What was your nightmare combo as a Newbie?

[shoremuad]

I started playing in the mid 90s. A highschool kid at boarding school, not much money to spend on cards, so I played with what I had. My roommate was also a MTG fan and we played a lot, but I never did well against his Lure and Thicket Basilisk and god forbid he put it on his Cockatrice. Wow, what a newb!

[Schau]

When I had just started playing I hated any infinite combos, but now I am fine if others play them (I don't play any of them myself).

[MonteTribal]

I think my first high synergy opponent was just elves. They just made near infinite life. I was swinging in with a 200/200 Aura Gnarlid and it had no effect. Then they fireball'd me.

Then I fought dredge....

[Aetherium Slinky]

I had trouble with Phytohydra + Pariah. Oh those times when I thought combat damage was the only way to go.

[Judaspriester]

I had trouble with Phytohydra + Pariah. Oh those times when I thought combat damage was the only way to go.

The nasty part about that is, that you'll need removal or lifeloss in order to win. Many infinite combos result in infinite turns/damage (like a fireball with over 9000 mana) and would be useless against this special combo. And you can't even use something like Stifle in order to secure your win, because we've got replacement effects here in stead of triggers.
A nasty solution for this problem would be Backlash with Disenchant on response (remove pariah). It always feels satisfying to see people get smashed by their own stuff.

[Firegriff]

Lure, Regeneration and The Wretched... And it could hit the board by turn 2 to attack turn 3.

[Slyvester12]

Before EDH was more standardized, I played at a local game shop and no one used a ban list. The store owner would mess with people sometimes and play a pretty busted deck. The most nightmarish thing he would do had multiple variations, but the simplest went like this:
T1: Island→Mana Crypt→T:Island, Mana Crypt→Tinker, sacrifice Mana Crypt→Blightsteel Colossus
T2: Attack for 11 infect.

EDIT: Also, this is more of a combo I just really like that I've been playing since around when I started. Any combination of mana dork myr that makes at least 2 mana, 2 Myr Galvanizer s, Myr Propagator, and Myr Battlesphere. I like it because every piece is mostly innocuous on its own, but it turns into infinite mana/tokens/damage. It can also be done in EDH with a copy spell like Phantasmal Image. I built a Thrasios and Sylas deck out of it and it's crazy fun.

[shoremuad]

T1: Island→Mana Crypt→T:Island, Mana Crypt→Tinker, sacrifice Mana Crypt→Blightsteel Colossus

Haha, sounds like a closet psychopath, must have been awesome!

[HarrisBop]

Before I spent money on singles, someone else in my play group bought modern DnT, and Leonin Arbiter + Any destroy land hurt against my 5 colour singleton jankfest.

[Lux_a_Ducks]

My first experience with MTG was playing commander with my big brother. He started playing first and had a nasty upgraded version of the commander 2016 deck, Entropic Uprising. He used Vial Smasher the Fierce and Kydele, Chosen of Kruphix as his commanders of choice. He used Kydele + Umbral Mantle with a Whispersilk Cloak to kill me. That really only happened cause my decks and I sucked.

[Red_Wyrm]

Hardest combo, fighting against two Knight Exemplars, as a new guy anyway. I wish that was the stuff I was afraid of now.

[WizardSpartan]

Hardest combo, fighting against two Knight Exemplar, as a new guy anyway.

Dat's some spooky shit right there ngl. You know what's even spookier? 2 Scion of Oona.

[Red_Wyrm]

Hardest combo, fighting against two Knight Exemplar, as a new guy anyway.

Dat's some spooky shit right there ngl. You know what's even spookier? 2 Scion of Oona.

I feel like you're making fun of me

[robort]

It wasn't a combo that I had to deal with when I first started out playing. Being a new person and learning basic casual magic was interesting on its own. The guy who taught me, well his girlfriend also played. There was this 1 card that she played and it would always dominate our games. Not knowing about wraths, removal and such at the time but I had learned to deal with was Hero of Bladehold. However later on in my casual magic playing I kept playing against this friend who had a reanimate/recursion deck. Every time I played against this deck it would always win. Not knowing on how to deal with reanimation/recursion at the time would probably be the first combo I didn't know how to deal with

[WizardSpartan]

Hardest combo, fighting against two Knight Exemplar, as a new guy anyway.

Dat's some spooky shit right there ngl. You know what's even spookier? 2 Scion of Oona.

I feel like you're making fun of me

No, actually. Both Knight Exemplar and Scion of Oona in pairs are actually really difficult to deal with. I was just providing an even scawiew exampwe.