal next turn, ideally silencing on everyone's upkeep. However, a win on the same turn you go infinite is certainly less risky. If you happen to get unlucky on a Tainted Pact and lose Silence, this could mean trouble. Is there, or should there be, a reliable same turn win? The post infinite Angel's Grace, brainstorm Yawgmoth's will to top, windfall, and subsequent windfall is one, but do you think it more useful to add demonic consultation and lab man to the package just to win on your infinite mana turn? Lab man, of course, being a dead draw early on. Thanks!

Yeah, zwells3, if you can make infinite mana/draw, you can loop a Paradox Engine, Voltaic Key and Sensei's Divining Top with a Noxious Revival on an Isochron Scepter, getting an effective Wheel of Sun and Moon effect. Use Windfall from this state to deck your opponents by constantly recasting it over and over, while looping you graveyard into your deck.

Hello AlwaysSleepy and Shaper... a question, why to use Regrowth in the place of something like Reclaim which being an instant makes for a better EOT combo setup play? I've always felt the extra 1cmc cost, and sorcery speed on Regrowth made it hard to include in the middle of a win turn.

Reclaim could also be imprinted on IsoCopy+IsoRev or IsoReclaim+Paradox Engine for looping purposes.

Aside from the obvious fact that Reclaim results in card disadvantage, is there any reason why regrowth would be chosen on that slot?

VelvetVendetta but they run Noxious Revival already, which is a better Reclaim, and Regrowth puts it to hand if you need the card that turn.

Yes but running both Noxious and Reclaim is a way to ensure you never lose your looping mechanism.

Although that's a way bigger deal for me, cuz I can't afford a timetwister (which is the perfect alternative for looping)

I mean, no, it is just another dead card, why would you lose the Noxious Revival?

VelvetVendetta

Hey man, basically, SynergyBuild is spot on. We play one which is free and one which puts it right into to your hand, so it covers the bases. Reclaim isn't specifically a bad card, which is important to note. It's more, it's kinda is a middling card between the two we run, so it's ideal to play the better cards in each. And since you really just need 1 or 2 of the effects, loading up on 3 is a bit much.

There are a lot of cards which could be playable, but aren't here since we're really working to keep this list as the best of the best, which is what gives PST its power. Thus, we play the free one, and the one which puts it right into hand. Reclaim would want a draw effect for the turn, which is doable, but asking for another layer (if we are comparing to Regrowth).

If you can't get a Timetwister, it's okay! You can use Memory's Journey to pretty much the same effect. The loop is in the write-up.

Honestly, I don't even own a Timetwister. Card's crazy $$$ lol.

Yeah, they cost around 875 right now, quite the expensive investment.

Well, in my list, I save the Journey slot exactly by using Reclaim INSTEAD of regrowth, optimizing the list by mixing both cards on the same slot.

I do agree that on a vacuum Regrowth is a better card, but I wouldn't feel safe having just Noxious as the only card that enables the loopings, I mean, we want to actually cast noxious, so it goes to the grave, people also run windfall effects, so yeah it goes to the grave even if we never use it.

And people do exile graves... I don't see why it would be so difficult to imagine a scenario where Noxious is lost.

But yeah your list has timetwister so you don't have "just noxious" you would need to lose 2 cards to exile to lose your ability to loop your kill spells.

By the way Sleepy, great primer you guys have here, just wanted to say that =D.

VelvetVendetta

I see your point, but Memory's Journey is a Twister loop card, and Reclaim would be Nox no. 2 for looping under Copy. I don't generally put Journey under Copy but you can if you want to, same effect. But there are plenty of other things to loop under it, so we keep the Twister loop line. Grave exile is totally a thing, but we insulate against it by playing other cards which themselves can be imprinted instead of Nox. Like Trophy or Winds of Rebuke or Swan Song.

I think now that Trophy is around, we get another pretty sick card to imprint. Just destroy everyone's permanents!

Thanks for the kind words, I'm glad you've been liking it.

Hey Shaper and Sleepy!

I had a couple questions about the deck. I have been having trouble finding a Morphic pool, would running an underground river in place suffice?

Also, I was kicking around the idea of including Lab Man as an alternate win con in the deck. What would you consider switching out for Lab Man if you were going to run it

Yeah, this deck isn't a Worldgorger Dragon combo that needs to tap specific lands infinite times, so Underground River works. IDK about Lab Man.

cpantaleoz Underground River is a fine replacement.

We talk about LabMan in the primer under the Alternate Win Conditions section.

Just out of curiosity, what is the reason for snow basics?

cpantaleoz Snow-basics do strictly more than basics. It's unlikely to matter whether you play snow or regular.

Hi, just wondering is Muddle the Mixture main use is to get a piece to Dramatic Scepter and I wanted to get your thoughts on Praetor's Grasp thanks again!