(Special thanks to Jolt135 for many of the combos in this deck, and Gatherer for the images I'm leeching. Written by metroid composite. Original discussion here).

What's the highest, non-infinite-combo damage you can do in one turn?

The rules of this game are simple. You have a Vintage-legal deck. Your opponent has all Islands.dec. Your deck must not have a way to go infinite (sometimes these can be very subtle, so watch out!) You can assume all chance events go the way you want them to (perfect draw, win all your coinflips). You may not have more than 60 cards in your deck, and your sideboard has 0 cards (so no, you can't make your deck 74 cards by copying Burning Wish 14 times).

What's the most damage you can deal? This was the question we asked ourselves, and this article describes the outcome of our mad science.

Introduction -- Strategies

Imagine the following scenario: you have four Kiki-Jikis in the battlefield (thanks to Mirror Gallery), and you start tapping them targetting Doubling Season, which you can do thanks to Opalescence.

Kiki-Jiki #1

A token that's a copy of Doubling Season comes into the battlefield...but wait! When a token comes into the battlefield, Doubling Season says we put twice that many tokens instead. So...we have 3 Doubling Seasons in the battlefield.

Kiki-Jiki #2

We make a second token...but wait! Doubling Season #1 says twice that (2 tokens) Doubling Season #2 says twice that (4 tokens) and Doubling Season #3 says twice that (8 tokens). Now we have 11 Doubling Seasons in the battlefield.

Kiki-Jiki #3

We make 2*2*2*2*2*2*2*2*2*2*2 = 2^11 = 2048 copies of Doubling Season. Now we have 2059 Doubling Seasons in the battlefield.

Kiki-Jiki #4

We put 2^2059 copies of Doubling Season into play (that's a lot).

...and then we tap Serra's Sanctum for 66,185,228,434,044,942,951,864,067,458,396,061,614,989,522,267,577,311,297,802,947,435,570,493,724,401,440,549,267,868,490,798,926,773,634,494,383,968,047,143,923,956,857,140,205,406,402,740,536,087,446,083,831,052,036,848,232,439,995,904,404,992,798,007,514,718,326,043,410,570,379,830,870,463,780,085,260,619,444,417,205,199,197,123,751,210,704,970,352,727,833,755,425,876,102,776,028,267,313,405,809,429,548,880,554,782,040,765,277,562,828,362,884,238,325,465,448,520,348,307,574,943,345,990,309,941,642,666,926,723,379,729,598,185,834,735,054,732,500,415,409,883,868,361,423,159,913,770,812,218,772,711,901,772,249,553,153,402,287,759,789,517,121,744,336,755,350,465,901,655,205,184,917,370,974,202,405,586,941,211,065,395,540,765,567,663,193,297,173,367,254,230,313,612,244,182,941,999,500,402,388,195,450,053,080,385,548 mana.



And then we use Djinn Illuminatus to replicate Burst of Energy, untapping Kiki-Jiki 66,185,228,434,044,942,951,864,067,458,396,061,614,989,522,267,577,311,297,802,947,435,570,493,724,401,440,549,267,868,490,798,926,773,634,494,383,968,047,143,923,956,857,140,205,406,402,740,536,087,446,083,831,052,036,848,232,439,995,904,404,992,798,007,514,718,326,043,410,570,379,830,870,463,780,085,260,619,444,417,205,199,197,123,751,210,704,970,352,727,833,755,425,876,102,776,028,267,313,405,809,429,548,880,554,782,040,765,277,562,828,362,884,238,325,465,448,520,348,307,574,943,345,990,309,941,642,666,926,723,379,729,598,185,834,735,054,732,500,415,409,883,868,361,423,159,913,770,812,218,772,711,901,772,249,553,153,402,287,759,789,517,121,744,336,755,350,465,901,655,205,184,917,370,974,202,405,586,941,211,065,395,540,765,567,663,193,297,173,367,254,230,313,612,244,182,941,999,500,402,388,195,450,053,080,385,548 times (and every time Kiki-Jiki untaps, we're going to tap him again to copy more Doubling Seasons!)

Time-out for a moment, audience check: if you're grinning with glee right now, this article is probably for you, stick around and grab some popcorn. On the other hand if you're hissing, holding up garlic to the screen, and yelling "the math, it burns!" trust me: it's only going to get worse. Get out now while you still can!

Background Reading

This article is a work in progress! It's definitely not self-contained yet. You might have to read about Knuth's up arrow Notation to understand what I mean when I start talking about 2^^X.

Outline of current best deck

Okay, this article is going to take some time to write, so for the moment this is just an outline. Sorry for the places heavy on shorthand and short on humor.

Layer 0, the kickstart

Channel, Eureka, Black Lotus, Squee's Revenge

How it works

Opening Hand:
1. Black Lotus (GGG)
2. Channel (G left in pool)
3. Orochi Leafcaller (empty mana pool)
4. Willbender (morphed) (17 life)
5. Karn, Silver Golem (12 life)
6. Gaea's Cradle, tap for GGG, use Leafcaller to filter to URG
7. Squee's Revenge, (11 life, G left in mana pool)

Remember, all luck is with us, not just a stacked deck, so we win all our coinflips and draw 50 cards. No need to count cards anymore!

Regrowth the Black Lotus (10 life, empty mana pool)
Black Lotus (GGG)
Eureka (8 life, G left in pool)

At this point, use Eureka to put all our permanents from our deck into the battlefield (Doubling Season, Opalescence, Kiki-Jiki, Rings of Brightearth, Temple of the False God, Nature's Revolt, Ęther Spellbomb, Dual Nature, Mirror Gallery, Vedalken Orrery, Djinn Illuminatus, Holistic Wisdom). Stack things the right way and we will have more Doubling Seasons than there are atoms in the universe, and similarly insane amounts of colourless mana. However our only way of creating coloured mana (Gaea's Cradle) is currently tapped, with nothing on the battlefield that can untap or copy it. (Okay, okay, so Black Lotus is a second coloured mana source, but that's stuck in our graveyard right now). Fortunately we still have G in our mana pool. So filter G into R using Orochi Leafcaller, then cast...

Heat Shimmer (targetting Gaea's Cradle)

That should give us enough mana to keep us going (espeically since all the Doubling Seasons we have mean we put a LOT of Gaea's Cradle tokens into play...all with haste, of course). Oh, and in case you're wondering: Gaea's Cradle is a creature thanks to Nature's Revolt (one of the permanents put into play with Eureka).

Why it doesn't mess with layers above it

I'll focus on the cards used exclusively to get the combo started (Channel, Eureka, Black Lotus, Squee's Revenge). The cards that are actually part of the combo will be covered in their combo section.

* Channel: we have no source of life gain right now
* Eureka: With the number of permanents this deck has, it's a spell that adds maybe 100 mana. Once we get going we'll have spells that add much, much more mana than that.
* Black Lotus: It's a spell that adds 3 mana. As an artifact, it's a permanent that can't be copied. If we make it an Artifact Creature it immediately dies to a state-based effect due to being 0/0, and there's currently no pump in the deck.
* Squee's Revenge: only 53 cards to draw in the deck (and it can only draw 52!)

Layer 1 (^), Doubling Season

Doubling Season, Opalescence

How it works

When Doubling Season gets copied, it puts 2^X copies into play, where X is the number of Doubling Seasons. Oh, and many of our copy effects give tokens haste, so they'll be able to attack this turn.

Why it doesn't mess with layers above it

Doubling Season is a replacement effect; other abilities can be enhanced by it, but if there's an infinite loop it's because those other abilities are going infinite.

Opalescence really doesn't hit much in this deck other than Doubling Season. We could copy Dual Nature, but once we have one Dual Nature in play, additional copies help us less than additional copies of Doubling Season.

Layer 2 (^^), Brightearthing Kiki-Jiki

Kiki-Jiki, Rings of Brightearth, Temple of the False God, Nature's Revolt, Karn (reusing doubling season to make copying Rings of Brightearth and Temple of the False God easier)

How it works

When Kiki-Jiki taps, copy it X times with our X Rings of Brightearth. The first (X-2) copies to resolve should copy Doubling Season; this gets us roughly 2^^(X-1) doubling seasons. The last 2 should copy Rings of Brightearth and Temple of the False God (so we will then have 2^^X Rings, and 2^^X Temples. When another Kiki-Jiki taps, use all our rings and temples to copy that Kiki-Jiki 2^^X times). Of course, in order for Kiki-Jiki to copy Rings of Brightearth, it needs to be a creature (that's what Karn's here for) and similarly for Temple of the False God (that's what Nature's Revolt is here for).

Why it doesn't mess with layers above it

It creates near limitless colourless mana (as much as we need for Rings of Brightearth) but it's not actually limitless. Without tapping Kiki-Jiki we have no way using only permanents to get more untapped Temple of the False Gods. Without using coloured mana, we have no way using only permanents to get more Kiki-Jikis or lands. We can bounce and replay various colourless permanents triggering Dual Nature, but this all costs mana, and there's a finite number of Temple of the False Gods in play.

Rings of Brightearth is triggered. Abilities have one chance to be copied, and that's it.

Nature's Revolt also affects Gaea's Cradle, but that land is legendary therefore Kiki-Jiki can't target it, and we don't have any shapeshifters that could be copied, and then transformed into a Gaea's Cradle.

Karn...really only exists in the deck to turn Rings of Brightearth and Ęther Spellbomb into a creatures, and because he's a colourless creature himself (to help kickstart the deck). His interaction with Black Lotus is covered above. His interaction with Mirror Gallery is meaningless. His interaction with Vedalken Orrery is meaningless.

Layer 3 (^^^), Bouncing Kiki-Jiki

Ęther Spellbomb, Orochi Leafcaller, Dual Nature, Mirror Gallery (oh, and this layer also uses Kiki-Jiki again, Doubling Season again, and Rings of Brightearth if desired).

How it works

Take GGG in our mana pool, filter it into RRU with Orochi Leafcaller, bounce Kiki-Jiki to our hand with Ęther Spellbomb (we can copy Ęther Spellbomb with Rings of Brightearth if we want to conserve coloured mana). Dual Nature notices that a non-token creature has left play so all the Kiki-Jiki tokens in-play die (but they were tapped anyway so we don't care). Replay Kiki-Jiki. Dual Nature copies him, and Doubling season puts 2^X copies of him into play where X is the number of Doubling Seasons.

Why it doesn't mess with layers above it

It can bounce cradle with Aether Spellbomb, but the "play one land a turn" rule stops us from abusing that. Dual Nature only affects things entering the battlefield, and cradle can only enter the battlefield once. Mirror Gallery pretty much can't break anything. And...Orochi Leafcaller is meant to filter Gaea's Cradle mana but not Cloudpost mana, which it does.

Layer 4 (^^^^), Gaea's Cradle

Gaea's Cradle

How it works

Turn it sideways for lots of Gs.

Why it doesn't mess with layers above it

The higher layers are spells. When they go to the graveyard, cradle can't do a thing about it.

Layer 5 (^^^^^), Heat Shimmer

Heat Shimmer (reusing Nature's Revolt to target Gaea's Cradle, and Doubling Season to put a lot of Gaea's Cradles into play)

How it works

Target Gaea's Cradle with Heat Shimmer. Doubling Season means we put 2^X Gaea's Cradles into play. Since Heat Shimmer does not have Kiki-Jiki's "non-legendary" clause, this works just fine.

Why it doesn't mess with layers above it

It targets only permanents. The permanents above it are things like Djinn Illuminatus (copying the Djinn does nothing since replicate is a static ability that triggers if we pay extra costs). There's also Holistic Wisdom (we gain nothing from copying that).

Layer 6 (^^^^^^), Radiate

Radiate, Willbender, Vedalken Orrery

How it works

Radiate copies Heat Shimmer for every permanent in play. Vedalken Orrey lets us replay Kiki-Jiki in between Heat Shimmer resolutions. Willbender redirects all of the Heat Shimmer copies onto Gaea's Cradle, bouncing when he needs to remorph. (No rush when it comes to Willbendering! Stack things so that the copies targetting Gaea's Cradles resolve first, at which point we will have a LOT more mana to mess around Willbendering the remaining copies).

Why it doesn't mess with layers above it

Heat Shimmer is the only spell in the deck that Radiate can copy.

Willbender can potentially counter spells by messing up the target, letting them hit the graveyard when we thought they'd be removed from the game, like, say, Woodland Guidance All spells we are running hit the graveyard normally, so this is not a problem for us. If we make an illegal target with Willbender (i.e. Kiki-Jiki targetting Kiki-Jiki) the ability is countered.

Vedalken Orrey is just here so that we can replay Kiki-Jiki in between Heat Shimmer resolutions.

Layer 7 (^^^^^^^), Replicate

Djinn Illuminatus

How it works

When we cast Radiate, instead copy Radiate X times (targetting all of them at Heat Shimmer)

Why it doesn't mess with layers above it

Djinn can get us to cast a spell X times where X is our mana pool, no more.

Layer 8 (^^^^^^^^), Fork it

Fork (and Willbender+Djinn again)

How it works

When Regrowth is on the stack, copy it with Fork, and replicate Fork X times, where X is most of our mana pool (to bring back Radiate multiple times). For the second resolution onwards, use Willbender so that Fork doesn't fizzle due to the target leaving the graveyard.

Why it doesn't mess with layers above it

If Fork is on the stack copying Regrowth, that means Regrowth is on the stack, and therefore not in the graveyard for Fork to return. Similarly, all the copies of Fork resolve before Fork itself does, so Fork can never return itself from the graveyard to your hand.

Layer 9 (^^^^^^^^^), Regrowth

Regrowth (and Willbender+Djinn+Vedalken Orrery again).

and yes, Fossil Find would be technically better because it costs 1 less mana, but readability of article > slightly better functionality

How it works

Replicate Regrowth X times, where X is most of our mana pool. For the second resolution onwards, use Willbender so that Regrowth doesn't fizzle due to the target leaving the graveyard.

Why it doesn't mess with layers above it

Holistic Wisdom RFGs cards--Regrowth can't touch that.

Layer 10 (^^^^^^^^^^), Holistic Wisdom

Holistic Wisdom (and Willbender+Rings of Brightearth again).

How it works

Copy Holistic Wisdom X times, where X the number of Rings of Brightearth we have in play (for each copy, return Regrowth). For the second resolution onwards, use Willbender so that Holistic Wisdom doesn't fizzle due to the target leaving the graveyard.

Why it doesn't mess with layers above it

It can't add cards to our library.

Layer 11 (^^^^^^^^^^^), Our Library

~40 random sorceries that don't let us go infinite, whose only real purpose is to be removed from the game by Holistic Wisdom.

How it works

Make sure we get all the cards from our library into our hand (Ęther Spellbomb can also draw cards!) Remember too that Eureka and Squee's Revenge are sorceries which no longer serve any purpose--use two spare Fork replications to get those back into our hand. Now...see the instructions for Holistic Wisdom and do them roughly 40 times.

Why it doesn't mess with layers above it

There ARE no layers above it, Narf!

Cranked Up To 11

Well that's the combo at the moment. This is just an early draft (I know the writing is bad in places) and the combo's been changing on a daily basis. Stay tuned for updates.

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