How does soul echo work? Do you fetch it out, or play it for zero the turn you ad nauseam? Does it preform up to par during your testing?

Yep, Zur either tutors for Necropotence or one of the enchantments that keep you alive through Ad Nauseam.You can also just play it for 0.

Ad Nauseam+Soul Echo into Sickening Dreams kills everyone, whereas with Phyrexian Unlife you would die to infect damage.

I like Soul Echo much more then Phyrexian Unlife personally and it has been great in testing. You should be winning on the Ad Nauseam turn so you shouldn't make it to your next upkeep.

I only try for the Sickening Dreams win if I think the Laboratory Maniac win will be stopped.You can Quicken the Sickening Dreams also.

Hmm, I am not sold on quicken, as it seems like a dead card most of the time. It also appears that sickening dreams only works with soul echo or grace, but I guess it can serve as a one card alternate wincon.

Whoah Library of len is weird, tell me about that one!

Thanks for the interest! Plz let me know if you have any suggestions, too.

Well, the Quicken is in there as a cantrip, to help play tutors on other turns or an extra draw to immediately play cards off of Vampiric Tutor or Enlightened Tutor in addition to an instant speed Sickening Dreams.

A surprising amount of the time I Necropotence or Necrologia into Ad Nauseam and on the end step after the draw either have Angel's Grace in hand or Soul Echo/Phyrexian Unlife out. With the free mana and ramp I drew in hand I can win during my end step, and Quicken into Sickening Dreams makes it possible.

Library of Leng is a third no max hand size card, and has the huge added benefit of keeping discarded cards rather than having them exiled due to Necropotence.

I am intentionally nerfing the deck by not running Doomsday and the Doomsday package, my meta is competitive but we are not yet at that level of power.

OO interesting. I didn't see necrologia. That makes your no maximum hand size plan make a lot more sense. I run a similar list, although mine relies on doomsday (based of skuloth but not nearly as expensive). I was considering adding soul echo (card seems sweet) and sickening dreams for an alternate wincon- just for kicks. Right now I run RIP and Helm, but in larger games that is obv not as good. So with Necrologia, you normally pay what? All your life- so that would average to about 30-35 cards drawn. Is that really enough discarded to kill off every other player? I feel like you might have some straggles who are at 40 or higher and just barely make the cut.

Lol, I'm gonna completely contradict what I said earlier. I've started getting the Phyrexian Unlife first off the Zur attacks. Now I always Ad Nauseam to draw the deck and then holding priority, play Angel's Grace to not die off to a Krosan Grip. That was a fun playtest. This way if Ad Nauseam is stopped, I at least still keep the enchantment if it makes it to my next turn.I've been trying to add a storm package as an alternate wincon with Tendrils of Agony which would incidentally give me more life to pay into Necropotence, I'll update this list if it pans out.

Can you make your list public? I'd like to see it

Ya know, I haven't built it on here because I am not about to individually add 100 cards to a deck. Is there a way I can import of cockatrice?

Nevermind I figured it out. http://tappedout.net/mtg-decks/edh-zur-doomsday/

seems like a massive waste of zur. and extremely uninteractive.

elonth

How do you figure? an early Zur tutors for Necropotence and you usually win that turn or the next turn from the massive card advantage.

For interaction there are 10 counterspells, 3 bounce spells which work great with a next turn wheel effect, 2 straight removal spells and 1 board wipe.

but other than the fact you can tutor for necropotence... you have literally no reason to play zur.

elonth

Sure, but just by tutoring Necropotence for card draw or Phyrexian Unlife if Ad Nauseam is in hand, he is by far the best general for this build.

Necropotence in the command zone is powerful AF.

If you mean I'm not abusing Zur's tutoring with multiple attacks then sure, I'm not using Zur as much as I could be. The other combo cards are more powerful than having more turns for multiple Zur attacks, why not just win ASAP?

elonth

You don't NEED a reason other than tutoring for Necropotence. It's one of the most powerful cards ever printed, and you almost always win the turn after it comes down or earlier. No other commander comes close to what Zur contributes to the deck.

Ok, I am going to show my Magic noobness, but can you explain how you win using methods other than Laboratory Maniac? How do your two "turn one wins" actually win? I am asking because I really just don't know and want to learn; not to be a jerk.

sandman1887

Sure, the two wincons are Laboratory Maniac and Aetherflux Reservoir, so let's discuss the reservoir.

With a T1 god hand that gets you all the cards into your hand you just play free artifacts into Helm of Awakening and Etherium Sculptor. Now you can cast all 2 and lower CMC artifacts for free. Play Aetherflux Reservoir, all free artifacts, net positive spells such as Dark Ritual and Cabal Ritual, and if needed bounce 2 artifacts to replay them with Chain of Vapor saccing your land.

I cover this in the Tendrils vs Aetherflux accordion panel, but the T1 god hand kill requires a total of 23 storm with trigger stacking to win, since you will start at -118 life after the Ad Nauseam.

In a game where you attack with Zur to get Necropotence you have 4+ mana if you didn't cast anything, and you simply tutor for Shimmer Myr on end step and follow the above steps for shenanigans. This requires 15 or fewer spells cast (almost always), nets you rocks/life if you get stopped somehow, happens at instant speed and usually goes mana positive unlike Tendrils. Chain of Vapor is a huge enabler too, you sac all your lands to bounce cheaps rocks for added storm count.

Hello there, I love this list :) it seems really cool and I higly prefer it to traditional lists focused only on DD. I got some questions, though.

1. What made you cut Phyrexian Unlife and Etherium Sculptor? You mention them in a description a few times but I don't see them in a decklist.

2. Why no Isochron Scepter? With Reversal it goes both infinite with storm count and infinite with mana. I guess in this list it may be a win-more but have you ever tested it :)?

3. Have you ever tested Paradoxical Outcome? After drawing 25+ cards with necro and casting myr it may simply draw you another half of the deck :D it sometimes work as combined AN and recall/chain. I'm currently playing this storm deck - Rashmi, Crafter of Masterpiece (Paradoxical Storm) built around Paradox Engine and I just adore this card. I don't have the access to black and Ad Nauseam. Maybe in Zur it's just another "win more" but it seems fine on paper. Both legacy and vintage use this card in storm decks, though.

Anyway I love this list. You have my upvote and I will follow it and see what changes will be made :).

Hey Rarian, thanks for the support, Shimmer Zur is clearly the best Zur :D

I should probably get around to updating the description for the CMC counts, card explanations and such.

Phyrexian Unlife went because it was always a dead card in hand and IMO a terrible Zur target. It limits you to an Ad Naus on your turn only, and if you have the mana to cast both Unlife and AD Naus in the same turn you would get better results from Ad Naus, play fast mana/rituals, tutor for Yawg Win, recast rituals, recast tutor for AG, win with AG/Ad Naus, or just Ad Naus into DD.

Unlife is also a pretty bad Zur target in that either Necro is the main line, or you are under heavy stax and you need removal. You'd pretty much never play Zur with an Ad Naus in your hand anyway so the only good time to have it would be if you naturally drew Ad Maus the turn Zur can attack. I don't think I've ever wanted to tutor for this card or to see it in hand, so it was cut.

Etherium Sculptor (and also Cyclonic rift) were cut because I stopped playing Zur in my normal staxy meta and started playing it more with ShaperSavant and CEDH friends. That table has pretty much no stax and is all fast combo so those 2 pieces of anti-stax went out for tutors and ramp.

I've been testing Isochron Scepter and just cut it 5 days ago, it's cool but it is just win more unfortunately. I wish I could keep it in cause it gives you even more T1 win possibilities (with Senseis trigger stacking to draw the deck)

Unfortunately youre right, Paradox Engine is too much of a win more card for this deck. I did make this Thrasios Kydele Test for it though, with an infinite mana sink in the command zone it's SUUUPER broken and wins on the spot.

Bolsheviktory - thanks for your answers but I think you missed one of my points :D I've been asking about Paradoxical Outcome not Paradox Engine :). I know that you don't need the Engine in here but I think that Outcame is at least worth a test.

Ah crap, sorry. I did test Paradoxical Outcome a while back, it's one of those cards that are awesome but only work when you're winning so it never quite made the cut. In vintage and legacy you do get multiple copies of the fast mana, and in vintage you get the moxen so it's just busted to all hell.

If you just have some fast mana on the board and you cast outcome, it's a riskier, crappier wheel that refills your hand but lets opponents keep their sculpted hands

I really wanted to make it work in SOMETHING though, it just doesn't quite fit this deck since the Shimmer line is more of a backup wincon.

There's always modern for the outcome though :D Paradox ArtifactsCause mana vault is totally modern legal and don't let anyone tell you otherwise

So my friend and I think that by adding Quicken, and perhaps the Isochron combo, we can mitigate the reliance on Labman and the more fragile Doomsday piles. What are your thoughts on Time Spiral? It's never done much for me, so I'm thinking of taking it out for Quicken. I think that might make the deck more resilient. Still unsure, though.

Alexdagreat I've also been considering getting Quicken back in just for the instant speed tutor/Yawg Win shenanigans. It's really hard for me to remove Time Spiral since this is also a high tide deck with a heavy island focus and fast mana, the cut for me may end up being Dark Petition.

Isochron Scepter has been bad in my testing but maybe it'll be better for you. For me it was a mostly dead card without also having Sensei's, if I was going for the Aetherflux win you easily stack enough spells/rituals without it, and Zur isn't Thrasios so you don't just win with infinite mana.

I've also started getting my expeditions together to play catch up :D

Those expeditions took me ages to trade for haha! Scalding Tarn in particular was a chore to find. Yeah, that's a good point. Dark Petition hurts when Ad Nauseam hits it, and Time Spiral does help for High Tide/Notion Thief. I always thought Quicken would be good post-Necro greedy draw if I'm top-deck tutoring for Shimmer or Aetherflux as well. I'm thinking of replacing Tormod's for Nihil Spellbomb due to similar upsides.

Yeah, more instant speed draw is always welcome. You can always justify running both in a hulk heavy meta too :D