
This is your brain on slowdecks. Any questions?
In Part 2 we supposed that one of the most effective ways to force an opponent to gain life was with Wall of Shards. The deck based on that idea worked quite well, ultimately spawning 65 Walls of Shards and gaining the opponent 44,256 life. There is an algorithmically superior method of gaining life in general, though, namely Beacon of Immortality. What's not clear is why any deck would ever need to target an opponent with Beacon of Immortality in order to kill them.
One option is to give the opponent his own copies of Beacon of Immortality. Hive Mind's trigger is mandatory, which provides a straightforward method for getting the opponent to "cast" any instant or sorcery you're willing to cast yourself. Another thought is to give yourself shroud with Ivory Mask, Solitary Confinement, or True Believer, and then somehow contrive an intermediate step in the deck that requires Beacon of Immortality to be cast.
Of course, each of those ideas present difficulties:
- True Believer can simply kill an opponent by attacking
- Solitary Confinement requires a steady supply of cards to discard
- How do you get Ivory Mask or True Believer into play without just being able to cast Celestial Dawn?
- Hive Mind, Ivory Mask, and Solitary Confinement are enchantments, each of which precludes the use of another enchantment until Celestial Dawn is ready to be cast
But they are difficulties that can be overcome! Here's a diabolical list that combines True Believer, Hive Mind, Beacon of Immortality, and the usual Murderous Betrayal engine to achieve a truly brobdingnagian double exponential:
“PoincarĂ© Recurrence” (36 cards)
Lands
Hall of the Bandit Lord
Gaea's Cradle
Mishra's Workshop
Serra's Sanctum
Tolarian Academy
Creatures
3× Draco
True Believer
Spells
Aladdin's Lamp
Apostle's Blessing
Beacon of Immortality
Blunt the Assault
Boggart Shenanigans
Breeding Pit
Celestial Dawn
2× Channel
Conspiracy
2× Corrosive Gale
2× Counterlash
Fold into Aether
2× Hidden Path
Hive Mind
Ivory Cup
Murderous Betrayal
3× Postmortem Lunge
Reverent Silence
3× Weakstone
Lands
Hall of the Bandit Lord
Gaea's Cradle
Mishra's Workshop
Serra's Sanctum
Tolarian Academy
Creatures
3× Draco
True Believer
Spells
Aladdin's Lamp
Apostle's Blessing
Beacon of Immortality
Blunt the Assault
Boggart Shenanigans
Breeding Pit
Celestial Dawn
2× Channel
Conspiracy
2× Corrosive Gale
2× Counterlash
Fold into Aether
2× Hidden Path
Hive Mind
Ivory Cup
Murderous Betrayal
3× Postmortem Lunge
Reverent Silence
3× Weakstone
As before, I encourage you to puzzle out for yourself exactly how the deck functions, and how many turns it takes to win. Turn-by-turn analysis follows.
+− Turn 1
Main
- Play Mishra's Workshop
- Available mana —
- Cast Ivory Cup
+− Turn 2
Main
- Play Tolarian Academy
- Available mana —
- Cast Weakstone
+− Turn 3
Main
- Play Gaea's Cradle
- Available mana —
- Cast Weakstone
+− Turn 4
Main
- Play Hall of the Bandit Lord
- Available mana —
- Cast Weakstone
+− Turn 5
Main
- Play Serra's Sanctum
- Available mana —
- Cast Apostle's Blessing, paying 2 life (20 → 18)
- Counter it with Fold into Aether, paying 3 life (18 → 15)
- Put True Believer from your hand onto the battlefield
+− Turn 6
Main
- Available mana —
- Cast Hive Mind, paying 3 life (15 → 12)
+− Turn 7
Main
- Available mana —
- Cast Aladdin's Lamp, paying 3 life (12 → 9)
+− Turn 8
Main
⋮- Available mana —
- Cast Beacon of Immortality, targeting opponent
- Opponent copies Beacon of Immortality, and targets himself
- Pay
to gain a life from the Ivory Cup trigger (9 → 10)
- Opponent's life quadruples (20 → 20*22)
+− Turn 109
Main
- Available mana —
- Cast Beacon of Immortality, targeting opponent
- Opponent copies Beacon of Immortality, and targets himself
- Pay
to gain a life from the Ivory Cup trigger (110 → 111)
- Opponent's life quadruples (20*2202 → 20*2204)
+− Turn 110
Main
- Available mana —
- Cast Reverent Silence
- Opponent copies Reverent Silence
- Hive Mind is destroyed
+− Turn 111
Main
- Available mana —
- Cast Corrosive Gale, paying 2 life (111 → 109)
- Counter it with Counterlash, paying 3 life (109 → 106)
- Cast Channel without paying its mana cost
- Add 47 colorless mana to your mana pool with Channel, paying 47 life (106 → 59)
- Cast 3× Draco
- Available mana —
- Cast Hidden Path
+− Turn 112
Upkeep
can be used to cast Draco, but not reanimate him. And in the interest of staying alive, Hall of the Bandit Lord stays untapped this turn.
- Sacrifice all three Dracos
- Available mana —
- Cast Corrosive Gale 2, paying 2 life (59 → 57)
- Counter it with Counterlash 2
- Cast Channel 2 without paying its mana cost
- Add 50 colorless mana to your mana pool with Channel, paying 50 life (57 → 7)
- Cast 3× Postmortem Lunge to reanimate 3× Draco, paying 6 life (7 → 1)
- Available mana —
- Cast Hidden Path 2
- Attack for 18 (20*2204 → 20*2204−18)
- Exile all three Dracos

+− Turn 113
Main




, and it may be spent as though it were mana of any color.
- Available mana —
- Cast Celestial Dawn
- Pay
to gain a life from the Ivory Cup trigger (1 → 2)
- Cast Conspiracy
- Pay
to gain a life from the Ivory Cup trigger (2 → 3)





+− Turn 114
Main
- Available mana —
- Cast Breeding Pit
- Pay
to gain a life from the Ivory Cup trigger (3 → 4)
- Thrull token 1 enters the battlefield
+− Turn 115
Upkeep
- Pay
for Breeding Pit
- Cast Murderous Betrayal
- Thrull token 2 enters the battlefield
+− Turn 116
Upkeep
- Pay
for Breeding Pit
- Cast Boggart Shenanigans
- Thrull token 3 enters the battlefield
+− Turn 117
Upkeep
- Pay
for Breeding Pit
- Activate Murderous Betrayal targeting Thrull token 1
- Pay half your life, rounded up (4 → 2)
- Deal 1 damage to opponent (20*2204−18 → 20*2204−19) with Boggart Shenanigans
- Thrull token 4 enters the battlefield (3 total remaining)
+− Turn 118
Upkeep
- Pay
for Breeding Pit
- Activate Murderous Betrayal targeting Thrull token 2
- Pay half your life, rounded up (2 → 1)
- Deal 1 damage to opponent (20*2204−19 → 20*2204−20) with Boggart Shenanigans
- Thrull token 5 enters the battlefield (3 total remaining)
+− Turn 119
Upkeep
⋮- Pay
for Breeding Pit
- Thrull token 6 enters the battlefield (4 total remaining)
+− Turn 220*2204−20 + 112
Upkeep
- Pay
for Breeding Pit
- Thrull token 220*2204−20−1 enters the battlefield (220*2204−20−3 total remaining)
+− Turn 220*2204−20 + 113
Upkeep
- Sacrifice Breeding Pit
- Cast Blunt the Assault
- Pay
to gain a life from the Ivory Cup trigger (1 → 2)
- Gain 220*2204−20−2 life (2 → 220*2204−20)
+− Turn 220*2204−20 + 114
Main
⋮- Activate Murderous Betrayal
- Pay half your life, rounded up (220*2204−20 → (220*2204−20)/21)
- Deal 1 damage to opponent (20*2204−20 → 20*2204−21)
- Activate Murderous Betrayal
- Pay half your life, rounded up ((220*2204−20)/21) → (220*2204−20)/22)
- Deal 1 damage to opponent (20*2204−21 → 20*2204−22)
+− Turn 220*2204−20 + 10*2204 + 103
Main
- Activate Murderous Betrayal
- Pay half your life, rounded up ((220*2204−20)/(220*2204−22)) → (220*2204−20)/(220*2204−21)))
- Deal 1 damage to opponent (2 → 1)
- Activate Murderous Betrayal
- Pay half your life, rounded up ((220*2204−20)/(220*2204−21)) → (220*2204−20)/(220*2204−20)))
- Deal 1 damage to opponent (1 → 0)

There are some methods you're not using that can get you to far, far higher levels of exponentiation. You can use a Howltooth Hollow to hideaway an Open the Vaults, and force yourself to mill your entire deck in order to cast it. That forces all kinds of stuff into play and gets you into plenty of shenanigans involving Opalescence/Doubling Season/Followed Footsteps. I was inolved in a forum threat about this a few years back. Our lists aren't close to optimal, but here's my 31-card deck that takes on the order of (2^^^18)^(2^^10) turns: http://forums.goodgamery.com/viewtopic.php?p=527631#p527631
ReplyDeleteHere's an even better one, a 34-card deck that takes on the order of 2^^(2^^^^^2) turns: http://forums.goodgamery.com/viewtopic.php?p=527798#p527798
Both use Wishes which I'm not sure if you allow, but the same basic premise could be modified to not need them.
Cool stuff!
DeleteThat was quite the ride. Wow.
ReplyDeleteGlad you liked it, thanks for reading :)
Delete