UNDEFEATED WITH NO MANA! Legacy Manaless Dredge Combo (Graveyard Combo MTG Trophy / 5-0)

[@page_sr7180]

Petition to start calling lands decks "Dredgeless Mana"

[@AdamBittner]

Sure, when you have a Lands deck without Life from the Loam.

[@page_sr7180]

@@AdamBittner Well, I know what my next donation decklist idea is now

[@carrikmcnerlin1770]

Make Legacy Names Weird Again

[@nixeduswavebreak]

What about Oops, All Dredge

[@Frommerman]

There obviously isn't a dredgeless mana deck in Legacy, and never will be because the Loam toolboxes are too good. Modern, however, has two decks which could be called that: Amulet and Tron.

[@aidanm.655]

At 31:50 there's a slightly better line. You discard grave-troll to phantasmagorian, then holding priority you cycle street wraith, dredging and returning grave-troll. This is all with the phantasmagorian trigger on the stack. Then still in response to that phantasmagorian you discard grave-troll again. This allows you to then dredge grave-troll a second time, while ordering your graveyard properly for nether shadow.

[@potatodavid1987]

Dredge always used to be the measuring stick for getting into legacy. I love it's occasional appearance and when it does well

[@ThrabenUniversity]

It used to be the "prepare for it or it will beat you" deck. It's fallen out of favor now.

[@SirSilicon]

@@ThrabenUniversity And as always this makes it automatically way more dangerous.

[@alexthompson5479]

It's lovely to see that so many of the opponents either had forgotten or never knew the terror of manaless dredge allowing you to take the draw.

[@ThrabenUniversity]

It's probably "never knew." The deck isn't popular at all these days.

[@ShadowDuskSky]

This might be my favorite deck in all of magic, and I’m really happy to see you playing it. It has so many interesting decision points during games, and I love watching to see how our play would have differed.

[@davidmay9799]

My favorite too! I switched over to LED Dredge at one point, but then sold off my LEDs. Really happy to see a good performance now that I've switched back to Manaless.

[@elliotthood1719]

This feels like watching someone trip in race, then shoot the other competitors with a cannon

[@ThrabenUniversity]

Honestly, good analogy.

[@llamarama6976]

From my experiance playing my deck at the table you can also lean into the illusion "awww NO i took a risky but great hand but i didnt get a land :("

[@yeepyorp]

@@llamarama6976 never works if you go "yeah sure you can go first" though

[@llamarama6976]

@@yeepyorp nah we roll off

[@llamarama6976]

Deck submitter here. Undefeated!? Hahaa! Cant wait to see the games! I suspected the deck may be tweaked as mine is from an older time. The horror in their eyes when you turbo out hogaak

[@ThrabenUniversity]

Yeah, I think I adjusted the maindeck a bit and kept your sideboard.

[@LucksackGames]

Thanks for donating for this. One of my fav decks to watch and play!

[@llamarama6976]

@@LucksackGames it was truely a joy when i first discovered it.

[@tony.v]

I saw this on the Reddit 5-0 Legacy league lists and was like 😲😲😲 I'm so glad this is finally here!

[@ThrabenUniversity]

I've been waiting for this one to release. Feels good to put up the trophy with an old favorite.

[@CharlotteMimic]

This is a wildly budget deck for legacy! Moxfield says $283 atm, and that's including four Force of Vigor, a $40 card.

[@ThrabenUniversity]

Oh wow, I didn't know it was THAT cheap.

[@impendio]

Force of vigor is 40 bux???

[@wyattmaniscalco3090]

If you get the cheapest versions of each card, it costs less than $250

[@Tupiaz]

You can probably cut the FoV and play Acid Slime instead. Leyline will still be a killer, however can deal with other cards.

[@ThermobaricScouring]

My favorite deck of all time. Love the way it dunks all over Delver I wish Modern Dredge was half as interesting. Then I would actually play modern.

[@IAMinDreams]

When you cycle dredge with wraith u want to do it at the end of the opponents second main phase so if you hit a narcomeba and amalgem it comes into play at the end of their turn. 19:44

[@darkritualpass]

Sweet video. Love this deck. Some manaless tips from someone who plays this deck in paper: If you street wraith during their 2nd main you can hit narco/amalgam and get both back. It does give them a chance to get something in at sorcery speed, but can still be very strong. You can also put street wraith into your Phantasmagorian stacks for a lot of cool stuff like discarding, dredging, then discarding again. Also check out river Kelpie and the versions of this deck with force of will, can be very strong.

[@wurmcoilengine161]

Manaless Dredge is so ridiculous and, at the same time, so fantastic to see in action.

[@geothornton]

Former SCG Top 8 Competitor with Manaless here, love the content! Congrats on the trophy!

[@ThrabenUniversity]

That's a decent accomplishment! Not many people get through the "big events" with Manaless Dredgr! When it's good, it's realllll good.

[@riccardogrossoni2795]

on the third round when you won with flayer of the hatebound there was also the line where you hit the flayer with its ability, so that the undying trigger gives lethal on the spot rather then at end of turn, plus style points for the self target of the flayer :)

[@smallsura]

Awesome, makes me want to put it together. Should unmask be grief? I can see how unmasking yourself might be a line grief cuts off, but having extra black creatures seems really nice for ichorid/shadow. And also quite nice with a bridge in the yard.

[@TheTinmanstudios]

I love this deck, played it for years, sleeve it up every now and then for kicks. This will likely inspire me to do so again.

[@scaraddeus4902]

Awesome to see this deck on the channel. After DNT my favorit deck in Legacy

[@Stellar_Lake_sys]

this was amazing to watch, still wild to me that there's enough cards with the right interactions to make this deck, let a lone to make a version this reliable

[@simonnomis9547]

And just like that I subbed and sleeved up my manaless dredge to once again give other wizards a hard time!

[@countOfHenneberg]

Always a pleasure to see Manaless Dredge doing well. And this list has cards I hadn't known about. I wonder how many green cards are needed for Force of Vigor?

[@ThrabenUniversity]

There's math out there for number of blue cards needed for Force of Will. I'd look at those numbers as your starting point.

[@Tupiaz]

17-18 cards (including force) you can do it once with 90% chance. 15 is on the low side. If you want more green cards you could play one extra Shambling Shell instead of Golgari Thug.

[@Eisenwulf666]

This deck and its various iterations are my favourite decks in magic, pretty awesome games too

[@andrewwistrand9024]

Hey Phil great video, think you basically always want to discard Phantasmagorian over your dredger when you have a street wraith. sets up a line where you discard 3 hold priority with phantasmagorian return effect on stack if dredge fails to find another dredger you can activate phantasmagorian again discarding your dredger. 28:14.

[@andrewwistrand9024]

if you are sniffing surgical just hold up street wraith forever until they move.

[@ThrabenUniversity]

Yeah, I thought of that line immediately after I started doing other things.

[@JobaKurtz]

This is one of my second favorite Legacy deck, right behind classic dredge.

[@sunset_irises]

Was about to type a whole big thing about how you could have won with Thassa's Oracle instead of casting Hogaak in match 4, but then I realized the whole thing fell apart because of the Abrupt Decay in the opponent's hand. XD Glad you at least paid attention to the opponent's removal, 'cause I apparently wouldn't have.

[@brianhelmick1105]

Got a soft spot for manaless dredge! I made a modern version years ago and it was quite cute to win thru a scav ooze that was on the field

[@ThePhysicalReaction]

Nutty deck. Really fun to watch

[@SuperbFairy]

was nice to see someone playing manaless dredge, the only deck i could afford to get into legacy was manaless a couple of years ago but now cards like force of vigor etc make it too expensive even for that online now

[@MTGreat202]

Woo second Edit: I really like the idea of this deck, it uses things outside the game like turn order in advantage

[@ThrabenUniversity]

Turn order is something that people rarely think about, so when it matters, it seems giga brain.

[@oelboy]

@@ThrabenUniversity I always feel big brained when not playing a land first turn with my reanimator mono-black edh deck to discard some big dumb creature. And every time I fool someone into thinking I kept a risky hand. 🤣

[@BrokenTablesPodcast]

Any chance we can get an update on this deck. It's my fav deck of all time and I love seeing it evolve. Has anything come out in the past year to add?

[@Dizzy2death]

I know the video is old, but in the combo line with flayer you can always use the undying trigger for a second bop to the dome, either sac'ing it to a therapy or another dread return

[@timrose131]

You piloted this beautifully! My favorite deck is jund hogaak. When you piloted that deck (forever ago) I think it was meh. This however was amazing. I want to see you try again on jund hogaak in the current Metta. Prob will have to donate

[@ThrabenUniversity]

I'm always happy to play some graveyard nonsense!

[@MrJ03K3rR]

I love how far this game has come where you can sweep a tournament without playing a single source of mana in your decks

[@errormtg8240]

Ayyyy my fave deck ever!! i miss playing this

[@catit6599]

Would 4 griefs in the sideboard be better cause theres lots of creature based synergies like bridge and nether shadow?

[@franzelmagetower]

I played standard on Arena for a while but got sick of it. I could easily imagine getting back into legacy with this deck because not only is it effective against the current meta, but it's quite economical and looks really interesting to play (and the games go quickly one way or the other). Thanks, Phil!

[@therealmikem5222]

It’s pretty cheap to build too if you don’t have the expensive sideboard cards. I remember building is in high school

[@Randomperson-pk3ce]

So, would it ever be the correct decision to take the manaless dredge line in vintage? Instead of mulliganing for bazaar. Like are there any matchups where is even sort of the correct decision

[@ryangainey94]

I do love that this is both so creative and so cheap. But the Vintage version is a real blast since you can do stuff turn 1 instead of turn 2, simply by running 4x Bazaar of Baghdad, which is banned in Legacy but unrestricted in Vintage. Since it has some other cards restricted like Dread Return and Golgari Grave-Troll, it leaves room for other cards as well, such as a one of Gitaxian Probe and Lion's Eye Diamond.

[@ThrabenUniversity]

Bazaar is a heck of a drug...

[@leviathandeep2289]

I didn't really see the vengeful pharaoh do much, would having something like sickening shoal in that spot be more reliable. Your thoughts on this

[@corbeaubm]

Farming delver seems like a good position to be in.

[@naphackDT]

But what is your strategy for when an opponent donates a reliquary tower on turn 1?

[@ThrabenUniversity]

Look, some things are just unbeatable...

[@demiurge2501]

Manaless dredge will always be my favorite deck ever

[@joshjoyce2174]

Hey! Im looking to get into legacy, and have modern dredge built, and am debating converting it to some form of legacy dredge deck. Im also a hammer player in modern, and 2 opals away from mono white hammer in legacy! I am confident that hammer is going to be my main deck, so i wanted to ask if you thought manaless dredge or led-less dredge would be a better secondary deck for the format. I have to say, I did not expect manaless dredge to have as much game as what I saw in the videos of you playing it. It definitely looks more fun than I thought

[@ThrabenUniversity]

Generally speaking, Dredge decks are abstractly powerful, but struggle with dedicated hate. Your game 1 win percentage is very high, but post-sb games are hard. Manaless Dredge is probably more powerful than LED-less Dredge. It's a nice secondary deck to have, and I think the totaly Manless Dredge cost is under $400, most of which is Force of Vigor.

[@miterbinnesdirty]

Something I find super cool is that this deck finds a mycosynth lockout irrelevant. You activate no artifacts and it basically only slows down force of vigor. Lavinia though... that one is rough.

[@bparispoker]

leyline seems a bit suspect as a sideboard card since you're timewalking yourself whenever you T0 it... although sideboarding for this deck in general tends to be quite suspect. Wonder if there's a better option there?

[@ThrabenUniversity]

Unfortunately, they haven't printed a cantripping graveyard hate card that doesn't require you to use mana to cast it ;) In matchups where your opponent is doing something equally unfair, it is worth the turn off to stop them.

[@Totescolin]

You don't really have many options against faster combo decks, mindbreak trap would be the best alternative but easier for other decks to interact.

[@anosmianAcrimony]

Still seems worthwhile in some spots because if they're Nihil Spellbombing or Tormod's Crypting you, or just Grapeshotting you into the ground, then they're MORE than Time Walking you.

[@lucabozza1750]

Why play thassa's oracle? If u resolve balustrade you can just bring back flayer + troll.

[@ThrabenUniversity]

Oracle lets you win through the occasional "weird stuff" that can happen in Legacy. It's just very safe.

[@KKDY28]

is there a good reason why not attacking when you have free attacks is good before sacking the creatures? for example at 33:18 the Narcomeba couldve attacked for free before being sacked to cast Dread Return An honest question, here. thank you for answering

[@ThrabenUniversity]

I just missed it that time.

[@KKDY28]

@@ThrabenUniversity Thanks for the reply! I am planning to build this deck after i saw this video And i want to know all the ins and outs of it I just thought that i might be missing something out Thanks, again, for the video!

[@shapooopiefour7173]

You could theoretically wedge Oops, All Spells in here, right?

[@floridaman6982]

Any recommendation of other additional resources to check out to get better at playing this deck? It looks so fun

[@ThrabenUniversity]

Most Legacy decks have a discord server. You can check the subreddit sidebar to find links to them: www.reddit.com/r/MTGLegacy/

[@drpibisback7680]

Since Unmask in the board is only for decks that you want to target with it, why not play Grief so your discard spell can also feed Ichorids when you Dredge over it?

[@ELDsTimeVaultGames]

And get bodies with Bridge!

[@llamarama6976]

Hi deck donator here! Unmask unlike grief allows you to target yourself (grief says opponent unmask says player) which is extremely useful sometimes when you have mulliganned to get started quicker. An effect you can also do with cabal therapy choosing yourself and naming a card you want in the graveyard. You are almost never going to dread return grief over either a combo piece to just kill your opponent or a huge hitter depending what variant you play.

[@ELDsTimeVaultGames]

@@llamarama6976 How often are you mulliganing with the deck?

[@llamarama6976]

@@ELDsTimeVaultGames that does provide an advantage. Its down to preference over if you want to be able to target yourself to get a specific card in the yard or you want to get resources quicker

[@llamarama6976]

@@ELDsTimeVaultGames gameone almost never. But if you know the opponent is going to just mulligan until they hit a leyline and you need to mulligan to beat them then its useful. Thus why its a sideboard card. But i can also see the potential of grief for the zombie it provides.

[@archonambroseus]

Dante reported that the entrance to Hell read, "Abandon all hope, ye who enter here." This is no longer the case. It now reads, "Dredge Discord."

[@lonewolf975]

You make it look likes it's easy to 5-0 with this deck and I haven't been able to win a match yet. Did you get lucky or am I just bad at dredge? seems like I keep getting paired against land decks with all the answers. boseiju for leyline and then thran foundry/tormods crypt/relic of progenitus + crop into bojuka + endurance + tabernacle + tokens to beat down with from urza's saga. Just can't handle all the angles and played 3 lands matches in a row.

[@ThrabenUniversity]

This deck is vulnerable to hate. If you play decks that are innately good against this, you will lose. This deck hopes to prey upon fair blue decks (Delver, control) that just have no hope of beating it in game 1. Dredge isn't innately a great deck in Legacy partially because of how high-variance its matchup spread is. So it might not just be you here. Some of it is pairinings.

[@lonewolf975]

@@ThrabenUniversity in retrospect I feel a little guilty about my comment because it was pretty salt fueled at the time, but thanks for the clarifying reply Phil! I definitely needed a different perspective approaching this deck. I got caught up in the hype of your 5-0 and then lost 5 straight matches myself (some misplays definitely happened on my end that affected that statistic as I'm a new pilot to the deck) Given it's high variance matchup spread, do you think this is a good deck to get in paper or should I go for burn for my first entry into paper legacy? I've been eyeing both and have more experience in burn, but manaless dredge has always caught my curiosity and seems pretty cheap right now.

[@ThrabenUniversity]

@@lonewolf975 both of those decks are great "starter decks" on a budget. Both have their issues. I always recommend that people play what they enjoy, as Legacy decks are a big investment.

[@MackNJacishopper]

I ask myself "Is this magic?" I am still undecided.

[@livedandletdie]

That's what Manaless Dredge does to you... It just feels so wrong, but trust me, when you win, it feels so right.

[@conovan5081]

Big fan of flayer of the hatebound

[@fishvenom962]

dredge is such a cool archetype. plays a completely different game

[@Belena711]

"And we take game one versus delver" Are there any sweeter words?

[@rhetsel1782]

hi, im bit confused on why hatebound didnt trigger after casting hogaak from the yard at the end of round 5

[@Platonic69]

I know this is very late... but, Flayer says it triggers when something enters *from the graveyard*. Casting a spell puts it onto the stack first. Things like Dread Return and Undying put the creature directly from the yard onto the battlefield without casting it, so both of those will trigger the Flayer ability. But by *casting* Hogaak, even from the yard, it has to go on the stack first. So the Hogaak is technically entering from the stack, not the yard. A bit of rules minutiae

[@rhetsel1782]

@@Platonic69 oh now i understand, the difference was on the stack its checking, i really appreciate your response and thank you for explaining it

[@gtobestball6050]

Hey there I'm a big manaless player myself! Grief is much better then Unmask in my opinion, it triggers your bridges, is a creature for Ichorid and can't be countered by force of negation. You can't target yourself but you aren't doing that often so I think the positives outweigh the negatives for Grief>Unmask.

[@gtobestball6050]

Also you can Dread Return Grief which comes up some.

[@82giuli82]

Im returning play Magic after 6 years, i had this deck on my mtgo collection, i really like play dregde!! But i cant remember something om mtgo, i cant discard 6 cards to trigger twice for phantasmagorian, can u explain me how???

[@ThrabenUniversity]

You need to hold priority, which is probably done by holding the control key.

[@DocZecon]

Can you use cabal therapy on yourself to discard stuff as needed as well?

[@ThrabenUniversity]

Yup! It targets a player, so you can choose yourself.

[@DrSiddha]

I like this list a lot

[@williamivancic5537]

This deck is sick

[@sawyermifsud852]

I feel like this deck should really be running some extra green cards. Its only answer to pretty common graveyard hate is Force of Vigor, which is extremely difficult for it to cast. Honestly not sure it's even worth siding those in vs leyline decks. I know it probably isn't worth mulliganing to look for.

[@peteryankowsky]

This is my favorite yugioh deck.

[@anthonynorwood8441]

I see manaless dredge I click. I have this deck triple sleeved in paper

[@mrsnufflegums]

Honestly now I feel like you should grab a vintage league and play some manaless dredge (I mean you have bazaar but beyond that...). After all, it's the unfair deck that makes the other unfair decks honest with their sideboard plans

[@mutsuhanma7807]

The hero is called Dennick, Pious Apprentice!

[@ZerFayt]

Man this deck is sick!

[@МаксРаджа]

Why everyone uses Flayer of the Hatebound instead of Thassa's Oracle or Lotleth Giant?

[@ThrabenUniversity]

Flayer is still good even if your library isn't empty.

[@p1k4nurxp13sr]

This pleases the man

[@lordofabstractions8462]

Osn‘t phantasmagorian the right discard almost all the time? You want basically all your cards in the grave, except the wraith

[@ThrabenUniversity]

Not exactly. In scenarios where you have a single dredge creatures, it's a little risky to go all-in on the Phantasmagorian immediately; if you miss a dredge creature, you timewalk yourself like 6 times until you can discard again.

[@impendio]

I love manaless dredge, it’s so disgusting, heretical even.

[@canadianhighlanderbremen7717]

that was so cool!

[@idlemindedmage6925]

Wow, this deck just SMEARS delver.

[@ThrabenUniversity]

Historically speaking, that's what this deck does! It bullies blue in game 1 really hard.

[@LucksackGames]

Love it

[@lancergt1000]

I wonder why they run Unmask over Grief in the sideboard, won't Grief be able to get free tokens off of Bridge from Below?

[@mindwhiz]

grief cannot target self, which in a deck like this matters.

[@ThrabenUniversity]

Yeah, it's one of those "this is a choice, not a strictly better thing" situations.

[@coryd531]

I assume that’s a dope pimp jacket and not a cozy blanket.

[@ThrabenUniversity]

*sweats* Uh, yeah, totally...

[@countOfHenneberg]

@@ThrabenUniversity if it keeps you warm and reduces the utility bills, that's a win for me!

[@clawtooth35]

Wait why didn't Hogaak trigger Flayer at:1:12:00 ?

[@ThrabenUniversity]

Hogaak entered from the stack, not the graveyard.

[@clawtooth35]

@@ThrabenUniversity riiiiiiiight

[@MaZe741]

I am pretty sure you can (or should be able to) cast Cabal Therapy without passing priority to the opponent after Nether Shadow comes into play, 5:49

[@ThrabenUniversity]

Nope! Cabal Therapy is a sorcery. Shadow happened in the upkeep.

[@MaZe741]

@@ThrabenUniversity oh yeah, of course. dont know why I thought Nether Shadow was a mainphase trigger...

[@thekevmeister77]

1:09:02 Daze undoing

[@andrewthomas5495]

Looks vulnerable to dauthi voidwalker?

[@selkokieli843]

did you mean any and every graveyard hate card?

[@ThrabenUniversity]

Look, this deck is vulnerable to all gy hate. You sign up for that when you play this and hope that you can win one of the two post-sb games.

[@ryansolomon7922]

29:15 why let ichorid die to itself rather than cabal therapy? It would have made 3 zombies in your 2nd main

[@ersatz94]

When everyone thinks dredge is poorly positioned is when dredge is actually the best.

[@ThrabenUniversity]

It always comes back...

[@StandardizedApologetics]

Grave troll kills once Flayer is in play. 1. Dread Return B Spy. 2. Dread Return Flayer. 3. Dread Return Troll. The end.

[@StandardizedApologetics]

And yes, it does work that way. Troll will deal damage equal to its power which isn’t 0 but equal to however many creatures are in the bin (usually between 30 to 40).

[@ThrabenUniversity]

Yup.

[@ricardoricardo2365]

hard to believe since graveyard is the most easy to shut and the opponent basically do nothing in those matchs

[@Belena711]

Seriously one of the cheapest decks in Legacy. I love not tying up a ton of budget in the manabase. ;) haha

[@Reversespacehippie]

Obligatory algorithmic contribution

[@huntermarquez2357]

nice

[@XaviFornells]

Why no using lion's eye diamond?

[@ThrabenUniversity]

This deck does not need mana.

[@XaviFornells]

@@ThrabenUniversity but LED is another discard outlet... If you have LED in opening hand, tou don't need to waste your first turn non doing anithing

[@ThrabenUniversity]

@@XaviFornells And then the LED gets countered... ;)

[@XaviFornells]

@@ThrabenUniversity true... Fow to LED will be game over...

[@TheQueerLeaf]

Neat

[@BrokenTablesPodcast]

Not Mulliganing is the answer lol. Just keep it. A mulligan with this deck is handing your opponent a free discard spell for 0. With so much hand hate, I keep the dead cards for hand size. Just draw til i can start the engine.

[@ThrabenUniversity]

*points to undefeated record* I'm guessing my mulligan decisions were just fine. Maybe not perfect, but if I pitched a 7 card hand with this deck, it was BADDDD.

[@BrokenTablesPodcast]

@@ThrabenUniversity oh I know! Your decisions were top tier. I've literally watched this entire video 5 times to learn your play style. That was just the advice I was given back at a pro tour event and it's worked pretty well for me. Any chance for an updated playlist? Any cards added in the past year?

[@BrokenTablesPodcast]

​@@ThrabenUniversity Do you think the new Valgovoth 9/9 Ward 3 is a good target for Dread Return?!?!

[@lanychabot-laroche135]

What an absurd deck. It can just afford to let the opponent do what they want for 5-6 turns and just durdle until it gets all the pieces in place.

[@MuteSpectre]

And this deck is only $236???? that's crazy. And if you take out the force of vigours it's under $100 wtf

[@MuteSpectre]

obviously you can't just like take out the force of vigours and expect the deck to still function past game 1 but still

[@Tupiaz]

@@MuteSpectre Play Acid slime instead. Not optima but you can return it with Dread Return. Leyline will be tough.

[@tobynburke4959]

Legacy on a budget

[@brandanmatthews4787]

Voice

[@JoseGarcia-vi3pu]

Wouldn’t this be weak against a fast red legacy token deck?