[Community Discussion]: For the homebrewers
General forum
Posted on April 4, 2014, 7:20 p.m. by Epochalyptik
Every Magic deck was, at some point, a homebrew. Even the event-winning netdecks had to be thought up by someone somewhere. So this CD is all about homebrewers and their shenanigans.
Tell us a tale about a homebrew that impressed you. It could be a story about using your own homebrew to take first place. It could be an anecdote about that one crazy inventor at your LGS who showed up with Naya Slivers. Whatever it is, let us know!
My LGS was dominated for SIX MONTHS by a Affinity deck. they had modern every thursday and about a month or so after the genre was introduced, he came in with the deck and no one could upstage him. To be fair, while he store drew a large crowd, modern was still small at the time, and no more than 20-25 people showed up for the modern nights. But even the man with the foiled-out, pre-Bloodbraid Elf -banning Jund deck that had all of the value in it couldn't stop him. I believe at the end of his streak he accumulated 600 dollars or so of store credit.
the ironic(?) end to this story is he retired his affinity deck, used the store credit to buy a foil, full money soul sisters deck, and now consistently goes 2-2.
April 4, 2014 7:30 p.m.
HorrorAvengers says... #4
I made a grixis super-heroic deck a while back, using originally Triton Fortune Hunter , and now Meletis Astronomer as well, along with Dragon Mantle , Fate Foretold , Scourgemark , and other power auras (namely Madcap Skills and Aqueous Form ) to draw craptons of cards per turn and swing with big big things. It was a spectacular budget deck, ran it for shits and giggles at an FNM, went 2-2 by suprise factor (And Blightcaster ) alone.
April 4, 2014 7:32 p.m.
miracleHat says... #5
The homebrew that impressed me the most something that my brother came up with. It seemed to be based rug eternal command used in the worlds champions (whatever it is called). He made his version, but instead of being rug, it was bant. The concept was the same, using AEther Vial to flash in creatures for terrific effects. I made my own version because i liked it so i made my own version. I have made many people rage quit on cockatrice because of this deck. My favorite play that i have achieved in having to AEther Vial s, with counters 2 & 4, with Snapcaster Mage on the field. They play something like Tarmogoyf and i Mana Leak it. My opponent thinking that they are clear to cast anything they like try and cast Liliana of the Veil . In response, i flash in Restoration Angel flickering snappy to recast Mana Leak . I have done that twice and both times my opponents rage quit :) I also like my brothers (yes, him again) g/b legacy dredge deck. I have never seen anything on the internet that is like it in legacy. There are variants in modern, but you don't get the Chrome Mox , Basking Rootwalla , and all of the other evils in there.
April 4, 2014 7:34 p.m.
aeonstoremyliver says... #6
When I first got back into standard, I ran a Gruul Eldrazi ramp deck. It was alright but could've been better given my budget and the right cards. I had a friend that ran an odd Myr deck with 100 cards. Like 4x of everything. And it was surprisingly good. We played an epic game that flooded the battlefield with Myr and Eldrazi tokens, neck and neck. He had Eldrazi Monument and Myr Battlesphere to buff his tokens and swung for what he thought was lethal, but miscalculated. I cast Garruk Wildspeaker and sacced some Spawn, which allowed me to hardcast Emrakul, the Aeons Torn , then popped Garruk for his ultimate and won. It was absolutely epic. And we're still friends :-)
April 4, 2014 7:53 p.m.
GoldGhost012 says... #7
I don't like running what the trendy, "winnable" decks are (or their price tag), so nearly every deck I build is some sort of janky homebrew.
Right now I've built, in Standard, brews that capitolize on Sedge Scorpion , Codex Shredder , and Akroan Horse , cards most people wouldn't look twice at.
But sadly, I've had no FNM experience with them.
April 4, 2014 8:22 p.m.
Back in Innistrad Block standard, I was running a mono green elf ramp deck which ramped into Primal Surge and dumping my deck onto the field, which included several Craterhoof Behemoth and well, i was running this for months, and then this "elf ball" starts appearing and i was like "what."
April 4, 2014 8:31 p.m.
I went to an fnm once, before theros rotation, so it was still Innistrad, M13 and RTR. This guy came in with a standard affinity homebrew, containing trading post a bunch of keyrunes and angelic accord. At first it didn't seem like much but when I watched him play he made it to second place and it was a sweet combo deck. It was nice to see an awesome non netdeck.
April 4, 2014 9:54 p.m.
I have an article series on PureMTGO and LegitMTG where I take cards people see as "trash" and make home brews with them. I call it, One Man's Trash
April 5, 2014 12:07 a.m.
My Maze's End Control was bonkers, until BoG destroyed it and me.
April 5, 2014 3:19 a.m.
I saw an RWU burn deck someone was playing at fnm. He played Oracle of Bones , his opponent didn't pay tribute... "Blast of Genius !" he drew his cards and discarded Rise of the Dark Realms . He got top 8, but didn't go to top 4.
April 5, 2014 9:51 a.m.
InconspicuousPotato says... #13
There was a guy who once brought a rat tribal standard deck to FNM who was playing against Bogbrew Witch combo. That game was nuts.
April 5, 2014 10:20 a.m.
TheDuggernaught says... #14
for my first standard fnm, i brought my mono white allies deck (~$30 at the time). it wasnt anything fancy... and it ran some less than stellar cards (Arrest over Pacifism , Smite over Condemn , World Queller over Felidar Sovereign . but i managed to top 4, beating both the first and second place participants who ran caw blade and some weird simic deck that used hexproof creatures and JtMS. whenever i played an ally with a Kabira Evangel out and said protection from white or green and swung to take out their $100 JtMS, they died a little inside.
April 5, 2014 2:03 p.m.
So last night I went to my LGS for the FNM.I played my G/B Aggro/Midrange deck that I wanted to try it out.When I went there 3 more guys were going to play also a homebrew deck. By the 3rd round we were 0-2 .My point is that homebrew decks are cool and fun if you want to try something alternative than net-decking but when you play against the net decks sometimes you might get destroyed!
April 5, 2014 3:52 p.m.
megawurmple says... #16
It's always fun to homebrew. I refuse to ever take a deck straight from the internet. Even if I am building a 'meta' deck, I'll put my own spin on it. The best story I have with my Modern ramp homebrew was when I took it to a GPT. I thought I would be thrashed by all the Pod, Twin and Affinity decks. As it turns out, no-one sideboards against T3 Elesh Norn, Grand Cenobite . I went 5-0 and ID'd twice to top the Swiss before winning in the quarters but losing in the semis to Timotee Simonot, which was fun.
April 5, 2014 5:40 p.m.
gnarlicide says... #17
Back in 2006, when it was mirrodin/ravnica standard a friend of mine made a bet with me. He said he would buy me a box of dissension, the new set at the time, if I made a deck with less than 5 dollars and won at least two rounds with it.
So I made a deck with Leyline of Singularity and abused the B and U "hunted" creatures. Like Hunted Phantasm and Hunted Horror . The rest of the deck was nothing but counters and draw. I opted not to run the shock lands because of the budget.
I made it to the semi finals before getting DQed because some dude wanted to fight me because he kept getting countered. It was a very un interactive deck, and when he threw his hat at me, I laughed. So I got hit with some unsportsmanlike conduct... But I got a box out of it, so I couldn't complain. Lol. That ended up being my first modern deck until they fucked with the legend rule.
April 5, 2014 6:15 p.m.
What's so wrong with the legend rule now? Oh no! they get 1 token, and you get a 4/6 unblockable. I guess Hunted Horror doesn't really work anymore, but all of the others are still fine. That's actually a really cool interaction though gnarlicide. I use Illness in the Ranks and Ratchet Bomb in a similar deck, but i often found it a bit clunky. Playing a 1-card beats all for free seems better.
April 5, 2014 8:02 p.m.
gnarlicide says... #19
SaltySpecula, yeah. I laughed at his distress and he threw his hat. Then he wanted to fight about it. The judge kicked us both out. It was dumb because I was 20 and he was like 16. There was no way I would fight some kid.
KingSorin, I suppose there is nothing really wrong with it per se! but the deck worked a million times better a year ago than it does now. For instance, a Clone did waaaaayyy more damage to their dude than it does now. I also ran Hatching Plans . Think about that one for a minute....
April 6, 2014 12:09 a.m.
I homebrew a lot, but my favorite was a few months ago in ISD-RTR standard. I made a deck using some key cards from the Aristocrats (Falkenrath Aristocrat , Cartel Aristocrat , etc) along with Fling , Cloudshift /Restoration Angel and, you guessed it, Act of Treason & it's variants. Many, many tables were flipped.
Believe it or not, Midrange doesn't like having it's fatties thrown around.
April 6, 2014 12:49 a.m.
I know a guy that played Kiora, the Crashing Wave with Scourge of Skola Vale . He sacced the 9/9 tokens with the hydra, put 9 +1/+1 counters on him, and untapped him with Kiora's Follower . I've also seen a combo where someone steals creatures with Act of Treason and saccs them to the hydra. He's a pretty fun combo centerpiece.
April 6, 2014 12:54 a.m.
ColdHeartedSith says... #22
I came up with a Hag deck that uses dicard and enchantments and lifegain as a weapon using, bogbrew witch bubbling couldren and the festering newt with sanguine bond and rescue from the underworld Erebos and that shreiking affliction ,mind rot, nighthowler and spiteful returned and wieght of P.6 and 2 elixirs and two 1 ofs nightmare and corrupt and so far R/W Burn can't beat it and neither can MUD and MBD is at about even. Tested it all day with good players. my HAGS is running removal but I am keeping the whole list to myself till I see if It may see an open piloted by just me.
April 6, 2014 2:12 a.m.
My favorite homebrew ive made is Phyrexian Mutation. Sadly its never been to FNM but it's done good in my play group.
April 6, 2014 1:35 p.m.
My favorite homebrew experience has to be with my current Esper deck. See, people in my meta don't usually run Ashiok, Nightmare Weaver in control (for some reason) so people always seem surprised if I drop one on turn 3. In the gameday BNG I had my first real triumph over RG monsters in the top 8 (played by a guy that had already stomped my face in before with the same deck). Both games of this last match I was able to drop Ashiok turn 3 and either remove or counter every single thing he played afterwards. During the second match about halfway, maybe 3/4 of the way through his library I was able to finish him off with a Blood Baron of Vizkopa while his field was still being wiped out. He just flipped out at this point. "This is bullst! This deck never fuing loses to Esper!" I apologize and go to shake his hand, he just continues gathering his things in a fit of rage. "Honestly, I don't know why you didn't just Ashiok me another 20 times in a row, you LITERALLY did it for 15 turns!" And he just walked away.I still find it amusing that he was so SO upset over one card changing the matchup and him actually losing. I was snickering, but for a second I thought he might flip the table lol.
April 6, 2014 1:42 p.m.
All I do is homebrew, every standard deck I've ever built especially. During m14 standard (m13, m14, Innistrad, RtR), I had Gruul Hexproof, turn 3 win. I won FNMs with it, and now I can't win nothin' lol. This devotion stuff is getting old fast haha
April 6, 2014 2:14 p.m.
Epochalyptik, I can't believe you use Naya Slivers as a joke:(
SLIVERS!!!!! SLIVERS!!!!! SLIVERS!!!!! Playtest
Standard
SCORE: 122 | 22 COMMENTS | 17782 VIEWSApril 6, 2014 3:43 p.m.
Human_Rogue_21 says... #27
I played 4x Lost in the Woods and 56x Forest and I tied all 4 rounds at FNM. What up.
April 6, 2014 8:07 p.m.
I regularly homebrew successful decks, but I don't attribute the success on the build alone.
Its all about knowing your enemy and knowing yourself, or rather your LGSs meta and your own deck.
When I first built my GR land destruction deck I Counter Your Land...Wait What? my meta was low on decks that utalized Sylvan Caryatid and Elvish Mystic and so I was successful for the first few times, soon after everyone knew what I was packing and I got pwned.
I then built my UW Heroic deck Testify! (Updated) 1st at FNM that is honestly still good against anything, I can say it is as close to "breaking the meta" as a random deck can get (as long as its played well).
I got bored with it for a week and built my UR Epic Experiment deck So Epic to try for a week, after the first time I decided I dislike losing and went back to the heroics.
Last week I decided to try modern for the first time and I haven't decided what to devote to building.
Good times though.
April 6, 2014 9:03 p.m.
KnightsBattlecry001 says... #29
Back during scars block and M11 i had a R/W knight deck that used a lot of the cards with battlecry. Bunch of cheap creatures, and a ton of burn spells out the ass. The big cards I used and could usually win with if I had them out were Hero of Bladehold , Hero of Oxid Ridge , and Knight Exemplar . Nobody else ran those cards and would be caught off guard when they hit the field and how fast the deck moved in general. Placed in top 4 every other week when I ran it. That time period is probably when I done my best at fnm. God I miss that deck.
April 6, 2014 11:08 p.m.
miracleHat says... #30
@KnightsBattlecry001, is that where you got your username from? That knights deck?
April 6, 2014 11:11 p.m.
miracleHat says... #33
@Jp3ngu1nb0y (i wonder if i was able to spell it correctly with out copy/paste???): where in the world did you come up with your name?
DAMN, i got it right for the first time...
April 6, 2014 11:15 p.m.
KnightsBattlecry001 says... #34
@ Droxium and Jp3ngu1nb0y yes that's exactly where I got it from. Was my first deck I played at fnm when I got back into magic. It will always be my favorite deck.
April 6, 2014 11:16 p.m.
Droxium there was a thread about usernames recently and I explained. I promise it's not gibberish haha.
April 6, 2014 11:20 p.m.
miracleHat says... #36
Penguins (or as chief called it: penises)??? Okay okay, it isn't gibberish, but is it alright if i just call you "Jay"?
April 6, 2014 11:24 p.m.
I built my Azorious Acid Trip deck for the modern FNM my LGS has for 3 weeks every month. After its first outing, I loved the basic 25 dollar shell so much, I decided to splurge for it. Now, I have 5 consecutive times in the finals in FNM and I have to say the deck is admirable for starting from a Pauper idea.
April 7, 2014 6:36 a.m.
umlweatherman says... #39
My favorite moment from FNM was with my Venser, the Sojourner deck. The purpose was to stop you from attacking me or targeting me .. then eventually I will just Sun Titan or Gideon Jura for the win.
It had Stonehorn Dignitary as the main player to bounce and had Mimic Vat if you killed him. The moment came against a Valakut, the Molten Pinnacle deck where I got an opening hand Leyline of Sanctity (which I mainboarded) and then he killed Stonehorn Dignitary onto my Mimic Vat not realizing what stupidness would ensue.
I had to call the judge over to tell my opponent that they just lost the next 3 combat phases after I did the following:
1 - Played the Stonehorn Dignitary from the Mimic Vat 2 - Played a Stonehorn Dignitary from my hand3 - Bounced the Stonehorn Dignitary I just played with my Venser, the Sojourner
He then boarded in artifact and enchantment removal and I lost the match 1-2, but just that moment I will never forget.
April 7, 2014 1:10 p.m.
Ohthenoises says... #40
I have two homebrews that regularly did well back in the area of NPH/INN.
Boom goes the goblin! and Little Shop of Horrors.
The best one involves Boom goes the goblin!. I lent it to a female friend of mine to play so she wouldn't be bored that night. As the night progresses her smile keeps getting bigger and bigger. When I asked her what was going on she told me her record was 4-0 with two more rounds to go and I was blown away (because of the way that my luck works I usually get average results when placing).
After she split for first (a record of 5-0-1 on the night) some people were talking about the games, even complaining about the way she would kill them on turn 4 like clockwork to me. I didn't have the heart to tell anyone that the deck was mine and I had built it with that in mind.
It made me so proud.
April 7, 2014 4:34 p.m.
Tezzeret, Agent of Bolas to dig for Crown of Empires , Scepter of Empires , and Throne of Empires , then win the game with them all.
April 7, 2014 5:46 p.m.
I built a 4 color Mid-range deck (I bet you have never seen this before, have you?) and actually got top 8 once! It was very cool.
Also, who doesn't love Chromanticore ? Well I built a deck (The Future of Standard- Chromantitactics and went 3-3 (it's best so far). I'm still working on it and correcting it. It will get top 8 one day, I know it!
Since Grixis doesn't have anything like Sphinx's Revelation (the closest is Opportunity ) and so I never thought this build would ever work (The Army of Nicol Bolas) but got top 8 and was so happy!
I'm always up to making the craziest decks! Post your idea of the next homebrew I should make on my page! Standard please!
April 7, 2014 9:22 p.m.
theinfernumflame says... #43
I tend to homebrew a lot (with varying success), but my favorite brew so far was the deck I made to repeatedly blink Thragtusk with Deadeye Navigator . It didn't always do well, but I did get first in the first FNM I took it to.
The LGS I go to has quite a few brewers who come up with nasty and relatively competitive decks. I'm playing my own take on the Monsters archetype (with a few innovations--like the ability to board into a control deck), but some of these brews (like U/W or W/R Heroic, or mono-green aggro) give my deck a significant challenge.
And, last Friday, one of the brewers there told me he intends to show up this week with a deck meant to abuse Akroan Horse . I really want to see this....
April 8, 2014 3:18 a.m.
deathtouch_roadrunner says... #44
I played my own deck
Heliod + Wives Playtest
Standard
SCORE: 0 | 0 COMMENTS | 48 VIEWSat a grand prix last weekend. I think if I hadn't made mistakes it might have been able to make day two. I did a write-up about it here.
April 8, 2014 10:49 a.m.
Magiclover318 says... #45
This was my homebrew deck when before Theros came out, I loved Archangel of Thune and saw how versatile she is, so I wanted to make a deck with her.
April 8, 2014 10:55 a.m.
I pretty much only play with homebrew decks since I play mostly at home or in my local area with friends. I'm not a big fan of the crowd at my local card shop, so it's pretty much just homebrew for me. As such, I have spent probably hundreds of hours at this point experimenting with deck ideas. Some of them turned out great, others not so much. I am actually doing a sweep of all of my current decks, cutting out the unworkable ones and refining the rest. I came up with a few new ideas along the way.
Most recently I am trying to work on a dragon deck for my wife for our anniversary. I want to make her a dragon EDH deck, but those are much more expensive. For now I do 60 card. I'm working with mono-red, but I'm starting to consider branching into other colors because mono-red that relies on such large creatures seems...vulnerable. Obviously my first consideration is green, but I have about 5 R/G decks and/or ideas already, so I'm trying to avoid redundancy where I can.
April 8, 2014 4:43 p.m.
I do homebrew - but I consult other decks and playtest a lot so my homebrew-purity may be debatable.
I find that when I switch to a new play group in EDH, I have to adapt a lot. The only deck that really seemed to surprisingly just work in its original unadapted form is my Jor Kadeen, the Prevailer EDH and in that case, it mostly just holds its own in the middle.
If a deck I brewed doesn't hold up well in a new group, I refuse to abandon it - I modify it instead.
I am brewing up some odd constructed decks and have yet to test them. It is a long slow process, just like it was when I made my entry into EDH.
April 8, 2014 4:49 p.m.
... which works, btw for EDH (and possibly modern and vintage and casual and pauper too) ... but takes way too much time to be standard - viable
(one of the reasons I probably won't ever get into standard)
April 8, 2014 4:50 p.m.
SnowCoveredRevenge says... #49
My kitchen table deck for squad deck (100 card/Commander/4of's/combined legacy commander banned list) is B/W clerics that
April 9, 2014 1:06 a.m.
Frimbleglim says... #50
There's a guy at my local game store who plays a modern deck based arround possibiliy storm. Once it is in play on about turn 4 he uses an ornethoptor to resolve a rune scarred demon. This tutors him up a gitaxian probe which resolves an enter the infinite. He then replaces his win condition (seizmic assult or some such) and uses another card to resolve it.
InconspicuousPotato says... #2
I have a friend that made a R/U Elemental tribal deck with Master of Waves and Young Pyromancer . He took 1st at FNM multiple weeks in a row with it.
He also made a deck based around Ajani's Chosen . That one sucked :)
April 4, 2014 7:29 p.m.