Pitch Dredge
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Placeholder post for Pitch Dredge discusson.
Here's a list:
Pitch Dredge 1 Ashen Rider 4 Bazaar of Baghdad 4 Bridge from Below 4 Cabal Therapy 2 Dread Return 1 Elesh Norn, Grand Cenobite 4 Force of Will 4 Golgari Grave-Troll 1 Golgari Thug 4 Hollow One 3 Ichorid 4 Leyline of the Void 4 Mental Misstep 4 Mindbreak Trap 4 Narcomoeba 4 Prized Amalgam 4 Serum Powder 4 Stinkweed Imp Sideboard 3 Chain of Vapor 2 City of Brass 2 Ingot Chewer 4 Mana Confluence 3 Nature's Claim 1 Petrified Field -
Pitch Dredge
Overview
Pitch Dredge is an aggro/combo deck which utilizes Serum Powder to find Bazaar of Baghdad to mill its own deck with dredgers such as Golgari Grave-Troll. Once this is accomplished, graveyard creatures and spells such as Narcomoeba, Cabal Therapy, and Bridge from Below are used to disrupt and kill the opponent. In the ‘Pitch’ variant of Dredge, manaless disruption such as Force of Will is used to supplement this graveyard plan.Why play Pitch Dredge?
The deck is extremely consistent (Serum Powder will give you an opening hand with Bazaar of Baghdad well over 90% of the time), kills quickly, and has abundant powerful disruption to slow down the opponent or to ensure a quick kill. Additionally, the deck is able to operate without utilizing the stack, which allows it to beat most countermagic (such as opposing Force of Will) and most mana restriction (such as Sphere of Resistance) fairly easily.Why WOULDN'T you play Pitch Dredge?
All variants of Dredge including Pitch Dredge can struggle against graveyard hate cards such as Grafdigger’s Cage and Leyline of the Void. Vintage sideboards frequently feature 4-8 graveyard hate cards intended specifically for Dredge decks, so you can count on needing to address graveyard hate in almost every match.
Additionally, Pitch Dredge typically eschews speed elements present in other variations of Dredge such as Fatestitcher. This can result in weaker matchups in cases where you need to race but your disruption doesn’t buy you additional time to do so. The primary example of this is other Dredge variants themselves, which tend to have a strong matchup against Pitch Dredge.Notable Cards
Graveyard Material
The main dredgers to consider are Golgari Grave-Troll, Stinkweed Imp, and Golgari Thug. Additionally, you can consider Life from the Loam (to recur specialty lands), Dakmor Salvage (to recur Bloodghast), or even cards like Darkblast.
Graveyard creatures frequently seen include Narcomoeba, Ichorid, Bloodghast, and Prized Amalgam.
The main graveyard spells are Cabal Therapy and Dread Return, with a haste creature like Flame-Kin Zealot or a board control creature like Elesh Norn, Grand Cenobite as the most common reanimation targets. However, almost any creature may be run as a reanimation target.Disruption
Typically the Pitch Dredge lists include a blue package of Force of Will (which must “pitch” a blue card), Mindbreak Trap, and Mental Misstep. However, any manaless disruption can be run and Leyline of the Void, Chalice of the Void, and other options such as Unmask are frequently seen.Sideboard Strategies
The main driver of variation in Dredge is sideboard strategy. Like Fatestitcher Dredge, Pitch Dredge can and often does include some amount of hate removal such as Nature’s Claim, Ingot Chewer, and Chain of Vapor.
Another common sideboarding strategy is to avoid the opposing hate and implement some sort of non-graveyard plan for postboard games. The most successful transformation is Dark Depths with Thespian’s Stage.
Finally, Pitch lists expect to derive some of their post-board wins from their maindeck counter suite. This may take the form of defending some non-graveyard threat such as Hollow One, or simply countering the opponent’s hate and winning with the graveyard plan.Click the banner above to find decklists, advanced guides, and additional discussion
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I haven't played in a Vintage Challenge since December 22nd, and Top 8ed one today with this INSANE deck:
I wanted to stream the event today, but couldn't get my streaming software to work - since I haven't streamed in like 2 years. I will see if I can do a rebroadcast of my matches.
There is much to say about this!
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Congrats on the top 8. How much trouble was it casting vigor with a green count of 11?
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You are applying force of will math to force a vigor. Its not the same. All you need to do is be able to dredge a green creature to your hand, most of the tome. I think the second-place dredge deck actually had less green creatures than me.
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The main reason for Force of Vigor is Leyline, which means you aren’t dredging.
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@smmenen Steve, did you check out the Maelstrom Wanderer idea for the Dragonlord slot? I believe it's just plain better, right?
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if we're talking about haste targets with multiple pitch Madrush Cyclops pitches to both Force of Vigor and Ichorid/Unmask if we want black instead of blue.
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@Smmenen Congrats on the finish! You should come test at Eudo more often
. I have a lot of questions about the deck! Lots of interesting deckbuilding decisions were made here it looks like regarding not only the mainboard but also the sideboard.-
I would be very interested in hearing your thought process for cutting the GY hate from the main and how/why you chose the cards to replace those slots with
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How did you feel the Force of Negations performed versus other options such as Mindbreak Trap
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Was only 4 answers to non-creature hate consistent enough to your liking and did Force of Negation affect how confident you felt about dedicating that few slots to that role
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Were the 3 Ravenous Traps to make up for the lack of GY hate MD and did this plan work
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Could those 3 slots have been dedicated to something else that you had trouble with, what would you suggest, what did you have trouble with
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Though process behind Terrastodon versus other DR targets and how it performed
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3 Spinning Darkness is a lot how did that feel/ how would something like Vengeful Pharaoh compare/ were you afraid of Yixlid Jailer
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I am a little confused by the singleton Dakmore Salvage, could you provide some insight as to why it is there?
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What would you change in the future and why
Overall your deckbuilding reflects a lot of the ideas thrown around on the Force of Vigor thread so I am interested in hearing your thoughts on some of those to.
Thank you and congrats again
"Pitch Dredge is the worst thing to happen to Vintage this decade." - 2015 Vintage Champion Brian Kelly
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@rat3de salvage is probably to be able to cast dread return through a sphere
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One redeeming factor of this monstrosity is that Dredge has served as positive public relations by keeping Dragonlords well centered in the public eye. They were laughed at upon release of DTK, and here we are, four years later... still going strong. Never forgotten.
Samantha: “Matt, the deck lost to Merfolk.”
Matt: “I don’t build decks to beat Merfolk. In any format.” -
@brianpk80 Kolaghan continues to be amazing at just killing people in 3 swings with no bridges
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My record with my current build vs Dredge just went from 8-0 to 9-5 in no time. Damn you, Hogaak! Oh, well. Time to maindeck some Yixlid Jailers, as Dredge is everywhere right now.
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Plan on doing a larger write up, but over the weekend through the Vintage Challenge and 6 leagues, I went: 21-14 on what I am now calling "Megapitch" Dredge in honor of @brianpk80
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I will probably stream my Vintage Challenge from the weekend, and answer all of @Rat3dE's questions tonight.
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@Smmenen Thank you! I eagerly await, though will most likely not be able to watch it live due to the Warriors game
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Promise it will be after the Warriors game :). I Will also be watching that
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@Smmenen Awesome, thanks
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AJ, I'm about to go live at: https://www.twitch.tv/smmenen
I haven't streamed in two years, so bear with me if there any bumps.
