Vintage 101: Fiddlebending
Howdy folks! It's time yet again for another edition of Vintage 101! I'm your host, Joe Dyer, and this week we're going to be taking a look at some cool Oswald Fiddlebender lists in Vintage. In addition we've got some Challenges from last week to discuss.
Without further ado, let's dive right in!
Oswald the Lucky Fiddlebender
As someone who looks at a lot of lists, I always enjoy when people are trying to push boundaries and explore new territory, especially in formats like Vintage where that sort of thing is incredibly difficult to do. One of those folks who really does push hard a lot in brewing is ChessNight5030 on MTGO. Generally what I've witnessed out of their deckbuilding amounts to being willing to try new things and looking for ways to attack the metagame. It's that willingness to be clever and think outside the box that is great to see in the Vintage community as a whole.
This has amounted very recently in a list hinging on two primary cards: the new Tezzeret and Oswald Fiddlebender.
Oswald acts as a bit of a glue for the deck in addition to Tezzeret's abilities by being able to tutor up artifacts in a very Birthing Pod-esque style. This lets you turn something like a Moxen into a Sol Ring or a Key, or enables you to turn that spare Mana Vault into a Time Vault or Void Mirror. In a lot of ways, it's a Tinker in white that is very difficult to respond to. In addition, the power of Tezzeret lets you leverage untapping artifacts and tutoring himself to get the chain started with Oswald. He even untaps Oswald, which is incredibly powerful when you can activate the card more than once per turn.
Furthermore, you can eventually turn this chain into something even bigger with effects like The One Ring and Paradox Engine, going into a full-on combo mode that you can use to eventually win the game off with Time Vault Key combo. Notably this deck includes Karn, the Great Creator but doesn't include anything like a payoff like Mycosynth Lattice, but that feels like a very flexible thing you could bring in if you needed to. Being able to wish for Nettlecyst to close out a game in a Time Vault loop seems like a great way regardless to win (generally you've won with the loop anyways).
Also, you get to play this card, and that alone is worth everything.
More recent lists from over the weekend, including the one you'll see in this article later on with Chess' Challenge win (surprise!), which updated the sideboard slightly to have access to Phyrexian Metamorph.
This is some really interesting and solid deckbuilding, and this deck is already having a pretty solid weekend with one Challenge win and another Second Place finish. I look forward to seeing if this deck continues to do well going forward, because I am loving people trying new things and playing interesting stuff in Vintage!
Vintage Challenge 32 9/11/2025
The first Challenge event of the week was the Thursday event. This event had 41 players in it thanks to the MTGO Vintage Discord.
You can find the Top 32 decklists for this event here and the data sheet here.
Dimir Lurrus was the most played deck of the event, and its win rate was pretty good. Doomsday looked superb here, as did BUG.
Let's take a look at the Top 8.
| Deck Name | Placing | MTGO Username |
|---|---|---|
| Lurrus Breach/PO | 1st | DethFrmAbove |
| Dimir Lurrus | 2nd | luvadepedreiro |
| Doomsday | 3rd | _SickDraw |
| Initiative | 4th | Munchlax446 |
| Dimir Lurrus | 5th | RPSbonjwa |
| Dimir Lurrus | 6th | mortr3d |
| Doomsday | 7th | Tsubasa_Cat |
| BUG | 8th | _Shatun_ |
Lot of Lurrus here, with the winner being Lurrus Breach/PO.
Pretty solid and straightforward list. Thundertrap Trainer is very much a solid card in a deck like this.
In Second Place we had Dimir Lurrus.
There isn't much here that is particularly thrilling. It's a very stock-looking list for sure.
Vintage Challenge 32 9/12/2025
The second Challenge event of the week was the Friday event. This event had 33 players in it thanks to the MTGO Vintage Discord.
You can find the Top 32 decklists for this event here and the data sheet here.
Both Initiative and Dimir Lurrus were popular here, with Dimir having a much better win rate. Initiative had a sub 50% win rate despite a Top 8 appearance. Shops decks did very well here.
Let's take a look at the Top 8.
| Deck Name | Placing | MTGO Username |
|---|---|---|
| White Prison | 1st | ChessNight5030 |
| Dimir Lurrus | 2nd | Mogged |
| Initiative | 3rd | VitorCarvalho01 |
| Lurrus PO | 4th | JUJUBEAN__2004 |
| Oath | 5th | etoustar |
| Dredge | 6th | Boucha |
| Sphere Shops | 7th | _Shatun_ |
| Dimir Lurrus | 8th | luvadepedreiro |
Very interesting Top 8. At the end of the event, it was the deck that we talked about in our focus today that won.
I think it's great that people are still trying to figure out Tezzeret and really pushing the bar with the card. It's too good not to keep finding space with.
In Second Place, we had Dimir Lurrus.
Not too much here as well that isn't stock, and that's fine. If it isn't broke, don't fix it!
Vintage Challenge 32 9/13/2025
The third Challenge event of the week was the Saturday event. This event had 51 players in it thanks to the MTGO Vintage Discord.
You can find the Top 32 decklists for this event here and the data sheet here.
Both Initiative and Dimir Lurrus were again the most popular decks, with Dimir having a strong win rate and Initiative being in the same place despite a Top 8. Lurrus Breach and Oath did well here.
Let's take a look at the Top 8.
| Deck Name | Placing | MTGO Username |
|---|---|---|
| Lurrus Breach/PO | 1st | DrPP |
| Dimir Lurrus | 2nd | O_danielakos |
| Dimir Lurrus | 3rd | bless_von |
| Dimir Lurrus | 4th | Navas |
| Jewel Shops | 5th | JoostdB |
| Dredge | 6th | SuperCow12653 |
| Initiative | 7th | wickedeasy81 |
| Doomsday | 8th | blub_blub |
All Top 4 Lurrus! At the end of the event it was Lurrus Breach/PO that won.
Having both the PO plan and the Breach plan is quite interesting for sure. This is the same list that won the other Challenge, and it's a really solid deck.
In Second Place we had Dimir Lurrus.
Wait! There's a main deck Soul-Guide Lantern. Yep. That's about it.
Vintage Challenge 32 9/14/2025
The final Challenge event of the week was the Sunday event. This event had 41 players in it thanks to the MTGO Vintage Discord.
You can find all of the decklists for this event here and the data sheet here.
Initiative and Dimir Lurrus for the third time were tied for most played. Initiative had a sub standard win rate despite a Top 8, and Dimir had a substandard win rate in general. Oath, Sphere Shops, and BUG did well here.
Let's take a look at the Top 8.
| Deck Name | Placing | MTGO Username |
|---|---|---|
| Oath | 1st | jibeta |
| White Prison | 2nd | Dreddybajs |
| BUG | 3rd | lordoflifegain |
| Esper Lurrus | 4th | DrPP |
| Jewel Shops | 5th | TrueHero |
| Initiative | 6th | sokos13 |
| Sphere Shops | 7th | crK |
| Raker Shops | 8th | musasabi |
Fairly interesting Top 8. At the end of the event it was Oath that won.
BUG Oath is definitely incredibly strong. I like the one of Ancient Tomb to enable things like Stock Up and Show and Tell.
In Second Place we have the White Prison deck again.
Four Void Mirror is such a message.
Around the Web
- Justin Gennari always has stuff for us:
- kindamtg has a video on Mesmeric Orb. Check it out here.
The Spice Corner
Ocelots.
Wrapping Up
That's all the time we have this week folks! Thanks for your continued support of the column, and join me next week as we continue our journey into Vintage!
As always, you can reach me at my Link Tree! In addition, you can always reach me on the MTGGoldfish Discord Server and the Vintage Streamers Discord.
Until next time!
