Let's Get Weird!

*One of my favorite things about Vintage is researching old and obscure decks. I was on an extended hiatus from Magic starting shortly after the Mercadian Masques block so I missed a ton of really interesting decks. When I look at how things have evolved since Vintage came to Magic Online I can't help but feel that the metagame (at least online, that is) has become somewhat homogenized. This isn't necessarily a bad thing; the increased visibility and playability of the format has led people to figure out the "decks to beat" with greater ease. In proportion to the relatively small number of people playing Vintage there happen to be quite a few streamers too, as well as the Vintage Super League. All of this exposure tends to lead to less-experienced players jumping in to the format by choosing one of the top two or three most-played decks. The end result is that the best players in the format will play a ton of Workshop decks or Mentor, and once everyone else jumps on that deck they come up with something next level. It's an interesting cyclical development.

When I look through the reported Daily Events and see "Ravager Shops" and "Jeskai Mentor" taking up the bulk of the results it does get a tad tiresome. Luckily for me I occasionally run into something weird and it makes my day. Finish Reading on MTGGoldfish

Thanks to everyone for reading my work over the past couple years. I've had a great time doing it, and your support means the world to me. https://www.mtggoldfish.com/articles/vintage-101-let-s-get-weird

I enjoyed the article, and I always like seeing updates to blasts from the past, especially when it turns into a history lesson for people

A good resource for ancient decks is the encyclopedia I put together years ago: http://www.archive.themanadrain.com/index.php?PHPSESSID=20uoj23uahaav36id5q6jqulr0&topic=37514.0

It took a lot of time to make and maintain and I kind of dropped it after a while, but there is an awful lot of information there.

Concerning the list in the article, it seems like reanimate would serve better than animate dead since you aren't trying to go infinite with dragon, and your most likely early target will be a welder. I would also turn at least 1 of the inkwell or myr into a wurcoil.

Another thing to note is that CA predates revoker, so It might be in your best interest play some answers to it in the main if you want to use your welders vs shops. (Granite Shards ftw)

Fluster storm stops reanimate but not the enchantment based reanimate effects. That could be the reason for the decklist choice.

Justin and I worked on the list he used to play that daily. We played it the last two years at TMD Open as a 5 color deck, but he went with the dual manabase online since he already had most of it. The deck is already pretty weak to Mental Misstep so Animate Dead is not too bad. It's possible it should be Reanimate anyway, but it is a pretty big chunk of your life total for creatures without lifelink. It's a lot harder to win the race with a 7/11 or battleball when you've domed yourself for that much. What we realized as we put together the list is that most of the awesome vintage cards printed since CA was around have been extremely bad for the deck, but it's still pretty fun to play.

@wiley said in Vintage 101: Let's Get Weird!:

I enjoyed the article, and I always like seeing updates to blasts from the past, especially when it turns into a history lesson for people

A good resource for ancient decks is the encyclopedia I put together years ago: http://www.archive.themanadrain.com/index.php?PHPSESSID=20uoj23uahaav36id5q6jqulr0&topic=37514.0

It took a lot of time to make and maintain and I kind of dropped it after a while, but there is an awful lot of information there.

Concerning the list in the article, it seems like reanimate would serve better than animate dead since you aren't trying to go infinite with dragon, and your most likely early target will be a welder. I would also turn at least 1 of the inkwell or myr into a wurcoil.

Another thing to note is that CA predates revoker, so It might be in your best interest play some answers to it in the main if you want to use your welders vs shops. (Granite Shards ftw)

Wow! This post should be imported and updated to this new TMD what a great resource!

@wiley said in Vintage 101: Let's Get Weird!:

A good resource for ancient decks is the encyclopedia I put together years ago: http://www.archive.themanadrain.com/index.php?PHPSESSID=20uoj23uahaav36id5q6jqulr0&topic=37514.0

It took a lot of time to make and maintain and I kind of dropped it after a while, but there is an awful lot of information there.

I just wanted to thank you for putting that together. As someone who missed many of the earlier years of Vintage, I have spent so much time on that encyclopedia reading up on older decks.

That control slaver deck sure is lovely. I wonder what an updated version would look like? So much of the core is the same as Grixis Thieves (it even has 2 Notion Thieves in the SB!).

@wiley said in Vintage 101: Let's Get Weird!:

I enjoyed the article, and I always like seeing updates to blasts from the past, especially when it turns into a history lesson for people

A good resource for ancient decks is the encyclopedia I put together years ago: http://www.archive.themanadrain.com/index.php?PHPSESSID=20uoj23uahaav36id5q6jqulr0&topic=37514.0

It took a lot of time to make and maintain and I kind of dropped it after a while, but there is an awful lot of information there.

Concerning the list in the article, it seems like reanimate would serve better than animate dead since you aren't trying to go infinite with dragon, and your most likely early target will be a welder. I would also turn at least 1 of the inkwell or myr into a wurcoil.

Another thing to note is that CA predates revoker, so It might be in your best interest play some answers to it in the main if you want to use your welders vs shops. (Granite Shards ftw)

Hi Wiley. I just want you to know that when I started getting into Vintage and researching stuff your encyclopedia helped me a ton. I loved reading it. Thanks for that!

@Hrishi said in Vintage 101: Let's Get Weird!:

@wiley said in Vintage 101: Let's Get Weird!:

A good resource for ancient decks is the encyclopedia I put together years ago: http://www.archive.themanadrain.com/index.php?PHPSESSID=20uoj23uahaav36id5q6jqulr0&topic=37514.0

It took a lot of time to make and maintain and I kind of dropped it after a while, but there is an awful lot of information there.

I just wanted to thank you for putting that together. As someone who missed many of the earlier years of Vintage, I have spent so much time on that encyclopedia reading up on older decks.

100% agree!!!

@wiley this is just brilliant. What a resource for someone who did not play during most of those years. Thanks for sharing and for putting this together in the first place.

Should check out some of the circa 2000 decks for some awesomeness hehe