I. Preamble
The arrival of the StarCityGames.com Philadelphia Legacy Open was another chance to play high level Legacy for hefty prizes. It is the type of event where better decks and better player prosper because the competition is intense, and a player needs every advantage to pull out close games.
Unlike other events, I had already decided awhile back to play Entomb Ichorid. The deck seemed like an excellent choice for a varied metagame because it has a natural advantage against most decks in game 1. It has the ability to beat any deck with speed, disruption, or the combination of both. It has a sideboard which addresses most the graveyard hate cards that could cripple its strategy. The sideboard also includes cards that improve the combo matchup. This is important because it is one of the few match-ups where Ichorid does not have a natural advantage in game 1.
The only change that I decided to make was to include a single Iona, Shield of Emeria in the sideboard, over a Ray of Revelation. I have personally seen less and less Leylines of the Void so it made sense to cut the Ray of Revelation. The inclusion of Iona improves match-ups such as Reanimator and Ad Nauseam Tendrils, where an Exhumed or Dread Returned Iona can swing the game largely in Ichorid’s favor. It can easily put the opposing player in a position where they must answer Iona before being able to combo off. The potential disruption from Iona along with Unmask, Cabal Therapy, and a quick clock can make things exceedingly difficult for a combo player.
Creatures (25)
- 4 Putrid Imp
- 4 Ichorid
- 1 Flame-Kin Zealot
- 4 Golgari Grave-Troll
- 3 Golgari Thug
- 4 Stinkweed Imp
- 4 Narcomoeba
- 1 Sphinx of Lost Truths
Lands (11)
Spells (24)
- 4 Entomb
- 4 Cabal Therapy
- 1 Deep Analysis
- 4 Breakthrough
- 4 Lion's Eye Diamond
- 3 Dread Return
- 4 Bridge from Below
Sideboard
II. Tournament Report
In trying to convey my tournament experience with the deck, I have little to rely on other than my memory and notes that are limited mostly to life totals. Instead of trying to remember the details of every turn, my memory has a more vivid recollection of the most memorable plays and the complications that came from making very human mistakes. These will be the focus of my tournament report, and they provide the best and most accurate insight into the tournament that I experienced. It is my hope that these plays provide some insight into the capabilities and limitations of the deck, along with its interaction with a format that is rich in its diversity and immense in its power.
Round 1 – James Buckingham playing Zoo
I’ve known James for several years now and he is usually playing Goblins, but the last few times he’s been trying other things. I was unsure about he would be playing, and I tried not to make any assumption about what it might be.
The first two games are not particularly memorable. In game 1, I fell behind early on a mull to six cards and he was able to develop his board faster than mine. Game 2 was pretty much the opposite, where I was able to develop my board faster than his and was able to cast multiple Cabal Therapies to strip his hand of anything useful.
It is game 3 that was the closest game and also provides us with an interesting play, and a possible misplay on my part. There was a turn where he attacked with a Kird Ape and Wild Nacatl and he had an untapped Grim Lavamancer. My board was two Zombie tokens and a Putrid Imp. I took several moments to consider if I should block, and in what manner. I decided to double block Wild Nacatl with the two Zombie tokens. I remember thinking that he could use Lavamancer to kill one of my tokens and then the Nacatl would destroy the other one, but I had the feeling that James would rather lose his Nacatl and take my only Bridge from Below out of my graveyard. I also did not want to fall too low on life and allow him to burn me out with Grim Lavamancer or any burn spells that he could draw off the top of his library. He spent some time to think about the play, and he let his Nacatl trade with one of my tokens and my Bridge from Below was removed as his Nacatl went to the graveyard.
It was the following turn where I brought back an Ichorid and dredged into two Narcomoebas, but James shot a Narcomoeba with Grim Lavamancer during my upkeep. This play prevented me from playing Dread Return during my main phase because I was not able to generate additional creatures with zero Bridges in the graveyard. I swung with Ichorid that turn because all of James’ creatures were tapped. Then I had to decide whether to play a Pithing Needle that I had been holding the whole game on James’s Grim Lavamancer. I spent some time thinking about this play, but I had spent most of the game fearful that he might draw a Tormod’s Crypt from the top of his library. I chose not to play the Needle, and this seemed at the time to be a cautious approach, but in retrospect it was a mistake. By holding the Needle I give him another chance to activate Lavamancer, and I give him the chance to draw a Crypt and activate it in response to Needle next turn. An observer who watched the end of the game talked to me about this, and helped me realize that this play essentially prevented me from winning the game a whole turn earlier.
James’s next turn is a bit more fuzzy, but I believe he used his Grim Lavamancer again and to shoot my Narcomoeba and swung with his remaining creatures. Destroying Narcomoeba on his turn meant that it generated no Bridge tokens and gave me less of a chance to reach three creatures for Dread Return.
On my turn I dredged two Bridge from Belows. With only one Ichorid I could not generate three creatures again for Dread Return. I swung with Ichorid against an open board. I also did play the Pithing Needle on Grim Lavamancer to protect my newly found Bridge from Belows.
On his turn he was able to attack me down to nine life, but without a way to get rid of the Bridges things were looking bleak for him. I brought back Ichorid and, along with the two tokens from last turn, that gave me enough to flashback Dread Return to bring back Sphinx of Lost Truths. Sphinx allowed me to dredge most of my library into a final Dread Return on Flame-Kin Zealot. This game also went to time and we were on the additional five turns, with this final turn being my last turn.
1-0
Round 2 – Andrew Weinberger playing Faeries
In game 1 I opened an excellent hand that looked something like the following:
Gemstone Mine
Gemstone Mine
Putrid Imp
Putrid Imp
Breakthrough
Stinkweed Imp
I am not sure what the last card was. I started by playing Gemstone Mine into Putrid Imp, which was answered by Force of Will. On my next turn, Putrid Imp resolved and I attempted to cast Breakthrough, but it was Dazed. The next turns were just slow dredges and at one point I was able to Cabal Therapy out a Stoneforge Mystic, which may have been able to race my slow dredge plan with the help of an Umezawa’s Jitte.
Several turns passed like this, until my opponent played a Relic of Progenitus and activated it. I was left with only a Putrid Imp and the Golgari Grave-Troll in my hand. I continued to dredge and found enough creatures to kill my opponent before he could stabilize. There was no way to expect that card in game 1, but Putrid Imp did a great deal to help me recover from it. It slowed down my progress by several turns, but it failed in its mission to completely annihilate my strategy.
Game 2 was less memorable as I discarded a Stinkweed Imp on the draw, but he had a Relic to immediately remove it on his turn. I was able to Needle a Jitte that he had played later on, but I fell behind on the board. In the end he raced me with two Dark Confidants and two Spellstutter Sprites. There was too much disruption and too much pressure for me to keep up with.
There was not a great deal of time left for game 3. I had boarded out the combo cards in game two thinking that I did not want my Dread Returns to be countered, but with little time I put the combo back in to give myself a chance to win the game before time ran out. Here was my boarding plan in game two:
-2 Dread Return
-1 Flame-Kin Zealot
-1 Sphinx of Lost Truths
-1 Lion’s Eye Diamond
+4 Pithing Needle
+1 Ancient Grudge
In game 3 it was:
-4 Lion’s Eye Diamond
-1 Deep Analysis
+4 Pithing Needle
+1 Ancient Grudge
Lion’s Eye Diamond does give me the ability to win on turn 1 and works well with the combo, but it was the most situational card only working when I knew I could afford to discard my whole hand.
Game 3 worked out because I was able to play out two Pithing Needles – one naming Relic of Progenitus and another naming Umezawa’s Jitte. On turn 1 it was an Entomb for Golgari Grave-Troll followed by turn 2 where I played both Needles. On turn 3 I played a played Breakthrough which resolved, and then activated Coliseum which dredged most of my library, and I Dread Returned Flame-kin Zealot for the win. The ability to answer all of your opponent’s hate cards and to win so quickly shows not only that I had a great hand, but Ichorid is not as fragile as it may seem. It has hands that beat hate and it has the speed to make those hands deadly.
2-0
Round 3 – Edgar Flores playing Reanimator
I remember opening an interesting hand in game 1, and it looked like this:
Lion’s Eye Diamond
Ichorid
Ichorid
Bridge from Below
Golgari Thug
Stinkweed Imp
Putrid Imp
My first inclination was not to keep this hand, but the longer I looked at it, the better it seemed. The appeal of this hand is that all of its cards are useful starting next turn. By discarding your hand, you have two dredgers for next turn along with an Ichorid which will yield a token next turn. The following dredges have the potential for two Ichorids along with the tokens from the Bridge. The drawback is that Lion’s Eye Diamond could be countered and the rest of the hand is terrible. It seemed too fearful to assume my opponent would have a Force of Will without even knowing if he was playing blue.
My Lion’s Eye Diamond resolved and I activated it, sending my entire hand to the graveyard. My opponent started with an Underground Sea and passed to me. I brought back one Ichorid (saving the Golgari Thug just in case the Stinkweed failed to dredge another dredger) and dredged for the turn. I had a slow but steady dredge from here, but my opponent on turn 3 was able to reanimate a Sphinx of the Steel Wind and then was able to reanimate Stinkweed Imp later on when it was my only dredger.
My board plan for game 2 was:
-1 Ichorid
-1 Golgari Thug
-1 Lion’s Eye Diamond
-1 Deep Analysis
-1 Flame-kin Zealot
-1 Sphinx of Lost Truths
+4 Chain of Vapor
+1 Iona, Shield of Emeria
+1 Fleshbag Marauder
Iona and Fleshbag Marauder are both excellent ways to disrupt my opponent, and are very close to winning the game all by themselves. Chain of Vapor is for any reanimated creature, especially Blazing Archon.
My opponent landed an early Blazing Archon, and I did have a bounce spell for it. The following turn I was able to activate Cephalid Coliseum dredging Fleshbag Marauder into my graveyard along with plenty of creatures to Dread Return it into play. I made a technical error here as I flashbacked Dread Return without ever discarding three cards to Cephalid Coliseum. I realized this after casting Dread Return. I informed my opponent of my mistake and we asked for a judge. The judge gave both of us an official warning. My opponent was not particularly familiar with Cephalid Coliseum and his warning was unfortunate, especially since it had virtually no bearing on the rest of the game as I had additional dredgers to continue the next turn. The game effectively ended on that turn anyway.
Game 3 was unfortunate for me as I mulled to four cards, which were:
City of Brass
Cephalid Coliseum
Iona, Shield of Emeria
Bridge from Below
This hand is not very good, but as four card hands go it allows me to play virtually any card that I would want to draw in this type of situation. My opponent played a land and passed the turn to me. I drew a Cabal Therapy for the turn and considered what to do. I briefly considered Therapying myself for Iona to simply cut off Exhume on my opponent’s part, but this also turns any Reanimate that he might be holding. I opted to Therapy him but he Dazed. The next turn he replayed a land and passed the turn. The following turn I drew Chain of Vapor. This was an excellent draw as it gave me a chance to disrupt his combo and give myself enough time to draw out of my mulligan. The following turn he played another land and passed. On my turn I drew a blank. My opponent’s next turn involved casting Entomb and Exhume (making me regret my earlier decision!) putting Iona in to play. At the end of his turn I cast Chain of Vapor, but he had a Force of Will for it. I did not have any ability to race Iona in this situation. My opponent revealed his hand at the end of the game, and he had a Coffin Purge even if I had Therapied myself for Iona.
2-1
Round 4 – Micheal Pozsgay playing Painter/Grindstone combo
The first game was very short as I decided to discard dredger on the draw after my opponent had played a basic Island. My opponent struggled to make the next few land drops while I continued to dredger each turn. My opponent was able to make a second land drop, but by then I had him dead the next turn with a Dread Returned Flame-Kin Zealot.
In the second game I tried the same “discard dredger, go,” but he played a Relic of Progenitus on his turn, removing my dredger. I was able to find another dredger, but my opponent was able to find other graveyard disruption to prevent me from implementing my strategy effectively.
Game 3 was one of the most bizarre games of Magic that I have ever played in my life. The early parts of the game had my opponent playing a Painter’s Servant. It is important to note that up until this point I had yet to see a Painter’s Servant in his deck because he used Trinket Mages and Imperial Recruiters to find disruption pieces instead of combo pieces. I played a preemptive Pithing Needle on Grindstone, assuming my opponent was going for an early win. He played another Painter, and the following turn played a Grindstone. I also had begun dredging every turn, and had another Pithing Needle to protect my graveyard. The problem was that in game 2 he had played both Relic of Progenitus and Tormod’s Crypt, so I was unsure what to name and how many of each he was playing. During the middle part of the game, he was able to activate Relic and after that turn I decided to Needle Tormod’s Crypt, hoping to play the odds. I rebuilt my graveyard via Putrid Imp plus dredger. The game continued back and forth for a few more turns.
During my opponent’s final turn, he drew another Relic of Progenitus and activated it, removing all graveyards. On my turn I drew a Pithing Needle because I could not dredge, as my Putrid Imp had been destroyed earlier. I already had three Zombie tokens in play, as well as a Narcomoeba. I was not sure if I should play the Pithing Needle, but the only thing left to name was Relic of Progenitus with two Needles one on Grindstone and one on Tormod’s Crypt. I attacked with my four creatures. My opponent blocked two of the Zombies with his two Painter’s Servants. During combat my opponent decided to red elemental blast my Pithing Needle on Grindstone. He took 3 damage and this dropped him to five life. After combat he activated Grindstone off two Ancient Tombs, putting him to one life. Grindstone put my entire library into my graveyard, triggering the three remaining Narcomoebas to come into play, but with no library and having already swung this turn, this meant that I would lose the game on my following turn.
I was completely flabbergasted by my opponent’s choice to Red Elemental Blast the Pithing Needle on my turn. It seems obvious that if he had that play, he should have done it on his turn and won the game then. There was no reason to wait until my turn. He realized this was a mistake after the game, and it turns out that if I had played a redundant Needle on Grindstone before attacking, I would have won the game. He would have responded by Blasting the first Needle and activating Grindstone, milling my entire library which would just mean that I could Dread Return Flame-kin Zealot and kill him the same turn. It seems incorrect to me that I should have played an additional Pithing Needle on Grindstone, since there is no reason to believe my opponent would just give me an additional turn,
2-2
Round 5 – Jason Koresko playing Belcher
My opponent mulled to six cards but I kept a great hand of:
Lion’s Eye Diamond
Lion’s Eye Diamond
City of Brass
City of Brass
Cephalid Coliseum
Putrid Imp
Entomb
My opponent went first turn Land Grant (Bayou), Simian Spirit Guide, Simian Spirit Guide, Rite of Flame into Goblin Charbelcher. He was unable to activate that turn, but my hand did not look so good anymore. On my turn I played City of Brass into Putrid Imp and passed the turn. On his turn, he drew his card and was unable to activate Charbelcher. During my upkeep, I entombed for Golgari Grave-Troll and then dredged it for my turn. I then played LED, LED, Coliseum cracking one LED to activate Coliseum. That dredged a large portion of my library into a Dread Return on Sphinx of Lost Truths. The Sphinx did not find Flame-Kin Zealot so it was sacrificed to a Cabal Therapy and then brought with a second Dread Return. This second time it dredged virtually the whole library and then a Dread Return on Flame-Kin Zealot won the game.
The following changes were made for game 2:
-1 Ichorid
-2 Golgari Thug
-4 Lion’s Eye Diamond
-1 Deep Analysis
+4 Unmask
+4 Pithing Needle
My opponent mulled twice down to five cards and had to pass the turn. He also mentioned between mulligans that he really felt like he needed to mulligan for Goblin Charbelcher against my deck because my tokens would outclass his. On my turn I cast Cabal Therapy on him naming Goblin Charbelcher, and it knocked it out of his hand. He also had an Empty the Warrens. He just drew his card and passed the turn. On my turn I had to decide between two plays — Entomb for Narcomoeba to flashback Therapy on Empty the Warrens or Entomb for Golgari Grave-Troll and then cast Breakthrough. I decided to go with the latter because I felt that I could race his Empty the Warrens especially because my second land was a Cephalid Coliseum. The Breakthrough did not win the game for me so I passed the turn. My opponent emptied the Warrens for 10 tokens. On my turn I dredged for the turn and then activated Coliseum culminating in about 20 tokens and a Flame-Kin Zealot for the win.
3-2
Round 6 Ali Aintrazi playing Ad Nauseam Tendrils
The first game involved a slow start by both decks. I dredged one card a turn and my opponent mostly played cantrips to find combo pieces. It was unclear what he was playing until I cast my first Cabal Therapy. My dredges eventually lead to all four Cabal Therapies which took out two Chrome Moxes and Dark Ritual. The Therapies combined with some creatures were enough to pull out the game.
My opponent cast a turn 1 Duress which took my Breakthrough. On my turn I followed that up with a Unmask taking a Ponder as the rest of his spells were just mana producers with nothing to cast with them. The game went back and forth for a few turns where I dredged and he played his lands and dropped a Sensei’s Divining Top. I had dredged into an Iona, Shield of Emeria that I had boarded in.
There was a critical turn where I made a mistake. I announced the flashback of Cabal Therapy as “flashing back Cabal Therapy, sacrificing Narcomoeba, putting two Bridge triggers on the stack”. My opponent responded by activating Top and then I asked him if he was responding to the Bridge triggers, and he said no, the tokens could come into play. I put the tokens into play, and he continued with his Top and then Brainstormed. At this point, my opponent assumed that the Therapy was targeting him, but since I had left off the phrase “target myself” it was unclear. I believe that I also was caught up in whether he was responding to the Bridge tokens that I simply forget that I had not announced the target of my spell, which I normally do when casting Cabal Therapy. After he Brainstormed, I said that I’ll name Stinkweed Imp and revealed two Stinkweed Imps in my hand. My opponent was confused and said he didn’t realize that I was targeting myself. I believe that I Dread Returned Iona into play after this confusion.
We decided to call a judge and we were told that there was nothing he could do to repair the situation. At this point the game was essentially over as Ali had Brainstormed incorrectly in response to the Therapy because he would have instead responded instead to Iona finding a bounce spell (which he did) and then cast Ad Nauseam to try and beat me. It’s not clear whether he would have won, but he did lose because of the lack of communication. I felt bad that a game would be decided by a mistake on my part, and I am truly sorry for the omission.
4-2
Round 7 Alex Douglas playing Natural Order Bant
I mulled to four cards in game one, but was able to start dredging one card a turn. My opponent did very little outside of playing lands for the first few turns. On his third or fourth turn he was able to play a Rhox War Monk. On my next turn I had a few creatures and I was starting to get Bridge tokens, but I used a Cabal Therapy and blind guessed Natural Order because it was the only card that could beat me in this situation. He revealed a hand of — Natural Order, Force of Will, Swords to Plowshares. I continued to dredge and eventually overwhelmed him by Dread Returning a Sphinx of the Lost Truths.
Game two effectively ended when my opponent landed an early Wheel of Sun and Moon, because I had boarded in 4 Pithing Needles and an Ancient Grudge to deal with the Tormod’s Crypt that he was suppose to be playing. I continued to play for a few more turns to play out some creatures like Stinkweed Imp to block his two Tarmogoyfs, but since Stinkweed Imp would not come back to my hand it was a short-lived strategy.
I decided to cut the Pithing Needles in favor of Chain of Vapors to deal with Wheel of Sun and Moon. I received some more bad luck in game three with a mulligan down to three cards. This was the hand I kept:
Putrid Imp
City of Brass
City of Brass
While not stellar, it was probably best hand I had during that sequence of mulligans. My opponent was able to Path my early Putrid Imp and a hardcast Narcomoeba. He also conveniently dropped a Tormod’s Crypt that made it virtually impossible for me to win through. My draws did not yield anything fruitful, and my opponent easily won the game.
As we were picking up the cards and signing the match slip, I asked Alex how his sideboard setup was, and he said that he was playing two Wheel of Sun and Moon and two Tormod’s Crypts. This is a nightmare from an Ichorid player’s perspective, as there is no way to know which card to try to answer, and bringing in eight cards where some of them will just be dead maybe almost as bad as losing to the hate cards themselves.
4-3
III. Parting Thoughts
My tournament ended here with no chance of making even Top 16. This was my second tournament experience with the deck, but it was much more extensive than last time. My thoughts after seven round of swiss is that this list is a significant improvement over earlier builds. Entomb is invaluable and is essential to any modern Ichorid list. I never considered boarding out Entomb as it was useful in almost every situation.
The only slot that I am not sure about right now is the Deep Analysis. While the possibility to Entomb for Deep Analysis makes it more useful it seems that this play will come up rarely because Entomb has so many other uses. The ability to abuse Lion’s Eye Diamond still makes Deep Analysis a consideration as well as another way to increase draws the number of draws in a given turn.
The current sideboard was very helpful as I used every card in it at some point during the day. The combo matchup is still somewhat difficult but the sideboard cards provide a great deal of help especially the Iona which is an excellent Dread Return target and is easier to find via Entomb when absolutely needed.
Ichorid’s lack of recent success should be a concern for anyone looking to play the deck. The deck still suffers from erratic opening hands and inconsistent dredges. It can at times have difficulties dealing with sideboard hate. Despite its shortcomings, it remains a powerful deck with an incredibly difficult strategy to disrupt. It has also has its own disruption and has very fast clock that can race almost any deck in the format. It also has a new card in Entomb that has significantly improved some of these problems. Whether this improvement will catapult the deck into the upper echelon of Legacy decks remains an open question.