While the companion mechanic was certainly a catastrophic design choice for constructed, it is undeniably sweet when a good companion draft comes together
Imo the beauty of the limited/cube format is that it ensures balance. Obv not a 100% guarantee but it's not like any other format where the creativity of a player can destroy the format for everyone
I enjoy Companions in Commander, they're a real constraint to your deckbuilding to try and make 99 card singleton conform to the restrictions of any of the 8 usable ones. I play a deck that companions Keruga, and a deck that companions Lurrus. I'd love to see a future return to Ikoria release variants on Lutri and Yorion that can be played in the -C set. Love seeing them for draft too, March of the Machine draft was cooler for including them. Totally understand how they trashed 60-card constructed though.
Second picking Gut would have been so boring. This is why we watch! So exciting to watch the draft and then have the games come to fruition as planned (and even some opps who let the games play out a bit!). Never seen a Zirda companion deck. Always learning something new, fortunate that LSV was my introduction to the Vintage Cube.
No joke! Tutor is a glorified mull to 4, Mox is effectively a mull to 3. To be fair, those 3 remaining cards are 2 lands and a turn 2 Blood Moon, which is an auto win against some decks, just not a 12 basics Rock deck.
This ranks very high amongst my favorite drafts of yours. Such a fun deck and your energy was great! Now if you'll excuse me, I have to go put Zyrda back into my cube.
Turn 3 infinite tokens through a Spellbinder was NUTS! It's hard not to feel for them, because they knew what your hand was, and thus knew that you drew exactly Basalt Monolith and Retrofitter. Yeah, you had a Miscalc to cycle if you hadn't, but the fact that those were your 2 draw steps and the perfect 2 draw steps were crazy.
Yeah when I heard enlightened tutor for chrome mox I died a lot inside. Then he's like I have a blood moon against an unknown deck, no clue how many basics they have so why do that play.
@@dark_rit He mulled to 5, saw his hand wasn't doing much so he gambled that this line was more likely to win him the game than playing a fair game or mulling to 4.
@@osiris201yup came here to say this, blood moon is a decent way to cheese wins on a material deficit. Not sure what the metagame was back in 2003, maybe turn 2 blood moon was unbeatable for half the field lol
Oh Great Richard Garfield, I ask you to guide LSV on this hopeful 3-0 journey, Grant them the wisdom to navigate the stack with clarity, And the strength to tap into their most potent mana sources. Bless their opening pack with the perfect pick, Be it a Mox, a Black Lotus, or an Ancestral Recall. Guide their hands to draft with synergy, and rebuke the temptation of Lurrus and Green strategies. May their mana base be no more than 3 colors, and tap without damage. Shield them from mana screw and flood, let their opponents tremble before their flawless curve. May they topdeck with precision and their opponents cast no moxen. In Urza's name, we pray Amen
Really surprised at passing on Thopter - seems like a great spec on the possible infinite mana. I realize it is a spec, but a mana sink seems helpful. I look forward to seeing how it pans out! Interesting deck. Edit: oh, nevermind - great wheel. LSV skills!
You shouldn't be, for three reasons. 1. Thopter Sword combo is really not as good as you think it is. It doesn't actually win the game, it just makes a lot of 1/1's. 2. It's really bad as a card without the combo. 3. It's much better to get a stronger pick early, and hope situational cards wheel. Also, LSV is cutting artifacts, making it even less likely that someone else would take it.
@@DrMonty-ng5fo fair enough, except when you have an infinite mana combo, converting that to infinite life + infinite 1/1s is much better. I mean, I get that it's a spec and it often wheels. It just slots perfectly into his plan. Regardless, we ate our cake and have it too.
@@DrMonty-ng5foadding onto your point here, his first like 5 or 6 picks were all banger artifact cards that anybody in artifacts would likely be snatching up, so the signals were strong that niche artifact cards especially were free to wheel and so picking up the generically strong blue cards and the like makes a lot of sense
@@DrMonty-ng5fo You also have to remember what pick in the pack it was. This was his 2nd pick. So when it wheeled, there were 6 cards in the pack. If there were less cards, but still Time Spiral, he might not have taken Spiral, but 14 cards wheeling 6, it definitely seems like a good choice. The same is basically true for Sword when he has the chance to first pick it. If Foundry wheeled with 6 cards, the odds of Sword wheeling with 7 cards is INCREDIBLY high.
Your cause and effect is backwards - the for fun ques have weaker opponents than the competitive drafts. Look at two days ago, when opponent in a normal draft attacked a flier into reach and a bunch of other questionable plays. That wouldn't happen in a cube worlds qualifier or a team draft on Luis' server.
@@williamtessmer8123 I wasn’t making a causative claim and agreed, variance in opponent strength definitely plays a big role in winning-though I have noticed that drafting according to a strict preconception of what is “competitively good drafting” can actually stifle some higher risk/higher reward picks, especially when it comes to prioritizing specific pick orders for specs (ie. never taking emrakul without already having sneak, etc) Sometimes playing it safe is the least safe option
honestly while the mana crypt did A LOT of heavy lifting, this deck did so much better than the slower grindy artifacts you generally tend to draft. Zirda mana and ballista/upheaval/thoptersword just go over the top of your opponents so much more easily and can just let you win a game you were losing. You usually end up drafting these grindy artifact decks with kappa cannoneer and retrofitter foundry as a value artifact card and your opponents tend to just go under or over you when you play those decks. This deck was just full of insane win conditions and ways to get you there or keep you alive til you get there, as well as the potential to just go off super quickly with crypt. love this deck, honestly feel like the zirda/monolith combos and thopter/sword combos get highly undervalued by you. good games, happy to see an LSV 3-0.
Genuine question, was there really no consideration for taking spell pierce instead of reprieve? It wasn’t even discussed when going over the choices in the pack. I realize reprieve draws a card but pierce is a very high value card in my experience.
I play Lurrus and Zirda in my cube but I decided to play with the original text on the cards. There are mixed opinions on whether they are two broken with the original rules. Would Lurrus and Zirda be too strong for the MTGO vintage cube if you didn't have to pay 3 to put them in your hand?
Companion is like starting the game with an 8 card hand - yeah the eighth card is expensive but it is still an available card. That is +1 card, in card advantage terms, which is equivalent to a divination. Since you invest no game resources to get you to that point, it is comparable to a 0 mana draw 2. Which is why these cards are best enjoyed as a fine vintage.
@@wernerbeinhart2320 No, the three cards are the turn you cast it. Recall spends 1 card for 3 cards (+2), Lurrus spends 0 cards for 2 cards (+2). And yes, you do spend mana, but some it'd be more fair to call it 3 mana than 6, since half of that 6 ends up as a must-kill 3 CMC permanent on board.
Dark Depth zirda is kind of funny. If Zirda manages to stay in play, you can pay 10 mana and get marit lage the fair way :) Not saying it's good, of course :P
Feel like them discarding the scalelord was much more that they knew they were about to die, didn't want to show you any more cards, and just wanted to burn a little bit of your clock instead of scooping.
4:06 doesn't tamiyo fulfill zirda's restriction because it has loyalty abilities on the back side? or does zirda not look at the backside for some reason
then they have to discard 1 less. But they are at 7 so you can try to end the game fast. But you also lose the spell bomb. I personally would not bounce thee balista...
Trying to imagine a deck that would both take a Manifold Key that early and would also be forced off of artifacts almost immediately afterwards, and I’m at a bit of a loss.
As the guy who frequently comments to point out all the times Retrofitter Foundry in non-Academy decks ends up being "3 mana Mons' Goblin Raiders," I'll duly note that it did some very nice work here when combined with Zirda, Thopter Foundry, and/or Mana Crypt. The fight to move it lower in LSV's pick order resumes tomorrow!
NGL I don't know what you mean. I feel like I see the opposite. I often don't think it is a good pick and he ends up stabilizing against any beaters, outright halting any attacks, or has opponents getting blown out by counterspells because they feel a need to pressure the Retrofitter. This, or opponents play it and the exact same thing happens in reverse 😂
@@traycarrot I've been watching the videos and tracking how many times Retrofitter actually gets activated on either side of the battlefield, and the most common result is once. Yes, it threatens inevitability in a late-game topdeck scenario, but so few games of vintage cube actually reach the point of "both players have a bunch of mana and no spells to spend it on." The threats are all too juiced. If your vintage cube deck gets solo'd by Retrofitter Foundry, you had a bad vintage cube deck.
I didnt watch the full video yet, and im really exccited about this one. really love Zirda. But thought it would be interesting to make a small correction that could be useful in the future In 4:08 , you say that you can't put Tamiyo in the deck. But that's incorrect. She infect DOES have activated habilities. Gotta remember that the backside of the card is still part of the card. So with her being a planeswalker on the backside, she does in fact get to Zirda´s requirements! Also a small addendum to 5:56. Urza's Saga also can't be put in the deck, it's really weird to think about it, but surprisingly. It doesnt have any activated habilities until it is on the battlefield. Now I'll continue the video. Hope this was helpfuil! :D
Unfortunately the backside of cards don’t count for companion purposes. 712.8a While a double-faced card is outside the game or in a zone other than the battlefield or stack, it has only the characteristics of its front face.
While the companion mechanic was certainly a catastrophic design choice for constructed, it is undeniably sweet when a good companion draft comes together
Companion are so awesome in cube, having one card basically create a whole archetype is so good for draft diversity!
Imo the beauty of the limited/cube format is that it ensures balance. Obv not a 100% guarantee but it's not like any other format where the creativity of a player can destroy the format for everyone
I enjoy Companions in Commander, they're a real constraint to your deckbuilding to try and make 99 card singleton conform to the restrictions of any of the 8 usable ones. I play a deck that companions Keruga, and a deck that companions Lurrus. I'd love to see a future return to Ikoria release variants on Lutri and Yorion that can be played in the -C set.
Love seeing them for draft too, March of the Machine draft was cooler for including them. Totally understand how they trashed 60-card constructed though.
Well to be fair they’d be a catastrophe here too without the 3 mana fix.
@@fsecco haha this is true
This is easily the best draft LSV has done in a long while. Right in his lane of play style and cards he loves. Well done sir, well done.
Second picking Gut would have been so boring. This is why we watch! So exciting to watch the draft and then have the games come to fruition as planned (and even some opps who let the games play out a bit!). Never seen a Zirda companion deck. Always learning something new, fortunate that LSV was my introduction to the Vintage Cube.
36:00 "guardian scalelord is both the best card they can play and the worst card in their hand?" 😂
It was the most sensible card to discard since they were dead on board and any other discard would have revealed another card
Nothing makes a mull to five better than Enlightened Tutoring for a Chrome Mox
No joke! Tutor is a glorified mull to 4, Mox is effectively a mull to 3. To be fair, those 3 remaining cards are 2 lands and a turn 2 Blood Moon, which is an auto win against some decks, just not a 12 basics Rock deck.
This ranks very high amongst my favorite drafts of yours. Such a fun deck and your energy was great!
Now if you'll excuse me, I have to go put Zyrda back into my cube.
Turn 3 infinite tokens through a Spellbinder was NUTS! It's hard not to feel for them, because they knew what your hand was, and thus knew that you drew exactly Basalt Monolith and Retrofitter. Yeah, you had a Miscalc to cycle if you hadn't, but the fact that those were your 2 draw steps and the perfect 2 draw steps were crazy.
Bro from the 2003 grand prix had such a bad opening line it literally stuck with Luis for 20 years, that’s devastating lmao
Yeah when I heard enlightened tutor for chrome mox I died a lot inside. Then he's like I have a blood moon against an unknown deck, no clue how many basics they have so why do that play.
@@dark_rit He mulled to 5, saw his hand wasn't doing much so he gambled that this line was more likely to win him the game than playing a fair game or mulling to 4.
@@osiris201yup came here to say this, blood moon is a decent way to cheese wins on a material deficit. Not sure what the metagame was back in 2003, maybe turn 2 blood moon was unbeatable for half the field lol
Oh Great Richard Garfield, I ask you to guide LSV on this hopeful 3-0 journey,
Grant them the wisdom to navigate the stack with clarity,
And the strength to tap into their most potent mana sources.
Bless their opening pack with the perfect pick,
Be it a Mox, a Black Lotus, or an Ancestral Recall.
Guide their hands to draft with synergy, and rebuke the temptation of Lurrus and Green strategies.
May their mana base be no more than 3 colors, and tap without damage.
Shield them from mana screw and flood,
let their opponents tremble before their flawless curve.
May they topdeck with precision and their opponents cast no moxen.
In Urza's name, we pray
Amen
amen🙏
I’m fairly certain that LSV goes by he/him, so intentionally using they/them, you’re misgendering.
Thank you, it worked!
@@simpsonzack22oh wow you're so fragile
Lmaoo great comment
Probably one on my favourite drafts of yours I have watched recently, this deck was awesome! Love the Sword Thopter combo
36:05 I couldn't stop laughing after the discarding of Guardian Scalelord and the subsequent commentary. Keep it up :) love the content as always.
Luis found a way to complain about winning Mana Crypt flips. He really is the GOAT
This draft was exciting. I love how effortlessly this fell together. Fun games!
Really surprised at passing on Thopter - seems like a great spec on the possible infinite mana. I realize it is a spec, but a mana sink seems helpful. I look forward to seeing how it pans out! Interesting deck.
Edit: oh, nevermind - great wheel. LSV skills!
You shouldn't be, for three reasons.
1. Thopter Sword combo is really not as good as you think it is. It doesn't actually win the game, it just makes a lot of 1/1's.
2. It's really bad as a card without the combo.
3. It's much better to get a stronger pick early, and hope situational cards wheel. Also, LSV is cutting artifacts, making it even less likely that someone else would take it.
@@DrMonty-ng5fo fair enough, except when you have an infinite mana combo, converting that to infinite life + infinite 1/1s is much better.
I mean, I get that it's a spec and it often wheels. It just slots perfectly into his plan.
Regardless, we ate our cake and have it too.
@@DrMonty-ng5foadding onto your point here, his first like 5 or 6 picks were all banger artifact cards that anybody in artifacts would likely be snatching up, so the signals were strong that niche artifact cards especially were free to wheel and so picking up the generically strong blue cards and the like makes a lot of sense
@@DrMonty-ng5fo You also have to remember what pick in the pack it was. This was his 2nd pick. So when it wheeled, there were 6 cards in the pack. If there were less cards, but still Time Spiral, he might not have taken Spiral, but 14 cards wheeling 6, it definitely seems like a good choice. The same is basically true for Sword when he has the chance to first pick it. If Foundry wheeled with 6 cards, the odds of Sword wheeling with 7 cards is INCREDIBLY high.
I was really hoping to see a Zirda-Dark Depths combo. It's basically Hexdrinker.
Minimum 1
@@SymmetricalDocking So exactly like Hexdrinker. 😀
I always feel like you draft the best decks when simply trying to have fun rather than be competitive
Your cause and effect is backwards - the for fun ques have weaker opponents than the competitive drafts. Look at two days ago, when opponent in a normal draft attacked a flier into reach and a bunch of other questionable plays. That wouldn't happen in a cube worlds qualifier or a team draft on Luis' server.
@@williamtessmer8123 I wasn’t making a causative claim
and agreed, variance in opponent strength definitely plays a big role in winning-though I have noticed that drafting according to a strict preconception of what is “competitively good drafting” can actually stifle some higher risk/higher reward picks, especially when it comes to prioritizing specific pick orders for specs (ie. never taking emrakul without already having sneak, etc)
Sometimes playing it safe is the least safe option
13:30 A balista in play is worth 2 in the bush.
Damn this deck was so fun!
Really cool games, I could feel your joy piloting this.
I appreciate mixing in mtgo queues so we can draft decks like this ❤️
Thanks for slogging through the recent L’s to come back and crush with a sweet 3-0!! Love to see the highs and lows
*love* when zirda companion works out. artifacts are the most fun and this was such a sick deck! Last match was def worth
honestly while the mana crypt did A LOT of heavy lifting, this deck did so much better than the slower grindy artifacts you generally tend to draft. Zirda mana and ballista/upheaval/thoptersword just go over the top of your opponents so much more easily and can just let you win a game you were losing.
You usually end up drafting these grindy artifact decks with kappa cannoneer and retrofitter foundry as a value artifact card and your opponents tend to just go under or over you when you play those decks.
This deck was just full of insane win conditions and ways to get you there or keep you alive til you get there, as well as the potential to just go off super quickly with crypt.
love this deck, honestly feel like the zirda/monolith combos and thopter/sword combos get highly undervalued by you.
good games, happy to see an LSV 3-0.
I love these big mana comboy decks 😍 sweet deck!!
Genuine question, was there really no consideration for taking spell pierce instead of reprieve? It wasn’t even discussed when going over the choices in the pack. I realize reprieve draws a card but pierce is a very high value card in my experience.
I think Reprieve and Remand are generally higher picks than Spell Pierce. Spell Pierce is good though.
I think in a combo deck like this the fact that reprieve replaces itself is pretty important.
I play Lurrus and Zirda in my cube but I decided to play with the original text on the cards. There are mixed opinions on whether they are two broken with the original rules. Would Lurrus and Zirda be too strong for the MTGO vintage cube if you didn't have to pay 3 to put them in your hand?
Very cool deck! Havent got to see Basalt go off that much
Loved this, peak LSV.
Zirda companion? That was sick
The end of that first match was ridiculous.
this was an absolute pleasure to watch
57:15 Cryptic Ciat doesn’t break Zirda companion, it has the 1U: return to hand
52:12
Snuff out needs an swamp to turn on the 4life cost
Ah yes Lurrus, the Ancestral recall that costs 6 mana
That also has to stay on the battlefield for at least 2-3 rounds to get you those 3 cards
@@wernerbeinhart2320 that you draw every game
@@wernerbeinhart2320 Itself is an extra card.
Companion is like starting the game with an 8 card hand - yeah the eighth card is expensive but it is still an available card. That is +1 card, in card advantage terms, which is equivalent to a divination. Since you invest no game resources to get you to that point, it is comparable to a 0 mana draw 2. Which is why these cards are best enjoyed as a fine vintage.
@@wernerbeinhart2320 No, the three cards are the turn you cast it. Recall spends 1 card for 3 cards (+2), Lurrus spends 0 cards for 2 cards (+2). And yes, you do spend mana, but some it'd be more fair to call it 3 mana than 6, since half of that 6 ends up as a must-kill 3 CMC permanent on board.
this was such a fun draft!
Dark Depth zirda is kind of funny. If Zirda manages to stay in play, you can pay 10 mana and get marit lage the fair way :) Not saying it's good, of course :P
When it's open it's open! Surprised the key wasn't there for you. Wo
Super sweet brew!
Feel like them discarding the scalelord was much more that they knew they were about to die, didn't want to show you any more cards, and just wanted to burn a little bit of your clock instead of scooping.
Wow what an awesome deck
he was winning so hard he started reminiscing about a game he won my lifetime ago
Does Evoke on subtlety not count as an activated ability?
That deck was nasty even without Academy
55:35 Has anyone heard Luis say "moxen" befor? he usually says moxes.
4:06 doesn't tamiyo fulfill zirda's restriction because it has loyalty abilities on the back side? or does zirda not look at the backside for some reason
----spoiler alert-----
that t3 infinite tokens, and your joy, just says it all. come for the magic knowledge, stay for the cackling victories :D
Finally artifacts are back
This deck was so sick
Would Tamiyo turn off Zirda? She has activated abilities on her back side.
This deck was beautiful
Come downstairs, kids. Daddy's home.
Finally a good deck!
What a fun deck holy moly🎉.
extremely sweet deck
Great content
You love to see it
At around 33:10 I feel like bounce balista with spell bomb is the best line. curious on other peoples thoughts.
then they have to discard 1 less. But they are at 7 so you can try to end the game fast. But you also lose the spell bomb.
I personally would not bounce thee balista...
Please pop the companion window out every game.
This cube needs a fireball lol
Trying to imagine a deck that would both take a Manifold Key that early and would also be forced off of artifacts almost immediately afterwards, and I’m at a bit of a loss.
probably took a mana vault or grim monolith in their first couple of picks, then no artifacts went around because lsv was cutting all the decent ones.
Really strong deck even after the first 8 picks or so
Best 5 drops in blue on turn two and three. Ice draft
Waiting for the dude on the comments to say: I was your opponent that mulled into chrome mox and blood moon.
More like Obsurda...
discard broke op
As the guy who frequently comments to point out all the times Retrofitter Foundry in non-Academy decks ends up being "3 mana Mons' Goblin Raiders," I'll duly note that it did some very nice work here when combined with Zirda, Thopter Foundry, and/or Mana Crypt. The fight to move it lower in LSV's pick order resumes tomorrow!
NGL I don't know what you mean. I feel like I see the opposite. I often don't think it is a good pick and he ends up stabilizing against any beaters, outright halting any attacks, or has opponents getting blown out by counterspells because they feel a need to pressure the Retrofitter.
This, or opponents play it and the exact same thing happens in reverse 😂
@@traycarrot I've been watching the videos and tracking how many times Retrofitter actually gets activated on either side of the battlefield, and the most common result is once.
Yes, it threatens inevitability in a late-game topdeck scenario, but so few games of vintage cube actually reach the point of "both players have a bunch of mana and no spells to spend it on." The threats are all too juiced. If your vintage cube deck gets solo'd by Retrofitter Foundry, you had a bad vintage cube deck.
THREE ZERO BABY
36:13 I assume the opponent has accepted the loss at that point and is just trying not to show you any more relevant cards
Time for another vintage Cube draft!
I wish the companion errata didnt apply to limited
sir 3-0? Normal.
No Urza is so unlucky.
I didnt watch the full video yet, and im really exccited about this one. really love Zirda.
But thought it would be interesting to make a small correction that could be useful in the future
In 4:08 , you say that you can't put Tamiyo in the deck. But that's incorrect.
She infect DOES have activated habilities. Gotta remember that the backside of the card is still part of the card. So with her being a planeswalker on the backside, she does in fact get to Zirda´s requirements!
Also a small addendum to 5:56. Urza's Saga also can't be put in the deck, it's really weird to think about it, but surprisingly. It doesnt have any activated habilities until it is on the battlefield.
Now I'll continue the video. Hope this was helpfuil! :D
Unfortunately the backside of cards don’t count for companion purposes.
712.8a While a double-faced card is outside the game or in a zone other than the battlefield or stack, it has only the characteristics of its front face.
It’s been laggy for days I feel like
Unless you have literal Black Lotus in your deck, Lurrus companion is much closer to Thassa's Bounty than Ancestral Recall.
A little more nuance than that. When you pay 6 mana for Lurrus, you end up with a permanent in play, and often 2.
Don't mind me, I'm just imagining the nasty Rakdos aggro deck we passed with Gut, Bob, Kroxa, Fiery Confluence and Carnage Interpreter