original doc by Elinor
translation by Slyfer (personal comment are in italic and marked with "ndT")
requested by A-FLo (TMD user)

I started playing Magic with sligh. I used it for one year and made my first tournaments with that deck, and get some satisfaction. In 2005, I felt like playing something more competitive, so I decided to try dragon, a deck that was showing so much good results to De Palma [italian old player, ndT] in those months.
Since then I played it and it became my pet deck, giving me other good results, even if it has hate.

With this article I'm trying to explain how the combo works and how to play the deck. Playing dragon is not that easy as it seems to be, above all because of the hate cards we suffer. There are some concepts that one should have clearly in mind when playing dragon, because it seldom forgives errors.
During the last years, Dragon had many transformations, and alternate results. Every new expansions seemed to have a new card that wrecks this combo, and this has disappointed many players.
I consider this deck interesting nowadays, because it can give some satisfaction and can be tuned vs various metagames.
I hope to attract someone's attention, to form new dragon players or just to collect some ideas.
It seems that everyone is considering dragon an obsolete deck, because of so many cards that stop it. But dragon is always there, behind the curtain, just a distraction, and his roar sounds stronger than ever.

The article is quite long so I'm making an index, if you want to read something specific directly:
1) what is worldgorger dragon (explains the combo)
2) what stops the combo
3) the new WGDX UB

3a) maindeck
3b) sideboard

4) The optional third color splash
5) How to ride a dragon!
6) Interview to dragon players
7) History of dragon (old decks...we can always get new ideas from the past)

1) what is worldgorger dragon (explain the combo)

The deck is based on a simple combo, made of 2 cards: worldgorger dragon + animate dead (or dance of the dead or necromancy)
Let's see how to get it step by step:
- play condition: worldgorger dragon in graveyard and we play animate dead
a) once animate resolves, enters into play and his triggere ability (TA from now) goes on stack:

When Animate Dead comes into play, if it's in play, it becomes an Aura with enchant creature. Put target creature card from a graveyard into play under your control and attach Animate Dead to it.

We obviously choose dragon as target

b) we resolve TA so now dragon enters into play and HIS ability goes on stack:

When Worldgorger Dragon comes into play, remove all other permanents you control from the game.

c) we resolve TA so all our permanent, except dragon, are removed from game. That triggers another ability of animate:

When Animate Dead leaves play, destroy enchanted creature. It can't be regenerated.

d) once resolved, dragon will be put into graveyard again, triggering the last ability:

When Worldgorger Dragon leaves play, return the removed cards to play under their owners' control.

e) everything comes back, included animate dead and every other permanent. When something enters into play from a "removed from the game" zone the rules are the following:
- lands comes UNTAPPED, so you can take mana (except if they comes into play explicitly tapped for some reasons, their text or other effects, for example root maze), or activate land's ability (like bazaar)
- creatures are untapped with summon sickness again (excepted hasted creatures)
- every permanent doesn't have memory of his previous state, so chalice of the void for examples comes into play with 0 counters, regardless if they had 1 or 2 counters before. Gemstone mine comes with all the 3 counters every loop.

f) now go back to point b, and you have infinite loop

Now you have many options since this loop cannot win the game alone (but it can force a draw if there are no other creatures in graveyards to stop the loop). Loop produces infinite mana, and can mill all our deck
- stroke of genious (actually cunning wish + stroke)
- ambassador Laquatus' ability: we put him into grave, stop the loop with him, and use the infinite mana on his ability targetting the opponent (note that game is won when opponent cannot draw a card, not when he has no cards in the deck. So you need to wait draw phase of force him to draw, typically with a flashbacked deep analysis the same turn you go off)
- other creatures usable as win condition are shivan hellkite (usable also as reanimated beater, requires red mana source to go off),
caller of the claw (you can produce infinite 2/2 without mana when going off), sliver queen. The last 2 will win on next turn combat phase.
- eternal witness. With this card you can stop the loop of the dragon, and with infinite mana, you take back a animate, retarget dragon, so now every loop you do, you take up 1 card from your grave. You can do this also all-instant speed (in response to everything) by using necromancy. So you can play ancestral recall on your opponent infinite times, or fire/ice opponent infinite time.

You can do this only with instant cards because there is always an ability on the stack.
Another option is to take back an e stroke/cunning wish/intuition/read the runes that lets you find the winning condition with the infinite mana available.

In magic there is no definition for "infinite". So we should always declare how many loop we want to do, and how much mana we take. If we are not able (and we are not obliged) to stop the loop with another creature, the game is a draw, and it re-start like nothing happened.
The option to force a draw is a valuable tool that only dragon deck has, because we can stall the game whenever the situation is too compromized and we would probably lose. And we get another chance.

2) What hates the combo?

Unfortunately this is one of the most fragile combos available. In fact, it's enough that opponent knows a bit how our combo works to make us disappear all permanents, and sometimes tons of mana burn.
A clever opponent can make dragon leave play (bounce a permanent, removal for a creature, removal for enchantment) when there is the TA of "permanents going out" on stack.
So dragon will leave play, bringin back nothing, then resolve the previous TA, and we lose the board.
Plus, any spot removal for graveyard (or mass removal like tormod's crypt) can stop the loop [Leyline is also a card that stops the combo, because cards will never go to graveyard, they are redirected to remove zone. So you cannot combo off until you bounce the leyline, ndT]

3) The WGDX UB deck

After the preface about the combo, let's speak about the complete deck. I will comment the most competive list (in my opinion),

WGDX by dicemanx (themanadrain forum user).

3a) WGDX maindeck

-mana base:
4 polluted delta
1 flooded strand
4 underground sea
2 island
1 swamp
5 mox
1 mana vault
1 sol ring
1 black lotus
1 mana crypt

this version of dragon requires much acceleration to support better intuition, read the runes and deep analysis. One can think to strengthen the mana base with -1 mox off color + swamp#2, I never cut mana vault because of initial sprint. Not all of us agree with this version, I know. I think 4 underground are important for the witness win needs 2 colours (black for animate, blue for wish).

-spell combo:
7 animate (3 necromancy, 2 dance, 2 animate)
4 worldgorger dragon
1 eternal witness

this version requires many animate spells. Later I will explain why. Witness is the best winning creature because of his "regrowth" incorporated if needed.
4x worldgorger dragon is needed, we want to see him very soon. Afraid of extirpate, one can think about this variation: -1 worldgorger dragon +1 entomb/tidespout tyrant. At the moment I'm testing the second one, becasue it enable interesting winning condition with the help of witness. Sometimes I noticed that I would have win faster if tyrant was a dragon.

-protections:
4 force of will
3 duress
2 cunning wish

the deck needs protections, and these are the best in game 1. One can think about the duress#4 or cabal theraphy#1 (nice with
witness!), but the slot are very tight and often you will prefer a threat over a discard. Otherways animate#7.
Unfortunately wish are needed. They are the winning condition, most of the time we only took stroke from the side. They look slow sometimes, I'm still looking for something quicker in side to use them better

-tutors and drawers
4 bazaar of bagdad
4 intuition
3 read the runes
3 deep analysis
1 demoniac tutor
1 vampiric tutor
1 ancestral recall

We cannot avoid the 4x bazaar. I tried sometimes to play 2 or 3, but at the end it's the card you always want and let us steal games.
Without squee, its role is only to discard dragon/deep, find the winning condition when combo is going or cycling cards from hand.
Never abuse it, becasue you cannot sit on it anylonger like in the past. Intuition is our best tutor. Can take card advantage with deep, bazaar or combo pieces. Read the runes was prefered over careful study because we have much acceleration and his strenght in late game (in early game it's better to pass through bazaar and/or intuition) and during the combo is a winning spell because you can draw all the deck.
The rest is obvious, deep must be cast to avoid mana drain, but are sense-less bombs, much more strong than squee to dig into the deck.

As you noticed they are 59 cards, the last one can be time walk (strong but often it's only a cicle), deep#4 (nice start is land mox go, bazaar activate + deep), duress#4 (needed only vs gifts maybe, but doesn't change much), mystical teaching (useble only to make intuition + animate a winning condition at all effect, taking dragon x2 and mystical teachings)

3b) Sideboard

Well, during game1 it's difficult to face much hate, the problems arises in game 2/3. For this reason it's very important to build up a metagamed sideboard, vs the threatens we expect.
I publish the sideboard I'd use in my local metagame (many combo and creatures deck, few gifts and prison.deck)

3 chalice of the void
3 extirpate
1 tinker
2 sundering titan
1 stroke of genius
1 rebuild
2 *bouncers*
1 stifle (or another rebuild)
1 *drawer*/*tutor* (fact of fiction, lim dull's vault, gush are candidates)

Let's look into futher details:

3x chalice of the void
initially these were to make storm combo match up even more fair, but they are nice against other combos
They can be seen as an addition protection vs some unpowered deck that suffer chalice @ 1 so much. I prefer chalices to leyline and
tormod's because of versatility and more incisive versus tps. But if graveyard hate is a meta call, can be switched.

3x extirpate
gifts is our baddest matchup, there are usefull vs gift and other controls
someone prefers discard effect like cabal therapy and mesmeric demon. Mesmeric can help vs combo and free up the space of chalice for leyline of the void

1 tinker + 2 sundering titan
alternate kill, post side it's often usefull to have an emergency button that doesn't require the graveyard. Great card vs control and other aggro-control expecially with 3color [ like URb fish, UBw fish, but not strong vs empty the warrens, even if the deck is Ubr, ndT ]

The rest are wish targets. Chain are the quickest bouncer we can have, even if it's hindered by our own chalice @1 that we could set. Repeal/echoing are valid choices. As for now I want to test lim dul's vault as draw, faster than fact or fiction that was previously used. Gush is an untested option, I'm afraid to take back 2 lands, but with bazaar can be broken.
I'd use only a global bouncer for artifacts, considered that we have a fairly good match up [ I don't think so... ndT ], in place of the typical second bouncer I'm testing a stifle (can make wish more versatile)

4) The third color mini-splash

The UB version is very solid in manabase, but has much difficult vs gifts [Because you don't use bazaar-squee engine, ndT ]
So let's see a possible third color to add.

White doesn't give much vs gift, because abeyance/orim doesn't have a stronger impact than extirpate [ in fact they are completely suboptimal because they are misdirectionables spell, instead extirpate can single handle gift that wants to use yag will, unless he uses duress before gifting. ndT]

-GREEN:
Green is the most promising color because of xantid swarm. Then with 2 more dual with green maindeck (-1 island -1 mana vault/mox#5) we can play eternal witness from hand, and as 60th card we can use life from the loam to exploit better bazaar (attention: lftl is nice with bazaar but it's quite slow, in the first turns deep analisys is always better).
In sideboard we can use 1 research/development if we fear exirpate and don't want to use tydespout tyrant.

-RED:
It was used in the past, with my older dragon lists, I noticed that it helped versus controls (they were T1T and the first gifts in that period). It gives red elemental blast and gorilla shaman (2 reb 1 gorilla to stay in the classical 3 slot).
Gorilla is like chalice a sort of denial. We can use empty the warrens (2 in place of tinker and titan) or fire/ice.
The problem of red is that main deck there is nothing playable with red mana, a part from playing dragon from hand or utilize some utilities via wish. If I wanted to use red, I would modify to the base list, looking back to the older ideas.

As of now May 2007, I would suggest green as a splash to combat gifts, because of life from the loam help with our no-so-standard manabase and of witness from hand, to use better intuition [Even if witness is removed by sword to plowshares, you still can win producing infinite mana with dragon loop + cunning wish in the deck (grabbable by read the runes also) ,ndT ]

5) How to pilot dragon!

Be a "dragonrider" is the most difficult part. I'll try to give some guidelines, tricks and explain my sideboard strategy
Let's start with how to play the deck. Dragon has an advantage, it's often undervalued, and it's easy to make opponent do mistakes.
Being so many ways to disrupt the combo, opponent is very often focalized on stop us in the last moment, leaving our path completely free from disruption.
When you ride a dragon, you command It's rare to face a deck that pushes you into defence, you should be aggressive, roar you dragons.
An error I made was to use duress always before comboing off, but it's not needed everytime. There are many ways to go off safely WITHOUT duress or force of will.

The simplest way is to cast two animate spell (and sometimes a land in hand). I don't land drop initially, we try to go off, we let our permanents be removed by something, then we drop the land and recast animate. WGDX doesn't need bazzaar to go off because it's enought to take infinite mana, and use read the runes or cunning wish to win. For this reason I tend to prefer the animate #7 spell than the duress #4. To do this manouver we need tonly 4 mana.

A trick to win using chain of vapor: it can be used to take back as many mox as possibile, and above all the animate spell, when
opponent is trying to stop the combo, so we can combo off again at once.
So, don't worry much about opponent and don't let them fear you. Try to find the best path for a safe win. You can always draw a game an restart as nothing happened, better than try to recover a desperate situation.

In case many cards hurt the combo, the deck has some alternate kill. Tinker for titan is only one of them. Cast worldgorger dragon or
sundering titan from hand directly is an option if there is a nasty tormod's crypt on the other side. I persoannly play tidespout tyrant
as alterante kill, because I'm afraid of extirpate. To avoid this card, we can anyway count on research/development or a higher number of discards.

Keep attention, don't burn out resources from hand (=cards), discarding too much to bazaar. First develop your mana, and try to
resolve intuition, then deep, then bazaar.
Use bazaar only if obliged, or if you absolutely want something in graveyard It's better to wait a turn then burn out resources
I don't want to say bazaar is bad or lesser its power, bazaar is the card you want to see in critical moments. Its use is very changed from the squee versions. Now it's pourpose is not to give card advantage via squee recursion, but to discard dragon, grant a win or cicling cards. It's not that bad anyway because it does all these with 0 mana and uncounterable.

This different use is due to the lesser dependence on bazaar. The deck is buildt to work also without it, only with intution and read the runes. This clarify the numbers of mox, that were not needed before, because the deck worked with only 2 mana.

Another choice in WGDX that I'd comment is to have many cards to close the game during the dragon loop. In the older lists you closed only with bazaar or intuition (for let's say caller of the claw, laquatus and deep).
Now there are more cards like cunning wish and read the runes (intuition is and eraly game card to build up the mana and the slower cunning wish + read the runes).

Be less dependent from bazaar is the way to go in my opinion for every dragon list. For this reason I think careful study is quite obsolete compared to read the runes, because it's not a card that helps the combo (you cannot use it while you are looping). If you want to think alternate lists, maybe come back to old squee, keep in mind that. Don't confuse dragon with other combo decks, because it is and old style combo where you must join the pieces of the combo, differently from storm or other combo that need no interactions between cards. The more the pieces are versatile, the easier will be the mosaic to win.
Plus in this way you can make the deck more fun to play and more unpredictable.

Some words on frequent match up:

-combo (various types):
Fine. This list is quicker than the past. Post side we have chalice which is very strong for all combo. The coming of dark condifant is

good for us because he is slow to give us problems. Tps (in italy it is played with dark confidant) is now a good match up

Typical sidebording:: -1 mana source -1 dragon (o tyrant) -1 animinate +3 chalice. I don't like tinker, it's not needed that much. Only

if he side in soo much hate, taking away 1 wish or vampiric or another dragon/intuition. In the green version life from the loam is too

slow for combo

-gifts:
our baddest mathc up, even if he has not so much vs us. The best way is to develop mana and try don't fall into his

counter/draw/counter web. I have to work out more on this. As of now I noticed that with xantid swarm we can handle something,

but I would like to see if extirpate can help

Typical sidebording: -1 mana -1 fow -1 dragon/tyrant -1 animinate -1 vampiric -1 bazaar +1 tinker +2 titani +3

extirpate/xantid/reb-gorilla. Life from the laom is too slow also in this case. I don't side chalice for space reason, and they are not so game breaking. If we are on the play we can try this:
-1 mana source -1 fow -1 dragon/tyrant -1 animinate -1 vampiric -1 bazaar +3 chalice +1 titan +2 extirpate

-oath:
Still have to test vs this deck's latest versions. Anyway, oath has always been a manageble deck, much more than other control decks. Now it gains the skeleton of the old atog and tidespout tyrant, bt we have read the runes and we can sacrifice his tokens [but he simply gives us another one by the way..,ndT]. Tyrant is a problem, but with deep analysis akroma was the same 2 turns clock average [ the big difference is that you cannot combo off so easy with tyrant out, with akroma we had no problems, ndT].
I don't fear this deck more than gifts

Typical sidebording: we must make some choices: if we want to combat his combo, its enough to side a couple of bouncers: -1 mana source vampiric (or life, or deep#4) for 2 bouncers for me is ok, grant we have also wish.
If we are afraid of his counter wall, we can side xantid (hmmm), reb, extirpate, taking out 1 fow -1animate -1 wish (or other).

-aggro controll:
It's not a hard match, expecially if they don't have p9. Without black they are not a big problem, generally we have advanteges from big 9.
Tricolor with p9 give more problems, because they have duress and maybe extirpate

Typical sidebording: -1 intuition -1 vampiric +2 bouncers. We can make also -3 duress + 3 chalice if we want to use chalice @1 for the tinker plan (avoiding sword to plowshares)

-stax:
An easy match up if we are able to develop mana. We can just win in our upkeep also in responce to his triggers. We don't afraid anything but broken starts. Just pentastax with much coloured spell (leyline or seal of cleansing) can give some trouble

Typical sidebording: -3 duress +1 rebuild +2 bouncer. We can side in stroke to avoid jester's cap, or a bouncer #4/stifle. Deep can also be sided out
[to avoid jester cap, just use intuition in response, so you get card in hand and grave, were cap cannot search. If dragons are removed, it's trouble if you don't have alternate kill like tyrant, ndT]

-aggro various:
another easy match up, a part if he is set against us since maindeck to the oblivion (practically almost mono black ). Avoid to burn resources, just to run to much, usually games are lost for this reason. Wait the good moment and keep drawing.

Typical sidebording: -1 fow -1 duress (o another fow) +2 bouncers. Rebuild can be sided if our only problem is vial/tormod's/chalice, or tinker + titan if he is tricolor with much hate.

As a general hint, remember don't side too much protections. An often run risk is to side in too much protections without siding out, forming a deck that is not a combo...seems an aggro-control It's clever to change side in third game, because you get a better idea of which cards opponent did side in and the optional need of alternate kill.

7) History of dragon

Looking to the past can often give interesting ideas. I report here decklist that made good results, I won't comment much decklist.

a) Dragon with 4x entomb, Roland Bode, 2002

1 black lotus
4 Animate Dead
4 Dark Rituals
3 Dance of the Dead
5 mox
4 Necromancy
1 sol ring
4 Entomb
4 Gemstone Mine
1 Demonic Tutor
3 Underground River
1 Deep Analysis
4 Underground Sea
3 Buried Alive
4 Undiscovered Paradise
1 Necropotence
1 Vampiric Tutor
1 Aerial Caravan
1 Ancestral Recall
3 Cunning Wish
3 Intuition
1 Time Walk
2 Worldgorger Dragon
1 Abeyance

Sideboard:
2 Abeyance
1 Blue Elemental Blast
4 Duress
1 Hoodwink
4 Hypnotic Specter
1 Mana Leak
1 Stroke of Genius
1 Whispers of the Muse

4 entomb made 4 dragons useless to play with cards to discard him, so dragon finished in graveyard by tutor, and that's why necropotence. From here entomb was limited, and the strategy was changed to "discard dragon from hand with a spell or ability".
We could think to this configuration with intuition or gifts as spell to "entomb" the dragon. Mystical teaching is required by intuition in this case, but the mana cost is a high (gifts cost much for dragon deck that has bazaar as land drop).
After entomb limitation, we saw two paths. One 5c and one Ubg, all with bazaar like the new engine of the deck

b)Drago 5c, dante, 2005

4 Dragon
4 Bazaar
3 Squee
1 Shivan Hellkite
1 Sliver Queen
1 Life from the Loam
3 Animate Dead
3 Necromancy
1 Ancestral
3 Lim-dull's vault
4 Intuition
1 Demonic
1 Vampiric
3 Pithing Needle
3 Abeyance
3 Xantid Swarm
21 Mana sources (5 mox, 1 lotus, 1 mana crypt, 4 COB, 4 Gemstone, 4 Orchard, 1 other 5cland, 1 sol ring)

Sideboard:
2 Sacred Ground
3 Ray of revelation
2 Oxidize
1 Abeyance
3 Chalice of the void
2 Sundering Titan
1 Engineered Explosives
1 Pernicious Deed

Unfortunately I didn't find an older 5c list, but they didn't change much (except pithing needle in place of sacred ground to avoid land denial). These version can play xantid and abeyance (negates also activated ability like tormod's, seal of cleansing, waterfront bouncer, angelic shield, ecc..). Lim dul vault is used as tutor, possibily with bazaar.
The deck is still interesting now, the manabase always scared me. Oath sideboard is interesting, having orchard maindeck. I'm afraid it has some difficult in combo meta, but can be strong in control and aggro control meta (where xantid + abeyance is stronger than duress + fow)

c) Drago BGr, unpowered , dario de palma, 2004

4 Worldgorger Dragon
4 Squee, Goblin Nabob
4 Elvish Spirit Guide
3 Xantid Swarm
1 Caller of the Claws
1 Shivan Hellkite
3 Animate Dead
3 Necromancy
2 Dance of the Dead
2 Buried Alive
3 Duress
1 Demonic tutor
1 Vampiric Tutor
1 Entomb
1 Crop Rotation
1 Mana Crypt
1 Sol Ring
1 Lotus Petal
1 Pernicious Deed
3 Bloodstained Mire
2 Polluted Delta
3 Badlands
3 Bayou
3 Swamp
3 Wasteland
1 Strip Mine
4 Bazaar of Bahgdad

These kind of list aren't interesting anymore, they were strong in the "4x trinisphere" era, but nowadays blue is much more important to be less dependant from bazaar. This list can be quick and aggressive, can be tuned vs aggro-control and stax.
vs control we have xantid, reb and some denial with gorilla shaman and strips, vs combo we have only discard effects and chalices

d) Drago UBr, lista di giuseppe de luca, 2004

4 Force of Will
4 Duress
4 Squee Goblin Nabob
3 Animate Dead
3 Necromancy
3 Fire/Ice
3 Worldgorger Dragon
3 Stifle
2 Intuition
2 Deep Analisys
1 Ancestral Recall
1 Time Walk
1 Demonic Tutor
1 Vampirci Tutor
1 Entomb
1 Crucible of the Worlds
1 Ambassador Laquatus
4 Bazaar of Baghdad
4 Polluted Delta
4 Underground Sea
2 Volcanic Island
1 Badlands
1 Island
1 Swamp
1 Black Lotus
1 Sol Ring
1 Mox Ruby
1 Mox Sapphire
1 Mox Jet
1 Mana Crypt

Sideboard:
3 Red Elemental Blast
3 Pyrostatic Pillar
3 Rack and Ruin
2 Sundering Titan
2 Tormod's Crypt
2 Free Slot

This list was born to recover the match up vs TPS, and has a fair match up, thanks also to stifle maindeck.

e) Drago UB, lista di Stephane Tichadou, 2005

1 Black Lotus
1 Mox Emerald
1 Sol Ring
1 Mox Jet
1 Mox Sapphire
1 Mana crypt
1 Underground river
4 Underground Sea
2 Island
2 Swamp
4 Polluted Delta
4 Bazaar of Baghdad
2 Compulsion
4 Worldgorger Dragon
1 Caller of the Claw
4 Squee, Goblin Nabob
1 Ambassador Laquatus
2 Deep analyses
1 Ancestral recall
3 Duress
4 Force of Will
2 Stifle
1 Chain of vapor
1 Dance of the Dead
2 Animate Dead
3 Necromancy
1 Demonic tutor
1 Vampiric tutor
1 Time walk
3 Intuition

Sideboard:
3 Null rod
2 Hurkylls recall
1 Duress
2 Sundering titan
2 Chalice of the void
2 Coffin purge
3 Engineered explosives

List played by italian player "ilsommodante" when he played dragon [before entering into the artifact tunnel LOL ndT]
Uses compulsion, and a solid 2 color for basic lands. Entomb wasn't played for the first time, it's disadvantage in the number of cards in hand. So he preferred the forth dragon (I also prefer 4 dragon with bazaar + compulsion configuration) or the third intution I hope this article can result interesting to readers that own a bazaar and want to try dragon.

Daniele Gualco - Elinor
Capra Team
Capra cavalcadraghi ^^