Start your Engine Combo Decks: Dimir Reanimator Storm, GRUUL STORM

I like combo decks. Yes, I said it. 

I don´t really know why I have such an affinity for combo decks though. Maybe because I was playing a lot of Yugioh when I was younger and playing combo decks in Magic is the closest one can come to the speed of Yugioh. When I started with Magic, I only played Booster drafts, where one can't really play focused decks. In Commander, combo decks are not liked for a good reason. Your playtime storming off takes away time from all the other players. There is however also the saying that combo decks are not interactive which I can't really fully agree with. More on that later.

My first exposure for combo decks was the MTGO vintage cube where I enjoyed LSV drafting insane Storm decks and comboing off on early turns. I bet a lot of you share the same experience. As I was still new to Magic, my first cube obviously didn't include all the storm cards that are needed to make the deck playable. However, that didn´t prevent me from tossing in cheap overpowered cards into my cube, namely Tinker, Channel and Balance, which seemed to be a crucial part of the fully powered Vintage cube. I quickly noticed that I heavily dislike a Turn 2 Channel into Ugin or a Turn 3 Tinker into Inkwell Leviathan (Fun fact: Inkwell is actually my least favorite Magic card). These plays are just very hard to interact with. So, I cut these overpowered cards and let down the idea of playing Storm and combo in my cube because I assumed that one needed the full vintage support for these cards to be playable.

Forward a few years to today. I think that I finally arrived at a satisfying support for Combo decks in my cube. However, I don't play any power nor any broken fast mana. Combo and storm decks in my cube are playable but are not broken. They are not very fast and can be interacted with my permanent removal, discard and taxing effects. The viable combo decks in my cube allow for the following decks, which I have drafted at least once: Simic Extraturns, Dimir Reanimator, Dimir Storm, Grixis Storm and Gruul Storm.

I will mainly talk about two decks here, Dimir Reanimator Storm and Gruul Storm/Blitz which greatly benefited from the new additions from MH2.

1) Dimir Reanimator Storm

Reanimator is a commonly known deck in most high power vintage cubes. The basics of the deck consist of three parts: Self discard, reanimation spells and reanimation targets. For the first section, we have the usual suspects in Jace, Vryn´s Prodigy, Looter Il'Kor and Frantic Search. For the second, we have Reanimate and Dance of the Dead whereas we play two reanimation targets in Archon of Cruelty and Griselbrand. By now, that would be a conventional reanimator deck. I noticed that I really liked Rituals in my Reanimator decks because it enables explosives starts with potential Counterspell backup. Hence, Dark Ritual is a nobrainer in these kind of decks in my opinion. It turns out that adding another semi-playable ritual in Cabal Ritual, Yawgmoth´s Will and a Storm payoff in Tendrils of Agony is actually enough to consistenly storm off with Griselbrand. Because of Demonic Tutor, it is very easy to get the necessary pieces together. The good thing about this deck is that it does not have a bad matchup against aggressive decks because of Archon of Cruelty. In contrast to Griselbrand, Archon of Cruelty can easily stabilize the board even when it is doombladed (infernal grasphed). Against slower strategies and control decks, one usually tries to go for the Storm win. The deck was a blast to play and could even hold its own against interaction because of the few Counterspells. It is not a broken deck my any means, but an example of a combo deck that slots easily into the typtical Legacy + cube already including reanimator.

2) GRUUL STORM 

Yes. Gruul Storm. Or rather: Gruul Blitz. I was very skeptical on the promised GR Storm archetype in MH2, but it sort of works. The basis of the deck consists of cheap red and green cards in the form of manadorks, burnspells and aggressive 1 drops. However, we have also added a little spice to the deck in cards that let us benefit from playing a lot of spells: Galvanic Relay, Thrasta, Tempest's Roar and Chatterstorm. The result of this deck are sort of mixed. The deck had really good openings and had insane lategame reach with cards as Experimental Frenzy and Escape to the Wilds. There were times, when I could easily play 6-7 cards from the top of my library with Frenzy in combination with Birgi, God of Storytelling and/or Goblin Anarchomancer in play. The deck worked insanely well with a Dragon's Rage Channeler on Turn 1 because you could consistently find more gas.

However, the deck also had really clunky starts that didn't go anywhere. I still don't know whether I like Chatterstorm and Thrasta. Especially Chatterstorm is just not a great Storm payoff. Sure, 2 mana for two 1/1s is fine, but we are not looking for fine is such a deck. Thrasta on the other hand impressed me more. I thought that the card was just bad, but with cards like Lotus Petal and Chromatic Star together with Rituals, it was fairly easy to play on Turn 3. And if the game didn't look like a Thrasta game, you could just pitch it to a Faithless Looting. I would even go as far and say that Thrasta would be really good if it didn't cost double G which makes it more of a challenge to cast. I heavily enjoyed Mine Collapse in this deck and I generally think that the card is really good. Dealing 5 to a creature or PW is really strong and it can also be played for 4 mana in the lategame. Another card that worked well was Reckless Bushwhacker as it was easily playable with its surge cost with all the cheap cards. It is especially good with manadorks that are laying around. One game, I could get the dream scenario of playing a Chatterstorm with Stormcount 7 into Bushwhacker. 

I will test this deck more, as I think that there is a lot of potential. Especially because I didn't need to add that many cards to support this sort of deck as I already play a lot of cheap red and green cards because of the low mana curve of my cube and because I already play the fast mana because of conventional Storm. 

See you for the next article.

Decklists:

Reanimator Storm

Preordain

Serum Visions

Kozilek's Inquisition

Cling to Dust

Dark Ritual

Reanimate

Jace, Vryn's Prodigy

Looter Il'Kor

Thassa's Oracle

Miscaculation

Demonic Tutor

Dance of the Dead

Cabal Ritual

Talisman of Dominance

Force of Negation

Frantic Search

Dead of Winter

Yawgmoth's Will

Liliana of the Veil

Tendrills of Agony

Archon of Cruelty

Griselbrand

Verdant Catacombs

Shelldock Isle

Watery Grave

Zagoth Triome

Bad River

GRUUL Storm

Fireblast

Mine Collapse

Simian Spirit Guide

Mutagenic Growth

Lotus Petal

Dragon's Rage Channeler

Monastery Swiftspear

Light up the Stage

Lightning Bolt

Faithless Looting

Birds of Paradise

Fyndhorn Elves

Elvish Mystic

Abundant Harvest

Chromatic Sphere

Reckless Bushwaker

Chatterstorm

Goblin Anarchomancer

Birgri, God of Storytelling

Seething Song

Jeska's Will

Galvanic Relay

Experimental Frenzy

Escape to the Wilds

Thrasta, Tempest's Roar

Taiga

Stomping Ground

Misty Rainforest

Wooded Foothills