Fastest possible mill to deck out?
Modern forum
Posted on Oct. 22, 2013, 6:32 a.m. by Quadsimotto
I know it's highly unlikely but the best I could come up with is at the beginning of your second turn. Let me know if this is an actual possibility.Both of us are playing with a 60 card deck. I win the roll and elect to go first. I have drawn 4xArchiveTrap, 2xSwamp and one Sign in Blood I play a swamp and pass turn my opponent plays a fetch land elects to search his/her library for a basic and pay one life. I respond with paying the 0 casting cost on all four Archive Trap placing the top 52cards in their graveyard. There is no longer a card for him to search for( so I don't know or don't think that's game just yet but if it were me I'd scoop right then) so he passes turn. I draw slap down my second swamp and play Sign in Blood No cards to draw= turn two win. If am wrong about this or any part of it let me know. Also if there is a faster way let me know by all means.
Quadsimotto says... #3
That is sick. Would it work with lands as well? And could I make this deck modern legal?
October 22, 2013 7:09 a.m.
Gidgetimer says... #4
oh sorry didnt see that this was in the modern forum, i got here from the front page. Well in legacy you can do it in 1 turn.
October 22, 2013 7:10 a.m.
Gidgetimer says... #5
Yes painter's servant makes ALL cards not in play the named color so the lands are now that color instead of colorless. I guess If it were 4x Mox Opal you could get around Grim Monolith but Grindstone is the only mill card that does what it does.
October 22, 2013 7:18 a.m.
If you let your opponent search for the land first, which is also required since you can't play it for 0 if the actual search hasn't occured yet, you don't need to play Sign in Blood for that interaction to work.
Your opponent draws a hand of 7 cards (53 left in deck)
He/she plays a fetch, and cracks it to find a land (52 left in deck)
You then play four Archive Trap milling 52 cards (0 cards left in library).
Pass turn, and you win.
October 22, 2013 7:31 a.m.
smash10101 says... #8
Are there any turn 1 infinite mana combos in modern? Cause Blue Sun's Zenith (and friends) works well with those.
October 22, 2013 8:46 a.m.
you're wasting your first turn. just do any turn 1 mill card Tome Scour , Dream Twist , Thoughtscour etc... in your scenario with 4 Archive Trap . you'd never have to start turn 2
October 22, 2013 10 a.m.
Gidgetimer says... #10
Archive Trap says nowhere in it to draw a card so no the first turn isn't really wasted since he is using Sign in Blood to win on his second turn instead of the opponent's second turn. As Dallie said the Tome Scour isn't necessary he could just pass to make his opponent lose when trying to draw in the draw step. Any way you cut it the opponent will lose on their next draw step at the latest if they play and crack a fetch when you have 4 Archive Trap in hand.
October 22, 2013 10:16 a.m.
i realize that. but he said how can you win quicker. by not tapping his first land drop for any use and waiting until turn 2 to Sign in Blood he's wasting his turn one resources...
October 22, 2013 11:38 a.m.
smash10101 says... #12
yeah, but a turn one play won't make the milling happen any faster, just wastes more of the Archive Trap s
October 22, 2013 11:42 a.m.
Gidgetimer says... #13
The thing is that even if he were to mill for 5 or 3 or even pull some BS and somehow Traumatize his opponent before the 4 Archive Trap the opponent won't lose until they try to draw from an empty library either on a draw step or because of a spell. A lot of people don't realize that if you mill your opponent out they still have until they next draw to beat you. Archive Trap doesn't specify to draw cards, just to put them from the library to the GY so you can cast 4 of them on someone with an empty library and it won't matter until they have to draw. So no substituting a mill spell for the Sign in Blood won't make it faster. It will actually make it slower since it puts him winning on Opponent's T2 instead of his T2.
October 22, 2013 11:54 a.m.
Quadsimotto says... #14
It can be done on their second turn still with only three traps a Tome Scour and a Glimpse the Unthinkable it really all depends on the other guy/girl playing that fetch land on turn one. Or you can drop a Ghost Quarter to sack it to destroy whatever land they put down tricking or forcing them to dig their library. Still need the hand to get it done and in that scenario you would need the four traps.
October 22, 2013 12:05 p.m.
@smash10101 in this scenario the opponent is cracking a fetch land to search on turn 1.... what modern player would crack the fetch on their turn and then have to pay 2 more life to play the shock untapped?
the scenario is you mill any cards your turn 1...they crack the land at your end step, you hit them with 4 archieve traps. they lose on their turn during the draw step. 7cards+52+ your mill they have nothing to draw.
October 22, 2013 1:27 p.m.
smash10101 says... #18
@xzavierx Actually, I think it was:
You T1 Swamp
Them T1 draw, (52 cards left) fetch, crack, anything. You cast 4x Archive Trap (0 cards left) during their turn (after they crack their fetch).
You T2 swamp, Sign in Blood , they loose.
October 22, 2013 2:29 p.m.
Gidgetimer says... #19
Well even if the other person was on the play:
Opening hand: 53 cards left in the deck
Crack a fetch: 52 cards left in deck
4x Archive Trap : 0 cards left in deck
Any mill beyond the Archive Trap s is redundant and will not make it operate any faster at all.
October 22, 2013 3:27 p.m.
Quadsimotto says... #20
I only used the Sign in Blood to end on my turn rather than theirs.
October 22, 2013 3:32 p.m.
Gidgetimer says... #21
Yeah but xzavierx doesn't seem to have the reading comprehension to read what the scenario is. Even if your scenario has the opponent making a bit of a bad play with cracking the fetch on their turn instead of yours he doesn't seem to realize that #1 with the fetch they are down to 52 cards without extra milling beyond the 4 Archive Trap so any other milling is superfluous and #2 you put yourself on the play so they were loosing before their second turn which is faster than waiting for their second turn for them to lose..
October 22, 2013 3:50 p.m.
smash10101 says... #22
and this is, of corse, assuming that they play a fetch turn 1 and that they don't have and big eldrazi
October 22, 2013 7 p.m.
Femme_Fatale says... #23
The only way to bypass the eldrazi with milling is to Xill instead. Exile mill, you can do that to their entire library on turn 4.
- Turn 1: Island, Paradise Mantle .
- Turn 2: Island, Grimoire Thief .
- Turn 3: Island, Freed from the Real onto Grimoire Thief .
- Turn 4: Equip Paradise Mantle onto Grimoire Thief and now you have infinite tap/untaps, meaning you Xill their entire library.
Bonus points to it being mono-blue, meaning you can do a control base around it. Stolen Grimoires shows just how it's done.
October 22, 2013 7:58 p.m.
smash10101 says... #24
Is Xill a thing already, or are you trying to make it common vernacular?
October 22, 2013 8:20 p.m.
Femme_Fatale says... #25
It's just me trying to make it a thing smash10101.
October 22, 2013 8:31 p.m.
smash10101 says... #26
I approve. How are you supposed to pronounce it? I'll try to do my part locally.
October 22, 2013 8:41 p.m.
Quadsimotto says... #27
I would imagine its pronounced exile or zill one of the two. So after doing some looking and reading I am bummed to see an overpowered card like Emrakul, the Aeons Torn is not banned from this format. Huh and neither is Griselbrand ?
October 22, 2013 9:02 p.m.
Femme_Fatale says... #28
Because you'll never hard-cast Emrakul, the Aeons Torn , Quadsimotto unless your playing elves, and even then it isn't fast enough to win. You must win by around turns 4-6 consistently to be modern competitive, unless your playing a form of control.
It's pronounced like ... kszill, do zill but put a very short and light ks at the front of it. like sort of like trying to say the letter X (eks) really quickly at the front of zill, while dropping the "e" part of it. Least that's how I pronounce it, probably would be better to use zill, since x doesn't really have a proper pronunciation in any language but various forms of Chinese. But I wouldn't know for sure as I don't have an expertise in languages.
October 22, 2013 9:32 p.m.
smash10101 says... #29
kszill is exactly how I was imagining it would be pronounced.
October 22, 2013 11:14 p.m.
Quadsimotto says... #30
I have been running my Smack Your Deck Up! against a lot of modern decks here and it has done really well usually ending by deck out at turn seven or so. I would say it holds up 70% percent of the games. The decks that give me the toughest time are infect decks,flashback heavy, anything digging the yard and hasty aggro with lots of direct damage. Generally by turn three close to half of their library is in the yard and it is hard to win if you don't have the cons to pull it off. I love playing it cause it feels like a race to see if I can deck them out before my life drops to zero.
Now I'll be thinking all about this exile library on turn four combo,Emrakul, and wtf I could have sworn I read somewhere that Sneak Attack
and Show and Tell
are not legal in this format.
October 23, 2013 5:37 a.m.
Gidgetimer says... #31
Cascading into Hypergenesis is a thing though, as is Quicksilver Amulet .
You can still make them lose on their second draw step if you replace the Sign in Blood with a Tormod's Crypt since you can activate it in response to the Eldrazi ability and exile their graveyard before it gets shuffled into their library. But Femme_Fatale's turn 4 is a lot less fragile since it only relies on 3 cards instead of 5.
October 23, 2013 6:54 a.m.
Quadsimotto says... #32
Well if Show and Tell is not banned from the format I would buy a playset of them Omniscience and Enter the Infinite and go mono blue for modern. Like I said though I am sure I ready somewhere that those are indeed banned cards.
October 23, 2013 11:22 a.m.
Gidgetimer says... #33
Show and Tell isn't banned, it just isn't legal. It wasn't ever printed in 8th edition or later. The other 2 are indeed legal but I am unsure how to cheat an enchantment into play in modern besides a cascaded Hypergenesis and most of the cascade spells are multicolor.
October 23, 2013 11:30 a.m.
Femme_Fatale says... #34
A good mill strategy against aggro and infect is the use of allies Quadsimotto. Unlike most mill decks, this one is Simic coloured as it relies on creatures and one sorcery. I too can creature a turn 4 win, but if your facing aggro and infect it will take longer as you will generally have to block the opponents creatures a lot. You would end up using cards like Harabaz Druid , Halimar Excavator , Jwari Shapeshifter and Doubling Chant . Here is my deck that features them: Excavator's Tale.
Against the reanimator type decks, Dimir ally mill is fairly good. It isn't my deck but here is the one featuring it: Gravedigger, When You Dig My Grave...
October 23, 2013 1 p.m.
Femme_Fatale says... #35
I wouldn't say my combo is a lot less fragile Gidgetimer ... maybe by a little bit. You have to remember that I need to keep a creature out for 3 turns! And every single colour has creature removal in one way or another.
October 23, 2013 1:03 p.m.
Gidgetimer says... #36
Hmm I guess you are tapping out each turn and Force of Will isn't a thing in modern, mostly because it isn't legal. But needing to get 1 each of 3 things by turn 4 is a lot more likely than 4 copies of 1 thing and 1 copy of another on turn 1.
October 23, 2013 1:18 p.m.
Quadsimotto says... #37
I do not have a large group of cards from having been gone from the game for so long. I have been buying since I got back so it will take me some time to acquire another large portion of cards. Till then I'm running my mill in the LCS modern tourneys.
October 23, 2013 1:25 p.m.
- Turn1 Ghost Quarter if an opponent plays any land except a basic kill it. They will opt to search for a basic. Play 4 Archive Trap. They mill 52. They went second so they drew and 8th card on there turn. 52+8=60 plus they thinned their deck by one from seaching fora basic. GG any questions?
February 2, 2015 12:34 p.m.
GlistenerAgent says... #39
If your opponent goes first, they can fetch --> Serum Visions, and you mill them for 52 with four Archive Traps and let them lose to their own cantrip.
February 2, 2015 12:51 p.m.
Femme_Fatale says... #42
Smeltz45, please look at the thread date before you submit a post, this thread is OVER A YEAR OLD.
Gidgetimer says... #2
I don't think you can cast Archive Trap for 0 until after he has searched so he will get his land. And if we are going for god hands you can mill them out on your turn and they will lose on their draw step.
October 22, 2013 6:58 a.m.