Building a Madness deck.

[Ninja_Of_Ni]

When I was looking up cards for another deck idea, I came across Spellbound Dragon, which looks like would be great in u/r madness. http://gatherer.wizards.com/Pages/Card/Details.aspx?multiverseid=18061

Pricewise, it is one I could afford to buy enough of for my deck. I don't know if I'd want to do just u/r or if I should add in a third color to this deck. Green does have some high cmc madness cards which could build him up pretty big.

Well, I've gotten a preliminary build together for this deck. I haven't added lands to it yet because I could use some feedback on how much of what types to add. I don't know if I have enough mana fixing with the 4 Sylvan rangers. The basic concept I'm coming up with so far is for the madness cards to be things to feed to my Spellbound Dragon to build it up. I also threw in a dredge creature figuring it would work here.

Again, this is the first draft for this deck, minus the lands. I don't have much for dual lands and I'd prefer to avoid ones that cost $10 each.

Mad Dragon Deck

Creatures

4x Spellbound Dragon
4x Arrogant Wurm
4x Reckless Wurm
2x Wild Mongrel
4x Sylvan Ranger
4x Greater Mossdog

Spells

4x Fiery Temper
4x Obsessive Search
2x Quicksilver Dagger
4x Circular Logic
2x Mana Leak

 

[Oversoul]

I once played U/G/r Madness in Legacy way back when. I can't find the decklist, though. It's blindingly fast, but a big part of that is Lion's Eye Diamond, and if you don't already have some of those, you're probably not interested in investing in them. LED can cast Arrogant Wurm by itself, often while dumping Anger into the graveyard. Again, I wish I could find my decklist. Ultimately, I found all of the madness builds back then (this was 2005 or so) to be a bit inconsistent. As opposed to a more recent madness-using deck like Vengevival, that has the consistency of distilled doom.

Spellbound Dragon takes the concept in a different direction, one I've never seen before. Just from looking at your decklist, I think it could work. I'd cut Sylvan Ranger for something more useful (even though you aren't using dual lands). Greater Mossdog doesn't seem that great either, although if it's your only dredge option and you find that it's doing the job you want it to, by all means use it. I'm curious about Quicksilver Dagger here and don't really know how it will work. Could be cool. If you have a way to consistenly have a mountain in play without using Taiga, I would strongly consider Anger. Arrogant Wurm and Reckless Wurm would both appreciate it.

 

[Ninja_Of_Ni]

Yeah, I threw the Sylvan Rangers because I figured I would need a land fetch when playing 3 colors. The Quicksilver Dagger is in there because I already have 2 and I figured they could form a reliable draw source. The only problem I see with them is the fact that I would need a creature to put them on and all my creatures except the Sylvan Rangers can attack for more than 1. See how I don't have anything here (save for non-madness costs, which I hopefully won't have to pay), I wonder if I could get away with only basic lands in this deck. I think at the very least I would want some sort of land fetch to at least guarantee I get one of all 3 types of land on the table. I also feel that I would need a good draw source because I can see a huge problem with running the Spellbound Dragon when I hit the point of 0 cards in hand. With there not being a "May" in its ability, having 0 cards in hand means I draw a card and am forced to discard that same card which if it is a land would end up being a waste.

Also, I'm not sure if I'm sold on Circular Logic in this case. If my main source of discard is when I attack, then I might have a hard time being to play the Circular Logic madness cost when i want to. Also, with most of my madness cards being permanents, I don't have too much hitting the graveyard by my own doing to build it up to make Circular Logic Useful. I think here, my best bet would to make blue the splash color for Spellbound Dragon and ways to draw cards.

*Edit

Actually, looking back at this, I think I would maybe be best to cut the counter-spells and just use blue for a drawsource/spellbound dragon. I think in that case, I could take out the Sylvan Rangers in favor of using Cultivate for my mana-fixing. Of course, that would leave me with no weak creatures for Quicksilver Dagger (as mentioned before) so I would either need to cut them or come up with another creature. I was thinking maybe something like Darksteel Myr where I can use it to block and then ping an opponent right at the end of the turn just before mine. I also saw a suggestion on Gatherer that Spellbound Dragon would work well with Seize the Day. And, of course, looking at your suggestion to add Anger, I think Seize the Day would synergize well.

So basically, I think the concept of this deck would work, but it needs some tweaks before I go ahead and purchase the cards to build it. I'm gonna try to take a closer look at my options later today and when I come up with the next draft of the deck, I can post it on here.

 

[Terentius]

I'm curious how this deck would stack up against my BR Pain Madness deck (by stack up I mean comparing fare against other decks, not two Madness decks playing each other). I don't have any of the cool blue or green cards; it's mostly leaning on Waste Not and Liliana's Caress to hit big on Dark Deal and Burning Inquisition, and bringing out extra muscle with Madness when I can.

 

[Oversoul]

Which list did you have in mind? There's the partial list (sans manabase) posted by Ninja of Ni, which is a start to something interesting, but as it stands, I'd think it would easily lose out on general duel matchups if compared to your B/R Pain Madness deck. The more interesting question would be how your list would match up in comparison to the more traditional U/G Madness decks. And honestly, I think it could go either way. Those decks were refined for tournament competition, and certainly weren't bad, but your list would have some advantages over them.

 

[Terentius]

Just read they're bringing back Madness in the upcoming set $$