Introduction:

More often than not I've tended to be a big fan of decks that prove successful because of a certain shell but still enough slots left over to allow for plenty of personal expression. I've been seeing Samwise Combo decks popping up in tournament results for some time now, but there's certainly not a One True build yet like how there is for MonoGreen.

The build you see here is my own personal attempt at predicting where optimized lists are likely to end head while having a decision about my card selections.

Quick Discussion on Combo in Historic:

*Caveat: Everything I'm about to say applies to competitive only. Play whatever you want. MtG is a game. Have fun with it however you'd like.

Statement: Historic is a combo centric format.

You can argue with me if you'd like, but you'd be wrong. I'm willing to grant that I'm leaning on the word "centric" pretty heavily though.

The Legacy format is defined by Brainstorm but it is Force of Will that keeps the true degenercy lurking in the wings at bay. Legacy would be nothing but Turn 0, 1 or 2 combo decks without that singular zero-mana counter spell keeping a vaneer of balance from atop it's lofty and venerable perch.

Historic is much the same. The triangle meta of Historic is:

It's not even really about "Fair" vs "Unfair". You can be "Unfair" too, but if you die first in the combo matchups, you'll get weeded out pretty quick since the "Fair" decks already have to be built to interact with decks just like you.

Despite what WotC claims how it would like things to be, they're simply awful at managing their formats. Their supposed "Turn 4 Format" has things like Greasefang, Leyline Geist Combo, Kethis and, of course, Samwise Gamgee running around in it. Why!? None of these produce any of the component aspects of "FIRE" you've claimed as your design philosophy! Just ban all these stupid things, WotC! Aaargh!

...Anyway, don't mistake these observations for me saying the Historic meta isn't "healthy" (whatever the heck that means in WotC's eyes). If you squint, you could easily make the case that Historic has a Bizarro-world version of "Aggro vs Midrange vs Control". I'm simply providing what I think the context is for the card choices I made for this build.

The Combo:

So, yeah, "What exactly is the combo in this combo deck anyway?" you might rightfully be asking by this point. Well, it's an infinite loop where you sacrifice the cat, get it back, drain for 1, get a Food, sac again, repeat until the opponent dies.

+ + 1x Food Token +

Some Zero-cost, repeatable creature sacrifice outlet. Such as:

| | |

NOTE: You must have a Food token out before you can go infinite.

The "Competition":

I find that it's good to compare a given deck/specific build to its direct competition to get a better sense of what you're trying to achieve by choosing to go with one deck over another.

For example, UR Wizards vs UR Phoenix are two decks that directly compete with each other in terms of the kinds of playstyle they go for and the players they would attract. Both are aggressive, velocity based, spell-slinger decks that explosively try to kill their opponents. The difference is that Wizards needs to let it's creatures sit out there for a turn or two making it much weaker to creature removal for the benefit of much more overwhelming single turn swings. Phoenix players churns through their decks so deeply each game that they are consistently able to produce the same results and are more resilient to generic creature removal thanks to the namesake, but they trade those benefits for ~1.25ish turns of kill speed.

The direct competitors to Samwise Combo are:

• Amalia Walker Combo
  • Certainly the most directly comparable deck.
  • Both decks are about as fast but I feel like Samwise is maybe that half turn (or maybe it's just a quarter turn) faster.
    • "Half a turn faster" meaning both decks can kill on Turn 3 (a busted thing to do regardless) but Samwise has more sequences to that Turn 3 Kill (T3K) and can therefore achieve them more regularly. This lowers the number of turns the deck has to play over the longer term.
  • Pros:
    
    • More incidental lifegain which buys time to find combo or to reassemble.
      • While presumably playing a similar mana-base, all the self-pinging is more easily absorbed
    • Requires slighly fewer pieces to go off.
      • "Amalia + Walker + Explore|LifeGain pieces" vs "Samwise + Cat + 1x Food token + Sac Outlet"
    • (Online play only) Exploring 18 or so times is significantly less "clicky" than the Cat loop.
  • Cons:
    • Fails to 1-shot opponents with >20 life.
      • This inability plus the inability to kill during the opponents turn (off of a CoCo) are what really put Samwise over the top for me.
    • Fewer sequences that lead to Turn 3 Kills.
    • Amalia needs to not be summoning sick which means she has to sit exposed to removal for a window.
      • You can only kill on your turn.
    • More restrictive card pool. Limits self-expression and adjustments we can make to the meta.
• BG Yawgmoth
  • Beyond the core of the Samwise Combo, the utility cards I'm playing were inspired by the Yawg deck.
  • Chord of Calling provides plenty of consistency and there is some sneaky card draw to help keep the hand stocked.
  • Pros:
    • Waaaay~ more board control (over creatures moreso than other permanent types)
    • Two color mana base is much cleaner and allows for utility lands.
  • Cons
    • Can't really 1-Shot so no free-win out of nowhere if they foolishly tap out
• Rosie Cotton LifeGain | GW LifeGain | MonoWhite LifeGain
  • Arguably they're all the same deck just going about things slightly differently.
  • Pros:
    • Loads more lifegain.
    • Goes "tall". It's tough to block an 4/4 on Turn 3. Much less an 7/7 on Turn 4.
  • Cons:
    • Again, can't really 1-Shot.
    • Doesn't draw extra cards so once the initial storm has been weathered, there's generally no path back into the game.
    • Playing synergistic creatures and expecting them to survive for several turns can be optimistic.

CoCo vs Chord:

vs

Many of the tournament decklists I see either play 4x Chord or play both Chord and CoCo.

For my two-cents I think going 4x CoCo is probably better overall because:

• While not targetted, it's not trivial that CoCo can snag two combo pieces instead of one.
  • This is better for "post-sweeper" rebuilding
• CoCo allows for more Turn 3 Kill sequences. I've allowed some utility cards in over just being purely all-in, but my pre-board card choices tilt towards simply achieving the combo quickly.
  • Turn 1: 1CMC Mana Dork; Cat. Turn 2: 1-2CMC Mana Dork; Cat; Sam; Bart. Turn 3: CoCo into missing pieces.
• All we're trying to do is assemble 1x of each piece of the combo on-board. Since we're packing so many copies in the deck, I feel the win-rate we drop even in the Completely Wiff floor-case is marginal compared to Chord's middling-but-guaranteed ability to fetch one of said pieces.
  • Even if we Completely Wiff with CoCo, we've still dug 6 cards deeper than we otherwise would have so our subsequent draws will be of higher quality.

The Main Deck:

The Non-negotiables:

• 4x Samwise Gamgee: Food token generator.
• 4x Cauldron Familiar: The damage dealing piece.
• 4x Woe Strider + 4x Bartolomé del Presidio: The sacrifice outlets. Minimally 8x, flex slots can contain more.
• 4x Collected Company: See the CoCo vs Chord discussion above for more.
• 4x Gilded Goose: Mana accelerant. The Food token leaves more sequences open for the combo if unused.

The Somewhat Negotiables:

• 4x Delighted Halfling: Mana accelerant. There are a surprising number of Legendaries in the deck so the fixing is much appreciated.
  • Could arguably be Llanowar Elves or some other 1CMC mana dork for budget purposes.
• 4x Prosperous Innkeeper: Mana accelerant. Plenty of incidental lifegain.
  • Could be trimmed down to as few as 2x. Replaced with another 2CMC mana dork or more copies of Dina and/or Elas il-Kor.
• 1x Yawgmoth, Thran Physician: That one extra Sac Outlet you'll find yourself wanting a decent amount of the time.
  • Doesn't get found by CoCo, but neither does Altar of Dementia.
  • Could be replaced with a Chord of Calling.

Flex Slots:

Could be replaced with any number of utility pieces. See Maybeboard for some suggestions.

• 1x Haywire Mite: Karn, the Great Creator is a mistake of a Magic card which they've banned everywhere else but Historic (at time of writing). I just wanted something in the Main Deck that deals with 1 of the utility artifacts that stupid lump of silver grabs.
• 1x Dina, Soul Steeper, 1x Elas il-Kor, Sadistic Pilgrim: Both are there for more incidental drain.
  • Could be 2x Dina or completely replaced if desired.
• 1x Tyvar, Jubilant Brawler: Here for the -2 only. He may only be a Sorcery speed mini-Collected Company for 1 creature, but Elf Chadington here does reanimate a combo piece and/or digs towards one a little bit; combined these factors let him beat out pure reanimates like Unearth for me. The effect gets better the more turns go by so no rush on casting him unless you're 1 piece shy.
  
  • Much like Yawg, could be replaced with a Chord of Calling.

The Mana Base:

Another big question is "How many is the correct number of lands?". It's a surprisingly tricky question given the nature of our mana needs.

The combo can run anywhere from a total of 5 mana minimum (1 Cat + 1 Sam + 1 Bart) to 7 mana maximum (1 Woe + 1 CoCo), and while I have spent that much in one turn, the cost is usually spread over a turn or two. The trick part is that we want have access to that maximum amount as close to on-curve as possible. One could also argue that we're running 12 mana dorks, but the 4x Goose and 4x Innkeeper only generate a mana once (effectively). Basically, I'm just going to treat the whole thing like we have the recommended 22 + 1 lands and 4 1CMC mana dorks.

Magic players are much too willing to skimp on lands overall bc they innately believe "screw beats flood" (or at least that's the best excuse I can rationalize). However, unless I find myself routinely flooded, I lean towards having the mana to cast my spells, thank you very much.

All our mana needs to come into play untapped as to not stumble on the path to our desired Turn 3 Kill. So no Triomes, Cycle Lands, any of that tapped nonsense. Get it outta here.

• 4x Mana Confluence: The duct tape of all greedy mana bases. I don't know anyone thrilled to be playing this card, but it does come into play untapped and produces any mana you need.
  • I must stress: Do not replace these; especially not with tap lands. City of Brassing yourself may feel painful, but the primary goal here is to get the opponent dead so fast it won't matter.
• 4x Blooming Marsh, 4x Overgrown Tomb, 2x Llanowar Wastes: We're fundamentally a Green-Black deck that's splashing a bit of White, weight which Fast Lands and Shock Lands to play accordingly.
• 2x Razorverge Thicket, 2x Temple Garden: +1 over the BW lands since we want to hit our 1CMC Green Mana dorks on Turn 1.
• 2x Concealed Courtyard, 1x Godless Shrine: Rounding things out.
• 1x Forest, 1x Swamp: It's arguable that our games shouldn't go long enough for Field of Ruin effects to become a factor, but I've been Pavlovian trained to play basics for so long that I don't even know if that's correct... Send help.

Sideboard:

The creature versions of other sideboard cards so we can CoCo into them:

• 4x Deep-Cavern Bat: Thoughtseize you can CoCo into. Here for opposing Turn 3 Combo matchups.
• 2x Phyrexian Revoker: Pithing Needle you can CoCo into. Here for Maze's End, Karn, the Great Creator, Liliana of the Veil or to stop some other random artifact and/or combo piece.
• 1x Misery's Shadow: A Stone of Enech you can CoCo into. Here for the mirror. When they sac their cat, it gets exiled.
• 1x Haywire Mite: An additional copy to remove Grafdigger's Cage, Leyline of the Void or Pithing Needle style effects.

Meh, replace with whatever. Try to keep it Black or Green though. Double White is stretching the mana-base:

• 2x Yawgmoth, Thran Physician: For if we want to shift towards a more Yawgmoth centric deck.
• 2x Agatha's Soul Cauldron: Pulls double duty. A bit of graveyard hate aimed at opposing yards; allows SacOutlets in our yard still be useful toward the combo.
• 2x Knight-Errant of Eos: Comes in vs control or extremely non-interactive decks where our utility is less useful than just finding the pieces to the combo.
• 1x Tear Asunder: Could be a 3rd Mite, but Tear hits planeswalkers too should that ever matter.