Ah yeah, here we are. The only thing of worth in this primer. Get ready for the loooops.
LOOPS
All of these loops require you to have Krark-Clan Ironworks + Scrap Trawler. So for all these descriptions (including IN PLAY), I'll just assume we have it.
So we're on the same page.
Krark-Clan Ironworks + Scrap Trawler = Mana
Oh yikes that's awful why am I doing this.
Bread and Butter
This is a pretty normal loop borrowed kinda(?) from the OG KCI crew.
Myr Retriever + Sculpting Steel (or another CMC 3 artifact) + Things with CMC or less that net positive at least mana.
This loop is pretty straightforward. Sculpting Steel functions as the second Myr Retriever for only the first round in this one, but Sculpting Steel costs , so you can return Myr Retriever with it. This is pretty easy to remedy with any of the silly mana rocks. For example, here is a loop with Sol Ring to net an arbitrarily large amount of mana and win with Urza, Lord High Artificer.
IN PLAY: Myr Retriever + Sculpting Steel copying Retriever + Sol Ring
- Tap Sol Ring to add .
- Sacrifice Sol Ring to Krark-Clan Ironworks, mana pool - .
- Eat a Myr Retriever, return Sol Ring (and another card, whatever you want), mana pool - .
- Eat Sculpting Steel to return Myr Retriever, mana pool - .
- Cast Myr Retriever and Sol Ring, mana pool - .
- Tap/sacrifice Sol Ring, mana pool - .
- Eat Myr Retriever, return Sculpting Steel and Sol Ring, mana pool - .
- Cast Sculpting Steel, copy Scrap Trawler, mana pool - .
- Go to step 4, and repeat through 9, noting that you will have more mana, and you return 2 cards off the Scrap Trawler copy trigger - Sol Ring and Myr Retriever.
You've probably noticed why this works. The total casting cost of Sculpting Steel and Myr Retriever is , and Krark-Clan Ironworks pays for all of that but . This is where Sol Ring comes into play and nets mana, for the last bit from Sculpting Steel, to pay for Sol Ring itself, and finally bonus.
Then you dump into the terrible UI and win.
Okay so a real observation, this is a mixture of 2 of the primary loops from modern. Something to note, you don't actually need Sculpting Steel, but I use it here since it's useful in copying either Scrap Trawler or Myr Retriever and thus nets you extra cards to work with. But the bare minimum is also fine.
Weird Jank Paying Mana Costs Loop
This loop is weird. If you played Modern during the reign of Krark-Clan Ironworks though, you know it. It involves paying a mana cost and then eating everything to return everything at once.
IN PLAY: Myr Retriever + 1x 1 CMC card
IN HAND: 1x 1 CMC card
- Announce your intent to pay for whatever trash I've put in the deck that costs .
- Eat Myr Retriever, the other CMC 1, and then Scrap Trawler (order matters, more later) card to pay for the cost, mana pool - .
- The card resolves, mana pool - .
- Every card you ate returns to your hand. Here's how. Scrap Trawler and Myr Retriever return each other. The Myr Retriever has a second die trigger from Scrap Trawler, so it returns the CMC 1 card.
- Replay Scrap Trawler and Myr Retriever, empty mana pool.
- Go back to step 1, and rinse and repeat.
Now what matters is what those CMC 1 cards are. If it's a Chromatic Star, you draw a card. If it's a 1 CMC mana rock, you net mana and go infinite that way. If you have random garbage 1 CMC blanks, you can toss in a Mox Opal for the 1 CMC card to return to net positive mana.
Some notes:
- You can't announce intent to pay for a mana cost of . That step doesn't exist. You can't just throw mana at everything and expect it to work. Unless you're playing CST.
- Looping with Mox Diamond may look appealing. It's not.
The Sacrifice Loop
This one uses either Chromatic Star, Chromatic Sphere, Sensei's Divining Top, or Aether Spellbomb, to draw the deck.
IN PLAY: Myr Retriever + 1 of the 4 listed cards + Mox Opal
- Tell your table you want to pay for the ability cost of one of the 4 cards listed. Note that if you are doing this with Sensei's Divining Top, tap it, then attempt to activate its ability.
- Pay for the ability by sacrificing Krark-Clan Ironworks, Myr Retriever, and Mox Opal, mana pool - . NOTE: If doing this with Sensei's Divining Top, sacrifice it too.
- Ability activates, you draw a card.
- All cards sacrificed this way and the 1 CMC card return to your hand, but you drew a card! Krark-Clan Ironworks returns Myr Retriever which returns Krark-Clan Ironworks and the 1 CMC card, and finally, the 1 CMC card returns Mox Opal.
- Replay all the cards returned, and go to step 1.
This works by attempting to pay the activation cost of the 1 CMC card. It's pretty much directly from Modern but we get more cool toys like Sensei's Divining Top, which even nets you mana.
There's an important note on why this loops works and why we sacrifice Krark-Clan Ironworks here and not Scrap Trawler. When we try to pay a cost for activation, there is an order to how things work, in which we use mana abilities to add mana and then we pay the cost in its entirety. Notably, after we sacrifice things in excess to pay the , we then use the mana to pay the cost - which includes sacrificing either Chromatic Sphere or Chromatic Star. If we eat Trolley, it's not in play to see this and we won't be able to return everything that is listed in this loop. However, this is also a mana ability so provided everything is done in the right order, triggers are placed on the stack and targets chosen the next time a player gains priority, which lets everything target everything. Essentially, after you eat a Scrap Trawler for mana, it stops seeing things go to the graveyard and no longer triggers.
This is probably strange to read, because it is just a strange and complicated scenario. The order matters when you pay for costs but the triggers all happen together because that is based on priority. Note that this is in contrast to the cost payment loop above, since there is just the single step and during that step everything is eaten in the correct order to see everything else.
wack
T H E D Y N A M O
Thran Dynamo is a sick mana rock, as it can return Myr Retriever off of a Scrap Trawler trigger and be mana positive for the entire process. Sick huh? Basalt Monolith also works but for meme value I'm using the Dynamo.
IN PLAY: Myr Retriever + Thran Dynamo
- Sacrifice Myr Retriever, mana pool - .
- Tap and sacrifice Thran Dynamo, return Myr Retriever, mana pool - .
- Cast Myr Retriever, mana pool - .
- Sacrifice Myr Retriever, return Thran Dynamo, mana pool - .
- Cast Thran Dynamo, mana pool - .
- Go to step 2 and execute T H E D Y N A M O.
So yeah. The total casting cost of Myr Retriever + Thran Dynamo is , but they net a total of mana. Dope.
Thinking about this one makes me happy. Though admittedly, it's the simplest in the list. It's just cute.
Literally Basalt Monolith works and it makes me sad. But I'm leaving it as T H E D Y N A M O.