Curby
01-17-2009, 04:25 AM
Whoops, this was last night, so it was the 16th.
Haven't done a report in a while, but this is my first decent showing with Merfstill, so let's have it.
About two dozen players, DCI-sanctioned but pretty casual. 5 rounds of swiss then tie-breaks (no top-X cut).
I was considering playing CounterSliver (just got Mutavaults!), Death and Taxes, or Merfolk (just got Mutavaults!). Since I am least familiar with merfs and didn't want all the mental anguish that D&T gives me, I decided on merfolk. I've tried the Selkie idea in the past, but I decided to try Standstill now that I have Mutavaults. There was another guy playing almost the same deck tonight, be he had additional trickery like Waterfront Bouncer. My list:
Merfstill
14 Island
3 Mutavault
3 Wasteland
4 Aether Vial
4 Daze
4 Ponder
4 Force of Will
4 Standstill
2 Vedalken Shackles
3 Tidal Warrior
4 Lord of Atlantis
4 Silvergill Adept
4 Merrow Reejery
3 Wake Thrasher
Sideboard:
3 Back to Basics
3 Propaganda
4 Relic of Progenitus
2 Umezawa's Jitte
3 Pithing Needle
Comments: I was debating using Brainstorm with Fetches, but this should be a little more robust at the expense of some power. Tidal Warrior was chosen over Cursecatcher for extra disruption along with LoA walking for non-blue decks. In my casual meta, it's not the fact that everyone plays blue. 2 Shackles main because of the creature-heavy meta.
Sideboard Comments: Propaganda for EtW/Bridge and random swarms, Jitte for life gain and additional removal, Needle for broad answers (Explosives and Deed suck), Relic cause why not. In the end my side did pretty damn well. I would have liked some Chills cause burn really sucks in spite of Standstill and countermagic, and random burnish decks are popular in casual metas. Kira would have been nice too, in hindsight, perhaps even in the main.
Round 1 vs 5 color casual wizards
Ouch, kind of a shame when someone brings a knife to a nuke fight. He had a 5 color deck with all basics and little to no search for needed land. In the first game I stuck three Standstills. In the second game I didn't go below 20.
1-0, 2-1
Round 2 vs GB Survival Reanimator
Game 1: He gets stuck on two Forests and scoops after I get an army on the board. Having seen nothing but basic land, I decided to keep my deck even though I heard he was playing Reanimator. (But Forests in Reanimator? Do people do that?)
Game 2: He drops a bunch of monsters in the yard and brings them back to eat me. He finishes at 3 life. Oh, ok. Reanimator, then. With Survival, even.
Sided: +4 Relic, +3 Needle, -3 Wakethrasher, -4 Silvergill
Game 3: I keep a hand with Relic and Needle, then end up drawing another Relic and Needle during the game. Between Relic, Needle on Survival, and Tidal Warrior denying him black, he doesn't have much to do. Cabal Therapy gets rid of Force of Will, and he drops a Deed, which would blow up Vial, Warrior, Needle, Relic, and Shackles. I use my second Needle on Deed, which makes him unhappy, then finish him off with another Merf army. Sideboards are pretty awesome.
2-0, 4-1
Round 3 vs RB aggro control (almost red death?)
Nice guy playing a pretty decent but unoptimized deck.
Game 1: I Waste his black source to keep him on red, which screws him up. He is surprised at Shackles.
Sided: -2 Wake Thrasher, +2 Jitte (I figure he has way too much removal for me to play expensive 1/1s. Rather be tricky with Jitte, and be able to gain life to counter his burn).
Game 2: This was awesome. He drops a first turn Hippie before I can Daze (no FoW). He drops a second turn Hippie after I get Daze online, but he now has two Swamps. I end my second turn with two Land in play, 2 Land, Shackles, and 2 merfs in hand. I could have cast a merf but Shackles was my ticket out of there, and I wanted as big a hand as possible to retain Shackles. His Hyppies ripped a merf and a land from my hand, leaving Shackles. I eventually drew my other Shackles and took both Hippies, leaving me with no hand and 7 life but two un-snuff-out-able evasive annoying dudes. He casts E. Plague on Specters and Null Rod so I can't take any more stuff, and I continue whittling away at him with 1/1s. I'm forced to Force of Will Ashenmoor Gouger, leaving me at 1 life, but Wakethrasher enters the fray. He has three turns to draw Lightning Bolt, Chain Lightning, Blightning, or Mogg Fanatic, but it isn't meant to be, and I win at 1.
3-0, 6-1
Round 4 vs B Specter Deck
The fact that he went 3-0 means a little bit, but his deck was pretty unoptimized, so I thought it strange when he got so angry when he lost.
Game 1: Turns out he's got a bunch of point destruction and Edicts, and he tries to empty the board, so baiting the removal is easy, though he sure does have a lot of removal. After casting the least important Merfs, I get three Reejeries into play, and he takes 17 in two attacks. He got a little mana-screwed this game.
Sided: -2 Tidal Warrior, +2 Jitte (kills Oona's Prowlers and Specters, black doesn't like resolved Artifacts)
Game 2: So I guess he has no discard spells, just specters. Hmph. I cast some merfs and he casts removal, same as last time. Eventually I get a Jitte on a Mutavault, and his sorcery-speed and toughness-based removal does nothing. He got a little mana-flooded this game.
Aside: At one point I had two Dazes in my hand. He had 3 Swamps, and tapped two to cast an Edict. I Daze him once, expecting to need the second. He read Daze, then sighed and tossed the Edict into the yard. Wtf?
Aside: He played Warren Weirding. I so wanted to sac a Mutavault to get some Goblins on my side, but unfortunately was always tapped out when he did that.
4-0, 8-1
The other undefeated decks entering round 4 were a weird stasis-like deck, two standstill decks, and a Doran deck. Of those matchups, Doran beat landstill and landstill beat the prison deck. I was really hoping to NOT fight landstill, and got my wish! However, to lose at that point would mean that I might not place.
Round 5 vs BGW Doran
Game 1: I don't remember this game too well, but he ends up beating me down with a Kitchen Finks wielding a Jitte. My Shackles was not enough to save me as he would kill off what I tried to take with Jitte. Also, turns out he's got man-lands too, wtf.
Sided: Wow, pretty much everything's gold against him. I end up choosing to add Back to Basics and Jitte, and taking out some Tidal Warriors and Wake Thrashers. In effect, I was trying to play more control.
Game 2: My B2B shuts down a Treetop Village and a Bayou, but he's still got a Forest and a Birds of Paradise, which are enough to cast two Goyfs and a Jitte. I'm able to bring him down to 8 this game, but in the end it's not enough.
Aside: Why didn't I bring in Relics? Relics Eat Goyfs. Sigh.
4-1, 8-3
Top 5 (4-1 or better):
1st: Doran from round 5 (15 pts)
2nd: Mono-U Landstill (13 pts)
3rd: Dreadstill (12 pts)
4th: me (12 pts)
5th: BR Aggro-control from round 3 (12 pts)
Lessons learned, comments, etc.
Shackles are freaking awesome. I was glad to have them in every matchup. Sure people play Goyf, Tombstalker, and Dreadnought, but they also play smaller critters that are often useful to take. In the long game, you can sometimes expect to take Goyf and Tombstalker if not Dreadnought. =)
Kira would have helped in all of the last three matches, though I only lost one of those matches. We can't explode onto the field as quickly as Elves and Goblins can, so point removal really does suck. Question is: what do we take out for her?
I mulled quite a few 1-land hands. Some of them might arguably be keepable cause I had a Vial and a Ponder for instance, but I played against a lot of black and was afraid that discard effects would turn such a fragile opening hand into a nightmare.
At least I played a bit better tonight than usual, but I'm not always sure when I should go aggro vs control. I probably sideboarded like crap too. Any suggestions?
If I'm fearing a lot of red in the meta, and want to add Chills, what should I take out of the side? I didn't really use Propaganda, though I guess it could have helped in the last matchup too (but only if I also land Back to Basics).
Tidal Warrior pulls his weight pretty well to deny them their necessary colored mana. I would have liked to test Cursecatcher in similar matchups to compare their relative merit, but that's hard to do. Finn has expressed a dislike for Tidal Warrior's interaction with Daze, but it's not as if Islands don't give mana. My opponents would sometimes tap it and use the blue as colorless, once again opening themselves up for Daze.
All-told, I probably should have played Fetches and Brainstorm over Ponder. That said, Ponder does pretty well too, because it both shuffles and cantrips. Any thoughts one way or the other?
Thanks for reading!
Haven't done a report in a while, but this is my first decent showing with Merfstill, so let's have it.
About two dozen players, DCI-sanctioned but pretty casual. 5 rounds of swiss then tie-breaks (no top-X cut).
I was considering playing CounterSliver (just got Mutavaults!), Death and Taxes, or Merfolk (just got Mutavaults!). Since I am least familiar with merfs and didn't want all the mental anguish that D&T gives me, I decided on merfolk. I've tried the Selkie idea in the past, but I decided to try Standstill now that I have Mutavaults. There was another guy playing almost the same deck tonight, be he had additional trickery like Waterfront Bouncer. My list:
Merfstill
14 Island
3 Mutavault
3 Wasteland
4 Aether Vial
4 Daze
4 Ponder
4 Force of Will
4 Standstill
2 Vedalken Shackles
3 Tidal Warrior
4 Lord of Atlantis
4 Silvergill Adept
4 Merrow Reejery
3 Wake Thrasher
Sideboard:
3 Back to Basics
3 Propaganda
4 Relic of Progenitus
2 Umezawa's Jitte
3 Pithing Needle
Comments: I was debating using Brainstorm with Fetches, but this should be a little more robust at the expense of some power. Tidal Warrior was chosen over Cursecatcher for extra disruption along with LoA walking for non-blue decks. In my casual meta, it's not the fact that everyone plays blue. 2 Shackles main because of the creature-heavy meta.
Sideboard Comments: Propaganda for EtW/Bridge and random swarms, Jitte for life gain and additional removal, Needle for broad answers (Explosives and Deed suck), Relic cause why not. In the end my side did pretty damn well. I would have liked some Chills cause burn really sucks in spite of Standstill and countermagic, and random burnish decks are popular in casual metas. Kira would have been nice too, in hindsight, perhaps even in the main.
Round 1 vs 5 color casual wizards
Ouch, kind of a shame when someone brings a knife to a nuke fight. He had a 5 color deck with all basics and little to no search for needed land. In the first game I stuck three Standstills. In the second game I didn't go below 20.
1-0, 2-1
Round 2 vs GB Survival Reanimator
Game 1: He gets stuck on two Forests and scoops after I get an army on the board. Having seen nothing but basic land, I decided to keep my deck even though I heard he was playing Reanimator. (But Forests in Reanimator? Do people do that?)
Game 2: He drops a bunch of monsters in the yard and brings them back to eat me. He finishes at 3 life. Oh, ok. Reanimator, then. With Survival, even.
Sided: +4 Relic, +3 Needle, -3 Wakethrasher, -4 Silvergill
Game 3: I keep a hand with Relic and Needle, then end up drawing another Relic and Needle during the game. Between Relic, Needle on Survival, and Tidal Warrior denying him black, he doesn't have much to do. Cabal Therapy gets rid of Force of Will, and he drops a Deed, which would blow up Vial, Warrior, Needle, Relic, and Shackles. I use my second Needle on Deed, which makes him unhappy, then finish him off with another Merf army. Sideboards are pretty awesome.
2-0, 4-1
Round 3 vs RB aggro control (almost red death?)
Nice guy playing a pretty decent but unoptimized deck.
Game 1: I Waste his black source to keep him on red, which screws him up. He is surprised at Shackles.
Sided: -2 Wake Thrasher, +2 Jitte (I figure he has way too much removal for me to play expensive 1/1s. Rather be tricky with Jitte, and be able to gain life to counter his burn).
Game 2: This was awesome. He drops a first turn Hippie before I can Daze (no FoW). He drops a second turn Hippie after I get Daze online, but he now has two Swamps. I end my second turn with two Land in play, 2 Land, Shackles, and 2 merfs in hand. I could have cast a merf but Shackles was my ticket out of there, and I wanted as big a hand as possible to retain Shackles. His Hyppies ripped a merf and a land from my hand, leaving Shackles. I eventually drew my other Shackles and took both Hippies, leaving me with no hand and 7 life but two un-snuff-out-able evasive annoying dudes. He casts E. Plague on Specters and Null Rod so I can't take any more stuff, and I continue whittling away at him with 1/1s. I'm forced to Force of Will Ashenmoor Gouger, leaving me at 1 life, but Wakethrasher enters the fray. He has three turns to draw Lightning Bolt, Chain Lightning, Blightning, or Mogg Fanatic, but it isn't meant to be, and I win at 1.
3-0, 6-1
Round 4 vs B Specter Deck
The fact that he went 3-0 means a little bit, but his deck was pretty unoptimized, so I thought it strange when he got so angry when he lost.
Game 1: Turns out he's got a bunch of point destruction and Edicts, and he tries to empty the board, so baiting the removal is easy, though he sure does have a lot of removal. After casting the least important Merfs, I get three Reejeries into play, and he takes 17 in two attacks. He got a little mana-screwed this game.
Sided: -2 Tidal Warrior, +2 Jitte (kills Oona's Prowlers and Specters, black doesn't like resolved Artifacts)
Game 2: So I guess he has no discard spells, just specters. Hmph. I cast some merfs and he casts removal, same as last time. Eventually I get a Jitte on a Mutavault, and his sorcery-speed and toughness-based removal does nothing. He got a little mana-flooded this game.
Aside: At one point I had two Dazes in my hand. He had 3 Swamps, and tapped two to cast an Edict. I Daze him once, expecting to need the second. He read Daze, then sighed and tossed the Edict into the yard. Wtf?
Aside: He played Warren Weirding. I so wanted to sac a Mutavault to get some Goblins on my side, but unfortunately was always tapped out when he did that.
4-0, 8-1
The other undefeated decks entering round 4 were a weird stasis-like deck, two standstill decks, and a Doran deck. Of those matchups, Doran beat landstill and landstill beat the prison deck. I was really hoping to NOT fight landstill, and got my wish! However, to lose at that point would mean that I might not place.
Round 5 vs BGW Doran
Game 1: I don't remember this game too well, but he ends up beating me down with a Kitchen Finks wielding a Jitte. My Shackles was not enough to save me as he would kill off what I tried to take with Jitte. Also, turns out he's got man-lands too, wtf.
Sided: Wow, pretty much everything's gold against him. I end up choosing to add Back to Basics and Jitte, and taking out some Tidal Warriors and Wake Thrashers. In effect, I was trying to play more control.
Game 2: My B2B shuts down a Treetop Village and a Bayou, but he's still got a Forest and a Birds of Paradise, which are enough to cast two Goyfs and a Jitte. I'm able to bring him down to 8 this game, but in the end it's not enough.
Aside: Why didn't I bring in Relics? Relics Eat Goyfs. Sigh.
4-1, 8-3
Top 5 (4-1 or better):
1st: Doran from round 5 (15 pts)
2nd: Mono-U Landstill (13 pts)
3rd: Dreadstill (12 pts)
4th: me (12 pts)
5th: BR Aggro-control from round 3 (12 pts)
Lessons learned, comments, etc.
Shackles are freaking awesome. I was glad to have them in every matchup. Sure people play Goyf, Tombstalker, and Dreadnought, but they also play smaller critters that are often useful to take. In the long game, you can sometimes expect to take Goyf and Tombstalker if not Dreadnought. =)
Kira would have helped in all of the last three matches, though I only lost one of those matches. We can't explode onto the field as quickly as Elves and Goblins can, so point removal really does suck. Question is: what do we take out for her?
I mulled quite a few 1-land hands. Some of them might arguably be keepable cause I had a Vial and a Ponder for instance, but I played against a lot of black and was afraid that discard effects would turn such a fragile opening hand into a nightmare.
At least I played a bit better tonight than usual, but I'm not always sure when I should go aggro vs control. I probably sideboarded like crap too. Any suggestions?
If I'm fearing a lot of red in the meta, and want to add Chills, what should I take out of the side? I didn't really use Propaganda, though I guess it could have helped in the last matchup too (but only if I also land Back to Basics).
Tidal Warrior pulls his weight pretty well to deny them their necessary colored mana. I would have liked to test Cursecatcher in similar matchups to compare their relative merit, but that's hard to do. Finn has expressed a dislike for Tidal Warrior's interaction with Daze, but it's not as if Islands don't give mana. My opponents would sometimes tap it and use the blue as colorless, once again opening themselves up for Daze.
All-told, I probably should have played Fetches and Brainstorm over Ponder. That said, Ponder does pretty well too, because it both shuffles and cantrips. Any thoughts one way or the other?
Thanks for reading!